Let's Kill Them Off Quickly So That We Can Get to the Important Stuff

Unfortunately, the final movie of this year's October tradition was a bit of a letdown--at least in my opinion. The movie was The Nightingale. Honestly, between trick-or-treaters, dressing up, and planning supper, I didn't have much time to choose a final horror movie for October. I defaulted to trusting movie reviews. They let me down. 

I want to use this final post to make an argument: An overly violent movie is not a horror movie. It's just violent. The Nightingale is an overly violent movie. That's all. It lacks all of the spiritual wonder that I believe underlies the best horror movies. This one is just bloody, long-winded, and cold. Really, there are no characters to love; we just endure their experiences. We feel sorry for them, certainly, but about as sorry as we feel for choosing to watch a bad movie in the first place. 

I don't want to be reminded how awful the world can be from a movie--even a horror movie. I want to be in awe of the mysteries of our world. A great horror movie makes me hopeful about unraveling the mysteries around me, not dejected by the vileness that one or two bad souls exhaust. Bad souls have a place in horror movies, certainly. But let's kill them off quickly so that we can get to the important stuff as quickly as possible.  

My wife and I are excited to add to our tradition next year. This addition was inspired by the final movie on our list: We're going to do a week (or more) of the worst horror movies of all time. At least those movies won't pretend to be something they are not--fingers crossed.  

The Nightingale | Rotten Tomatoes 

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