by Thomas Horn
Halloween is nothing without the screams, scares and frights of horror films, but modern day movies have little to offer compared to the classics.
Classic horror movies simply have a better quality of terror than their remakes.
Imagine the roar of a chainsaw that compels you not only run, but to sprint. This is the kind of horror scene from movies like “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” which first shocked audiences in 1974 with Leatherface, the chainsaw wielding villain.
Horror movies know how to make an audience pay attention. In modern horror movies, there are copious amounts of blood and gratuitous graphic gore. This makes the movie less scary, yet more sadistic. It reduces the genre of horror to be simply disgusting.
With the sadistic violence in the remake of “Friday the Thirteenth,” more time is devoted to spilling blood than to the actual acting portion of the movie. With the classic horror movies, the suspense is what really pulls the audience in. Blood and guts are simply gross and uncalled for, but the suspense has a true horror aspect involved.
A good aspect of horror movies is when there is an intense chase going on or when someone is hiding in a closet waiting for the terror to go away. This is the piece that makes classic horror films worth watching.
In the classic film “The Night of the Living Dead,” zombies attack a home in the country, and pure terror takes over the lives of the individuals trapped inside the house.
True terror is all about suspense. Without suspense, the horror genre would not exist. Villains may never reach their victims, but if there is tension rising, that is what makes the movie scary.
The Stephen King classic, “Carrie” is a great horror movie with elements of tension, suspense and shock. I’ll never forget the scene when the immense amount of vile pigs’ blood is dumped on title character Carrie.
The audience can sense a rise in suspense and Carrie doesn’t disappoint, as she starts going insane and chaos erupts. Significantly, the pig’s blood is one of the only gory scenes in the movie.
This movie was originally made in 1976 but a remake is being released on Oct. 18. This movie will feature Chloe Grace Moretz as Carrie and Julianne Moore as Carrie’s mother.
Even though Julianne Moore is a good and well-known actor, they shouldn’t be remaking this classic. The movie industry should preserve classic films because so many horror remakes can wreck the movie experience.
Remakes of horror movies just go straight into the violence, and all of that flying blood leaves room for only a minimal amount of tension. I hope the remake of Carrie is good and isn’t filled with unnecessary blood and gore — it would devalue the plot.
A great horror movie should make you feel as if you are i in the story, as if someone were hunting you down.
The concept of a good horror film is the experience of the suspense.
