| Author | Message | ||
     John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.208.214.50 |
So I went into this this afternoon my usual cynical self and to my utter delight came out shaking, which hasn’t happened in a very long time. I’m sure I’ve said this before but every now and then a film comes along that reaffirms your faith in being a horror film fan. It’s also nice to be reminded of what an utter pleasure it is to be placed in the hands of a director who actually knows what he’s doing. Admittedly it took a while to get going and the plot wasn’t hugely original but by the time The Orphanage reached the halfway mark, with a séance so beautifully constructed it had me on the edge of my seat half scared silly, half marvelling at the delicious way the scene had been orchestrated to wring maximum suspense out of the situation, I didn’t care. After that the director had us well and truly on his side and every ‘cliché’ from breaking glass to a banging door had myself and the packed cinema audience I watched it with jumping a mile. The bit near the end that echoes the children’s game that opens the picture is just one of a number of camera setups that are so brilliantly staged I want to watch the film again. Add one of those endings that’s actually utterly heartbreaking (but only when you start thinking about it) and I thought this film was genuinely classy stuff. It also made a nice change to leave a cinema surrounded by people saying “That was fucking brilliant”. Because it was. One of the best horror pictures I’ve seen in the last ten years. Please go and see it everyone - it deserves to be a hit. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
I've heard good things about this too, if it's what I think it is. Good to ehar the good news about it. And the unfortunate news is that it's going to be remade for Hollywood, with the main man acting as producer but not redirecting. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.189.60 |
The bit that echoes the game is so brilliant it had me in tears, especially when we catch a glimpse of the first ghostly kid. I will certainly go and see this picture a second time. Highly recommended. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.94.94 |
I'm on to it John. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 61.216.32.33 |
I'm glad you enjoyed it as much as I did, John - I had a feeling you would! I posted about this the other day in another thread, so I'll just copy what I wrote there: I went to see THE ORPHANAGE yesterday, and on the whole I really liked it. I was confused about a couple of things, but that was probably due to me being a bit woozy (I'm fighting off the flu and a throat infection at the moment) and the fact that the film was in Spanish with Chinese subtitiles (I can read them, but the speed with which some of them came and went meant that I may have missed something important). Like THE NAMELESS and DARKNESS before it, this was another well-made, creepy Spanish horror film. It wasn't exactly original, to be sure - there are moments which bring to mind many other horror films, such as POLTERGEIST, THE OTHERS, and THE CHANGELING, to name a few - but it was handled with such intelligence and craftsmanship that it didn't really matter to me in the end how original it was. There was a real sense of brooding horror in many of the scenes which took place in the titular building itself, as well as a couple that took place outside the orphanage. A couple of scenes set inside a cave on the beach near the orphanage were very effective, and another scene that was set on a busy city road provided probably the biggest 'shock'-style scare in the film (even if this kind of scene has become a bit of a cliche by now). One of my favourite scenes involved a live, videotaped seance held in the orphanage. It was nerve-wracking, to say the least. In the end the film was almost as poignant as it was frightening, not an easy combination to pull off well, I think. I won't spoil it by going into details, but THE ORPHANAGE was a good, solid haunted house movie, the best of its type in some years, in my opinion. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.16.77.112 |
Yes, John, refer to my earlier - er, archived post on same, what a wonderful film this was. And you forgot to mention how utterly Ramsey-Campbellian it was too! (To me, at least.) The ending is truly disturbing. What I love, without giving spoilers, is that it made you, the viewer, figure out "what happened" in the A-story (two stories here, another richness I liked - the attempt to achieve a novel-like feel), through its THE SIXTH SENSE-like flashback-cutting; instead of filling in every single gap completely with that back-cutting, like other lesser films.... It does seem to pass the mantle of greatness to the Spanish directors in horror, whose films are all flawed to one degree or another, but are clearly delving into horror in a very serious way. | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.199.0.31 |
I agree there are flaws, but there are so many spendid touches that you forgive them. The road accident scene is a masterful example of a stinger that only those of us who have sat through a thousand mishandled examples can truly appreciate. What's a kid's worst nightmare? To be told they're adopted? Of that they're going to die? Or that they're going to lose their parents? Why not just wrap up all three together in a dialogue scene that is so unassuming it gets under your skin before you realise. And you don't realise it's dug its claws in until later. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.189.60 |
To me the ending is simply perfect. The children want a new nanny, and by gum, they get one. Storyline A meets storyline B. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.180.224 |
I'm still affected by this film nearly a week after seeing it. I was thinking about it before going to sleep last night, and I woke up later with a distinct shivery feeling. I don't know if I dreamed specifically of the film, but it certainly affected me. It's the creepiest thing I've seen in quite some time - possibly since DARK WATER and KAIRO. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.189.60 |
In DARK WATER, too, the spectral child is merely looking for affection. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.69.121.100 |
Went to see this last night and... wow! Like John said it retreads some old ground with haunted house motifs but it does them so bloody well. This is the single best horror film I've seen in years. The plot was well worked out, the characters sympathetically portrayed and the horror well paced. The conclusion is heartbreaking, chilling and slightly bleak (but in a good way.) I urge peoples to go and see this, it's just brilliant. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.193.32 |
Yep, I agree, Jonathan. I've been thinking about this film a lot since seeing it, and would like to see it again. I've been reading interviews with the director, and he really seems to be coming from the right place as far as horror is concerned. It'll be interesting to see what he follows this up with. Have you seen DARKNESS? That was another decent Spanish horror film, by the director of LOS SIN NOMBRE (THE NAMELESS, based on Ramsey's novel), Jaume Balaguero. Balaguero's latest film is [Rec], which I am dying to see. Anyone here seen it? | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.47 |
Huw - I'm off to see [REC] today, all being well | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.47 |
Oh, and next week they're showing something called WOMAN OF THE DUNES - apparently an 'unusually cruel' Japanese thriller from 1964 about an entomologist who is 'forced to cohabit with a desirable but inarticulate woman in an escap-proof sandpit by mysterious tribal villagers'. Have you heard of that one? | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.156.247 |
WOMAN OF THE DUNES is excellent, John - reminded me of Samuel Beckett for some reason when I saw it a long time ago. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.193.32 |
Yes, WOMAN OF THE DUNES is excellent. PITFALL, by the same director (Hiroshi Teshigahara) is worth seeing too. Let us know how [Rec] was, Lord P! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Is Balaguero's FRAGILE any good? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0422272/ | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 61.216.36.144 |
Zed, I ordered FRAGILE about a week ago, so I'll let you know what it's like. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Good man! i only ask because it's cheap on Play.com and I liked the man's previous films. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.65.204 |
Let's hope it turns up in one piece. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
Spoilers contained I finally got to see this last night and loved it. I agree with most of the comments above - a touch slow to get going but brilliant when it does. The childrens game toward the end was one of mighlights, along with the very brief flashbacks to explain what happened to the boy and how it was all her fault. When you realise that the knocking on the wall from mid way through wasn't part of the ghost story... That's a hugely clever piece of film making, to show the solution to the mystery element in plain view but trick the audience into thinking it's the ghosts... that's mean but fantastic | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.157.91.38 |
S'got bloody Calista bloody Flockhart in it though. | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.170.200.175 |
That girl needs a good meal inside her. gcw | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
She isn't in The Orphanage - Mick, you're thinking of that other ghost film set in an orphanage. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.157.91.38 |
Sorry, I was thinking Weber was still talking about FRAGILE, 'cos the messages above his were about that (although I know the thread is about THE ORPHANAGE!). I must admit I was surprised as I thought Weber was giving a great write-up to FRAGILE... | ||
| John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.110 |
Calista Flockhart DOES need a few good meals inside her though | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.157.91.38 |
Indeed she does. Just been watching INCENSE FOR THE DAMNED - Imogen Hassall had more of a shape than Flockhart, that's for sure! | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
I wondered what you were blathering on about Mick. I was indeed talking about thet title movie of this thread. Do you think if you got hold of seth Brundle's machines and put Kate Moss and callista Flockhart both in one of them, you'd get a full size woman out of the other? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.224.180 |
I think the result might rather look like Martin's dog in The Fly II - after the treatment  | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
Sigh. I've just watched Orphanage and feel ... shruggy. Too familiar, the drama not amazing drama and the spook stuff not amazing spook stuff. It was OK, and with a 3 cheese topper ending. Where is that Innocents and The Haunting poetry? That feel? Will we never ever see it again? Will any films ever have a 'feel', never mind horrors?  Cuaron is still my favourite Spaniard. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Boy, you're hard to please. I thought THE ORPHANAGE was an excellent film. The drama was moving; the spooky stuff was thrilling (the peek-a-boo game was sublime). One moment (the car "accident") even shocked me. Jaume Balagueró is my favourite of the current new crop of Spanish directors. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
Ha! I am. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.208.65 |
Just sent you an email agreeing with you, Tony. Apart from a total of about 100 seconds, it's mostly Hollywood bullshit. The lack of subtlety is hilarious. The "spooky" noises in the house sounded like a mammoth was on a bouncy castle in the attic. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.208.65 |
Goya's my favourite Spaniard. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.247.19 |
I say, take it where you can get it. About half THE ORPHANAGE's storyline was superb, pushing the acceptable/conventional limits of horror in film... but, as Proto points out, film is not just story; Tony's right, THE INNOCENTS and (the original) THE HAUNTING were films first (as their source material were stories first - let alone, always). THE ORPHANAGE is not a bad film, imho, it's a very good one. But no, not if you compare it to the best of the genre.... | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
But not every film can be the best of the genre. It's like dismissing every novelist apart from Ramsey because the rest are not Ramsey. As for Proto's "Hollwood bullshit" quote: I totally disagree. For a start, it's Spanish. :-) Sometimes I despair on here. Glossy Hollywood rubbish like the Harry Potter films get praised to high heaven, while a good little chiller like this is slated. Films like The Haunting and The Innocents were products of their times, when audiences were willing to be challanged and watch a different kind of film. We'll never, ever see their likes again. Even blatant copies (or homage, if you like) like The Others amp up the pace and stick in a few crowd-pleasing moments to satisfy modern audiences. Rant over. :-) | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.163.48.186 |
Glossy Hollywood rubbish like the Harry Potter films get praised to high heaven... Come on everybody, own up - which of you has been praising the Potter films? | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.154 |
"As for Proto's "Hollwood bullshit" quote: I totally disagree. For a start, it's Spanish. :-) " I'm talking about sensibility, not geography. This thing even has a TEAM AMERICA montage bit near the end with "getting ready/meaning business" type music. Ghastly. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
I like the Potter films! Orphanage was quite slick you know. Azkaban had more spooky-dookyness, atmosphere, and was actually more affecting. It's more possible to go to the Azkaban movie in your dreams than the Orphanage; it was nicely photographed, had no sense of a big dark universe operating out of shot, like I said about Hellboy. Sixth Sense was better, and The Others, and even they weren't up to The Innocents standards. This film had no ambiguity, no magic. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.189.95 |
I hear you, Zed! How anyone can prefer Harry Potter and the like over The Orphanage and Hellboy 2 is beyond me. Aaargh! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
This thing even has a TEAM AMERICA montage bit near the end with "getting ready/meaning business" type music. Ghastly Are we talking about the same film here? I have no recollection of this whatsoever. I'm talking about sensibility, not geography. I know. I was just messing with ya. :-) | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.238.203 |
Well, as much as I liked the film, I have to agree about the noises - I remember doors being shut sounding like cannons going off. I wouldn't say the film is Hollywood fodder, though. It definitely has a European sense to it; those of you who have seen Almodovar films might even think it has a large amount of Spanish sensibility to it. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.154 |
"Are we talking about the same film here? I have no recollection of this whatsoever." When she's preparing the orphanage near the end. It's like an A-Team montage. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Ah. Well, that's just personal perception - I didn't see it that way at all. Once again, I think what we're all debating here is personal taste. Which, of course, can never really be changed by debate. For example, I think the Harry Potter films are derivative commercial tripe, but still enjoy them on that level. Tony, however, seems to see something more in them. Neither of us is wrong: it's just personal taste and perception. To borrow a phrase from GF, we all fuse our own horizons with those of certain filmmakers. | ||
| John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.253.174.81 |
I can't believe people are finding such funny little things wrong with this film, but I agree with Zed above - it's a matter of personal taste. Also in my experience horror fans as a whole (and this certainly goes for me) tend to be quite forgiving as they want to enjoy something rather than find fault with it, hence my comments at the top of the thread - there are lots of loud bangy creaky noises but by then Balaguero had me on board so I was more than happy to go alond with what he was doing rather than find fault with it. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
I actually applauded with that bit near the end, where they echo the childrens' game By myself. Ina dark living room. :-) I'm going to watch this again tonight - I'm in the mood for it now. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.185.143 |
I think I'll watch it again too. Come to think of it, I still haven't finished that Six Films to Keep You Awake boxset... | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.236.61 |
I did cringe at some of the "film" elements of THE ORPHANAGE. But overall, it succeeded, and (flipside) not partially because of its strong, character-rich storyline. By comparison, the powerful storyline overwhelms its film, frankly, in THE NAMELESS; but that oversight just makes Mr. Campbell the author richer and better known, the ultimate plus. THE INNOCENTS, for horror, most finely fused film and story... but what a story! And what a film! There's been consensus recently that, thanks to Peter Jackson, the LOTR films exquisitely fused film and story - having seen HEAVENLY CREATURES and not yet LOTR at the time, I believed it was going to be a given. But I think the LOTR series fell down: ultimately, because Jackson (the film-maker) was poisonously too self-aware... but upon reflection, also because: the LOTR story just isn't rich enough - not the particular kind of character richness that film most excels in. When you fuse great filmmakers, with great material, you get the summit. THE ORPHANAGE comes close... and we're not in the 70's anymore, when there was so much truly great stuff to compete with... so this Spanish film is practically an instant classic by default.... | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.178.71 |
The Lord of the Rings films were a triumphant success, I thought. There were some missteps, certainly, but overall it's hard to imagine anyone doing a better job with them. I also disagree with you about the story (have you read the books, Craig?). I think it is very 'rich' indeed. | ||
| Lincoln_brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 58.165.11.223 |
Not that it matters, but 'The Orphanage' is not a Jaume Balagueró film.  I enjoyed 'The Orphanage', but thought that 'Darkness' and 'REC' were much better. I hope Balagueró makes a few more horror films before leaving the genre. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Well, The Others is hardly an imitation or even just a homage, any more than The Innocents or The Haunting exist in a vacuum - they're all part of an honourable tradition. The Wise film in particular applies the techniques he learned under Val Lewton, and it's possible to find them a little overstated (rather like Lovecraft in the very few tales where he uses "indescribable" horrors) in the later film. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.178.71 |
Indeed, The orphanage is the work of a relative newcomer, Juan Antonio Bayona. I hope his next project is as good. I agree with you about Balaguero, Lincoln. I'd love to see him trying his hand at another story or novel of Ramsey's. He changed quite a lot of things in his adaptation of The Nameless, but it's a good film that (in my opinion) remains faithful to the spirit of the book. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.204.184 |
Here I go again, but The Haunting does nothing for me. The Orphanage is just stitched-together cliches. Del Toro's fumbling fingerprints are all over it: he hasn't realised that you can't use expressionistic surroundings with a cast of realistic characters. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
I use The Haunting and The Innocents as good examples, off the top of my head, and because they stand out. Orphanage for me isn't so much a problem for the use of familiar elements but because it just did nothing for me - the placing of camera detracted from mood and narrative, and times removed the viewer from the action - me, anyway. The Haunting isn't perfect, but it has a nice mood, a dreamlike feel to it. It helped that I saw it very young and half asleep, late at night, and did not see the beginning or the end of it; it felt like a dream and so now has a patina of such for me, so feels more authentic than maybe my eyes tell me it really is these days. Maybe i'm too old but the Orphanage just left me cold - I was not transported anywhere, or even really frightened. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.199.66 |
I love The Innocents -- watch the extras on the new BFI disc, Tony. You'll love Capote's ideas that didn't make escape the page. I watched The Haunting directly after finishing the book, so maybe it suffered from that. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Proto - clearly you and I have utterly differing tastes. I've just rewatched THE ORPHANAGE, and was actually wrong about it. It isn't merely very good, it's bloody excellent. Everything about the film works for me: the setting, the characters, the scares, the pathos. It's not only a ghost story, but also a fine meditation on loss, grief, love, and the fact that what haunts us most in life is our own failures. The seance scene is breathtaking. The ending is sublime and gave me goosepimples. The lead actress gives a terrific performance, and even the kid is good. "you can't use expressionistic surroundings with a cast of realistic characters" Oh, I couldn't disagree more.The use of realistic characters in expressionistic surroundings grounds the film, makes it real, makes it exist beyond the screen. I honestly think that if you can't see the quality here, I'm dumfounded. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Well, The Others is hardly an imitation or even just a homage, any more than The Innocents or The Haunting exist in a vacuum - they're all part of an honourable tradition. Okay, you're right on that score, Ramsey. I actually like THE OTHERS a lot. The other two are IMHO the greatest ghost stories ever filmed. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.199.66 |
What about GHOSTBUSTERS? | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
The Orphanage isn't a bad film - but I think we're just so relieved to find an ok horror that we're letting it off with far too much. It's pretty but clumsy, like all first steps. I wish the director well. I don't mind being in a minority for no being crazy on it btw... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
And I think it got so many good reviews because it's a horror that is at least a bit sensitive and thoughtful, and it took folk by surprise. But really, emotionally, it didn't strike me too deeply. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.16.77.246 |
I also disagree with you about the story (have you read the books, Craig?). I think it is very 'rich' indeed. Again, HUW, I was talking about a particular kind of character depth - the "inner arc" of the lead protagonist/s as a study in character. THE INNOCENTS and THE HAUNTING are both fantastic horror films... but they can also be looked at as something altogether different, something non-horrific (genre): their stories transcend genre. You don't have to look at them as horror stories at all because of the two female leads (both nominated for Academy Awards, right?... did they both win?... I might have that wrong), and their complex psychological journeys in these particular stories; stories which exist as it is, in their literary form, at the fringes of the genre. LOTR is very good, like THE ORPHANAGE is very good... but its characters are genre-bound, and in comparison to the films discussed (just because they're here), two-dimensional. The film is too aware of its being a film. To me, HEAVENLY CREATURES is superior to almost all 10 hours of LOTR: it is Jackson's crowning achievement, though LOTR is a nice dessert. (And yes, I've read LOTR, many years ago - and love it too!) | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.191.199 |
Tony, I see what you mean about being overly enthusiastic about a good spooky film coming all when there's been such a dearth of them. I thought The Orphanage was a good film, but I wouldn't call it a great one. Some of the reviewers in mags like SFX have just gone nuts about it, flinging around 5-star reviews as if they're nothing. The other day I picked up a mag and was disgusted to see Dreyer's Vampyr given a 3-star review, and misrepresented as 'another German Expressionist horror film' (or words to that effect). Next to it was a review of something called Robot Chicken: Star Wars, which was given 5 stars. Go figure... | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
For me, a film like THE ORPHANAGE is far more than a spooky film. With its themes of child murder, loss and regret, it resonanted with me very deeply. It gave me exactly what I demand from a horror film: more than simple scares. Huw, that's shocking about Dryer's film: now there's a true masterpiece. I can't stand this current backlash against LOTR, btw. Just go back and watch it - examine what an achievement it really is. Two-dimensional, my arse. :-) | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
"You don't have to look at them as horror stories at all because of the two female leads...and their complex psychological journeys in these particular stories; stories which exist as it is, in their literary form, at the fringes of the genre." Craig, why shouldn't we want to look at them as horror films? I say don't look at the trash as horror films; works like THE HAUNTING and THE INNOCENTS are exactly what horror films should be. Hollywood has progressively dragged the genre down to the level of tat; these films are proper horror films. They don't exist at the fringe of the genre: for me, they are the heart of the genre. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.191.199 |
Very well said, Zed (hey, it rhymes!). The Lord of the Rings films are a magnificent achievement, and anything but two-dimensional. They are among the richest films I've seen (in many ways), and unlike a great many other recent fantasy films that I could name, they possess real atmosphere, emotional depth, and a genuine sense of wonder. And I don't say that lightly: as far as I'm concerned, words like 'wonder', 'magic', and 'awe' are tossed around way too easily these days, to the point of trivialisation. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.191.199 |
"works like THE HAUNTING and THE INNOCENTS are exactly what horror films should be" Again, well said. For me, a horror film doesn't have to be literate or intelligent to succeed (hey, I'm the guy who has a soft spot for CHUD after all); but it helps, and I think the best ones have those qualities. I hate it when people complain about a film like Kurosawa's KAIRO or Nakata's DARK WATER (for example) not being a good horror film, and then lauding the latest Freddy or Jason film as if it were the very pinnacle of horror. For me the two afore-mentioned Japanese films are among the best of recent horror films, because they were not only scary as hell, but also because they had something to say (and said it in a subtle, intelligent way). I don't see why we should pretend that horror films are anything else - a lot of people seem to think these films are somehow more worthy if we label them dramas or 'psychological thrillers' or whatever. I believe horror can be as deep and as literate and as affecting as any other genre, including that nebulous entity 'the mainstream'. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
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| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 61.216.32.183 |
Is that the new author photo for your upcoming novel, Zed? ;-) | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
:-) It would be better than having my dodgy boatrace plaster on the dust jacket... | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
You have a lovely face Gary! Mmmmmmm.... Gary's face. (Actually I'm scaring myself now) I'll get my coat | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Aaaaaaaargh! :-) | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.236.6 |
I've just rented REC. Looking forward to this one... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
Did you like Cloverfield? It's better than that, but I still wasn't sure. Loads of really great things in it, though. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.238.129 |
Not much. Some bits were awesome (remember what that word used to mean?), but it was mostly ridiculous. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.3.160 |
HUW, it could be that I wanted so much out of LOTR, that it could only fail to achieve it... but no, there is no one on Earth that could have done LOTR better, imho. I shouldn't rag on it: like you say, it's a fantasy film - who am I to judge it on other standards? That's not fair. And HUW, and Zed: I'm just saying, someone who has zero interest in "horror," could watch THE HAUNTING as a 100% non-horror film - as a complex psychological study, the slow, spiral unravelling of a deeply sexually-repressed individual: it's closer, in so many ways, to THE HEIRESS, than to THE HAUNTING. The greatest films in the genre, surpass the genre, I think.... | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.178.56 |
I see what you mean, Craig. Why do people write my name in caps so often? I'm just plain ol' Huw... | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
HUWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!! | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.178.56 |
Damn it, ZED! | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.207.116 |
REC wasn't bad. Half a dozen genuine frights on top in a generic cheapie zombie flick are enough to avoid feeling cheated, but there's no transcendental horror here. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Again, I'd have to disagree. :-) The last 10 mins are among the most terrifying I've seen in a horror film. The whole movie transformed into something rather fine in those final scenes. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.181.111 |
Were you expecting something transcendental, Proto? Not trying to be difficult, I'm just curious as to why you'd expect it to be that (if you did). Were your expectations raised too high from reading all the enthusiastic comments/reviews on it? I must admit, I was slightly disappointed, for that very reason. I thought it was a decent, creepy movie (especially the last ten minutes). It had a good, suspenseful build-up, and managed to convey a sense of mounting panic and dread pretty well. Not brilliant by any means, but definitely one of the better recent horror films. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
I tend to ignore all reviews/hype and watch films cold (it's easy; I never read newspapers and rarely watch TV). That way I'm rarely disappointed... | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.207.116 |
I wasn't expecting it to be transcendental, I just always hope something will be. I didn't know much about it, other than Tony giving it a wavering thumbs-up. The ending was scary, but not haunting. We've seen it all before but it at least had some well-staged moments. Why can't such films have more subtlety in the characters, though? Why can't we have something as revealing of character as THE OFFICE (UK version) in a mock-doc? During it, I kept wondering why horror is so keen to subcategorise. Once you know you're watching a zombie-movie. Surely weird, scary things should happen without explanation, without us knowing the rules of the game. Surely each new monster should be unique. That'd be much scarier, wouldn't it? | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.207.116 |
Meant to write: "Once you know you're watching a zombie-movie, you relax a bit." | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.16.87.157 |
Hollywood has an aversion to anything purely new or exotic or surprising. They think that strangeness will put off people; they think it's too "fringey," and hence will not garner a wide public. Vampires, zombies, werewolves... all quantifiable, all known. But other kinds of monstrosities are not. A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET had the exotic Freddy Krueger; but, the gimmick of the first movie was: the monster in your dreams really can kill you. Dreams that can become dangerously real is a simple, clever twist; and everyone knows what a dream is - nothing exotic about that. Freddy, now, he is unique; but once we've see him, Freddy becomes quantifiable; and so he's familiar enough to justify subsequent movies without a hook "crutch." But again, Freddy's a character who got to be introduced through the premise: he is not a premise. Hollywood fears too much explanation, and too much lack of explanation as well; though twists on the familiar that don't become too strange or non-categorizable, are the most sought after of all commodities: they are new AND the same. Hollywood just loves that.... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
I think what Proto is saying is that he's reached a level where he wants to see something more than there is. I felt it the other day, wandering round town, that everything I looked at was familiar. I felt almost ill, claustrophobic. | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.14.96 |
If only a serious film maker would look at Aickman and make it their live's work. Being 100% faithful to bringing that type of FEELING to the screen. Oh, why!? Or maybe proto wants it for real? Still opening doors expecting to see wonderland? | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
>>I felt it the other day, wandering round town, that everything I looked at was familiar.<< That's because it was all familiar, Tony. Having moved around a bit over the past 10 years, I'm almost painfully aware of when that feeling of familiarity-contempt creeps in... | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.14.96 |
Unless you moved to a city made from sweets and magic I don't see how you could find the unfamiliar again. If you were to break into a house at random you'd probably say " Hey, we have that wallpaper." | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Yeah. The last time I killed someone, I thought: I used to have a pair of boots just like those. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Brown and scuffed, they were. Scuffed, I tell you. If there's anything that makes me come over all homicidal, it's a scuff. | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.14.96 |
Do you ever suddenly feel like watching YOUNG SHERLOCK HOLMES? | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.113.110 |
Some genuine Earth-tilting newness has happened to me over this summer, actually. It has revitalised me. It does happen, but you've got to meet it half way. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
I once went to meet it half way, but it had stayed at home to watch YOUNG SHERLOCK HOLMES on DVD. Damn it! It and its...scuffs! | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.14.96 |
Crossing your eyes doesn't count. Nor does bending over and peering at the upside down world between your legs. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.23.233.246 |
But then the old stuff looks VERY old! Doesn't it? Maybe this is why yhe old don't mind dying? I like Young Sherlock Holmes; the living cakes and that weird fridge. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.23.233.246 |
I have to catch that Aickman sense in odd places, like a scene where nothing is really happening in JULIET BRAVO, something like that. Or the titles of CROWN COURT when they show a picture of a kid in a grubby seventies flat with that strange music playing over it. The first draft of my book is better than my current one. I want to die. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.113.110 |
No, really. It can happen. Makes me feel young again. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.231.13 |
Tony: you should clutch a book of poetry to your chest, wander around your town sighing and applying other clenched-fist-wrist to forehead, and finally find a river and throw yourself into it. There's nothing so young as angst. Or angst-ridden ennui. | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.14.96 |
Or learn the history about the old buildings that you often see. Or sniff glue. Horror has to make you happy. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.231.13 |
Perhaps along those lines, take up an exotic hobby, like, oh... creating a second-skin composed completely of road-kill fur. Or dressing up all in black and break-dancing in front of your local mortuary, to get customers to come inside. Or actually digging up dead bodies. When's the last time anyone dug up dead bodies and dragged them back to the homes of their loved-ones? | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.14.96 |
you could wear the skins of their dead ones and demand a cup of tea. "I'm parched" you could shriek as you go for the smallest of them... Most hobbies end in death, I've been told. Imagine being chased by the radio controlled plane of a monsterman. What would it look like, this plane? All lumpy and alive? | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.113.110 |
What if your head was put in the cockpit of a RC-plane? And the rest of your body was on the ground and had the controls? What would you do then, eh? Something to think about. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.239.132 |
Imagine being chased by a monsterman's kite! The beast laughs in wicked glee as he swoops the gigantic colorful butterfly down upon the scattering, screaming populace. Hey Hollywood! I'm seeing tentpole movie here! | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.14.96 |
Suppose I saw a man wearing a hat that had veins threaded through it, throbbing? What then, eh? ever thought about that? | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.239.132 |
I have thought about that. So hard, my veins throbbed through my hat. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.239.132 |
Actually, the arteries were throbbing. The veins were squirming. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.113.110 |
http://www.viruscomix.com/page436.html | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.136 |
Craig - I once stumbled on a necrophiliac's site and he told of breaking into a grave and taking out someone's ashes. With the help of this girl he mixed the ashes with a grease or fat and smeared it all over his naked body and walked about the place. My God his site was odd. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.229.34 |
Ed Gein's grandson? | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.232.5 |
"My God his site was odd." The most redundant sentence ever written? | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 99.241.220.139 |
Finally saw this last night, and I have mixed feelings about it. Spoilers may occur. The beginning felt off. There are some good moments there, such as the car accident -- really, anything with Benigna in it -- but they didn't really seem to mesh for the first half hour or so. The scene with her running down the beach seemed overdone, for instance. Then the section with the medium in the house came, and I had to turn my light on I was so creeped out. That is one of the best passages I've seen in any spooky film to date. From that point on, the film stayed at a pretty high level until it got to the very end. The ghostly children's game and the recognition of what had actually gone on was all fantastic. My only complaint through the middle section of the film is that the husband was a bit of a stereotype for this sort of film. But at the end, starting with the introduction of the swelling heartwarming music as the dead woman is reunited with her son and the orphans she grew up with and continuing on through the prevously skeptical husband smiling at the thought that his wife now haunts the house, really put me off. It seemed like the filmmaker didn't dare embrace that this was a tragic film and wanted desperately to make it into something else. I definitely think it's worth watching, but I can't say I share quite as high an opinion of it as some of the other people on the board. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 31.94.73.35 |
I LOVE the Potter films. They will endure. God, this place was tense sometimes. Like duelling, everyone trying to be the wise one, the last one typing. Like me, now! |