A scary thing happened on the way to the Movie Forums - Horrorcrammers

*fights urge to re-post ANoES2 review from just three months ago...

And do yourself a favor, read all the backstory about the movie after you see the movie.

Expectations matter a lot. The First Omen, I came late to, but heard, "this is unexpectedly good." I mean, it had serious flaws, but if I hadn't heard that take, I will would have avoided it with the expectation there's nothing in the movie for me.


Nosferatu - it's the person who made The VVitch and The Lighthouse doing what sounds like is their passion project on a movie that manages to already have one really good remake, on a story that has been done differently many times over the years. It seemed like there was great potential there. So, it's hard for me to see the missed potential because the angle/hook he was going in with was interesting and one I struggle to think of another Dracula adaptation that took that route (even though it seems like an obvious one.)

Imagine if I went into Nosferatu with First Omen level of expectations - low, but with the understanding that there's supposed to be some good stuff in the movie, I'd have been satisfied and probably impressed.

I just located your review. Sounds encouraging. Maybe I'll finally do the whole series this year

I probably wouldn't go far to say I preferred the second Elm Street to the original but....oh who am I kidding, of course I would.


The original is about fifteen pretty great minutes padded with a lot of lifeless horror bait padding. The second doesn't have any great moments, but is consistently fulfilling trash.


3 is where it's at though. And then 4 if you are willing to accept it pulling the franchise towards the kinds of 80s excess that made the later Rocky movies so ridiculous but so fascinating in a time capsule kinda way.

I'm not in the least willing to accept that but I will watch it anyway because I'm a completist.

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I LOVE The Hidden. It's one of my all-time favorite sci-fi movies and while I wouldn't give it 5 stars, it's pretty darn close.

I did have very high expectations for this one, which may have been misplaced.

And I've been mostly critical of the film in our discussions, so I want to say something nice about it:

Something that I absolutely loved about the movie, even in its dumber moments or in parts that I felt were unnecessary, is that it was sincere. I feel as if sincerity and telling a scary story without being glib or winking is something that's really missing from a lot of horror movies these days. And so it was nice to see a movie that was brave enough to take itself seriously. That opening sequence with Ellen and the shadow in the curtain, pretty much the disorienting entirety in the castle, all of Orlok's character: just really wonderful, straight-forward horror. If the overall level of the film had stayed in that zone, I'd consider it an instant classic.

I think this was a bust when it came out but I saw it in the theaters at the time. So much fun, 9/10, accept no substitutes.

Seems I was the only one that didn't get the memo about The Hidden. Thanks for nothing, guys!

What are you folks' thoughts about Honeymoon, 2014? I heard of it in positive terms, but I thought the premise was stretched to the breaking point. The climax was quite long, and it could have used more plot points.

I've been talking about The Hidden for YEARS. I love the premise, the performances, and the nuanced .

It also hold the distinction of having one of the absolute worst sequels ever. Not just a bad film in it's own right, not just a movie whose first 10 minutes are just a literal montage of the first film, but it also continues the story in a horrible way that made me really upset.

I generally liked it. It also bears the proud moment of me being like "Why does this actor sometimes look kind of sickly and other times look just fine?" and then realizing that there are two Treadaways, they are both actors, and one is just a bit inclined to looking pale and drawn.

I really liked the idea of the characters .

Just a nice little heads up...we've three 90% Horror movies out in February...Companion, The Monkey, and Heart Eyes.

With a title like The Hidden, I thought everyone already knew about it. It's great, lots of fun, good concept, Kyle Maclachlan.

Are you suggesting that I have, in fact, read multiple posts about The Hidden and simply ignored and/or forgot them? Balderdash!

The Hidden is so fun, so ‘80s. I would love a 4k of it.

I went into it completely blind so imagine my surprise when you-know-what happened the first time

It's not like I can say anything. I'll roll into threads and be like "Hey, have you all ever heard of this movie called The Shining?"

As for The Hidden, that look between .

The trick is to accept that the clock on the 80s passed midnight between Part 2 and Part 3. The first half (and a bit more) of the 80s is actually pretty good to great and the second half is middling to awful. Part 3 is the embracing by the franchise of the cheesy second half of that decade. It's the "Wolfman's got nards!" of the franchise. After which the whole thing is cheesy and corny and silly.
That said, if you can embrace and lean into that, chuckle along with it and wink back at it and not expect it to in any way reflect the true Horror of the original and to some degree its follow-up, then Parts 3, 4, and 5 can actually be enjoyed as campy fun.
But if you go into 3 and especially any of the ones after that with expectations of an actual good Horror movie rather than Horror-camp, you are gonna be pissed off.

Well, that's good, yeah, if someone had asked me I would have just said you straight-up didn't like this movie and didn't think it was good based on what you've said so far.
I do agree with your positive, maybe the reason I'm giving it higher marks is that I didn't have very high expectations and I was really grateful for a movie, particularly a vampire movie, that didn't hedge its bets against audience incredulity but sincerely told its story darkly.

I only recently learned about it (though I'm pretty sure I saw it when I was 14) through some online things that I follow. Don't know how you and I both missed people selling this movie but I guess that tracks.

90% by what metric? I don't know what we're using these days.