it's halloween week so i thought we should discuss some scary shit. i have a love/hate relationship with scary movies. in that i love them and i hate them. they can be a great let down or (if they are good or hit some kind of personal nerve) shake you to the core. or if you're me turn you into a hypochondriac-obsessed-with-the-devil-afraid-to-do-gymnastics-for-fear-of-floating-off-the-ground fun loving eleven year old!!!! let's talk about that for a moment...the movie of which i refer is 'the exorcist'. i was 11 (same age as linda blair's character) and very impressionable. i actually sat down with my parents in the living room to watch this movie. in their (parents) defense they did tell me that this was too scary for me. but me, being the stubborn gal that i am decided that i could handle it. everything started off innocent enough...
regan goes to the doctor cuz things just ain't right..doctor can find nothing wrong...(umm...cuz she's possessed by the devil!!!!)...
then this shit starts happening...the ole backwards crab walk down the stairs...
and this....
WHAT. THE. FUCK?!?!?!?!?! i mean that is an image that you'd be hard pressed to forget. let's just say that at this point i was in my room immersed in paper dolls signing..tra la la la la laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!! although my thoughts were on this.....
and this...
wondering when in the fuck was this going to happen to me? i was tormented for YEARS by this movie. truly. i lived in fear for the better part of 3 years that i was possessed by the devil. i have since seen it many times as a sort of rite of passage. i also paid a visit to the actual stairs in washington dc that they used in the movie. you know the stairs that father karras falls down? yeah..those. it was healing.moving on...
another movie that scared the shit out of me as a youngster was this....
very well done. very well acted and well directed. i believe these are crucial elements to a successful scary movie. 
it fucked with me..hard. i couldn't watch a movie with john hurt in it for years. or linda blair for that matter, i mean let's face it linda blair didn't go on to a very successful career because she couldn't act. it was because NO ONE COULD GET THOSE FUCKING IMAGES OF HER OUT OF THEIR HEADS!!!!!
very well done. very well acted and well directed. i believe these are crucial elements to a successful scary movie. i mean, THIS scene???
it fucked with me..hard. i couldn't watch a movie with john hurt in it for years. or linda blair for that matter, i mean let's face it linda blair didn't go on to a very successful career because she couldn't act. it was because NO ONE COULD GET THOSE FUCKING IMAGES OF HER OUT OF THEIR HEADS!!!!! moving on to another 70's era brainmelter:
was there anyone out there after this that didn't look sideways at the ocean and say....hmmmmm...maybe i won't go for a swim today? or a lake? or a pool? or even put your bare ass on a toilet without fear of a shark swimming up through it??!! changed my view on such things FOR-EV-ER! i was convinced sharks could manage JUST FINE without saltwater.
was there anyone out there after this that didn't look sideways at the ocean and say....hmmmmm...maybe i won't go for a swim today? or a lake? or a pool? or even put your bare ass on a toilet without fear of a shark swimming up through it??!! changed my view on such things FOR-EV-ER! i was convinced sharks could manage JUST FINE without saltwater. 
so those 3 are the ones from the MFAMB formative years that stick out the hardest with shook me to the core status.
onto the adult years...now let it be known that i have seen quite a few scary movies...i am somewhat of an aficionado, but i also know that scary to me might not be scary to you and vice versa. for example my husband says he was really fucked up from 'when a stranger calls' (the original with carol kane not the remake with camilla belle-that movie sucked. if only for the fact that we all knew HE WAS IN THE DAMN HOUSE ALREADY!!) not so to me. it just didn't get me like the others. now there was 'the shining'...super scary i know, but it wasn't core shaking to me. also, 'the omen', 'halloween' (my brother was pretty fucked up by this one) and countless others that were really, truly scary. and they deserve an honorable mention for sure but the ones i speak of here are responsible for fear that lasted well outside the few hours that i endured watching them.
have any of you ever seen 'wolf creek'?
this is one of those movies that not too many people have ever heard of. i hadn't. we watched it one night and were pleasantly surprised. (although do you say "pleasantly" when referring to a movie that makes you shit your pants?) there are no monsters, no supernatural anything. just some crazy austrailian outback hillbilly motherfucker. this guy:
this is one of those movies that not too many people have ever heard of. i hadn't. we watched it one night and were pleasantly surprised. (although do you say "pleasantly" when referring to a movie that makes you shit your pants?) there are no monsters, no supernatural anything. just some crazy austrailian outback hillbilly motherfucker. this guy:
i called my mom (another fan of the scary movie) an told her to rent it. she did. she called me in a fuckyoufortellingmeaboutthis tone and told me she had to turn it off halfway through b/c the suspense was physically hurting her. she's right...it does. it physically hurts to watch this movie. i highly recommend this one, unless you have a weak heart.
moving on to what might be the creepiest, scariest, most innovative movie SINCE the exorcist...
i saw this one in the theatre, the only one of this bunch that i have seen in the theatre. and i could barely watch it. you know, eyes half covered looking up at mike gaging his reaction to see it i could look. of course i had no idea those first few moments when the girl's face melts that that was going to happen. i had never seen anything like that before...not since the famous crab walk had an image frightened me so much. this is when i decided that this movie was best watched through my fingers. but besides the melting faces... 
there was the waterlogged samara crawling in a crazy crab walk fashion out of the tv and well....
and that goddamn horse scene!! not to mention the music, if you could call it that. i couldn't get the "music" for this movie out of my head. it became my own personal hellish soundtrack. now, no longer an impressionable eleven year old girl but a grown ass woman i wasn't nearly as traumatized as i was way back in '71, but i was pretty fucked up for a few days. so...i have yet to be as scared from a movie as i was from these. but then there's this....
has anyone seen? there is a lot of hype here which concerns me. kind of like the blair suck project? remember that? that movie just made me mad. maybe had i seen it long before the rest of the world started hyping it up i might have been sucked in..but i wasn't. i am going to see it this saturday so we'll see. i'll let you know. here's a preview.. (for some reason you have scroll way down)
so what about you? what movies scared the bejesus out of you??