Blame computers and money
Yikes. Horror took a serious dive this year and nothing — sequels remakes and gory outrages — seemed to resurrect its quickly decaying corpse.
To be fair there were a few good to great flicks: Cancon Hobo with a Shotgun was hilariously offensive; Insidious brought the old-school scares despite a villain who looked exactly like Darth Maul; Kevin Smith did a fine job with the clever siege picture Red State ; and Don’t be Afraid of the Dark was full of punchy shocks (minus the goblin-like critters lifted from The Gate ). Lucky McKee’s disturbing The Woman was more palatable than reviews would lead you to believe and Ben Wheatley’s exhilarating Kill List is everything a horror flick should be: gross beguiling and creepy as hell.
Before delivering the bad news let’s briefly mention the three most dreadful stupid and aesthetically disgusting of the bunch: Apollo 18 Paranormal Activity 3 and Shark Night 3D . Offences: the use of found footage quickly becoming shorthand for “ugly and nausea-inducing”; 3D which no matter how skilfully used looks muddy and unnecessary; and making PG-rated genre flicks ensuring a lack of nudity and gore.
Genre masters had a brutal year too. Wes Craven offered the bloodless Scream 4 somehow managing to be more boring and ridiculous than the excoriated third instalment. Apparently the film’s nerdy oracles’ announcement that there are now “no rules” was supposed to create suspense; instead it proved how dull and elderly the series had become. After a lengthy hiatus John Carpenter returned to the screen with The Ward which while not terrible was devoid of the director’s usual crafty touches.
The remakes and sequels continued with Fright Night 3D probably the best of the bunch largely due to Colin Farrell’s sleazy and menacing vampire antagonist. The Thing a serviceable remake/reimagining of John Carpenter’s bloody classic managed a few scares though the blobby CG had nothing on the original’s gooey organic effects. Final Destination 5 was… Final Destination 5 and the unnecessary remake of I Spit on Your Grave didn’t improve on the icky original which was already dirty and rape-y enough.
It seems unfortunately that horror has abandoned the usual tricks of the trade (suspense deep shadows looming foregrounds… story) for nasty grisly gore. Which while much easier to pull off can have a charm of its own — the phrase “torture porn” is almost always used pejoratively but some of the genre’s smartest grossest flicks are among the best. (I’m a staunch defender of Hostel 2 .) Where was the gore this year? I can’t think of anything that truly lustily spilled the blood and guts. Okay there was The Human Centipede 2 and the notorious A Serbian Film but the latter — which was supposed to test even the hardiest of gag reflexes — was so clumsy and dumb that viewers probably forgot to be sick.
I blame computers and money. Okay I blame those two for everything. But to horror filmmakers they’re death — and not the good kind. Pure style and homemade effects have been sacrificed to opening weekends and slick CG all for the benefit of kids who don’t know any better. But fans do and like all slavish nerds will keep the faith no matter how dismal things get. Here’s hoping 2012 makes for a more visceral experience.
