What do you believe qualifies a movie as horror?
 

What do you think should be the qualifications for a movie to be called horror? Does it have to make you horrified? Scared? Does it have to have blood and guts? If that is the case, why is Faces Of Death not classified as horror? I know the images are real, but so what? It's designed for the same purpose - to horrify you. Does the movie have to remind you of your own mortality? Does it have to have supernatural elements?

What do YOU think qualifies a movie as horror?

someone dying in a non comedic way

WRONG FUCKING FORUM!!!



Just kidding ege :D


I think if the intention of the movie is to cause fear, it is horror, even if the movie is so terrible it doesnt actually scare anyone.

also, if it uses horror themes, at least partially in a serious note. Scary movie, although it uses horror themes, is a comedy, not even remotely horror.

Unless you count chris elliot as hanson....

"Take my little hand!" jesus that made me cringe....

If the movies main theme is centered around a killer/killers, (human,monster,demon,ghost,etc...) and the other actors are trying to avoid, and eventually kill. Thats a horror movie for me, Friday the 13th/Texas Chainsaw are perfect examples.

A thriller for me, is more a heroic, evil over good thing. like with Terminator that is a sci-fi/thriller, IMO.

Hmmm.... Good thread....



I can tell you that I think just because a movie has ghosts, doesn't make it a horror movie. People always try to call 6th Sense horror, but I don't think it is. It's suspense. Just because there is ghosts does not instantly prequalify it as a horror movie. No one tries to say that gay as movie with Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore, 'Ghost' is a horror movie, so I'm sick of people thinking that a ghost = horror.

did we ask for your opinion oh wait we did lol

Any film with a young, nude Jamie Lee Curtis in it is a horror film. Any film with an old, nude Jamie Lee Curtis in it is unintentionally a horror film LOL. ok. I made all that up. I need more sleep....
CK

For me its the movies that could remotely happen, Psycho, TCM, etc.

even the movies like NOES, F13, and Halloween could in some way become real, if you gave some 7 foot freak a bag of PCP and a machette, he would for all intensive purposes be pretty unstoppable. and with the psycho's in today's society its like they are going for that headline, so I can picture some sick fuckin pedophile strapping on a bladed glove and terrorizing a quiet unsuspecting neighborhood. no he wont really get them in their dreams but you can damn sure bet a whole lotta kids will be asking for a nightlight.

Scary thing is, Je Suis, 'TCM' and 'Psycho' actually are based on real stories. Well, the same story actually, good ol' all-American cannibal/graverobber/necropheliac/murderer/'he was always such a quiet man' Ed Gein. They just don't make 'em like that any more. I had my picture taken on his grave about 13 years ago. I'd love to get that back from an ex-girlfriend after all these years.
CK

Oh sure they do, they just dont catch them that often :D

if the intention of the movie is to cause fear/dread/whatever, it's a horror movie

Dammit, Vod, Ed Gein is an icon and national treasure ! Show some respect LOL Murderers ? Of course. Cannibals ? Why not ? Necros ? ugh, probably. Grave robbers ? all things are possible. All of them rolled into one ? Priceless ! :D
CK

I don't know ... The intention of Reefer Madness was to cause fear. Fear of marijuana. But that's not a horror movie.

Also, Jacob's Ladder is a horror movie, to me. Although, it doesn't really center on a killer/killers of any kind. Neither did The Eye.

And someone dying in a non-comedic way happens all the time in dramas. We wouldn't call Titanic a horror movie, nor Schindler's List.

So, I suppose the only thing that all movies have in common that I consider to be horror films is: unusual, frightening occurrences happen to the protagonist in a way that is meant to cause tension and fear in the audience.

horror movie= gore, monsters (human, weird things)...scary moments...suspense

what do you think makes a horror movie GREAT?

michael myers without bust rhymes

Well, this isn't necessarily true. The Ring, The Eye, The Blair Witch Project, and Poltergeist were all horror films (to name a few) that did not have gore.

I actually thought for a while on this one and I realized that I have no idea. Apparently some people on the board think Se7en & A Clockwork Orange are horror but I think they are thriller/dramas. Its different for everyone

Horrification, or an attempt thereof.

what about the face scene from pltergeist?

Agreed. Anyone that tries to call A clockwork Orange a horror movie needs a good slap. Se7en is slightly closer, but like you said, it's more of a suspense-thriller. I'll probably take some crap for this, but I don't even consider The Silence of the Lambs a horror movie. It's an excellent movie, and a brilliant psychological thriller, but I just never considered it horror. In all actuality, Hannibal is way more of a horror movie that SotL. Another one that always bugs me is 6th Sense, but I already mentioned that in this thread so I won't go off on it again.

ooo...good point. i've haven't watched the Ring, The EYe, or Blair Witch (i'm probly not gonna watch that one) but i'll put that on my to do list. :)

bwind22: I think that The 6th Sense is a horror movie. True, just because it has ghosts does not make it a horror film. But the child in the movie is haunted, and is constantly afraid. Even though most of the ghosts are not malevolent, we, as an audience, do not know this and fear for the child's safety. Even so, they (the ghosts) are frightening, and they are meant to give the audience the major creeps: (the ghost with the back of his head blown open, the girl vomitting beneath the "tent", the group of ghosts hanging in the hallway.) These are all horrific images.

And I would say that a good horror movie has to have a load of suspense. It just has to. You can't have one without the suspense. However, once you take a "suspense" film and add creepy spirits, a clairvoyant child, and a conflict that revolves around the premise that "I need to do something so these things will stop scaring the ever-loving shit out of me", then you have a horror film. True, the threat to the child is not against his physical life, but his emotional one. He lives a life of fear and paranoia.

Does the threat of death need to present for it to be a horror film? I don't think so. Again, I cite Jacob's Ladder and The Eye as examples.

The films you cite, (IMO) are cross-overs. They are hard to fit into any one catagory, and contain elements of, horror, thriller, ghost story, at least for me.

Horror is... I'd like to think that almost every horror-movie have got some supernatural elements, or is circled around ancient curses, killers of some sort, and I'd also like to say that almost every horror-movie have got some violence, or at least that one or more persons is killed. It's difficult to settle presicely what a horror-movie is.

Italian Horror is easier to say what is: Fulci, Argento, Soavi and Bava, to name a few, have all got some gore in their films. The Italian market like gore, and Fulci and Argento etc. is satisfying that market. I love italian horror. Fulci is the king!

I classify Se7en a horror movie on atmosphere and visuals alone. If it had been just a regular serial killer-type thriller movie, I'd agree with you. But it has the atmosphere of a horror movie, and especially the look of a horror movie.