[Jason Stringer]

The Exorcist is always one step ahead of the bunch, but other classic horror films that can easily be mentioned in the same breath include:

Jaws
The Shining
The Sixth Sense
An American Werewolf In London

My own personal opinion, of course. 🙂

[drexul]

Well it may seem obvious, but i would pu Exorcist 3 on the list.

[fatherbowdern]

I would vote for Silence of the Lambs as well.

[madaztec2]

In my humble opinion THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT was one of the films that when I first saw shook me a bit. The ending in particular was what shook me and made me ask what the heck?! I also must admit that it changed the way I displined my children, if you guys remember the witch made the children face the coner as she did her deed.So to me THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT since it made me change a facet of my every day life.

[fatherbowdern]

madzatec, if only I had seen The Blair Witch Project without knowing it was fake, I could have potentially bought into some of it (especially when the weird and freaky lady is being interviewed in the beginning … a true “off-the-street” amateur).

[madaztec2]

fatherbowdern
I see what your saying . True they could have done a little better job on some of the actors that they used for the interview shots but i guess the makers of the film wanted that look of no trained actors and it came out a little cheesy. What got me was the last 20 minutes of the film it really creeped me the #%&* out it is the basic fear of man. Darkness , being chased , the not knowing or not able to explain what the hell is chasing you in the dark. So with that said the film creeped me out and it made me change some thing in my every day life.

[fatherbowdern]

madaztec2, I’m sorry I was clear about the actors. I actually think their “candid interviews” (although somewhat vaguely scripted) appeared pretty genuine. I absolutely agree with you about the ending. When “what’s her face” went looking for “Josh” (I think that’s the name she kept calling out, while she was going through the house was indeed a its best moments. The hand prints of the kids was a unique twist for a horror film, yet very effective (I still see these on Halloween props and I think of the movie).

[Jagged]

The Haunting & The Innocents are the only 2 films I would consider mentioning in the same breath as The Exorcist.
There are quite a lot of other genuinely good horror films but only those 2 are on a par.

[fatherbowdern]

Do I dare say, The Others? Good theme similar to The Sixth Sense with the twisted ending. I was totally off guard and thought Kidman was just a whack job (well, she was, but in another sense).

[Jason Stringer]

fatherbowdern, nice call. I also liked The Others, although it didn’t ‘freak me out’ as much. Still a great film.

[mathmarchetti]

The only two horror movies that I consider superior to The Exorcist are The Shining and Suspiria. The Exorcist is the third in my list. On the same level, I think the extremly creepy and yet beautiful Korean movie “A Tale of Two Sisters”, Hitchcock´s “Psycho”, the original “Carnival of Souls”, Polanki´s “Repulsion” and the original “Black Christmas”.

[fatherbowdern]

Cap, I guess it’s my great love for Kidman’s acting in every film that makes them wonderful. To me, Kidman is like the Australia version of America’s Meryl Streep because she can do so many accents and her acting is stupendous. If you ever seen the film To Die For, she’s a knockout and so believable as the semi-autobiographical true case here in America. What stumped me was why the Academy Awards didn’t nominate her for the role of Suzanne. But, she did win The Hours. And won numerous awards for The Others including Best Actress.

Plus, and most importantly, she is hot!

[karras13]

One thing that always helps me ‘get into’ a movie is when I’m not familiar with most or all of the actors.When I saw The Exorcist in 1974 at the age of 17 I had no idea who any of the actors were and it helped make it more believable.This is where movies like The Shining fall apart for me.Besides not being scary at all ( for me at least)all I kept thinking was ” oh there’s Jack Nicholson running around trying to be frightening.” It doesn’t work for me when I see a big name star in a horror movie.I guess I know too much about them to believe it could really be happening.Can you picture Blair Witch starring Tom Cruise or Jessica Alba?
Uh-uh.

[fatherbowdern]

karras13, you are right on target with the lack of knowledge about the actors. I was 13 when I saw the film way back when. Having someone you can “only see” in one role happens with me a lot, too. I didn’t find Nicholson scary … he was just acting more nuts than usually does in films. And, the “Heeeeeeeere’s Johnny!,” is the most famous thing to remember from that film and the audience laughed their asses off. On the other side of the coin, think about how Linda Blair’s career was really ruined by playing the part of Regan. I don’t care what’s she in or what’s she doing, she’s also the 360-degree head spinning, pea-soup vomiting little girl with crucifix for the doing the naughty! 😉

[Jason Stringer]

Shining and Jaws absolutely. I watched Poltergeist recently and unfortunately it doesn’t hold up so much. It’s very clearly 80’s in a bad way… especially the animations. Might be due for a remake any day now.

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