A scary thing happened on the way to the Movie Forums - Horrorcrammers

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My opinion is that your opinion is on-point.
I waited a long time to see this movie, when I did it was nothing like what I was expecting, it had even weirder curve balls than I had planned for, and I ended up liking it a lot.
Also, I was really pretty impressed with Chuck Connors. Which is not a sentence I ever thought I'd write.
It was filed in my mind as an also-ran 80s slasher, so needless to say it was not at all what I assumed it would be despite starting with a car full of teens on vacation.



I liked my colonoscopy more than The Prowler.
What a strange, intimate thing to share with a slasher movie and I’m sorry it wasn’t as enamored with the procedure as you were. I’m sure you loved it very much.



Whoa---I didn't even connect them as the same character, yet kept wondering why her name sounded so familiar!



Such an insane sequence, LOL!
Yeah she was introduced in the Mr. Mercedes books and because everyone loves her King keeps shoehorning her into his other novels.



Yeah she was introduced in the Mr. Mercedes books and because everyone loves her King keeps shoehorning her into his other novels.
I mean, obviously the Holly in The Outsider is both aged up in presentation--she REALLY feels like a teenager in Mr. Mercedes--but also played by someone of a different race. I liked this iteration of her a lot more, though I did like the actress who played her in the Mr. Mercedes show.

There were times where she threatened to come across as a Mary Sue, but I think that the romance with her and Andy was a good choice because it gave her a vulnerability that felt earned.





Threads, 1984

In this documentary-style film, escalating tensions between world powers results in hundreds of megatons of nuclear material on the UK. Centering largely on a young, pregnant woman named Ruth (Karen Meagher), the film documents the increasingly futile efforts of the government to manage the crisis and of the citizens to deal with the fallout from the nuclear attack.

Just a little light viewing for a Saturday morning, LOL.

It's easy to see why this film made such a splash when it was first released, and why it continues to be an effective piece of storytelling. Fundamentally, this is a movie that understands that any horror you put on screen will hit twice as heard if you actually care about the people on screen.

Threads spends a long stretch of runtime at the beginning of the film letting us get to know Ruth and her boyfriend, her family, and the other locals who will be important to the story.

What is most striking about centering the film on Ruth and her family is just how little power they have over anything that happens. When two locals watch the news and one of them remarks on his increasing anxiety, the other replies that there's no point worrying because they have no control over events.

The horror of the events in the film isn't just in their immediacy, but in the impossibility of recovery from them. Ruth survives the nuclear attack, but at what cost? Alone and pregnant, she is forced to grapple with her day-to-day survival while also contemplating what it means for her unborn child.

A haunting film, and it's amazing to think it was a made-for-TV affair.






Threads, 1984

In this documentary-style film, escalating tensions between world powers results in hundreds of megatons of nuclear material on the UK. Centering largely on a young, pregnant woman named Ruth (Karen Meagher), the film documents the increasingly futile efforts of the government to manage the crisis and of the citizens to deal with the fallout from the nuclear attack.

Just a little light viewing for a Saturday morning, LOL.

It's easy to see why this film made such a splash when it was first released, and why it continues to be an effective piece of storytelling. Fundamentally, this is a movie that understands that any horror you put on screen will hit twice as heard if you actually care about the people on screen.

Threads spends a long stretch of runtime at the beginning of the film letting us get to know Ruth and her boyfriend, her family, and the other locals who will be important to the story.

What is most striking about centering the film on Ruth and her family is just how little power they have over anything that happens. When two locals watch the news and one of them remarks on his increasing anxiety, the other replies that there's no point worrying because they have no control over events.

The horror of the events in the film isn't just in their immediacy, but in the impossibility of recovery from them. Ruth survives the nuclear attack, but at what cost? Alone and pregnant, she is forced to grapple with her day-to-day survival while also contemplating what it means for her unborn child.

A haunting film, and it's amazing to think it was a made-for-TV affair.

Yeah, that one is very horrifying.
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I liked my colonoscopy more than The Prowler.
The only point of comparison is that both were total ass. 😉



I watched the new Scream movie. It was fine, if a little too melodramatic at times, and has a weirdly edited third act. How many more “requels” are we getting before they fully reboot the franchise and call it Screamake?

WARNING: "Scream (2022) and Once Upon A Time in Hollywood" spoilers below
I can’t be the first to notice Mikey Madison was the killer in the third act of both Scream and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and was also set on fire in both of them.



I watched the new Scream movie. It was fine, if a little too melodramatic at times, and has a weirdly edited third act. How many more “requels” are we getting before they fully reboot the franchise and call it Screamake?

WARNING: "Scream (2022) and Once Upon A Time in Hollywood" spoilers below
I can’t be the first to notice Mikey Madison was the killer in the third act of both Scream and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and was also set on fire in both of them.
Hey, that gives me an idea for an awesome new Letterboxd list...







Creep, 2014

Aaron (Patrick Brice) is hired for a job on a remote mountaintop, where he is employed to spend a day or two filming Josef (Mark Duplass), who claims to be dying of brain cancer. Josef supposedly wants to document some of his life for his unborn child, Buddy. But it quickly becomes clear that all is not what it seems to be.

Creep already had one strike against it, namely that I am not the biggest fan of found footage films. While the movie did some things that I liked, overall I struggled with a lot of the character choices.

Duplass is suitably creepy as Josef, and I liked how the film portrayed the way that Josef immediately begins pushing boundaries with Aaron. It's one of many ways that the film leverages the fact that Aaron's character is a man and not a woman: we can just barely believe that Aaron would stay in a room with a man who, like ten minutes after they meet, strips naked in front of him.

The character of Aaron, though, is where the movie kind of falls apart for me. The entire first half--consisting of the escalating weirdness between the two men--squeaks by, if only because you can see how Josef manipulates Aaron.

But once we transition to a point where Aaron has returned home, it just doesn't wash. We watch a frustrating phone call that Aaron has with the police, unable to give them any concrete information about the man who is stalking him. But Aaron has no friends or family? Was this established and I totally missed it? I find it entirely unbelievable that Aaron wouldn't go to someone for help or reassurance. Further, I'm sorry, but
WARNING: spoilers below
Aaron going alone to an isolated spot and sitting with his back turned? No, absolutely not.


The movie tries to lampshade some of these issues, but I just don't buy it. Very much like horror movies that trade in poor character decision after poor character decision, there's an alienating effect that makes it harder to stick with Aaron as a protagonist.





Creep, 2014

But once we transition to a point where Aaron has returned home, it just doesn't wash. We watch a frustrating phone call that Aaron has with the police, unable to give them any concrete information about the man who is stalking him. But Aaron has no friends or family? Was this established and I totally missed it? I find it entirely unbelievable that Aaron wouldn't go to someone for help or reassurance. Further, I'm sorry, but
WARNING: spoilers below
Aaron going alone to an isolated spot and sitting with his back turned? No, absolutely not.


I've seen some arguments that
WARNING: "Creep" spoilers below
he's giving in and intentionally getting himself killed at that moment, which makes for something interesting to think about but ultimately doesn't change much.

You gonna watch 2?



I've seen some arguments that
WARNING: "Creep" spoilers below
he's giving in and intentionally getting himself killed at that moment, which makes for something interesting to think about but ultimately doesn't change much.
That would be a neat theory, but I feel it's very thinly supported by what comes before it. We don't see any signs that Aaron
WARNING: spoilers below
is really depressed or wants to die, nor is he so obsessed with Josef that it makes sense he'd sacrifice himself for him. As of 30 minutes left in the film, he's calling the police to report Josef. So when did this miraculous suicidal impulse appear?

And if he wanted to die, why the talk about being ready to call 911?

If the film had really played up Aaron as being depressed and isolated, it could have worked. He and Josef would essentially be "solving" each other's needs, like that case where the guy wanted to be eaten and the other guy killed and ate him.

But that angle would require more, for lack of a better word, passion on Aaron's part. Instead we only see that from one side, Josef. Several of the parts also point to a romantic/sexual fixation--undressing in front of him, all the hugging, the heart locket, etc--but we get zero of that from Aaron's side of things.

It does seem like he just let himself be killed, but there's absolutely no logic to it so it's annoying, not profound.


You gonna watch 2?
Is it on par with this one, better, or worse?



Outside of a bad opening scene, Creep 2 is far superior to the first and one of the reasons is a complete lack of Aaron (on screen. He still directs)



I liked Duplass in it, but otherwise found Creep obnoxious and awful and pretty much never tense.



I liked Duplass in it, but otherwise found Creep obnoxious and awful and pretty much never tense.
I agree with the lack of tension. And what tension there was often felt so manufactured. Like several times that Aaron should have just left the house but instead decided to go exploring?

At least it mostly managed to skirt being homophobic, which the rare film about men being obsessed with another man often grapples with. Though I think it mainly accomplishes that by having Aaron almost totally lack normal human emotions or literally any other humans in his life, so . . .



Outside of a bad opening scene, Creep 2 is far superior to the first and one of the reasons is a complete lack of Aaron (on screen. He still directs)
Is it also found footage style?



Is it also found footage style?
Yes but it has a pretty good hook that completely changes the dynamic of the movie. Feels like a more realistic version (though less good) of Behind the Mask.



Victim of The Night
It's funny that Creep gets so much buzz when I've never talked to anyone who actually really likes it.
Pretty much everybody rates it between a 5 and a 7 and yet it appears on lists all the time and gets watched and discussed a lot.
Ima save my 90 minutes.