These are the things often heard among horror fans (or fans of cinema in general) in a group setting. Enthusiastic sentiments cementing their hardcore affinity for a favorite horror film that, well, they know inside and out. They’ve seen it more than any other horror film they’ve digested. They know every scene, the inflection in which a line of dialogue is spoken, the length of a shot or when a well-timed explosion of bloodshed occurs.
We all have movies that we consider “the best,” but in some unique way, the ones we’re very familiar with – the films we don’t mind revisiting over and over and over and almost feel like a best friend – rest proudly on another pedestal. Perhaps they take up a separate section on your DVD shelf, easily accessible.
I recently attended a 35mm screening of Dead Alive and it dawned on me that Peter Jackson’s splatter opus could be added to the list of films I know by heart. The others? Fright Night, The Return of the Living Dead, The Funhouse, Evil Dead II, Army of Darkness and Scream.
All of these connected on various levels with me for one reason or another. They either entered my life at a formative moment and remained cherished, carried a particular energy that I didn’t mind seeing repeatedly or provided what I like to consider a “security blanket”-like comfort. I could reach for them, know they were reliable and could be endlessly entertained. I’ve seen these films more than any other horror film and, hell, when I owned laserdiscs, I anticipated the “disc flip” before it needed to happen.
Now, I pose the question to you – because I always love seeing which films carry this kind of value to horror fans – which films do you know by heart and consider your “most-watched”? And why?
