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married but discreet posted:
We probably could do brackets on what constitutes a horror film.
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Jul 18, 2020 19:29
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| # ? Jun 3, 2024 14:29 |
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I will be doing a very casual Sunday stream tomorrow on the CineD discord, from 9am EST. The lineup will be: 0900 - King Kong 1100 - Son of Kong 1220 - Godzilla 1410 - Godzilla Raids Again 1540 - Godzilla: King of Monsters 1710 - Rodan 1840 - Maniac Cop 2 Feel free to drop in and out as you see fit. Be advised, all times are subject to change due to the wavering incompetence of the management. Thank you.
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Jul 18, 2020 23:19
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Debbie Does Dagon posted:I will be doing a very casual Sunday stream tomorrow on the CineD discord, from 9am EST. The lineup will be: I gotta stop in and watch Maniac Cop 2- it’s kinda bullshit I haven’t seen it yet since i love Cohen, Lustig, Hennenlotter, Ferrara dirty, grimy, NYC horror flicks with a passion
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Jul 18, 2020 23:33
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I'm not really good with like all day marathons and I got Son of Kong and Godzilla Raids Again in today. But depending on how tonight/tomorrow goes I definitely might join you for the last few films. I also might stream Martin and Planet Terror for anyone who doesn't have them on Monday/Tuesday. But I have to figure out if I can. As best as I can tell the Discord streaming thing doesn't have audio for Macs so I need to figure out a work around.
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Jul 18, 2020 23:37
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Nice! That'll make a great double bill.
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Jul 18, 2020 23:41
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There are a few philosophy of film books that try to get at what the nature of horror is, and what the requirements might be, the most prominent of which is probably Noel Carroll's Philosophy of Horror or Paradoxes of the Heart.
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Jul 18, 2020 23:45
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I think I generally have a very broad idea of what horror is. Like I think Seven and Silence of the Lambs are horror. But I don't really think something like Outbreak is horror. But if you told me you felt Outbreak was horror I wouldn't really disagree. I can see why and how you get there. And to some extent I do think "horror" is just really about how you engage with it and that can change for each person. I feel like Criminal Minds is basically horror, and a horror I won't watch. So like, I do think horror is often "you know it when you see it." So like... I really don't see Memories of Murder as horror. There's the one stalking scene and the one flashback scene but they feel very small in the film as a whole. And no, its not quite a cop procedural but its more of a deconstruction of it the way the Wire is. So like, I just personally don't feel like those short scenes get me there because as terrible as they are they were never really what the movie was about. The movie is about the cops and what they're going through. But you know... if you see that movie and see horror then what can i say? Its about your engagement and perspective.
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Jul 18, 2020 23:52
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Funny thing is nobody has even mentioned Destroyer yet.
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Jul 19, 2020 01:58
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I wish I had a way to watch it without stealing from KK.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:00
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Basebf555 posted:Funny thing is nobody has even mentioned Destroyer yet. That's tonight with Martin if I feel up to it. That will be an interesting test since I really didn't like Martin when I saw it but it sounds like it will be the truer horror. So will be interesting to see how much of a hypocrite I am.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:01
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I was going to watch it tonight, but it turned into an impromptu date night. I've heard good things though.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:03
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It's a decent movie but it's even less of a horror movie than Memories of Murder so I was surprised that the whole discussion ended up being centered on that.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:06
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Saw Martin on Youtube, I'd be up for Destroyer.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:06
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Basebf555 posted:It's a decent movie but it's even less of a horror movie than Memories of Murder so I was surprised that the whole discussion ended up being centered on that. Destroyer is up against Romero, so there's no expectation that it's going to win. Whereas Memories is against a far weaker film, so arguing about whether or not it's a horror is a good way of edging it out, without acknowledging the elephant in the room.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:12
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I mean, I just haven't mentioned it because I haven't seen it. I happened to watch Memories first and it seems like a bunch of others did too. But yeah, it might just be a matchup thing. Martin seems to be a favorite around here and Romero is Romero. So debates like "genre" or "inspiration" tend to be more tiebreaker discussions for close matchups and maybe people just don't expect that one to be close.
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Jul 19, 2020 02:14
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 King Kong begins in 30 minutes on the CineD Discord
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Jul 19, 2020 13:31
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Rodan is all about escalation and environmentalism, though in a more subtle way than most. If you don't know anything about it I do wonder how surprising the twists and turns are. It's not as compact a story as Gojira, not as well crafted, but it's an incredibly good time regardless. Maniac Cop 2 on the flip side has a lot of excellent stunts and not much else
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Jul 20, 2020 01:17
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That's not fair. Maniac Cop 2 also has very confusing messaging. I think Rodan is maybe a little bit too twist heavy and it leaves the human story feeling very  . But it also benefits the movie so many years after because like you can think you know what the movie is about and it still manages to toss you a curveball or two. And it still pulls off some emotional story and messaging with the general plotting and action.
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Jul 20, 2020 01:23
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Rodan vs Maniac Cop 2 Maniac Cop 2 is a very impressive film when it comes to stunt work, but there's really no glue there to hold the story together. It's more of a series of "wouldn't it be cool if" moments, roughly strung together. Wouldn't it be cool to be if there were strippers. Wouldn't it be cool if there was a creepy serial killer. Wouldn't it be cool if MC was on fire, and beating people up. Sure, the individual elements are nice, but I didn't feel like I cared at any point. Rodan is very similar. I couldn't tell you who any of the characters were from memory. You have this constant escalation, but to what avail? I don't really care about any of these people, and by the third act it becomes very large scale, and abstract. There's no stand-out Odessa Steps moment, of zooming in on one individual's panic as they flee from Rodan's path of destruction. What there is though is a sprinkling of empathetic moments. The grieving widow crying, and banging on the door of the person she accuses. The cute bugs, scuttling around this new human world which they don't fully comprehend. Rodan's finale itself is a dark, emotional high point, which I think everyone can empathise with. As such I can only vote for Rodan, as it's the only film that really gave me something to latch onto, and feel, and move me. If cinema doesn't do something funny to my squishy innards, what's the point, right? Good. Bad. Just don't make me feel indifferent.
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Jul 20, 2020 01:54
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Ishiro Honda’s Rodan vs. William Lustig’s Maniac Cop 2 I LOVED Godzilla. But this isn’t Godzilla, its Rodan. I liked Rodan. I liked Rodan a lot more than Godzilla Raids Again. Rodan accomplished the feat of being a kaiju film that is primarily about the monsters and waiting to see what they do, and still managed to have true pathos and emotional weight to it. That’s probably my biggest hurdle with kaiju films. Sure, it might be fun to see a big monster smash some toy trucks and buildings and wreck some havoc and maybe fight. But if I’m bored the rest of the film and just waiting for that to happen then you’re not gonna hold me. I can’t say I was engrossed in the human elements of Rodan or even remember the names of the humans. But there was a story with the monsters and even some pathos. So I was engaged. And a bunch of twists and turns, which maybe contributed to some of the soft human story, but kept the story fresh and surprising throughout. Maniac Cop 2 has some very good stunts and well constructed world of characters. But it feels confused tonally and storywise. I don’t know what its trying to tell me or if its trying to tell me anything at all. Is the bad guy a bad guy? Is he killing indeterminately or is he seeking justice? I have no idea after 2 viewings of the film and the posters I watched with didn’t know either. Its a solid enough cop action film but like… that’s all I got. And you know… for as much as we’ve talked about whether Memories of Murder is a horror film or might still talk about Destroyer, if Maniac Cop wasn’t ostensibly a zombie this would basically be a Die Hard or Lethal Weapon or Bad Boys movie or something. I’m not saying its not horror. Its clearly a slasher and he’s clearly a zombie. Its just an odd tone film and honest, as I said with Memories I’m kind of sick of cop stuff. Introspective thoughtful cop stuff and dumb action cop stuff. So… I didn’t love either film but I think its clear I liked Rodan more. I was gonna talk about Honda and Cohen and Lustig. I was gonna open it up for someone to convince me. But nah, I like Rodan more. I like Honda more. Rodan. I gave MC2 a second chance. I’m good.
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Jul 20, 2020 03:00
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Does voting end tomorrow? I still need to watch The Fury and rewatch Maniac Cop 2. If necessary I'll drop the rewatch and just vote for Rodan, I'm pretty confident in that vote already.
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Jul 20, 2020 14:08
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Voting ends early Thursday morning.
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Jul 20, 2020 14:10
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The Fury is De Palma doing a better Scanners before Cronenberg even had an idea for Scanners. There are hints of Firestarter, but it's a wholly unique, paranoid paranormal thriller with striking horror imagery, all set to an awesomely underappreciated John Williams score. It's just crazy good. It felt like a 4 hour movie told in two hours, and I mean that as a huge compliment.
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Jul 20, 2020 14:18
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Ok good I have time for both then. Going into Rodan I figured it has to be a very solid and well made kaiju film to beat Maniac Cop 2. And that's exactly what it turned out to be. I really enjoyed the structure of it, how the first third involved a lot of investigation and just overall how they approached the creatures from a scientific perspective. It felt similar to how the MUTOs were treated in the more recent Godzilla film. In the end it didn't deliver as many memorable scenes as Godzilla, but I appreciated how much it was willing to do it's own thing and Honda really just knows how to make these kind of movies. I caught about half of Godzilla Raids Again on DDDs weekend stream and it felt like Honda's directing hand was sorely missed. One might be fooled into thinking that these movies are simple, you throw some actors together in a simple science lab set, have some monsters fight it out as you periodically cut back to the concerned humans, bam you've got a kaiju film. But I think what I'm realizing about Honda is that he was able to consistently balance genuine human pathos with the rubber suits, and knew from scene to scene what was needed to keep the equation balanced all the way through. It's an issue that's come up so many times in more recent kaiju attempts and I think it's proven that it's no easy task. So Honda, however far he ends up going in this tournament, definitely deserves more respect than he gets.
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Jul 20, 2020 14:27
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What I found most interesting about Rodan (so far, I kinda have to finish the final act, cuz I kept dozing off at the end due to late-night viewings) is that, unlike most Kaiju movies, the first two acts are ostensibly creature feature monster movies, similar to The Blob, Them!, Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Honda could have just made "Godzilla, but Rodan", and instead gave us a completely different movie (with similar themes that don't heavily overlap), illustrating the breadth of possibilities of storytelling with Kaiju films.
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Jul 20, 2020 14:37
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Counterpoint to the Rodan voters: That scene with the girl on the side of the car on the highway and also the man on fire stunt at the end of Maniac Cop 2.
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Jul 20, 2020 15:04
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I've still got 2,000 Maniacs and Destroyer to watch, and then hopefully rewatches of Martin and Maniac Cop 2. I'd like to rewatch Planet Terror as well, but will I have the time?? There were a lot of movies to watch this week. I know there's still four days left, but drat.
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Jul 20, 2020 15:06
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TrixRabbi posted:Counterpoint to the Rodan voters: That scene with the girl on the side of the car on the highway and also the man on fire stunt at the end of Maniac Cop 2. I think everyone has already acknowledged that the stunt work is top notch, but that's not really something I personally give points for in a horror thread. If this were Action Director Bracketology, then absolutely, that was very impressive. I however want horror to move me emotionally, and Maniac Cop 2 just feels like such a one note, shallow venture when it comes to creating human moments.
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Jul 20, 2020 15:17
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I'm way behind too, I still need to see Fury, Destroyer and 2k Maniacs. Stoked for all, but hard to get :/
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Jul 20, 2020 15:30
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married but discreet posted:I'm way behind too, I still need to see Fury, Destroyer and 2k Maniacs. Stoked for all, but hard to get :/ I'll stream all three for you right now if you want, just say the word.
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Jul 20, 2020 15:35
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The Fury is so good that I immediately bought it from Arrow, since it's included in their current sale.
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Jul 20, 2020 15:56
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Debbie Does Dagon posted:I think everyone has already acknowledged that the stunt work is top notch, but that's not really something I personally give points for in a horror thread. If this were Action Director Bracketology, then absolutely, that was very impressive. I however want horror to move me emotionally, and Maniac Cop 2 just feels like such a one note, shallow venture when it comes to creating human moments. I don't even discount the stunts in a horror. I'm happy to give Maniac Cop 2 the credit for them. But 2 good scenes don't make for a good movie.
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Jul 20, 2020 17:05
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I don't really mean to discount the stunts. I mentioned during the stream that I thought both scenes were really cool, but they also just felt like things that happened. Neither scene really felt integral to the film overall, and that's cool in action movies, where I'm there for the action and the emotion is an afterthought, but I bring a different metric to horror. I just finished watching Martin, and there are several action scenes. All of them are far less impressive from a technical standpoint, when comparing them to MC2, but because Romero went to the trouble of establishing suspense, tension, and drama, they were all an order of magnitude more enjoyable for me.
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Jul 20, 2020 17:45
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Franchescanado posted:The Fury is so good that I immediately bought it from Arrow, since it's included in their current sale. Lol I almost did the same, need to wait until next sale tho I suppose.
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Jul 20, 2020 18:42
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Destroyer contains perhaps the saddest handjob ever depicted on film.
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Jul 20, 2020 18:43
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Debbie Does Dagon posted:Destroyer contains perhaps the saddest handjob ever depicted on film. and ya'll thought it wasn't horror!  
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Jul 20, 2020 18:47
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Time is the most brutal and vicious horror of them all, so in that way I suppose Destroyer is horror.
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Jul 20, 2020 19:01
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Debbie Does Dagon posted:I'll stream all three for you right now if you want, just say the word. I'd be up for watching one in the evening, maaaybe 2 so I can actually finish all of them by Thursday.
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Jul 20, 2020 20:12
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married but discreet posted:I'd be up for watching one in the evening, maaaybe 2 so I can actually finish all of them by Thursday. Neat! Let me know on the Horror Director Discord channel when you're ready
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Jul 20, 2020 20:24
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| # ? Jun 3, 2024 14:29 |
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Martin vs Destroyer This is perhaps the easiest matchup of the week. Destroyer isn't horror, even by my extremely flexible definition. The closest we get to horror is probably the sad handjob, and that's it. The rest is a very ordinary feeling crime thriller, held together by Nicole Kidman's masterful lead performance. If it were not for her, this movie would not be worth discussing. Martin on the other hand is a horror, and an extremely good one. I can't remember who said Martin was their favourite Romero film, but I'm definitely leaning in that direction. It's a strange psychosexual horror drama, which plays with the idea of the vampire as a kind of proto-inc*l, serial-rapist, perhaps delusional in regards to his vampirism, perhaps not. Then it layers family drama over that amazing premise. I think it would make a really strong double bill with something like Henry. It has the same grimey intensity, whilst also being uncomfortably sympathetic.
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Jul 20, 2020 20:59
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