Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

Ah. The Masterpiece finally lands.

Never thought of it as a slasher. Slasher, to me, is not a movie that has a human killer in it, that is so insanely broad it could include thousands of movies going back a hundred years. For many, one could say "I can't define a Slasher but I know it when I see it", and that is fine too, I kinda feel that way a bit, and I don't see it with TCM. But I really subscribe to a more specific point of view on this particular topic.
To me, Slasher is a form, like the sonnet or the Blues. Certainly, hundreds of films fit into this form and we've come to know it so well that "we know it when we see it".
And TCM sure ain't in that form.

Spinning plates on sticks, as in giving the general audience exactly what it already knew it was getting? Operating on a regimented tradition. Relying on little than muscle memory and maybe a little flourish and bow to the crowd at the end of it all?


Hmmmm. Doesn't sound like something I would like much either.

Weird. For me, it's like, "Yup, this feels like a slasher to me. I don't even know why it doesn't feel like one to other people."

Well, that, as my mother used to say, is what makes the World go 'round.

For me, JB is his most restrained work, with his usual penchant for over self indulgence that we would see in in his later films, absent.

Probably would rank his films something like this:
Jackie Brown
Pulp Fiction
Inglorious Basterds (don’t hate!)
Kill Bill vol 1
Kill Bill vol 2
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Hateful Eight
Django
Death Proof

I abstained from adding Reservoir Dogs, as it’s been around 25 years since I’ve seen it and I am long overdue for a rewatch. Time has wiped it mostly clean from my memory banks.

1) Kill Bill
2) Pulp Fiction
3) Jackie Brown

4) Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
5) Django Unchained

6) Hateful 8
7) Death Proof
8) Reservoir Dogs
9) Inglorious Basterds

For me, the key point of distinction is that most of the other iconic slashers tend to operate alone (e.g. Michael, Freddy, Jason) whereas Leatherface is always part of a family unit - not only that, he's frequently characterised as a mentally challenged manchild who follows the whims of his much more lucid (if still criminally insane) relatives while other slashers have more personal motives.

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

Again, I think it's a very stylishly-directed movie, but there's still only so much Hooper could do to keep it from becoming tiresome when literally half of it is nothing but watching one character screaming, getting chased around, and tortured the whole time, you know?

Anyway, to do some catching up here, I also have to say that I'm super-happy to see Jackie Brown in this thread, being that it's my current favorite Tarantino (as you can see here), since it's the least self-indulgent of his movies to date, and has the most of what he's best at (that being character development), and I really wish he had continued more in this direction post-millinieum, instead of regressing and doubling down on embracing some of his worst tendencies since then, even though he has made a couple of good movies post-2000.

Quick question. How many of those who see TCM as a slasher are from N. America?

I suspect there might be a cultural side to this as there is with other 'horror' films (not that I'm saying TCM isn't a horror) but in the early years of my internet experience I had quite a few discussions about Silence Of The Lambs and whether it's a horror film. It isn't, btw. And in later years, Se7en (which really isn't) and Aliens (which I've said more than enough on over the years and, for the love of God trust me on this one, it isn't) but most of the people I've had these discussions with were from N. America. I don't know if it's to do with the way we consumed movies back then (in N. America you had big chains across the continent, so everything was categorised the same. I don't know about elsewhere but in the UK it was primarily independent video shops), that more N. Americans were online back then, the way they were written about or something else?

It might just be a time thing and as US entertainment and standards have spread, so has their view of what things are. Or it could simply be that sub-genres are even less defined than genres and, therefore, people have different standards/restrictions as to what fits where? I don't know, but I do find it interesting. Unlike TCM, which I don't.

Never has the line "Shut that ****s mouth before I come over there and ****-start her head." been more apt.

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5-time MoFo Award winner.

If we want to be technically precise (and why would we want to be that in a discussion about an art form), Silence of the Lambs and Seven are thrillers. Aliens is an action movie.



But art is all about cross-pollination, and all three of those movies have picked up seeds from the horror genre. Meaning that, fans of horror can find something of interest in them.



Fighting battles over defending genre boundaries has always been a bit of a waste of time as far as I'm concerned. Labels are for marketers. Sure, they can be a guideline on what we might want to watch on any given night, but the greater overall effect they have is to divide audiences up into subgroups. Makes people dogmatic about what they want to see their genre films do. Which is what allows genres to stagnate. Which opens the door for us who are fans of horror (or comedy or romance or whatever it may be) to just keep our mouths open while they keep shovelling us the same shit over and over again.


No thanks.


Also TCM is effectively a slasher, in that people who enjoy slashers are going to find a lot of what they want in it. But it came long before, so it doesn't really conform to any of those stupid rules. What TCM actually is is an art film, borderline experimental tonally. A mood piece. Which is why Stu is always going to be wrong about his complaint that there is too much running and screaming

I don't know, when my friends and I are being chainsaw-massacred, I like to take an occasional breather. Take in the situation, have a granola bar or something. The running and screaming is another option of course, but I prefer to be chainsaw-massacred quietly. Who has the energy to be running from chainsaws all day and night?

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Captain's Log
My Collection

It's like jazz. It's the chainsaws you don't hear.

Well, I mean, if by technically precise, we refuse to use slashes when applying our genre tag descriptions. Sounds like someone did a poor job programming a movie site if they did that though.

Also the entire movie is on land, which is the lesser part of the film compared to the non-existent part of the movie that's out in the ocean.

Wooly and I are both United Statesers. I think it's more because I associate Leatherface with Jason, Michael, and Freddy (and I always hear those three listed as slashers), and I can't take the term 'slasher' literally in the instrument of death because of Jason* and Freddy.

*: The amount of head crushing, pitchfork stabbing, axe-cleaving, and harpoon firing he does in the early ones...

Puts Honeykid on list of people who I don't trust for genre-classification.
Apparently not nearly as bad as Wooly when it comes to comedy though.

I've been fortunate enough to see David Byrne perform live twice, both times involving a considerable cross-section of songs from his time as frontman of iconic art-rock outfit Talking Heads. Both times made for some of the best live music I've ever experienced, but I can't help but wonder how it would've felt to experience the Heads at the peak of their powers. At least we have Stop Making Sense to serve as a vibrant document of the band touring their commercial breakout album Speaking in Tongues. Not content to simply intensify their genre-bending approach to New Wave through an electrifying performance by an expanded nine-piece ensemble, Byrne collaborates with Demme to develop a distinctly cinematic approach to the concert film that begins with the musicians slowly trickling in over the first few numbers and then crafting all manner of elaborate (or even pointedly minimal in the case of "Once in a Lifetime") numbers that are designed to be captured in as visually arresting a manner as possible. The oversized business suit used in "Girlfriend Is Better" rightfully became iconic for emphasising the nervy and absurd nature of the band's lyrics, but Byrne dancing with a floor lamp in "This Must Be The Place" underscores that song's own simple delights so very well. There's not even any slowing down proceedings for interviews or backstage footage, just a pure replication of the concert experience. Story time: I saw this in theatres a couple of years ago and heard some people try to clap after every number - at first nobody else joined in, but it didn't take long before everyone decided to stop making sense and clap for a forty-year-old concert. That's movie (and music) magic right there.

2005 ranking: N/A
2013 ranking: #48

Stop Making Sense is the rare film that is composed of pure joy.

I guess, Jason, Michael, and Freddy all came after Leatherface and they are the sole antagonists in their films. What Leatherface is is something else entirely. I think the other three have a lot more in common and are part of the Slasher movement while I think Leatherface and TCM pre-dates it and is something else entirely.

I have so much love for this film.