Topic Question
Added 2023-09-02 17:34:41 +0000 UTCWhat movie or movie scene scared you the most as a kid and why?
Comments
The scene of Thirteen Ghosts as Arthor Criticos tells his daughter there's no such thing as ghost; than she puts on the goggles and who is in front of her? The Jackle!!! And it scared the fuck out of me at 11yrs old!! ☠️😱
davis376 .
2024-08-21 00:19:05 +0000 UTCKitchen scene in Jurassic Park had 5 year old me hiding behind the couch, and that was me watching it on vhs in a fully lit living room!!
Jared Angcanan
2023-09-05 02:42:30 +0000 UTCNever heard of this before so I looked it up on YouTube. Absolute nightmare fuel lol
Henri J. Mertens
2023-09-05 02:16:52 +0000 UTCThe ending of Mary Poppins where the old man starts floating, I remember that image being so frightening to me. Had nightmares for weeks
Mees
2023-09-04 22:24:42 +0000 UTCWee Sing Together. I don't know who was in charge of designing those costumes for this kids sing-along movie, but it scared the shit out of my sister and me when we were younger. Even now those costumes creep me out.
Dan L
2023-09-04 21:32:03 +0000 UTCOther than Jaws it would probably be the 'Georgie Scene' from the 1990 version of IT. Not sure how but I managed to see it when I was 11 or 12 and a thing partially hidden in a dark drain luring children to their doom totally freaked me out. Even though we have a different drain system in the UK I made sure to stay well clear of them if I was out and about on my own for a few years after that, just in case.
Ross Skilton
2023-09-03 16:15:13 +0000 UTCYes, that scene was so terrifying. You nailed it.
Lee
2023-09-03 09:29:18 +0000 UTCFor me, it had to be "The Exorcist" which I was allowed to see at waaaay too young an age. The vomiting, the crab walking, the vicious profanity, the neck bones crunching as Regan twists her head around 180 degrees, and worst of all--the horrific mock masturbation scene, as Regan repeatedly stabs herself in the vagina with a crucifix while the demon possessing her yells, "Let Jesus fuck you!" followed by thrusting her mother's face into her bloodied crotch and screaming, "Lick me!" As a young impressionable Catholic kid, that last scene with its combined brutality, sexual violence, and over-the-top blasphemy spun my own little head around more than a few times. I was not only terrified, I was sure I had been spiritually soiled by simply witnessing it. (I think I listed viewing "The Exorcist" among my litany of adolescent sins in my subsequent confession.) I'm not much of a religious person these days, but just thinking about that scene still makes me shudder. 50 years later, I wonder how much that scene would affect a modern audience seeing it for the first time. With Christian religion generally in decline in the West (at least according to polls e.g. from the Pew Research Center), is the combination of blasphemic images & words in horror movies less impactful to this generation of movie goers?
Brian Kelly
2023-09-03 04:59:12 +0000 UTCWhen I was a kid I was horrified by a scene in How the Grinch Stole Christmas (Jim Carrey). At the beginning when you first see the Grinch and he gives that creepy smile. It terrified me when I was younger.
Ken
2023-09-03 01:34:33 +0000 UTCMrs. Baylock visits Katherine in the hospital (The Omen 1976). Mainly because of Billie Whitelaw's eyes and facial expression. She was so good in this role (btw, check out her birth date). But it's pretty much everything about that scene. They did a great job with direction. Closeups, the way light & shadow were used, music set the right tone. Lee Remick had very expressive eyes. All the terror is there. Also build up to Mrs. Baylock's entrance - reflection in the window while Kathy is getting up to change her clothes. Quiet before the storm. Opening Credits from The X-Files scared me a lot too.
Oskitello
2023-09-02 22:03:44 +0000 UTCIn 102 Dalmations, there’s a scene at the end where Cruella gets covered in cake batter and is crawling forward on a conveyer belt trying to grab one of the dalmations. That scene scared the hell outta me for a few years. And I love her but I know this will sound rude. Imagine being a little kid and seeing Glenn Close’s face smiling and cackling while covered in heavy cake batter as well as these spikes sticking out of her head. Terrifying.
Shane Palamara
2023-09-02 21:05:32 +0000 UTCThe ballroom scenes in the 1990 version of The Witches. When the witches, all gathered together away from human eyes, start to take off their disguises and reveal their true grotesque forms, I freaked out when I saw that as a kid. The Grand High Witch in particular, played by Anjelica Huston, is frightening to behold, because she literally rips her face and hair off and reveals a ghastly crone straight out of a storybook illustration, only worse because it’s right there before your eyes in physical form. Things only got scarier from there when the witches, with their bald heads, rotten teeth, and intensely gleaming eyes, catch two boys and force them to drink potion to turn them into mice, sneering and cackling loudly all the while. Those boys’ transformations also freaked me out because, thanks to Jim Henson, it shows all the stages in between as their features become rodent-like and they start twitching and convulsing as the potion takes effect. It’s a lot for a little kid to watch but the sequence certainly is effective. I’ve never forgotten it. The ‘80s and early ‘90s had a lot of dark fantasy films that did not mess around. Lots of kids from that era were most likely traumatized, but I’m sure they hold those movies very near and dear to their hearts, as I do with The Witches.
Bennett Oliver
2023-09-02 19:25:44 +0000 UTCThat was one of my favorite films a decade ago but I haven't seen it since. I didn't even know it was part of a series cause the U.S. title, which is what I saw on TCM, is Five Million Years to Earth.
Wolfman Brandon
2023-09-02 19:01:29 +0000 UTC1953, Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, the dinosaur eating the policeman. I was 8 years old and horrified. This topic reminds me of a horror movie question I've been trying to solve for decades with no satisfactory result. Quatermass and the Pit, 1967. There's something subliminal or atmospheric that unsettles me every fucking time I watch it. Yet, knowing that, and looking for it multiple times, I can't identify it. I'll Patreon you an extra $20 if you can see it or sense it and explain it.
PETER COLLINS
2023-09-02 18:36:06 +0000 UTCSomehow I was never scared by movies as a kid. My lack of understanding for cinema didn't register any genuine emotional response from anything which is funny because the lack of understanding is why kids are scared by certain films in the first place. I first saw Jaws when I was 9 or 10 and it didn't scare me at all but it intrigued me. I was always the kid who would not be phased inside a haunted funhouse while everyone else is screaming around me. While it's very rare, I get scared by more films today despite having a better understanding. The ones that scare me the most don't use or have minimal music during the horrifying scenes like the schoolhouse scene in The Birds, the drowning scene in Leave Her to Heaven, the boy kissing Deborah Kerr in The Innocents, surviving the destroyer in Das Boot, and the climax of Audition.
Wolfman Brandon
2023-09-02 18:22:56 +0000 UTCThe scene in IT (1990) where Pennywise appears as Ben's father standing in the swamp. All of a sudden he has a handfull of balloons and turns into the clown while taunting the kid. Watching that scene on TV at night as a kid scared the hell out of me and I regretted turning it on. It took me over a decade to watch the movie again, only to realize how tame it actually is. As a kid your imagination goes wild with what could happen on screen, it felt like an absolute nightmare.
David
2023-09-02 18:13:01 +0000 UTCNot a specific scene, but the entire kidnapping/sucking out children’s souls through their mouth subplot in Monsters Inc creeped me out. Especially the line “I’ll kidnap a thousand children before I let this company die!” My family lived in Miami at the time, and there was a lot of crime, so I think that’s why that scene stuck in my head as a kid.
Henri J. Mertens
2023-09-02 17:39:48 +0000 UTCHas to be something from the Shining. Probably the first time that Danny rounds the corner to see them standing there. Absolutely terrifying stuff as a kid and, if I'm being honest, as an adult too.
Tyler Shobe
2023-09-02 17:38:00 +0000 UTC
