The Strangers

[goh]

Re: The Strangers

Spoiler

1. James leaving with the gun, leaving Kristen by herself and defenseless in the house.
3. James shooting Mike without even waiting to see who it was.
4. Mike seeing the house destroyed, and instead of calling 911, just walks around silently. Didn't even bother to shout "James, are you here? James are you okay!"
5. Instead of going to face the strangers, when James even has a shotgun, they sit in the garage (was it a garage?) in the corner. You have a shotgun, go pump some rounds into the ****ers.
6. James leaving his cell phone in the car. How many people do you know who just leave their phone in the car? My phone is either in my pocket, charging, or sitting on my desk. I never leave it in my car, especially when my girlfriend/fiance calls and says people are screwing around with her.

I'm sure there are more, but I really wasn't paying all that close attention to the movie. It was just one of those movies I physically had to push myself to watch.

Just stupid things that no one in their right mind would ever do in real life. Overall, I was not a fan of this movie.

Spoiler

1. Didn't she still have a knife?

3. Mike wasn't even supposed to be there so who else would it be? Far as James knows the only people in the house are him,the girl and the strangers,the girl was behind him,so what's that leave?

4. He was probably wondering what happend,wasn't going to call 911 without knowing for sure and even if he did say something it probably wouldn't have been heard over the music.

5. 3 of them,1 of him. So he could go out into the complete darkness trying to find the 3 of them and likely get jumped from behind or side by the other 2 even if he managed to get 1,this even assuming he knew there was only 3 and not thinking there could be more. While in the room they wouldn't be able to get the jump on him,they'd have to come to him and there was only one way in there so he'd have the drop on them instead of it likely being the other way around. Probably should've just stayed there actually.

6. She's not his girlfriend/fiance anymore,thought they made that pretty obvious. After being rejected he wasn't thinking clearly and it was a somewhat urgent situation after he had just been talking to her wich again would cloud thinking,hence leaving the phone in the car as he probably had been talking to her while driving and just put it down and was in too much of a rush to get back to the house.

[Double Eights]

Re: The Strangers

Spoiler

1. Didn't she still have a knife?

3. Mike wasn't even supposed to be there so who else would it be? Far as James knows the only people in the house are him,the girl and the strangers,the girl was behind him,so what's that leave?

4. He was probably wondering what happend,wasn't going to call 911 without knowing for sure and even if he did say something it probably wouldn't have been heard over the music.

5. 3 of them,1 of him. So he could go out into the complete darkness trying to find the 3 of them and likely get jumped from behind or side by the other 2 even if he managed to get 1,this even assuming he knew there was only 3 and not thinking there could be more. While in the room they wouldn't be able to get the jump on him,they'd have to come to him and there was only one way in there so he'd have the drop on them instead of it likely being the other way around. Probably should've just stayed there actually.

6. She's not his girlfriend/fiance anymore,thought they made that pretty obvious. After being rejected he wasn't thinking clearly and it was a somewhat urgent situation after he had just been talking to her wich again would cloud thinking,hence leaving the phone in the car as he probably had been talking to her while driving and just put it down and was in too much of a rush to get back to the house.

Spoiler

1. A girl with a knife, versus an unknown amount of assailants. Wise to leave her like that.

3. So like you said, they were safe in that room. So, why couldn't he have waited to see who it was? Earlier in the night he called Mike and asked him to come over, and sure enough, he came over. Waiting that extra 2 seconds to see who it was would have saved Mike's life and potentially all of their lives.

4. Any rational individual will start yelling out names if they walk into a house that is destroyed. I sure wouldn't just walk around quietly when I see the entire house destroyed. I'd be wondering what happened, and since the car was in the driveway, i would be shouting to find out what happened. If the car isn't gone, obviously they aren't either.

5. He had a shotgun, and if Mike's death was any indication, he wasn't that bad of a shot. By the actions of the strangers throughout the film, it was clear they weren't going to leave. Therefore, I wouldn't have just hid in the room hoping they'd leave me alone. Had he waited on shooting Mike, it would have been 3 on 3, and only one side had a gun (I think). The three of them could have went outside and called the strangers out; at least that's what I would have done. I'm not a fan of backing down and letting people terrorize me, especially when I have a gun.

6. I can understand that. In a frenzy, after hanging up he just put the phone down and forgot to pick it up afterwords.

[goh]

Re: The Strangers

Spoiler

1. A girl with a knife, versus an unknown amount of assailants. Wise to leave her like that.

3. So like you said, they were safe in that room. So, why couldn't he have waited to see who it was? Earlier in the night he called Mike and asked him to come over, and sure enough, he came over. Waiting that extra 2 seconds to see who it was would have saved Mike's life and potentially all of their lives.

4. Any rational individual will start yelling out names if they walk into a house that is destroyed. I sure wouldn't just walk around quietly when I see the entire house destroyed. I'd be wondering what happened, and since the car was in the driveway, i would be shouting to find out what happened. If the car isn't gone, obviously they aren't either.

5. He had a shotgun, and if Mike's death was any indication, he wasn't that bad of a shot. By the actions of the strangers throughout the film, it was clear they weren't going to leave. Therefore, I wouldn't have just hid in the room hoping they'd leave me alone. Had he waited on shooting Mike, it would have been 3 on 3, and only one side had a gun (I think). The three of them could have went outside and called the strangers out; at least that's what I would have done. I'm not a fan of backing down and letting people terrorize me, especially when I have a gun.

6. I can understand that. In a frenzy, after hanging up he just put the phone down and forgot to pick it up afterwords.

Spoiler

1. Well no but she wasn't entirely defenseless.

3/4. He sure did and Mike wasn't supposed to be there untill morning. Like 10 am morning. He called ahead to say he came early,no answer of course and I believe with the very first knock that happend they had said something like "Who could that be at 4 am?" therefore Mike could've assumed they were asleep and didn't want to wake them with yelling.

5. When he found the gun he said he never used it before. The point of waiting in the room would be waiting for them to walk down the hall looking for them. Then after shooting the first one the other 2 would probably go away. Again Mike wasn't even supposed to be there.

I wonder how this even ended up with a R rating. Even the unrated one.

[Blzer]

Re: The Strangers

I wonder how this even ended up with a R rating. Even the unrated one.

That's kind of what I was saying before. This movie didn't have any real risky business whatsoever, not even in language or gore.

It just might have been mostly for the brutality of it all.

[marshallfever]

Re: The Strangers

This argument holds true for any horror or terror film.

At one point in the film, Liv's character locks the door after being spooked. I laughed because why wasn't the freaking door locked in the first place?

But, I've come to accept that with horror/terror films, a lot of logic is getting thrown out the window. Logic leads to a very short film where no one dies.

Here's another situation. Her mobile phone is supposedly dead. She goes to charge it. Maybe, it's just my amazing phone designed by Samsung, but who in the world can't use their phone while it's charging? She could have called 911 right then and there. But, if she did the movie would have been over in 15 minutes.

Anyway, I don't think anyone here that enjoyed the film enjoyed it because it was amazingly realistic. I doubt anyone believes it was. But, we wanted to watch a film that terrorizes and once you understand what that requires within horror concepts, you just sit back and try to enjoy.

Heck, even 30 Day of Night, as great as it was, stretched it's plot when it could to achieve it's desired outcome.

Here's the thing though, why must the main characters in horror movies be totally ignorant? Why can't we get a horror movie where the main character actually reactions like a real person and still gets sh*tted on?

Lately, i have yet to really sit down and be scared or even frightened watching a horror movie. So many times it is because the characters feel soo distant from reality.

Torture movies don't count as well. There's nothing generally scary about torture movies, all it does it disgust you.

Someone please bring out a actual movie that can scare the sh*t out of an audience. I've always been a sucker for a killer doll movie. Since watching the first Child's play i've been excitied for a movie that can recreate that "ooo sh*t " moment. I watched Dead Silence but it fell short. I hear they're remaking the first Child's Play, but remaking a movie doesn't necessarily make it good or scary

[Blzer]

Re: The Strangers

I'm never afraid of horror movies either, but The Ring genuinely scared me. I went in knowing nothing about it, and lost sleep that night (I believe I was a high school sophomore as well).

Of course, that's not quite the realistic movie, either.

I bet there are boundaries set in Hollywood on some movies in terms of making them too realistic. The reason these movies work is because we can all sit in a theater together and see things that we aren't necessarily afraid of happening to ourselves, though we get entertainment out of it sort of as a guilty pleasure of not wanting to do it or have it happen to us ourselves. However, if you put in a realistic Jeffrey Dahmer kind of movie in theaters, people would be frightened. Not like "jumping out of your seat" scared, or "man, that was a scary movie" terrified, but they would literally be awestruck. I have to admit, Funny Games sort of did that to me. I have a feeling other movies would get a similar reception.

[Jukeman]

Re: The Strangers

Well to defend the movie, I was watching the bonus features(to see wat true events it was base on) and while watching the making of the movie, they said it wasn't a "horror" flick, they were calling it a "thriller" I think that was the word he(the director) used

[CMH]

Re: The Strangers

Well to defend the movie, I was watching the bonus features(to see wat true events it was base on) and while watching the making of the movie, they said it wasn't a "horror" flick, they were calling it a "thriller" I think that was the word he(the director) used

He said "terror." I used the term a few times in my posts.

[goh]

Re: The Strangers

That's kind of what I was saying before. This movie didn't have any real risky business whatsoever, not even in language or gore.

It just might have been mostly for the brutality of it all.

I had just watched what acording to back of the box,is a PG rated TV show where a guy fell onto his own powersaw that was worse than anything in this movie.

Dahmer type? Like Anton in No Country? I didn't think that was scary though,just badass.

[MizzouBravesFan]

Re: The Strangers

It's sad that not too many people really liked this movie. I liked it for straying away from what horror movies have become. It was a modern day classic horror movie IMO. If you saw this in the 70s, I think you would have enjoyed it. That's just me, though.

Agreed.

I liked the film, had no qualms with it. I knew going in it wasn't going to be Oscar worthy or anything...it entertained and creeped me out.

Seeing it in the theater was much better than watching it on DVD, added a lot more to the film.

[MizzouBravesFan]

Re: The Strangers

Right, but save perhaps for House of 1000 Corpses and Devil's Rejects (and maybe the first saw)

Man if we're using those two movies as the standard bearer, we're in friggin' trouble lol.

[Adam Dayton]

Re: The Strangers

Man if we're using those two movies as the standard bearer, we're in friggin' trouble lol.

We've been in trouble for awhile. The horror genre has been absolutely atrocious the past decade.

[MizzouBravesFan]

Re: The Strangers

No disagreeing there...it's been on a steady downhill slope since the 80's and here lately, it's just been straight into an abyss.

Remakes galore, stupid and pointless sequels, and a ton of unoriginal ideas are plaguing this genre.

That's why I love movies like Cloverfield, The Descent, and 28 Days/Weeks Later so much...just off the wall UNIQUE ideas that are done well and come across as such on the screen.

I can only take so many Saw movies or crappy re-makes of Japanese or 80's flicks before I just want to puke.

[Flyboy]

Re: The Strangers

The Descent is indeed, that ****.

[Brandwin]

Re: The Strangers

When the movie was over, I was entertained.