Category: Name That Trauma!

Okay, I've got one for you that's been driving me crazy for years. I think it may have originally been a Disney movie, back when Disney wasn't afraid of going to the darkside from time to time. It had to come from the early '80s, based on when I remember seeing it. The plot involved a monster living in the bottom of a water-filled quarry. All I really remember about this, other than the fact that it really scared me as a kid, was that the monster turned out to be a crane (of the mechanical type, not the bird). I know the lead character was a little boy. My warped memory keeps turning the kid into Barrett Oliver, even though I know it wasn't him. If you or any of your followers could ID this film for me, I would be most grateful. I've been trying to remember for over twenty years and I just can't come up with a title!

Thanks!

UNK SEZ: Thanks for writing in, Suzanne. I do believe that I've found what you are looking for. It stars E.T.'s Henry Thomas and was released in 1986. It's known as FROG DREAMING in its native Australia, THE GO-KIDS in the United Kingdom and here in the states it went by THE QUEST. I'm happy to tell you that it's available on YouTube so you can revisit your kindertrauma below!

Hey there,

When I was a kid, we had this unmarked VHS tape, and on it, was a short Christmas film. It was the ‘80s. All I can remember, and my brother too (up until a few years ago, I thought I had conjured up this nightmare, until one day we discovered we both remember the movie) is a 6-foot something man in a big old white bunny suit, ears erect, black eyes, pink tongue I think, and it was riding out of the side of a big old black steam railroad train.

It looked like a shitty winter, grey snow scattered around the ground but otherwise you just saw trees behind the passing train. And then you ended up in the North Pole. But that's all we remember; this scary, ominous, huge bunny. And I could swear it was not meant to be cute.

Ring any bells??

We've been trying to debunk this for years.

Thanks for your time,

— Rae M.

Hi all:

I have a Name that Trauma that I've always been wanting to send but have been too lazy to type it up and send it. Anyway, I can't remember if this was an actual movie or perhaps just a short on a show like NIGHT GALLERY. I remember watching it back with my uncle in about the early '80s and then remembered one of my friends talking about it, so I know it existed and wasn't a fever dream.

Here's what I remember:

It starts with a group of friends going hunting and then one of them mistakenly shoots someone from a different hunting party, a small firefight ensues and a couple of members on both sides are shot. I think the rest of the movie (short?) entails this group of hunting buddies trying to convince some of their other friends to go back with them next year to try to take out the rest of the other hunting party for revenge.

The friends end up humoring them and go with them the next year thinking nothing was going to happen. But of course, when they get there and end up at the river where the first event happened, trap doors open up on the other side and men pop out and starting shooting at them…and then I swear, I even remember there being a tank that they uncovered that started shooting at them.

That's about all I can remember from it, if anyone can help me that'd be awesome because it's been bugging me for years!

— Joe S.

Help me, Kindertrauma!! You're my only hope!!! A mystery needs to be solved for my friend (and for my own sanity, as well). The problem is thus…. in the mid '80s (this would have been around '85-'86) our school teacher used to roll in a TV & VCR sometimes and show us episodes from a TV show that was very much like AMAZING STORIES in nature, but I don't think it was AMAZING STORIES, I think it might have been another similar show. I remember a logo at the end or beginning of every episodes of a large Phoenix bird on fire against a black background, and that might have been the logo for the show or maybe from the production company.

One episode I remember vividly is of a young boy who was afraid of a monster who hid in his closet. The monster was white or pale with spots in different bright colors. It was a large monster too, I remember that. The twist was that the boy discovered that the monster was actually nice so they became friends. It was in color, so the show must have been from the late '70s to mid '80s. This has been breaking my brain for almost four hours. I've already figured out that it isn't AMAZING STORIES-I searched through the episode guides. I've also asked my friend if he can remember if the show was American (he's Swedish), was it live-action, and if he can remember how long the episodes were….in hopes of making further deductions.

Hello Kinderpals!

I have a Name That Trauma that is actually from my wife, but I have transcribed it here for her (dubious) benefit.

She remembers very little from the original source, so this one might pose a bit challenging. I'll give the basic details to the best of my abilities.

This was an animated film from the 1980s, most likely, but it might have been from the early 90s. The main thrust of the narrative concerned a young boy who was transformed into a stone statue. He didn't turn into a gargoyle or anything; he retained his original appearance, just in stone form. The audience—and perhaps other characters in the movie—could hear the thoughts of the stone boy.

My wife is uncertain of the exact setting or circumstances of the boy's transformation, but she's been haunted by the central figure of this statue kid for years. Like I said, it's not a lot to go on at all, but it was my hope that some of the other Traumatots here might remember something similar from their pasts. Thanks in advance for any help you can give!

Hi, I have three entries. These three did not necessarily scar me for life, but they have chilled me to the bone since I was a kid.

1) A dark-haired woman is seen in her bright white light kitchen, the woman is wearing a bathrobe or raincoat and is cooking something in her pot of boiling water on the stove. The woman (quite starving) opens her nearly empty refrigerator, moving jars around, and finds a can of dog (?) food. She feeds it to her small grayish white dog (might have been a cat) pouring some food in the bowl. She kneels on the floor, if I remember correctly, and begins eating some of the pet food. As her dog comes rushing into the room, she stares at it with this horrible greenish face. I saw this in 1990-1992, but someone said (unfortunately, they just remember as much as I do) they saw it in the mid-‘80s. There might have been a scene where this hand comes out of the pot grabbing the woman pulling her face into the pot.

2) A woman is lying in her pitch dark bedroom. She might be in a hotel. She hears a noise, asks if anyone is there, and then we see a walking/floating ghost hidden underneath a blue sheet. The ghost is seen in the hallway, eventually making its way up two steps of banisters. When it does, the woman calls out a name; I think the name of her former lover. No answer, the ghost flies towards her. The woman does nothing, but stares up at it, fussing, screaming, trying to kick it away with her legs. I saw this around 1990-1991.

3) A late teen (wearing black clothes, pulled back light brown hair) is seen walking in a vacant classroom towards the front of the room. As she walks, a disembodied head of a young man (probably her instructor) flies throughout the room eventually landing on its corpse, which we see resting beneath the blackboard, near the front desk. I saw this sometime around 1987.

(All were shot in color; all I saw on TV, #1 and #2, I think, are night shots, while #3 is a day shot)

I know this is not much to go on, but can anyone here please help me? I asked all around, and no one knows.

Hey,

I have a trauma that I have been thinking about lately and I was wondering if someone could help me out. I want to say that it is a movie from the eighties/maybe early nineties. It involved a group of sorority girls who (I believe) were part of some cult or something. Anyway, the only part I really remember is the very end when some guys were running from these murderous girls and they were at the bottom of a set of stairs. A head comes rolling down it and there is a voice from one of the sorority sisters saying something to the fact that these girls have to finish every single bite of these guys or they would be punished (implying that they were in fact cannibals). I'm sorry, but that is all I remember other then the fact that it was a cheesy horror flick and/or part of an anthology (whether film-wise or on TV). Your site has greatly helped me out in the past so I was hoping for more of the same now!

Thanks,
Andy

This is more of a request to help me find an old episode of something that scared the hell out of me. Here is what I remember. I think it may have been an episode of the 80's cable Hitchhiker series. But it could have been another.

Here is what I remember. The setting is a man and woman in the midst of some sort of romantic tryst in, I believe, a hotel room. The woman suggests they play "Gotcha" (though it could be another name I am sure this is it). Anyway, she goes and hides while he stays on the bed. As the film goes along he becomes increasingly paranoid. Feeling extra strange as it seems she has only gone to hide in the bathroom, we see him sitting on the bed sweating and generally freaking out. The climax comes when some horrid disfigured harpy-type thing descends upon him from the ceiling fan directly above him (whose repetitive turns have been marking the increase in his anxiety), saying "Gotcha!" Then we see that it was just his girl all along sneaking up to the side of the bed. One of the best jump scares I ever had, but sadly from my wee lad days. If it wasn't The Hitchhiker, it was a similar '80s serial. Could even have been drawn from an anthology film but I doubt it.

The couple, the room, the game, the first person camera to guy's anxiety, the figure descending from the fan, and his shock from the vision of seeing his girl beside him going basically "boo." These are the threads I remember. Can you find it for me? It has been plaguing me for years. Airtime on Showtime or HBO would have been circa '84-'88.