CatfaceFourtoes wrote:Apples and oranges. At the time I was growing up in, there were horror movies that you would just have to see, so that you were not one of the kids in the group who had not seen Freddie or Jason yet. These are obviously movies that were not aimed at kids, yet were so popular that kids would actually seek them out. I remember wanting to watch RoboCop when it first aired on cable because it looked like some metal superhero movie, like Iron Man. Imagine my shock when ED-209 turned one of the members at a board meeting to hamburger with live ammo. Now, unless you were some kid that never saw images of predator dinosaurs eviscerating other animals in one of those books at the school library, let alone read Chrichton's novel, I don't see what could be more shocking about Jurassic Park other than the idea of Velociraptors stalking children or the T-Rex biting a guy in half.
Pretty sure most kids did that. I'm pretty sure most kids also rooted through their Dad's stuff looking for issues of Playboy or Hustler; doesn't mean that those publications "secretly" for that demographic just because some children don't follow the rules.
There's no point in speaking in terms of "kids watch things they aren't suppose to watch anyways!" because it's far to presumptuous; it assumes that all children are actively seeking out that subject matter. The only fair way to discuss graphic content is in terms of what is generally accepted to be appropriate for that demographic.
If Jurassic Park could go there, so could an updated Godzilla film. It already halfway happened with GINO after all, with its offspring actively hunting humans for food. Cloverfield also took that dark turn without exceeding a pg13 rating as well. But I guess I see the point that no one here wants a Godzilla movie to be turned into a gore fest.
Sure it could. But why does it need to is the question. What purpose does it serve?
The entire motivation behind making a dark and violent Godzilla film is either to A) Emulate the success and critical admiration that
Gojira gets and/or B) A desperate attempt to stamp out any accusations of Godzilla being campy and for kids by showing off how dark and brutal it can be.
This is flawed reasoning because Gojira didn't need graphic violence to demonstrate the horror it represented or the destruction that Godzilla unleashed. Seeing an inherently silly character (superhero, giant monster, etc.) partake in excessive violence for the sake of doing so is one of the biggest displays of childish immaturity you can muster. People who think Godzilla is stupid aren't going to be swayed by being gruesome.
Here's a thought; has anyone considered an intelligent and tasteful Godzilla film that shows the dark and apocalyptic overtones it initially represented without showing people get vaporized? How about a Godzilla film that embraces its "for all ages" heritage with a rich display of narrative tones and a relevant social conscious?
Oh, and as for me not knowing what scary is because I happen to cite horror movies where there is gore without pointing out the psychological horror, I can say the the opposite holds true about you saying that gore has no psychological punch in a horror move. Watch Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds and go and rewatch the scene where Kane has his episode in the cafeteria in the original Alien.
Can you quote me where I said this? Because I didn't. This entire disagreement came about because you said that Nedry getting eaten was "OK for kids" because we didn't see anything happen. I contested that the scene uses a technique that's been employed as long as people have been scared of the dark of not showing what's happening and letting your imagination fill in the details. You referenced two brutally violent horror films "If I want something scary" and I told you that
"Both films would be moreorless just as terrifying no matter how much gore we saw." Can gore work? of course it can. I never said that it didn't.
I'm not disputing that Gore is scary. I'm disputing the necessity of gore in films to be effective in scaring an audience.