Based On A true Story...
 

Ok, this doesn't really have any spoilers in terms of giving away plot, but a general atmosphere, tension or mood, i guess, could be spoilt??????

SO, if you hvaen't seen Fargo pr Texas Chainsaw Massacre you may not want to read? but there's no real plot revelations or anything, it's tought to say... (although the thread title could fuck things up :lol: .. argghhh too much crapping on......)

(highlight if you want to read :D)

Spoiler:
I saw the movie Fargo on the weekend. A really great movie about some fantastical occurances in a rather small out in no-where place. Anyway, at the start of the movie, there was a Based on a true story disclaimer with some minute details about the case.

So throughout the movie i was constantly under the belief of thinking the story was true, cause the claim, at the start seemed genuine. Also, after the movie finished, a friend and my brother where discussing how close to a true story it could've been (as the occurances where rather fantastical, and fasinating). Namely about how they knew that Buscemi buried the breifcase.

They actually got in a bit of an arguement about it, albeit rather nonsensical. Seeing the DVD had a documentary on it, i suggested we watch that as well, because they might havce some of the actual news or details about the case.

However, we soon discovered that, in fact, the movie wasn't based on a true story at all, in the sense that a simlar event or crime had taken place. Even a poor Japenses woman apparently flew to Fargo to try and find the suitcase buscemi buried, cause she thought it was true.

Although, the whole hype and pyschology of saying based on a true story, at the start seems to play on your mind a lot, and make the movie, seemingly, quite a bit more interesting, 'cause you ahve in the back of your mind that this is real, and can happen.

The same with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It had a simialr disclaimer at the start, and i thought it was real? Only to discover it was inspired by some of the serial killings and canabalism of Ed Gein.

yeah, so this has just been about wether a story is true or not? and how the truth aspect really does seem to make the movie experience have an extra dimension (even though, they're fucking lying, cheeky bastards :p ).


I don't know if this was a justified spoiler or not, but it was cool to properly use the function :lol: :p

anyones thoughts on this? or exmaples of any other movies?

edit:
also, i reminded of a cool quote out of Good Will Hunting (i think), where Matt Damon is telling a joke, or an anecdote and he says it in first person even though it didn't actually happen to him, but that it sounds more believeable or better, or something, if it's in first person. Too true :)
I, like most others, hate the "oh, it happened to a friend of a friend of a sister... etc of mine" :rolleyes: ;)

yeah I was kinda upset to find out that The Texas Chainsaw Massacre never even really happened, it was only inspired by a true story. Which means that it was based off some other serial killer's (probably Ed Gein like you mentioned) killings in a completely other state and didn't even involve a chainsaw. You can look up an interview with the writer of the original movie from the 70's who says that he was in a mall or some place and he saw a hardware shop with a display of chainsaws in the window and he thought that'd make a good horror movie. But yeah, it woulda been WAY scarier just knowing the fact that it possibly really did happen. It's deceiving, but that's how these studios make money; they even went to lengths of showing "footage" of the killer in the beginning and end of the movie... *sigh*

And thus the spoiler feature is defeated. :)
I'm surprised you didn't list the ultimate example of this: Blair Witch Project. It caused uproar at the first screening because it seemed that the producers were profiting from the deaths of the filmmakers, etc.

An interesting fact...

The movie Psycho as well as the character 'Hannibal Lector' from Silence of the Lambs was based off of Ed Gein as well :)

Re: Based On A true Story...
 

Alas, this is yet another part of the Fargo myth that is untrue.

The Japanese woman, Takako Konishi, went to Minnesota with the intention of killing herself. She had been to the states on at least three previous occaisions. She was apparently heartbroken over the end of a relationship with a man from the states.

For the complete story, which in a weird twist of fate is almost as sad and surreal as Fargo, go to

http://film.guardian.co.uk/features/...970908,00.html

The Blair Witch Project was the one that sucked me in the most because I saw it at a film festival in Chicago thinking I was witnessing someones death from some fucked up shit. This made the movie a lot scarier than it actually was, when I saw the actress from the movie on Jay Leno I was quite dissapointed and now the movie doesnt have the "edge" it did when I saw it thinking it was true. It proves to be great advertising.

amityville horror....
exorcist

yeah those were real.

heh, yep, also excellent movies as well :) It's interesting; when i was actually researching The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, to see if it was true or about the apparent actual events, i came across a website that said that there were more/better movies based on Ed Gein, than the Virgin Mary. Sadistic and cynical :p :D

ha, got me again :o

Good point, forgot about that one. It's just i've seen those two movies recently, so they were stuck in my mind :)
I was sorta pulled into that as well, good use of hype and marketing did great things for that movie :)