Author Topic: Building the Horror/Thriller 1000  (Read 63112 times)

1SO

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Building the Horror/Thriller 1000
« on: August 02, 2016, 12:24:41 AM »
399 films listed by IMDB as Horror and recommended for some reason or another on I Check Movies. Some of these are cult, some of these are so bad they're good and some push  into highly controversial territory. I plan to watch these in Chronological Order, my current favorite way to Marathon. I will aim to give a brief paragraph or two. I may choose not to finish some of them and some I may skip altogether once I catch on to where they are headed.

Here is the ranked list.
« Last Edit: November 27, 2023, 08:45:37 AM by 1SO »

1SO

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #1 on: August 02, 2016, 01:00:36 AM »
The Queen of Spades (1916)
* * * - Okay
There are 17 filmed versions of this short story by Alexander Pushkin. The most famous one is from 1949, stars Anton Walbrook and is coming up later in the Marathon. It's a supernatural story with a gimmick twist performed like a magic trick. You know there going to be magic and you even know when to expect it, so it's all about the 'what', which generates enough suspense. At 64 minutes, this thing is padded and then the padding is padded. I'm interested to see what the 1949 version does to justify feature length.

pixote

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #2 on: August 02, 2016, 02:09:06 AM »
I'm not sure whether I'm more excited to read reviews of J'Accuse (I wonder if either version really fits under the umbrella of horror), Silent Night, Deadly Night, or The Slumber Party Massacre.

pixote
Great  |  Near Great  |  Very Good  |  Good  |  Fair  |  Mixed  |  Middling  |  Bad

1SO

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #3 on: August 02, 2016, 08:45:12 AM »
I've seen SNDN and I thought I reviewed it for Shocktober but I can't find my review anywhere. (It's terrible.) The title on the list is Silent Night, Bloody Night aka Night of the Dark Full Moon.

Corndog

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #4 on: August 02, 2016, 09:56:24 AM »
Great project!
"Time is the speed at which the past decays."

Sam the Cinema Snob

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #5 on: August 02, 2016, 10:22:19 AM »
Nice marathon. Getting through the They Shoot Zombies, Don't They? list is one of my bucketlist items.

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #6 on: August 02, 2016, 02:45:30 PM »
I still think TSZDT is flawed and skewed too modern, but it's as good a list of Horror recommendations as I've seen and the Top 100 are all essential for the genre. I have about 250 of those left to see, but I expanded to include other lists like Cult Movies and Tim Dirk's Most Controversial Films.

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #7 on: August 04, 2016, 01:36:56 AM »
Genuine: The Tragedy of a Strange House (1920)
* *
From the makers of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, released the same year. Picture has a similar heightened dream-like Art Direction, but the story is a lot harder to follow. There's an interesting idea of gender battling for control at the center. A captured princess has gone feral and is considered dangerous to men because she can seduce them into doing anything, including suicide. One man decides to keep her locked away in his mansion. Some curious men find their way in and the woman escapes her room. Largely of interest because of its aesthetic connection to Caligari and only worth watching if you want to see a lesser version of that style.

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #8 on: August 04, 2016, 02:54:11 PM »
Following.
"It's not art unless it has the potential to be a disaster." Bansky

1SO

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Re: Horror: The Final Chapter
« Reply #9 on: August 04, 2016, 09:31:22 PM »
J'Accuse (I wonder if either version really fits under the umbrella of horror),

J'Accuse! (1919)
* * * - Okay
It never looked Horror to me, but I've seen many sights classify it as tangental Horror so I included it to see why. Plus the two films are supposed to be excellent. I figured there would be a nightmare sequence in the story or that it would take a literal view of war as hell, which it does, but Gance also uses magical realism to really drive home the way war is soul destroying and a place where people easily believe in sacred imagery. I get why this comes up even though it is not a Horror film.

I've seen 3 films by Abel Gance and he is one of the most original designers of stylish shots. In the world of silent cinema, he can be seen as the eras David Fincher, with a dose of David Lynch. He doesn't get discussed as much as Murnau because Gance's films are intimidatingly long. J'accuse! runs 166 minutes and he has 3 acclaimed films that are longer.