Suburbs: The endless sprawl of identikit mass produced housing that surrounds most towns and cities in the western world. Lacking the rural tranquility of the countryside and the spirit, history and community of the inner cities they are designe to enduce a life numbing stupor into it’s inhabitents to keep the ‘prolls’ under control. Also known as concrete deserts, they are the loneliest, most soul destroying and down right dull places on the face of the planet.

Since World War II, North Americans have invested much of their newfound wealth in suburbia. It has promised a sense of space, affordability, family life and upward mobility. As the population of suburban sprawl has exploded in the past 50 years, so too has the suburban way of life become embedded in the American consciousness. Hollywood has been quick to capitalize on the suburban lifestyle and the angst and fears of its inhabitants. Here is burbia.com’s list of the Top 10 Movies with ‘Neighbors from Hell’ part 1 and 2.

The 10 Best, part 1

• Rosemary’s Baby (1968), neighbors = Devil worshippers
• Arlington Road (1999), neighbors, the Langs are right wing nut-job domestic terrorists.
• The Stepford Wives (2004), all the neighbors are decidedly not your friends unless your desire is to be turned into a robotic (lobotomized) “yes, honey” wife-oid.
• Disturbia (2007), neighbor = monster serial killer?
• Cujo (1983), dog is out of his mind nuts, rabid and hell-bent on maiming and killing.
• Neighbors (1981), Freakazoid gun-toting, carousing, constantly interfering next door neighbor
• Barton Fink (1991), Next door neighbor is really not such a good friend; in fact he’s a bad friend, actually evil, and, as Satan as his witness, is going to make sure things don’t end well.
• Rear Window (1954), Unhappy neighbor realizes he’s been watched and naturally wants to “take care” of the snoopy, suspicious voyeur.
• A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984), Another neighbor you’d just assume live – and sleep – without.
• Pacific Heights (1990), Menacing neighbor and tenant is determined to destroy his “friends’” marriage, break them financially and otherwise do whatever is necessary to steal everything from them.

The 10 Best, part 2

• American Beauty (1999), Wired-too-tight Marine officer with issues: repressed rage, overwhelming confusion at the social changes around him, and some serious (and, for him, intolerable) and explosive sexual dysfunction and identity problems.
• Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Predatory aliens who ooze out of pods and who want to do the same to you?
• Funny Farm (1988), Country folk aren’t as Hallmark advertised; they’re as small-minded, mean-spirited, unfriendly as your local traffic cop trying to fill his monthly ticket quota.
• Psycho (1960), Norman Bates lives in a house just behind the Bates Motel – definitely a bad neighbor
• The Burbs (1989), Cannibals, folks who come out only at night, neighborhood dogs crapping freely on lawns, a naked gardener, and a gun –obsessed freakazoid.
• Dawn of the Dead (1978), Zombies, however cool and trendy today, normally don’t make great neighbors.
• Halloween (1978), Michael Meyers, incurable murderer, escapes from a mental institution and returns to his home town.
• Duplex (2003), Little old lady who, it turns out, is the ultimate unrelenting neighbor from hell.
• The People Under The Stairs (1991), Horrible next door neighbors are one thing. But evil freak neighbors who abduct kids, maim them, and stash them under the stairs are totally unacceptable.
• Shaun Of The Dead (2004), More zombies invade the neighborhood and, as usual, they’re not good neighbors.
• Beetlejuice (1988), The folks living upstairs are ghosts and they’d really like you to leave.

Popularity: 1%

Coming of age is a young person’s transition from adolescence to adulthood. The age at which this transition takes place varies in society, as does the nature of the transition. Often the individual(s) has developed in some way, through the undertaking of responsibility, or by learning a lesson. Movies of this genre are a very popular; either they are greatly loved by the generation they represent, or illustrate the issues that affect a peer group as a whole.

thelistuniverse.com has posted their Top 15 Iconic Teen Movies:

1. Rebel Without a Cause (1955)
2. Cidade de Deus (2002)
3. La Haine (1995)
4. Stand by Me (1986)
5. Back to the Future (1985)
6. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)
7. The Breakfast Club (1985)
8. The Dead Poets Society (1989)
9. American Graffiti (1973)
10. Y Tu Mamá También (2001)
11. To Sir with Love (1967)
12. Boyz N The Hood (1991)
13. Dazed and Confused (1993)
14. Elephant (2003)
15. Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)

Other films that we thought deserved mention include (summaries by IMDb):

• American Pie (1999) – At a high-school party, four friends (Jim, Kevin, Finch, and Oz) find that losing their collective virginity isn’t as easy as they had thought. But they still believe that they need to do so before college. To motivate themselves, they enter a pact to try to be the first to “score.” And of course, the senior prom is their last best chance. As the fateful date draws near, the boys wonder who among them will get lucky. More importantly, do they really want to do it at all?
• Beach Party (1963) – The first of the five official American-International “Beach Party” movies, all directed by William Asher and all very popular. Anthropology Professor Robert Orwell Sutwell (Bob Cummings) and his secretary Marianne (Dorothy Malone) are studying the sex habits of teenagers. The surfing teens led by Frankie and Dee Dee (Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello) don’t have much sex but they sing, battle the motorcycle rats and mice led by Eric Von Zipper (Harvey Lembeck) and dance to Dick Dale and the Del Tones. Look for Vincent Price in a surprise cameo. (more…)

Popularity: 6%

Dystopia: an imagined place or state in which everything is unpleasant or bad, typically a totalitarian or environmentally degraded one. The opposite of Utopia.

Several weeks ago, Snarkerati posted a list of the Top 50 Dystopian Movies of All Time. After its release, many people took the site to task for its rather loose interpretation of the term, dystopian. Specifically, term does not mean sci-fi, or cyberpunk, or anything like that. It refers to a political or social state. That means it could take place in the future or the past. Some could consider a movie about WWII Germany a dystopian movie. A movie that has robots, grime, etc. in it does not automatically make it a dystopian movie.

One reader, a fan of the genre, commented:

This list has started a discussion in my household at to what a dystopian movie actually is. You’ve got it defined here as…

‘The simplest definition of a dystopia is as follows: An imaginary place or state in which the condition of life is extremely bad, as from deprivation, oppression, or terror.’

This is fine, and holds up to most of the list. But if you think about dystopia as the opposite of Utopia, the perfect society, you start to sharpen the idea of what a dystopian movie or novel is supposed to be.

Society goes to hell for one of three different reasons:

1. By accident: The global pandemic, the post-apocalypse, the oil suddenly runs out, the aliens take over, the machines have decided they’ve had enough, or any other natural disaster/extinction-level-event that turns the world mad in an instant. Movies based on this definition of dystopia specifically deal with the aftermath of such an event, of which The Road Warrior, A Boy and His Dog, 12 Monkeys and Children of Men (hey, all the sudden we can’t make any babies) are perfect examples. (more…)

Popularity: 6%

“An idiot or stupid person. An insensitive, selfish, ignorant, cocky person who is inconsiderate and does stupid things.” — Urban Dictionary

Everybody knows one. Whether at work, on the road, or at home, we’ve all been confronted by them. In life, they’re bad, but on the silver screen writers seem to bring out the worst in some characters:

Johnny in Karate Kid (1984) – Yeah! Okay, here’s your first lesson: how to take a FALL! [He sideswipes Daniel, knocking him over the edge and down the embankment.]

Philips in The Sandlot (1993) It’s easy when you play with rejects and a fat kid, Rodriguez.

Col. William Tavington in The Patriot (2000) – [After killing another innocent man] You know, it’s ugly business doing one’s duty… but just occasionally it’s a real pleasure.

Ed Rooney in Ferris Buellers Day Off (1986) – [Whistling for the dog with a vase in his hands] Come here doggy! Look what Uncle Ed’s got for you, you little f*cker!

Commodus in Gladiator (2000) – They tell me your son… [Maximus stops] squealed like a girl when they nailed him to the cross. And your wife… moaned like a whore when they ravaged her again and again… and again.

Extreme Sports Punks in Harold and Kumar go to White Castle (2004)

Deebo in Friday (1995) & Next Friday (2000) – [yelling out before kicking his brother in the stomach] You know I gonna find you and when I do, I’m gonna put my foot up in your ass!

Biff in Back to the Future (1985) – Biff Tannen: And uh, where’s my reports? George McFly: Uh, well, I haven’t finished those up yet, but you know I… I figured since they weren’t due till… Biff Tannen: Hello? Hello? Anybody home? Huh? Think, McFly. Think! I gotta have time to get ‘em retyped. Do you realize what would happen if I hand in my reports in your handwriting? I’ll get fired. You wouldn’t want that to happen, would ya? Would ya?

Originally from Cameltap

Popularity: 1%

Monika Bartyzel, on cinematical,  wonders “why we don’t get many classic fairy tale horror movies. I’m not referring to reimagining familial tales into something more adult (like Dorothy and BDSM), but rather going back to the source of the fairy tale”:

Hansel and Gretel: A family is starving, burning of the old woman, and her cannibalistic dreams. That the mother or stepmother happens to die when the children have killed the witch has suggested to many commentators that the mother or stepmother and the witch are, in fact, the same woman.

Sleeping Beauty: Originally published by Charles Perrault, the story consisted of two parts. The first is what we’re familiar with, except that the prince raped the sleeping girl. Then there is Part 2: Attempted infanticide and cannibalism, war, and an Ogress Queen torn apart by snakes and vipers.

Red Riding Hood: In an earlier version, the wolf was a werewolf, and he feeds grandma’s blood and meat to the little girl (more cannibalism). He then makes her strip, throw her clothes in the fire, and has her come to bed. However, before anything can happen, she figures things out and asks to go the bathroom so she can escape.

Rapunzel: A pregnant women who will agree to any demand, a witch, an imprisoned 12-year old girl who is impregnated by a passing prince, the prince is blinded by thorns after near fatal jump from a tower.

Rumpelstiltskin: A gold-spinning demon, an imprisoned daughter facing execution: "she would be skewered and then fricasseed like a pig,” a infant ransomed, and the gory end to Rumpelstiltskin: "in his rage drove his right foot so far into the ground that it sank in up to his waist; then in a passion he seized the left foot with both hands and tore himself in two."

Snow White: Attempted murder by: poisoned apple, comb with poison, asphyxiation by tight dress and a kingdom’s retribution: "a pair of heated iron shoes were brought forth with tongs and placed before the Queen. She was then forced to step into these and dance until she fell down dead."

The Juniper Tree: mother dies in child birth, stepmother decapitates child, daughter convinced she cause the child’s death, child’s body fed to Dad in pie, ghost seeks revenge on evil stepmother

There’s even a song that goes along with The Juniper Tree:
My mother, she butchered me,
My father, he ate me,
My sister, little Anne Marie,
She gathered up the bones of me,
and tied them in a silken cloth,
and laid them under the juniper.
Tweet tweet! What a pretty bird am I!

We came up with a few to add to Monika’s list:

The Red Shoes (paraphrased): Once there was a poor little girl, named Karen, was adopted by a rich old lady after her mother’s death. She grows up vain. Then, she buys a pair of red shoes and repeatedly wears them to church, without paying attention to the service. Her adoptive mother becomes ill, but Karen deserts her, preferring to attend a party in her red shoes. Once she begins dancing, she can’t stop. The shoes take over. She cannot control them and they are stuck to her feet. And the shoes continue to dance, through fields and meadows, rain or shine, night and day. She can’t even attend her adoptive mother’s funeral. An angel appears to her, condemning her to dance even as she grows cold and pale, as a warning to vain children everywhere. Karen then asks the executioner to chop off her feet. He does so and gives her a pair of wooden feet and crutches. Thinking that she has suffered enough for the red shoes Karen decides to go to church in order for the people to see her, but the chopped-off feet with the red shoes dance before her, barring the way.

The Girl without Hands: A deal with the devil, child’s hands chopped off, a king demands the queen and newborn child kill; the eyes and tongue as proof.

Godfather Death: Death becomes godfather to boy, physician receives the power to heal or condemn to death, tries to trick death, ends up dying in hell.

Struwwelpeter, a series of stories that include: boy bitten by a dog; a girl plays with matches and burns to death; a rabbit steals a rifle and hunts the hunter; a son told not to suck his thumbs – a roving tailor appears and cuts off his thumbs with giant scissors; a healthy, strong boy refuses to eat, over the next five days he wastes away and dies; a boy goes outside during a storm and is blown away to his doom.

Popularity: 1%