Category: Misc.

Scare Your Pants Off, San Francisco Style

By Majnoonita
updated 2 months ago

There's nothing like a good cinematic thriller to get your blood pumping on a foggy San Francisco night. Yes, the fog can be spoooooooooky. Yes, you want it to feel even spoooooooookier. Here's my pick for the TOP 5 Bay Area themed suspense films that will leave you paranoid, hysterical, and clinging for dear life to the nearest warm body.

And the winner is...

You know that feeling. It’s one part one part thrill seeking to two part suspension of disbelief craving, shaken on ice and garnished with a twist of masochism. It’s scary movie time. You want secret psychologies that go bump in the night. You want your palms to sweat But wait, wait, wait. You don’t want cheese. Please hold the cheese entirely, you’re going vegan for the night. This thrill can’t be too cheap. You want the be frightened in a moderately intelligent fashion. You are in San Francisco, after all. “The Last Bastion of High Society,” as W Magazine stated in the January 2007 issue. You’ve got standards. You cravings will most likely be adequetly satisfied by the following:

In order of most creepy:

1: ZODIAC

...and the worst part is, it’s all true. Consider yourself warned: this is a particularly graphic account of the Bay Area’s most infamous killer, a killer who to this day remains unknown and uncaptured. The bulk of the film is gracefully carried by the three main protagonists: an awkward cartoonist (Jake Gyllenhaal), a flamboyant and alcoholic reporter (Robert Downy Jr.), and the wise cracking investigator (Mark Ruffalo). All three actoes are in rare form here as the film spans over two and a half hours. The interwoven stories and gripping suspense keep you precariously balanced on the edge of your seat while you plead with the characters to “RUN! RUN LIKE HELL!!” I don’t recommend watching this alone. Be prepared for a higher energy bill as you sleep with all the lights on for the next month.

5: THE BIRDS

Alfred Hitchcock’s portrayal of nature’s revenge was jaw clenchingly creepy and innovative when it debuted in 1963 a and stays true to those characteristics to this day. Hitchcock’s slow pans of small town California infested with large and looming birds hell bent on pecking your eyes out are brilliant in their ability to insight a sense of “OH SHIT.” As always there is a whole entourage of bizarre female characters, from the requisite twisted mother-figure, to the love bombshell interest and the homo-ambiguous (although gold hearted) rival. Ahh, nothing like an apocalyptic attack scenario to re-enforce gender roles!

2: THE CONVERSATION

Gene Hackman is young, geeky and impeccable in Francis Ford Coppola’s Oscar nominated exploration of paranoia, and with it an obsession that goes above and beyond workaholism. Hackman stars as a mildly OCD surveillance expert who questions his morality in the wake of a seemingly routine surveillance gig: what is the information and what are the implications of the information? These questions gnaw away at your white knuckles while you desperately try not to blink for fear of missing a clue. Watch out, though. The climax is not for the faint of heart. I jumped out of my seat, literally.

4: THE FOG

Don’t be fooled by the cheesiness factor of this You Tube trailer for John Carpetner’s “The Fog.” This is a film so skillfully laced with supernatural paranoia and devistatingly horrifying cinematic technique that it leaves you in a breathless and cold sweat. The bizarre Christian subplot intermingiled in this oceanside zombie thriller is only boarderline pedantic in its dogma, thankfully saved by John Carpenter’s off kilter sense of humor. In fact, Carpetner’s greatest skill may just be in his use of irony and humor as a foreshadowing device. If you’re a smug drunk bastard on a boat at sea and you laugh in the face of your weather prediction, one thing’s for certain: you gonna die!