Martin Scorsese's Top 11 Horror Films

[Disciple_72]

Dunno if this has already been posted, but thought it was kinda cool.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-a...s-of-all-time/

The Entity at #4. If only Ron Silver was alive to feel that sense of validation.

[Parker]

Cool! Some really interesting choices. A little too 'old school' for me sometimes, but its Scorsese so that makes sense. The original Haunting is really well done and genuinely creepy. I still think about the door bending scene every once in a while. Sticks with me. His thoughts about Psycho are perfect too. I re-watched that a while ago with someone who'd never seen it. They were scared and they didn't know the twist. Watching the movie with someone who knows nothing about it just reaffirms the films brilliance

[Fat Elvis]

Thanks for the link, Disciple!

Cool indeed.

I love that Scorsese appreciates The Shining & The Exorcist.

I really need to see Dead of Night.

<I never liked the Entity, but now i'm curious to give it another shot!>

[Phil]

The Entity and The Changeling surprised me. Also surprising is the lack of Cronenberg; Scorsese was an early booster.

[Fat Elvis]

Safe to say, Scorsese love a good haunted house flick. Ha.

[Parker]

I'm also surprised there's no Bava. He's a big fan.

[Fat Elvis]

Yeah, I expected Kill, Baby Kill!

[Iron Maiden]

Sweet list!

The Val Lewton stuff doesn't surprise me at all. Scorses was very enlightening in that TCM documentary about Lewton's career. I like every film he listed, but I'm not the biggest fan of The Uninvited. It does have a solid atmosphere, but it just doesn't compare with The Haunting.

[Ryan S~]

Originally Posted by Phil

The Entity and The Changeling surprised me. Also surprising is the lack of Cronenberg; Scorsese was an early booster.

Surprised me too. Maybe with The Changeling* he felt he filled his Canadian quota.

*Still a pretty good flick if a little slow to get going.

[horrid]

I was hoping he was going to say Cujo, just to confirm my theory that Martin Scorsese and Jake's avatar are the same person.

[DARKMITE8]

Originally Posted by Iron Maiden

... but I'm not the biggest fan of The Uninvited. It does have a solid atmosphere, but it just doesn't compare with The Haunting.

I've never seen that one, but Scorsese's mention has me curious. Netflix doesn't seem to have it.

[Richard Dickson]

TCM showed The Haunting and Dead of Night back to back during the afternoon on Halloween, and even in daylight with the windows open, The Haunting still creeped me the fuck out. Incredible use of sound effects in that film.

[BobClark]

FYI-
That DEAD OF NIGHT clip is pretty spoilery. It's a good movie, kinda drags at spots, but still worth seeking out.

[Xagarath Ankor]

The Uninvited is irritatingly hard to come by- I've been trying for years.
Good to see Dead of Night on there, though.

[Mark T]

The Innocents should get more celebrity endorsements.

[nekkerbee]

By the way, The Innocents is available to watch instantly on Netflix.

[Gabe Powers]

I'm disappointed (as if I matter) in the lack of Bava too. And I still kind of hate The Entity beyond the central performance. EW has a best horror movies of the last decade list up, and I'm shocked at how much I like their choices overall, including stuff I thought only I liked like Hostel 2 and From Hell.

[IggytheBorg]

Originally Posted by Gabe Powers

. . . including stuff I thought only I liked like Hostel 2 and From Hell.

[Raises hand as to both]

[Name_user]

I don't understand the lack of love, or at the very least like, for Hostel 2 either.

[Pop Zeus]

I guess it's not surprising that I haven't seen most of these movies.

[Alex B]

I was kind of expecting Peeping Tom to feature on this.

[BrundleFlyboy]

^ Good point, he championed the shit out of that film...it's a brilliant horror film.

More people that like Hostel 2... huzzah!

I'm surprised at Scorsese's choosing of 'The Entity' too, though I can see his point. I don't like it but it scared the utter shit out of me when I was younger... watched it alongside Amityville II : The Possession and their combined scares and a nasty, dirty quality did quite a number on me.

[Disciple_72]

Originally Posted by Iron Maiden

I like every film he listed, but I'm not the biggest fan of The Uninvited. It does have a solid atmosphere, but it just doesn't compare with The Haunting.

Ostensibly they're both old, B&W haunted house movies and as Scorsese says both are rich in atmosphere (and interestingly enough both contain subtle lesbian undertones), but really The Uninvited is a quite different film, from a different era. It's a consummate ghost story with some standout hair-raising moments, but tempered by a lush, romantic Victor Young score, and debonair Ray Milland almost always in lighthearted trifle mode, dropping mother in law jokes and throwing objects at ghosts to get them to fuck off. The film is as much about the mystery as it is about scares, the cliffside setting veers more towards beautiful than creepy, and the ghosts aren't all that frightening or malicious (definitely not the kind of hardcore movie ghosts that make you sleep with all the lights on and a Louisville slugger blessed with holy water underneath the bed... don't look at me like I'm the only one who's ever done that). The fairer comparison would probably be with spooky-but-sedate contemporaries like A Place of One's Own or even earlier stuff from the Old Dark House genre, rather than The Haunting, because Robert Wise doesn't fuck around, his is the one to turn to when looking for intensity of experience, when you want that knob turned up to eleven. The Uninvited is a great film though, and the "wailing woman" scene alone makes it essential viewing. It sucks about the DVD situation but if anyone does want to check it out, they sometimes have it on Turner Classic.

And Elvis, seek out Dead of Night when you're in the mood for some classic anthology horror. Scorcese mentions the brilliant way the film builds to a "crescendo of madness", but the main attraction is Hugo the ventriloquist's dummy (SPOILER he's evil and dangerous and makes you wish someone gifted him to that Dunham douche). I treasure my out of print Anchor Bay DVD of this film, which has it doubled with the amazing The Queen of Spades.