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Dumarest said:
It is unfortunate how lesser talents ape the superficial aspects of superior artists and think they're creating something worthy because it has a vague resemblance to prior praised work. (Although I personally never cared for Frank Miller's Batman, let alone the countless impressionable imitators who followed in his footprints.)
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The one issue I have with Frank Miller's Batman is turning Selina Kyle into a literal whore.


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Alan Moore has often expressed horror at the "influence" his works had on comics. His opinion was that Deconstruction is supposed to lead to Reconstruction, but for most of the early 90s, It was just echoes of echoes of deconstruction, without any real understanding of what the underlying point was. Hence Alan Moore trying very hard to introduce Reconstructionist comics in the 90s - 1963, Supreme, Promethea, Tom Strong etc. Eventually a Reconstructionist movement did take off - Marvels, Starman, JLA Year One, etc. But those early 90s were a dark, dark time to be a superhero fan.
 
Tommy Brownell said:
It’s funny, because I LOVE the original Halloween and still think Scream is a really good movie.

But the novel Dracula bores me to tears and feels tired and clichéd, even though its biggest sin is spawning legions of imitators like the other two.
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The original Halloween is still a compulsively watchable formalist excercise in the use of steadycam and framing that I find fascinating. I can't think of any slasher since that really got the visual approach that Carpenter brought to his minimalist material. It Follows is pretty clearly a tribute to the style though.
 
Voros said:
The original Halloween is still a compulsively watchable formalist excercise in the use of steadycam and framing that I find fascinating. I can't think of any slasher since that really got the visual approach that Carpenter brought to his minimalist material. It Follows is pretty clearly a tribute to the style though.
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I always thought The Shining largely got some of it's camera work ideas from Halloween and a lot of David Lynch's movies used slow tracking shots too (although I think they were hand held).
 
Trippy said:
I always thought The Shining largely got some of it's camera work ideas from Halloween and a lot of David Lynch's movies used slow tracking shots too (although I think they were hand held).
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I agree, I recently read a review of the new horror film Hereditary where the writer notes the influence of The Shining's slow pans and tracking shots on the film and then argues that The Shining is probably the most influential horror film of the past few decades (I can see The Shining's influence in The Witch too). Halloween and The Thing are probably the only other competition. The 80s slashers though were generally a visually stolid lot.
 
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Wouldn't Alien enter this discussion? Or it's qualities were unrelated to what is being discussed here?
 
Muchacho said:
Wouldn't Alien enter this discussion? Or it's qualities were unrelated to what is being discussed here?
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The first half for sure. Once the alien is fully grown I think the editing becomes more conventional, as I recall. That used to bother me but now I love that film for what it is, sure the second half is basically a slasher in outer space but what a slasher!

I do think Alien and The Shining are of a piece in terms of the cold, alienated tone and little attempt to make the characters conventionally 'sympathetic.' But I think Alien is still pretty sui generis, the films that 'imitate' it only ape its most superficial plot elements, not the tone, which I think would be assumed to be too alienating (ha!) for modern audiences.
 
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Voros said:
The first half for sure. Once the alien is fully grown I think the editing becomes more conventional, as I recall. That used to bother me but now I love that film for what it is, sure the second half is basically a slasher in outer space but what a slasher!
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I was a little young to see Alien when it came out. I started watching R horror films in 1982, which meant I had already seen a fair number of slashers before I saw it. That meant I found the second half a little disappointing. I've come to a like it a lot more now that I am not living in the middle of a slasher glut.

I do think Alien and The Shining are of a piece in terms of the cold, alienated tone and little attempt to make the characters conventionally 'sympathetic.' But I think Alien is still pretty sui generis, the films that 'imitate' it only ape its most superficial plot elements, not the tone, which I think would be assumed to be too alienating (ha!) for modern audiences.
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That really pays off in the slasher part of the film as none of the typical horror rules on who is likely to live or die apply. If anything, Ripley is set up as the cold, officious character who is going to bite it.
 
You're right, one thing that is really radical about the film is that if you watch it as I did as a kid not knowing Sigourney Weaver it isn't clear she is fated to be the protagonist.

She appears to just be one of the ensemble crew, it is Dallas who I think most viewers will identify with, not only as the Captain but as the warmest personality. That's what makes his death so shocking, like Leigh's death in Psycho, it upsets our narrative equilibrium.
 
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Voros said:
You're right, one thing that is really radical about the film is that if you watch it as I did as a kid not knowing Signourney Weaver it isn't clear she is fated to be the protagonist.

She appears to just be one of the ensemble crew, it is Dallas who I think most viewers will identify with, not only as the Captain but as the warmest personality. That's what makes his death so shocking, like Leigh's death in Psycho, it upsets our narrative equilibrium.
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Were it released today they'd tell us in the trailer that she's the heroine and show the alien in a well-lit full-body shot. :clown:
 
I remember so clearly the first time I saw Alien. The same year I saw Superman:The Movie and Star Wars for the first time. It was such a fascinating film. I wasn't scared, but I was just mesmerized by the visuals. That first shot of the chamber with the eggs, the giant pilot was etched on my young memory. The cast was amazing, it felt like watching a documentary. I havent seen many films where the interactions were so natural.
 
Dumarest said:
Were it released today they'd tell us in the trailer that she's the heroine and show the alien in a well-lit full-body shot. :clown:
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Probably, but the fact that Alien got to have such an enigmatic trailer was amazing even then. Spoilery trailers have always been common.





TristramEvans said:
I remember so clearly the first time I saw Alien. The same year I saw Superman:The Movie and Star Wars for the first time. It was such a fascinating film. I wasn't scared, but I was just mesmerized by the visuals. That first shot of the chamber with the eggs, the giant pilot was etched on my young memory. The cast was amazing, it felt like watching a documentary. I havent seen many films where the interactions were so natural.
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You've reminded me that while I didn't see the movie until later, someone gave me this jigsaw puzzle for my birthday in 1979. I remember spending a lot of time staring at it thinking about the horrifying things that must happen in that movie.
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Baulderstone said:
Probably, but the fact that Alien got to have such an enigmatic trailer was amazing even then. Spoilery trailers have always been common.
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Yeah, but at least once in a while we'd get enigmatic stuff like this:

I haven't seen anything like that in years... though maybe that's just because I don't go to the theater much these days either.
 
Wow, that is an awesome trailer.
 
Simlasa said:
Yeah, but at least once in a while we'd get enigmatic stuff like this:

I haven't seen anything like that in years... though maybe that's just because I don't go to the theater much these days either.
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That's pretty hard to beat, so I am not even going to try.

I will however list some recent trailers that I think did a solid job of not outlining the plot. And I will admit that I don't make it to theaters much either, but these ones caught my attention.





The Guardians of the Galaxy trailer gets points for mostly being made up of footage that doesn't exist in the movie.

The TV series Legion had a good Season one trailer as well. One thing I like about is that it seems to show a lot of the series, but everything in there is from the first episode, aside from some clips that aren't even in the show.

 
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