And you like shitty pretentious movies like Dogville, what's your point? Come on DD, this shit is going nowhere, I like to make fun of Zelkiiro too but eh!

22 Jump Street, 300: Rise of an Empire, Brick Mansions, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Dumb and Dumber To, Godzilla, How to Train Your Dragon 2, Rio 2, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, The Expendables 3, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part I, Think Like a Man Too, Transformers: Age of Extinction, X-Men: Days of Future Past...

Yeah, Hollywood has been so original this year and hasn't released any sequels and/or reboots and remakes...

Asian and European cinema owns Hollywood big times these days... a few decades ago, it was the other way around but these days are gone... I can't even remember the last time I went to watch a Hollywood movie at the cinema that would be worth 9,5/10 or 10/10.

To me, virtually all the anime he likes is the apex of 'visually interesting and narratively bankrupt'. I just found it funny because I'm pretty sure I've described it in those exact terms before.

whoops, forgot to respond to this point specifically. By "comport" I didn't (solely) mean trailers or the surrounding/preceding Shyamalan miasma. I did watch a trailer (it was adorably silly) and I did kinda think "right, another one, this should be good...", but what I mean with that verb also applies to the movie itself. There's just a forced INTENSE SCARY PROFOUND thing going on that isn't even remotely realised for me. That's what I find so funny, while the concept itself could be made to work, the execution is way off. The believer guard dude personifies this in the movie, for some reason he instantly knows what's what and acts all in awe and terrified while the rest of the characters are like "wtf is this moron going on about, it's a damn stuck elevator..." (well, in the beginning, at least). It's like taking the ludicrous plot premise of some cheap 80's horror movie and filming it like it's Se7en or Shining or something. At least that impression is what I remember the movie left me with. I just couldn't take it seriously, and not in a good way.

thank you for your insightful comment

however, i didn't feel that "intense scary profound" thing. i mean, i didn't feel that director is putting it in my face like that. i could choose to see it that way, latin guard being the narrator, yes. or i could see it as an elevator slasher movie ...that was the only way for me to continue watching this movie. of course it's half-assed, and that's why the movie is not good. but it still isn't shit.

while watching the movie, i was afraid that the director will ruin the antagonist when he shows his real face. however, he surprised me and did a good job. black lenses, character's voice was the same, and at the same time, it had a quieter, deeper voice. less is more approach.

You're missing my point. I listed a bunch of hands down high quality films proving that this year has not been a disappointment, and of my mentioned films they are all non-remakes and/or sequels. And as of your "damning list", 2013 and 2012 had shit ton of sequels too, big whoop, you're simply reaching when you declare this year a disappointment in terms of Hollywood films.

Hollywood has been business as usual, but if you were paying attention, myself and several others like Tony and Necro have been talking about plenty of great American films that aren't in that umbrella.

I'm an hour into Catching Fire and I'm not liking this movie at all. It's slow and dull and all that's happened was a guy being whipped. It needs a thorough edit as a majority of the first half could have been summarized in a one minute montage, there's plodding scenes of mostly inconsequential filler dialogue and the games start way too late in the picture. I'd watch and re-watch The Running Man 50 times over before putting myself through this again.

Philip Seymour Hoffman is great with what he's got to work with but everything else is the same unnecessary crap as before, only tired/predictable and more serious this time. Did we need to go through the training phase AGAIN? Jennifer Lawrence delivers woeful acting with a total of three expressions, she almost makes Josh Hutcherson appear like Daniel Day Lewis.. I'm not exaggerating.

Let's say the actual games is the real redeeming factor and the action is really engrossing.. At 1:20 minutes in it doesn't matter, my patience is spent and I find all the characters highly unlikeable.

Im not really bothered by the sequels, as most of those were really good, except for mainly Expendables 3 and Godzilla. My big gripe with Hollywood right now is horror movies. Only good news Ive read is that Evil Dead will be a tv series, especially since it'll be on Starz, which guarantees a hard R. The best hollywood could do for halloween was a shitty dracula movie and some teen board game bullshit.

Well, I don't think that movies like "John Wick" are great achievements... it's just an extremely weak plot justifying a repetitive slaughterfest. If you want to see an intense revenge movie, watch "I Saw the Devil" or "The Man from Nowhere"... Same goes for "Guardians of the Galaxy", we have seen stuff like this many times before and right now, there are way too many superhero movies out there...

One more week until I can get "The Babadook" on demand. So fucking excited. Not really looking until anything else this year.

Narrative is for pussies. Give me experimentation on a thought and I'm all in - hell, I'd be fine if they just had one idea and just rewrote it with a thousand different teams...imagine..TMNT reboots written in the style of Philip Roth! Complete with Donatello masturbating with a pork cutlet. Or ANOTHER "teen movie" but done through a Burroughs' lens, where the nerdy girl turns popular by butt-fucking a Mexican prisoner with a strap on because he feels he must pay for his crimes. write the same story all the time fro all I care, just do it in a weird fucking way and I'm kind of about it.

"The Mutant Stain: A novel of two parts"


"Non-Nude Lunch" Also, I wrote a story eerily similar to this in high school...

No more mainstream Hollywood horror films this year?

Has their honestly been any truly good horror films in the last decade? I'm not talking 'okay' or 'not bad', I'm talking 5 stars. It's been routine loud noises/jump scare garbage horror for years.

There have been a fair few. Check out my list here: http://docuniverse.blogspot.com/2014/10 ... aples.html

At least the top 5, I'd consider truly great horror films. Though Session 9 is a bit older than you were asking.

Ooo, that's a good question. Are we talking just Hollywood or internationally? Antichrist was 5 stars from me, at least. A lot of people really loved Let the Right One In, although I'd personally only give it 4/5 stars. The Descent was good. The original [Rec] was very good for what it was, though maybe not 5 stars good. The Silent Call of Cthulhu was 2005, so within 10 years, and I'd give that 5 stars. I'd definitely agree with Empy's list regarding Pontypool, definitely 5 stars from me.

So yeah, there have been a few, but not really any huge films with A-list actors like Rosemary's Baby or Jacob's Ladder. But really, those were never that common at any time. Big-budget, highbrow horror films have always been few and far between.

Mostly Hollywood but can be international if it received wide exposure and popularity.

Agree about The Descent, that's non-arguable but being 2005 it's also borderline in a decade. Upon further thought I think The Strangers, The Hills Have Eyes and The Crazies remakes are all stand-outs worthy of mention, I found all to be highly entertaining (The Strangers more so unsettling).

[Rec] faulters in too many places with non-scary jump scares that make the POV feel fake. I think it's overrated given some of it's execution.

I sometimes feel Antichrist is more of a disturbing and violent psychological drama than anything, although I can see it as horror film and it's certainly A-grade.

So I saw Mockingjay Part 1 today after work with the entire company. I've never seen the other movies so I'm just gonna state this outright. This movie sucked. Part 1's that have a Part 2 along the way tend to suck. Harry Potter 7 Part 1 and even that Twilight Breaking Dawn Part 1 sucked balls. Both were followed up by Part 2's that were phenomenal (yes, even Twilight's Part 2 was the best in that series, the way my stool yesterday was excellent compared to the previous four).

I'll spoiler this without really giving anything major away.


Please tell me someone else saw this and saw it for what it was.

Oh and best part of the movi-wait, let me get the spoiler out on this one cause it's not worth giving away for anyone that hasn't seen it.

There are plenty of good fear-inducing movies, just not pure horror. If you're going to include intense psychological dramas like Antichrist, I'd throw in Cache, Inland Empire, hell maybe even Winter's Bone or Coraline. All scared me in some way. I'd keep the 'horror' label for that brand of supernatural thriller - something is coming to get you and you'd better be scared, and which aren't made much anymore. Which makes sense, I mean how many times can a certain apparition scare you until you've gone numb to it?

I read both spoilers without a moments hesitation. I'm not a fan in the slightest degree, and your spoilers echoed my sentiments of the second movie. Not surprisingly it's done by the exact same director, Francis Lawrence, who made some truly remarkable films with Constantine and I Am Legend.


Apparently some alien horror film came out today called Extraterrestrial, I'm personally on the fence based the trailer and directors but it's got top badguy Michael Ironside and a decent interview: http://www.toplessrobot.com/2014/11/tr_ ... strial.php

This has been probably discussed here but I wanted to know your thoughts on Malmhaus (2013).

Personally I liked it much more than Hesher since it left me with a "you can be whoever the fuck you want" feeling that I didn't get with the Joseph Gordon Levitt movie, it had flaws of course but was solid overall.

I'd definitely call Antichrist a horror film - sure there were psychological drama aspects, and no monsters or ghosts or anything, but there certainly was gore, and everything in it contributed to the buildup of a dark, disturbing feeling. It's a kind of horror that doesn't really pop up in movies too often, but certainly exists in plenty of literature - aside from the overt gore and genital mutilation, it felt very much like a Thomas Ligotti or Robert Aickman type surreal horror story.

Definitely agree on Absentia and Pontypool, both excellent films. I'm curious to see what you'll think of The Babadook, based on your praise for Absentia I'm pretty sure you'll dig it.

I'd also put Lake Mungo among the best horror films of the last decade. Some people are probably put off by the fake documentary aspect, but I found it really immersive. The narrative is maybe stretched a bit at times, but it's full of genuine characters and acts as an interesting exploration of grief and death, as well being really damn creepy.

I definitely want to see The Babadook, yeah. Your post about it made it sound interesting - Lake Mungo sounds cool too, never heard of that before now.

The Babadook was probably one of the most refreshing horror movies I've watched in a while, so if you're looking for something new you might like it.

Yeah, Big Hero 6 was good'un, then? I was curious about the seeming adorable-ness of it.

Watched Snowpiercer earlier tonight. Kind of cool if utterly ridiculous concept, and I didn't realize going in how much action would be in the movie, so that was welcome I guess. The cast was pretty weird - Captain America sucked in the lead because he's just kinda there and boring, then the secondary characters (John Hurt, Tilda Swinton, Ed Harris) were awesome, then the tertiary characters ranged from cool (that evil henchman dude) to horrible (the angry mom, some of the other tail section people). Also the dialogue had a very "translated from Korean" feel and the voices seemed dubbed in almost, which kind of gave the thing an anime or maybe Road Warrior quality. Still pretty cool though, with a lot of surprisingly neat action scenes.

Interstellar is one of the most powerful movies I've ever seen. It's art. I cried three times.

haven't seen all of them, but pontypool was excellent. it's the kind of horror i enjoy watching, because it relies on atmosphere instead of gore. and it's original. orphan was great as well.

have you seen these horror films and how did you like them?

you're next. a nice enough slasher movie. not particularly original, but thoroughly enjoyable. girl power over 9000! 7/10.

honeymoon. horror of the mind kind of thing, my favorite theme in the genre. a guy and a girl are newlyweds, and they decide to have their honey moon in a cabin in the woods. suddenly, the girl starts behaving strangely. 7/10.

the battery (2012). i wouldn't call this a horror, because it reminds me of zombieland but this is more unpredictable and artistic. it's about two guys roaming the country after a zombie apocalypse kind of thing. i really love this movie. 8/10.

sightseers. this one is marked as horror on imdb, but it's not a horror per se. it was disturbing, though. i'm not really a fan of english humor, but some directors just get the black humor right. and i love the randomness without silliness kind of movies. 7/10.

as for babadook...i wasn't fascinated, but it was ok. i liked the first half of the movie, but as plot progressed, the scary scenes started to overwhelm me, until coming to a point i just didn't care anymore. and i didn't care for that video game sound effect babadook made, that was just lazy editing. the acting was superb, though. 6/10.

I really hated You're Next - probably my least favorite movie of 2013. Just complete nauseating shit with bad characters, bad plot, etc. Couldn't even stand to watch it all in one sitting.

too bad ...i found it fun and not really stupid.

i still respect your opinion greatly, because you have a lot of movie experience, and i'll try my best to see those horrors you recommended. 'mandy lane' will be the first.

Thanks. I'll have to check out the other ones you mentioned; may be good. I've never actually heard of them.

cheers

the judge. this was a fine movie. duvall kicked ass in the role of a stern father & judge, and downey wasn't shabby. this is not really a courtroom drama, it's more of a father & son story. 7/10.

moneyball. i saw some clip on the internet where jonah hill and brad pitt are talking about my favorite 21st century actor, p.s. hoffman. jonah said that hoffman was so convincing that he genuinely felt bad when hoffman yelled at him on film. this is the sole reason i decided to see the movie. unfortunately, there were no scenes in which hoffman's character is mad with hill's character. but onto the movie now...i felt like i didn't know what is the director trying to tell us. is this a movie about baseball, or a movie about brad pitt's character? not bad at all, i just felt that the screenplay is a tad meandering. 6/10.

predestination. i love time travel movies, especially with mindfucking twists and turns. this wasn't perfect, but it kept me on the edge of my seat for the whole duration of the movie. great cinematography. 7/10.

all the boys love mandy lane. decent horror flick. loved amber heard here. johnny depp is one lucky son of a gun getting his hands on amber. plot was ok, murders were filmed well, they were directed to look sloppy, and i liked this a lot, 'cause not everyone is a professional killer. on the other hand, i hated the sounds telling me 'feel scared, right now!'. sometimes it's just better not to have scary sounds when you have a scary scene. and yeah, the visual design was better than average for this kind of film. 6/10.

contracted. a girl has unprotected sex one night. the next day she's ill as fuck. this was an interesting movie with a decent lead actress. liked the mother/daughter aspect of the movie. however, i didn't like the music during terrifying scenes and i hated the end (last minute of the movie). 6/10.

the children (2008). ok, this was a stupid movie. i like the idea of little children killing their parents, but suspension of disbelief should be its alternative title. filmed nicely, though. 4/10.

im making a rare appearance because of:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFinNxS5KN4

Well sure, but it's basically an infection/zombie/patient zero flick - it's no more suspension of disbelief than, say, the original Night of the Living Dead. The characters mention the kids' sickness several times, albeit in small easily-missed lines that you only notice on further viewings. It's quite a clever film in that way. You pick up clues every time.

In a shittier movie, they would have had some big 'reveal' where some scientist shows up and spends five minutes giving you the backstory on how some contagion escaped a lab and that's how it all happened - fuck that, personally I'm glad they did it the way they did in The Children.

Wait and see I suppose. Not a fan of modernization (although there's not much on show in the trailer), the CGI looked unconvincing with that whale dinosaur and the director isn't someone with many movies to his belt. The trailer makes it appear better than Jurassic Park 3. Hope it can be as well crafted and hit the right notes like Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

Not sure if it was the worst of 2013 but it was particularly bad, especially when the "bet you didn't see this one" reveal happened, totally killed what was a passable opening.

I think the trailer looks good, but I'm disappointed that Sam Neill and/or Jeff Goldblum won't be in it. I enjoyed them as much as the dinosaurs. That scene where Chris Pratt is riding a motorcycle amidst a bunch of velociraptors was interesting because they were running past him and not attacking. I wonder if they genetically engineered them to be less aggressive or something. I'll definitely be seeing this, hopefully in theaters.

Going to see Birdman tonight, finally. Been looking forward to this one.