Christopher Lee: Horror films today are 'obscene'

[charlie and algernon]

London, England (CNN) -- Although his name is synonymous with horror, Christopher Lee says he doesn't have much desire to see pictures that fall under that genre these days.

The 87-year-old, who helped Britain's legendary Hammer studios breathe new life into the horror genre in the 1950s, says he rarely watches horror films.

"I find it quite nauseating what they do," Lee told CNN. "The blood is all over the screen like an avalanche -- the mutilation -- dreadful things, and I just don't enjoy that."

The veteran actor, who played Count Dracula and Frankenstein in a series of Hammer movies from the 1950s until the 1970s, says it's "obscene" how much is displayed in horror films today.

"What you don't see is far more frightening than what you do see," said Lee, who considers Roman Polanski's 1968 supernatural thriller "Rosemary's Baby" the scariest film he's ever seen.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/Movies/10/27/christopher.lee.horror/index.html

[TK421]

1. For the most part, I have to say I agree with him

this is coming from a horror legend, in my opinion.

[Vidar]

2. I agree totally. Chainsaw massacres hold no appeal.

[charlie and algernon]

3. it not just chainsaws

in the remake of House of Wax, it wasn't good enough to have the villan step on a girl's finger, he's got to bend over and cut OFF her finger. We've gone from horror films that show very little blood to where bloody amputations are all too common.

[Orrex]

48. In the original "Last House on the Left," the mom bit the weenie off of one of the killers

Just sayin'.

[charlie and algernon]

51. but did they actually show it happen?

now they show the amputations in all their bloody glory

[Orrex]

52. Showing Teh Penis would likely have gotten the film an X rating

However, here are a few films that graphically show amputations or eviscerations and were released more than 20 years ago:

Predator (1987)
Robocop (1987)
The Fly (1986)
Gymkata (1985)
The Hunger (1983)
The Thing (1982)
Creepshow (1982)
The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Alien (1979)
Star Wars (1977)
Blood Sucking Freaks (1976)
The Brain That Would Not Die (1959)
Freaks (1932)
Un chien andalou (1929)

That's fourteen titles, just from memory, though I had to look up the dates. I'm sure that I could come up with a much longer list. And that's not even including any Jason, Michael, or Freddy films.

In any case, it's clear that graphic amputations and eviscerations have been very popular in film for at least eight decades. Sure, they might feature more prominently in recent films, but honestly not that many. Quick: give me a list of theater-released films in the past 20 years that have graphically portrayed amputations. It won't be a much larger list than what you could assemble for any other two-decade slice of film history.

Yes, yes. The portrayals are arguably more graphic now, but once again I submit that this is due to the advance of special effects technology rather than to a ravenous taste for blood and guts.

There is nothing new under the sun.

[cemaphonic]

49. Of course, the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre really wasn't that gory.

Plenty of implied squick, but like a lot of classic horror, it relied a lot more on mood than buckets of fake blood everywhere.

[david13]

4. The subtleties and suggestions are always better than the

special effects.
dc

[jonnyblitz]

5. I love those old Hammer Studio horror films. nt

[Forkboy]

6. That's what people said about the Hammer films when they started.

Those movies raised the level of eroticism and nudity and blood in horror movies tenfold. I should know, I watched the bloody things often enough. :evilgrin:

[charlie and algernon]

7. lol, so we can expect the stars of Saw and the Hostel movies

to lament the "obscene" horror movies in 2049?

[Forkboy]

9. Probably.

:)

[Danger Mouse]

11. I would hope not. Saw and Hostel are disgusting enough.

I'd rather not think of how much further we can lower the bar.

[charlie and algernon]

12. heh, you know we're just a decade away from mainstream snuff films

and you know dancing being accepted by the public and not thought of as devil worship. :rofl:

[hippywife]

20. Exactly what I was thinking as

a response to how lower the bar can go. Or we could just show war footage of the dead and maimed on the six o'clock news. :eyes:

:hi:

[CBHagman]

19. AAAAAAGH!!!

lol, so we can expect the stars of Saw and the Hostel movies to lament the "obscene" horror movies in 2049?


No, seriously, as a person who gets terrified enough by The Night of the Hunter and so forth, that's all I have to say. AAAAGH!

[charlie and algernon]

8. lol, stupid double post

[Danger Mouse]

10. Most 'horror' movies today are just torture porn. The more sadism, the better...

and usually directed at women. I have no interest in seeing this kind of garbage...none.

[Orrex]

14. Yeah. The original versions of Last House on the Left and I Spit on your Grave were so wholesome!

And let us not forget the immediately forgettable Blood Sucking Freaks: In Ghoul-o-Vision!

There was plenty of gore in the good old days, and there was plenty of explicit torture.

I submit that the main reason we didn't see more of it is that the SFX technology wasn't up to the task; film makers knew that the effects would have looked comically lame, so they avoided showing it directly.

on edit:
You're right about the violence mostly being directed at women, but it's always been that way. That certainly doesn't make it right, but it does mean that we can't put all the blame on today's film makers.

[JonLP24]

21. Horror is not my genre

But isn't the violence directed at both genders? I seen Texas Chainsaw Massacre prequel or sequal, whatever it was and there was no survivals either male or female. :shrug:

[Danger Mouse]

22. Never saying they were.

It's just become much more prevalent than it used to be.

[spiritual_gunfighter]

25. I am a huge horror movie fan

and the torture porn phenomonon is disgusting, I hate those movies and I totally agree with Chris Lee.

[JTG of the PRB]

13. I just watched the Bela Lugosi version of "Dracula" last night...

...and I have to agree with Mr. Lee. What you DON'T see can creep you out a lot more than what you DO see.

[Individualist]

15. I agree

My favorite is the 1963 version of "The Haunting".

[kentauros]

18. That movie is almost entirely "what you don't see"

and yet I know people that didn't find it scary at all. My guess is that those that don't find it scary don't know how to lose themselves in the film to where their imaginations take hold to fill in the scary parts. That was one noisy house! :o

[TreasonousBastard]

41. The BOOK scared the shit out of me. The movie...

brilliantly kept you guessing just like the book did.

[WinkyDink]

16. We live in violent, thuggish, psychopathic, and misogynistic times.

[frogmarch]

17. It's mostly spatterpunk. I like scary, but I

don't like gore. The mermaid horror movie She Creature was almost too gory for me, but movie was beautifully photographed and well acted, so I liked it anyway. Lots.

[Taitertots]

23. Those old movies were not scary

They were just spooky dramas. These new movies are horror movies.

The real crazy shit is on the internet. No movies have even a feather of the gore and obscenity that is on the internet.

[RidinMyDonkey]

24. I'm with him

It's actually a pet peeve of mine how violent movies have become. Especially horror films.

I don't find any of that blood all over place, spilling guts, and mutilation to be scary one bit. It's freaking gross. It reminds me of watching a cable surgical show like Nip/Tuck, except the dialogue is terrible and there the plot is as minimally interesting as possible.

[tigereye]

26. I think the Hitchcock films are pretty scary

I don't really like the gory ones...

[valerief]

27. He's absolutely right. All the gore is pervy, kinky, fetishy, gross.

Rosemary's Baby was one MF scary movie, too.

OTOH, obscene films today are horrible.

[SoxFan]

28. Meathooks for Meatheads

A lot of modern horror is just plain uncreative, half-assed filmmaking.

Take a movie like the underrated Exorcist III (aka Legion). It relies on mood, tension, and atmosphere. Nearly all of the considerable violence is implied offscreen. But it's a lot scarier than Saw XXVIII.

[JonLP24]

29. There was this movie I watched made in the early 80's

It was "Braindead" or "Dead Alive" and that was the grossest, goriest movie of all time. Nothing today compares to that flick, I actually threw up watching that movie.

[Orrex]

30. That film ruined the director's career, and we never heard from him again.

[JonLP24]

32. He became producer and screen writer for Lord of the Rings

Also produced District 9 and probably some others.

Edit: I just looked up Peter Jackson, Braindead was made in 1992. He apparently made some other splatter and gore movies in the 80's though.

[Orrex]

33. Is this thing on?

Testing, one two three.

Check check.

Sound?

[JonLP24]

34. I don't get it?

:shrug:

[Orrex]

35. I know, but please don't feel bad.

[JonLP24]

36. Well... can you fill me in?

I apologize for being dense but I have no clue what you are saying. :(

[Orrex]

37. No apology necessary. It's late.

And I knew that Jackson was the director.

:evilgrin:



And I suggest that you feel yourself in.

[JonLP24]

38. I fixed it

I meant 'fill'. However I'll do my best to 'fill' or 'feel' myself in. :hi:

[Orrex]

31. Lee's 1971 film "I, Monster" opens with an extended shot of a dead, two-headed baby in formalin

But I guess that doesn't count as nauseating or dreadful to the octogenarian actor.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

39. As a kid, one of the most disturbing images I remember is from a Lee Dracula film...

..."Dracula Prince of Darkness"...when "Clove," his assistant, hangs one of the "guests" upside down by his ankles, over Dracula's coffin, and slits his throat so that the blood drains on the ashes, bringing Dracula back to life.

So yes, in 2009, I'll watch a movie like "Wrong Turn II" starring Henry Rollins and think "this is some sick, disturbing shit," but the Lee Hammer films weren't exactly squeaky-clean either.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

40. They don't understand the master of suspense, Hitchcock.

I refuse to see horror films, gory or violent films.
I thought Blair Witch Project was the stupidest thing I ever saw.

The stupidest, most pointless, recent violent film I saw was The Dark Knight. Nothing but explosions and people threatening and killing other people. Not a single bit of character development that would make you care about them before they are killed.

I refuse to go to movies that will give me nightmares.

Movies I couldn't watch on TV: Alien; Aliens; Body Double (woman killed with drill).

Movie I refused to watch on tape: Silence of the Lambs as soon as Anthony Hopkins started hissing.

[Drunken Irishman]

43. Eh. Psycho was seen as obscene by many.

Movies from yesteryear are good, but you've got to shake things up or it gets stale.

No one wants to see the fiftieth creation of Dracula. They want a real vampire movie with blood, guts and tits.

Nothin' wrong with that.

[Common Sense Party]

45. So with every successive generation, it inevitably HAS to get worse?

That's the way it seems--they have to dumb down movies every generation, and make them more moronic, fill them with more gore, more sex, more mindless violence and explosions, or the knuckledragging masses won't shell out their $10 to go see a film.

Will the coarsening ever stop? Will we, as a society, ever reach a point and collectively say, "Whoa. That's too much. Tone it down"?

I'd hate to see what movies will look like in 2050.

[Drunken Irishman]

42. I don't know if it's gotten worse...

Just different. I've enjoyed some recent horror films like Drag Me to Hell and Paranormal (both released this year).

There is a lot of junk. But there is also a wider market than there was thirty years ago.

[Common Sense Party]

44. Amen, Mr. Lee.

These gore-orgies are pathetic and ham-handed. Most horror directors wouldn't recognize true "suspense" if it bit them in the arse.

[Orrex]

46. Yeah. Well.

Most directors during the "golden age" of Lee-acceptable horror couldn't do suspense, either.

I keep making lists in my head of all of the graphic, gory films in the horror genre, and a huge number of them came out decades ago. In fact, with the profit-driven mass-migration of films to the PG13 rating, much of the horror genre is now watered down so that the films lack both gore and real suspense.

Upthread I mentioned that special effects prevented past directors from showing too much gore right onscreen, as did the limitations imposed by theaters and distributors who didn't want to release films that they deemed too gory. Still, for every "too gory" film released in theaters today, I'm sure I (or anyone, really) can name at least two released more than 25 years ago.

[distantearlywarning]

47. I have to basically agree with him.

I don't agree that Rosemary's Baby was the scariest film ever, but I do agree that it was a far superior horror film to the vast majority of modern films out there right now.

Actually, my fav. horror film of all time might very well be the original Wicker Man, in which Mr. Lee plays a very important role. :-)

[Bucky]

50. They also had more boobies. The British made excellent horror films with boobies back then.

The next person who runs for president promising less amputations and more boobies, I'm voting for 'em!