Sat 21 Jan 2006
Creep
Posted by anaglyph under Movies, Spooky
[13] Comments
Ten Creepy Films You Should See:
★Jack Clayton’s The Innocents
★Tod Browning’s Freaks
★Tod Browning’s Dracula
★F. W. Murnau’s Nosferatu
★Robert Altman’s Images
★James Whale’s The Old Dark House
★Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now
★Dario Argento’s Suspiria
★Roman Polanski’s The Tenant
★Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby
In no particular order, but definitely in a darkened room.
I’ve only seen the last one and I loved it. One time that I thought the movie was almost as good as the book.
Roman Polanski doesn’t need to make movies to be creepy.
Hideo’s Dark Water is my vote for Completely Creepy. Nothing happens – but you will scream out loud when he wants you to. Do NOT risk it in a darkened room.
Now now Ms Arkham, that’s not very charitable.
And there is a film that I will never buy on DVD even though it is fantastic – Victor Fleming’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde from 1941. There is a fleeting moment between Ingrid Bergman and Spencer Tracy halfway through the film – just a few frames of horror that are gone so quickly that you almost can’t believe you saw it. I never want to be able to pause and rewind and have a good look at what I glimpsed – that would destroy a preciously creepy memory.
Oh, I agree Pil – Dark Water is a really good example of how to do a lot of creepy with very little artifice. The original Ring has a few sublime creepy moments too, and only one of those involves a special effect.
Anyone bsides me creept out by th photo included in this post? Whatnahell IS that … that splootch?
I agree… three cheers for the creepiness of the original Ring. Closest to sublimely creepy in decades.
Rosemary’ Baby… the ultimate creepshow. And an Oscar winner too, yes? Not that THAT’s a measure of a great film… at least anymore… but somehow it made horror seem legit.
The worst scare I ever had in a cinema was that scene in ‘The Sixth Sense’ where the kid is in the bathroom and someone walks behind him along the corridor. I got a rush of terror down my spine that was exactly the feeling I had as a child when I got really, really scared (courtesy of an over-active imagination), a feeling I’d long since managed to bury deep in my subconscious. It still amazes me how this one cinematic moment could bring back a childhood fear so exactly and with such force.
Joey: You have to watch ‘Don’t Look Now’ to find out what the splootch is.
Dear lord, no. I wrote those down so I know which movies to avoid and never, ever see. I want to sleep at night, damn it!
martha who?: Yes, Rosemary’s Baby won an Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role (the wonderful Ruth Gordon).
Piece of trivia: Rosemary’s Baby was produced by the inimitable William Castle, who directed wonderful schlock cinema in the ’50s and ’60s, including The Tingler and The House on Haunted Hill, both of which I recommend for a jolly good laugh-a-scream-a-minute beer and pizza experience.
Considering what I could have called him, I think I was being charitable.