CGI in horror

I agree completely, so I can comment. :-)

For me, horror works best when its resources are limited. It is absolutely vital that most aesthetic effects be performed in the camera, not in post. This is because post-production manipulation always introduces a degree of realistic falseness. The earliest horror stories capitalized on the idea of being "based on a true story," and that is an idea that continues to this day, regardless of whether it is explicitly stated.

CGI often feels fake, and therefore counteracts the mood. For instance, the real billowing sheets in Friday the 13th Part 3 set an eerie mood, but the CGI sheets in The Conjuring draw attention to themselves. This destroy the sense of reality, which affects the mood of the film.

The Friday the 13th reboot was marred in my opinion by using CGI. The girl under the docks, the girl who was impaled near the end. The CGI immediately takes me out of the scene.

And for the Elm Street reboot, I watched the movie wondering why the side of Freddy's face looked so "blurry," not at all like the rest of his face. It turned out to be a patch of CGI. Why would anyone make that choice?

I actually think Nightmare on Elm Street is one of the few horror films where you can get away with CGI. Since the film involves dreams, an adherence to realism isn't required. CGI would be perfect to make the dream sequences feel more surreal. But CGI shouldn't be used outside of dream sequences, and it definitely shouldn't be used to simulate a practical effect from the original. You're just asking for trouble if you do that.

Horror movies were better when the effects had to be real. That's why the original Night of the Demons is so kick-ass, you know they spent hours getting that crap plastered to their skin, they actually got set on fire, it was dangerous, it was real, that's what made it great.

CGI horror is so bad I don't even know where to start. Except one that always comes to mind how crappy it is, Return to House on Haunted Hill was a BAAAAAD movie overall, but the cremation scene was just lame, that doesn't look like somebody being set on fire in an oven.

I actually can't think of too many ghost movies but I completely agree. In fact the scariest 'ghost' movies are the ones where we don't even see the ghosts, Haunting of Hill House for example, though I'll admit the first time I saw 13 Ghosts some of them freaked the hell out of me.

On that note though, can we talk about House on Haunted Hill vs. Return to House on Haunted Hill? The remake...most of the ghosts just look like people, the staff, the patients, yes there are freaky as hell things like that groaning ghoul in the corner and the decapitated heads in jars screaming, etc., but most of the ghosts, until that final thing is released, just look like people. The sequel...what the hell was wrong with the faces of those two...patients? doctors...pulling the guy to pieces with the sheets? You never got a GOOD look at the faces but you KNOW they were deformed somehow, what was up with that?

The scariest part of the "new" House on Haunted Hill was a roller coaster ride with a broken rail.

As a kid I NEVER got that part and yes it WAS very freaky.

Indeeeeeeeed, when you can actually pinpoint where it is, and you can do that a lot in horror movies, then it is NOT working.