Writing prompt response
Slasher movies didn't scare me when I was younger. I started obsessively watching them as a preteen during friend's slumber parties. Halloween. Friday the 13th. Nightmare on Elm Street. We watched them all, analyzing the dumb moves the characters made.
"Why did she go up the stairs? Why didn't she run out the front door?
Why can't I watch the Elephant Man movie?
During my teenage years, I went through an Alfred Hitchcock phase, watching all his movies, not feeling scared, more intrigued than anything else.
But I will admit Rosemary's Baby and Carrie creeped me out; those stand out as movies I didn't watch fully until I was an adult.
I remember begging my mom to allow me to watch The Elephant Man, which was airing on one of the networks in the 1980s. She wouldn't let me stay up and watch it. I don't know why I wanted to watch it so badly, but her saying "no" compelled me further.
Then I discovered Stephen King novels. Pet Semetary, to be exact. I couldn't finish it. I tried Cujo, both movie and book form. Nope, couldn't do it. Animals getting harmed or in the act of harming others, no matter how fantastical, I couldn't read or watch it. I mean I loved It. I dressed as a clown for years for Halloween, so that didn't bother me. It was the animals.
I blame Disney.
Bambi and Dumbo scarred me when I was little. Why oh why did the mamas get killed or harmed right at the beginning? And they were both animals. Explains a lot.
My parent fail
And now as a parent to teenage kids, it's interesting to see how my two sons react to scary movies. One is never scared, but he is sensitive to animals being mistreated and my other son can't handle any "scary" movies yet (they are 13 and 15).
I remember watching the movie Titanic with my kids a few years back. They had been learning about it in school, so I thought it would be nice for them to see the movie.
My youngest started crying and left the room when the ship started sinking. I wasn't expecting that since we all knew what was going to happen! It was the scenes showing the older couple holding each other in their bed as the ship was making its descent. I hadn't expected that reaction (and probably scarred him now of ever being on a ship).
Is real life scarier than fiction?
Sometimes "real" life can be scarier than a scary movie involving fake blood and plastic knives. The real reason Bambi scared me when I was a little girl was I didn't want to think about anything happening to my mother (and I do love animals); it was too much for me to imagine.
The same with my son. He knew the ending; he knew the number of people who died in the sinking, but the movie felt realistic. Seeing examples of the people who passed away, not just a number in a history book, made him run off.
I must say I agree with Mark Twain.
"Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't."
― Mark Twain, Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
Writing prompt response
What film or book scared you the most as a child? Or now?
@2021 Ellie Jacobson