So, its October, this is usually the month where I naturally binge on horror movies. I like it. But I’m not sure why I like it. The “it” I’m talking about is being scared.
As far as I can remember I have enjoyed scary things…yet I’d also get nightmares from scary things, I’ll lose sleep over scary things. I remember the first time I watched “Ringu” – you may know it from its American remake, “The Ring.” I watched it at my ex-boyfriend’s house, pooped my pants, and returned home to my room…where I used to have a television… Let’s just say, I didn’t sleep the whole night and all I could do is keep looking at the screen, hoping that if something did come out that I’d be able to run my pansy little ass out my bedroom door.
Scary things also made me avoid places all together, like that time when I thought there was a monster in my bathroom…I never used the damn place. I was much younger when that happened, probably in first grade. The house we lived in at the time had a long walkway. To the left of the walk way was my parent’s room and their bathroom. To the right of the hallway was my room, my brother’s room and at the very end a dark bathroom. One day I walked in, sat down, started doing my business, when all of a sudden I felt something crawl across my toes. When I turned on the lights, there were bugs everywhere! I reached for the shower curtain and inadvertently made it open, only to be greeted with the sight of several spiders and spider webs. OH GOD. I turned around quickly in a panic and flushed the toilet so that I could make my escape. But what followed, when my fingers pressed down against that shiny plastic lever, was the most demonic sound I had ever heard in my life. I ran all the way down to my parents bedroom and squashed myself between my mom and dad. That was the last time I’d use that particular bathroom again.
When I was still in elementary school, I read books by Shel Silverstein, which sometimes had rather scary stories. Then in middle school I was obsessed with the Goosebumps book series. I read some Steven King thanks to my school’s library. I’d also go on to watch the shows Are You Afraid of the Dark and Goosebumps when it was made into a television series. I’d lose sleep over what these media images and words would leave in my head.
I just kept indulging in more and more scary stories, movies and television!
You could say that after a while I started to become desensitized.
I remember I watched Poltergeist…and it did nothing for me. I also watched The exorcist, and I wasn’t the least bit afraid – great theme music though! Dun da dun da da da dinnng da dum! I think it was during my viewing of the original Halloween film that I realized that these movies weren’t doing it for me anymore. I had to admit to myself that I wanted to be scared. I enjoyed it, but why? Why do I like that? I had no idea. I remember talking to my dad about my dilemma, he told me that he remembered one particular film to have frightened him when he saw it, and one day we ended up watching it; it was Carrie. Something about this movie was different, maybe it was the fact that she was so tortured that it seemed far scarier than any undead murderer. The ending of Carrie left me sleepless that night, so much so that I think I abstained from any horror films for a long time.
This abstinence was of course broken, because I watch them to this day. Though I don’t generally watch horror films by myself now, unless its 8am and the sun is blazing. I’m still not sure why I like to be scared.
To rap this up, I’d like to share with you guys a couple of films that are more recent that I have seen rather recently that I’d like to recommend to you if you’re also into scary films. The first is V/H/S which I believe is still available on Netflix. Its a compilation of scary shorts, each with a different story line, which are tied together by a more general story line.
The second is V/H/S 2, which is the sequel. V/H/S 2 is not available on Netflix, but I’d still recommend it. A lot of crazy shit happens in that film as well, with the same format – scary short films all tied into one general story line.
Have fun!
I'm just Super Saiyan 