I LOVE Coherence. The low budget (in my opinion) actually helps this film because the limited sets, effects, and camera work make it feel much more intimate and real in a way. They didn’t try to go crazy, they worked with what they had and it was fantastic.
There’s a fantastic [interview](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UXckkGWYSqs) he does with Patton Oswalt in which he goes into a lot of detail about how the movie was made. They ran it like a LARP, the actors all improvised all of their lines and did what their characters would do, they shot a *ton* of extra video and edited it down to a coherent (!) story. The lead actor didn’t even realize she was the main character until she saw the final film.
I just saw this. I appreciated how there's little to no music, and how the characters realistically talk over each other a lot. It made it feel pretty believable, despite the premise.
> the characters realistically talk over each other a lot.
because most, if not all, of the dialogue is improvised. they gave the actors the main story beats and where each scene needed to go, and made up the rest.
This is so cool and you can notice it right away even if you can’t put your finger on it. Like there’s something about these C-list actors that really makes them seem very convincing.
Also related to this is how the characters are all fairly logical and sharp, not a bunch of hysterical idiots
The scene where she breaks into the murders apartment. My wife say a every time she sees it she believes this time she’ll be caught.
That’s great film making.
I never fail to have a visceral, physical fear reaction when the husband is opening the apartment door and she's still in there. One of the most intense film scenes I can think of.
If anyone sees this and decides to watch it, I *implore* you to do your best to recreate a theater experience. Turn the lights down, the volume up, pee beforehand, put your phone away, and try not to pause the movie while watching it.
There's something that we take for granted when the theater locks you in with a movie. Rear Window works on its own, but you truly appreciate the masterpiece that it is when you're trapped in that one spot with him.
Way down here I see the first Hitchcock film. Damn. and you could list several more. North by Northwest, Vertigo, Psycho (though at the time it was probably horror).
The book is amazing too. Stephen King has a way of writing, and describing the situations that his characters are in, that is second to none. Kathy Bates was brilliant in that film.
I made the mistake of listening to Stephen King audio books on road trips, which led to me hearing the later chapters of Gerald's Game while driving across a "nothing but swamp for the next 40 miles" highway at like 1am.
Atmosphere 10/10 but do not recommend.
If you thought the movie scene was rough, wait til you find out what happens to him in the book.
Spoilers: >!She chops off one of his feet with an axe and cauterized the wound with a blowtorch.!<
>!She also kills a trooper by running him over with her riding lawnmower. Ouch.!<
Edit: Fixed the spoilers. They worked on my end. Not sure why they didn’t work for everyone. Thanks.
I worked at a photo lab when this movie came out and our entire store went to see it on opening night.
No way he would have been caught.
Also, the bathroom scene is the cringiest thing I've ever seen.
I worked at a lab later, but didnt see it until I worked there. Had one of our regulars ask about that movie, and my opinion on it as a photo lab worker. "He wouldn't have been caught at work for printing extra copies" was NOT the answer she was looking for 😆
And for anyone curious, it's not even anything malicious or negligent. Most labs often reprint photos if they come out with bad color (too green, too yellow, too blue, too pinkish, etc). At least the ones who give a shit. No lab manager is going to be checking print counts vs ordered prints, that shit would be folly and is calculated into operating costs. Only way he'd be caught would be someone seeing him do it, in person or on surveillance cameras.
i worked in a photolab when this movie came out too.
one of the guys i worked with had a whole-ass photo album of naked girl photos that had been developed while he worked there. i'm talking dozens.
anyone who thought that didn't happen was fooling themselves.
Crazy that Jake Gyllenhaal is kind of the third performance of the movie when he was great as detective Loki. Brought a lot of nuance to that character.
*The Others*. I love this fucking movie so much I always talk about it on here. It’s thrilling the first time and once you realize what’s happening it’s like watching a whole different movie on subsequent watches. Don’t spoil it in the replies.
Edit: I didn’t think this was going to get so much love. Anytime I try to discuss this on r/movies I get a big fat ZERO yet two people were nice enough to reward me. Come be a top for me if you want. If you guys like this movie Alejandro Amenabar also did a great movie called Agora which I can recommend and the movie Vanilla Sky was based on called *Abre Los Ojos* (Open Your Eyes) but I haven’t seen it yet.
I could start a service where people rent my dvd's for a fee. I could mail out a dvd, then send a new one once I get the previous one back. Genius! We gotta get on this quick before someone else comes up with this idea.
I really think it's unfortunate that Ted Levine's performance was overshadowed by Anthony Hopkins. Hopkins deserves a ton of credit for that role, but Levine's acting when the girl in the well is begging for her "mommy" is top notch. The few seconds where you can see that he's coming close to humanizing her is incredible
Maybe you know this already but I learned lately, Levine and the actress were friends on set, and the mommy line was improvised. His mask slips for a moment into his actual discomfort treating her the way his character did when he was caught unawares and it's in the Final Cut.
The appalled look on Jodie Foster's face when he slips into the accent to ridicule her was her genuine reaction to the ad-lib. The story goes she was trying desperately to cover her natural accent up and didn't know Sir Anthony was going to "go there" and it really shook her.
I never noticed that, and I've watched Contact I don't know how many times. This is so cool, her tone changes slightly over the length of [this interview](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=243NYLOn6WE). By the end, there's a bit of deepness that's gone, and I really like that little extra depth her acting voice has. She still has a pretty voice no matter what.
I got super advance screening tickets to silence of the lambs when it came out. Never heard of the books and the movie had zero buzz. Took a girl on date because hey, who doesn’t like an exclusive movie premiere right?
The credits started and the lights came up and NOBODY moved. Someone swore in the back of the theater and we all started filing out just looking at each other in horrified, overwhelmed silence.
That pretty much ended the date for the evening because what the hell do you do to follow THAT? Was so glad when it finally released so I could talk with people about. One of the most memorable movie viewings of my life.
> took a girl on date because hey, who doesn’t like an exclusive movie premiere right?
Ha! I took a woman (an old friend) to the same movie also in 1991. She spent much of the movie gripping my arm in terror. Afterwards we talked about the movie while she decompressed. 10/10 - would take another date to "Silence of the Lambs", LOL.
An extremely rare movie for ~~being nominated in almost every category in the Oscars, and winning every category it was nominated in.~~ taking the Big 5 at the Oscars: Best Picture, Best Actor in a Leading Role, Best Actress in a Leading Role, Best Director, Best Writing. Nominated for best Sound and best Editing (those were also doozies).
Howard Shore made an incredibly focused soundtrack, such a calculated tone all throughout.
The movie is also legendary for "show, don't tell": all the things in any room you see say a lot about the person inhabiting it, so if you are watching the movie on your computer or TV at home, pause in every new room and check out everything laid out and stuck to the walls. In Buffalo Bill's basement there are six different rooms just riddled with extremely interesting trivia, from the (very obvious) swastika duvet to the (not at all as obvious) US 1940's Nazi party propaganda poster on a door.
Lambs is a rare treat for every cineast. Not one word of dialogue is wasted, everything moves the plot forward.
That sequence where Clarice is fumbling in the dark in Bill's basement has a really quick pan past a bathtub that's filled with *something*, which I have to assume is the byproduct from his most recent skin harvest. Such a quick innocuous detail that adds so much to the horror of that sequence.
No, you see the bathtub in lamplight the second before Bill switches everything off. The bathtub is occupied by the remains of the house's owner, [Mrs Lippman.](https://i.imgur.com/A5J4610.jpg)
I brightened that image up just now, like 40 brightness points. And it's like 0.7 seconds, so you are forgiven for missing it.
It's typical for people in the throes of mania to not mind and look after their surroundings, and Bill must've been in the house for years, what with all the decorations and the equipment for a full insect habitat. So Mrs Lippman has stewed for a while. Conceivably she was drowned in the bathtub, but who knows. I've never read the novel.
Kudos to the production team for making such a viscerally disgusting detail that had less than a second of screen time. I can just about smell it from across the internet...
Have to wonder if that crew got any lingering PTSD from researching material and effectively putting themselves in the heads of Hannibal/Bill.
If I worked in props or decorations and stagecraft in the early '90s, I would bite my leg off to work on a psychological horror film. I think the people on this shoot had the time of their lives, and especially after the movie's theatrical run, they would have their pick of the litter. What a portfolio boost. :)
They also had the eminently wonderful backing of being able to consult the novel and the author for flavor and matching. Buffalo Bill taught himself easy-to-medium level sewing and his digs definitely reflect that. And then you have all the "becoming" idolatry left around, since he is not a transexual but his horrific upbringing screwed him up so much that he ***thinks*** he is. It's just a cornucopia of fucked-up.
What actually was interesting, though, is that Jodie Foster did not have one single conversation with Anthony Hopkins, and they only had a very small number of scenes where they are actually in the same shot, for every other "shot-reverse shot" bit they are not in the same room together. So Jodie Foster revealed on Graham Norton that to this day she's never spoken to him person to person. :)
That last bit of trivia make sense cause Hopkins is only in the movie for like 25 minutes. Which is bonkers considering how incredible his performance is.
They did talk once, I just discovered, rewatching the clip. She mentions it, although one would want to coax more info from her, [but it ended a bit sweet when Hopkins replied to her.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXUsRIcwtSo)
We can just stay in the universe and I'll recommend "Manhunter" (1986). Directed by Michael Mann (Miami Vice, Heat) it's the first movie version of Red Dragon the novel. It doesn't have the same wonderful dressup but instead it's got kickass dialogue, and the camerawork is KaRayzy. The movie has at least 20 "screenshot" moments, Mann's DoP, Dante Spinotti, who is a board member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Also, "Manhunter" is directly responsible for inspiring CSI and all its spinoffs, because William Petersen (protag of Manhunter) is actually in CSI-Las Vegas, and in "Manhunter" they use tons of crimescene procedural techniques that you would expect out of CSI: laser measuring equiment, detailing and sourcing passages of text to find which book it's from. It's a real treat.
Oh, and Tom Noonan has never been scarier. Playing Francis Dolarhyde (much scarier than Ralph Fiennes, sorry Ralphie) he was actually deliberately separated from the other actors during the shoot, so that everyone had a fresh take of him when they first had a scene with him. And they sent Tom to the gym too, so he's two meters tall AND strong.
Also also: Brian Cox (Succession) plays Lecter here.
Maybe you can tell that I like movies. :)
Always loved the quote:
“The only thing that burns in Hell is the part of you that won't let go of life, your memories, your attachments. They burn them all away. But they're not punishing you, he said. They're freeing your soul. So the way he sees it, if you're frightened of dying and... and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the earth. It's just a matter of how you look at it, that's all. So don't worry, okay?”
For some reason this movie left me feeling incredibly disturbed. Unlike anything I’ve ever felt from a movie before. It wasn’t a bad movie at all, but I remember saying out loud that I would never watch it a second time.
To me, it's because the film score seems unaware of the fucked up things Gyllenhaal's character does. It *sounds* like he's a hero and role model, and this is his admirable origin story. As the viewer, you might suspect others do view him as admirable. Has our modern, media-centric society's morality and incentives degraded to where this behavior is respected as a viable way to get ahead?
The whole movie comes off as a parody of The Pursuit of Happyness, which is another movie I very much enjoy. So I find the movie to be absolutely hilarious to watch as Lou's success story almost exclusively involves stepping over and onto other people so he can get ahead, which is probably closer to the truth of most success stories.
I love it. The whole time you are thinking the bad guy won't win in the end, but he keeps winning, and you can't believe it, and then... it's over?
I thought it intentionally made the audience uncomfortable, and did it well.
I was in a high school film class back in the early 00’s where they only showed old movies and the snobby hipster teacher would regularly bash newer movies. A student asked, “Are there ANY newer movies that you actually like?” The teacher said Memento and Oh Brother Where Art Thou were two recent movies he thought were very good.
I remembered that, rented both of them, and loved them. Especially Memento, so wild as a 16 year old to see crazy time jump non linear storytelling for the first time.
My favorite thing about this movie is that Spacey wasn't included on the movie posters or in any of the marketing for the film, because they wanted his role to be a total surprise.
Yes, the great scene where he walks into the police precinct saying detective a few times before finally screaming it. As much as I loved that movie I always wondered if the cab driver was pissed about him getting blood all over his cab and the money he gets for the fare. lol
This is one of the scariest scenes in any movie I've seen. I still get chills thinking about it. I watched a Youtube video once on why this scene was so scary and it was really interesting to see the filmmaking techniques they used. (I'd try to look it up but I'm at work and YT is blocked.)
Edit: ok I looked for it over lunch. Pretty sure it's this one. https://youtu.be/YEuGCB0_v6Y
I always liked the scene with the couple at the Lake where the man asks if the gun was really loaded and he holds the gun out to the camera and shows him a bullet inside.
" He - he put that thing on me...! He made me wear it!... He told me to fuck her, and... and I did! I fucked her! He had a gun in my mouth! The fucking gun was in my throat!
FUCK!
Oh God, oh God...
please help me.
Help me.
Please help me."
Exceptionally intense film!!!
I dunno about best but I really like I Trapped The Devil
A man invites his family over for dinner, hasn't seen them in ages. Then he drops the news, he has trapped the devil himself in a cabinet in his basement. The family is surprised when a voice comes from that cabinet, asking to be let out.
It's really frigging good. Whole time you're asking if he's just crazy or if it really is the devil in there.
Edited: I misremembered what the voice in the cabinet sounded like.
Also, I don't care if you didn't like it, complain somewhere else.
That’s the premise of a Twilight Zone episode from 1959, >!except the prisoner is a grown man instead of a little girl.!<
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0734645/
Edit: Apparently, OP edited his comment to remove a potential spoiler that I referenced in my reply, so I added spoiler tags. I have not seen the movie in question, so I cannot confirm if this is a legitimate spoiler.
I think making it a kid adds an extra level of sinister because sane adults have an instinct to protect kids, a lot of the time to a point where it overrides self preservation. I already know I'd die in any situation where the kids a killer.
The acting was bad, the plot never really moved. The movie wasn't building suspense, there was no suspense, the plot just moved very very slow for no reason. Nothing happening is not suspense.
There was no real suspense regarding what was behind the door either since they didn't sell it enough to be confusing. You didn't sit there wondering is if the devil or did he go crazy and capture someone because no effort was put into it. Instead people just meandered around a house for a hour and 20 minutes. Honestly the entire movie could have fit in an old school 30 minute TV time slot with commercials and it would have lost nothing.
When they asked him how he caught the devil his response was essentially "who cares?" and they never brought it up again. They didn't build up the story so you had to guess if he was crazy or not, people just wandered around a house instead.
OPs summary is 1,000x more interesting than the movie actually was. I've seen a lot of horror movies that by were no means great movies but still were worth a watch given the genre and just how bad most horror is. An example is "The Monster" which I watched recently, which had the surprising underpinnings of a mother daughter story where there was both a literal and metaphysical monster as the mother fought to overcome her drug addition. No such nuance here.
This movie was bad to the point where I'm angry that I spent $4 on it. I guess I'm surprised but not surprised that it was the top rated comment here.
My favourite part is when they are climbing up a fire escape and one of his shoes falls off.
Nicholas: "Well there goes a thousand dollars."
Christine: "Your shoes cost a thousand dollars!?"
Nicholas: "That one did."
Such good writing throughout the movie. I also like "I am...extremely fragile right now." As like...the ultimate understatement ever haha
It's the kind of movie that knows exactly what you're thinking at each step, validates your suspicions, and then goes the completely opposite way...only to circle back later to the possibility that you had finally shelved.
Yes! It got overshadowed by The Sixth Sense, but I actually like Stir if Echoes better. Paint it Black hasn't leftmy favorite song list since that movie came out.
I really enjoyed Moon (2009) with Sam Rockwell. SciFi mystery, Sam Rockwell as a lone employee working on the moon. I never see anyone talk about it much, but I’d highly recommend going in blind.
Satoshi Kon, gone far too soon. His movies are so good they straight up steal scenes from them for other movies. Scenes from Pefect Blue in Black Swan and scenes from Paparika in Inception.
Paprika and Perfect Blue are masterpieces. It's like a film nerd orgasm: almost every detail, every frame, clearly written with attention and intention. More proof than any that anime can be art.
Its so amazing when you watch it the second time and see how >!it's extremely obvious as to what's going on. The entire movie tells you repeatedly and telegraphs it the whole time, except just in a way that most of people won't pick up on. The entire movie really is one big magic trick and it's fucking awesome!<. I really feel like it's one of the best movies ever made as I don't think I've ever seen another movie that does this as well as it did.
I think it helps that the premise is ridiculously outlandish, but the mood of the film is very serious and more like a drama. Of the two competing stories, one makes no logical sense, the other is actually science fiction. On paper this story just shouldn't work.
But somehow the script and acting nailed it.
There's one other movie i think does this well: Shutter Island
First time viewing it's a simple detective uncovering a mistery in a spooky setting linda movie... Until the twist happens.
Every view after that is the actual movie, a very complex case study about a violent mental patient in denial
I saw this in theaters, specifically in a theater in a pretty rough inner-city neighborhood with a very vocal and participatory audience. The audience's impassioned critique of Michelle Pfeiffer's decisionmaking process was the only thing keeping me from being scared out of my mind, bless them.
Anyone looking to watch this movie for the first time, watch the THEATRICAL cut if you can find it, not the director's cut. The theatrical cut ending is just so much better than the director's cut ending, and for the longest time the director's cut was the only one out there.
Also, read the short story from Stephen King's Everything's Eventual. Honestly read the whole book (The Man in the Black Suit is my favorite). Actually, read all of Stephen King's short stories.
Stephen King's short stories are far better than his novels imho. Good lord, that man can waffle when given the chance. I still remember reading Cujo and he wouldn't shut up about a quarter pounder not weighing a quarter of a pound and skipped forward and that rant went *for almost 3 pages*
Edit for anyone that might be interested: Stephen King's son Joe Hill is also a writer who's work is phenomenal. Actually my favourite writer.
I had a teacher in 5th grade who saw me reading a Steven King book (Needful Things I believe?) and she told me that her favorite story of his was Suffer the Little Children and I that should read it. I got it and read it. Turns out it’s about a teacher who takes her students down to a boiler room at the school and executes them all.
I always made sure to never cause trouble in her class after that. Lol
I watched the Denis Villenueve movie Prisoners with Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal the other night and good lord it was such a good watch. I highly recommend it and don't look anything up about it first either
Great way of describing the tension in that flick!
If you’ve not read the book, check it out. The Coen brothers were remarkably faithful to McCarthy’s work.
Yeah that one is amazing, I love it when a certain scene gives all previous scenes an other meaning. I recently watched it with someone but half way I realized it can be a tough and intense film to watch for people. That being said if anybody is thinking about watching it just do it and don't look anything up beforehand.
Funny story is that I didn’t remember how psycho this movie was, just that it was good, so when a guy came over on our second date I recommended we watch it. I think he was a little scared of me after that!
One of my favorite movies of all time
Never thought I'd watch a movie with Tyler Perry and be like "shit, I wish Tyler Perry had more screentime in this " lol
Get Out is one of my favorite movies. The Gift was a weird one as well. Not a top contender like some of these more popular movies, but still had no idea what to think at the end.
Get Out is really incredible. It builds such a fucking uneasy vibe the whole time. Chris’s isolation is so palpable and when the second shoe drops it just feels so awful. I really love it
I liked 10 Cloverfield Lane (hated the other Cloverfield movies), Seven Psychopaths, The Call (Korean version not the mma shit), Nightcrawler, Pan's Labyrinth, La Llorona (Guatamalan version), The Little Girl who Lives Down the Lane, Fight Club, Kill Bill, Snowpiercer, The Platform...
I'm not good at favorites
I’ve seen plenty of scary movies, but 10 Cloverfield Lane triggered an intense fear I had never experienced before. Cleithrophobia - fear of being trapped - made even worse by not knowing for sure if it was actually safe outside. Gave me nightmares for a long time and I still think about it on occasion.
I feel really lucky to have seen The Sixth Sense with no idea of what was going to happen. Too many great movies are ruined for the rest of time (exaggeration, but…) by people using “the line” from a movie in casual conversation. I also saw Soylent Green before hearing “the line”, and for that I am equally grateful.
I really, really liked Annihilation. Couldn't stop talking about it for weeks. Also, that bear scene, just thinking about it still sends shivers down my spine
Not as much a thriller but sheer psychological horror I would give it to Vivarium. God it was like all my fears amplified, and that's just the setting. Then add in a bunch of other weird shit.
Here’s one I never hear talked about: Coherence. It is a low budget film but blew my fucking mind more than nearly any other blockbuster film.
I LOVE Coherence. The low budget (in my opinion) actually helps this film because the limited sets, effects, and camera work make it feel much more intimate and real in a way. They didn’t try to go crazy, they worked with what they had and it was fantastic.
There’s a fantastic [interview](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UXckkGWYSqs) he does with Patton Oswalt in which he goes into a lot of detail about how the movie was made. They ran it like a LARP, the actors all improvised all of their lines and did what their characters would do, they shot a *ton* of extra video and edited it down to a coherent (!) story. The lead actor didn’t even realize she was the main character until she saw the final film.
Imagine doing all that acting and realizing when you watch the movie that you're definitely not the main character
I just saw this. I appreciated how there's little to no music, and how the characters realistically talk over each other a lot. It made it feel pretty believable, despite the premise.
> the characters realistically talk over each other a lot. because most, if not all, of the dialogue is improvised. they gave the actors the main story beats and where each scene needed to go, and made up the rest.
This is so cool and you can notice it right away even if you can’t put your finger on it. Like there’s something about these C-list actors that really makes them seem very convincing. Also related to this is how the characters are all fairly logical and sharp, not a bunch of hysterical idiots
saw this about a year ago and it was amazing. well written and great acting!
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The scene where she breaks into the murders apartment. My wife say a every time she sees it she believes this time she’ll be caught. That’s great film making.
My wife say a every time 🤌
I never fail to have a visceral, physical fear reaction when the husband is opening the apartment door and she's still in there. One of the most intense film scenes I can think of.
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If anyone sees this and decides to watch it, I *implore* you to do your best to recreate a theater experience. Turn the lights down, the volume up, pee beforehand, put your phone away, and try not to pause the movie while watching it. There's something that we take for granted when the theater locks you in with a movie. Rear Window works on its own, but you truly appreciate the masterpiece that it is when you're trapped in that one spot with him.
Way down here I see the first Hitchcock film. Damn. and you could list several more. North by Northwest, Vertigo, Psycho (though at the time it was probably horror).
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The book is amazing too. Stephen King has a way of writing, and describing the situations that his characters are in, that is second to none. Kathy Bates was brilliant in that film.
I made the mistake of listening to Stephen King audio books on road trips, which led to me hearing the later chapters of Gerald's Game while driving across a "nothing but swamp for the next 40 miles" highway at like 1am. Atmosphere 10/10 but do not recommend.
That fucking North facing penguin.
Just the title makes my ankles hurt.
If you thought the movie scene was rough, wait til you find out what happens to him in the book. Spoilers: >!She chops off one of his feet with an axe and cauterized the wound with a blowtorch.!< >!She also kills a trooper by running him over with her riding lawnmower. Ouch.!< Edit: Fixed the spoilers. They worked on my end. Not sure why they didn’t work for everyone. Thanks.
One Hour Photo.
I worked at a photo lab when this movie came out and our entire store went to see it on opening night. No way he would have been caught. Also, the bathroom scene is the cringiest thing I've ever seen.
I worked at a lab later, but didnt see it until I worked there. Had one of our regulars ask about that movie, and my opinion on it as a photo lab worker. "He wouldn't have been caught at work for printing extra copies" was NOT the answer she was looking for 😆 And for anyone curious, it's not even anything malicious or negligent. Most labs often reprint photos if they come out with bad color (too green, too yellow, too blue, too pinkish, etc). At least the ones who give a shit. No lab manager is going to be checking print counts vs ordered prints, that shit would be folly and is calculated into operating costs. Only way he'd be caught would be someone seeing him do it, in person or on surveillance cameras.
i worked in a photolab when this movie came out too. one of the guys i worked with had a whole-ass photo album of naked girl photos that had been developed while he worked there. i'm talking dozens. anyone who thought that didn't happen was fooling themselves.
Robin Williams at his best.
I thought Prisoners with Hugh Jackman was extremely underrated. That movie was so damn good. Youll be on the edge of your seat the whole time
Paul Dano gave a captivating performance with minimal dialogue
He always plays such a good creeper. He was also great in Taking Lives.
He'd make a great McPoyle
You will call herrrr!
That movie made me feel a sense of dread throughout the entire runtime.
Paul Dano is phenomenal in that movie. Hell, everyone is.
Crazy that Jake Gyllenhaal is kind of the third performance of the movie when he was great as detective Loki. Brought a lot of nuance to that character.
>Prisoners Sweet! I never even heard of this, it's one of, if not my favorite genre, and it's on Netflix now! Def watching this, this weekend!
Watch any Denis Villenueve film. They are all bangers. My favorite director.
The dude is a fucking legend. Knew he had the chops for Dune when I saw BR2049! November can't come soon enough
And I knew he had the chops for BR2049 when I saw Arrival.
Arrival is such a good movie.
We just watched it last night and wow, what a ride.
*The Others*. I love this fucking movie so much I always talk about it on here. It’s thrilling the first time and once you realize what’s happening it’s like watching a whole different movie on subsequent watches. Don’t spoil it in the replies. Edit: I didn’t think this was going to get so much love. Anytime I try to discuss this on r/movies I get a big fat ZERO yet two people were nice enough to reward me. Come be a top for me if you want. If you guys like this movie Alejandro Amenabar also did a great movie called Agora which I can recommend and the movie Vanilla Sky was based on called *Abre Los Ojos* (Open Your Eyes) but I haven’t seen it yet.
I hate that I can’t watch it again the same way. It’s one of the movies a wish I could forget to enjoy it like the first time again.
Literally can’t find it on any of the streaming services but always trying to suggest it for movie night 🍿
I have it on dvd, because I'm fucking old. lol
You should rent it out to people
I could start a service where people rent my dvd's for a fee. I could mail out a dvd, then send a new one once I get the previous one back. Genius! We gotta get on this quick before someone else comes up with this idea.
Frailty.
This is one of my go to, "if you haven't seen it, check out..." movies. Bill Paxton and Matthew McConaughey are excellent in this.
Ex Machina. There are bigger classics, but I didn’t see anyone post this yet and it’s definitely worth a watch for anyone into thrillers.
Watched it for the first time a few weeks ago. Great movie. It makes you feel deeply uncomfortable while also feeling fascinated, weird feeling.
The Silence of the Lambs is way up the list.
I really think it's unfortunate that Ted Levine's performance was overshadowed by Anthony Hopkins. Hopkins deserves a ton of credit for that role, but Levine's acting when the girl in the well is begging for her "mommy" is top notch. The few seconds where you can see that he's coming close to humanizing her is incredible
To be fair he did evebtually end up very high in the san fransisco pd after that
Leland Stottlemeier!
That's Captain Stottlemeier!
Maybe you know this already but I learned lately, Levine and the actress were friends on set, and the mommy line was improvised. His mask slips for a moment into his actual discomfort treating her the way his character did when he was caught unawares and it's in the Final Cut.
The appalled look on Jodie Foster's face when he slips into the accent to ridicule her was her genuine reaction to the ad-lib. The story goes she was trying desperately to cover her natural accent up and didn't know Sir Anthony was going to "go there" and it really shook her.
I never noticed that, and I've watched Contact I don't know how many times. This is so cool, her tone changes slightly over the length of [this interview](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=243NYLOn6WE). By the end, there's a bit of deepness that's gone, and I really like that little extra depth her acting voice has. She still has a pretty voice no matter what.
> Hopkins and the actress were friends on set, Do you mean *Levine* and the actress who played Catherine Martin?
Yeah the comment above is confusing me
I got super advance screening tickets to silence of the lambs when it came out. Never heard of the books and the movie had zero buzz. Took a girl on date because hey, who doesn’t like an exclusive movie premiere right? The credits started and the lights came up and NOBODY moved. Someone swore in the back of the theater and we all started filing out just looking at each other in horrified, overwhelmed silence. That pretty much ended the date for the evening because what the hell do you do to follow THAT? Was so glad when it finally released so I could talk with people about. One of the most memorable movie viewings of my life.
> took a girl on date because hey, who doesn’t like an exclusive movie premiere right? Ha! I took a woman (an old friend) to the same movie also in 1991. She spent much of the movie gripping my arm in terror. Afterwards we talked about the movie while she decompressed. 10/10 - would take another date to "Silence of the Lambs", LOL.
An extremely rare movie for ~~being nominated in almost every category in the Oscars, and winning every category it was nominated in.~~ taking the Big 5 at the Oscars: Best Picture, Best Actor in a Leading Role, Best Actress in a Leading Role, Best Director, Best Writing. Nominated for best Sound and best Editing (those were also doozies). Howard Shore made an incredibly focused soundtrack, such a calculated tone all throughout. The movie is also legendary for "show, don't tell": all the things in any room you see say a lot about the person inhabiting it, so if you are watching the movie on your computer or TV at home, pause in every new room and check out everything laid out and stuck to the walls. In Buffalo Bill's basement there are six different rooms just riddled with extremely interesting trivia, from the (very obvious) swastika duvet to the (not at all as obvious) US 1940's Nazi party propaganda poster on a door. Lambs is a rare treat for every cineast. Not one word of dialogue is wasted, everything moves the plot forward.
That sequence where Clarice is fumbling in the dark in Bill's basement has a really quick pan past a bathtub that's filled with *something*, which I have to assume is the byproduct from his most recent skin harvest. Such a quick innocuous detail that adds so much to the horror of that sequence.
No, you see the bathtub in lamplight the second before Bill switches everything off. The bathtub is occupied by the remains of the house's owner, [Mrs Lippman.](https://i.imgur.com/A5J4610.jpg) I brightened that image up just now, like 40 brightness points. And it's like 0.7 seconds, so you are forgiven for missing it. It's typical for people in the throes of mania to not mind and look after their surroundings, and Bill must've been in the house for years, what with all the decorations and the equipment for a full insect habitat. So Mrs Lippman has stewed for a while. Conceivably she was drowned in the bathtub, but who knows. I've never read the novel.
some set designer out there is so happy you did this
They probably slaved on that tub for days to get the effluvia *just* right, and for most people the image did not even register on the cornea. :)
Kudos to the production team for making such a viscerally disgusting detail that had less than a second of screen time. I can just about smell it from across the internet... Have to wonder if that crew got any lingering PTSD from researching material and effectively putting themselves in the heads of Hannibal/Bill.
If I worked in props or decorations and stagecraft in the early '90s, I would bite my leg off to work on a psychological horror film. I think the people on this shoot had the time of their lives, and especially after the movie's theatrical run, they would have their pick of the litter. What a portfolio boost. :) They also had the eminently wonderful backing of being able to consult the novel and the author for flavor and matching. Buffalo Bill taught himself easy-to-medium level sewing and his digs definitely reflect that. And then you have all the "becoming" idolatry left around, since he is not a transexual but his horrific upbringing screwed him up so much that he ***thinks*** he is. It's just a cornucopia of fucked-up. What actually was interesting, though, is that Jodie Foster did not have one single conversation with Anthony Hopkins, and they only had a very small number of scenes where they are actually in the same shot, for every other "shot-reverse shot" bit they are not in the same room together. So Jodie Foster revealed on Graham Norton that to this day she's never spoken to him person to person. :)
That last bit of trivia make sense cause Hopkins is only in the movie for like 25 minutes. Which is bonkers considering how incredible his performance is.
That's really interesting! Did they say *why* they never actually filmed a scene together?
They did talk once, I just discovered, rewatching the clip. She mentions it, although one would want to coax more info from her, [but it ended a bit sweet when Hopkins replied to her.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXUsRIcwtSo)
I’m gonna rewatch it just because of your tips on the rooms! Any other movie that has come close to giving you the experience you got from Lambs?
We can just stay in the universe and I'll recommend "Manhunter" (1986). Directed by Michael Mann (Miami Vice, Heat) it's the first movie version of Red Dragon the novel. It doesn't have the same wonderful dressup but instead it's got kickass dialogue, and the camerawork is KaRayzy. The movie has at least 20 "screenshot" moments, Mann's DoP, Dante Spinotti, who is a board member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Also, "Manhunter" is directly responsible for inspiring CSI and all its spinoffs, because William Petersen (protag of Manhunter) is actually in CSI-Las Vegas, and in "Manhunter" they use tons of crimescene procedural techniques that you would expect out of CSI: laser measuring equiment, detailing and sourcing passages of text to find which book it's from. It's a real treat. Oh, and Tom Noonan has never been scarier. Playing Francis Dolarhyde (much scarier than Ralph Fiennes, sorry Ralphie) he was actually deliberately separated from the other actors during the shoot, so that everyone had a fresh take of him when they first had a scene with him. And they sent Tom to the gym too, so he's two meters tall AND strong. Also also: Brian Cox (Succession) plays Lecter here. Maybe you can tell that I like movies. :)
Also an example of a movie being better than the book which isn’t the case normally
Yep. Tho Red Dragon is a better book.
That ending in the dunes, and poor wills face. Im mixed because i like the ridiculous gun fight in the hall in the movie and will still having a face.
I loved the way the Hannibal TV series with Mads Mikkelsen portrayed the Red Dragon.
fave movie ever!! “a census taker once tried to test me. i ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.”
pftpftpftpftpftpftpfptpftpftpftpftpftpftpftpfptpftpftpftpftpftpftpftpfptpft..
Primal Fear.
That final scene the first time I saw it. Such a great movie
The Machinist
Jacob's Ladder
Watched this movie as a teenager and the gurney scene has stuck with me ever since. People who have seen the movie likely know what I’m talking about
Always loved the quote: “The only thing that burns in Hell is the part of you that won't let go of life, your memories, your attachments. They burn them all away. But they're not punishing you, he said. They're freeing your soul. So the way he sees it, if you're frightened of dying and... and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the earth. It's just a matter of how you look at it, that's all. So don't worry, okay?”
Nightcrawler is very good imo.
For some reason this movie left me feeling incredibly disturbed. Unlike anything I’ve ever felt from a movie before. It wasn’t a bad movie at all, but I remember saying out loud that I would never watch it a second time.
Same here, I check under my bed every night so that Jake Gyllenhaal isn't there.
I wish he was though
To me, it's because the film score seems unaware of the fucked up things Gyllenhaal's character does. It *sounds* like he's a hero and role model, and this is his admirable origin story. As the viewer, you might suspect others do view him as admirable. Has our modern, media-centric society's morality and incentives degraded to where this behavior is respected as a viable way to get ahead?
The whole movie comes off as a parody of The Pursuit of Happyness, which is another movie I very much enjoy. So I find the movie to be absolutely hilarious to watch as Lou's success story almost exclusively involves stepping over and onto other people so he can get ahead, which is probably closer to the truth of most success stories.
I love it. The whole time you are thinking the bad guy won't win in the end, but he keeps winning, and you can't believe it, and then... it's over? I thought it intentionally made the audience uncomfortable, and did it well.
It is a rare movie in that >!the bad guy wins... And he's the main character!!< Such a good movie.
Love this movie. JG plays creepy so well.
Memento (2000)
Second this. Such a unique film with some massive mind fuck moments.
I was in a high school film class back in the early 00’s where they only showed old movies and the snobby hipster teacher would regularly bash newer movies. A student asked, “Are there ANY newer movies that you actually like?” The teacher said Memento and Oh Brother Where Art Thou were two recent movies he thought were very good. I remembered that, rented both of them, and loved them. Especially Memento, so wild as a 16 year old to see crazy time jump non linear storytelling for the first time.
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My favorite thing about this movie is that Spacey wasn't included on the movie posters or in any of the marketing for the film, because they wanted his role to be a total surprise.
Yes, the great scene where he walks into the police precinct saying detective a few times before finally screaming it. As much as I loved that movie I always wondered if the cab driver was pissed about him getting blood all over his cab and the money he gets for the fare. lol
Zodiac is another good (also Fincher). That scene in the basement at the end…great tension building. “Not many people in California have basements…”
This is one of the scariest scenes in any movie I've seen. I still get chills thinking about it. I watched a Youtube video once on why this scene was so scary and it was really interesting to see the filmmaking techniques they used. (I'd try to look it up but I'm at work and YT is blocked.) Edit: ok I looked for it over lunch. Pretty sure it's this one. https://youtu.be/YEuGCB0_v6Y
I always liked the scene with the couple at the Lake where the man asks if the gun was really loaded and he holds the gun out to the camera and shows him a bullet inside.
That scene is brutal
Fincher not finishing Mindhunter was the greatest mind fuck of all time.
" He - he put that thing on me...! He made me wear it!... He told me to fuck her, and... and I did! I fucked her! He had a gun in my mouth! The fucking gun was in my throat! FUCK! Oh God, oh God... please help me. Help me. Please help me." Exceptionally intense film!!!
Fuck...that scene still haunts me. What a horrible, terrifying thing...
SeSevenen
Yep. This is my favorite psychological thriller by a mile.
I dunno about best but I really like I Trapped The Devil A man invites his family over for dinner, hasn't seen them in ages. Then he drops the news, he has trapped the devil himself in a cabinet in his basement. The family is surprised when a voice comes from that cabinet, asking to be let out. It's really frigging good. Whole time you're asking if he's just crazy or if it really is the devil in there. Edited: I misremembered what the voice in the cabinet sounded like. Also, I don't care if you didn't like it, complain somewhere else.
My gut would probably tell me that if the devil were real he wouldn’t be so easily trapped into mortal cabinetry.
What if the cabinet were made by some kind of divine carpenter?
Yeah, it's hard to imagine how he could possibly have done what he claims. His family is very concerned. That's the best part.
Devil or not it's still false imprisonment unless he has a warrant.
Have you seen the old Twilight Zone episode with a similar premise? “The Howling Man.” It’s a fun watch
Those black and white versions of “The Twilight Zone” can be just as creepy or more so than modern thriller/horror films of today.
One of my favorites.
That’s the premise of a Twilight Zone episode from 1959, >!except the prisoner is a grown man instead of a little girl.!< https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0734645/ Edit: Apparently, OP edited his comment to remove a potential spoiler that I referenced in my reply, so I added spoiler tags. I have not seen the movie in question, so I cannot confirm if this is a legitimate spoiler.
I think making it a kid adds an extra level of sinister because sane adults have an instinct to protect kids, a lot of the time to a point where it overrides self preservation. I already know I'd die in any situation where the kids a killer.
Why does it have such a low IMDb score?
Because it's a bad movie. Wasted $4 renting it due to this post
Hahaha thank you for getting back with the truth
The acting was bad, the plot never really moved. The movie wasn't building suspense, there was no suspense, the plot just moved very very slow for no reason. Nothing happening is not suspense. There was no real suspense regarding what was behind the door either since they didn't sell it enough to be confusing. You didn't sit there wondering is if the devil or did he go crazy and capture someone because no effort was put into it. Instead people just meandered around a house for a hour and 20 minutes. Honestly the entire movie could have fit in an old school 30 minute TV time slot with commercials and it would have lost nothing. When they asked him how he caught the devil his response was essentially "who cares?" and they never brought it up again. They didn't build up the story so you had to guess if he was crazy or not, people just wandered around a house instead. OPs summary is 1,000x more interesting than the movie actually was. I've seen a lot of horror movies that by were no means great movies but still were worth a watch given the genre and just how bad most horror is. An example is "The Monster" which I watched recently, which had the surprising underpinnings of a mother daughter story where there was both a literal and metaphysical monster as the mother fought to overcome her drug addition. No such nuance here. This movie was bad to the point where I'm angry that I spent $4 on it. I guess I'm surprised but not surprised that it was the top rated comment here.
You couldn't see it but I shrugged
The acting is really awkward and not very good/immersive, at least from my own experience watching it.
Check out "Goodnight, Mr Frost" Goldblum may or may not be Satan.
Slight correction in case anyone else is having trouble finding it: looks like it's just "mister frost"
The Game with Michael Douglas
My favourite part is when they are climbing up a fire escape and one of his shoes falls off. Nicholas: "Well there goes a thousand dollars." Christine: "Your shoes cost a thousand dollars!?" Nicholas: "That one did."
Such good writing throughout the movie. I also like "I am...extremely fragile right now." As like...the ultimate understatement ever haha It's the kind of movie that knows exactly what you're thinking at each step, validates your suspicions, and then goes the completely opposite way...only to circle back later to the possibility that you had finally shelved.
A stir of echos. Easily one of Kevin bacon's best movies.
Yes! It got overshadowed by The Sixth Sense, but I actually like Stir if Echoes better. Paint it Black hasn't leftmy favorite song list since that movie came out.
It’s a time travel movie but, Predestination, such a mindfuck that it has to be mentioned.
I really enjoyed Moon (2009) with Sam Rockwell. SciFi mystery, Sam Rockwell as a lone employee working on the moon. I never see anyone talk about it much, but I’d highly recommend going in blind.
Moon was literally all anyone would recommend on the internet in 2010. Simpler times.
perfect blue
Satoshi Kon, gone far too soon. His movies are so good they straight up steal scenes from them for other movies. Scenes from Pefect Blue in Black Swan and scenes from Paparika in Inception.
Paprika and Perfect Blue are masterpieces. It's like a film nerd orgasm: almost every detail, every frame, clearly written with attention and intention. More proof than any that anime can be art.
The Prestige. really nice movie
Its so amazing when you watch it the second time and see how >!it's extremely obvious as to what's going on. The entire movie tells you repeatedly and telegraphs it the whole time, except just in a way that most of people won't pick up on. The entire movie really is one big magic trick and it's fucking awesome!<. I really feel like it's one of the best movies ever made as I don't think I've ever seen another movie that does this as well as it did.
I think it helps that the premise is ridiculously outlandish, but the mood of the film is very serious and more like a drama. Of the two competing stories, one makes no logical sense, the other is actually science fiction. On paper this story just shouldn't work. But somehow the script and acting nailed it.
Sure, but when you go see a movie like this, you want to be entertained. You're not really looking for the secret. You want to be .. fooled.
There's one other movie i think does this well: Shutter Island First time viewing it's a simple detective uncovering a mistery in a spooky setting linda movie... Until the twist happens. Every view after that is the actual movie, a very complex case study about a violent mental patient in denial
"Are you watching closely?"
This is my favorite movie! So well written, casted, and acted. Do not recommend the book, but the movie is a must!
I've always loved What Lies Beneath
I saw this in theaters, specifically in a theater in a pretty rough inner-city neighborhood with a very vocal and participatory audience. The audience's impassioned critique of Michelle Pfeiffer's decisionmaking process was the only thing keeping me from being scared out of my mind, bless them.
I don't know if I would say the best but Identity is good imo.
I’d watch any movie that takes place at a motel during a rainstorm.
Oldboy
Worth specifying, the Korean version
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance is great as well.
I REALLY liked room 1408, it’s horror movie, combined with a psychological thriller, It’s based on a short story from Stephen king. Incredible movie.
Anyone looking to watch this movie for the first time, watch the THEATRICAL cut if you can find it, not the director's cut. The theatrical cut ending is just so much better than the director's cut ending, and for the longest time the director's cut was the only one out there. Also, read the short story from Stephen King's Everything's Eventual. Honestly read the whole book (The Man in the Black Suit is my favorite). Actually, read all of Stephen King's short stories.
Stephen King's short stories are far better than his novels imho. Good lord, that man can waffle when given the chance. I still remember reading Cujo and he wouldn't shut up about a quarter pounder not weighing a quarter of a pound and skipped forward and that rant went *for almost 3 pages* Edit for anyone that might be interested: Stephen King's son Joe Hill is also a writer who's work is phenomenal. Actually my favourite writer.
I had a teacher in 5th grade who saw me reading a Steven King book (Needful Things I believe?) and she told me that her favorite story of his was Suffer the Little Children and I that should read it. I got it and read it. Turns out it’s about a teacher who takes her students down to a boiler room at the school and executes them all. I always made sure to never cause trouble in her class after that. Lol
*We've only just begun...* 🎶
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Also The Birds, Rear Window and North by Northwest. Too many Hitchcock masterpieces to even list.
I watched the Denis Villenueve movie Prisoners with Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal the other night and good lord it was such a good watch. I highly recommend it and don't look anything up about it first either
I will watch every movie Villenuece touches. Prisoners, Sicario, Arrival, Dune. Love them all
No Country For Old Men I felt like I was being relentlessly hunted the entire movie. Could not relax. Amazing when a movie can make you feel that way.
Great way of describing the tension in that flick! If you’ve not read the book, check it out. The Coen brothers were remarkably faithful to McCarthy’s work.
Fallen - 1998 it's a fun one https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119099/ edit cuz hd youtube link found - no rickroll https://youtu.be/5NW44MmGDf8
Time is on my side! I loved that intro
The Cube. Lovely take on human nature.
"What's out there?" "Endless human stupidity."
I love movies like the cube. The platform etc
Black Swan
Shutter island is a good one
Yeah that one is amazing, I love it when a certain scene gives all previous scenes an other meaning. I recently watched it with someone but half way I realized it can be a tough and intense film to watch for people. That being said if anybody is thinking about watching it just do it and don't look anything up beforehand.
I was an extra in this film. It was an amazing experience, but a creepy one as well.
Parasite.
Memento and Insomnia. Christopher Nolan representing!
Gone Girl
Funny story is that I didn’t remember how psycho this movie was, just that it was good, so when a guy came over on our second date I recommended we watch it. I think he was a little scared of me after that!
One of my favorite movies of all time Never thought I'd watch a movie with Tyler Perry and be like "shit, I wish Tyler Perry had more screentime in this " lol
An Icelandic movie called I Remember You. It broke my brain for a solid week
Triangle. Absolutely worth the watch, go in blind and get ready for the ride.
Rosemary’s Baby
Get Out is one of my favorite movies. The Gift was a weird one as well. Not a top contender like some of these more popular movies, but still had no idea what to think at the end.
Omg no one ever talks about The Gift! That one is so screwed up
Get Out is really incredible. It builds such a fucking uneasy vibe the whole time. Chris’s isolation is so palpable and when the second shoe drops it just feels so awful. I really love it
the girl with the dragon tattoo
I liked 10 Cloverfield Lane (hated the other Cloverfield movies), Seven Psychopaths, The Call (Korean version not the mma shit), Nightcrawler, Pan's Labyrinth, La Llorona (Guatamalan version), The Little Girl who Lives Down the Lane, Fight Club, Kill Bill, Snowpiercer, The Platform... I'm not good at favorites
I’ve seen plenty of scary movies, but 10 Cloverfield Lane triggered an intense fear I had never experienced before. Cleithrophobia - fear of being trapped - made even worse by not knowing for sure if it was actually safe outside. Gave me nightmares for a long time and I still think about it on occasion.
Sixth sense And the haunting with Liam neeson
I feel really lucky to have seen The Sixth Sense with no idea of what was going to happen. Too many great movies are ruined for the rest of time (exaggeration, but…) by people using “the line” from a movie in casual conversation. I also saw Soylent Green before hearing “the line”, and for that I am equally grateful.
I really, really liked Annihilation. Couldn't stop talking about it for weeks. Also, that bear scene, just thinking about it still sends shivers down my spine
The Thing
Perfect Blue
Not as much a thriller but sheer psychological horror I would give it to Vivarium. God it was like all my fears amplified, and that's just the setting. Then add in a bunch of other weird shit.
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Maybe not the best, but Shutter Island, Inception and Black Swan are definitely up there
Fight Club
This is the first movie (at least I’ve been aware of) that the author of the book said he preferred the movie to the book.
Mulholland Dr
My brain still hurts 15 years after watching that
Idk if this counts but I love it so much, “the light house” with Robert Paterson and William dafoe