A-List: Scary Movies That Aren't Horror Movies
By Josh Spiegel
October 29, 2009
BoxOfficeProphets.com
No, the only movie opening this weekend is Michael Jackson's This Is It, a movie with one hell of a grammatically incorrect title; not to go on a tangent, but a) seeing as Jackson tragically passed away before the film even came to fruition, it can't be his, though he could be "starring" in it; and b) what is "This" or "It"? Clarity always wins in my book. Anyway, since there are only a few great posthumous performances in film (and frankly, that A-List would turn into me extolling the well-known virtues of Heath Ledger's performance as The Joker in The Dark Knight), and I'm not a concert-movie aficionado, let's ring in All Hallows Eve with a look at some of the great, truly scary movies.
Of course, as you've noted from the title, this A-List is about scary movies that are not horror movies. You won't see Michael Myers (or Mike Myers) on this list, nor Freddy Krueger, nor Jason Voorhees. None of the films on this list are strictly meant to be vehicles for blood-gushing mayhem. In fact, gore is not prevalent in any of the films, at least not the kind that spills onscreen. This list is by no means definitive, but the five films on the list are among the most frightening movies I've had the pleasure to see. What's more, sometimes, a bit of the true pleasure of such movies as these ones is not expecting to be scared, creeped out, or the like. Sometimes, the best scares come when you least expect them. Here are five films that proved noteworthy when it comes to giving you the heebie-jeebies.
The Night of The Hunter
In the style of Southern Gothic literature from authors such as Flannery O'Connor and William Faulkner, 1955's The Night of The Hunter is an all-time classic, despite having been a bit of a throwaway when it first came out. Starring Robert Mitchum, Shelley Winters, and Lillian Gish, among others, this freaky film came and went with little fanfare, despite being the sole directorial effort from famed actor Charles Laughton. When Ben Harper (Peter Graves) goes to jail for robbery and is sentenced to death, he manages to give his young son, John, the location of his hidden loot. Unfortunately, Harper's cellmate, Harry Powell (Mitchum), gets wind of Ben's stolen cash and decides, once the robber is dead, to romance the widow Harper (Winters), kill her, and get rich. He believes, correctly, that John and his sister, Pearl, know where the money is and will do everything to find out its location.
Harry Powell is one of the great movie villains, someone who cloaks himself in the Bible while murdering people in God's name. The most famous part of Harry is his knuckles: he has LOVE tattooed, letter by letter, on one hand, and HATE tattooed in the same fashion on the other. Powell's terrorizing of the kids is not only well-depicted but truly chilling. What would seem to be a classic horror-movie trope, or something that most kids must have thought about, occurs here in its best form: John and Pearl run up the stairs of their basement as Powell, his arms outstretched, slowly comes up the stairs, tripping over everything they've thrown in his path. The images here are chilling, captured beautifully by cinematographer Stanley Cortez. The film lives on now through Turner Classic Movies. For a good scare, and a truly unforgettable character, this is the right movie.
Jaws
Yes, this one's a bit of an easy choice, but come on: when you first saw Jaws, you were a bit scared to go to the nearest beach, right? Heck, some people probably got scared of the pool in their backyard (it's okay, I won't spoil your secret). Despite being, in many ways, an adventure film alongside a budding friendship between a local sheriff and a wisecracking ichthyologist, even from the first scene, director Steven Spielberg sets the audience up for maximum scares. The opening is iconic, as a young woman skinny-dips in the ocean and ends up being shark food. The main story is as simple: the sheriff of Amity (Roy Scheider), the ichthyologist (Richard Dreyfuss), and a local shark hunter (Robert Shaw) team up to kill the titular shark.
What makes Jaws a classic is more than just the infamous score by John Williams, that opener, and a few one-liners are those three characters. Brody, Hooper, and Quint become memorable not just for their one-dimensional character loglines but because of the great dialogue between them, as they all grow to accept each other despite their quirks and differences. The true classic scene here is when Quint tells the two younger men about his time on the USS Indianapolis, a ship that was sunk during World War II filled with men who ended up being shark food. The emotions in the scene run from humor to pathos to fear, as Quint's tale is climaxed by the title character banging around their little boat. Spielberg's first big hit, Jaws is not just a classic adventure flick, but truly scary and still holds up after over 30 years.
Se7en
Is there anything scarier than Brad Pitt screaming, "Oh, what's in the box?" Okay, seriously, 1995's gritty crime drama Se7en is a haunting, chilling procedural that stands out not just because of David Fincher's stylish and grim direction, but because of how uniquely baroque and dark it seems. Yes, we've seen movies about serial killers before, but the frights come here from who John Doe chooses to kill based on how they've violated one of the seven deadly sins and from his cruelly ironic manner of killing. Pitt, as a hotshot detective, is partnered with Morgan Freeman, currently working the last week he'll ever do as a man with a badge, to figure out who John Doe is and who he's killing next. Of course, Doe is just a bit smarter, and only reveals himself when he wants to.
The final 40 minutes of Se7en move past the trappings of a typical cop film, as John Doe (played by — spoiler alert, if you've never seen the film — Kevin Spacey) admits to being the mastermind and brings Pitt and Freeman's cops along to his final victim. Of course, who that final victim turns out to be is part of the most memorable and freakiest scene of the movie: it involves Pitt's wife (played by Gwyneth Paltrow) and the box. Take a wild guess if you're unfamiliar. Pitt's a bit over-the-top in the last scene, but the overall tension, camerawork, Freeman's calm fighting a battle with his worries, and last twist are all worth the wait. Fincher's best film wouldn't come for more than a decade (Zodiac, not Benjamin Button), but Se7en is arguably one of his best films.
The Sixth Sense
It's funny; ten years ago last August, two surprise hits were taking Hollywood by storm; one of them was The Blair Witch Project, a faux-documentary about three 20-somethings who go searching for a mysterious witch. The other was The Sixth Sense, written, produced, and directed by a relative unknown, M. Night Shyamalan. Now, we're looking at another faux-real movie about the supernatural in Paranormal Activity, and Shyamalan is considered something of a fluke, having directed three good/great movies before churning out clunker after clunker. That said, The Sixth Sense remains his best film. Who knows if, with the prevalence of spoilers on the Internet now, it would have been as huge of a hit in 2009, though.
When I first saw The Sixth Sense, I expected a potentially entertaining ghost story with Bruce Willis. What I got was an often unsettling, slickly made story with a strong relationship at its core, between Willis' child psychologist and his patient, played by Haley Joel Osment, who received an Oscar nod for Best Supporting Actor. Of course, we all know (or, I presume we all know) the big surprises here: Osment's character sees dead people, sees them everywhere. And, as we find out in the huge twist ending, one of those dead people is...Bruce Willis, who's been dead ever since the prologue. Nowadays, the movie still stands up despite not being a jaw-dropper of a surprise. When it came out, though, it not only surprised but scared us; the scene where Osment obliviously goes to the bathroom as a dead woman walks by the open door is a great scare. If you haven't seen The Sixth Sense in a while, this is the perfect time to do so.
Mulholland Dr.
Here's a movie that...okay, let's be honest, I'm not going to do a great job of explaining the plot of this movie. For those of you who are looking to have a bit of salaciousness in your scary movies, something more than just some dumb blonde getting it on with a frat boy before being stabbed by Jason, how about this: Naomi Watts getting into a lesbian relationship with an exotic, raven-haired beauty. Good, go get it on Netflix. Now, for those of you are otherwise intrigued in this haunting 2001 film from David Lynch, the plot (or what I can tell you) is this: Watts plays Betty, a young ingénue who goes to Los Angeles to become a movie star. One night, in her new apartment, she stumbles upon a dark-haired woman who chooses the name of Rita, because the bump on her head means she's lost her memory. The two women attempt to figure out what happened to Rita, while becoming friends and then some. Elsewhere, we follow a hip, young director's struggle to make a movie, and the cowboy who's forcing him to do otherwise.
Did I mention the movie is by David Lynch? Yeah, this thing is very weird, and truly unsettling. What about the scene where two guys are in a café, one talking about a recent nightmare; afterwards, we follow them outside, where the figure from the guy's nightmare attacks him? What about the two old people who start out wishing Betty well and end up as miniature people outside that same café? Do I need to repeat that the cowboy tells the movie director what to do? Of course, the most frightening element is the cameo (yes, this is real) by Billy Ray Cyrus as a pool man sleeping with another man's wife. Weird, unique, creepy, and captivating, Mulholland Dr. is David Lynch's best movie.