It was an instant classic and the inescapable horror movie of 2017 - both a pitch-perfect throwback to writer-director Jordan Peele’s beloved Seventies “social thrillers” and a right-now racial state-of-the-nation address that touched a raw nerve. And then there’s the climax, which references numerous supernatural horror-movie ancestors without once seeming like it’s ripping them off. The movie requires several viewings at least, so you can see how impressively the film is planting clues at what’s really going on the whole time. Everything from the cinematography to the score suggests a bad dream you can’t wake up from. Toni Collette’s performance as an artist dealing with loss(es) is a masterclass in how to play someone slowly losing their mind Alex Wolff’s portrayal as her son, equally heading off the rails, matches her step for step. Its mix of grief, grotesquerie and ghost-story dread feels nigh unbeatable. It knows exactly when and how to jump headfirst into insanity. Whether you think it’s “the scariest film since The Exorcist” or simply one of the best horror films in the last deacde, Ari Aster’s debut feature is one remarkably self-assured, genuinely disturbing take on family dynamics. In terms of using genre to tackle the female-body politic, Raw is one hell of an art-horror dirty bomb, smuggling in transgressive notions about control and womanhood under the cover of fake–Type-O splatter. Bon appetit. In terms of next-gen horror filmmaking, this shock to the system serves as an introduction to a major new talent that shot of our heroine chomping into her arm en flagrante delicto is gorgeous and haunting and sick as fuck. Following the story of a college freshman (Garance Marillier) who slowly finds herself developing a taste for some off-the-menu delicacies, this gnarly look at a cannibal’s coming-of-age flips the script on notions of empowerment even as it turns stomachs. (The movie that caused fainting at festival screenings! Mon dieu!) A little under two hours later, they exited the building having seen a genuine Grand Guignol masterpiece. Many folks walked in to French director Julia Ducournau’s extraordinary, extreme debut expecting to test their mettle. But the ranked list of films here are guaranteed to have you repeating to yourself, “It’s only a movie … it’s only a movie… it’s only a movie …”. As in any committee-led process, our highly opinionated writers and experts argued over what constituted being included/categorized here ( Mulholland Drive belongs on every list of the Greatest Films of the Millennium whether it’s genuinely a “horror” film, however, is still up for debate). ![]() So we’ve assembled our take on the 65 best horror films of the 21st century – the zombie-apocalypse tales, things-that-go-bump-in-the-psyche ghost stories, retro-slasher flicks, neo- giallo nuggets, J-horror, K-horror, French extreme and Hollywood franchise films that have spooked us, shook us and scared us shitless since 2000. and abroad that deserve a place in the pantheon. That, and the fact that such free-floating dread would help give birth to a number of films from both the U.S. Yes, it’s always been a durable genre regardless of what’s going on in the culture, but considering what’s happened globally over the last 20 or so years, it makes sense that horror films would resonate with folks the way they have. Back in the late Sixties and early Seventies, Vietnam and civil unrest helped kickstart a new golden age of American horror movies shortly after the beginning of our new century, we had one massive public atrocity and several new wars to fuel a whole new wave of movies dealing with communal anxieties via scary monsters and super-freaky maniacs.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |