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As a horror movie fan who has despaired of ever returning to that state of innocence that enables one to feel actual fear while watching movies, the much-advertised "Horrorfest: 8 Films To Die For" fills me with a tiny ray of hope. These are supposed to be movies "too graphic and disturbing for general audiences." Fortunately I've never considered myself to be a member of a general audience.
I'm not completely hard-core, mind you. I love the Saw franchise but refuse to ever watch Hostel. et.al. I think the distinction can be summed up in two words: Quentin Tarantino. Ever since the ear-cutting scene in Reservoir Dogs, I've had an aversion to his too graphic, too ultra-realistic horror. Yes, I know this makes me a bit of a hypocrite. Let me 'splain: I don't really enjoy seeing people tortured for long periods of time, and in Saw typically the physical torments are brief (but the psychological......). Does that make sense?
I thought it was mighty strange, then, to see a commercial on SciFi announcing their airing of last year's Horrorfest. If these movies are "too disturbing for general audiences," is it really a good idea to show them on cable at 4 in the afternoon? I suspected massive editing must be involved.
Since I never get to surf, I was unaware of them being shown and only caught three on SciFi. The rest I'm leaving up to Netflix. Here they are in no particular order:
( ::The Hamiltons:: )
If this was the industry's idea of "too graphic for general audiences," it didn't bode particularly well for the rest of Horrorfest. Or maybe I AM more hard-core than I realized. 1 out of 5
Next up was ( ::Penny Dreadful:: )
I thought of a handful of twists for the end that would have been amusing and refreshing: What if all this was staged by her therapist as sort of shock therapy? You know, "Yes, car accidents are awful, but there are so many far worse things that could happen to you"? That was the best one. I had more, but I forget them now. It's moot, since the filmmakers opted for the utterly predictable ending that I saw from a mile away but hoped that maybe, this once, I'd be wrong. 1.5 out of 5
Hmmmm. So far 0 for 2. Fortunately, next was ( ::Unrest:: )
Unlike those other two, this one was genuinely scary (to me) so I don't want to give away anything else. Scary enough that I might like to see the unedited version someday (again, assuming SciFi had to cut something to preserve the sensibilities of the fragile, childlike general public). 4 out of 5, for getting me to cover my mouth in terror and restoring a tiny bit of faith in the horror genre.
I'm not completely hard-core, mind you. I love the Saw franchise but refuse to ever watch Hostel. et.al. I think the distinction can be summed up in two words: Quentin Tarantino. Ever since the ear-cutting scene in Reservoir Dogs, I've had an aversion to his too graphic, too ultra-realistic horror. Yes, I know this makes me a bit of a hypocrite. Let me 'splain: I don't really enjoy seeing people tortured for long periods of time, and in Saw typically the physical torments are brief (but the psychological......). Does that make sense?
I thought it was mighty strange, then, to see a commercial on SciFi announcing their airing of last year's Horrorfest. If these movies are "too disturbing for general audiences," is it really a good idea to show them on cable at 4 in the afternoon? I suspected massive editing must be involved.
Since I never get to surf, I was unaware of them being shown and only caught three on SciFi. The rest I'm leaving up to Netflix. Here they are in no particular order:
( ::The Hamiltons:: )
If this was the industry's idea of "too graphic for general audiences," it didn't bode particularly well for the rest of Horrorfest. Or maybe I AM more hard-core than I realized. 1 out of 5
Next up was ( ::Penny Dreadful:: )
I thought of a handful of twists for the end that would have been amusing and refreshing: What if all this was staged by her therapist as sort of shock therapy? You know, "Yes, car accidents are awful, but there are so many far worse things that could happen to you"? That was the best one. I had more, but I forget them now. It's moot, since the filmmakers opted for the utterly predictable ending that I saw from a mile away but hoped that maybe, this once, I'd be wrong. 1.5 out of 5
Hmmmm. So far 0 for 2. Fortunately, next was ( ::Unrest:: )
Unlike those other two, this one was genuinely scary (to me) so I don't want to give away anything else. Scary enough that I might like to see the unedited version someday (again, assuming SciFi had to cut something to preserve the sensibilities of the fragile, childlike general public). 4 out of 5, for getting me to cover my mouth in terror and restoring a tiny bit of faith in the horror genre.
