I am just wondering about the true definition of Horror in modern movies. To me it suggests some kind of supernatural, spiritual, mutated or migrated from space entity, being or spirit. By this I mean should the fact that some mentally disturbed normal people cutting people to bits be classified as horror. Or should horror be limited to "The thing from outer space" or a wolfman, vampire and mutated monster of this kind qualify? For instance "Hannible" is a great charactor to scare people but is this Horror? Chainsaw massacre is another that is scary, but is really some very disturbed folks that need to see a therapist and "Misery" same thing, versus a movie like Holloween where the guy is kinda possesed by the devil, and the Exorcist as well. Frankenstein back from the dead would qualify I believe. Evil Dead, Hellraise, Phantasm, Scanners, Amityville Horror, House on Haunted Hill and like all qualify I believe. Any thoughts on this?

Yes I think the mentally disturbed movies qualify as horror. They may not be possessed or have anything supernatural going on but the deeds they do are horrific and that to me is what qualifies any and all true horror.

I found this a great question, I was alread to agree that it should be of the supernatural aspect, or mutated monsters, but HC brings up a valid point about slasher's and what they do to the humans they are going after,,,,,some of the things we humans do to one another is very horrirfic, I think the human condition can be a horror in of itself.
That being said maybe it should be catorgazied in specific areas I susposse,,,,,,but who knows

I definitely think that thriller, slasher, psychological, gore films all belong under the category of horror. Anything that is frightening should be considered. To me, the idea of a human being who can think and act rationally, yet still murder and eat humans is pretty frightening!

I agree to some extent.

murder and eat humans doesn't really scare me, I just think it's SICK. It don't think it even qualifies as gore, it's just plain SICK. That is unless it's zombies, their just "Hunting" for and eating dinner

Some great books to read on this subject are "The Philosophy of Horror: Or Paradoxes of the Heart" by Noel Carroll, "Terror and Everyday Life: Singular Moments in the History of the Horror Film" by Jonathan Crane, and "Caligari's Children" by S.S. Prawer. I've read all of these books and they provide fascinating ideas about what the horror genre is and why we enjoy horror. Horror is hard to define and is subjective, as proven in our own Personal Fears thread. But anything the deals with the uncanny and darker sides of existence that attempts to evoke terror in the audience is a good start. I think "attempts" is the key word, since not everyone is scared by certain things. But just because a movie wasn't scary, doesn't mean it's not a horror movie. So the attempt to scare and create fear, and to show the uncanny are pretty simple. Werewolves, psychos, vampires, killer animals, zombies, ghosts, demons, etc... are all uncanny. I'm using the word uncanny a lot because it shows up in these studies and was a term pioneered by Sigmund Freud to define the fear of the unknown. All of those creatures and things that go bump in the night are unknown and exist outside of our norms. If you want to read about Freud and the uncanny, which you probably don't, go here:

http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~amtower/uncanny.html

The horror genre is comprised of many elements, not all of which need to be present in any one piece of work. A supernatural element is common, but the supernatural element is simply a metaphoric device for exploring humanity and isn't necessary. A brutal, sadistic human can be more horrific than any imaginary monster because the truth of it hits very close to home.

Stated simply, horror is an exploration of the dark side of human nature and the human experience.

Sooo we are all say that horror is relative,,,its our own prespective on how we internalize what hooro is to the indivual

I guess I could loosen my interpretation as I agree with a lot of what is being said in here, but I still do not know if I can include movies like "The Village" and "Misery" as Horror. But I guess Psycho does qualify, to me mainly because they show his mother's skeleton at the end and obviously the famous shower scene. I personally like movies that do not just jump into blood and guts, but slowly build the tension and let your own mind freak you out. I think Holloween did this, I know now everyone has seen it a million times and the shock value is gone to some extent. But when I watched this in the theatre there was a lot of very scared people walking out of the place looking over thier shoulder and in the shadows on the way to the car. And there was not a lot of blood and guts.

That sounds about right

Yep -- horror is entire subjective. Which is one of the great things about the genre.

I disagree. I don't think horror is subjective, although what scares each of us is. If the genre was completely subjective, then everything could be horror and the idea of a "genre" would break down. We still need objective, set definitions for purpose of classifying. Those books I listed and the link are good starts.

This is going in circles here. Everyone is right to some extent and everything has a flaw somewhere.

There was a point a few weeks ago that I was trying to explain what the difference is between a "Scifi" and a "Horror" movie. In fact, I was thinking about starting this very thread back then but thought the discussion was over but, new people join so the discussion continues. Astralpictures, I think you have the best point that I've seen here.

If you don't have some sort of boundries, you could say that a "COOKING" show is "Horror" because they had to "Slaughter" the cows. Or if it's a movie that is All about cooking but they kill the cook at the very end, are you* going to say it's a Horror movie because "someone" thinks that is horrorible?
I know this example is a bit extreme but I think it shows the point.

Thank you for your attention, now you can rehash it all you want, I'll shut up and watch for awhile.



ps. I'm not trying to stop the discussion, discussion is what this board is for. Keep going, there has to be a lot of people that might dispute my point.




*you meaning anyone

Obviously, I'm talking about within the confines of the genre itself. The genre being defined as a film made with the intent to scare. Obivously a cooking show is not made with an intent to elicit fear (unless you're talking about Giada DeLaurentis' scary looking mouth). But whether something made with the intent to scare is "horrifying" is indeed subjective.

Very few horror films give me the willies or make me squirm. I think AUDITION, HIGH TENSION and WOLF CREEK were the last films to make me cringe. Other than that I find most horror films simply entertaining.

Whereas my wife finds most of them simply to scary to watch.

Subjective.

I think "horror" is in the eye of the beholder, there are so many genre's because peoples opinions differ. To me horror is about a feeling a movie gives me. I don't prefer gore, I like creepy atmospheres, and slasher movies (because someone chasing me trying to kill me is scary to me)and haunted houses.

You are very close here but the only thing I will point out is movies like Notes on a Scandal for example deal with the dark side of human nature but that is definitely not a horror movie, so I think the definition still needs to be refined a little.

True, not every movie that explores the dark side of human nature and experience is horror. A film about war could fit that definition, or corporate greed, or any tragedy.

The difference is that several elements of horror must also be present in some significant measure.

I don't think the definition is completely subjective. It becomes subjective when there are some elements of horror present in more than a slight degree. One person feels that there aren't enough elements present in a significant enough measure, another feels that there are. Neither person is wrong. They're both right according to their own criteria.

I AGREE TWO WEEKEND'S AGO MY MOTHER N LAW CAME BY AND SHE HAD CONVERTED OUR WEDDING VIDEO FROM VHS TO CD AND I HAD TO WATCH THAT DAMN THING THREE TIMES IT SCARED THE HELL OUT OF ME!!

I like that talking point about the difference between "sci-fi and horror" I think this is where the term "Horri-fi-ed" came from?? ha ha.

Sorry it was there, but I think some movies classified as Horror should be thriller, or suspense maybe.

I have to agree. Horror isn't completely subjective, however certain elements of it can be.

For instance, brutal torture could be considered horror, but you wouldn't consider Jack Bauer torturing a terrorist for information Horror.

Chopping off someone's limps could be considered Horrific. But, Star Wars wouldn't be considered Horror.

Massive amounts of blood and body parts can be considered Horrific. But in shows such as ER, it really is pretty tame.

I guess really the truest definition would be the 'act of doing something, in the hopes of invoking a specific response of fear, dread, or foreboding.' The problem is, that so many of us are afraid of so many different things, on completely opposite sides of the spectrum. Hence why every Horror film doesn't invoke the same response in every member of the audience.

Sure in some instances we may have similar fears. Such as agonizing death, indestructible evil, or the loss of those we care about. But in the end, we all have different interpretations of Death, Evil, and Loss.

This is a good, thought- provoking topic. Too bad it's buried among all these horror movie threads.

Ah yes, I remember this thread. I'm sure no one has checked out the books I recommended!

I love going into my college library and taking out books on the horror genre. There are so many, it's great. A lot of studies have been done on the genre in relation to psychology, sociology, literature, etc... It's a fascinating subject if anyone really wants to get serious about studying horror.

Have not had time...

I have been wrestling with this question. Looking at all these "top 100 horror film" lists and trying to compile my own. Here are some movies that I had a hard time deciding:

Dr. Jeckle and Mr. Hyde. Doesn't have the typical narrative because the bad guy is the main character. But all three versions do produce creepy effects so I classified it.

Picture of Dorian Gray. Definitely different. You're not seeing a crazy killer or traditional supernatural ghost vampire, etc. But again, there is a creepiness to the movie. It is scary because it deals with the horror of human nature.

Godzilla 2000. More action than horror

King Kong. Same thing

Frenzy. More suspense thriller than horror, but a close call.

Butterfly Effect. Really liked this movie. I don't know what genre it was, but it wasn't horror.

Can anybody else think of "on the bubble" movies that could or couldn't be horror?

-Also, there is horror for horror fans and then horror for mainstream fans. A friend of mine quoted Silence of the Lambs and was surprised at my blank look. I dind't care for that movie and I don't think of it when I think of vintage horror. I would say the same for Jaws. On the other hand, yesterday I saw a movie called Count Yorga, Vampire. I liked it a lot. I can't see anybody who isn't a horror fan liking it, however.

Whenever i was writing my review for "Severance" a while back, i ended the review by surprisingly defining horror for myself.

i said something along the lines of:

"it's truly amazing to see a director who knows what horror is: bad things happening to good people."

i know that doesn't apply to a lot of horror, but the films that always get under my skin the most and stay in my head long after the credits are the ones where an everyday person becomes the victim of something horrific, be it psychosis, a serial killer, or something with a social message. I.E. Session 9, The Brood, Who Can Kill a Child?, Severance, Perfume, and more. I don't know if my definition makes a lot of sense, but i suppose when i really give a shit about a character, anything bad that happens to them i would classify as "horror". (in a genre film, of course. I don't mean in a comedy film, etc.)

My preference for the category of real horror in cinema and/or TV would be anything which has a subtly but ultimately discernible chilling psychollogical edge to the film's and/or series's plot, the pacing of the sequential order of scenes and character action of the film and/or series, and the makeup, costumery, special effects and sets used, in addition to a script that's faithful for the most part to both the letter and the spirit of the story that the film is based on, or scripts which are mostly faithful to the letter and the spirit of the stories which the eps of series such as Night Gallery are based on. It's just a thought that I wished to express. Thanks for your indulgence. MartinKandell September 25, 2008