To think CGI isn't scary and it's ruining horror?

[MrsFattyBumBum]

I was watching IT, the one from a few years ago on Netflix before.

And Pennywise is scary as a character but all the CGI stuff, it's just so unrealistic that it just makes it almost like animation, just takes all the fear away. It's like watching a cartoon. You just know it's all fake.

I miss good old fashioned horror films that are just creepy. Things in the shadows crawling about. Peeping out from round corners. Not really knowing what is out there.

With CGI you see too much. Nothing is left to the imagination and it's imagination that keeps you up at night after a scary film.

So AIBU that CGI is ruining horror films?

Agree re paranormal activity. The first 2 films were brill!

I think this is why the Blair Witch project was such a massive hit. It was ALL in your imagination!

I must admit I absolutly love the Conjuring. Best horrer in years especially at the cinema.

And Tim Curry is the best Pennywise, he nailed it

YANBU. I find the stage show of Woman In Black terrifying, and they create all that tension from the most basic, pared back production. Translated into the Daniel Radcliffe film version it just became ridiculous and not scary at all. Totally lost it's minimalist, use your imagination to fill in the blanks eeriness. Less is more, in horror.

Same for Babadook. I fell about laughing as soon as the 'Babadook' was revealed. Would have been so much more effective if the audience had never actually seen the 'monster.'

I really enjoyed the first hour of the Babadook and was finding it genuinely scary - the creepy book was enough to rattle me. But as soon as it showed up, with its silly hat, looking like Jerry Sadowitz in the Ebenezer Good video, that destroyed it for me. I don't know why film makers never learn that implied horror is so much more effective than blood-dripping CGI stuff.

The grudge not the remake with buffy (Sarah what's her name) but the original Japanese version even with subtitles it's so creepy and atmospheric, that noise she makes still gives me the creeps 20+ years on

Dog soldiers was good

Yeah and the Japanese horrors - ring, grudge, dark water etc

The first Paranormal Activity film was excellent, DH doesn't like scary things but happened to catch the scene where the woman is just standing still completely vacant and proclaimed it the scariest thing he's ever seen. The second one is decent if a retread of the first, the rest are awful. Attempting to create a backstory for the demon makes it less scary somehow.

I'd forgotten about the Creep films, I couldn't see how a second one could work without be a copy of the first but it's just as good.

I'm not a fan of the conjuring films, they're not terrible but they're not particularly original either, they feel a bit horror by numbers for me. Also the fact the real Ed and Lorraine were a pair of shysters puts me off.

I LOVED It Follows. Really really creepy.

I also agree with The Orphanage, although it was so tragic I cried my eyes out till I got a migraine.

You’ll all laugh at this I’m sure, but years ago that Mel Gibson film Signs scared the absolute shit out of me. It was the unseen - there’s a bit where the family are all in the house and the aliens are creeping round outside. I was home alone and it just freaked me out. I wasn’t even drunk!

Paranormal Activity and Blair Witch are best watched on a laptop with headphones which is what I did and scared myself silly. Also the Marble Hornets thing on YouTube which spawned the Slender Man meme.

DH and I have just finished watching all the Insidious films. I didn’t hate them, but like a lot of films they just give away too much. The last one was the best IMO.

I really liked Signs - even though it was panned by just about everyone. I thought it was scary - probably the cornfields and the glimpses of aliens (seeing the one on the roof was terrifying.) But with a slightly silly ending.

Paranormal Activity, Blair Witch, It Follows - all great examples of less is more when it comes to horror. It Follows in particular, even if I do sometimes get the feeling it's a public information film promoting abstinence amongst teenagers

A Tale of Two Sisters. It's a Korean film, and one of the scariest I think I have ever seen. Not in a typical way - it doesn't set out to make you jump, but genuinely creepy.

I loved signs too. Until you saw the alien.

Marianne on Netflix, it's a series not a film though and it's French but with an English voice over (but you do soon forget)

It's the scariest thing me and DH have ever watched, and to quote DH "I think I actually just pooped"

I started Marianne. Bits so far are creepy. I’m not sure what I think yet.

@NotMyFawlty you’re totally right about the alien! Spoiled the whole thing.

Hope I’m not lambasted for this - but in general, I feel like films go too far to explain what’s happening and give no credit to audiences to understand any nuance. Hollywood movies and tv are the worst for this.

I’ve just remembered - Black Christmas was really scary. I had nightmares after watching it. The remake a few years ago I turned off less than halfway through - it was a vehicle for pretty scantily clad girls

FatherFintanFay

‘Pipes’ still terrifies me now !!

Ghostwatch was really well done, fantastic telly!

I think "haunted house" stories set in completely mundane post-war semis are the absolute worst because you can all too easily imagine it happening to you! Abandoned psychiatric hospitals are all a bit meh, cos how often do you have to go to one of those in your day to day life?

For those who liked Signs, Dark Skies is a good scary film about aliens.

It Follows was brilliant, just that awful feeling of something coming for you in plain site and knowing the only thing that can save you is passing it on. And even then it only works if everyone passes it on.

Just horrible.

I think some Black Mirror episodes border horror and some of them are very well written.

House on Haunted Hill (watched it twice as got a bit confused the first time)

A.M.I was pretty good (Netflix)

A Stranger Outside (Netflix)

Another one where a woman is a mans second wife and moves to an island he lives on in a lighthouse (forgot name. Not horror but definitely a bit creepy)

I don't like horror movies I usually think they are a bit dumb, but I enjoyed Orphan, and nightmare on elm Street scared the shit out of me in my teens. One film that has stayed with me since i was in my early teens was 'when a stranger calls' no blood, no gore, no CGI, just a good old thriller. I suppose movie makers want to push the boundaries of possibilty so cgi allows that.

Creep and Creep 2 are excellent. Peach Fuzz occasionally visits my nightmares.

CGI is ruining cinema.

Compare LOTR with The Hobbit. Whilst LOTR used CGI is was restrained and used physical sets etc much more.

The Hobbit is fucking awful with many scenes totally unrelatable because of the excessive CGI.

In horror movies all CGI does is remove the peril and whilst I quite like the latest IT movies (I LOVE the Tim Curry version), the scenes with heavy CGI are depressingly bland and lacking any horror at all.

Haunting in Connecticut always freaks me out