Growing Out of Horror Movies?

Over at the Duquesne Duke, Jess Eagle has a little memoir about falling out of love with horror movies.  I'm not sure I buy the analysis, but it's an interesting perspective.

Most Profitable Horror Movies

HorrorMovies.Ca has a list of the 9 most profitable horror movies.  Top honors go to blockbuster indies that filmed with very small budgets, like the Blair Witch Project (below) and Paranormal Activity.

Top 10 Creepy Children in Cinema

Here's a solid list of creepy children in horror movies, which, while comprehensive, seems to leave out quite a lot of them, too.  Seriously, what is it about kids that's so unsettling?  Has anyone ever done a study of this?

Top 10 Illustrated Horror Movie Posters

The art of hand-drawn movie posters has all but died out (at least here in America -- it's alive and well in places like Ghana and Thailand), but FEARnet has a list of the ten best illustrated horror movie posters to take you back to the good old days of pen-and-ink posters.

Scorcese's 11 Scariest Movies

Last year, the Daily Beast ran a list of Martin Scorcese's 11 scariest horror movies.

The list is a pretty great one, though it skews pretty heavily towards pre-1970s cinema. I haven't watched my way through the entire list, but those I've seen have been excellent, and Scorcese includes a couple of my favorite ever horror films, including The Innocents and the 1963 version of The Haunting.

Twilight Vampire Baby Costume

Just in time for the release of the first installment of Breaking Dawn, here's a super-creepy/brilliant Twilight costume. 

First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes terrifying vampire c-section

LIFE Magazine Black Cat Audition

 What are Vincent Price and Peter Lorre doing with those cats, you ask?

They're auditioning them, of course!  What else?

Apparently Price and Lorre were part of a 1961 Hollywood casting session for black cats, presumably for a horror movie.  LIFE Magazine was there to capture the proceedings, and as you can see, the results were fantastic.

What impresses me most is not that some Hollywood executive decided it would be a good idea to have an open casting call for cats, but that so many people managed to wrangle their cats into coming with them.  No matter how lovely I may find my two black cats, I know there's no way they would tolerate being put on a leash and trotted down to a movie studio.  Although, to be fair, the cats at above don't look too happy about it, themselves.

There are a bunch more truly awesome photos from the LIFE Magazine shoot here, and here.  [Via BoingBoing]

David Gordon Green on His Suspiria Remake

Pineapple Express director David Gordon Green will be directing a remake of Dario Argento's horror classic Suspiria.  Complex has an interview in which he talks about the project:

With Suspiria specifically, you’ve been trying to get a remake made for years now. What is it about Dario Argento’s original film that keeps you so determined to make a new version?

To me, what I love about it…. I love the original, but the movie that I’ve written based on that is just very much influenced by that. I think the idea of an isolated setting with a young, naïve girl stuck in the isolated setting is just a field day for what I find to be scary. It’s me responding horrifically to that movie; I was really terrified by that movie. My take is somewhat different from what Argento’s movie is, and it’s really me seeing what I have to offer that genre.

It’s the seed that Suspiria planted in my head, rather than a shot-by-shot remake. It takes that tone and goes into a new place with it

Ten Tricks For Surviving A Horror Movie

 Not only is this article on how to survive a horror movie in the Miami New Times full of helpful hints should you fall into a horror movie, it also demonstrates a pretty sharp understanding of the rule-governed nature of the horror genre, and of the concept of genre in general:

​A scary movie is nothing but a pattern; a circumstantial plot that moves from one point to the next,systematically taking its viewers into a familiar world. In one version the chick might be the hero, while in another she's the victim. There are serial killers and ghosts, and there's always some idiot who does the opposite of what the audience is telling him to do.

But the thing is, no matter the premise, horror flicks are adrenaline-based entertainment that drag their audiences through the mud and back again, throwing obstacles at them from all angles without a care in the world about feelings, stress, or any other emotion.

Top 10 80's Horror Movies

Don't go into the light!

Here's a list of the ten best horror movies of the 80's to mull over.  Thoughts?

The Science of Screams

io9 had a neat piece last week on the science of screams.  It should come as no surprise that horror movies use screams to elicit particular emotions in viewers, but the neat thing that researchers have found is that, the more irregular they are, the harder screams are to ignore.

This article also alerted me to the existence of Wilhelm scream, a stock Hollywood sound effect scream that's been used on tons of movie since the 1950s.  I'll never be able to listen to another horror movie the same way.  Here's a supercut for your enjoyment.

The Exorcist on Stage . . . Now With More Teller

Why is possessed Linda Blair so happy?  Because not only is there a stage play of The Exorcist in the works, but now it looked like Teller, of Pen & Teller fame, will be working on the stage effects.  Strange, but true.  [Via The Mary Sue]

On a side note, I'm more freaked out by that photo than I was by the entire film.

Mourir Aupres de Toi

If you're in the mood for some macabre stop-motion animation that isn't The Nightmare Before Christmas, check out this cute animated film directed by Spike Jonze.  There's all sorts of delightful weirdness when the covers of the books at Shakespeare & Co. in Paris come alive!


Spike Jonze: Mourir Auprès de Toi on Nowness.com.

[Via Jezebel]

10 Worst Haunted House Cliches

In honor of the recent release of Dream House, Complex has a list of the ten worst haunted house movie cliches.

In case you ever feel like keeping count, here's a horror cliche bingo card for you, via Sarah Hates Your Movie:

The Woman in Black

Oh, hell yes.  [Via io9]

The Gawper

[Via The Mary Sue]

On Vampires

Over on the Huffington Post, Varla Ventura reflects on vampires.  Having just recently watched the 1931 Dracula, I can't argue with that.

"The Raven" Trailer

John Cusack as Poe.  Why do we have to wait until March for this?

Steven King on TCM's Night at the Movies

Dread Central would like to remind you that Steven King will be on TCM's "A Night at the Movies" tomorrow night, October 3, at 8 PM.  Following the special, TCM will be showing a bunch of great classic horror films all night, including Frankenstein, Freaks, and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Here's the full lineup:
8:00 PM TCM "Night at the Movies: Horror" 
9:00 PM Frankenstein 
10:15 PM Freaks 
11:30 PM TCM "Night at the Movies: Horror"
12:30 AM Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 
2:15 AM Mark of the Vampire (’35)
3:30 AM The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
4:45 AM Nosferatu 
6:15 AM Phantom of the Opera 

The Awakening

 

Rebecca Hall as a turn-of-the-century ghost hunter in an isolated English school? Yes, please!