Horror Taboos

[iHaunt]

I was wondering about everyone's thoughts on taboos?


1. Bestiality?
2. Cannibalism?
3., Necrophilia?
4. Nunspoilatition?

Without listing them, countless horror movies have had these taboos, somehow, and many way into their storylines.

[hippieluvn]

horror alone is considered a taboo genre for many folks because it stirs anxiety in people and usually focuses on death, which is also a taboo topic

[shanda]

What is nunspoilatition? I could look it up, I guess.

I think those things are not just taboo, In fact , I feel that keeping from those things is what makes us civilized humans.

We are wired to bond emotionally with others and form loving bonds that remain even after death. Those that engage in such behaviors, usually have deep emotional issues of abuse and neglect.

But, in the event I am stranded in on an arctic tundra with a couple other unfortunate souls, I could enyoy a good "man"witch.
( I just loved Zombieland!)

[iHaunt]

What is Nunsploitation?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nunsploitation

[ilovemichaelmyers]

Are you related to Norman Bates? or maybe Hannibal Lecter?

[iHaunt]

Are you related to Norman Bates? or maybe Hannibal Lecter?

No, I'm related to....
Rob Zombie!

[smoleniuch]

Good horror movie = chop zombie

[Pumpkin_Man]

I don't think that anything can really be "taboo" per se when it comes to horror movies, because the whole genre, as one poster pointed out, deals with taboo subjects, such as death, blood drinking, and sexual perversion. As for the concept of Nunsploitation or Priessploitation, I am hot a huge fan of that because I think the church and Catholics in general have been handed a number of bad raps over the past decade.

Now if you look at real life, there are many horror stories that really did happen. Taboo subjects like what John Gacy and Jeffery Dahmer did to their victims are something that is simply not discussed in what we call "polite society." However, the stories of those two monsters is as real as it gets, and if you're going to make a movie about their attrocities, you have to explore topics like canibalism and other subject matter of a ####ual nature. It's the same deal with the holacaust. If one is going to make a movie about what life was like for a Jewish person in Treblinka or Auswitz, you have to discuss antisemitism and other very unpleasant and taboo subjects. Those subject will include but not be limited to the murder of children, medical experiments, and a whole host of others.

Mike

[Murfreesboro]

Everything depends on context. You can discuss/present anything if you frame it right. For instance, the Holocaust has been shown pretty graphically in a number of movies (I'm thinking especially of Schindler's List), but there is a moral context, so as an audience member, you might find it difficult, but you never feel you are merely a voyeur.

The problem with showing some of this stuff in horror movies is that the primary objective is generally just to shock, to horrify. So, yeah, I think they can go too far. However, we have freedom of speech, etc., so people will be able to make the movies, and others will be able to watch. It becomes a matter of personal taste/judgement. I have discovered that I am not so much a fan of out-right horror movies as I am of eerie movies. I like ghost stories better than slasher films.

[Pumpkin_Man]

Murf, I too, prefer a good story to just being a "voyer" as you put it. Case in point, the "Hostel" movies. I thought those movies were truel horible because there was no real plot, the story line was very loosly strung together, almost as thought they were making it up as they produced the film, the "Hostel" movies were simply displays of people who were sxuly arounsed by blood, gore and brutality. There was even a scene at the end of (i think) the original "Hostel," where a woman is decapitated, and a bunch of homeless children use her disembodied head as a Soccer ball. No rhyme or reason to any of it, just blood, gore and hanious acts for the sake of voyerism.

Unlike most bad movies I've seen, I didn't find "Hostel" to be boring. I found it to be very disturbing, and totaly lacking in a story line. Just innocent women being cut to pieces and brutalized in horible ways for the sake of entertainment.

Mike

[VanHelsingStandIn]

I wasn't a big fan of Hostel either. I only saw the first one, so I'm going on it and the things I've been told by other people who have seen the others. The only reason I saw the first one though was because it was produced by Quentin Tarantino, and I thought it would be more character driven than just a bunch of gore for the sake of gore. We live and learn, and now keep my Tarantino movies to the ones he directs(although he can be kinda' outhere too. Remember he kills of Adolf Hitler in Inglourious Basterds)That never happened but still a good flick. I like the Grind House double feature he did with Robert Rodriguez too.

It really is HARD to NOT laugh at the idea of woman who has had her leg cut off and then replaces it with an M-203 30mm grenade launcher and she propels herself around by firing off a round from her gun leg. (was it Rose McGowan?)As my late mother would have said, silly, stupid but harmless, because anybody who believed that could happen would also think the 3 Stooges really poked each other with hot irons and had 2,000lb rocks fall on them and then just walk away.

Does anybody remember the movie Dusk till Dawn by Robert Rodriguez? It had George Clooney and Salma Heyek? Salma had that big albino snake hanging on her?

Okay. Then like a few years ago, she along with two other female actresses are doing an outdoor interview and some little snake crawls onto the set and all three start screaming and freaking out and climbing on chairs? Remember that? Wonder what made Salma lose it then but not with the big python/boa or whatever it was?

I've always been jealous of that albino snake too!

[Pumpkin_Man]

VanHelsing, I COULDN'T STAND "Inglorious Bastards," because it was a total departure from true history, and in my opinion, was an insult to the countless millions who died trying to defeat Hitler and Naziism. It was also a very hokey story IMHO.

As for the "Hostel" franchises, again, there's no story to speak of at all, and to boot, they went back to this supposedly "artistic" deliberate uncerexposure of the film to make it look creepier. It was just gore for the sake of gore, and IMHO the cinematography was lousy, as was the sound track.

Mike

[VanHelsingStandIn]

I have to agree and admit I was kind of thrown for a loop when Quentin killed off Hitler in the movie. Being Quentin, it IS possible he didn't know how Hitler died. He is a bit strange of a boy!

But I also agree with you it could be looked upon as an insult to those who fought and died and suffered through the war. I won't go so far as to condemn it though, since one of the many things those men fought and died for in WWII was the right to express yourself, even if its not what you and I would pay money to see.

Dusk 'Till Dawn part 2 was a straight to video/dvd and it had more holes than Swiss cheese. It had its share of stupidity too. The one that got my attention was the vampire hooker in the cheap hotel they're all staying at. The girl had about $8,000.00 worth of cosmetic surgery but she was living at a little motel out in the middle of nowhere? How did she get a boobjob? Did she get the cosmetic surgeon to come out at night? To there?

Where Quentin Tarentino and Robert Rodriguez are concerned. TRUTH and BELIEVABILITY
are the first things to go out the window!

[Pumpkin_Man]

I never saw either of the "Dusk to Dawn" movies, but I agree, that what those men and women faught for was freedom of expression, so I don't condemn it. I just didn't like it, and wanted my money back, but anyone who liked it has a right to see it.

As for the vampire hookers you mentioned, I never really got into the sxual aspect of vampires, because vampires are supposedly reanimated corpses, and I just am not attracted to corpses. I realize that the suave, sophisticated Count Dracula and Barnabas Collins sweapt many women off their feet, but the reality of that was that they were both living, breathing, leading men. Bela Lugosi and Johnathin Frid. But women who turn into bats and sprout fangs just don't turn me on.

Mike

[Murfreesboro]

LOL!

Since most lore has it that vampires are cold to the touch (like dead bodies), I can't imagine actually enjoying a partner like that. But, yeah, I think women get turned on by some of the leading-men vampires because they aren't really vampires, they are men. And if they are good-looking men, portraying tormented men who want to be better than they are--well, lots of women just can't get enough of that, at least in fantasy.