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The Big Bad "Body Horror" Bonanza

Started by alan nagsworth, February 21, 2013, 01:09:16 PM

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alan nagsworth

Yes, I've got a bit of an obsession at the moment. Brooding and suspenseful pre-1990s horror films, specifically ones that feature a stylised content of prosthetic nastiness. I've been working my way through one or two films a day when I have the time and I've lost count at the amount of times I've been completely transfixed by the events taking place on screen, hands to mouth, as my stomach muscles contort and clench in comprehension of such horror. Naturally, I now find myself seeking further wonders of the genre and would like to talk a little about what I've already seen.

My obsession with this style of film has been there from a young age, when I watched Carpenter's The Thing at the age of 9 or 10 and scared the living daylights out of myself. When my friend introduced me to the magic of George Romero, and later Lucio Fulci, I knew I had to dig out The Thing and finally relive the initial terror of which I only carried a distant memory. After sitting down to watch it with him, and both of us being completely flabbergasted by the magnitude of the animatronics and prosthetic gore, I knew there was something stirring in my heart that might possibly never go away.

Since then, I've been on a steady quest to watch the very best (and worst) of this, what I would consider to be one of the most essential and sadly almost forgotten aspects of the horror genre. Naturally among my first ports of call was Cronenberg's The Fly, and from there I've been delving further into recommendations from friends as well as reaching across the pond to countries of such renowned classic horror such as Italy and Japan. Lucio Fulci has quite a colourful catalogue of outright grim effects, from the savage teleporting brain-squeezing zombies of City of the Living Dead to the quite honestly preposterous and gut-churning tarantulas eating a man's face (with a close-up of his tongue being ripped off) in The Beyond. The former I found to be the more entertaining of the two films, though the latter is definitely not without merit! While we're in Italy, and although it doesn't strictly fit the thread description, it'd be a crime not to mention the magnificent Dario Argento and the sheer dazzling beauty of every single god-damned shot, angle, expression and colour of the masterpiece that is Suspiria.

Japan naturally has its fair share of inexplicable madness. The works of Takashi Miike really need no introduction, not least of all because I've banged on about him enough on these boards already, so I'll keep it short by saying that Ichi the Killer is an absolute staple of Asian cinema. The lesser-known hero of Japan is Shinya Tsukamoto, whose Tetsuo movies have been a brutal foray into the relationship between man and machine, and are notable for such scenes as a woman voluntarily fucking a giant drill penis, a fetishist inserting a metal pole into his thigh, and an array of artillery bursting its way out of a man's chest.

Credit is also severely overdue for the 1977 masterpiece House from director Nobuhiko Ôbayashi. This film is truly unlike anything I've ever seen before, combining the camp jollies of exploitation cinema with horror that can at times be utterly hilarious or truly deranged. The cinematography is really well-executed and this is far more than just another b-movie. It's completely over the top to perfection and a riveting watch from start to finish. The scene where the grand piano eats one of the girls is particularly memorable.

Returning back to the west, recently I've been wowed by a number of films ranging from the truly excellent to the rather awful. I'll start by saying that Society is an absolutely essential film for fans of Cronenberg, etc. with a perfect measure of idyllic American life and dark, brooding surface tension that threatens to burst out at any moment, and when it eventually does... fucking hell. I watched this one only yesterday and I was so aghast with awe at the horrors of this film that I found myself actually cheering at certain points, laughing in complete disbelief, barely able to contain my excitement.

Now, a film that could rightfully divide the opinions of critics is Xtro. Personally, I enjoyed it a lot it, warts and all. Beyond the tragically wooden acting of the mother and son and the at-times-unbearably-shit soundtrack, this is a very surreal film where the events that occur are far from linear and give way to little explanation. Much like The Thing, this film defines the term 'alien' in that the things we see are beyond our comprehension, yet still seemingly not impossible in a far off corner of some distant galaxy. A very odd little film indeed, featuring appearances from 80s dance-pop act Tik and Tok who play the parts of the alien and the creepy giant action man toy.



So, thoughts on the genre? Recommendations? Memories of your favourite scare? Let's be havin' 'em.

Blumf

Xtro is a nice little thing, I love the action man scene and that gif is a classic bit. Red Letter Media have recently given it a quick review and were pleasantly surprised with it.

Have you tried Possession? It's kind of like an art-house video nasty (it was one of the genuine banned video nasties)

More physiological than pure body horror but it does have some very memorable SFX scenes as well as just plain memorable scenes...


Kane Jones

Stuart Gordon's 1980s cult favourites 'Re-Animator' and 'From Beyond' are both grotesque and hilarious in equal doses.  Well worth watching too.

Society is fantastic.  Caught that film late one night and assumed it was some post 90210 high school shite.  Holy Christ, was I wrong...

Deanjam

Watched Xtro as a kid in the 80's. Think it scarred me for life to be honest. Basket Case is one that still creeps me out despite the effects looking a bit rubbish nowadays.

Cerys

I absolutely love this kind of film and I'm having to exercise extreme self-control just to keep from zipping straight to Amazon and ordering a bunch of the ones mentioned in this thread.  SNG doesn't like them very much, which helps to keep me from going berserk.  On the down side, it also prevents me from watching stuff like this as much as I'd like.  Phooey.

alan nagsworth

Yeah, I forgot to mention Possession! How could I?! It's fucking hysterical, man. I don't think I've ever seen such a harrowing portrayal of the confusion, emotional trauma and skin-clawing hair-yanking despair of the disintegration of a relationship as the one depicted here. At first i thought it looked ludicrous and was ready to dismiss it, but as it progressed you seriously get a grasp of what the director was going through at the time: a hairy divorce of his own, not to mention the previous issues the he had suffered getting his work released in his native country, Poland. This IMDb review details that aspect:

QuoteDuring 1970's and 80's Poland, all films were approved by the Polish film commission and Zulawski's second film "Diabel" (1975) was banned. Made in Polish, "Diabel" was essentially cut off from it's only possible audience. He took a trip to France, ended up making a film and then returned to his homeland. He worked on yet another film for two years which the authorities did not allow him to finish. Since then he has basically lived and worked successfully in France.

"Possession" is the first film he made immediately following the 2nd incident in Poland. I read an interview where he talked about how his personal identity was in crisis at the time due to his divorce and being (for all intents and purposes) exiled from his homeland.

Given these facts, I found the film to be utterly compelling and extremely visceral. At times it did seem a tad pretentious for my tastes, most notably during Anna's detailed descriptions of her mental state which I felt were a little cumbersome and unnecessary, but overall it is a great watch. The horror scenes are memorably disturbing but they only scratch the surface of the varying degrees of quiet contemplation and complete insanity given to us in a truly memorable performance from the beautiful Isabelle Adjani. That woman is a powerhouse for sure.


acrow

big fan of all the films mentioned, especially society. like kane i remember seeing it late at night with no idea what it was and being blown away by the insanity. it's a shame that yuzna has never managed to make anything that matches up to his one great first film.

a recentish film i remember quite enjoying was splinter.not a classic by any means, but a lot of nasty fun.


billtheburger

Housu probably holds the record for the film that had my eyes the widest open & least number of blinks. It has a cat singing along to the score...
As mad as it seems, I think the film is a homage to Western Cinema.

I also enjoy the US House film with William Katt.


madhair60

Guinea Pig: Mermaid in a Manhole.  You're welcome.

Edit: Also, the original The Evil Dead goes without saying, and you could also try Guinea Pig: Flower of Flesh and Blood, though that one isn't very fun.

Kane Jones

Quote from: madhair60 on February 21, 2013, 03:35:38 PM
Also, the original The Evil Dead goes without saying

Oh absolutely[nb]and Evil Dead II, which I think I actually prefer..[/nb]

BlodwynPig

I still haven't watched House, even though I started a thread about it here. Must correct that.

acrow

i don't really think of flower of flesh and blood as body horror. it's just a man in a nifty hat cutting up a lady.

i've just looked at the body horror wiki page and it says that it "may deal with disease, decay, parasitism, mutilation, or mutation."

it's definitely got mutilation, but then so do saw and hostel and i'd have a hard time defining those as body horror.

the two guinea pig films that i think really exemplify body horror are the already mentioned mermaid in a manhole and also he never dies.

madhair60

It's the stuff towards the end of FoFaB that pushes it into body horror, I think.

Oh, and can I nominate Necro... crap, I've forgotten the name.  Necro something.  It's fucked up.  Necro-something-ia?  I genuinely am at a loss.

acrow

yeah, i think i was combining fofab and the devil's experiment in my head.

are you thinking of lucker the necrophagous? or nekromantik?

Deanjam

Quote from: madhair60 on February 21, 2013, 04:14:03 PM
It's the stuff towards the end of FoFaB that pushes it into body horror, I think.

Oh, and can I nominate Necro... crap, I've forgotten the name.  Necro something.  It's fucked up.  Necro-something-ia?  I genuinely am at a loss.

Necronomicon?

madhair60

Nekromantik, that's the (corpse) fucker.  Cheers.

More suggestions later if arsed.

billtheburger

Ah. That reminds me one of my favorite Jess Franco films is Necronomicon - Geträumte Sünden AKA Succubus.
Recommended.

BlodwynPig

Quote from: billtheburger on February 21, 2013, 04:28:54 PM
Ah. That reminds me one of my favorite Jess Franco films is Necronomicon - Geträumte Sünden AKA Succubus.
Recommended.

Any relation to the mythos book?

billtheburger

Quote from: BlodwynPig on February 21, 2013, 04:39:28 PM
Any relation to the mythos book?
Only by title and the fact she is a daemon.

acrow

nekromantik is really great. the sequel too. i'm a big fan of the director's (jorg buttgereit) whole filmography.

schramm, in particular, contains some wonderful grotesque stuff.

phantom_power

Japan are pretty good at these. Tokyo Gore Police has the body horror thing down pat, though the film itself isn't really horror

billtheburger

Once upon a time one of the writers from TV's Neighbours drank too much cough syrup and wrote the Australian masterpiece that is Body Melt:

Recommended.

Deanjam

Quote from: phantom_power on February 21, 2013, 11:58:30 PM
Japan are pretty good at these. Tokyo Gore Police has the body horror thing down pat, though the film itself isn't really horror

A quick search has led me to this poster.



I can see the appeal.

zomgmouse

Eyes Without a Face, just for that one scene where they
Spoiler alert
actually cut the girl's face off
[close]
.

lazarou

Quote from: phantom_power on February 21, 2013, 11:58:30 PM
Japan are pretty good at these. Tokyo Gore Police has the body horror thing down pat, though the film itself isn't really horror
That's a fun film, it's got some cute Verhoeven tributes in there too. It's a bit all over the bloody place, but definitely worth a watch.

As far as recent stuff goes, I really liked American Mary. Not nearly as grisly as some of the films here, but good stuff all the same. Excision was great too. I don't know if they quite fit into the same genre, but I'm not sure what else I'd label them as.

Brundle-Fly

Stuart Gordon's Faust (2000) has a fabulous but preposterous body morph horror sequence.
Spoiler alert
The Satan fella turns on his sex mad female siren sidekick and transforms her into a gigantic pair of tits and arse with her face in the middle. Not on YouTube and too NSFW to link here anyway
[close]
.

El Unicornio, mang

The Fly 2, although not a great film, has some good body horror. Particularly the ending which had me disturbed for a while after.

acrow

Quote from: lazarou on February 23, 2013, 01:47:33 AM
That's a fun film, it's got some cute Verhoeven tributes in there too. It's a bit all over the bloody place, but definitely worth a watch.

As far as recent stuff goes, I really liked American Mary. Not nearly as grisly as some of the films here, but good stuff all the same. Excision was great too. I don't know if they quite fit into the same genre, but I'm not sure what else I'd label them as.

can't believe i forgot about american mary. that is definitely one of my favourite films of last year.

based on this post i watched excision last night and thoroughly enjoyed that too. it reminded me of may, another great body horror (i think. i don't know. i'm not sure i totally understand what the term means). thanks for reminding me to watch that film.

tonight i watched the first film directed by brandon (son of david) cronenberg, antiviral. while it doesn't feature any of the wonderful gloopy nastiness you see in society and stuff like that, it seems to me to be the very essence of body horror. i very much enjoyed it. i imagine lots of people here will not like it if the black mirror thread is anything to go by.

Mini

American Mary and Excision are both two of my favourite recent horror films. I'll also add Cell Count which isn't great but has some wonderfully icky body horror moments, and plenty of not too subtle nods to Alien and The Thing and Cronenberg.

remedial_gash

Ha! Was body Melt really written by someone from neighbours? Ian Smith (Harold) has a brillig swear and Toby Mangle faceplants spectacularly.

Miike was mentioned above, but mainly for Ichii, though I think Full Metal Gokudô is the most proper body horror entry of his stuff, and the Tokyo Gore Police people made a few along the same lines, like Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl - which isn't terrible.

Videodrome is body-horror, right? If so, a shit load of Cronenberg would be included, like Shivers and Rabid - though I guess that Night Breed is also considered, with mutating creatures and D.C. being the most monstrous despite the most 'normal character' etc...

Someone mentioned Basket Case up-thread, but Frankenhooker is probably his best work (Brain Damage a close second and probably more relevant), he did a comeback movie called Bad Biology a few years back, and it was fun but full of Ron Jeremy, fake tits and flying cocks.

Gash
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