Posted on August 22, 2011 by Darren
The Ring is actually a surprisingly effective horror when measured on its own terms, as well as being perhaps the most successful American adaptation of a Japanese horror. I would make the case that the film isn’t a patch on the original Ringu, but it’s to director Gore Verbinski’s credit that he attempts to subtly distinguish his film from the one that inspired it, while remaining true to the spirit of that classic cult horror.

Watts going on here?
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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Armie Hammer, DVD, Edgar Allan Poe, films, Gore Verbinski, horror, horror films, japanese horror, Jerry Bruckheimer, johnny depp, Lone Ranger, Movies, non-review review, review, Ring (film), ringu, the ring | Leave a comment »
Posted on October 29, 2009 by Darren
Horror films are scary. And scary isn’t an emotion we’re intended to experience regularly. It’s evolutionary purpose is to tell us that something really bad is going down right now and we really need to cop ourselves on in order to deal with it. It’s meant to make our adrenaline flow, and our hair stand up – it’s meant to keep us on the edge and stop us feeling comfortable. So, why do we take such great joy in experiencing that abstract terror, the suspense and the horror of scary movies? Surely it’s contrary to our evolutionary logic, right?
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: emotions, fear, horror, horror films, movie genres, psychology, scared, screen scare week | Leave a comment »
Posted on June 27, 2009 by Darren
I watched Quarantine with my aunt, uncle and brother last night. It was fairly okay – it did pretty much exactly what it promised on the tin, nothing more nothing less – but it was undermined by a fine third that revealed to us (and the characters) the reason for said outbreak. The reason wasn’t particularly smart or original – it was really exactly what you’d expect, which isn’t what you’re looking for in the final twenty minutes of a horror film. It got me thinking, are these horror films scarier the less we know about the beasts lurking in the darkness?

Hangovers were worse than usual at the office Christmas Party - no one could remember where they parked...
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: films, george a. romero, horror, horror films, horror genre, horror movies, Movies, night of the living dead, quarantine, the revolution will not be televised, undead, world war z, zombie apocalypse, zombies | 2 Comments »