So overnight tonight, I watched “Scream” and “The Ring”. I found “The Ring” moderately creepy and disturbing, but “Scream”, well, not in the least bit frightening. Spoiler warning: these are old movies, but I may spoil it for you if you haven’t seen it.
When I was a kid, scary movies really scared me. I’m talking, nightmares-for-weeks scared. I haven’t watched a really scary movie since I was maybe seventeen. So tonight, I prepared by turning on all the lights on the floor of the house where I was, grabbing a nice cold drink, a ready hand on the “pause” button so that I could take unnecessary bathroom breaks, and all that.
What, you mean I really should watch freak-me-out movies late at night with the lights all off, windows opened, sound turned way up with compression off so the louds are really loud and the quiets really quiet, and then come back and tell you whether I thought the movie was scary or not? No way, Jose. I know how jumpy I am in real life, I feel no need to exacerbate it.
Anyway, I think part of the problem with “Scream” was that I recalled watching it at some point in the past, so I kind of knew the punchline. Maybe that was all it was that I didn’t get really creeped by the movie. Well, that and the fact that I’m familiar enough with voice modulation technology to know that you wouldn’t come up with the same distinctive man’s voice by using a vocoder-type box. I guess I get hung up on the little things, there, too. Like you can’t normally see the safety clearly when staring down the barrel of a gun to know if it’s on or off. Or that garage door openers have automated cutoff switches for over twenty years to prevent accidents — both when raising and lowering.
Or the whole “picturing Courteney Cox with David Arquette” thing. To think, they tied the knot just before filming this movie. To be honest, that creeped me out more than the rest of “Scream”. He’s the “floating outside the window” dude from the original “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”, and she’s Monica from Friends. Yeah, I know, that’s not their real-life personas, but it still seems weird to my TV-burned brain.
One thing I noticed about “The Ring” is that there seems to be… I don’t know how to put it. Maybe “supernatural melodic progressions”, or something. There’s a style, a phrasing, a way of orchestrating things which seems to say “otherworldly”, or “ethereal”, which is abused by supernaturalistic scare movies, and another way which screams “scary man with big knife” that I’d like to figure out.
If I remember correctly, “The Forgotten” abused the “supernatural scare tactic” style of music, too. I’ll have to rent that one again (we watched it in the theater originally) just to listen to the music. I recall one really haunting melody that stuck with me for several days afterward.
One thing that “The Ring” seemed to do really well was communicate an intensely nervous feeling through the use of music and brief stills of disturbing things. The little girl with the large vein in her forehead and black shadows around her eyes. A haunting melody for the segues, and dissonant strings for the moments of tension. I don’t know that I’m a big fan of the “loud noise and fast cut to a dead body” approach to startling people, though. I mean, it works to make people jump, which is part of the goal of keeping your audience off-balance I suppose, but I liked the “buildup of suspense” aspect of the soundtrack much better. The build-up to the “mounting dread” is part of what makes the soundtracks sweet.
I like great movie music. When I think of the original “Star Wars”, the soundtrack is largely what leaps foremost into my mind. I mean, what if, say, Barry Manilow composed the score? I’m fairly certain it wouldn’t have done nearly so well with bland tunage. The score really carried that movie, and I’m fairly sure “Copa Cabana” wouldn’t have been nearly so powerful as a theme song.
What would you recommend as a really moody, atmospheric, scary movie where the soundtrack really seems to carry and enhance the picture?
The soundtracks to M. Night S
The soundtracks to M. Night Shyaman’s films spring to mind. Particularly the Village. Which granted, is not your classic “scary movie,” but it certainly had frightening moments.
I think what I like so much about the soundtrack is that yes, it enhances mood, and yes, it makes use of the “sudden loud noise” technique, but it’s above all *beautiful.* The violin solos are hauntingly mourning, and they convey a sense of loneliness and loss that emotionally draws you to the characters.
And when you’re drawn to the characters, darn it, you don’t *want* the scary monster to eat them. So you’re more scared on their behalf.
Arthur Rowan Brother Katana of Reasoned Discussion Rebel Leader and Creepy Shadowy Figure for the Unitarian Jihad
Final Destination
I havent really been impressed by any of the recent Horror movies. The only in recent years to give me a scare was Final Destination. I thought the plot was interesting and rather unique. Also, while there was alot of interesting and graffic deaths, they weren’t to the point where you are asking yourself how its possible for one body to produce that much blood. As for the soundtrack… its mostly non-existent but does pop in to add alot to the movie. I’ll never be able to listen to John Denver’s “Rocky Mountain High” the same way again. — Bryan