Checked out The Texas Chain Saw Massacre today, for the first time, I have never seen any of this before.

It blew me away. I can't believe this is from 1974, it's aged insanely well. The atmosphere was so dense, the music, the setting, it was perfect. This was truly amazing and caught me off guard, I didn't expect something so good. Finally after all this silly slasher nonsense, I got something super serious, utterly dangerous and dreadful. I feel like I've seen influences of this in everything from movies to games.

Very awesome.

No disagreements there Xeo - TCM is one of my favorite movies as well and one of horror's all time greats. They don't make them like that anymore.

I might even put that above Halloween, it was so good!

The music was so crazy for 1974. Didn't expect that kind of soundtrack for something from that time.

Re: TCM: It's legitimately one of my favorites too. I remember begging my mom to let me watch it when I was 10 because I don't know why. I guess this was around the time I had started seeing some of the Halloween movies and so I wanted to see the first one because apparently I'm so hipster that I was a hipster before they were even a thing. I watched it with my stepdad, who warned me I might not like it. I remember thinking it was weird that it wasn't as bloody as I was anticipating, but the overwhelming dread just stuck with me. To this day I still haven't seen a movie with such a sickly atmosphere and thick sense of helplessness. I probably didn't blink or swallow throughout the entire dinner scene. When it was done I said it wasn't scary because when you're ten and only have seen a few slasher flicks you think scary = violent death. I then went to bed, had nightmares all night, and vomited several times. No movie has ever been so disturbing that it actually made me physically ill, but TCM is the one exception. A truly timeless movie.


Anyway, I just saw Tusk. And... uh. I uh... don't know what real life is anymore.

Basically think 007 made by the exact same creative team as Kick-Ass. That type of R.

TCM is a flawless horror movie. You'd probably be wise to avoid the sequels, though TCM2 is decent in its own strange way.

I don't think there has ever been a movie prop with such unlimited story potential as the Hot Tub Time Machine. The franchise really could continue indefinitely!

Texas Chainsaw Massacre '74 is the best horror film ever made, hands down.

The sequels are obviously all far inferior, but all are worth watching simply for the sheer insanity of them all. What they lack in true dread they make up for in sheer weirdness. The fourth one is pretty much a throwaway though, even if it beat The Cabin In The Woods to the whole The third one could have been amazing if the studio hadn't forced them to tone it down so much. 1990 was a terrible time for horror filmmakers. But it's still worth it just for Viggo Mortensen and Ken Foree's performances.

Yeah I mean there's CGI gore but it's real violent/gory, lots of profanity, etc. Definitely refreshing to get such a hard R action/comedy.

So I just saw Gone Girl and my first reaction was to break up with my girlfriend.

Holy fuark, they actually managed to fund and make an Atlas Shrugged: Part 3?!?! Well, now I know what to put on for "Bad Trilogy Movie Night!!!"

So I'm about done with Rampage (1987) with Michael Biehn (it's possibly his greatest performance) and a serial killer that puts Hannibal Lecture to shame. Recommended if you like your courtroom drama brimming with powerful dialogue and plausible crime scene investigation/detective work. From the maker of The Exorcist and The French Connection.

Edited for the 3 people in the world who don't already know

So I rewatched the Thing again, and I liked it way more. I think last time I was watching it as a horror and the general ineptitude/immobility of the thing left me disappointed (compared to guy in a suit stuff like Alien), but its a ridiculously well paced and set up movie. It doesn't care about building character and the few who do die randomly so there's no real wondering who's next or if you care about who goes, there's just a lot of fun effects and gore and and great pacing and mystery. I still found a few gripes based on how immobile the thing is, (why leave one guy alone once you know everyone is safe, fuck, still annoying, horror trope and all), but yeah, great movie. I love the pacing through the first act, no.getting to know the soon to die pawns, right into the mystery and weirdness, let us build bonds over time (not that anyone but the dog keeper is likeable anyway) just an exciting well paced movie from start to finish, with awesome.visuals which aren't intimidating at all, but its great.

Just realized I posted 'Hannibal Lecture'..

Well lectures can be crazy scary when it's before finals. Leatherface has got nothing on these multiple choice questions.

I just rewatched it last night as well. First time seeing it in hi-def I think and the BD release was insanely good. The only part that still looks a bit goofy is when the "thing" coming out of the guy strapped down to the chair and grabs that guys face, it looks like a doll in his mouth, but otherwise it's so brief this scene is still insanely awesome beyond that moment. I just can't fathom how most of the effects in this one were created. The dog stuff is still probably my favorite.

And yeah, the movie does an awesome job of making everyone out to be untrustworthy including Kurt Russell. Gritty stuff.

I still like Alien more myself, but I'd say they're still pretty different. Alien for the atmosphere and sci-fi, HR Giger, but The Thing is a practical effects spectacle.

I'd say the dog tentacles were done with a fairly simple mix of animatronics and reverse photography. That's a highly underrated technique, it's also good for shots of people being impaled or struck in a way that can't be faked with cutaways. The making-of doco's from a lot of those 80s movies reveal some insanely simple methods for what seems like tricky business. Another good example is the "Freddy-shaped wall" scene in A Nightmare on Elm Street. They did that with a sheet of spandex on a wooden frame, at a cost of about $1

My favorite special effect in all the Nightmare movies is from NoES 2 when Jesse transforms into Freddy via Freddy slicing through Jesse's gut and clawing his way out of Jesse's body. That's right up there with the agonizingly drawn out decapitation from the climax of Nekromantik 2 for my favorite gore effect ever. Never Sleep Again didn't really go into specific detail about how that particular scene was done, but they did say they spent 11 weeks building the various elements for it, and every single shot in the scene is a different effect.

EDIT: In watching the segment from Never Sleep Again on NoES 2 again, they don't go into detail about the Jesse transformation apparatus as I had mentioned above, but they do go into detail about the fucking possessed parakeet that catches on fire, including how it worked, the symbolism of a bird going apeshit over Freddy's impending arrival and test shots of a demonic, animatronic Freddy bird that they discarded because "it wasn't parakeet-like enough".

I need to track that one down.. it's not on the Blu Ray, although there's a 50 minute doco with the same title which i'm guessing is the first part of the full feature. But the rest of the series only has a few short featurettes for each film.

If you have Netflix, Never Sleep Again's on there. The whole thing is about 4 hours long, which is an insane amount of time for a documentary to run for, it's justified because the movie goes into excruciating detail about the creation of every NoES movie, as well as delving into some of the stuff that came about when Freddy Krueger became a pop culture icon. I for one greatly appreciated the inclusion of a segment on Freddy's Nightmares, which I always felt was better than most give it credit for. Sucks that the only bits of that show released on contemporary media in the US was two episodes in the big NoES Blu Ray box set from a few years ago. The only other ways to watch that show would be through Youtube or finding the old VHS releases on eBay.

I might just go all arrr me matey walk the plank on it, just keep an eye out for a cheap BD or DVD copy of it.. I don't think Netflix is available here but I don't like in paying for any form of intangible content

That's how I got it at first, because it only just went up on Netflix late last year. And when you finish with that, go all walk the plank on Crystal Lake Memories, which is a documentary made by the same people with the same format as Never Sleep Again, but this time it's on Friday the 13th. Be prepared to set a weekend aside to watch these things though, because while Never Sleep Again is 4 hours long as I mentioned, Crystal Lake Memories is SIX-AND-A-HALF-HOURS long.

Or you could just get them from Amazon, where the Blu Ray of Never Sleep Again is $18 American and the Blu Ray of Crystal Lake Memories is $23 American.

Fuck that, add in postage to NZ and it'd be double that. I never pay more than $15 for a movie unless it's a new release or something I reeeeeally want. Just paid $25 for the Blu Ray of From Beyond and it was worth every cent, but for a BTS documentary i'd set the limit at $10. I just find it a bit greedy to release making-of documentaries as standalone films instead of including them in some sort of special edition box set with the film itself.

See? What a terrible movie.

Well with those two documentaries it's easier to justify them being standalone releases simply because of how massive they really are. They legit transcend the whole idea of a "making of" documentary. They're the most excruciatingly detailed, in depth, hardcore nerd boner documentaries I've ever seen. Plus it'd be a bit difficult to put them on a box set with their respective series because of licensing issues; the production company that made the two documentaries is totally independent from either Paramount or New Line/Warner Bros., so they'd hafta finagle some kind of deal where the companies each get a slice of the pie to their liking and it's just too complicated a process to work out. It might be a little easier since the documentary makers had to license all the movie footage from the studios that own the franchises, but it's still just easier to release the documentaries on their own.

Yeah choassphere, if you actually consider the amount of effort they put in to these documentaries it's well worth the price.

Sure, but the extended LOTR/Hobbit box sets, Rob Zombie's Halloween, numerous releases of Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the Kingdom of Heaven Director's Cut DVD for example all have feature-length extras included as part of the package. Thing is, BTS documtaries are a watch-once deal for me, so I prefer it to be all in one place otherwise once i've watched them they're just hogging up shelf space. But as I said, i'd buy them at a reasonable price, but 30-odd bucks a pop (once you figure in exchange rates and shipping) is just too damn steep for something i'm really not going to get that much use from.

I really think you're underestimating how huge these documentaries really are. Your standard making-of documentary runs about 90 minutes if they put their mind to it. Maybe two hours for a bigger film. Never Sleep Again and Crystal Lake Memories are a combined 840 minutes. It's more than worth the price of admission.

All the ones I mentioned have between 4 and 9 hours each I'll keep an eye on WOWHD, they often have crazy low prices on UK Blu Ray releases. Also bear in mind I can't watch Region A discs, at least until I get a new PC with a BD-ROM drive that I can lock to that region.

I'm definitely pretty interested in Crystal Lake Memories now. As bad as some of those Friday the 13th movies were, I think the whole franchise left a really good impression on me as a whole. Great charm and lots of fun everywhere, I can kind of see how Jason achieved that iconic status and all.

Definitely sounds like a better franchise than Halloween.

Halloween is better than any Friday the 13th, but as a whole F13 is a much better franchise for sure. It's just a lot more wildly varied, instead of starting off with a masterpiece before taking a sharp nosedive into bullshit. Seriously, I couldn't even finish Halloween 4, it's about as suspenseful as paint drying in slow motion.

Pretty sure he was kidding...it was actually a really good movie and book. Clever and subversive...a very wryly funny, dark thriller. Not sure where you got the idea it was trying to be this big drama. A lot of it was very clearly satirical.

Why would you watch that rubbish anyways? Reminds me:
http://www.vocativ.com/culture/tvmovies ... ted-films/



Because apparently everyone who downloaded it, would otherwise have bought it. *shrug* Not sure about you guys, but if I have doubts about whether or not I'll like something, I tent not to buy it, rather than run out and watch it immediately to satisfy my curiosity, as those wankers keep implying. The only nominated film worth watching in my opinion is Imitation Game, the others that I'm aware of of are mostly semi-art semi-entertainment Hollywood generica. The Theory Of Everything could have been really great, but they made it into a bloody love story.

Now where would you put NoES in this? I'm of the opinion that the first is a goddamn masterpiece of horror, and while every movie after that isn't as good as the first one, Dream Warriors and New Nightmare are great in their own rights. Freddy's Revenge was not as bad as people claimed, but it still wasn't very good. Dream Master, Dream Child, and Freddy's Dead all suck in sad, painful ways. Freddy vs. Jason was quite great, and the remake, while not as pissed at it as I was years ago, is still pretty not good, what with the awful acting from the main kids and making all the subtext from the original movie blatantly obvious and beating you in the head with it.

I find the whole piracy thing to be bullshit. American Sniper has made a lot of money. Really annoyed me when Expendables 3 got leaked and they blamed that for the reason it flopped. What really happened was the people who downloaded it gave it really bad word of mouth, myself included.

I like that Elm Street seems very self aware pretty much right after the first one. It's humorous how they all feel kind of PG-13 in comparison to this other stuff though, yet the gore is usually higher. I rewatched the first one and it's still awesome, the BD release is fantastic. I definitely like the three Wes Craven ones a lot myself. Still probably my favorite series of the big three.

The reboot is one of the worst things I've ever seen though. No good points whatsoever.

Except Jackie Earle Haley. He's the one good element in that whole mess of a movie. It's such a different, even darker take on the character. Robert Englund's portrayal, even in the movies where he's depicted as a much more evil, less jokey character, still had this demented sense of humor about him, and he always had a one liner to spout, even if it's a fucked up one like "I'm your boyfriend now, Nancy". There's none of that to be found with the remake's Freddy. Just pure, fucked up, demented, joyless violence and hatred, and I really liked that he took this iconic character that everyone in the universe associated with Robert Englund and made it his own, even if it's in a shitty movie like the remake.

In thinking about the big three slasher franchises, it occurred to me just how different each first movie of all three series' really are. Halloween was very Hitchcockian, being built around the suspense and underlying sense of stuff going horribly, horribly wrong that was laid down in Psycho. Friday the 13th was like a cross between the 70s exploitation stuff Sean S. Cunningham was known for from The Last House on the Left and the wave of Italian giallo films that came about that same decade. A Nightmare on Elm Street is the hardest to pinpoint the genre origins of, but I've always been of the opinion that if Phantasm hadn't been as big a success as it was, there either would have been no NoES or it would have been drastically different. It's really fascinating to think about when you start researching how all three of these movies came to be.

Watched Jupiter Ascending last night with my son.
Well... I took away a bit of a DUNE vibe from some of it for sure. It was alright I suppose over all, there was certainly some corny eye roll moments aplenty, plus some of the actors really are not actors at all, just people cheap enough with the right looks to stand in the roles I suppose? haha

Yea... I guess the little horror DUNE streak vibe was about the best thing to take from it.

Maybe if 1 and 2 would have been a bit better, people could have been bothered to turn up for the third. *shrug* xD

Overall I think the Nightmare series is better than either Halloween or Friday the 13th, at least for those first 3 and Freddy Vs Jason. I don't remember much of the ones after Dream Warriors but I have the BD set so I will get around to revisiting them in the near future. The first one is a masterpiece, easily the strongest slasher since Halloween and it's amazing what they achieved on such a small budget. Even most of the FX stand up today, although the stretchy-arms scene looks a bit rubbish but Johnny Depp's bloody demise is a mind-blowing piece of work considering their budget had pretty much run out by the time they filmed it.