Jaws is a monster movie, straight up. It's an implacable killer, it strikes from the darkness, unpredictably. You have to face the monster and kill it. It's exactly calibrated the same way as Halloween. Michael Myers is equally filled with motiveless malignance. Also, Quint at least ascribes evil to the sharks with "their dead white eyes" etc.
Wesley: Illyria can be...difficult. Testing her might be hard without getting someone seriously hurt. Angel: We'll make Spike do it. Wesley: Good.
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Buffista Movies 7: Brides for 7 Samurai
A place to talk about movies--old and new, good and bad, high art and high cheese. It's the place to place your kittens on the award winners, gossip about upcoming fims and discuss DVD releases and extras. Spoiler policy: White font all plot-related discussion until a movie's been in wide release two weeks, and keep the major HSQ in white font until two weeks after the video/DVD release.
DavidS - Oct 28, 2009 5:18:36 pm PDT #4692 of 30000
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."
quester - Oct 28, 2009 5:27:15 pm PDT #4693 of 30000
Danger is my middle name, only I spell it R. u. t. h. - Tina Belcher.
The 2 scariest movies I have ever seen are Failsafe and The Accused.
I saw Failsafe back before the neo-nuclear movies like Testement and The Day After came out. Chills, I'm telling you!
The Accused was scary because at the time I was Jodie Foster's character with more education, but just as stupid. It made me seriously rethink my drinking behaviour!
§ ita § - Oct 28, 2009 5:38:08 pm PDT #4694 of 30000
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.
Stupid is the purest form of evil.
Are sharks stupid? More stupid than the alien? What's the difference? It's all one big biological imperative.
tommyrot - Oct 28, 2009 5:38:10 pm PDT #4695 of 30000
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.
The 2 scariest movies I have ever seen are Failsafe and The Accused.
Were you surprised at the ending to Failsafe? A friend of mine really was. I had been spoiled - even before I read the book, in fact.
How shocking was the movie when it came out? It came out well after On the Beach, right?
flea - Oct 28, 2009 5:39:44 pm PDT #4696 of 30000
information libertarian
Wait, there were aliens in Star Trek called Horta? Horta means "greens" in Greek - it's like having aliens called "The Kale."
Possibly this is deeply funny only to me.
tommyrot - Oct 28, 2009 5:40:41 pm PDT #4697 of 30000
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.
Heh. Actually, the Horta were silicon-based, so not very much like greens to us.
Juliebird - Oct 28, 2009 5:46:32 pm PDT #4698 of 30000
I am the fly who dreams of the spider
What's the difference?
It's got to be relative to the species, methinks. But I was offhandedly speaking on purely human terms. And also in the terms of "this creature is taunting, torturing and slowly killing you because it lacks the awareness that there is anything wrong with what it is doing". But I think that's still on human terms. Or maybe not. I just have this primal fear of the shit that "stupid" or "impaired" characters can get away with. Which is why I think children scare me so much.
I don't know if I mean IQ level or lack of experience/education/civilization. But Lord of the Flies was certainly good birth control.
tommyrot - Oct 28, 2009 5:49:25 pm PDT #4699 of 30000
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.
Are sharks stupid? More stupid than the alien? What's the difference? It's all one big biological imperative.
I agree about it all being a biological imperative, but I think (in Aliens at least) we're supposed to be surprised by their intelligence.
DavidS - Oct 28, 2009 5:50:17 pm PDT #4700 of 30000
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."
I don't think horror requires evil. I'd be horrified if a shark was closing in on me even if I was just food to the shark.
It requires Fear of Death. Actually a lot of horror is about plying the Uncanny Valley - creatures which are only somewhat human, or debased or Unclean violate certain lizard brain rules of propriety.
tommyrot - Oct 28, 2009 5:53:44 pm PDT #4701 of 30000
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.
I'd be horrified if a shark was closing in on me even if I was just food to the shark.
Yeah, but if you saw a movie where someone became shark food, would that make it a horror movie?
Hmmm... I'm leaning toward "no."