(WATERSHIP DOWN) was shown to our 3rd grade class on a rainy day. It ruined my life.
Editor's note: I would like to officially announce my first ever Traumafication-by-proxy which took place while hunting down an image for this post. WATERSHIP DOWN is a veritable nightmare that has now ruined my life as well. Thanks, Matt!
P.S. Matt: Whatever you do, do not click HERE
My first R-Rated film was a little police procedural Slasher hybrid called 10 TO MIDNIGHT starring CHARLES BROSON. I believe I was only 7 years old when the film premiered on HBO. My parents and some assorted aunts and uncles were gathered around the TV watching this trashy flick and nobody seemed to notice that I was even there. The plot, as interpreted by my 7 year old mind, goes like this: A serial killer gets naked and then kills naked women; it is up to a detective (Bronson) to kill the serial killer.
My most distinct memory of the film is when the killer goes after a black girl. This gorgeous and quite voluptuous young woman is taking a very steamy shower when the killer strikes. The image of a nude
man stabbing the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen (up to that point) has stayed with me for over two decades.While this shower-scene-gone-terribly-wrong is taking place, my aunt looks at me with a bewildered look on her face, as though she just noticed I'm even in the room. She then looks to my mother and she says, "Should Ricky be watching this?"
My mom, without missing a beat, says, "Oh, he won't remember this!"
I have yet to revisit 10 TO MIDNIGHT since that fateful night, despite the fact that it has finally appeared on DVD. This memory is too special (for good and for bad reasons) for me and I'm worried that seeing the film again will spoil it for me. Was my obsession with horror films (especially Slashers) hatched right there and then? Probably. One thing's for sure, my mother's theory on the absorbency of the adolescent mind could probably have used a little work.
Hey kids, go crash the non-stop viewing party at Richard's great site Doomed Moviethon.
The most scared I can remember being after watching a horror movie was when I watched FRIDAY THE 13th with my little brother at my cousin's house. The whole movie was mortifying but the scene that really got me is when KEVIN BACON gets killed. There he was just chillin' in bed, reflecting after sex when a spear comes up through his neck from under the bed! I not only had trouble sleeping afterward, but trouble even lying down in bed. Me and my brother shared bunk-beds at the time and I remember having to check under the bed before I could get under the covers. I'm not really the biggest FRIDAY THE 13th fan today, but this does explain the soft spot I continue to have for fellow Philadelphian KEVIN BACON!
I came out of the womb loving horror movies. As a kid I was obsessed with FRANKENSTEIN,THE WOLF MAN and all the Universal monsters. I used to build Aurora models with my dad and was an avid reader of FAMOUS MONSTERS. My parents had every reason to believe I could handle the action adventure movie RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. For the most part they were right, I loved the snakes, the rotting skeletons, everything until the finale. When the ark was finally opened and the everyone's faces began melting and exploding, I realized I was in way over my head. I covered my eyes but the damage was done. Not only was I terrified but I actually felt like my own head had exploded. That night I couldn't sleep and I ended up melting the face of one of my Frankenstein models with a bic lighter just see what it would look like.
There is something about freaky old people that just irks me. ‘Till this day if I see an old woman on the street and she's freaky looking, I throw rotten vegetables at her and run the other way. I was always obsessed with horror flicks as a child. Nothing really creeped me out, such as monsters or zombies etc. Old people though, are another story. I was really freaked out by that old bathtub chick in THE SHINING severely. However, 1984's CLOAK AND DAGGER was a source of severe trauma for me as a kid. (more…)
I was trying to come up with a story for Kindertrauma about what movie made me pee my pants as a child and the only movie I remember really scarring me was A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET which is kind of boring. A better story would have been how NIGHTMARE PART 2 made me gay, but that wouldn't be true, well maybe a little true. (more…)
It's hard for me to try to follow up WIL's sexual Kindertrauma unless you count that I like playing dress up and running through haunted houses. I guess I could say my first memory of a horror film was when I was a few years old and my dad let me watch SQUIRM. (more…)
When I was really young, my mom used to watch that show UNSOLVED MYSTERIES and every damn time the theme song started playing, I would completely freak out and cry like a maniac, begging her to change the channel. It wasn't even the show itself that scared me because I never actually watched any of the episodes at that point. It was just that stupid song that gave me nightmares. At this age, I had already been watching plenty of horror movies and loved them so I don't know why this particular song had that kind of affect on me.
Eventually I ended up catching the middle of an episode one night and unwillingly got hooked by the creepiness about a haunted house. When a ghost inevitably appeared and frightened a little boy, my dumb child mind randomly thought the ghost was Jesus (I guess because I was already scared of Him to begin with) and it totally traumatized me. From then on, I developed an intense fear of Jesus and would stay up nights thinking that he might come visit me while I slept. I even had a panic attack while at church a few years later for a relative's baptism. To this day, I still feel uneasy just thinking about him.
Believe it or not, I'm a really sweet person and I don't worship the devil. I'm NOT the antichrist, as this would suggest. Well, at least I don't think I am…
Back in grade school, one of our recess ladies, Ms. Fontaine, had feathered blond hair and a scratchy voice. She always reminded me of Callahan, Oscar Goldman's secretary on the BIONIC WOMAN. After catching the episode where Callahan revealed herself to be one of the FEMBOTS, I made countless excuses so I could spend recess indoors. I was convinced Ms. Fontaine was a robot, and I was too terrified to go outside and play tether ball when she was there.
Editor's note: Hey Bryan, whatever you do don't look at THIS!
