Holy crap we got through Hump Day and now it's the easy days and then the weekend and that's IT. EEEE!
Big Octopunk thanks for the best-attended HHD contest in a long while, and shout out to lovable lurkers HandsomeStan, Mr. AC and my lovely wife for sounding off! (Yes I know instead of lurking they could be just ignoring us, but I can pretend.) I have a current favorite haiku, but since the entries just keep piling up I'll keep the contest rolling until Sunday, aka Horrorthon Eve.
For today's project I want us to compose some big, sloppy lists. We talk about making category-based lists of movies we've reviewed, and I have faith that someday Johnny Sweatpants will do exactly that (we're all thinking that, right?). But for today, I'm going to call out my three least-favorite genres of horror movie and then I'm going to spit out the movies that fit those categories as I think of them. What I want from you guys is to shout out movies that I haven't thought of, AND, more importantly, lay down the genre of horror that YOU like least, so we can start helping you out the same way.
What I hope for the end result, besides fun, is a potential resource for someone (maybe even someone who isn't Johnny) to actually start lists of these various genres. I'm going with genres that we dislike to narrow the field a little, because a free-for-all barrage of you crazy people yelling out all the horror movies you like just isn't something the internet can take.
I'm considering this a pretty loosey-goosey affair. Feel free to jump on anyone else's bandwagon, mention movies you have or haven't seen, or point out movies that overlap the categories we've already chimed in on. The only guideline is to be clear which category a movie belongs to when you bring it up. And so here we go.
HORROR GENRES OCTOPUNK GENERALLY DOESN'T LIKE
Predicament horror: Real-life or kind of real-life survival situations
Mad Hillbilly horror: In which the bad guys are unbalanced hillbillies
Depraved horror: Particularly 'round the bend stuff. You know.
Disclaimers!
-- Last year I said I'd tackle Depraved stuff this year, but I'm announcing in advance that I'm whimping out on that, at least as a large-scale project. I'm just not in the mood right now.
-- And I don't really "dislike" the Depraved genre exactly (which is why I listed it last), but it does take some stamina.
-- I have already screened a lot of movies in these categories (particularly the last two), but there are still enough to warrant an organized roundup in some future 'thon.
-- As a non-biddy Horrorthonner I acknowledge that I am obliged to tackle these categories, as indeed that is part of what horror movies are about. But today I make no specific promises.
And now to start some bitching!
(Image comes from here.)
20 comments:
PREDICAMENT FLICKS
Open Water
Frozen
MAD HILLBILLY
Already 'thonned:
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre series
The Hills Have Eyes series
Not 'thonned/seen:
Motel Hell
House of 1,000 Corpses
The Devil's Rejects
Deliverance
Mother's Day
DEPRAVED
The Human Centipede series
Salo: 100 Days of Sodom
A Serbian Film
The Poughkeepsie Tapes
I'm not a huge fan of FOUND FOOTAGE flicks. My reason is that it seems to be an excuse for not having to write a decent ending.
The last Exorcism
The Devil Inside
Also, The Poughkeepsie Tapes is more of a found footage but doine in a style I like, documentary style.
MAD HILLBILLY
Wrong Turn and all of it's sequels
torture porn
usually i will watch any movie that is really good regardless of genre. torture porn is the one exception.
according to past horrorthon ratings, the following are excellent movies i will probably never see:
hostel
martyrs
a serbian film
I'm with you AC! As a self-proclaimed biddy, even though I'm slightly curious about those movies, I just can't convince myself to watch them. Which is one of the reasons I loved it when Octo did the recap of all the Saw deaths. I want to know about the movie - but I don't want to watch it!
All the ones AC listed as well as those Human Centipede movies. *shudder!*
This is just going to be superbrief since I'm at work and haven't gone through the scope of the genre with a fine-tooth comb:
Found-footage movies
Movies that rely on stuff jumping out at you and screamy, scrapey noises. *shudder*
60's-70's British Horror - can be very tedious with little to no payoff. Usually star Christopher Lee and/or Peter Cushing. Lord knows I've seen my fair share.
60's-70's Italian ranges from ultra gory (Fulci, Bava) to artistic (Argento). (I like this genre)
80's slasher movies - predictable, formulaic, fun, unimaginative, boobs.
French horror - not for the weak at heart.
For the record, I hate the term "torture porn" and refuse to use it. I prefer Octo's "depraved" description.
I worry that the creativity of Horrorthoners in naming sub-genres will act as a barrier to JSP ever actually organizing the monster list into categories. Maybe we'll have to take this brainstormed thread of subgeneres and do some conflating to come up ultimately with a list of say, 12 main horror categories.
I think the depraved/torture porn one is the only one I really have no interest in.
Though the silly ScFy made-for-tv flicks are pretty universally lame. I reviewed one about a whooly mammoth a few years ago, and since then, I've surfed past similar nonesense a few times.
This discussion is going well but I think my idea that it would be a list-making resource was a bit of a stretch.
I was actually thinking Torture Porn and Depraved as two different categories, but I'm not fond of the former phrase either as it's not really fair to porn.
The TP (sub?)genre is not super populous if you ignore the fact that there are seven Saw movies.
Hostel flicks
Saw flicks
Captured ? Is that right?
What about Turistas? It was kind of marketed in that rusty mode but I never saw it.
i dunno -- i'm sort of case-by-case. i tend to reject things just because they suck of their own merits. for instance, i frigging hated Memorial Day, not because it was a slasher, but just because the acting was irredeemably bad. i hated blair witch 2 because i found the characters annoying. i don't dislike found footage movies on spec.
it was really DOTD 2004 that made me settle into this point of view. that was the last time i went into a movie prepared to hate on it because of the category (in that case, remake). it blew my freaking mind, so i stopped generalizing.
okay, i guess i just hate shitty pop-horror movies like Final Destination, or Fear Dot Com, or Alone in the Dark (the one that sucked, not the one with Martin Landau).
...he says, having never seen any of those except Alone in the Dark (the one with Martin Landau, not the one that sucked).
i guess i just want there to be a genre named "Shit-Pop".
I love it! "Shit-Pop" is the perfect name for Final Destination and the like - films that have a decent budget but any potential edges are dulled by "Hollywood bullshit". An endless assembly line of "safe" feces.
Eww NO. That makes me think of poop on popcorn.
You do point out a genre that needs to be defined, which is recent mainstream stuff (regardless of quality). All the movies you mention are 2000 or after, and I'm sure at least some of the 90's should be in that category, too (Idle Hands from 1999 comes to mind).
As subcategory would be movies in which "legit" actors go slumming in horror. These are usually below par (Gothika, Hide and Seek).
Final Destination has some game. The other two you mention do indeed suck.
Ah. Just saw Johnny's comment. Well put, except "shit pop." Really? I say again, ew.
suck-pop?
A popular sub-genre of "shit-pop" known as "poopcorn" is defined by terrible horror movies that are irresistibly fun to watch.
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