Recasting couch

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

DragonManagement — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 21:31:09 GMT

Oh, by far, it was watching Stephen King's IT on TV.

After that, I never had the desire go to a circus, and clowns still scare the shit out of me...clowns and porcelain dolls. STOP LOOKING AT ME, YOU DOLLS!

More importantly though, I think everyone, deep down, knows clowns are inhuman trollops ready to pounce on anyone who gives them attention, so isn't King (and the movie) just saying what we already know?

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

eeyorejeff — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 05:14:32 GMT

Growing up in the 80s, the local recreation swim club my family frequented during the summers would host midnight movie nights for the youths.

I was about 10 when they showed Night of the Living Dead. Not long after anything gross happened, my stomach started churning and I threw up all the Boston Baked Beans candy I'd been eating, and three things happened:

1) I earned a summer of teasing from my friends; 2) I have never eaten Boston Baked Beans again; and 3) I refuse to watch gory horror movies (I'm 32 now).

Re:Scarred for Life Winner

Risselada — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 19:09:43 GMT

I'm surprised mercurial didn't win since his story lead to an eventual almost drowning that required CPR!

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

nala — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 19:25:43 GMT

The scariest movie for me is Omen. I watched it at the age of 10. I still blame my parents for letting me watch it. I was scared to death. I never rewatched it ever since, but it's like it was only yesterday. After this film I shiver each time I hear chorus singing like Cormina Burana (which was the main theme) not to mention Cormina itself. E.g. I couldn't watch Eyes Wide Shut because of the scene of masked ball as it refered me to my child fears (the funny thing is that chorus singing used in EWS was a romanian church singing) I dread everything connected with 666 and all devil's attributes. I just can't make myself watch Exorcist or Rosemary's Baby. So now it's my biggest fright.

Scarred for Life Winner

SkyPilot — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 17:03:30 GMT

Cinechic wins for bringing The Exorcist down on her head at age 5. How did she do it? By scaring the wits out of her mother. So our heroine has a tragic flaw, like in a Greek play or Tales from the Crypt episode. Check out her story on page 1.

P.S. -- Paul and I realized we put everyone in a difficult position, asking you to share your scars with the purpose of deciding who's been hurt "really, really good." So Paul and I wish hugs on all of you. Close your eyes, wrap your arms around yourselves, and squeeze.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

candyapple — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 21:41:33 GMT

Because I've always been easily traumatized by scary movies (even Critters had me terrified for a year that those spiny alien-balls lived under my bed), I knew I should never watch The Exorcist. But when I was in high school, the curiosity became too great and I decided I could handle the edited-for-TV version. I was wrong, so wrong. I spent the remainder of my high school nights frozen in fear, convinced that the slightest tremor was my bed beginning to bounce, signaling my possession by demons.

Keep in mind I was raised a Southern Baptist and was going through a particularly religious phase, so I firmly believed in demons and the Devil. On top of that, when I was 10, I'd had recurring nightmares in which a man's voice ridiculed me, and sometimes I even heard his voice in my head when I was awake. Post-The Exorcist, I feared those earlier dreams were an attempted possession and this time, THIS TIME, the devil would succeed!

The good news: I recently re-watched The Exorcist for the first time since then, and I'm happy to report it no longer terrified me. I'm cured! At least that’s what the demons told me to say.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

DrZaius — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 20:47:45 GMT

Back in college, some of my buddies and I would often rummage through our local Blockbuster for old and interesting films to watch. On such a journey we came across one that looked interesting. Seeing it starred Sean Connery, and being a fan of his numerous iconic performances, we decided to give this unassuming movie entitled "Zardoz" a try. At the very least we were expecting a passable fluff film we could sit and enjoy laughing at. What we did not expect, and what greeted us, was one of the most eye-jarring yet mind-bogglingly dull films I can remember seeing. Connery, in a bold but misguided attempt to unbrand himself as James Bond, is running around for most of this film in red Speedos, red bandoleers/suspenders, and thigh-high red leather boots, while sporting a french braid hairstyle and handlebar mustache. We sat, watching in awkward silent horror, as Connery wandered aimlessly from scene to scene occasionally spouting dialogue gems like "The gun is good, the penis is evil", while searching for the the answer to the riddle of Zardoz. To this day I wish I could reclaim the 105 minutes and precious brain cells I lost enduring this nauseating borefest.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Risselada — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 15:38:03 GMT

cyclometricus:

I was trying desperately to impress my first real girlfriend during our second month of dating, so we watched her favorite film: Dirty Dancing. I remember how I felt while trying to squelch my true feelings - it was like trying to swallow a potato whole, but I squeezed a smile onto my face and won an Oscar for acting like I was enthused by the experience.

Her birthday was coming up, so I plunked down $30 for a two-disc special edition of Dirty Dancing as her present, and she was pleased until she turned the case over and discovered that the movie was presented in widescreen. My blood ran cold.

A year later, at the bitter end of our relationship, I went to her house to retrieve some items that I had lent to her, and discovered that she still had the DVD that I purchased for her. It was still in the wrapper, never used, in a box in her closet.

That's how Dirty Dancing scarred me for life.

So widescreen was a BAD thing for someone who considers themselves an enthusiast of a film??

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

cyclometricus — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 01:33:31 GMT

I was trying desperately to impress my first real girlfriend during our second month of dating, so we watched her favorite film: Dirty Dancing. I remember how I felt while trying to squelch my true feelings - it was like trying to swallow a potato whole, but I squeezed a smile onto my face and won an Oscar for acting like I was enthused by the experience.

Her birthday was coming up, so I plunked down $30 for a two-disc special edition of Dirty Dancing as her present, and she was pleased until she turned the case over and discovered that the movie was presented in widescreen. My blood ran cold.

A year later, at the bitter end of our relationship, I went to her house to retrieve some items that I had lent to her, and discovered that she still had the DVD that I purchased for her. It was still in the wrapper, never used, in a box in her closet.

That's how Dirty Dancing scarred me for life.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

jamerika — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 00:21:07 GMT

I just thought of 4 more- they would not qualify as "scary films" -i'm sure it says more about me than it does about the films- but the following were films I could not watch as a kid because they made me sad:

1) Benji 2) Milo and Otis- animal stories where the animals are lost and alone, tired and hungry always got to me as a kid. For some reason the idea of these animals not having anyplace to go really bothered me as a kid. I just remember Benji running from block to block , looking mangey and hungry - and sometimes eating a bad guy's pudding cup. Milo and Otis had a similar theme of farm animals who are seperated from each other and have " adventures" and meet again as adults. the "adventure" never seemed like happy adventure at all.

3) Enchanted Journey (1984) - i had this on VHS and only watched it once or twice beacuse of the idea of the chipmunk that sails away on a breeze inside a hat and finds itself in the cold cruel world did not appeal to me. damn anime (the hard knock life version of animation).

p.s. Yes, i grew up to be a lover of animals (i have 2 cats despite being asthmatic). lol

4) The scene from The Witches ( w/ Angelica Houston) where the little Dutch girl with braided pigtails named Erica was snatched by the witch leader and locked inside a painting. The little girl remained trapped there, looking very sad, aging as the years went by and becoming very frail.

Eventually, she just...disappeared.

jamerika:

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

jamerika — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 23:54:59 GMT

Okay, this might sound weird but one of my traumatic film experiences was with Peter Pan starring Mary Martin. I don't know if you remember that version but it was the one where Tinkerbell (Tink) drank poison to save Peter's life and you had to clap in order to save her. The whole idea of 1) bringing the inevitable demise that will come to us all into a children's film was a little much 2) that you were then held personally "responsible" for bringing her back to life was a little too much pressure. I mean, here was beautiful Tink ,in all of shining flying glory, who drank poison in order to spare the Peter, the unassuming love of her life from harm. Then, in his desperation to save the person he took for granted, he asks for help from YOU- a kid who just wanted to watch him fly around and do battle with the evil Hook. I've always thought this version took this fairy story into a dark realm that was not really child- friendly.

p.s. Someone mentioned E.T. being traumatic- i totally agree- i never thought it was such a great kids film- it is depressing! I've seen it once- EVER. Someone else mentioned the Wizard of Oz- another good choice. the scene where Elmira Gultch turns into the Wicked Witch of the West (when the film is still in B&W and the house is inside the tornado) made me paranoid for months afterward.

paul:

In less than 200 words, share your most scarring movie memory in this thread. We'll pick the most traumatic experience, announce the winner on Filmspotting and send them some Spout swag.

I'll be the first divulge dark secrets with my most scarring memory...

Even more than watching Luke’s hand get axed by Darth Vader, was E.T. I was six years old watching what I felt was the greatest movie ever conceived, when E.T. gets sick, he goes missing and Elliot’s older brother goes to find him. Find him he does, unconscious laying next to a drainage ditch in the LA suburbs, all pink and fleshy looking like a skinned cow carcass sculpted to look like an alien. I burst into tears and climbed in my mom’s lap. I wanted to go home. Even the messianic resurrection and E.T.’s pick up by the homeboys on the mother ship didn’t undo the damage.

I was literally a full grown adult living on my own before I finally stopped getting butterflies in my stomach each time the lights went down in a movie theater. If I could hang words on that instinctive feeling, they would be, “What the f@#k am I about to get myself into? Another E.T.?”

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

indieabby88 — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 19:00:52 GMT

The first movie I ever saw in a movie theater was "Beethoven," that movie about the family with the giant St. Bernard. I was four. I've never been very good with suspense, but when I was a little kid, any kind of threat to anyone in a movie, anything that was vaguely scary, was totally unbearable. The part where the little girl falls into the swimming pool, and the dog has to jump in and save her made me scream so much that I had to be carried from the theater and taken home. For a couple of years afterward, until I was about eight years old, I was utterly convinced that I couldn't watch that scene, even though I knew everything turned out okay. I had some friends who loved that movie, and every time we watched it, I would tell them I had to go out of the room for few moments during that scene. I was kind of a weird little kid. I make no apologies for this.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

theeradicator — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 17:03:11 GMT

When I was little, I was part of a bank savings club that would play a free movie every Christmas at the local theater (that’s where I first saw Christmas Story.) When I was about 6, they played The Bear. I don’t know if the movie wasn’t screened before hand and they just went on the PG rating, or if it was a cruel, cruel joke, or if someone really did think baby bears high on 'shrooms, mauled horses, and guys vomiting from fear were great viewing for kids, but I do know that by the time the mother bear dies (about 10 minutes in) I was terrified. I continued to be terrified until the end; other kids burst into tears from time to time and had to be led out by their parents. I think I made it to the end. I’ve watched it since, and enjoyed it, but I had bear-related nightmares for years.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Risselada — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 22:08:32 GMT

Jagsfans:
I'm sure I have seen "Seven" at least 200 times since then.

If that's not hyperbole then that means you've spent over 17 and a half days of your life watching that movie. That means if you don't watch it any more than you already have, and you live to be 70 years old you will have spent an average of one minute every day of your life watching the movie Seven. That's more time than some people spend brushing their teeth I bet. How old are you right now? If you are only 30, then you've already spent an average of 2.3 minutes of your life per day watching it.

So I guess you really like it!

Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

atacta — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 13:11:57 GMT

The Exorcist (1973)

Sorcerer (1977)

I saw The Exorcist for the first time when I was about 7 years old. This wasn't the theatrical version - it was @1976 at the time - but a Sunday-night network televised version. I had no idea what was on TV. and merely had chanced at this film without knowing a thing about the movie either. I was alone and I remember being so terrified I could not move and I had this really hard swallow. I wanted my parents to come downstairs but I would be afraid of ANY movement in the room other than from me. I will never forget the specific lighting in the den that night - it perfectly complemented the terror I was experiencing.

Friedkin got me again when I was taken to see The Sorcerer the year it came out. My parents had made a mistake. I think its PG or PG-13 now but it’s my first film experience of people burning alive. That’s all I remember. Thanks Billy Friedkin!

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

bavmotors1 — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 02:09:35 GMT

“Wait Until Dark.” My father rented this one night in when I was nine or ten years old and scarred for life is a terribly accurate way to put it. I simply cannot watch it now to re-confirm my memory of it but there was no release until the movie was over. It was a constant building clench that left me sleeping with the lights on for days. That apartment just seemed to get smaller and smaller and darker and darker. Not only did the movie scare the poo out of me, but seeing it at such a young age ruined thrillers for me forever. The ones I do watch are the watered down TNT versions with the mute button engaged at the first note of creepy music. Movies nobody would describe as scary are crossed right off my list and if a scary preview is shown before a movie any friend of mine knows the next words out of my mouth will be, “Well... not gonna see that.” There were even parts of “Broken Lizard's Club Dread,” and “Shaun of the Dead” that had my fingers headed for my ears. Yeah... Scarred.

As an honorable mention I was maybe 19 or 20 years old and had started to watch Salem's Lot on TV. Books never scared me and I like Stephen King so I though I would give it a try. I fell asleep before too long but woke up to a scene with people floating outside a window. Even writing it down gives me a chill.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Jagsfans — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 18:46:32 GMT

Mine is from one of my top 5 movies of all time "Seven". I sat down in the theatre 6 weeks after it came out with a buddy of mine. No more than 12 people in the theatre on Saturday night. I knew nothing more than this was a serial killer movie based on the seven deadly sins. The chilling NIN opening theme gripped me and the suspense held me until John Doe caught the bullet from Mills. Then to top it off the credits started to roll backwards. As I walked out of the movie, speechless for at least 20 minutes before I broke the silence saying "I feel like I need a shower" Easily the most disturbing moment I can remember from seeing a movie. I'm sure I have seen "Seven" at least 200 times since then.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

see_sherpa — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 18:47:00 GMT

I may be able to come up with something else if I really dug into the depths of my cinememory, but when I heard this topic the first film I thought of was Perfume. I saw this movie a while after it was released in my town's $1.50 theater and my friend and I were the only folks in attendance. Can't say now what I was expecting, what I was looking for in this thing, or even what I thought it was about. But coming out of the theater I was in a horrified daze. The movie was disturbing on a level I could barely grasp and longer than anyone should have to handle. Something about the grungy, empty theater didn't help. What truly saddens me is not so much the frightening dreams I had for the following several weeks (mostly involving being strapped to a chair and having to choose between treated like a character in Saw and having to watch this film again, ususally ending in my having to do both) is the distaste I now automatically have for Alan Rickman and Dustin Hoffman. These are both men that I admired and respected deeply, and attempt though I may to continue those kind feelings, they are overshadowed by the characters they portrayed in this mad creation.

I've never been back to the $1.50 theater.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

benthams_head — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 16:33:53 GMT

had just arrived home from Indian Guides and was hanging my red felt vest on the hook by the front door when I heard a voice eminating from the living room television set. No, it wasn't that of a screaming teenager or some toy clown come to life with a grudge and an axe. It was.....Jason Robards. I had a certain affinity for Mr. Robards after seeing him in kiddie-horror film, "Something Wicked This Way Comes" and was immediately drawn-in by the gruff-yet-affable grandfatherliness of his tonal delivery. And here he was, in this ostensibly tame movie-of-the-week, chatting with his daughter in an art gallery. I sat down to watch....

Mom swiftly admonished me to go upstairs; telling me that this was a show for "adults only". Now my interest was really piqued. Could there be a nude scene? No, surely not on my parent's TV set. That kind of thing could only be seen on grandma and grandpa's cable box. I deduced that mom's commandment could only mean one thing: violence. Now I was REALLY interested.

Eventually, my powers of persuasion won out and mom agreed to let me watch the show until bedtime. At first, her concerns seemed downright unfounded. Sure, there was talk of Russians and nuclear war, but we were mostly treated to scenes of a midwestern family planning for a wedding or Steve Guttenberg hitchhiking out of town for some inexplicable....then it happened. Rockets were launched from corn fields, missiles flew over a crowded football stadium, Jason Robards emerged from his car to stare in horror at the Kansas City skyline, and then...freeze frame. A close-up of Mr. Robard's face turned black and yellow for a few haunting seconds. Kansas City had been pulverized. The nuclear holocaust was upon us. As my eyes turned to saucers, my mother swept me upstairs. I was in no mood to rebel.

I brushed my teeth and went to bed, but of course I couldn't sleep. I found myself thinking of the Russians and nuclear war and corn fields and... Jason Robards. He had outwitted that evil magician in "Something Wicked", but this was so much bigger. And worse yet, it was real. I thought about that "No Nukes" rally my parents brought me to the previous summer. Is this what they were fighting against? The complete destruction of Kansas City or New York City or Tacoma? Did President Reagan and the Russians really want to ensure our mutual self-destruction? These were heavy thoughts for a 7-year-old, but my obsessions with Return or the Jedi, Hot Wheels, and the "Thriller" picture disc seemed downright childish at that very moment. I inevitably ended up at my parents door around 2 AM. Mom sat up with me for awhile and tried to soothe my fears; telling me that even President Reagan did not want to see us all nuked into oblivion.

Eventually, the macabre image of my childhood home turning black-and-yellow faded from my mind's eye and I now longer pictured missiles flying over the Grant Elementary soccer field. Still, years after the end of the Cold War, I can't help but remember how that film forced upon me a great mental leap into the land of adults. It was not a colorful and heroic land like in "Return of the Jedi". It was the land where the banal sometimes crossed with the horrific; where a schoolteacher's visit to space would unexpectedly turn tragic and a cosmopolitan symbol of the global economy would become a symbol of the brutal gulfs that persist in the world. Like the film's title, every day since then has been "The Day After".

The Day After (1983)I

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Yupatuwah — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 21:37:31 GMT

2004: We were in love that summer. Working together in the daily parade at Silver Dollar City, we read 5 books apiece (free time) and got free park tickets.

Heaven.

After a hot day of parading - she as a clown, me a giraffe - and a humid evening with her 2 friends, we went to see Will Ferrell's new movie... "Anchorman." We laughed uproariously, but with 30 minutes left, my day-long deluge of amusement park food battled in my bowels over what would come out first... and fastest. "Anchorman" was funny, so...I pinched. Clinched. Squeezed. Tightened furiously to avoid stinking up the theater. Finally, credits roll, and as we filed out of the full theater, I let it all go. Sweet release of pressure! I thought, "We'll be gone before anyone notices." And then... OUTTAKES. Everyone stopped.
Panic.
Then, "Oh my GOD! Who crapped their pants? Do you SMELL that?"
Severe Panic.
I grabbed my girlfriend's hand, told her the situation, and ran down front - that's right, we didn't just LEAVE, because she - we - also wanted to watch the outtakes.

Fearful Discomfort.

Afterwards, I spent about 25 minutes in the bathroom.
We broke up that fall.

-Jason Eaken, from Kansas City

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Photogeezer — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 02:02:58 GMT

An Innocent Man with Tom Sellick.

It is not a great film. It is not a good film. But it is the scariest film I've ever seen.

A couple of corrupt cops bust the wrong house (Selleck's). They proceed to shoot him thinking the hair dryer in his hand is a gun. To cover their mistake they plant some Cocaine and arrest him anyway. He is eventually convicted and sent to prison where he is raped!

Movies like Alien, Saw and the Descent don't scare me. Being sent to prison, unfairly, and be raped is the scariest thing I can imagine.

I'm a mild-mannered, well-behaved 56 year-old adult. But since seeing this movie, I'm even more law abiding - fearful of any minor infraction that could snowball with me going to jail or prison.

I know this is an irrational fear. But so is the fear of flying and other fears felt by millions. And this is a lot more realistic that aliens and ghosts. After all, doesn't reality provide the biggest terror and fear?

Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

matt_the_movie_watcher — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 00:34:46 GMT

A Tale of Two Traumas

Trauma One --Trailers From Hell

I was about ten years old and my folks had taken me to see Indiana Jones in his (supposedly) last crusade, a movie I had seen ads for on TV and was very much excited about. Although my parents generally protected me from horror (Nightmare on Elm Street) and violence (Rambo), I wasn't completely sheltered. For instance Star Wars and Indiana Jones were household favorites. However, nothing in Temple of Doom prepared me for the terrifying spectacle that preceded our feature on that fateful night.

Before the movie started we were predictably treated to a number of trailers. With the exception of one, I have forgotten what they were. It wasn't the full trailer because the film wasn't released for a while still, but I will forever be haunted by the teaser trailer (link below) for Coppola's Dracula that I saw that night. The sight and sound of Gary Oldman's Dracula laughing was so loud and terrifying; I remember covering my eyes and praying for it to end. To this day, when this film is on television I always make excuses for why I don't want to watch it. "Keanu is in it you know" I say desperately trying to dissuade my girlfriend from putting it on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-JGNTHXbos

Trauma Two -- Indiana Jones and the Secret of the Loose and Liquid Bowel Movements

By the time the film started and the Paramount logo faded, the origins of Indy's fear of snakes and his famed fedora, helped me recover from the Dracula trauma. The movie was better than I could have expected, it was funny, exciting, everything a ten year old boy could have hoped for. I was enjoying the film so much that nothing could take my eyes off the screen, and I mean nothing.

Indy finds the entrance to the catacombs underneath the library that, which I don't need to tell you, is a very humorous reveal seeing how he had earlier explained to his students that X never marks the spot. He climbs down with the beautiful Dr. Schneider and soon encounters the rats, and that’s when I encountered some problems myself. Now I don't remember if there was a stomach bug going around, if I had eaten something spicy for supper, or if the film was just too exciting, but by the time Indy and Elsa were searching through oil slicked water, I was dealing with a serious diarrhea dilemma. What does one do in a situation like this?

Indy is being pursued by the Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword in a terrific motorboat chase, and I'm sliding into the first when I heard something burst. Watch the movie or go to the lavatory? These are decisions children are not equipped to make. Ultimately dad must have smelled something because moments later he insisted that we visit the washroom. In some ways it's a happy ending because really all I missed was the sex scene in the Venice apartment, which was not the kind of thing I was interested in at the time.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

SaraAnne — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 23:25:53 GMT

We were supposed to be going to the drive-in to see The Cat From Outer Space, but Uncle Joe said we got in the wrong line, and we couldn't turn around because of all the cars behind us. I thought at the time that he had tricked us, and cried loudly, to no avail. He said we could either watch the movie we'd inadvertantly lined up for or no movie at all. My sister and I huddled at the back window of the van, able to see the big screen antics of Haley Mills and the kitty in the shiny collar, but the soundtrack was that of the panicky last moments of Nantucketers being devoured by a man-eating shark . Uncle Joe had 'accidentally' taken us to see Jaws 2. I was afraid of water for the next six years.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Risselada — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:43:14 GMT

EasyCompany506:
My most traumatic moment came in 1988 when a little film called Who Framed Roger Rabbit came out. My dad gave my brother and me $20 and said go ride your bikes and catch a movie. So we picked the cartoon. Remember, $20 bought a lot of candy and pop when tickets were cheap back then. We were so excited and had a blast. When we got home my mom was packing up the car with everything that was hers and she moved out. Turns out dad sent us to the movies so they could have one last fight and agree to get a divorce and have my mom move out. THANKS DAD!!! Now I can never ever like that movie again.

When I first started reading this, I thought you were going to start talking about Judge Doom and his eyes popping out. But yeah that sucks you have to associate such a FANTASTIC movie with such a bad memory.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

EasyCompany506 — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 20:56:06 GMT

My most traumatic moment came in 1988 when a little film called Who Framed Roger Rabbit came out. My dad gave my brother and me $20 and said go ride your bikes and catch a movie. So we picked the cartoon. Remember, $20 bought a lot of candy and pop when tickets were cheap back then. We were so excited and had a blast. When we got home my mom was packing up the car with everything that was hers and she moved out. Turns out dad sent us to the movies so they could have one last fight and agree to get a divorce and have my mom move out. THANKS DAD!!! Now I can never ever like that movie again.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

beautifulsoup — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 19:17:46 GMT

I don't know if this counts, because technically I don't remember the initial traumatizing experience itself. For years and years, all throughout my childhood, I had these very disturbing nightmares about a naked, rotting old woman in a bathtub. They were definitely more intense and memorable than your average recurring childhood nightmare, and I had no idea what could have inspired them. I didn't tell anyone, because I didn't want everyone to start thinking that I was a psychopath.

Finally, when I was a teenager, I saw The Shining on TV while on vacation with my family. Because it was heavily edited, I asked my dad to explain what had happened during the Jack Nicholson bathroom scene. When he told me, I was absolutely overjoyed to have proof that I wasn't mentally unbalanced. When I was very young I used to sneak downstairs after bedtime and secretly watch what my parents had rented for the evening; apparently I saw The Shining at some point and it got stuck in my psyche. I have since seen The Shining many, many times and it has become one of my favorite horror films… but I still close my eyes during the bathroom scene.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

asalaw — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 18:51:31 GMT

Nothing will ever beat my experience in watching Dawn of the Dead in its first theater run in 1979. In fact, it was July 15, 1979.

I was hooked when I read in Starlog magazine that George Romero withdrew the film from MPAA consideration because they were going to give it an X-rating. It was released unrated to much controversy.

I was 14.

I conned my mother into taking me and my best friend Omar into tagging along. They had a horrible time. By the time the main characters made it to the shopping mall, both of them wanted to walk out in utter disgust. I begged them to stay, convinced the movie would redeem itself in the end.

Cut to: The climax of the movie, in which zombies rip people apart and eat their entrails. On camera. In closeup. Those of you under 40 should realize that nothing like that had ever been mass distributed in the US before. As Lenny Bruce did for Richard Pryor, Dawn of the Dead blew down the doors that barred us from violent gore. Today we're jaded, but back then the impact was really something.

I was incredibly traumatized. The violence had shocked me to my adolescent core.

Worse, my mom and best friend were extremely pissed off at me. My Cuban, old-school conservative mom angrily lectured me about the decadence of American drug-induced hippie culture. And then came the icing on the cupcake: mom turned on the car radio just as Jimmy Carter's despiriting "malaise speech" was beginning. So now the president was telling me America was kaput. My soul was scarred and my country was in flames. Whatever would become of me?

Fortunately I survived the spiritual mauling of that night. I had experienced a major hit of horror crack, and my permanently warped mind has been happily addicted to horror ever since.

Thanks, George Romero for making me the gnarled, Lovecraft-loving twist I am today. Jimmy Carter, on the other hand, actually came close to ruining my adolescence.

Aureliano Sanchez-Arango, Washington, DC

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

csprague — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 18:39:59 GMT

Its a little fuzzy, but when I was about 5 or 6 my Dad took me to see The Fox and the Hound and for some reason the scene with the animal skins on the back of the shed door gave me nightmares for weeks afterward.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Risselada — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 18:16:59 GMT

I've always been scared of black wolves. So I'll second the bid for The Neverending Story, but specifically the part where the big wolf is talking from within that cave.

But the worst one for me was Benji The Hunted. There was a frightening wolf in that, and the worst scene is when Benji tricks the wolf to run off the side of the cliff. You see the wolf's body fall down this deep ravine while you hear the most blood chilling howl. For some reason this movie played often in my house. I don't know why we would have rented it more than once, but somehow it was always on TV or something. I would watch the movie with my family but have to run into the bathroom when I knew that scene was coming up and plug my ears. I had a lot of nightmares of wolves coming to attack me at school around that time.

Holy crap, I just watched this and it just gave me major goosebumps. And I don't even have any audio at work.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

Risselada — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 18:09:36 GMT

coryphella:

When I was 14 I heard about the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey on an overnight retreat.

A week later I convinced my dad to watch this movie. I don't think I breathed the entire time. By the time we got to the last scene, I was terrified - of the monolith. When I went to bed after the movie I kept thinking I would look at the end of my bed and see it standing there. I kept my dad up all night, and I think he regretted ever showing that movie to me.

It honestly took me 7 years to watch it again. It really haunted me more than any horror movie ever did. Now, I love the movie...but to this day I'm still scared that I'll see the monolith at the end of my bed. In my bedroom today I have a closet with a narrow door that always remains open. At night, that dark rectangular opening looks a little too much like the monolith standing in my bedroom.

I can't remember if I mentioned this in another thread, but I also have a strange story about being scared by this movie as a kid, only not by seeing it directly. Does anyone remember these cassette tapes and read along books that would come out for different children's movies? There were a ton of them for the old Disney cartoons like for Fox and the Hound for example (which actually has kind of a scary moment in it too). But basically there would be a book with pictures from scenes of the film and a cassette tape that would have audio from the film and maybe narration. It must have been compacted because I don't think these books were as long as the movie.

BUT THERE WAS ONE FOR 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY! Why would they market this to kids!?? For one, it's probably boring to most kids, also it's very cinematic and doesn't translate the best to this kind of thing. But I remember they had one. And those MONKEYs at the beginning scared me so much. Why did I have this book? I can't even remember. I'm sure I would have been even more terrified if I had seen the actual film.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

seven-ate-9 — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 17:56:33 GMT

Thanks to the darkness of the 80's PG movie, something that we'll never see again mind you, we have a tie:

1982 - 7 years old and I get to see "The Dark Crystal" with my older sisters' Brownie Troop. Don't ask (how sad that girls were icky at the time - I could have been the mack). I love this effing movie but to this day I cringe when those damn Skeksis (spelling ?) come on screen. Nightmares of being carried off by them for years...until of course they were trumped by:

1984 - I'm nine years old and I see "The Neverending Story" with my older sisters and my mom. Atreyu loses his horse Artax in the swamps of sadness and I freakin' sit there and ball my eyes out in the theatre. I don't remember thinking this at the time, but God knows I probably tried to fight the tears or else I would be taken down with him. Thanks Mom!

(update - Just did a search on google for "Artax" and someone's got the scene on Youtube. You know I'm not clicking on that shit.)

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

LindaHM — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 17:54:26 GMT

Wizard of Oz, hands down, most disturbing, terrifying, neuroses inducing movie of my life.

First we have an ugly, vicious woman who wants to kill a dog and none of Dorothy's family will protect Toto from the old bat, then the munchkins, the witch, and the flying monkeys. Who decided these images were good for kids? I saw the movie when I was about 5 and I have never gotten over it nor have I ever watched it again.

Thanks to that movie I have a totally incapacitating fear of midgets, seriously, I start to hyperventilate and completely freak at the sight of them. And monkeys? Terrifying, flying or not.

SO, thanks to my parents who thought it would be a great thing for a 5 year old to watch, and the sadistic, twisted bastards that made the film, I am completely scarred for life from The Wizard of Oz.

Re:Scarred for Life - Salvador Dali and Luis Bunuel do me in...

lopezdash — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 20:03:46 GMT

mercurial:

Growing up on the California coast had an immensely adverse effect on me as a child, especially the fact that I had an older brother that despised my very birth. At the age of 7 he exposed me to Jaws and used his gargantuan older-brother hands to keep me planted on the couch to view the film despite my repeated attempts at escaping the horror on screen. I have no recollection of going into the ocean before this but vividly recall every attempt thereafter. When my family’s weekly Sunday brunches in Carmel, CA culminated in a walk to the beaches of the coast, I remember bursting into tears and crying until my parents allowed me to stay isolated in the backseat of the family station wagon. Approximately 28 months later my father felt compelled to break me of my fear and drag me 1 ½ miles from the coast into the sea and leave me alone to “break” me of my fear. I was subsequently dragged into the undertow after an hour of dog-paddling and taken further out from sea where I was subsequently rescued by a lifeguard and given CPR back on the shore. I didn’t talk to my father for about a year afterward. From that point on I have been unable to enter any body of water alone and only have nightmares of Great White Sharks attacking me.

A little more than 200 words but had to explain it all. Hopefully it still counts.

Oh, wow! That's funny though. I grew up outside of LA and have always felt safer swimming in the ocean. For some reason, I am more frightened of swimming in a lake. I'm convinced there's a monster of some sort living in lakes, and they're very mad because fo the limited space available for swimming.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

DeadRobot — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 00:45:20 GMT

Once upon a time there was a movie of high adventure and epic battles. It was a movie filled with heroes and villains, with lovely lasses and sweeping vistas. During the course of it, lives were lost and lessons were learned, some harsh and some tender. Sitting in that faraway theater I learned about love in the face of loss, about becoming who you are even if you don’t fully understand it, about standing up to your fears, and most of all I learned that there can be only one.

When the sequel to that movie finally rolled into my local cineplex, another harsh lesson was delivered. This time I learned that everything I thought I knew WAS A LIE! There wasn’t just one, but a whole planet of ones. I learned that I wasn’t watching a fantasy, but instead a terrible sci-fi wreck of a film. I learned that Michael Ironside needs to pick better films. And, the worst of it was, I learned that sometimes you can’t go back, no matter how bad you wish that you could.

Damn you, Highlander 2. Damn you to hell.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

tonguecutsparrow — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 21:45:13 GMT

The most scarring moment for me could have been a number of things, honestly. I wanted to say "Killer Klowns From Outer Space", just for the shadow T-Rex mass murder at the bus stop. I saw that scene when I was a small kid, and that kept me awake for quite a while.

But that wasn't enough for me (and it was just a little too jokey). So the next one that popped into my brain is "Empire of the Sun", one of my favourite films of all time. However, it took me a while to see this movie. When I was much younger, I would always catch the film near the very end. I didn't know what it was (I didn't even know it was Spielberg), but the scene where *spoilers* the young Japanese pilot tries to help Bale's character Jim with his fruit, and Basie shoots him, and the blood runs down the kid's blade onto the fruit, that was probably one of the most scarring things for me. That image seared into my brain, and I spent a lot of time in school pondering that moment, and even as a young child, it made me question my existence and mortality.

But the film that pushed me over the edge, caught me completely by surprise, and has scarred me for probably the rest of my life is "Grave of the Fireflies". I can't remember a film that has shut me down emotionally and left me completely broken apart. Setsuko reminds me of my little sister, and even though I was about 20 when I saw this for the first time, it still is an extremely hard watch. From the beginning scene at the train station to watching the fly crawl across Seita's sunken face, this movie, while anime, is more realistic than any live action film I've ever seen. It changed my life and made me appreciate not just my sister but life and those that I affect around me more than I ever had before.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

coryphella — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 12:57:35 GMT

When I was 14 I heard about the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey on an overnight retreat.

A week later I convinced my dad to watch this movie. I don't think I breathed the entire time. By the time we got to the last scene, I was terrified - of the monolith. When I went to bed after the movie I kept thinking I would look at the end of my bed and see it standing there. I kept my dad up all night, and I think he regretted ever showing that movie to me.

It honestly took me 7 years to watch it again. It really haunted me more than any horror movie ever did. Now, I love the movie...but to this day I'm still scared that I'll see the monolith at the end of my bed. In my bedroom today I have a closet with a narrow door that always remains open. At night, that dark rectangular opening looks a little too much like the monolith standing in my bedroom.

Dog + Dolphin + Guttenberg = scarred for life

bearc0025 — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 02:31:15 GMT

Flying back to the U.S. from Sweden, I very nearly missed my connection in London. I raced to get on the plan only to wait 3 hours while they fixed some minor nothing with a toilet or something (forshadowing for the crap to come?).

Fortunately, they couldn't use the A/C during that time so I developed a nice healthy, "weight-loss sweat" after my jog through Terminal C.

Once airborne, I was treated to a film in my hunger and heat induced state of delirium compounded with a nice over-seas-flight-sleep-exhaustion bout.

That treat is the 98 minute torture vehicle developed originally to be used on kitten drowners, but deemed "too cruel" called "Zeus and Roxanne."

Despite the presence of Steve Guttenberg in a tank top working on a motorcycle, this tropical romp with a befriending of a dog and a dolphin somehow haunts me to this day.

Maybe it was friendly Atlantic skies, maybe it was the air recycled ten times over, but whatever it was, this movie just didn't connect with me. Whatever it was, the image of this movie just won't go away. The movie poster doesn't help: http://www.imdb.com/media/rm2879953152/tt0120550

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

dbonesteel — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 00:02:25 GMT

I was 12 or 13 when I snuck into the original "Dawn of the Dead" at the local multiplex. When I saw that head explode during the apartment assault scene, I felt for the very first time that perhaps I shouldn't have come and that ratings existed for a good reason. When a biker's intestines were pulled out later, I was sure of it. I had a similar experience the same or following year with the film "Alien" just because of the sheer tension.

Re:Scarred for Life - Salvador Dali and Luis Bunuel do me in...

mercurial — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 10:01:28 GMT

Growing up on the California coast had an immensely adverse effect on me as a child, especially the fact that I had an older brother that despised my very birth. At the age of 7 he exposed me to Jaws and used his gargantuan older-brother hands to keep me planted on the couch to view the film despite my repeated attempts at escaping the horror on screen. I have no recollection of going into the ocean before this but vividly recall every attempt thereafter. When my family’s weekly Sunday brunches in Carmel, CA culminated in a walk to the beaches of the coast, I remember bursting into tears and crying until my parents allowed me to stay isolated in the backseat of the family station wagon. Approximately 28 months later my father felt compelled to break me of my fear and drag me 1 ½ miles from the coast into the sea and leave me alone to “break” me of my fear. I was subsequently dragged into the undertow after an hour of dog-paddling and taken further out from sea where I was subsequently rescued by a lifeguard and given CPR back on the shore. I didn’t talk to my father for about a year afterward. From that point on I have been unable to enter any body of water alone and only have nightmares of Great White Sharks attacking me.

A little more than 200 words but had to explain it all. Hopefully it still counts.

Scarred for Life - Salvador Dali and Luis Bunuel do me in...

Lawgers — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 07:40:44 GMT

When I was 16 in 1979, I got to spend 4 months in Rotterdam for a summer. I was fascinated with Dali from a book I found in the library, and my exchange family took me to an exhibit. Un Chien Andalou started up, and two minutes in the sight of straight razor slicing through a human eyeball was burned onto my psyche for eternity. The nightmares began immediately.

But, oddly enough, it was the last image that really terrified me--a placard that read: "In the spring...", then showed two lifeless torsos buried from the waist down in a bleak seascape. I think this robbed me of all joy for about a week. It's important to remember that this movie so shocked its audience that it caused a riot at its original screening, and inspired Frank Black to write "Debaser."

While I've seen much, much worse since then, nothing could ever match the immediate scar this left on my personality, and a lifetime fascination with surrealism.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

cinechic — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 05:08:14 GMT

My mom claims not to be a movie person nor a good Catholic, but I'm not so sure. Case in point:

One day when I was five, I learned how to make my voice hoarse. I was teasing my mom with it, who kept asking me to stop. She said it freaked her out, and even threatened to punish me. The brat I was, I didn't. So she did. My punishment? Not a grounding, but a showing of "The Exorcist", which my mom had told me the voice reminded her of. So at the tender age of five, I was exposed to Reagan and her spinning head, pea soup vomit, and crucifix vagina-stabbing. Needless to say, I never used that voice again, AND had the fear of God put into me at an early age.

Second place: me, at the age of six, wanting to hang out with my older and therefore cool cousins. I find them in the basement, watching a movie. I watch it for a moment, say, "Ooh, a doll!" and sit down with them. They, being teenage boys, let me watch the movie with them. The movie they were watching? "Child's Play." Gah!

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

SkyPilot — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 00:12:21 GMT

PlantPage55:

Here I was, sitting in the basement with my older brother and his friends – feeling so cool that they would let me hang out with them and enjoying some offbeat (pre-“beat off”) Herman antics. ... when Large Marge transform into the grotesque, claymation monster, my heart felt like it was going to burst out of my chest, I started hyperventilating, and trying to scream in terror – all while the older gang around me laughed at my expense.

Oh man, terror and humiliation at the same time... this is rough.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

CharlesInCharge99 — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 00:07:49 GMT

PlantPage55:

I've always been something of a fradie-cat when it comes to classic movies. Whether it was my older brother chasing me around with a 12-inch C-3PO doll (yes, I was afraid of C-3PO) or him going trick-or-treating as ET one year, causing me to opt out of having to look at his frightening visage in the low-lit night.

But leave it to Pee Wee Herman to scare me so badly that I will not even revisit the scene as an adult to face my demons. If you have witnessed Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, then you know exactly the scene I am about to reference.

Here I was, sitting in the basement with my older brother and his friends – feeling so cool that they would let me hang out with them and enjoying some offbeat (pre-“beat off”) Herman antics. The Large Marge scene comes and I was on the edge of my seat - waiting for the joke - when Large Marge transform into the grotesque, claymation monster, my heart felt like it was going to burst out of my chest, I started hyperventilating, and trying to scream in terror – all while the older gang around me laughed at my expense.

This is a great one and I had a similar experience with Large Marge. My most traumatic movie experience, however, would be watching Jaws when I was 6. It actually had nothing to do with the shark but was when the body floats out from the sunken ship. I maintain that it's one of the scariest moments I've seen in film because it was so unexpected.

Oh, and seeing Kathy Bates naked in About Schmidt.

My God, the feet...

SkyPilot — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 19:50:23 GMT

I wasn’t afraid of the dark until I saw The Wizard of Oz, and then I slept with a nightlight until I was (this is embarrassing) twelve years old. It all started with those witches, and one image in particular: the feet! Aside from how they wither and curl (which is enough to give me the willies every time) just those feet BEING THERE frightened me beyond reason.

Imagine you accidentally harmed something mysterious and far more powerful than you. Even though it was an accident, something’s going to come and get you for doing it. That’s part of what the feet conjure for me.

Oz inflicted some other neurotic habits on me: I began sleeping with my entire body and head covered by my sheets, leaving a little air hole near my face. I kept my eyes directed towards the door while I dozed off, so I’d be more likely to see if a witch entered in secret. I started practicing holding my breath, too, thinking that if I didn’t stir and could hold my breath long enough, maybe an intruding witch would be fooled and leave.

Re:Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

PlantPage55 — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 19:39:41 GMT

I've always been something of a fradie-cat when it comes to classic movies. Whether it was my older brother chasing me around with a 12-inch C-3PO doll (yes, I was afraid of C-3PO) or him going trick-or-treating as ET one year, causing me to opt out of having to look at his frightening visage in the low-lit night.

But leave it to Pee Wee Herman to scare me so badly that I will not even revisit the scene as an adult to face my demons. If you have witnessed Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, then you know exactly the scene I am about to reference.

Here I was, sitting in the basement with my older brother and his friends – feeling so cool that they would let me hang out with them and enjoying some offbeat (pre-“beat off”) Herman antics. The Large Marge scene comes and I was on the edge of my seat - waiting for the joke - when Large Marge transform into the grotesque, claymation monster, my heart felt like it was going to burst out of my chest, I started hyperventilating, and trying to scream in terror – all while the older gang around me laughed at my expense.

Are you sure you want to do this?

m_rturnage — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 18:55:52 GMT

What happens if you get any stories that venture away from the funny/ironic stories of childhood?

"Whoa. Sorry The Accused caused you to relive your rape trauma. Um... here's a T-Shirt. Hope everything's cool now."

Scarred for Life - Most traumatic movie memories

paul — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 15:26:11 GMT

In less than 200 words, share your most scarring movie memory in this thread. We'll pick the most traumatic experience, announce the winner on Filmspotting and send them some Spout swag.

I'll be the first divulge dark secrets with my most scarring memory...

Even more than watching Luke’s hand get axed by Darth Vader, was E.T. I was six years old watching what I felt was the greatest movie ever conceived, when E.T. gets sick, he goes missing and Elliot’s older brother goes to find him. Find him he does, unconscious laying next to a drainage ditch in the LA suburbs, all pink and fleshy looking like a skinned cow carcass sculpted to look like an alien. I burst into tears and climbed in my mom’s lap. I wanted to go home. Even the messianic resurrection and E.T.’s pick up by the homeboys on the mother ship didn’t undo the damage.

I was literally a full grown adult living on my own before I finally stopped getting butterflies in my stomach each time the lights went down in a movie theater. If I could hang words on that instinctive feeling, they would be, “What the f@#k am I about to get myself into? Another E.T.?”