What's Your Favorite Horror Movie?

11.24.04 | JohnRobertson

[John Robertson]

What's your favorite horror movie...and why? What fried your hair, and still makes it jump if you get a little too tired and you remember a sequence or two from something that scared the stuff out of you.

I've always dismissed horror movies as a waste of time, but the older I get, the more I realize they must serve some function--some cathartic function--because they are an enduring genre, and each generation likes to find its own favorite scary movies. Heard a commentator saying the other day, the reason the country is so preoccuppied with horror films right now is, it's a horror we can "handle," versus the real, terrorist kind of horror.

[null and void]

John Carpenter's "The Thing"...that sprouted head freaked me out...

I thought it was cute.

The original story 'Who goes there?' by John W. Campbell, Jr. was badly adapted to the silver screen, twice. It's much scarier in it's own quiet way...

[GraceofGod]

"The Shining" was my favorite for many years. The character played by Jack Nicholson seemed like a genuine psycho. One of the most terrifying scenes though is when Danny was riding his big-wheel through the halls of the empty Hotel and runs right into a vision of the two murdered little girls. The music was perfect and the voice of the little girls too, saying, "Come play with us Danny, come play with us.. forever.. and ever.. and ever."

When I rented that many years ago I had a new Sony VCR with the frame by frame feature, and was playing with the feature going frame by frame around that very scene that was spooking me out, and unless I had a defective tape, there was just one frame of those little girls before he actually see's them in the film that is not visible to the naked eye when you're watching the film in normal speed. Maybe that's why it spooked me out a little more than it would have.

[KarlInOhio]

Generally I can't suspend disbelief enough to be taken in by a horror movie. (Jason has a weedwacker- eek, eek, zzzz!) However, Silence of the Lambs scared the hell out of me. Most horror movies I can dismiss by saying that isn't real. SotL had me thinking "There are people out there like that. I need to buy more ammo."

[swilhelm73]

I read "It" in about a week, IIRC. I just could not put the thousand page (?) book down. Wake, work, eat, read, repeat. :)

[asgardshill]

If they could have stretched Ghost Ship's first 5 minutes throughout the entire movie, it would have been the greatest horror film ever made.

[Liz]

The Haunting with Julie Harris, Claire Bloom and Rus Tamblin.

The book on which the movie is based, Shirley Jackson's "The Haunting of Hill House," is even scarier than the movie.

One of my fave scary movies ---sometimes shown on PBS ----is "The Innocents" starring Deborah Kerr, set in a mid-Victorian English countryside estate, based on Henry James' book "Turn of the Screw."

[Spyder]

I'm with you but would put The Shining second on my list with Silence of the Lambs #1. I know it's not really supposed to be horror per se, but both my husband and I were glad we went to a matinee and exited the theater in full daylight.

[Chad Fairbanks]

Agreed LOL

[Chad Fairbanks]

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/6305325812/002-4955998-5872858?v=glance

Best horror movie ever made.

[Chad Fairbanks]

So, what horror movie scared YOU the most? :0)

[diamond6]

The Bone Collector by Stephen King I think......... shiver.

[mowowie]

Now's A good time of year to check out "Black Christmas" a lesser known but GREAT horror movie from the 70's. very creepy! Just check out some of the user reviews on IMDB.COM
and you'll race out and rent it. You won't believe that this movie is Directed and produced by Bob Clark, The man who also brought us "A Christmas Story". Talk about Christmas extremes!!

[null and void]

LOL!

I saw Alien when it first came out. At the Hollywood Egyptian Theater. Odd theater, the projection booth is low, so the center isle jogs around it. On the second turn I abruptly turned around, shoved my spread hand into the face of the stranger behind me and screamed eeeahh!!!

Turned out to be a black kid, he visibly blanched and said in a quavering voice, "Don't DO that, man!!!

He's probably still trying to find me...

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

Hmmmmm...anything with a Democrat in the Oval Office. : )

[OOPisforLiberals]

Oh man. Heart attack time. You'd get sued for that these days ;)

[BigCinBigD]

Some of you are confusing science fiction with Horror. Aliens was science fiction. Texas chainsaw Massacre was horror.

The "best" horror movie of all time is easy.........HALLOWEEN! The end where the doctor shoots Michael and he falls out the window. Then Jamie asks him.
"Was that the Boogie man"? and he says"As a matter of fact...It was" Then they look out the window and he's gone!

Gives me chills to this day. Speaking of horror shows. I must no go and scrape the number 8 off my Cowboys jersey and iron on a number 7. I endeavor to preserver!

[Chad Fairbanks]

ROTFLMAO...

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

But I'm still partial to the Evil Dead movies. I don't know why.

'Cause they're great?

[Ciexyz]

"The Hitcher" (1986) scared the bejeezus out of me. About a hitchhiker-killer (Rutgar Hauer) who stalks a young man who gives him a ride.