Really? One of the best films of the 90s, and not in that obscure sense of only niche audiences liking it. It was a massive hit at the time with Brad Pitt in the lead at what was probably his commercial peak.
There has definitely been some latitude allowed as to what constitutes a horror film.
It’s an imprecise thing. Some films, definitely horror, no argument. Other films might be classed more as a thriller, but I’m not a film critic.
Oh, and as for Seven, I will look for it and watch it. I vaguely remember starting it, back in the day, but I can’t remember finishing it, or what happened. So I need to up my game and get it watched!
I’ve only just connected the dots that both are David Fincher films.
Seven is a great example of the serendipity that is often required for great films to come together. The studio commissioned a rewrite because they felt it was too relentlessly dark and disturbing. The material so challenging that they had trouble casting the killer’s role. Several actors they pursued rejected it for being too disturbing and numerous agents were reported to have not even been willing to pass it on to their clients. Fincher refused to budge on the original script though and so pushed up production so they could get started and get enough filmed before the studio realized he wasnt filming the revised version of it, but that meant starting before they’d cast the killer’s role. Spacey finally agreed after Pitt personally approached him, and they only met Spacey’s salary demands after Pitt agreed to defer some of his. Spacey also made it a requirement that he not do press for the film or appear in the marketing, which the studio was reluctant to do after paying him so much. In the end the agreed, and all those contributed to the film being the masterpiece that it was.
I think when you’ve got a script that is so psychologically disturbing that people refuse to work on it, or try to keep their client away from it for fear the depravity of the role will have on how their client is viewed I think it’s a reasonable shout to call it a horror.
For me if a movie isn’t categorized as horror on at least one of wikipedia, rotten tomatoes, imDb, boxofficemojo or letterboxd, then it almost definitely isn’t a horror.
Not sure it overly matters here, considering past winners of these votes.
The more films in the pot at the beginning the merrier is what I say…
Those judged to be on the periphery of horror/thriller will be voted out quite quickly I would imagine
Seven is a brilliant psychological thriller, bordering on film noir, and mixing other genres.
Calling it a horror film is like calling Gandhi a western. It simply isn’t a horror movie, and all the great stories about actors and promotions still don’t make it a horror film.
Not that they didn’t fit the criteria, just that most of the winners were not the most worthy in my opinion.
So if somehow Clockwork Orange manages to win best Horror movie, it will be in good company.