What qualifies as horror to you?
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Horror
Onyx_Hades — 9 years ago(November 06, 2016 05:26 PM)
If a movie on IMDB is listed as horror, but you don't find it in the least bit scary, do you still consider it a horror movie? Ignore what it says on here, I'm talking about your own personal feeling. If I watch a movie that's listed as horror/comedy on here, and it seems to have more comedy than horror to me, I just can't personally consider it horror. For me it's straight up comedy.
Tromafreak and I have had this conversation many times, and I would like to know what you think. -
!!!deleted!!! (22250229) — 9 years ago(November 06, 2016 05:37 PM)
I don't always go by IMDb. Once Bitten is listed as comedy and horror, but that is definitely just a comedy. It uses the backdrop of a horror film (vampire), but it's never scary, threatening, thrilling or revolting.
If a horror comedy, that's never scary, like The Toxic Avenger, has enough gross-out gore than the casual, everyday movie-goer enjoys, then I have no problem with it being labeled horror. Splatter comedy might be a more appropriate label, but maybe that's taking things too far.
Manhunter (1986) is classed as horror on this site and that I strongly disagree with. Yeah, there's a serial killer, but the focus is never really on the murders, like in typical horror movie scenarios, so there that goes. And the killer never feels threatening to us because, apart from one scene and the end, we're not really around him. The movie is more about the police procedural work in trying to catch him. Definitely drama / thriller, in this case.
So, basically, I just go with my gut. Man Bites Dog (1992) - crime, comedy, thriller.
You got the wrong guy, mang. I don't come off no banana boat. -
!!!deleted!!! (22250229) — 9 years ago(November 06, 2016 05:45 PM)
No prob. Everybody has their own opinion, with Jaws being a huge one that divides people. That movie might have a lot of other themes and tones at play, but horror is definitely one of them.
If, as a kid, even swimming in pools made me a bit leery, as silly as that sounds, obviously the damn movie did its job lol.
You got the wrong guy, mang. I don't come off no banana boat. -
Mysteriously_Eerie — 9 years ago(November 06, 2016 06:24 PM)
I think of comedy and horror as being similar to peanut butter and chocolate. The two flavors are always distinct when blended.
You can blend them completely, such as in black comedies (e.g., slipping on blood or someone getting beat to death by their own arm), but usually the two flavors are clearly distinct, with hard pieces of chocolate appearing inside peanut butter, or just the two appearing together but separate, like in a Reese's Peanut Buter cup.
Once Bitten is clearly a comedy, but I think it's appropriate for it to have the horror tag. One aspect of horror we tend to forget about is macabre. Macabre is an old school horror technique involving imagery and associated horror characteristics without an attempt to scare, and I think a lot of comedies use macabre to various degrees as a backdrop to tell a mostly comedic story (e.g., Once Bitten, Tucker and Dale, Abbot and Costello, Arsenic and Old Lace).
So even though a film might be more comedy than horror, if it has a horror backdrop, I really don't have a problem with the genre tag.
Now, MANHUNTER labeled as horror is just wrong. -
Simian_Jack — 9 years ago(November 06, 2016 09:29 PM)
There may be a difference between looking at a film as horror in and of itself and looking at it as belonging to a genre. I always look at the latter, as many films meant to be horror fail to scare anyway.
I learned about horror cinema and TV from the pages of books that covered the genre, and from Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine. There are a great many films that were celebrated as genre though you'd be hard pressed today to say whylike King Kong, The man Who Laughs, or the Hunchback of Notre Dame. There are also movies that are clearly children's films like The Mad Monster Party, or musicals like The Rocky Horror Picture Show, that are clearly not meant to scare but are aimed squarely at genre fans and that lovingly showcase horror icons or tropes.
I have a sense of the genre's history that I feel should be honored, and the sensibilities of some who would throw out time-honored or cherished films simply because they don't fit the narrow definition of not being frightening does a disservice to the genre, and disrespects it.
Essentially, a movie doesn't have to be strictly horror to earn a place in the genre. Tim Burton's family-friendly toons are allowed in the OC for good reason. -
Jono_Moffat — 9 years ago(November 07, 2016 01:25 AM)
My general rule of thumb (not scientifically proven or anything) is the intent of the film/film makers - is it intended to be scary (or otherwise 'horrify')? If yes, then I'll stick a horror label on it - even if it's tame or unscary by my standards. It can be blended with just about any other genre of course, and it may not be the primary genre, but if the intent is there, I'll give it a horror tag. I think, and I haven't put a huge amount of though into this point, that what I'm referring to is the sense of danger/doom/threat that the narrative contains. Something along those lines, anyway - as I say, I haven't fully fleshed out that idea.
IMO horror is too wide a genre to be too narrow in the definition - it's an umbrella term that covers a vast array of sub-genres that are so broad that they could pretty much be genres in their own right.
Works for me, anyway. -
Johan_Wondering_on_Waves — 9 years ago(November 07, 2016 01:32 AM)
If only what scares me can be labeled horror I'm afraid there is not much I can call horror. If it is the movie's intention to horrify the viewer (that's where horror is derived from) it is horror. That can either be scaring or grossing the audience out. So that can be done by gore, paranormal, psychological, excessive violence, monsters, creatures or even just atmosphere. It is all so subjective. I am therefore quite lenient to accepting movies as horror.
To give an example. While the gore in a horror comedy like Bad Taste is neither scary nor funny to me, I'm sure it would gross out my 70 year old mother.
Once you have seen lots of horror and come in the phase of saying well that's not horror to me you have forgotten what it was like before you actually became a horror fan IMO.
So not even us horror fans can answer this question truthfully. Just like comedy horror is subjective. It is about the intention though. If that is to horrify the audience it is horror, if it is to make them laugh it is comedy? And if it is both it is horror comedy
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begob — 9 years ago(November 07, 2016 06:22 AM)
The usual conclusion is that it's all subjective, but I think a horror movie has to sport these badges:
The characters go through the looking glass: losing the map in BWP, all work and no play, the call's coming from inside the house.
On the other side there's an external threat of death. Internal can blur with external, but at the risk of ending in "it was all a dream". The Babadook's post-script is a clumsy example of having its cake and eating it, whereas the final photo in The Shining works perfick for me.
The threat rules the other side, where normal rules don't apply. Is that a girl crawling out of the TV screen, you say? And the dead have arisen? Flurkin' hell!
I wouldn't go further than that, so you can see the same elements in the weirder thrillers and war movies. But that's the minimum for a horror. -
ZakkWyldeMyLittlePony — 9 years ago(November 07, 2016 12:27 PM)
I'd list films such as (just to name a few) and I know these are obvious picks, but:
Silence of the Lambs
Se7en
The Sixth Sense
Halloween
Carrie
Dracula
Frankenstein
The Exorcist
Rosemary's Baby
Evil Dead
Metallica, Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, and My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fan