kindertrauma

Month: October 2010

Traumafessions :: Reader Ariel on Are You Afraid of the Dark? ep. "The Tale of the Crimson Clown"

Posted on By aunt john

Okay, so I have a fear of clown dolls. Not clowns (I respect that some of them may actually be funny), but clown DOLLS. I blame ARE YOU AFRAID OF THE DARK?

I never watched this show as a kid, but my older brother did. One evening, I thought I'd be brave and watch an episode with him. Turns out I should have went to bed instead. The episode in question is called "The Tale of the Crimson Clown," and it has terrified me ever since I saw it as a child.

The episode starts with two brothers trying to find a present for their mom's birthday. The younger brother (Sam) is a snot-nosed brat who bumps into people without apologizing and steals money from his older brother (Mike) to spend on a video game. In the store, they both see a creepy clown doll. Mike tells Sam to smarten up or…or…or the Crimson Clown will come get him! He just scoffs and heads out to get into more trouble.

When they get home, Sam goes up to his room to find the creepy clown doll sitting on his desk! He calls Mike in, but the clown has disappeared. As they head down to dinner, and with the strings section screeching in the background, the camera pans under the bed to see the clown doll there, complete with glowing eyes and maniacal laughter.

I just about wet my pants.

I screamed and my brother being the kind soul he is, switched the channel. After that, I never watched another episode of that show. I had a clown doll that I used to love and think it was so pretty. I chucked it in my closet and closed the door (because monsters are trapped in closets if the door is closed) determined never to look at it again. Years later I was able to display it in my room, but it definitely was NOT my favourite doll.

Just recently, I watched that episode again just to find out what happens in the end. Well lo and behold, there is a terrifying dream sequence in which the clown ties Sam up, moves around under his covers, and disappears when Sam gets free and pulls back the sheets. Sam tries to get away and warn his brother, but instead of Mike being in the bed, it's the clown and his head blows up like a balloon and explodes scattering glitter everywhere. The clown is at the window and the door, and Sam can't get away, so he cowers in bed. Then he wakes up and he's learned his lesson and the mom gets a wonderful present for her birthday.

Years later (and knowing what to expect) I still freaked out when the camera panned under the bed… I am so going to have nightmares tonight.

Cheers,

Ariel

Traumafessions :: Reader My37 on "Outside Over There" by Maurice Sendak

Posted on By aunt john

I'd like to make a contribution to your website (which I discovered recently and LOVE by the way). This book scared the hell out of me as a child. It was about a girl who was in charge of taking care of her baby sister and basically from what I remember, the baby is stolen by goblins. Way before LABYRINTH, and not as cute and fun like some of Sendak's other books, this traumatized me.

I had just had a little sister for the first time when I first read the book in the early '80s, and I feared this was going to happen my sister while I was "in charge" of looking after her. The illustrations are creepy, and to me was just not a kid friendly book.

Name That Trauma :: Reader Sammi S. on Terrifying Texas Tea

Posted on By aunt john

I'm pretty addicted to Kindertrauma, someone on another website linked it to me and it's my fourth day in a row reading as much as I can!

At the tender age of seventeen, I'm probably one of the youngest readers, but I do have a Traumafession.

It has to be somewhere in the mid-to-late ‘90s, I think I was watching a movie with my older male cousins at my grandmother's house. I can't remember much, but what I remember was being unable to sleep for a very long time after seeing it.

It was something about three or four or even two boys who discovered an underground cavern, maybe there was a caveman in it, maybe there wasn't, I forget, but apparently discovering the cavern released some sort of black ooze that made you decay or get sick or something AWFUL. I was so scared of the black ooze!

I hope you can help me with just this little bit.

UPDATE: NAME THAT TRAUMA SOLVED! Kudos to reader Chris for solving it with THE X-FILES: FIGHT THE FUTURE (1998).

Traumafessions :: Reader Holly T. on Moonlighting ep. "I See London, I See France, I See Maddie's Netherworld"

Posted on By aunt john

I was recently re-watching an episode from the final season of MOONLIGHTING ("I See London, I See France, I See Maddie's Netherworld"). The nightmare scene is surprisingly gory. I remember seeing a re-run of the episode on Lifetime when I was around 11. Even though it was shown in the middle of the day I got so scared I had to turn it off. Scary stuff.

Blood and Lace (1971)

Posted on By unkle lancifer

Netflix streaming is blowing my mind as of late. I keep stumbling across movies not available on DVD and in the case of BLOOD AND LACE, never released on VHS either. It was probably nearly a decade ago that I went on a mad search for this vaporous movie. I eventually ended up with a bootleg tape whose image was so gray and vague I couldn't even watch it. That was then and this is now. The version I just witnessed, thanks to Netflix, is widescreen and as crispy bright as an acid flashback. Can you believe that once upon a time Netflix and I hated each other? Now look at us! I totally understand why dogs hump legs.

So besides unavailability, what's so special about BLOOD AND LACE? (Not an especially helpful title by the way!) Check this out….

It opens with a P.O.V. murder. The killer enters a kitchen, opens a drawer and yanks out the weapon of choice. They then proceed to go upstairs to complete their nasty chore. How can you not think of HALLOWEEN?

A young girl wakes up to find a man looming over her with a burned face and a shocking red shirt. Everyone tells her that it was only a dream. I'm telling ya, it's straight out of A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET.

Human bodies are treated like meat and stored in a freezer sort of like in THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE.

The big crazy is a woman of a certain age played by a Hollywood veteran just like a little movie called FRIDAY THE 13th!

What's so fascinating about all that is that BLOOD AND LACE is from 1971! (The copyright on the actual film is 1970.) Now, I don't want to accuse anybody of copying anybody's homework so let's just say the collective unconscious works in mysterious ways. In any case, this movie couldn't be more ahead of its time and it can't stop doing the Nostradamus boogie!

Of course, BLOOD AND LACE is not for everybody. It's acting is amateurish in spots, the story and the character's behavior push credibility often and the whole business is drive-in trashy. The soundtrack, which comes across as random records being played, is the biggest drawback and could possibly be blamed entirely for this movie missing the appreciation that it deserves. Personally, I don't mind any of those factors too much and I don't think any other fans of seventies cinema will either. This is the type of movie that would never get off the ground today; it's grim, sleazy, gory, startlingly perverse and believe it or not, PG (well, GP to be exact).

After Ellie Masters (adorable yet sturdy MELODY PATERSON) witnesses her by all (and I do mean ALL) accounts whorish mother's brutal bludgeoning via hammer, she is sent to a group home (apparently specializing in rather old-looking kids.) The orphanage is ruled over by a sadist named Mrs. Deere (a fantastically off-putting GLORIA GRAHAME) and her knuckle-dragging goon of a handyman, Kredge. It's the kind of place where escape is discouraged with cleavers chopping off hands, starvation-torture and being frozen alive in a meat locker. Ellie, no chump, knows something's fishy and every revelation she comes across is more lurid than the last. Look for appearances by ALICE's VIC TAYBACK, SEINFELD's "Unkle Leo" LEN LESSER (as Kredge) and a young DENNIS CHRISTOPHER (IT, FADE TO BLACK). You'll thank me later for not revealing much more.

The way I see it, BLOOD AND LACE shares more than just a freezer in common with THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE in that the tune it's humming seems to be a requiem for the idealism and hopefulness of the sixties. The trapped teens we find throughout dream of a freedom just beyond reach but ultimately wake up to the odious conclusion that the callous constructs created by the previous generation are impossible to scale over. In one of the films most lingering moments the youth, when presented with an actual chance to flee, stand motionless and passive. It's as if they've come to the conclusion that there really is no escape and that the outside world offers them nothing more. Similar to the NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET series, adults are consistently shown as corrupt, covetous, cruel and predatory. The evil Mrs. Deere even taunts Ellie with the ultimate curse that one day she will be like her.

This is some gritty dark twisted material and yet it's sometimes filmed like a bright sparkling seventies Coke commercial. If you're a fan of grindhouse and cult cinema, you're sure to snuggle up fast. It's quite an unusual mix of innocence and salacity and though it's on the surface crude and exploitative, I think it ends up saying something pretty interesting about how one generation goes about limiting and crippling the next. As blunt and brutal as BLOOD may be, the real nightmare here is the woebegone pessimistic dread that the young can never free themselves from the enslaving patterns they inherit from the old. Well, that's the movie I saw anyway.

BLOOD AND LACE is the one and only film directed by PHILIP S. GILBERT which is a real shame. Even though its low budget impedes, its soundtrack is atrocious and it's sometimes unintentionally comical, I'm head over heals with how unabashed it is about rattling its ribald chains. Its slip may be showing but its flirty attraction to the grotesque is inspiring. If you ask the person named me, this is one genuine lost classic so forward-thinking that it's able to predict the future of horror both on and off the screen.

Traumafessions :: Reader Melanie G. on Tales From the Darkside

Posted on By aunt john

I'm relieved and a bit anxious to get off my chest and confess the trauma which has eaten slowly away at my soul for years…

The TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE theme/intro. What evil beast composed that horrific bell chime tone? Not since the world infamous "Tubular Bells" has a simple bell theme made my heart race 'til I sweat. Then, there's that guy's voice.

OH, DEAR LORD, HIS VOICE!

It's like listening to Satan's alcoholic grandfather read you a nighty night story before he tucks you in and slices your throat.

Then…wait for it….at the end…. the ridiculously loud end note where all possible notes on that Casio keyboard are pressed at once and you can't help but wince in terror. And WTF is up with the beautiful nature/farm scenes turning into the demonic forest filled with hideously petrified wood all burnt up and a black sky?

What kind of EVIL TRICKERY IS THAT!

I remember it playing late night when I was about 7 or so and having to cover my ears and yell to cover up the sound. This show, along with MONSTERS and FREDDY'S NEW NIGHTMARES were family favorites, don't ask me why. My brother used to jack me and call me into his room and blast it on high when I walked in. I would cry and cry and cry….in fear. That dude's voice and those bells were coming after me, and I was unable to defend myself against it's evil infiltration of my brain. SCARY doesn't even describe it. I was so traumatized by this I was flipping the channels late night a few weeks back and came upon it and had nightmares for weeks! WEEKS! Just from seeing the name of the show on the menu guide.

Thanks, TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE.

I hate you.

Traumafessions :: Reader Jason T. on Pennywise

Posted on By aunt john

When I was four years old and living in New Jersey, I was sent into a storm drain to retrieve a baseball that my brothers and friends lost during their game on the street. So into the black hole I went, I found the ball and then tried to get out and quickly realized that I was stuck and I could not get out. About an hour and a half later I emerged from the dark place thanks to my parents and friends from the neighborhood. While I was in the hole I had this terrifying feeling that something was in there with me. It was the longest hour and a half of my life, and the scariest.

A few years after the storm drain incident I caught my first viewing of Stephen King's IT on TV. While I watched the scene when Pennywise is in the storm drain and is trying to lure Georgie in I was more terrified than I ever had been since I had gone though a similar experience. Worst of all now I could put a face to the unknown thing that was in the dark hole with me, the face of Pennywise the evil clown. To this day that scene scares me like no other.