“Torture porn” is a misnomer and a stupid one at that. The idea is to horrify, not to titillate.
Besides, Wolf Creek gave me a much bigger erection than Hostel.
I’ve seen one and find torture porn to be a quite fitting description, unfortunately.
We made it through four, taking longish breaks. The first was the strongest by far but felt a little slow. The second moved at a nice pace and sort of worked for me for a while, but quickly fell apart. From there, the stories/plots degrade in quality quite a bit as the series progresses. There were a few points where I felt like I had no idea what the writers were trying to do and they probably didn’t know any more than I did. But we had good mindless fun at least. I think my skin is properly numb now and when we’re done I’ll pull out Wolf Creek. She apparently enjoys crappy movies, but I can enjoy just about anything, to an point, when my viewing partner has a huge appetite for it.
Uncle Larry, I think the idea is to titillate, with these movies. Personally I think good horror can horrify to a much greater degree using more sophisticated storytelling and filmmaking.
Who are these women that want to inflict these movies on you? ;)
Ya know, I tried to watch the first one, but after I had kids, any movie where kids are put in danger, I just can’t deal with it. It is kind of hazy, but once Elwes’ kid (kids?) get snatched, I tried to push through, but it was too much. I never, ever had such a strong reaction to any silly horror movie before that. Weird brain.
Shawnee Smith and the hypodermic needles makes Saw II my favorite. These are more like live action cartoons or horror comics than ‘torture porn’ imo. Watch Martyrs if you want the full torture porn effect.
Wolf Creek didn’t impress me all that much. It’s not far out enough to be disturbing, but it is far out enough to not be mainstream.
Yeah, we attempted Wolf Creek last night and it was too slow for her. We only made it to the gas station scene and then had to fall back on Plan B. She appreciated some of the setup, however. She’s only 25 so her tastes will probably expand over time. So I guess if I’m not going to try to challenge her, I’ll stick with recommending faster-paced, action-oriented horror.
Same kind of people who dig garbage like SAW and Hostel are the same kind of folks who ducked happily into the freakshow tents at the travelling carnivals. Same performance media for the same audience.