Saw "Identity" at the theater last night and rented "The Ring" and watched it tonight. Both were freaky and well worth a watch. Scariest of all time IMHO was The Exorcist. The supernatural stuff gets me more than the slasher/gore stuff. Other movies that nearly caused unwanted bowel movements: The Changeling The Silence of the Lambs The Thing (John Carpenter's) Cape Fear (De Niro's, I didn't see Mitchum's) What are your faves?
As a teenager seeing "The Exorcist" on the big screen was probably the most scared I have ever been. (its funny now, thank god)
I did not see the movie "Pet Semetary", but if it was anything like the book......... I have read every Stephen King book. But that one really was the only one that really was scary (for me, anyway). Rosemary's Baby was pretty creepy. Kubricks version of "The Shining" had it's moments of scariness, and was a tour de force by Jack Nicholson as the greatest psycho maybe ever in a movie. And when I was a very little kid, I remember losing sleep after seeing "The Curse of Frankenstein" ....was pretty young, so I don't know how scary it really was, but it did get me then. "Night of the Living Dead" was also scary first time around. Seeing it years later, it was too campy to be scary. "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane" also got me, but again, I was probably too young to see it. "Alien" was scary. And as was mentioned, John Carpenter's remake of "The Thing" was a frightening and disturbing movie. "Don't Look Now" was kinda spooky. But well balanced with a very hot looking young Julie Christy. A true classic!!!
When I saw a movie of George Bush's accomplishments when he was running for President, I was terrified. Just goes to show you that a very short film can be just as scary as a full length feature.
At the time(1984-85), the scariest movie I had seen up to that point was Nightmare on Elm Street...Granted I was about 13 at the time, but I had seen all of the horror film classics, and this one had a premise that scared the hell out of me...The idea of mixing dreams with reality and the idea that if you fell asleep, that was when Freddy Krueger could get you was damn scary... There are horror films that have shock effect like "Faces of Death, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Day of the Dead, etc, etc", but the scariest are the ones that combine some form of the unknown in a somewhat realistic manner...Hitchcock comes to mind as a true legend as well cause when you see a movie like The Birds you can remember all of those times that some random birds flew close to you and you wondered if they were threatening...A movie like Psycho where you are staying in a motel and know that someone else has the key to the room...It's all the sense of the unknown that borders on reality that makes this stuff so scary...
Vulture, hopefully you're aware that the Faces of Death is as fake as they come. Gotta admit NOES freaked me out way back too...
Hapaboy, I would be interested in why everything has to be political with you? Granted, Optional started this with his comment on Bush. But no matter what your politics are, Optional's comment was humorous. Yours really was not. Why so compelled to even respond? I agree, Psycho was a true horror classic. And a Hitchcock masterpiece. What really made Hitchcock an "original" was his recurring plots of ordinary people thrust into extraordinary circumstances. I think this was a great part of the appeal of his films. The audience could identify (usually) with whatever character found him/herself in bizarre situations. This element or "reality" brought the horror closer to home for so many. It became possible to relate to the characters. So very different from the old Universal classics (Frankenstein, Dracula, the Mummy, etc.), in which the fantasy was so far removed from anything we could relate to. Of course that did not make these far fetched horror films less frightening. But when the movie was over, you never had the feeling "that could have happened to me".."what would I have done?". And, "The Birds"....for whatever reason, a lot of people have an innate fear of birds. Like some have of snakes, etc. But birds are just so ubiquitous. And hence, more of a "threat" to a wider audience. Hitchcock was unique in his day, and now so often imitated. Which, as they say, is the greatest form of flattery. Peace, and good trading....bell about to ring. Knock 'em dead guys! Rs8.5
Why do you take everything so seriously? And what made his comment so humorous and mine not? Tsk, tsk. Your own political bent is showing, RS! And you're exactly right - Op started with his comment on Bush. What's the argument here?