Genre guidelines

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iateabee
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by iateabee »

I admit I'm a bit of an outlier: I embrace the grey areas when it comes to genre and enjoy making non-standard categorisations. It may be a personality thing: some people dislike ambiguity, and others live for it. Falling in the second category, I'm always bemused by people who argue that Silence Of The Lambs can't possibly be horror as it's a thriller - when, to me, it's clearly both, just as Star Wars: A New Hope is SciFi and a western, and Blade Runner is SciFi and a noir.

It's fun to cast a wide genre net and see what you catch; for example, I've noticed some people consider Todd Haynes's Safe to be a horror movie, and I love that. It adds a whole new layer of context to what is otherwise a ponderous arthouse film about a housewife who may or may not have allergies. Having said that, I doubt a film like Safe would go down well with the FrightFest audience.
Last edited by iateabee on Sat Jul 02, 2011 12:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by Mr Bill »

I think iateabee has hit the nail on the head.

Many great films simultaneously fall into several genre categories, Assault on Precinct 13 is both a police thriller and a western homage, but at the same time I will always list it up there with my favourite horror films, purely for its creepy, chilling brilliance. The successful French and British homage-remakes, The Nest and F are also well worth casting your genre net wide enough to catch.
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by DoctorKaren »

What's the least 'horrorish' film to have scared you?
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by iateabee »

DoctorKaren wrote:What's the least 'horrorish' film to have scared you?
Though not commonly considered 'horror' films, here are a few films that have terrified me:

Haneke's White Ribbon, Haynes's Safe, Greenaway's The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and her Lover, and Lynch's Lost Highway.

Personally, I do think of these as horror films (though I suspect many here would disagree).
Last edited by iateabee on Sun May 29, 2011 1:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by Mr Bill »

I agree Greenaway's stuff, like The Cook, The Thief..., has a very creepy feel without actually being out and out horror, Zed and Two Noughts sticks in the mind, particularly for the large animals rotting at high speed to maddening music, sometimes things can freak you out enough to stay with you without actually frightening you.

I'd say the documentary Catfish is one of the most freaky films I've seen lately, Facebook is evil!
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by DoctorKaren »

Do you think these rough genre definitions could culturally shift at all (depending on audience, marketing etc)?
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by Mr Bill »

DoctorKaren wrote:Do you think these rough genre definitions could culturally shift at all (depending on audience, marketing etc)?
Other than the gradual shift from Crime to Horror as the genre where the nasty stabbings tend to happen, I would also say there has been a slow shift over the last 30 years in Science Fiction films from a horror to an action/thriller emphasis.

We don't seem to get the great trashy fun Sci-fi horror films we got in the seventies and eighties like Saturn 3, The Death Machine or Hardware. Although the same sort of themes are played out in action adventure blockbusters for a broader audience.
Phillip K Dick adaptations have shifted from gritty sci-fi horror's like Total Recall and Screamers to action romps like Paycheck and The Adjustment Bureau. Perhaps the best way of tracking this gradual audience shift is through the steady change in the Terminator films from the first 18 certificate dark horror to the most recent 12 certificate action blockbusters.

Maybe it was Aliens that kickstarted the shift? But whenever it happened, more and more of the Sci-fi arriving is living on the Action Shelves (like the woefull Skyline) and less and less is ending up on the Horror Shelves (like the underated Pandorum).
I blame the rise of CGI, which lends itself better to action than horror.

I also miss the sci-fi westerns that were still popular into the nineties, the only truly good one I recall recently was Hunter Prey.

Can anybody think of or reccomend any good recent sci-fi with an old school feel, and no Shia LaBeouf?
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Genre guidelines

Post by daveroughcut »

Moon and Splice
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by DoctorKaren »

daveroughcut wrote:Moon and Splice
Care to elaborate? Without going spoilerific, how does it stick out as being uber? With a title like that I'm genuinely intrigued (and I am not a sci-fi fan). Thanks :-)
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by maxmum »

DoctorKaren wrote:What's the least 'horrorish' film to have scared you?
Ransom. :oops:
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by MaxRenn »

DoctorKaren wrote:What's the least 'horrorish' film to have scared you?
Miracle Mile. Terrified me, my hands were shaking afterwords

That and Watership Down, which I can't bring myself to watch to this day. The General in the warren, arrgh!
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Re: Genre guidelines

Post by Mr Bill »

DoctorKaren wrote:
daveroughcut wrote:Moon and Splice
Care to elaborate? Without going spoilerific, how does it stick out as being uber? With a title like that I'm genuinely intrigued (and I am not a sci-fi fan). Thanks :-)
I think Dave is talking about two seperate films (If I'm wrong then I share your curiosity, Moon and Splice is an awesome title! sounds like a working title for Human Centipede)
Splice is classic Vincenzo Natali, thick with sophisticated allegory, but helped along by some uneven acting and abrupt plot advances, it ultimately lands on the wrong side of the silly fence. Moon I only just caught up with and it is a very good atmospheric slow burn, not unlike Solaris and 2001 in many ways, but with a very small cast. Both are well worth a watch.
As is Whistle, a half hour short film by Moon writer/director Duncan Jones, which is burried on the same disc amongst the commentaries.

I'm with MaxRenn on Watership Down, and haven't revisited it since it made me cry every time I watched it as a child, but the foul mouthed seagull did lift the bleak mood a teeny bit.

In hindsight, so does:

Is it a kind of dream,
Floating out on the tide,
Following the river of death downstream?
Oh, is it a dream?

There's a fog along the horizon,
A strange glow in the sky,
And nobody seems to know where you go,
And what does it mean?
Oh, is it a dream?

Bright eyes,
Burning like fire.
Bright eyes,
How can you close and fail?
How can the light that burned so brightly
Suddenly burn so pale?
Bright eyes.

Is it a kind of shadow,
Reaching into the night,
Wandering over the hills unseen,
Or is it a dream?

There's a high wind in the trees,
A cold sound in the air,
And nobody ever knows when you go,
And where do you start,
Oh, into the dark.


Art Garfunkel, manipulative...much?
(when I copied and pasted this I was taking the piss, but reading through it now I'm almost welling up! Maybe they should work Bright Eyes into The Bunny Game for added gravitas during a slow motion torture sequence?)
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