OldBoy

to all the violence and sex and horror we see on the screen...

i go to movies now and in instances like The Conjuring, it was a very good movie, very adeptly made, but it didn't scare me, it didn't horrify me or anything. i enjoyed it more than mildly. and while there wasn't alot of blood and guts flying aroubnd like some of your other horror flix, but even with the Saw franchise, it just doesn't affect me.

i get more affected by emotions or real-life horrors more than anything else, but is that a desensitizing from Hollywood? have we become comfortably numb?

does it still affect you? or no?

Solid Snake

Some people react stronger than others. This can stem from how they were raised to many other things. I don't have much reaction to gore in films, saw RoboCop when I was 3. And I was fascinated by why I didn't understand exactly was happening in that film at times. For example, my father died when I was 13. I react a bit strongly to father figures dying than most I think. In terms of violence, the more realistic it sounded and looked the more of a reaction it'll get for me. When Norton makes meat of Renfro's face in Fight Club. That gets me to say eew or a minor wince, but it doesn't glorify for me violence.

Are we desensitized? a bit but not really. We pick and choose are discomforts thanks to the MPAA.

What I think you're approaching is tone. Tone changes everything.


Also how many threads have you made this week? Lol.

Ash Ketchum

I've become desensitized to special effects, cgi and computer animation...to the point where nothing makes me happier today than going to the shelf and pulling out a VHS tape, preferably Japanese, with 2-D animation from an earlier era, the simpler the better.

Troy Stiffler

Nah.

Naked women still give me boners.

I only cringe when something deserves it. For instance, the ankle slide in Hostel. Or the face beating in Fight Club. Or when Murphy is murdered in Robocop. The good ones stick in my mind. It has more about being somehow emotionally attached to the movie. If that's not there, the violence doesn't matter.

Scary movies are still scary. Though I only laugh when horror movies follow bored horror conventions.

Impulsive comedic violence is still pretty funny. It was best when it was new to me. Like on South Park. Something about the mix of pain or violence and comedy makes me laugh.

DeputyDave

This coming from someone with an undead baby as his avatar

I think we are a little desensitized. but not all the way. Gore has never bothered me but I'm sure some of the gore I see now would have shocked a little the 80's me. The things that always scared me still do though but maybe I am a little more picky at how well they are pulled off.

RichC2

Scary movies aren't scary, they're just fun.

I've been watching episodes of Hannibal, the show has creeped me out more than most movies I've seen in the past year or so.

E Unit

They're not scary, they're not fun. To me, these kinds of movies like Conjuring seem to cater to a more teenage crowd. I know several of these are Rated R, but they don't invoke any kind feelings of horror. Based on my Facebook feed, the teenage friends/family members all saying something like "it's so scary", while the adults are kind of meh about it.

I think the Hannibal TV show is a good example, and subsequently Silence of the Lambs. Those are scary both physical and psychological.

DeputyDave

It depends on what scares you. I personally think it's silly to be scared of snakes or spiders. A movie like that would never scare me no matter how well done or adult it was. What scares me (always has and always will) is ghosts. I don't believe in ghosts but it is what always scares me. There were scenes in the Sixth Sense that scared the crap out of me. I saw the Grudge and Saw at the theater on the same night. Saw I thought was a little stupid and ruined by very poor acting and writing and The Grudge scared me so much I almost pissed myself. I can tell you with complete honesty that had I seen a little Japanese boy somewhere in the lobby when leaving that movie I would have kicked him in the head and run away screaming like a girl. Different strokes.

moviefan2k4

I think that most people - including myself - have become desensitized to certain things. The more you tend to view something that's outside your comfort zone, the more likely you'll eventually want something more...no matter how disturbing or perverse. Its just the sad fact of a fallen humanity.

Dr. DVD

I think we have become more desensitized to violence as it is presented in way more forms than sex and nudity nowadays. In fact, one can push the level of violence quite a bit and still have something safe for network TV or a PG-13 rating. Hell, stuff like Breaking Bad, Walking Dead, and Sons of Anarchy have R rated levels of violence, but they are deemed safe for TV as long as they carry an MA rating.
I feel that if a studio really wants to get people talking, make a big budget erotic thriller like Basic Instinct again. It's been so long since a studio release had that level of sex and nudity that just touching the surface of what those were would generate publicity.

Brack

The 80s and early 90s level of sex/nudity is nowhere nearly as prominent nowadays.

I'd also say movies aren't as brutally violent as they used to be either, but there are exceptions.

Rambo is probably the most gruesome "war" film ever made. Surprised that wasn't NC-17.

Fifty Shades of Grey is supposedly being made, so more erotic mainstream films could be made if that's the monster hit it is expected to be.

The MPAA is dumb. A few f-bombs and nudity will get you an automatic R rating, but endless violence and death but no gore will get you a PG-13 rating. There's something wrong there.

I thought World War Z was scary for an action thriller.

I'm not sure if I just don't find scary movies scary anymore because there hasn't been a truly original horror movie in a long time. The last horror movie I saw in theaters that truly scared me, and not with stupid jump scares, was Joy Ride. That was more of a horror thriller, and wasn't truly original either, but it took the When a Stranger Calls/Scream premise and just ran wild with it.

The Human Centipede had me fucked up, but it didn't scare me.

Why So Blu?

Nope. Quite the contrary. Everything is rated PG-13. If anything, we're going in reverse. There really isn't a lot of shit that's pushing the R rated boundaries nowadays.

Solid Snake

You're generalizing too much based off of yourself. Your little blurb a while back was all kinds of fucked up.

DaveyJoe

This is totally you:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/hVFKjP7uVuI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

TimeandTide

No.

As Troy Stiffler so aptly put it, "Naked women still give me boners."

And the face stomp and wrist-slicing scenes in Drive make me cringe every time I watch them.

inri222

I love Drive but I would not call it "Hollywood".

DeputyDave

It is sad but true.

taffer

I don't think its really that we have become desensitized so much as its just that we have grown up. Kids are more easily impressed by anything no matter how crappy it is and more easily frightened by horror movies than adults. Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees scared the shit out of me when I was a kid, but now they just seem really stupid when viewed through my adult eyes.

Nick Danger

Hey OP, what was that movie where the actor ate something that was alive and struggling to get away as he pushed it deeper into his mouth?

Why So Blu?

The face stomp doesn't, but that fucking wrist slice does EVERY TIME!

moviefan2k4

Generalization isn't always a bad thing, and which "blurb" are you referring to?

DaveyJoe

I can't judge, those movies scare the shit out of me too. The first time I saw Ju On I was spooning with a girlfriend on the couch, but actually I was just hiding behind her.

E Unit

This also is another call out on how Hollywood really is lost in translation when it comes to regurgitating good horror movies. I have to agree, Ju On really got to me. The Grudge was a waste of time. Same goes for Ringo/The Ring, and others.

Numanoid

It just means that you're getting old, boy. As we get older, and accumulate knowledge about film making, we begin to see through the screen, and learn to expect the gore and scares, and can rationalize them.

I used to get really scared at horror films, then I trained myself to realize that the scares are nothing more than effects and camera tricks. Now, it takes a lot to really scare me. Sometimes I wish I could go back to those more innocent times.

inri222

For horror films :

Atmosphere & Sense of Dread >>>>>>> Gore