Some of the movies that scared me the most as a kid were made-for-TV movies based on true events. Sure many of them are corny and deviated from the actual facts, but as a kid most of the time I didn't realize it. I was fascinated by the movies that had to deal with horrible accidents or people being disfigured. I don't know if I was an insensitive little shit or if I just watched too much TV. One film I'll always remember was WHY ME?
It aired a lot in the '80's, mainly on Lifetime. I remember the first time I watched almost the whole movie was particularly horrifying. I was at my cousin's house during a summer afternoon while my Mom was working. My cousin, who was around my same age, just had surgery done to his eye and he had to wear a patch over it. I'm not sure who thought this was a good idea, but the patch his doctor made him wear was a skin-colored bandage. I guess from a distance it was less noticeable than a patch like a pirate would wear, but up close it was really off-putting to an eight-year-old kid. It looked like skin had melted over his eye. I shouldn't have been scared of him, but I was.
So as I avoided hanging out with him during his recovery, I found other things to do like watch Lifetime with my Aunt. She was watching WHY ME? It was about a nurse who's face was disfigured in a car accident. Here's another situation where I shouldn't have been scared, but I was. I remember it looked like skin had melted over her mouth after she had one of her operations to reconstruct her lips and it reminded me of my cousin's eye so I couldn't get away from it. I was also freaked out by one doctor's drawings and I wondered why he wanted to make her look as ugly as his sketch. All of the medical jargon completely went over my head at the time and I didn't realize that facial reconstruction was such a long process.
Watching parts of the movie on YouTube, I now realize that a lot of the plot is based on how controversial and groundbreaking the doctor's procedures were. He wanted to use vaginal skin to repair the nurse's lips. I was also pleasantly surprised to see BRUCE ABBOTT make an appearance as one of the patients.
— Grimpressions
"He wanted to use vaginal skin to repair the nurse’s lips."
I always wondered why "puss" was slang for the mouth…. :-O
Sorry, sometimes I just can't control myself.
I remember seeing this as a kid. Even back then there were so many potential jokes…
But that whole "I have no mouth, and I must scream" phobia was also present in Twilight Zone: The Movie and The Matrix. Any others?
I thought of the TZ movie too when I was getting the images for this. I don't remember this movie but I did notice that besides Bruce Abbott (Re-animator, Bad Dreams) it also stars Armand Assante (The Prophecy) and Craig Wasson (Ghost Story, Body Double). The main actress is the girl from "The Boy in the Plastic Bubble".
As far as the no mouth thing, there's also this poster for Silent Hill….
http://www.movieposterdb.com/posters/08_03/2006/384537/l_384537_85ef1f4e.jpg
Maybe Magritte was the inspiration for this movie (snicker):
http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/rene-magritte/rape-1934
Alright that made me laugh and I've been trying not to laugh all day.
It is not right to make fun of stuff like that!
I was just brought back to me and my siblings (and cousins) doing impersonations of Linda Purl and Sean Cassidy after seeing "Like Normal People"
We were kids so forgive but "No, it's Mrs Bugs Bunny!" was our favorite thing in the world…
LOL! I completely forgot about that movie. Talk about a flashback…
Hugely entertaining post! And somewhat uncomfortable, as it brought to mind my first run-in as a small child with someone's severe facial disfigurement. Sad to say, it did not go well. It was at some sort of outdoor bazaar-type event and I freaked the eff out and hid my face and begged to be taken home, lest we happen upon her a second time. I like to think I'm as cool-with-everyone as a person can get these days, but at age three or whatever, all I knew was that I didn't understand what I was seeing and never wanted to see it again.