Horror Movies

Tonight Alex and I went out to a movie. We love scary movies and this weekend the new film "Sinister" opened. After reading the preliminary reviews this one looked promising.

Now, let me tell you, I am something of a snob when it comes to scary movies. I've seen them all, from teen slasher movies to haunting ghost stories to deep psychological thrillers. I can appreciate many types of horror films as long as the film keeps me interested, doesn't get too cheesy in it's explanation of what's going on and doesn't rely too heavily on gore or those shock moments when something just pops out to scare you.

"Sinister" stars Ethan Hawke as a crime writer who moves his family into a home where the previous family who lived there were murdered. They were hung in their own backyard from a tree. And, as an added twist, one of the their children is missing. He's there because he had a big success with a crime book ten years earlier but nothing since so he thinks if he can write about this murder he might have another big hit on his hands. As soon as they move in, stuff starts  happening. He finds a box of super 8 home movies which, once he starts watching them, he realizes are all of different families and they are all being murdered. He has no idea who left this box in the attic or why. So it starts to wear on him and things start going bump in the night and it gets pretty intense for a while.

But then...

I'm not going to give you the rest of the story or tell you how it ends but, for me, right near the middle of this movie, it started to get boring. Certain details the director felt were important were given way too much time and they just weren't scary! Even when there is a discovery of a demon like character it wasn't scary. He looked like a the love child of Heath Ledger's Joker character and the mask from the SAW movies.

Anyway...this blog isn't really about that movie. That movie got me thinking of the movies I've seen that really have scared me so I thought I'd share a list of them. You know, just in case you wanted to have a good scare of your own. These are in no particular order because I have a really hard time deciding which are my favorites.

1. The Haunting of Hill House (sometimes just called The Haunting) - this movie is from the 1960's I think and it stars Julie Harris and Claire Bloom. It's in black and white. The premise is a man studying paranormal activity gathers a group of clairvoyants and whatnot to this house to study it. It's a premise that's been done a million times but this was the original and the best. What makes it so good? The only special effect in this movie is done with sound. There are no CGI ghosts or moving objects. Just sound...heart stopping, creepy, unnerving sound and, man, it still scares me to watch it!

2. The Shining - directed by Stanley Kubrick, starring Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall - I saw this movie when it opened in 1980 in a crowded theatre. A great experience. You know this one - a writer moves his family into an old hotel to work as the winter care taker while he writes his novel. The hotel has other ideas as to what he will do with his time. Stephen King hated this version of the movie but I don't understand why. Nicholson is amazing. The hotel is amazing. The visuals are stunning and frightening and I still get goose bumps just thinking about it.

3. When A Stranger Calls - from 1979 - Trust me one this one. As someone who has been the baby sitter for a lot of kids, the whole premise of this film scares the liver out of me! The phrase, "Have you checked the children lately?" makes me shiver!

4. The Amityville Horror - also from 1979 - the original. I also remember reading this book and not being able to sleep at night. And I was 19 years old at the time. My mom was not happy with me coming into her room in the middle of the night asking her if I could sleep with her! LOL

5 and 6. Psycho and The Birds - Alfred Hitchcock....man, that says it all. I put these two together for a reason. When I was in junior high, my best friend Liz would have me and a couple of other girls over for a "sleep over" on her birthday which was in October and one or the other of these movies was always playing on TV when we did. The suspense in Hitchcock's films is so thick you can taste it. They stand up even today and I watch them any time they're playing on AMC.

7. Suspiria - 1977 but I actually watched this film only a couple of years ago for the first time and I was hooked on Dario Argento. In this movie the scares start creeping up on you and reach a point where they're almost relentless! There's a scene with maggots that is....ew...maggoty. EW! Another great Argento film is "Insidious" which is pretty recent and just as scary and weird. Loved it!

8. 28 Days Later - 2002 - a guy goes into a coma and wakes up 28 days later to find that the entire world has suffered some horrible virus that has turned everyone into flesh eating maniacs. He finds others like him and they try to get to an army base where they think they'll be safe only to find the "humans" who are supposed to help them might be worse than the flesh eaters! Excellent film!

9. Hellraiser - 1987 - What can I say? I've got a little crush on Pinhead! LOL

10. 1408 - I liked this more than I thought I would. In fact, I really liked this movie. It's underrated, I think. John Cusack plays a writer who writes about haunted hotels but he doesn't really believe in that stuff until he checks into room 1408. This ones from 2007 I think.

11. SAW - 2004 - Gory? Yes, but really creepy and scary. The later films in the SAW franchise seem to have lost their scare factor for me but the original is a classic!

12. REC - 2007 - This was a goody! Especially scary if you live in an apartment. The premise? There's some kind of virus (or something) in this multiunit apartment building and they won't let anyone leave. So many good scares in this one! It was remade in an American version called Quarantine but the original version is so much better.

13. The Ring and 14. The Grudge - Again, I'm lumping these together because they are both based on equally scary Japanese horror films. The Japanese versions might be just a tad scarier! The fx in these films are creepy creeperton! Visually scary and stays with me long after I've watched them!

15. The Strangers - Yikes! This one was scary. And supposedly based on a true story. A couple is at a remote home when three strangers begin terrorizing them, eventually trying to murder them. Creepy because it could be true.

I'll stop there. There are so many others that I love. I left off the Nightmare series, and the Halloween series....some of them are very good, others not so much. A true scary movie for me doesn't have to have a nice wind up finish. I don't necessarily want or need to know why this scary stuff is happening. Don't you think it's almost scarier that there is no explanation? And the only Stephen King movie I mentioned was The Shining because, in my opinion, that's the only good Stephen King movie. I love his books but they have not been translated into film very well. Even "It" with that really scary clown Pennywise just got reduced to a big rubber spider at the end which completely sucked!

So, that's my short list! Halloween's coming soon so maybe you'll find something you like!