Spooky movie assignment, Need Help. - by LancerChronics
Gestalt on 11/10/2006 at 19:40
The Others was a pretty good ghost story, and it would be an interesting one to compare with The Sixth Sense.
newphase on 11/10/2006 at 22:42
Deadringers - a truly horrific movie with Jeremy Irons (iirc)
Oneiroscope on 12/10/2006 at 01:58
You don't need my permission to use the quote, lol. Though if at all possible you should probably hunt it down yourself since I don't remember it word for word. As I recall it was in a foreword he wrote for a collection of short stories. I am sorry I can't remember the title, I read it years ago and even then it was an antique book you arent likely to find. Anyway, I hope you can find it.
But even if you can't find the quote, it shouldnt stop you from using the idea.
Another great movie to use might be Marathon Man. There's a great torture scene in that flick. "Is it safe?" Plus it has Dustin Hoffman in it, so your teacher will probably hump your leg.
Maybe you could play up the use of terror/horror for dramatic effect in otherwise mainstream films or something. I dunno.
I gotta say, though, why the heck is your teacher against using horror films? Sounds like the age old bias against the genre to me. As if horror movies somehow don't count in the history of cinema. Puh-leeeze.
Hmm, how about Reality Bending/Shifting? A sub genre of horror that involves the complete redefinition of the characters' perceptions of reality and how they adapt to that shift. In The Mouth Of Madness, From Beyond, and other Lovecraftian flicks might fit into that niche quite nicely.
Lhet on 12/10/2006 at 04:19
Hmmm. Uzumaki? More weird than anything.
Or maybe Jacob's Ladder?
Oldboy maybe.
ercles on 12/10/2006 at 04:36
Didn't Hitchcock pretty much master the psychological thriller? Something like "Rear Window" was pretty darn spooky, and would have volumes that you could write about...
hopper on 12/10/2006 at 08:50
Quote Posted by newphase
Deadringers - a truly horrific movie with Jeremy Irons (iirc)
Quoted for emphasis.
And "Night Watch" is very spooky, too, although it really end up as a kind of traditional murder mystery. There's the Danish original and a Hollywood remake of it, but I only know the original, so I don't know which one is better.
"Flatliners" may border on horror at times, due to occasional violence, but it's more spooky than horror imo.
Looking at where spooky meets noir, I'd also suggest "Dark City".
Haegan on 12/10/2006 at 12:33
I am aware that the following film is rubbish.
However....
I think it is trying to be presicely the type of film you need:
'The Blair Witch Project.'
OOH! BLOKE STANDING IN CORNER! BIG CLIMAX!!!
Phydeaux on 12/10/2006 at 13:25
I'm not a huge Anime fan/buff, but one that I did see was pretty spooky and disturbing. And not in the gory tentacle rape sense either; definitely a pyschological thriller. (
http://imdb.com/title/tt0156887/)
Jacob's Ladder definitely gets my vote as a spooky (non-horror) movie.
Flatliners would probably work too, if it didn't majorly suck balls. In my mind, it takes more to make a true mindfuck film than tinted filters and crooked camera angles. Amaturish crap with big name stars.
For true spookiness, it's hard to beat the master. Alfred Hitchcock's
Psycho.
What Lies Beneath and
Secret Window might qualify.
The Bone Collector too.
LesserFollies on 12/10/2006 at 14:46
a couple of oldies:
--The Haunting, based on Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, does a good job of making a person pee his pants using only some voices and a shot of wallpaper. The old version! Not the fairly recent piece of crap with Liam Neeson (which also incites terror, but only because it's so BAD.)
--The Innocents, based on Henry James' The Turn of the Screw. Again, you want the crispy old b&w version, this one starring Deborah Kerr. A lot of the effects are done with simple light and shadow and ambient noise. Very creepy.
Random_Taffer on 12/10/2006 at 15:22
I'm not a big anime buff but Perfect Blue was pretty freaking weird...
[SPOILER]A screwdriver to the eye? Wtf?[/SPOILER]