"Horror Fans" for Dummies

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Postby orz » Wed Aug 23, 2006 10:09 pm

maybe... tho I'd rather go and watch some horror movies to be honest <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START :) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> seems a more worthwhile way to spend my time. I just wanted to put my oar in against the idea that enjoying horror/gore in a fictional context is in any way broadly wrong or contradictory to being an authentic human.<br><br>Incidentally tho in a slightly agreeing way, i do find it odd how mainstream scenes of hardcore gorey surgery/autopsy have become these days, in CSI type junk... but then I don't really watch much TV... <p></p><i></i>
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kljgsgjsd

Postby orz » Wed Aug 23, 2006 10:29 pm

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>But it enters the consciousness as if it's real.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br>Well this is the thing... When you're watching a movie, sure it's 'real' enough to be accepted by your sensory organs as actual experience just like any dream or 'real' experience...<br><br>But really, the trauma you might experience from a horror movie is nothing compared to real trama. It may appear similar but it's not in the same catagory of experience. You might find nasty gore scenes in modern movies upsetting but if you think even the most extreme cinema nastiness can even be measured on the same scale as the everyday experiences of ordinary adults and children in war zones for instance then that's a pretty odd perspective you have.<br><br><br><br>If you have a nightmare do you get upset at your subconcious for 'desensitising you'?<br><br><br><br>P.S. on the somewhat related theme of video game violence, this new coke ad might make some RI heads spin! - <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START :eek --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/eek.gif ALT=":eek"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> <br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://stashmedia.tv/feed/coke_pallg_prog_lbox001.mov">stashmedia.tv/feed/coke_p...box001.mov</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--> <p></p><i></i>
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Re: kljgsgjsd

Postby FourthBase » Wed Aug 23, 2006 10:48 pm

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>Well this is the thing... When you're watching a movie, sure it's 'real' enough to be accepted by your sensory organs as actual experience just like any dream or 'real' experience...<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Right.<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>But really, the trauma you might experience from a horror movie is nothing compared to real trama. It may appear similar but it's not in the same catagory of experience. You might find nasty gore scenes in modern movies upsetting but if you think even the most extreme cinema nastiness can even be measured on the same scale as the everyday experiences of ordinary adults and children in war zones for instance then that's a pretty odd perspective you have.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>I'm not literally equating the experience of seeing fake horror with real horror. Not on the same scale, of course. Well, maybe...in a subconscious way. Yes, your waking mind tells you it's fake. But the raw accumulation by your senses of so much horror, fake or real, must do <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>something</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END-->. Maybe 200 scenes of simulated horror adds up to the same subconscious impact as one scene of real horror? Just throwing that out there, I don't really know how to proceed with the conversation.<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>If you have a nightmare do you get upset at your subconcious for 'desensitising you'?<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>No, but I don't ask for nightmares, or pay $10 to see one. Our nightmares are an organic, mysterious, unpredictable thing. Although, who knows how the barrage of simulated horror has affected them. <p></p><i></i>
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Re: kljgsgjsd

Postby Rigorous Intuition » Wed Aug 23, 2006 10:54 pm

<!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>"Our nightmares are an organic, mysterious, unpredictable thing"</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br>Yes. And like most mysteries they reward exploration. It takes a true talent to depict them well, and that creates great art. <br><br>I don't have a link for it, but I remember reading when <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Dark City</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> was released that it was based upon a recurring nightmare of director Alex Proyas. <p></p><i></i>
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Re: kljgsgjsd

Postby JerkyLeBoeuf » Wed Aug 23, 2006 10:58 pm

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>No, but I don't ask for nightmares, or pay $10 to see one. Our nightmares are an organic, mysterious, unpredictable thing. Although, who knows how the barrage of simulated horror has affected them. <hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>A finely wrought film -- horror or otherwise -- is ALSO a mysterious, unpredictable thing. That's the whole point. <p></p><i></i>
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Re: kljgsgjsd

Postby FourthBase » Wed Aug 23, 2006 11:02 pm

Fair enough points, Jeff and Jerky. <p></p><i></i>
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yes

Postby orz » Wed Aug 23, 2006 11:03 pm

well put... more coherently than attempted to express it. <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START :) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> <p></p><i></i>
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Fear and Fire

Postby Ouish » Thu Aug 24, 2006 12:00 am

Fear is a wild, uncontrollable force like fire. We are at the mercy of such forces. To be able to start our own fires, for cooking, for warmth, for protection, is a form of mastery. It doesn't give us control over wild fires, but to have any control over any fire is marvelous. Fear is similar. Things make us afraid and we don't have any control over it. I'm imagining the terror of a primordial band fleeing a forest fire as it consumes their territory, a kind of living simile. Horror stories are domesticated fear just as a campfire or stove is domesticated fire. Both are human artifacts. To enjoy the marvel of controlled, artificial fear, you take a videocassette down off the shelf and turn it on. When you turn it off, the fear is over. A primal force, bent to human wishes through prisms of artifice. Notice how the two are combined in the common image of people sitting around a campfire and listening to a scary story. A meaningful picture.<br> <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=ouish@rigorousintuition>Ouish</A> at: 8/23/06 10:00 pm<br></i>
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Re: Horror

Postby Attack Ships on Fire » Thu Aug 24, 2006 12:16 am

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>Does it not also pull the horizon closer? The boundaries are not physical, but mental.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Yes, you're absolutely right. Even a physical horrific transformation makes a mental impact, but it's not ever the other way around (unless the brain is giving orders to the body to mutilate oneself/others, but really the horror would be "felt" first in the mental psyche state.)<br><br>That's why I love apocalytic horror fiction a great deal, particularly the sub-genre that presents humanity facing something unenvisioned before in the annals of man but now has to be faced. Matheson's protagonist in "I Am Legend", the survivors in Romero's "Dead" films, Lovecraft's heroes about to lose their saving throw against insanity when they face the unspeakable horrors from beyond...all that kind of horror fiction resonates with me. What would you do if the nightmare you faced was something you never conceived of before (unlike the very real nightmares of nuclear war) but came from beyond space or the shadows of the nightworld? I think that by making the terror come from a completely unnatural place (like Romero's flesh-eating zombies or Lovecraft's deities) but by raising the stakes to be the very soul of humanity hanging by a thread, the creator is able to make not only great fiction from it but also reveal some very rarely seen depths that our souls traverse in their solitude.<br><br>I know that there are many admirers of Lovecraft's dystopic horror fiction on here, so I'd like to make a recommendation in case you're looking for more. There was once a horror writing partnership named Skipp & Spector (aka John Skipp and Craig Spector) that produced some great apocalyptic horror fiction. They broke up and went their separate ways a few years back but starting around the late 80s 'til sometime in the late '90s they wrote some great scary stuff, in particular an ecological apocalypse novel titled "The Bridge" (here's my easy way to describe it: imagine if the alien from Carpenter's "The Thing" got out of Antarctica.) They also edited and assembled two volumes of short stories set in George Romero's "Dead" universe which had some moments that really pushed the envelope moments.<br><br>One of the most unnerving horror books I've ever read was Dan Simmons' "Carrion Comfort", about these sorta mind vampires that can control humans to a degree, and the concept of how ultimate power corrupts absolutely. Even though the book's central bad guys are these supernatural humans that have this one mind ability, I think what Simmons was writing about is the ability for *any* human to transform themself into an unbelievable monster. One of the bad guys was a Nazi in a concentration camp, and that's an easy, identifyable real world monster that Simmons can use to establish just how bad these guys are. However, there's a scene that happens on Christmas Eve to a minor character and his family that is so utterly horrific that it became one of the very few instances that I found myself *mad* with an author for writing what he did. The thing of it is, while it's an awful nauseating thing that the author is describing, it's not anywhere as graphic as anything in the Skipp & Spector zombie books; if anything, what makes that scene in "Carrion Comfort" so unnerving to me is that this is the kind of real world horror that happens every goddamn day on this planet, quietly, behind the scenes, deep under the surface of the top news story that you might have seen this evening. Bad, unspeakable things happen, but the fact is that they *do* happen, and to combat such monsterous evil you must confront that kind of nightmare and overcome your revulsion to it if you want to learn how to break it and destroy it. If you want to understand how fathers, brothers, husbands and good men can stand guard and file paperwork at places like Treblinka, Auschwitz or anywhere else such monsterous evil takes place, you have to look at it. I also don't think that you will lose oneself if you have to become aware of the nature of evil to combat it, just as I think watching horror doesn't desensitize oneself from empathy for one's fellow man/woman.<br><br>Though I just unleashed some heavy praise for "Carrion Comfort", I don't think Simmons is a literary god. In fact, his stuff is hit/miss with me. I think "Hyperion", his science fiction novel, is absolute genius, and sure enough there's quite a few horrific things in there too. "Fires of Eden" and his short story collection -- ehhh, not that great.<br><br>There's been a couple of mentions of some horror films that I've not heard of before and now my radar has been alerted to them (like that one described as this blog done as a movie!) Thanks for the recommendations and if anyone else has others they'd like to toss out, please do!<br> <p></p><i></i>
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Horror films appeal to the inexperienced

Postby johnny nemo » Thu Aug 24, 2006 2:20 pm

When I was 8, a friend of mine blew his brother's head off with a handgun 2 doors down from my house.<br>I heard the shot and ran down and saw the body and the blood.<br><br>A couple years later, I saw two guys beat a guy to death with baseball bats in the middle of a city street.<br><br>A month after that, I saw a guy get stabbed in a drug deal gone bad.<br>I just happened to be walking by when I saw the guy fall down and bleed out.<br><br>About two months after that, I saw a guy beat another guy to death with a toaster inside an appliance store.<br>Again, I was walking by and heard loud noises and saw the whole thing.<br><br>A few years after that, a friend of mine was stabbed to death when he refused to cooperate with the person robbing him.<br><br>Later, another friend of mine hung himself in his front yard.<br>People thought it was a Halloween decoration, so he stayed there until the next morning, when his parents realized what happened.<br><br>I could go and on, but I think you get the idea.<br><br>After seeing this kind of horror in real life, why the fuck would I want to see simulations of it?<br> <p></p><i></i>
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Re: Horror films appeal to the inexperienced

Postby FourthBase » Thu Aug 24, 2006 2:26 pm

Jesus christ, johnny. <p></p><i></i>
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Re: Horror films appeal to the inexperienced

Postby Rigorous Intuition » Thu Aug 24, 2006 2:38 pm

What FourthBase said. How terrible.<br><br> <p></p><i></i>
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Re: Johny Nemo's experience with real live horror

Postby Hugh Manatee Wins » Thu Aug 24, 2006 2:54 pm

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>After seeing this kind of horror in real life, why the fuck would I want to see simulations of it?<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Suffering and atrocity are not 'entertaining' to me either.<br><br>The reality of world filled with wars and torture, poverty and trauma is NOT in anyway amusing and I don't waste my time getting 'high' on stress chemicals from spook or merchant-generated experiences.<br><br>Real life is filled with horrible crimes and making amusement out of it is an inhumane disrespect to the victims and a way to make sure the victimization continues.<br><br>Blurring the line between fact and fiction is a prime mind control tactic and that's what TV and movies specialize in.<br><br>Knowing that real prisons are filled with people being tortured by CIA-trained goons means that the New Yorker cartoons with the proverbial bearded-man hanging by his chains with punch lines are not fucking funny. <br><br>Those dark humor cartoons are used as psychic shock-absorbers and de-sensitizers to prevent outrage at the REALITY.<br> <p></p><i></i>
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Re: Johny Nemo's experience with real live horror

Postby FourthBase » Thu Aug 24, 2006 3:02 pm

I doubt New Yorker cartoons like that are <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>used</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> as de-sensitizers, Hugh, but they might de-sensitize nonetheless. <br><br>There's a grey area in which it's hard for me to distinguish what ought to be depicted for posterity/accountability and what ought <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>not</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> to be depicted in order not to reinforce/desensitize. Not sure if I expressed that right. I think it's a key issue in this discussion.<br><br>...Still reeling over johnny's post. <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=fourthbase>FourthBase</A> at: 8/24/06 1:03 pm<br></i>
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Re: FourthBase gets to the crux of the media bisquit

Postby Hugh Manatee Wins » Thu Aug 24, 2006 3:19 pm

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>There's a grey area in which it's hard for me to distinguish what ought to be depicted for posterity/accountability and what ought not to be depicted in order not to reinforce/desensitize. Not sure if I expressed that right. I think it's a key issue in this discussion.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Well put, FB. You are absolutely right. The ability to prioritize what you put in your mind is a moral choice. Every waking moment we have the power to decide what we do with our one lifetime-long attention span.<br><br>What we watch and read is the frontline decision point for either dedicating your mental energies to helping others in desperate need or amusing yourself with what prop body parts look like.<br><br>It is the point of deciding whether you are morally activated beyond your own appetites to help others...or not.<br><br>I know ProfPan and others will pipe in with accusations of my being some kind of Dobson-style reactionary who needs to lighten up but, like Johnny Nemo, when you see the bodies for real and you admit your connectedness and face the daunting fact that you have the power to stop atrocity and end suffering, much like a soldier who sees war while civilians play games you lose patience for piffle and amusement as Not Helpful and thus Immoral or maybe Amoral since many don't even recognize the reality of atrocity and realize they have the power to do something about it.<br><br>Entertainment = mind control.<br>Information = resources for peace and justice.<br><br>It wasn't just a bogus Bushism when he challenged Americans to be either "with us or against us."<br><br>When your neighbors are in a house on fire, you are either pulling them out...or watching them burn.<br><br>This is the black and white dichotomy of surviving or dying.<br>And you are either using your brain to help others or you are amusing yourself while they burn.<br><br> <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=hughmanateewins>Hugh Manatee Wins</A> at: 8/24/06 1:25 pm<br></i>
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