kindertrauma

Month: October 2008

Satan's Little Helper

Posted on By unkle lancifer

During the tenth month of the year, just about any horror movie is welcome around these parts. Horror movies that are centered around the Halloween holiday itself are treated like V.I.P.s. It's a pointless endeavor to ever expect any of these movies to compete with JOHN CARPENTER's 1978 masterstroke but who cares? The search is its own reward. Sometimes you get a pleasant surprise like SATAN'S LITTLE HELPER, a movie that may not inspire you to lock your doors and bolt your windows, but delivers a general atmosphere of unfettered mischief that perfectly reflects the holiday itself.

Little Dougie Whooly's (ALEXANDER BRICKEL) video game inspired idolization of Satan is taken to the test when he imagines he meets his hero on Halloween night. In actuality, he has stumbled across a genuine masked killer on the rampage but Dougie's desire to live out his fantasy life blinds him to reality again and again. Jumping head first into the role of protégé, Dougie keeps a look out while the masked killer "Satan Man" massacres his neighbors, delighting in the bloodshed that he believes they are racking up "points" for. It's only when he discovers that he has endangered his family (mom is played by the always entertaining AMANDA PLUMMER) that that he begins to see his "master" in a new light.

"Satan man" and his apprentice's ability to blur the line between video game and reality hits a high score in a grocery store parking lot where they gleefully crash their shopping cart into a pregnant woman, a baby carriage and a cane-carrying blind man. It's this type of cartoony, slapstick black-humor that keeps things from getting too scary, but trust me it's worth the trade off. As much as this is a larky good time SATAN'S LITTLE HELPER does deliver its fair share of tense creepy little moments. If you have ever laughed at a Halloween costume only to find yourself with a moment of discomfort where you question its wearer's intentions, you'll recognize much of that feeling of dread here.

Writer/Director JEFF LIEBERMAN is the real deal. Not only did he grace us with the cult classics SQUIRM and BLUE SUNSHINE, but he's also the man behind slasher favorite JUST BEFORE DAWN. There are many interesting ideas bouncing around inside this particular treat bag. He explores the effects of domestic abuse, religion and media violence, and there is a constant preoccupation with the consistency in which people allow their preconceived notions to cloud their minds. All of these ideas come into play at regular intervals without ever dragging the action down. It's not a perfect film and many might be turned off by it's obviously meager budget but it's definitely the product of a lot of thought and imagination. If you are searching for a fresh modern take on the holiday look no further, SATAN'S LITTLE HELPER aims to please.

Name That Trauma :: Reader Claudine on a Girl Trapped in a Tree by Wolves & Vampires

Posted on By aunt john

This was a movie about a young girl looking for her missing father seduced by a female vampire, chased and treed by werewolves who were fought off by the vampires as she watched from up in the tree.  This is all I can remember, please let me know if you have any idea what this might be.

UNK SEZ: Claudine, I know just what movie you are seeking! It is one of my personal favorites and it's called LEMORA: A CHILD'S TALE OF THE SUPERNATUAL. I've written about that haunting film on these very pages! Read my gushing ramblings about that gem HERE. Thanks for being traumatized by something I know. I was beginning to develop a complex! You cannot see me doing a Snoopy-flavored happy dance in your honor, but that is just what I am doing!

Traumafessions :: Reader thetrace360 on R.L. Stine's "Night of the Living Dummy"

Posted on By aunt john

As a young child, from the time I was around 8 well into about 13, I was completely obsessed with the author R.L. STINE. I owned and read just about all of his books both GOOSEBUMPS and the FEAR STREET Series. One summer day, around 1998, my mom brought home one of his books for me to read. The title was NIGHT OF THE LIVING DUMMY. This wasn't an ordinary copy of the book mind you. It contained all three NIGHT OF THE LIVING DUMMY books and the front cover was oh-so-much creepier; it had red eyes that lit up when you pressed a secret button hidden in his mouth.

Just looking at the fiendish ventriloquist dummy on the cover had me excited to start reading. I began right away, reading well into the night. The book so far had no effect on me to speak of, until I laid down to go to sleep that night. I placed the book on the side table and went to sleep. That night I had the most frightening of nightmares of the fiendish dummy chasing after me trying to kill me! He chased me and chased me for what seemed like hours to me, until we reached the edge of a huge cliff. The dummy had me and he knew it.

Slowly backing away from him, I was cautious even though I knew being cautious would do no good to me now as I reached the very edge. There was no escaping him now. Just as this thought entered my brain, he lunged at me, causing me to fall off this cliff in my dream and plummet to my death.

Just as I was reaching the ground in my dream, I fell off my bunk bed, even though we had the guard rails on! As I hit the ground in a sitting position, I screamed as loud as my little lungs could manage. I never again picked up that book and I ended up selling it at a garage sale for a lot less than my mother bought it for about a year later.

I'm not sure why, but that dummy had me terrified and shaking in my platform tennis shoes.

Traumafessions :: Reader Michael On Homicidal

Posted on By unkle lancifer

I don't know what possessed my father to take me and my brother to the movies to see William Castle's 1961 HOMICIDAL when we were age 5 and 7. But take us he did and there is one scene near the end of the movie I will never forget. There was an old, creepy, invalid mute lady who lived in a mansion. She used one of those lift chairs that was connected to the wall of the stairway to get up and down the stairs. Towards the end of the movie the camera focused on her sitting in the lift chair in the darkened house as it lurched slowly step by step to the ground floor. When it finally reached the bottom of the stairs, the chair jerked to a stop and………. her head rolled off her body!

Talk about nightmare fuel! I didn't sleep for days and I had nightmares about this for many a year. I saw the movie a few years ago and it is not really that scary (and the special effects were laughable). But the 5 year old me got the shock of his life. Thanks alot Dad!

NOTE: Careful folks, this clip brings new meaning to the term "spoiler"!

The Halloween That Almost Wasn't

Posted on By unkle lancifer


Did you know that back in the year 1979 Halloween was almost canceled? It's true. That means no costumes and no trick or treating…nothing. It's almost too painful to contemplate. I know I went out trick or treating on that very night, blissfully unaware of the events that made my monster-in-drag candy hustling excursion possible. Why the government has buried this information is beyond me, but thanks to the brave 30 minute reenactment of these events known as THE HALLOWEEN THAT ALMOST WASN'T the truth can now finally be told.

Most films based around Halloween regurgitate the same information over and over again. You know all that Samhain and All Hallows Eve history type junk. Here the mechanisms of how the holiday works in the modern era are revealed, including numerous facts that many of us are either confused by or completely ignorant of. Did you know that Halloween can only begin when a certain witch flies over the moon? Well it's important to know because in 1979, that fact was used to said witch's advantage in a power play between herself and Count Dracula that began with mild violence and assorted zingers and ended (thank God!) in a disco extravaganza that proved the greatest gifts are rewarded through compromise and subtle blackmail.

At the time of the events, Winnie the Witch found herself struggling with the vast difference between her known internal self and her external public persona. She was tired of being feared and thought of as an uggo. In addition, she was also feeling taken for granted, for even though she worked as hard as Dracula, she got zero credit for her endeavors. (Even in the monster world there is a glass ceiling). At the end of her rope, she decides that the only way to have her voice heard is to go on strike subsequently putting a halt on Halloween altogether.

An obvious influence on the later work of OLIVER STONE, THE HALLOWEEN THAT ALMOST WASN'T looks behind the curtain of what the media would have us believe and reveals, as best as possible, the actual events during this troubled time in history. Assembled to portray the monsters involved in this near tragedy are some of Hollywood's finest. JUDD HIRSCH plays the power hungry, so called leader of the monster group with conviction. He is able to reveal another side of the Count rarely glimpsed before. MARIETTE HARTLEY was nominated for an Emmy for her career-defining role as Winnie, a portrayal that in another actresses' hands could have come off as less sympathetic or at least hen-pecky. Rounding off the assembly line of master thespians is JOHN SCHUCK (Frankenstein's Monster), HENRY GIBSON (Igor) and JACK RILEY(Wolf Man). Two other dudes play a mummy and a zombie priest.

Many of you might want to turn a blind eye to this important film. You may think as long as I get my Halloween why should I care now? That's the type of stinking thinking that causes catastrophe. Make no mistake, this movie is not all preachy and dry, it entertains while it informs. If you don't feel like you personally know Winnie the Witch by film's end then you're just not paying attention. At the risk of revealing the startling conclusion, I recommend that a box of Kleenex be at your disposal when Winnie is confronted with the truth about how others really feel about her. (Be prepared for an appearance by the ultra glamorous HARTLEY you know and love!) Oh, if only all of our nation's disputes could be resolved on a disco dance floor just like they were on that fateful night in 1979. What a wonderful world this would be!

NOTE: In case you have any doubts about the validity of Winnie's claims about being marginalized in favor of Dracula's grandstanding consider this, when released on video the title was changed to the very inaccurate and misleading THE NIGHT DRACULA SAVED THE WORLD. My friends, in reality it was Halloween not the world that was at risk, and it was Winnie herself whose actions saved the day. Yet another example of just what had gotten Winnie's goat in the first place. I ask you is this irony or simply monster world status quo?

Educate yourself HERE, HERE and HERE!

Kinder-News:: Vote On Proposition M.J.

Posted on By unkle lancifer

The other day there was a disturbing development at Kindertrauma headquarters. We discovered that two of our finest and most beloved readers were, in fact, operating under the cover of darkness and hiding an illicit affection for Mary Jane brand candy. Mary Jane candy, which usually is wise enough to stay hidden throughout the year, is well known to resurface just before Halloween in order to sneak its devious way into trick-or-treat bags posing as a confectionery reward. My spidey senses are presently alarming me to the unthinkable conclusion that if there are two of you amongst us, then indeed there must be even more. Although I admire the bravery of the dissidents whose names I will, for the time being, protect, I must say that where I grew up, the love of Mary Jane candy was something that was not to be spoken of out loud in polite society. With an election on the horizon perhaps it is time that we ALL place our cards upon the table and reveal just where are sympathies lie!

So if you support Mary Jane and her theoretical peanut buttery goodness vote YEA! Or if you are like myself and feel she should be discontinued, never to show her face in another trick-or-treat bag for all of eternity vote NAY! The choice is yours my friends and I offer you this, if support for Miss Jane is greater or equal to her detractors come Election day, I will publish a public apology to her in the comments section of this very post! I also would like to state that I have no present beef with the fine people of Necco. In fact, I am a card carrying fan of the Necco Wafer, a pastel colored delight that is not only a sweet treat but, in a pinch, can be utilized as sidewalk chalk.