RF Generation Message Board

Since it's October and there seems to be several horror film fans on our site (see HoD discussion in the replies from the last podcast), I thought it might be appropriate to list some of our favorites.  Top 5 -10 lists encouraged.  Always happy to see references to ones I have never seen.

the only horror flick that truly freaked me out and downright disturbed me was Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer. And a very straightforward, no-frills, no-nonsense, unapologetic portrait at that. Probably due to it being grounded in the real world, very loosely based on the exploits of Henry Lee Lucas and Ottis Toole. The fact that the events in the movie could actually happen, and likely have, is what makes it a chiller of epic proportions.

Oh, and Monster was pretty disturbing and downright saddening, too. Like Henry, it was based on real-life serial killer Aileen Wuornos. The movie's use of the Journey song Don't Stop Believin' was used in such a powerfully and intentionally ironic fashion, I can't help but think of the movie whenever I hear it on the radio. In fact, if I do hear it coming up, I'll switch stations so I don't get all bummed out.

As for Freddy and Jason: as the sequels moved along, they became such over-the-top self-parodies, I treat them more as high camp than proper horror flicks.

...have you seen Maniac (1980)?

I agree, the Freddy/Jason series started getting a little cheesy, but the original nightmare and the Friday the 13th series up through 5 are still classics.  I've got a copy of "Twitch of the Death Nerve" (Bay of Blood - U.S. title) on my Amazon wishlist, which of course get's ignored almost every year at Christmas time.  It is supposedly the father of the "slasher" genre.  I love opening gifts Christmas morning and getting a stack of horror DVDs my mom or mother-in-law ordered with no idea about the content.  It's always great when they ask.  This years list consists of: Twitch of the Death Nerve, Torso, Cat People, and The Bird With the Crystal Plumage.  Some of my favorites are as follows, no specific order:

any of the Universal monster films
Tenebre
Deep Red
Texas Chainsaw Massacre (original)
Alien/Aliens
Zombie (Fulci)
Evil Dead II
The Blob (McQueen)
King Kong (1933)
The Brood
Halloween
The Exorcist
Dead Alive
The Frighteners
The Omen
Ravenous
Sisters
Shadow of a Doubt
American Psycho
The Tingler
Targets

Looking over this list, it's odd that some of these don't specifically fall into the "horror" category.  It's odd how movies further fragment into sub-categories.


 

Twitch of the Deathnerve is a bit of a letdown honestly. It's more like "oh.. yeah.. I can see why it was an inspiration on US slashers." But it's not exactly a great film on its own.

Yeah, so I've been told.  Bava can be hit or miss, but I've still always wanted to check it out.

Oh yeah you SHOULD see it.

Nightmare on elm street series
Wishmaster series
Leprechaun Series
Hell Raiser Series
House Series
Cube Series
Puppet Master Series
Evil Dead Series
The Fly
The Thing (old One)

I'm a huge fan of the SAW movies, but the first one is hands down the best in my opinion.  A lot of people didn't see the ending coming.  Every SAW movie after that you kind of were looking for the twist, but that first one caught me off guard.

FYI, horror films are my favorite genre. Slasher is my favorite sub-genre. I've seen in the neighborhood of between 100 and 200 slasher films. That said, I've never been good at Top 10 lists or anything. So I'll mostly just be commenting on other posts here haha.

Audition
Martyrs
Inside
Texas Chainsaw Massacre
The House of the Devil
Creepshow
Psycho
The Stuff
The Descent
Hatchet
Dead Snow
The Fly (either one)

Just to name a few of the top of my head and browsing netflix.

Also, I very highly recommend Trick 'R Treat for the Halloween season. The one with Anna Paquin. I watch it every year on Halloween night with the wife. It is more of a "fun" horror anthology, like creepshow but the stories are more intermingled with each other.

Well my taste in the horror movie genera is pretty shitty. But I'll at least give my two cents if I may.

If the movie Rocky Horror Picture Show counts than that is my favorite. It's a fusion of so many genera's all rolled into one. It's a mental mind f**k. But it does have horror in the name sooo, I guess it counts.

Moving on with my bad taste in horror

Tremors 1&2
The Butterfly Effect (May not be a horror movie but sure is scary to me)
Silent hill
Resident Evil series
Saw series
28 Days Later
28 Weeks Later
Dawn of the Dead (2004 version, cause its the only one I've watched)

Well thats all I can think of off the top of my head. Just be glad this isn't a favorite comedy thread or else I'd be blowing it up with favorites.

Guess I'll have to wait till April until I can post that.

Um... should I?

BTW thanks to Nanners for reminding me of American Psycho, which is one I've been meaning to get to.

Oldboy.

Good call on The Thing.  Forgot about that one.  The original with Mr. Russell of course.

I've heard good things about Audition, but have been reluctant to watch it.  Not a big fan of the newer genre of torture films, but I may have to check it out.  I've seen Trick or Treat a few times and it's are really good one to watch around Halloween, good twists and intermingled stories work well together.  I actually have a copy of the graphic novel.

Love Tremors as well.  Very campy, but so great.  Anything with odd monsters in it Critters, Ghoulies, etc.  I'm sold.

Oh yeah, forgot to mention the Silent Deadly Night series. It's so bad it's good.  Mickey Rooney is in part five as an evil toy maker.....

Oh yeah, I almost forgot about The Collector.  Anyone seen it?  I think the writers from some of the SAW films wrote it.  Also Repo: The Genetic Opera is awesome.  Speaking of SAW, wasn't the director of SAW James Wan, suppose to direct the Castlevania movie?

The Austin Powers trilogy... always creeps me out!!

Not to give anything away, but Audition is more of a slow burn than a straight up new school torture flick. I think it gets lumped in with the other torture stuff, and the way they market the movie (cover art especially) doesn't help. Don't get me wrong, it isn't Psycho but it isn't Hostel either.

Good call on Silent Night, Deadly Night. I wrote a song about that movie. PUNISH!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VEgCEmzSH8

yup. But be warned, it is disturbing man. Tense movie. I find Henry pretty tame by comparison.

is that the one where the guy is breaking into a home to steal a diamond or something, but there's already *someone else* in there? If so, then yeah. It was actually surprisingly good for a recent flick that came out under the radar. I enjoyed it.

I've also heard good things about Funny Games (the original, it was remade a few years ago...).  Apparently, it's kind of a home invasion movie, much like The Strangers (also a decent flick).  I've heard that because it depicts something so close to real life, it's pretty frightening.

Funny Games is awesome. I've seen both, and oddly, I prefer the remake. It should be said, the original director did the remake, and it's shot for shot. So... but yeah the US version has a great cast (Naomi Watts, Tim Roth, Michael Pitt).

Interestingly, it walks a weird line -- yes it's meant to feel very "this could happen" but it also has moments where the fourth wall is deliberately broken. It kind of has this weird "hey you! You watching! You're the sicko for watching this movie!" vibe going on. Very interesting. See it.

Believe me, I want to.  Just waiting for my wife and kids to go out of town.  She's not a big fan of horror, but does enjoy the more artsy/thriller films like Argento's.

Yeah, The Collector is the movie where the handyman is a jewel thief and breaks into the house.  It pretty gruesome when the girls boyfriend falls backwards and lands on 30+ bear traps.

I've heard a lot of good things about VHS. Anyone here seen it?

I remember Collector being pretty gory. Something about a bathtub and eyeballs if I recall?

VHS? I haven't heard of that GG... is it something new? The title alone make me wanna see it haha.

Yeah pretty new. Supposedly a found footage anthology. A horror buff coworker of mine saw it and said it was awesome.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2105044/

sounds sweet. I'll check it out.

GrayGhost you are officially my hero/kindred spirit.  I actually went to a Christmas party one year dressed as Ricky from Part 2.  About 2 people there got it; the rest were dressed in the "tacky" Christmas attire.  Sincerely, Garbage Day!

I love the first Silent Night, but the 2nd... meh. I know it's kind of a so-bad-it's-good flick with all the flashbacks. BUt it bugged me.

Y'all like Christmas Evil?

Ohhhhh......it's bad.  But, it is the king of one liners.  You gotta love it for the comedy.  Never seen Christmas Evil or Santa's Slay.

Christmas Evil is great. See it!

Santa's Slay is... funny.

Jack Frost is awesome (Shannon Elizabeth attacked by snowman's carrot awesome). Haha.

I finally got around to watching V/H/S.

It is pretty good, but nowhere near the expectations I had for it. Very interesting for what they did within the constraints of the found-footage format, but also rife with decades old horror movie cliches. Good mix of fun and disturbing. You could do much worse I guess.

I must have missed this thread back in Oct.  I love a great horror flick. 
My favorites are normally odd for others:
The Exorcist 1 & 3, Bereavement, Session 9, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, 28 Days Later, Spider Baby (1968), The Omen, The Baby's Room (Italian), Nosferatu (1922), Otis, Turistas, and so many others.

The Shining, The Exorcist, and The Thing are all movies I love but I never think of them as horror so much as good movies.

Good movies tend to transcend being labeled just by their genre and all three of those fit.  When was the last time someone refered to Citizen Kane by it's genre?

I've got a decent sized DVD collection and I'd say half of them are horror movies.  A lot of them fall into the "so bad it's good" territory and my favorite of those kind has to be Puppet Master.  I coud watch that movie every day of my life.

I always struggle with naming a favorite horror movie, but I guess my top three would probably be The Thing (of course), Dawn of the Dead, and In the Mouth of Madness.  Of course that list tends to change depending on what mood I'm in.

The Shining
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
Silence of the Lambs
Mulholland Drive
The Thing
Creepshow 1 and 2 (3 wasn't terrible)
Twilight Zone the Movie
Poultergeist

Interesting, I never thought of Mulholland Drive as horror. I always considered it a thriller/mystery. Will need to watch it again to see if it has horror elements

I was thinking the same thing. Although several Lynch films kind of border on the fringe of horror, I'd really never consider them as such.

I've had arguments with my friend about movie genres. He says that Silence of the Lambs isn't a horror.

also, Jaws used to be considered a horror, but now I think most people would consider it suspense/thriller. Alien was considered a horror for a long time but I imagine most would think "sci-fi" now.

I consider a horror to be any movie that is designed to scare the viewer.

Getting pumped up for my weekly horror movie fest in October!  I'll probably be announcing the films soon.

I love that we have one thread that gets bumped annually.

Be back soon to post some new ones. Need some time to think.

Two that I've seen more recently that I'd recommend are The Babadook and It Follows.

It Follows was so good stylistically but I'm in the camp of viewers who couldn't get past that fact that the movie breaks its own rules pretty frequently.

Not disagreeing, just curious about what you're referring to.

My yearly October household HorrorFest includes: The Gate (1987), Shocker (1989), Phantasm (1979), and The Invisible Man (1933). Discuss.

The invisible man is great apart from the shrieking woman. The effects in that are fantastic. Better than a lot of cgi you get nowadays

I always try to do a classic film the last week. It was between this and Bride of Frankenstein this year.

Good choice. Bride gets a lot of attention but invisible man is mostly ignored. But as I said before, with the great effects etc it definitely deserves more attention

Great choices! The Gate is fantastic, I have a thing for Stop Animation, and this movie has great creature effects. As much as I love watching Horror, I have yet to see Phantasm all the way through. Its not that I think its bad, its just I have only seen the beginning

I haven't seen a whole lot of the Universal monster movies, I have only seen Dracula (Renfield steals the show in this one), Frankenstein (Dr. Frankenstein is an incredible performance) and The Mummy ( Great performance by Karloff). I usually go for the Hammer Film versions, I like the gore, and more risqué elements that were more acceptable at the time. Maybe I will choose one to watch this year from the Universal Monsters.

I feel I have to categorize my favorite horror films by era/decade, since there are so many I like.

I am going to try to do at least my Top 5 from each era

Here is my list:
Silent Era: Nosferatu, Phantom of the Opera, Dr. Caligari
1930s-1940s (Universal Monster Era) : Frankenstein, Dracula, Mummy
1950s-1960s : Psycho, Horror of Dracula, Night of the Living Dead, Them!, Curse of Frankenstein
1970s: Halloween, Last House on the Left, Black Christmas, Zombi 2, Alien
1980s: Friday the 13th, The Beyond, The Howling, The Thing, Re-Animator
1990s: In the Mouth of Madness, Flatliners, Jacob's Ladder, Candyman, Species
2000s: Gingersnaps, Cabin Fever, Freddy vs. Jason, Drag Me to Hell, Trick r Treat
2010s: Cabin the Woods, V/H/S, ABCs of Death, That is all for now

Please Discuss

 

Wow!  I hate that I am just now seeing this post. I would have certainly commented on it earlier. I really like how you categorized your favorites and you have some great films on your list.  Here are my thoughts:

Silent Era: Yeah, you are all over this. Love Nosferatu, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and Phantom, you might consider Haxan here as well, Faust is decent, and I've heard good things about The Golem, but have never seen it.
1930's-1940's - can't go wrong with Universal films. I'd add The Wolfman (1941) and Bride of Frankenstein (1935) to your list and check them out if you haven't already. The former is one of my favorite Universals.
1950's-1960's - in college, I really got into the atomic age films, so glad to see you include Them!, since it is one of the best from that era; I also liked The Mole People (incredible and surprising ending) from that era and The Tingler (1959) with Vincent Price.  My list would include Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) and The Blob (1958) even though these seem out of place for the era.
1970's - love Halloween and Alien, would add Zombie (Fulci), The Exorcist, The Brood, Sisters, and Deep Red, maybe even Jaws, but you HAVE TO have Texas Chainsaw Massacre in here, so grainy, so great!  Too many good films in this era to pick 5. Ha!
1980's - I've seen City of the Living Dead and have been on the lookout for The Beyond since then (the Gates of Hell series is great), Friday the 13th series classic staple of my childhood. Add Return of the Living Dead, Tenebre, Evil Dead 2, The Shining (1980), and maybe Nightmare on Elm Street (DAMN! too many good ones in this era)
1990's - love that you included Candyman! Army of Darkness & Dead Alive (more like comedies though), and Silence of the Lambs (though more of a drama). I love Ravenous (1999), a must see. Seems this era was more about mixing genres.
Newer films (2000+) - Add The Descent, Shawn of the Dead, Let The Right One In, The Babadook, and It Follows.  I dug Trick 'r Treat as well and glad it made your list.

And in the 2000s don't miss Devils Rejects. A rob zombie film and sequel to his pretty crappy house of 1000 corpses (a Texas chainsaw clone). However devils rejects is far superior

I forgot about, The Descent, that is a great one. Just watched It Follows, very good. I liked the schoolbus story the most from Trick r Treat.

I have seen all of Rob Zombies movies, they are good and fun movies but they didn't make it into my Top 5.

Coincidently I watch It Follows last night too. Pretty good film. Worth a watch

Yeah, I really dig the way it is filmed as a throw back. You know that it's modern because the kids are using cell phones, but it still has that great John Carpenter, small town feel. The way the camera pans by the small houses in the neighborhoods is well done and the music.............HOLY SHIT!..........the music. I had to immediately find and download it when I got home. Great, fresh concept that really exploits the sex trope found in many of the 70's and early 80's slasher films.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DS_-3pop7EQ

They did an amazing two-sided movie poster. One side is more modern, and the other looks like it came straight off an 80's VHS tape cover. I want to find one for my game room.

[img width=400 height=498]http://famousmonsters.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/IT-Follows-iTunes-Poster.jpg[/img]

Yesss!!! The music is so great, and the cinematography is excellent, it shows lots of depth to the scenes. I love the 80s poster, really cool. I don't own the movie but I will.

Have you seen House of the Devil? it has a nice 70s/early 80s horror feel to it. Its not as good as It Follows, but it was pretty good

Haven't seen it, but will check it out.  Watched Phantasm last night. Holds up.

Nice, I am going to see if I can just buy it for cheap somewhere, and watch it

I'm on a Zombie and Werewolf kick lately on Horror films.  Some of my favorites are:
Late Phases
Silver Bullet
An American Werewolf in London
Night of the Living Dead
Night of the Creeps

Man, I'm a big fan of Silver Bullet. Just found a special edition of The Howling this week.

Night of the Creeps is awesome, the characters are so classic. Seen it multiple times and enjoy it everytime. You should check out Blood Diner, that movie is nuts, just completely crazy.

Me and my best bud watch bad horror movies all the time. By bad I mean stuff like Python, Sand Sharks, stuff like that. Horror movies that are fun to rip on. We always have a good time. I think that's why I like the horror genre. Its so fun to watch for different reasons and different moods.

I think it would be impossible to pin down a favorite, as if asked I would likely give you a different movie each week as being my favorite.  For this post it is Nosferatu the Vampyre (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosferatu_the_Vampyre), that creepy German take on the silent original.  There is just something so disturbing about the cinematography in that movie, especially Klaus Kinski's portrayal of Nosferatu.  And the ending.  Soooo creepy.

I got an early start in gearing up for the Halloween holiday by popping in Bava's "5 Dolls For an August Moon" last night.  This is one I purchased on a whim after someone unloaded quite a bit of Bava DVDs at my local media store.  Last Halloween, I saw "Blood and Black Lace," which I was totally enamored with, and had heard that 5 Dolls was another Bava Giallo that I should check out. I have to admit, I wasn't impressed with this effort, and would have to contend that this really isn't even a horror film, but more of a thriller.  Sure, the same whodunit element of the Giallo is there, but all of the murders (other than a few virtually bloodless shootings) are committed off-screen.  One of the characters is super out of place and there's no reasoning for her being on a private island and not living in the only home present there. There's no indication of why she is even there, or how the others know here.  Bava certainly has some extremely beautiful women in all of his films, but especially in this one, because they all look like models, I had trouble distinguishing who was who and which "belonged" to which husband/lover.  The premise of the film is pretty good and sets up nicely for a murder mystery, but man, the payoff at the end frankly does not...well... payoff.  I figured out the killer before the movie was halfway over.  This film, though very beautiful in places, (Bava's use of color is like any other) falls very short in the entertainment category.  Curious if anyone else has seen it and what they think.   

Well, it's almost that time again. The wife and I have planned out our annual October Horror Movie viewing parties.  This is actually our 6th year doing it and it's always a blast.  This years line-up includes:

October 2nd - The Burning
October 9th - Grabbers
October 16th - Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors
October 23rd - The Howling
October 30th -  Season of the Witch

Sounds great. And I’ve actually only seen two of those. I am a failure

That’s looking like a solid list. Unfortunately my SO isn’t a fan of horror movies, but I always find the time to watch a couple of the movies they run on AMC during October.

I wish my SO was a horror movie fan as well. Anything in the horror genre I have to watch on my own, so needless to say I don't get to watch many horror movies these days.....

My wife wasn't a big horror fan at first either. I think that the key is to find something kind of fun to get them interested and move on from there. Something like Shawn of the Dead is a good ice breaker. Once you realize that even the scarier films are fun group viewings, then it becomes fun for all involved.

I'm not much into horror movies, but my favorite is either the deliciously cheesy Night of the Living Dead remake from 1990 (with Tony Todd), Shaun of the Dead, or The People Under the Stairs. I also like the original House and House II, for the camp factor.

Those are all great films FRO. The only one that I have not seen is The People Under the Stairs.

Really? I would highly encourage you to see it. What I like about it is, it's not a horror film in the "gore" sense, but more in that, it plays with your head. At least, that's what I remember from when I watched it. It's been a number of years since I saw it last, but I remember liking the psychological horror aspect of it.

Thought I’d share a couple of horror film collection photos with you guys. I’ve got a lot more horror but these are the two sections I have taken out of the main A-Z film collection and put into date order as much as possible.

First my Universal Horror/Monster stuff:
[img width=700 height=525]https://i.imgur.com/2MvmwAH.jpg[/img]
There’s no real definition of what is included in this “set” outside the obvious frankenstein, mummy, Dracula etc. But basically I go off the latest Wikipedia list, which does have some odd stuff on it. But whatever.
This films can be pretty tricky to get hold of over here in England but I get them when I can.

And my Hammer collection:
[img width=700 height=525]https://i.imgur.com/Uk6gtkp.jpg[/img]
Which has a lot more films in it that it at first appears but most are in box sets.
I think wherever you are in the world Hammer is a bit of a pain cus it’s all owned by different distribution companies.

I ended up watching Pulse (1988), The Fog (1980), and Children of the Corn during September. The Fog and Children of the Corn are favorites of mine that I've seen before. Pulse was ok, but not something I would feel compelled to watch again.

The original Halloween and The Shining are staples that I watch every Halloween season. Right now I feel like I'd also like to rewatch The Thing (1982) and Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), so I'll try to make those happen. I may end up watching some others, but I don't have anything else planned.


People Under the Stairs is good stuff. I also haven't seen it in quite a few years.