Can Someone Explain Horror Movies?

by onesong 39 Replies latest jw friends

  • katiekitten
    katiekitten

    I think people who have experienced genuine horror for real do not find horror movies entertaining.

    Its a luxury to be able to watch violence and evil as a form of entertainment and enjoyment. If you lived in Iraq or Afghanistan or anywhere where evil and violence were a part of daily life you might want some other form of escape in your spare time.

  • Crumpet
    Crumpet

    As a major horror movie fan I get asked that a lot. I think perhaps esw1966 has the most accurate pschyological description - that life could be worse -

    I could be having my entrails ripped out from my rear end(The Legend of Sam Hain), I could be being having my eye removed without the benefit of anasthetic (Hostel), I could be on a "team bonding" corporate weekend and end up gettign tied to a tree, dowsed with petrol and presented with a flamethrower (Severance), I could end up getting roasted alive on a sun bed as a result of my vanity and carelessness (Final Destination 3), I could be celebrating new year on a cruise a ship dancing away and get sliced in half by a loose wire (Ghost Ship), I could have my ham strings severed and left to drown in a lake (Mr Vengeance), I could have my toe bitten off by a mad Irish imp (Leprechaun 3)....

    The list is endless - I watch horror for the same reason people watch Steve Martin or Billy Crytsal movies - they make me laugh and they make me feel better. There are no surprises in horror movies - hey follow a predictable pattern and story line - just the way the people die varies. I've always been into this since I was a little girl and saw my first "gory" scene in a Miss Marple drama of a maid murdered and pegged to a washing line in the dark. I have an appalling memory ofr most things but I bet I can tell you how every character dies in every horror movie made since 1980. Maybe that should be my chosen subject for Mastermind!

  • katiekitten
    katiekitten

    But Crumpy my darling thats silly. Of course none of those things would really happen to you.

    And I think people who say horror movies make them laugh have just been desensitised to violence, and IMO I think thats a really bad thing.

  • R6Laser
    R6Laser

    I think people who have experienced genuine horror for real do not find horror movies entertaining.

    Its a luxury to be able to watch violence and evil as a form of entertainment and enjoyment. If you lived in Iraq or Afghanistan or anywhere where evil and violence were a part of daily life you might want some other form of escape in your spare time.

    Not really. I'm in Afghanistan living in a military base and myself and plenty of soldiers and contractors enjoy to watch horror movies, or violent movies in our time off. And we get attacked almost on a daily bases with bombings or rocket attacks so violence is pretty much a part of our daily lives. Now the afghanis might be a completely different thing, they don't have any tv's in their houses. So to the afghanis that don't even have tv's of course they are not going to see it.

    But I'm sure if an afghani were given a chance to see a horror movie he would definitely sit down and watch it. There are some local afghanis that actually work on base and when they walk by a place with a tv that's turned on they stop and watch it in amazement.

    Liking horror, or comedy movies has to do with the simple fact that people are different. Therefore different people like different things. There's nothing wrong with someone who doesn't like horror or violence type movies. Just as there's nothing wrong with someone not liking comedy or romance type movies. It all boils down to personal preference and nothing else.

  • Crumpet
    Crumpet

    Many horror movies I've watched are intended as comedies. Severance is hilarious - although you'd have to watched lots of horror movies to get some of the gags in it I guess...

    And some horror movies do have a distinct message and use this format to get it across. Hostel for example was a damning movie about American isolationsim and how they are not necessarily welcome as tourists everywhere.

    See it's not all mindless violence... and crumpet needs something to distract her whilst doing the ironing!

  • bronzefist
    bronzefist

    I love horrror movies. I've seen all but one that Crumpet has listed. I don't consider myself as "sick" or "twisted". These are just movies...not real....special effects. All those actors that were horribly "butchered" laughed all the way to the bank. If you want real horror... imagine yourself in most of the scenes of the Hebrew Scriptures or as "bird food" during the great and wonderful day of God Almighty. Just my blood stained 2 cents.

    brzfst

  • under_believer
    under_believer

    For me it's all about the zombies. I can't really explain it but zombies are awesome. A recently good zombie movie (that actually had a point to make, as well) was 28 Days Later. I recommend, as long as you don't mind seeing people (sort of people) get shot, hacked to death with machetes, de-eyeballed, etc.

  • MsMcDucket
    MsMcDucket

    I have always loved horror movies from Dracula to Frankenstein to Saw I & II. Blood and gore doesn't bother me, I guess that's why I'm a nurse. It's something about the psyche of it all. I mean like in "Play Misty for Me" that woman was straight crazy! Then the thought of the supernatural and how humans fall prey to it, like in the "The Skeleton Key". The supernatural movies scare me the most. Those are the one that make me jump in the middle of the night or make me really wonder if it could happen. The Exorcist scared me out of my skin. I read the bible for days after reading the book. I had to come up with a resolve for my conflict. I thought that if there's an evil supernatural being that there must be a good supernatural being.

    The movie 9mm showed how absolute power (money and such) can degrade the person's mind. It showed the affect that it had on the main characters view of the world, and how much he was willing to go threw to make it right.

    Oh, in The Skeleton Key, I liked when the main character said I don't believe in Hoodoo, and how the other lady said "then I suggest you leave before you do".

    I hate it when the bad guy wins, but it happens in real life. There are so many people that literally get away with murder.

  • MsMcDucket
    MsMcDucket

    I think people who have experienced genuine horror for real do not find horror movies entertaining.

    I don't know about that. I grew up in a very dysfunctional household (I will not go into details), but I will say that when I was around 5 years old, I saw a man get beat in the head with a hammer.

  • onesong
    onesong

    Thank you all for your input. I do have a friend who loves horror movies and this is a woman who took part in the cleanup of the Oklahoma City bombings and it didn't bother her at all.

    I am amazed at the variety of human experience and perspective. I know that with my makeup I could never be a paramedic or a mortician but the world needs em' and I'm glad for em'.

    It truly feels great to not judge anyone but to try to understand EVERYONE.

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