Are they really Horrors?

6th

Sometimes I just get p*ssed with so called horror movies. In so many cases they are just thrillers and its just not the same. For me they have to have something supernatural in them i.e. it cant just be a guy running around killing people like "I know what you did last summer".

If its gonna be horror the guy needs to be a freddy, jason etc.

I'm sure there are some thrillers that work as horrors but in my opinion not many!

A thriller is a thriller and a horror is a horror - what do you guys think?

6th

Zombienosh

hmm I somewhat agree, I like my horrors, containing the paranormal or somewhat unbelievable, monsters , zombies etc, but for a horror to be realistic it would involve the "killer" being a human right?

6th

for me a horror has to have an edge to it where its not realistic but makes you think "christ what if that happened". Real killers dont give me nightmares and never have coz so much crazy sh*t happens in the real world.

Its that "it isnt real....is it" part of my head that makes me love real horror.

Apart from that i do love the classic horrors as in the old school B&Ws. I even love abbott & costello's horror stuff and carry on screaming, they are what they are and dont claim to be anything else.

Tusky

I dont agree, but I dont have time to elaberate on it right now!

Karl Hungus

So only something supernatural can be scary? I don't agree. Films like I Know What You Did Last Summer is a poor example aswell, it's part of a cash-in trend started by Scream, and cash-ins are terrible movies by default. For fantastic horror films with a serial killer at the centre, rather than something supernatural, Dario Argento's earlier works make far better examples.

That said, generally I prefer a more supernatural horror film.

6th

so if a film is scarey its a horror? Thats a very low qualification. Supernatural may be the wrong word but its the best i can think of right now.

6th

ok in answer to my own question: Yes in some cases they are. I'm just a little p*ssed that when i go looking for horror films i get some very lame suggestions which are no more horror than eastenders!

In saying that some "thriller" which are definately horrors are, Silance of the lambs, Cujo - theres alot more obviously but i'm mentally exhausted - you get the idea i'm getting at i hope?

TerrorFirmer

Yes, this is what most of us true fans think, don't worry.

Example of horror: Perhaps not necessarily scary, but horror based on its premise and ideals: Hellraiser, Silent Hill, The Grudge, The Ring, Exorcist, etc.

Now, as I said, it needn't be scary as such - for me horror is about the unnatural, the unexplained, the fantastic, and even the debated issues in life and sometimes, etc so regardless of the quality of a film, for me, if it fits into these classes it's still a genuine horror film.

Examples of what are NOT horror but are still classed as such: Scream, I know what you did last Summer, Switchblade Romance, and every other "omg its the best friend" feature ever made.

People debate over tmovies like Hostel and Saw - for me these are not horror films, and are not scary; but again, its not just that they aren't scary - it's just I find them part of a different genre, or even caught between them - extreme thriller really to be honest. Strip away the OTT violence from Saw and Hostel and you're left with a cheap 12-a thriller.

Gore and horror are a genre apart...but sometimes they are automatically churned in together by default.

Karl Hungus

6th wrote:

so if a film is scarey its a horror? Thats a very low qualification.

Well if being scary was the only qualification there wouldn't be many horrors would there!

Seriously though, I think it's all to do with the setup, the atmosphere, how it's done. So a film like, Memories of Murder for example, it's a more serious look at a real life serial killer, it doesn't go out of it's way to set up a scene that illicits fear. Another film would be Haute Tension, which I'd certainly consider a horror based on how things are done in the film. Scenes are set up to illicit fear, create an atmosphere.

I suppose it would depend on your definition of Thriller aswell. I'd consider the film Ronin to be a good old fashioned Thriller.

spooky donkey

With out getting to deep into this. Id concider it a horror if it was just come guy going around killing but when he did you got a real gore fest and it make you wince a little. I dont really think many horrors are scary but stuff like Hostel made me look away a little, now that was a horror. Its really hard to define though. When there is a human killer and all you see is a dead body I wouldent really call that a horror more a thriller. Seven was a good exampls of this.

Fysh

Is this where someone chips in and starts being pedantic about the distinction between "terror" and "horror"? It sounds a bit poncey but it's worth distinguishing the two.

"Terror" films would be films where the central theme of the film is more about the fear of something happening and a corresponding atmosphere (eg Friday 13th/Nightmare On Elm Street/any flick with serial killers on a rampage, though these are bad examples of the atmosphere factor), whereas "horror" would be more about a sickening confrontation with the gruesome detail of some aspect of terror (eg the increasing gore in mainstream horror flicks, such as

the eye scene in Hostel, the boiling oil scene in Ichi The Killer or the torture scene in Audition

). "Thrillers" would be related but a separate genre, in my experience focusing more on a specific plot but with some aspect of the terror atmosphere

There's a lot of bleed between these films, because of the difficulty in making a mainstream film which functions as only one of these genres. For example, it's hard to have a proper "terror" film by the above definition if there's never any suggestion of the horror that causes the terror (imagine if all the Friday 13th films had the gore trimmed out, so that there was only ever shots of characters finding their dead friends off screen - that would move it into the scope of a "terror" film and away from the slasher subset of the horror genre it currently sits in). Likewise, "terror" films without structure can quickly become boring or appear plotless unless thriller elements are present.

To be honest, I don't see the point in over-categorising films on the basis that the more labels or categories you have, the more likely it is you'll disagree on what they mean with someone else. Certainly there are films whose "horror-ness" can be debated, but that's because not all films are purely and exclusively one genre, so a precise classification is awkward.

But at the end of the day, does it matter if the films are good? Carpenter's remake of "The Thing" could be more accurately described as a paranoid sci-fi/thriller film than as horror, but it doesn't stop it being a damn good show with some great horror aspects.

garred

There are many "horrors" where you would wonder how they got the term. I know a lot of people who would classify the Alien films sci-fi whereas to me they would be horrors. People have different tastes when it comes to films and different opinions in what they take out of them.
You should check some of the dvd retailers and what they classify as horror, sure IMDB have Beetle Juice in the horror section.

Crash

In my mind what we're discussing in a way is the difference between horror movies and slasher movies really, no?

Tusky

&#231 wrote: »

In my mind what we're discussing in a way is the difference between horror movies and slasher movies really, no?

Was about to say that. I still consider crappy slasher movies to be horror movies...just not paticularly good ones.

lodgepole

This sounds a lot like the "they're not a punk band, they're a pop band" debate. The horror genre is incredibly broad and encompasses all kinds of films. Films, particularly nowadays, rarely fit into one genre and indeed some of the most interesting are those that take elements from several.

Take the IMDB's number one horror film... Psycho. The Wicker Man and Misery are other examples. Repulsion, Peeping Tom... This is just skimming the top one hundred...

Funny Games too, doesn't really have too many elements native to a horror film, but is certainly horrifying.

Lodgepole

Lodgepole wrote:

Funny Games too, doesn't really have too many elements native to a horror film, but is certainly horrifying.

Indeed and by that categorisation you could lump Irreversible and Requiem for a Dream in aswell.

Lets be honest- a word is just a word. All it does it but very arbitrary bounds around a medium that constantly throws aways such boundaries. I like scary films. I like films that push my boundaries in terms of visceral experience. I like films that maintain a narrative tension. I like supernatural movies. Whether they're horror, fantasy, drama, comedies or sci-fi its the ingredients I seek- not the rigid arbitrary categorisation.

r3nu4l

For me horror has to have a supernatural element to it, werewolf, vampire etc although the recent spates of Hollywood films - Van Helsing and UnderWorld for example - are blurring this distinction for me. These are more like super-hero format movies than anything else. Anything with ghosts, spirits and demons and shock factors is good too

I think that Hostel and the like are really slasher/gore-fest films and not horror (IMO only).

Just my opinion and I do think the lines are always inter-woven and the differences very fine.

Thrillers to me are usually crime, conspiracy, action type - Patriot games, The firm, Se7en, etc.

And for me Alien is strictly gore-fest Sci-fi as is Predator, sorry

Tusky

r3nu4l wrote:

For me horror has to have a supernatural element to it, werewolf, vampire etc although the recent spates of Hollywood films - Van Helsing and UnderWorld for example - are blurring this distinction for me. These are more like super-hero format movies than anything else. Anything with ghosts, spirits and demons and shock factors is good too

I think that Hostel and the like are really slasher/gore-fest films and not horror (IMO only).

Just my opinion and I do think the lines are always inter-woven and the differences very fine.

Thrillers to me are usually crime, conspiracy, action type - Patriot games, The firm, Se7en, etc.

And for me Alien is strictly gore-fest Sci-fi as is Predator, sorry

Alien ? Gore fest?!?!

hmm

r3nu4l

Yep, all those poor alien creatures being massacred by that evil woman just because they wanted a meal...that was what it was about wasn't it?

OK, to me it is sci-fi, not horror.

Earthhorse

6th wrote:

For me they have to have something supernatural in them

r3nu4l wrote:

For me horror has to have a supernatural element to it

That's just supernatural horror as opposed to horror, so really you're just expressing a preference for a sub genre.

Twigy

The problem with horror movies now days is that they are way too predictable. I mean half the fun of being scared is that you have no idea what is going to happen next,you can only imagine the worst. The best horror movie will leave you guessing and make then make it more horrible than you could have ever imagined. Doesn't really matter if its supernatural or more realistic. Thats what i think anyway.

r3nu4l

earthhorse wrote:

That's just supernatural horror as opposed to horror, so really you're just expressing a preference for a sub genre.

Yes, unashamedly, the OP is looking for opinions and I'm giving mine as I said when I used the words "For me"

So what's your opinion earthhorse, you haven't given one, just pointed out what you seem to think is "wrong" with mine!

Anything to actually contribute?

Earthhorse

The OP started by asking whether movies without a supernatural element to them were indeed horrors. My answer is that, yes they are, just not supernatural horrors.

The fact that he, or you, may not find other horrors horrifying is neither here nor there when answering the question really. If you're interested in reading more on the subject, or are a HP Lovecraft fan, I'd recommend reading his "Supernatural Horror in Literature". It's not a great read but he does a pretty good job of tracing the development of this sub genre.

It is true to say that horror and supernatural horror have become virtually synonymous in the public's mind and indeed it probably accounts for most of the horror out there today, but that does not mean a regular horror film should be seen as a thriller or indeed anything other than what it is (which is a horror!).

r3nu4l

So you like Cthulhu etc. Cool, so do I

As you ahve read up on the subject and probably know more about it than me can I ask you would you consider The Hound of the Baskervilels to be horror?

I'm not being sarcy here, just interested.

As I say, what I expressed earlier is my opinion, it doesn't have to be right, it just has to be mine

Earthhorse

Ha ha! Well, first off, let me say I am not trying to paint myself as an expert. Indeed, my citing Lovecraft was an attempt to defer to his expertise.

The Hound of the Baskervilles I would class as a mystery or a detective novel. There are no doubt eerie elements to it, and I'm sure many film versions have capitalised on these, but I came to the book as an adult and by way of working through my brother's collection of Holmes fiction, so I read it as exactly that - a Holmes story. I can see how you would classify it as horror; if it sent enough shivers down your spine then so be it, I wouldn't have a problem with that.

If something fulfills the criteria of a genre then I have no problem assigning it that, which also means I have no problem assigning it to multiple genres. Star Wars, for example, is both Sci-Fi and romance. If, on the other hand, one wants to say that something does not belong to a genre purely because one didn't "feel" like it evoked that genre, even though it fulfilled the criteria, then I think that's wrong, because genres are essentially an intellectual exercise (a largely trivial one at that) and shouldn't detract frome one's enjoyment of a piece nor be influenced by it.

r3nu4l

I definitely agree with you about the Hounds of the Baskervilles.

Taking away from something I said earlier :rolleyes: (you can tell I'm still thinking this one out ) I view John Connolly novels as crime with a supernatural element and not horror, despite some of the more Stephen King like passages.

I haven't fully formed any opinons so they will change as more people post here and I read more books and see more films and I get time to think about it a bit more.

That said, it's not the most pressing issue in my life right now

garred

r3nu4l wrote:

Yep, all those poor alien creatures being massacred by that evil woman just because they wanted a meal...that was what it was about wasn't it?

OK, to me it is sci-fi, not horror.

What about Jason X, would you classify that as Sci-fi or horror?
I'd have to take the Alien=horror road myself. Just cause it took part in space I would'nt feel the need to classify it Sci-fi (which to me would be Star Wars, etc).
I remember years ago there used to be a chiller genre and I think it would be more apt today for many of the films classified as horror. But thats just my thoughts.

TCamen

In my mind what we're discussing in a way is the difference between horror movies and slasher movies really, no?

That's exactly what I was thinking when I read the OP.

I think sometimes there's a fine line between thriller and horror for some movies (e.g Silence of the Lambs), but slasher movies are definitely horror to me: Halloween, Friday the 13th, Nightmare on Elm St etc.

I really do think it's just gonna come down to personal preference, but for me, the type of horror I feel like watching really depends on my mood - I mean slashers would probably be my favourite sub-genre, but I also enjoy watching supernatural ghost flicks, J-horrors etc.

What I really like about Amazon.com is that when you go into 'Horror DVDs', they have lots of sub-categories which makes browsing for titles so much easier (even if I don't ultimately buy them from Amazon

Asian Horror
By Theme
Classic Horror & Monsters
Cult Classics
Frighteningly Funny
Hammer Productions
Horror Masters
Independently Distributed
Italian Horror
Series & Sequels
Slasher Flicks
Teen Terror
Television
Things That Go Bump