[Movies] What do you consider to be a "Horror Movie"

[Daginni]

I want to know what people consider to be a "Horror Movie" these days. The reason I ask is I personally think the Category of Horror Movies has been degraded over the years to the point no one knows what it really is, and in fact I actually think I haven't seen a true Horror Movie come out of Hollywood for years.

So, what do you consider to be a Horror Movie?

[Sorrior]

Things that mess with your psyche/subconcious like the ring or other psychological horror. SLashers to me are mainly just good for the gore fetishists. I don't like em not cause they scare me but cause i don't like endless amounts of blood and guts i find it rather disgusting.

[Aphrel]

horror for me is like ghost stuffs. the ring, the grudge and so on. also movies with psyco murderes going rampage liek jason/freddy movies, house of wax , hills have eyes and whatever more types of movies there are.

im not sure wether i whould include torture movies liek saw and hostel in horror. for me they seem to for better in a "disgusting" genre.

[Kindahuge]

When you say a true horror movie hasn't come out of hollywood in years, you may as well be be a comedy fan who says a true comedy hasn't come out of hollywood in years, too. Horror movies are just obviously movies intended to deal with scary themes, and scare people. Be it through fear of gore and mutilation, the supernatural, or other scenarios (being buried alive) the idea of a horror movie is to give the audience a thrill by tapping into that fear. Those come out all the time.

[Deleted]

I like slasher movies but I wouldn't call them horror at all. A horror movie has to make you shit your pants. You won't be able to sleep the whole night and be paranoid as hell for at least one week. That is a good horror movie.

[DemoBytom]

Horror movies.. It's like horror games. They should make you paranoid about what may lurk in the darkness, in the fog. They should be full of athmosfere of fear. You should be sure that something may jump out and eat you/a character in a movie. Great horror movies don't need to show monsters, though they need this feel that a monster is there somewhere, really close.
I never call slashers a true horror movies. They are not scarry, they are disguisting, and this is a totally different thing for me.

Check Total Biscuit's Amnesia gameplay:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snnB8C5sDkY

This is a true horror for me. When you are paranoid about what is going on. You hear a piano music in an empty room and you shit your pants, you see a small movement in a corner of the screen and you run the hell away screaming.

Movies? Few that comes to my mind would be Ring when I was watching it for first time, where I really got suck into the story Blair Withc Project. something like this. Never Freddy or Jason.
Though I've really shat my pants playing Silent Hill, in a dark room with earphones ;P

[ItachiZaku]

I like slasher movies but I wouldn't call them horror at all. A horror movie has to make you shit your pants. You won't be able to sleep the whole night and be paranoid as hell for at least one week. That is a good horror movie.

I agree. I love Slashers as well though. Torture porn vs Psych thriller...

[psychedelica]

i see horror movie as Paranormal, terrifying mythological creatures, and dark story that will make you either scared or shocked by the Movie.

[Daginni]

Things that mess with your psyche/subconcious like the ring or other psychological horror. SLashers to me are mainly just good for the gore fetishists. I don't like em not cause they scare me but cause i don't like endless amounts of blood and guts i find it rather disgusting.

I personally couldn't of said it better.

When I see a movie like Saw being labeled by people as a "Horror Movie" I tend to want to slap the ignorance out of them. Movies like Halloween and so on I would personally labeled as more of a Suspense/Action Movie that just so happen to constantly try to Startle you. The unneeded amounts of gore can make you feel a little qweezy also if you are unused to it, but that doesn't make it scary, just foreign to you.

A true Horror Movie makes you sit in fear for what happens next. It doesn't make a axe wielding murderer jump out of a door to startle you, it makes you fear the unnatural being (or natural being if the movie is good) in front of you. A good Horror Movie makes you go to bed and check under the bunk for the next week. It makes you believe in the Ghost in the Closet.

[Deleted]

I can't ever recall being affected long term by any film I've ever seen. There have been 3 or 4 I wouldn't choose to watch again but they don't keep me up at night or make me look over my shoulder when walking down a dark alley.

My favorite film ever is The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Is it scary? No not really. Is it gory? There's virtually no blood. Does it deserve its reputation? No. Noone is killed directly on camera. It's a milestone in horror films where you see the violence in your mind. More people should either see it to put their prejudices to rest or just to experience one of the landmarks of horror cinema.

I'd agree the core idea of the horror movie does seem to have shifted more towards "torture porn" a la Saw and Hostel or to go down the route of the supernatural. I have no issue with gore or torture paticularly but when a film is just one set piece after another strung out for 7 films it gets a bit old. The story is Saw is so conveluted its beyond rediculous.

About a year ago I set out to watch all the Video Nasties from the late 1960s through to the mid 1980s. To qualify they must have at some point been on the BBFCs Video Nasties list. In total there are around 72 banned films. Some are very hard to find in their original form and others are just too expensive to source. However I did manage to find all the big ones. A few examples:

The Last House on the Left
I spit on Your Grave
Cannibal Hollocaust
Cannibal Ferox
Zombie Flesh Eaters
Snuff

To my mind the top 3 on that list are genuine horror movies. The other 3 aren't even in the same league. Not only are the top 3 really difficult to watch they are also brilliantly well made.

There have been a few modern classics such as Ring and Grudge but by and large the horror genre is so bogged down with slasher flicks (which most of the time I love) and torture movies it really seems to be suffocating under a wave on unoriginality.

[Gecko]

Watch The Strangers... that is a horror movie.

Slashers (Jason, Freddy), torture (Hostel, Touristas, Saw), and supernatural films (The Ring, The Grudge, Pulse) all are great for what they intend on providing, but the normal people plagued by other people doing crazy stuff is pure horror in my book. Seriously, go watch The Strangers.

[Deleted]

Psychological horrors. No monsters or big weird looking things. You dont have to know whats coming after people, and you dont have to see it either to make it scary. Its always the unknown that scares people the most.

[lanerios]

Horror is hard to describe for me. The scenes in movies that came close:

Human Centipede, the way he explained the procedure to the 3 "patients"
Silent Hill, The whole Hospital (but I have an issue with hospitals in general), but notably the Nurse scene.
Silent Hill, the babies at the start of the town

Pretty much mindfucks. Above didn't really frighten me, but more gave me the idea of "If this was done better it could be scary"


Problem is, horror movies go the way TB did is Amnesia review, waaay over the top scared reactions constantly.

[PandaFart]

its really about your frame of mind. 20 years ago the movie childs play scared me shitless but i was a kid, if i would have never seen that movie and watched it today i would probably lol at it

[Greywulf]

I know its an obvious thing to say, but its purely subjective. I guess its whatever "horrifies" the viewer.

From my experience, as one gets older, the less horrified one gets at films. I'm more scared by whats going on in some parts of the world than if the latest batch of screenteens surivive till the end of some rubbish movie.

Personally, if I was required to point at two films which have left a shocking impression on me, they'd be The Vanishing (the original, not the remake) and Don't Look Now.

Don't Look Now is a fucking brillant film, with one of the most shocking scenes I've ever experienced in a film. I remember seeing it in my early teens and still point to it as the most creepy film I've watched.

The Vanishing draw is more about the horror which can be commited right under our noses, by the most mundane of people. As they say, its always the quiet ones.

[Deleted]

Anything with ghosts

[Daws001]

Movies that scare you and get in your head. The Strangers and Paranormal Activity are the most recent ones that freaked me out. I actually didn't finish The Strangers, it was that bad. It doesn't help that I was watching it alone at home at night.

[McNeil]

Movies with clowns and walking skeletons... atleast scary for me

[PBitt]

Something that is horrifying of course! Well, to be more specific, yeah, slashers are not horrifying, such as the scream movies, its just dumb people acting terribly and getting killed off in predictable patterns, they are more like comedies. I like the more solitary ones with few deaths and lots of scary moments, even if they are somewhat predictable.

I thought The Ring movies were both excellent horror movies, the best horror movies that have come out in recent years, at least...good story, main characters aren't total morons, creepy little girl, it even has VHS tapes...now thats scary! I kind of like the style of Paranormal activity but they ruined it by making the characters stupid and with a crappy predictable ending with no thought put into it at all....I was actually cheering for them to die so it kind of wasn't super scary for the whole second half because I couldn't stand their stupidity. I don't really watch much horror unless it gets good enough reviews that it might be worth watching.

[Ulfric Trumpcloak]

"The Midnight Meat Train"