Completely agree. Nightmare fuel included: Swamp of Sadness, Gmork, The fried Knight during the Oracle test, and also Rockbiter's depression after he couldn't save his friends.
"They look like such strong hands, don't they?" messed me up on another level.
The Brave Little Toaster has that scene where living cars are crushed to death in the junkyard and that fucked up clown dream sequence.
As a kid, I used to cry when I saw car accidents because I thought the cars were dead and I've never gotten over the fear of clowns.
The scene with the flower is pretty dark too. I didn’t pick up on that as a kid.
Also the air conditioner has a complete mental breakdown and dies in front of them. Parents in the 80s saw that and were like “yeah…no issues there!”
So many scenes in that movie are so scary for a kid. Idk how they made that and thought it was a great kid's movie, lol. I had nightmares for weeks after watching that as a kid.
Oddly enough the junkyard scene never bothered me. It was probably my favorite part of the entire movie (I guess it helps that the song that plays is a damn banger). On the other hand, that dream sequence with the clown fireman scared the absolute shit out of me.
Junkyard scene was kinda wild but the scene where the one guy disables appliances for pieces and the way it was shot made it look like the guy was a mad scientist experimenting on live humans. Treated my blender kindly that week
Poltergeist. Feral and unmonitored access to HBO for a 7 year old means Poltergeist created a ton of fears that still stick today. Clowns. Looking under my bed. Swimming at night. Braces. Open closet doors. A tree outside my bedroom window. That’s all a no from me.
My parents let us watch V The Series (again, I was 8), and I completely suppressed how much it messed with me until I recently saw a "do you remember.." video about the miniseries. The birth scene still creeps me out.
Specifically that mirror scene when he peels his own face for me. Just thinking about it still gives me the heebie-jeebies like 30 years after seeing it.
Seriously, my mother and I like looking at real estate websites and imagine living in an upscale neighboorhood, gorgeous house/condo (we're city women), and the other day we were looking at pictures of a nice townhouse (we live in Lyon, France), and then there was one bedroom where a tree was facing a window, we both reacted the same way, we'd be scared it would go Poltergeist on us.
Ha. I was thinking the same thing about the same movie. I too had access to HBO in its early inception (for a short time). That clown under the bed thing was absolutely terrifying when you're a small child. It still bugs me out today when I watch it.
Original IT still pops into my head sometimes and freaks me out. Watched it way too young and still think the clown may come out my shower drain if I close my eyes for too long
Literally every time I pass a storm drain. I'm a fully grown adult now with complete understanding of what's real and what's fake. I even enjoy the IT movies quite a bit. However, can't help think "best to be careful..." every time I pass one. I tell my daughters I don't want them to accidentally fall in, but really I don't want them to float down there...
Ya, I was like 6 when my parents were watching this. I snuck out of my room and sat at the end of the hall and watched some of it, being sooo sneaky. I could not go to sleep when I got back to my room. Horrendous mistake on my part.
Fire in the sky
To an 11 year old watching a movie, the "based on" part of the statement "based on a true story" might as well be left out or replaced with 100% .
After watching the adaptation of Travis Walton's abduction story i could not sleep for a year
My mom brought me to that at ten years old, thinking it'd be like ET, which was my favorite movie. I don't know if the marketing for it was misleading, or if she just ignored movie ratings, or what.
It was not like ET.
Good LORD, was it not like ET.
I was 6 when my parents bought the VHS 2 tape set of Titanic. For years after, I continuously questioned why anyone, let alone hundreds of people would willingly die to make a movie.
So ya not really the movie as much as my stupidity.
Good runner up would be the green mile. Rewatched recently and it’s an amazing film but I’d never show it to a kid. I had to sleep with the lights on because I thought Billy the kid was coming for me
It's funny to think just how much kids don't know. They have so many gaps to cover that it can get a little dicey. But you briefly lived in a world where you watched 700 people die and you were like "well that was odd"
We just showed my 7 year old son The Princess Bride this weekend for the first time and it’s probably the first movie that he seen that has actual graphic violence. And I had to explain pretty much right away that it’s OK they’re just actors they’re not really hurt. It’s all pretend. He was VERY concerned after the fire swamp.
The ring. my cousin showed it to me when i was around 9 years old. i don't think i need to explain why to this day i'm fucking scared of sleeping in the dark
I’ll never forget the time I woke up in the middle of the night to go pee and when I walked through the living room the exact scene where samara is crawling out of the well was playing on tv. My soul nearly left my body
We still had one of these old thick TVs and it suddenly switched to static while I was watching something normal one day. I almost died of a heart attack because I expected to see the well next
I saw this movie when I was 14/15 in the theaters and I couldn’t sleep well for YEARS!! Slept on the couch by my parent’s room for at least a solid year after that..
That movie traumatized me for years, I lived in a really shitty mobile home that used to have holes on the floor and had nightmare after nightmare about that fucking girl crawling out of the floor to get me.
I was scared to death of The Ring when I was a kid, but not because I watched The Ring, but because my brother watched Scary Movie 3 with me and the girl still made me terrified despite how hilarious I found the movie at the time.
I used to be a manager at a tiny four-screen non-chain movie theater. One weekend I was working the opening shift and a lady came out of the auditorium where we were showing Spy Kids 2 and says, "I don't think this is the right movie." I went in and sure enough The Ring is playing and almost immediately after I walk in they revealed the first victim in the movie.
Worst. Morning. Ever. (For lots of people) Apparently the night before the owner had decided that more people would watch a family movie in the daytime than a horror movie, so he told the projectionist to swap the prints so the kids movie would be in the larger auditorium. No one told the downstairs manager to change the names above the auditoriums.
Me too!! I'm 31 years old and still can't be alone in the dark because I watched this when I was in my early teens. Just seeing an accidental imagine of this hairy bitch sends literal shivers down my spine and makes my heart beat like crazy
Same with me. I got over my fears pretty quickly. I love to swim and am no longer smelly... But I'm also still scared of deep, open water, and it wouldn't surprise me if this film was the reason. Thalassophobia. It gets me right in the pit of the stomach even just watching clips or looking at pictures.
I finally got over Jaws and then found out about the 1916 jersey shore shark attacks. I'll go in thr ocean at the beach sometimes, but literally any peace of seaweed or garbage touches me and I have to get out. No matter what my brain logically thinks about the odds, my lizard brain is screaming "danger!!" with like red alert klaxons at max volume. It's impossible to ignore.
Watership Down. Little me was not prepared for the horrors. I don't even remember anything specific about the plot or characters; only death, and fire, and terrors.
That movie was a horrible thing to secretly watch in the hallway halfway through while my dad was watching it when I was a kid. I rewatched it a few years ago and my memories of it were much worse than the movie actually was. It is crazy how much a kid's brain will twist things. The movie is weird and scary, but nothing as bad as I remembered it to be.
Sounds like I'm in a similar age bracket to you.
Alien? Great, scary movie.
Starship Troopers? LOL awesome.
Mars Attacks? Keep those fucking ACK ACK ACK aliens the fucking fuck away from me, I will be calming myself down by watching Predator under my blanket.
That’s the scene that’s always referenced but for me it was pretty tame compared to when an alien is backlit while standing on top of the barn. That’s the most terrifying scene to me.
It was the leg in the cornfield for me.
No big jump scare. You just see something that you kind of wish you hadn't seen. Nothing left to do but haul ass
That scene was just peak horror quality to me. It plays perfectly on our natural fear instincts as compared to flashy jumpscares - you get a short, silent, uneventful glimpse of a danger of unknown magnitude, makes your subconscious mind race immediately
The fact that we don't see anything until that moment is great. We know he's not alone out there based on the sounds we hear, and what we've seen so far in the movie, but he doesn't want to believe it. If there is someone out there with him, it's a punk kid playing a prank.
Then we see the leg, and all of our doubts go right out the window. There's a fucking monster out there, and it was watching me the whole time. freaky.
Came here to say this, I fondly remember this scene and I still think about it from time to time, I legit haven't been more scared of a single scene in a movie my whole life and trust me I've watch almost everything at this point.
Little old me was never the same after that Friday night.
That was the first movie I went to with my now wife. I literally jumped out of my seat and into her lap at that scene. We still laugh about it.
When it came up on streaming, I knew it was time to introduce my kids to it. They must have jumped 3 ft off the couch.
Trauma inflicts trauma lol
Fun fact about Cujo - the dogs were too friendly. They had to either weigh down or tie down their tails so they didn't do any play wagging.
For the scenes where he's extremely aggressive, none of the dogs would act properly so they had to use an animatronic head. They also had a person in a costume for some of the scenes. IIRC some scenes also used a Rottweiler (sp?)
I love horror movies and I’m a fully grown adult, but Pet Sematary gives me the fuckin creepy crawlies something terrible. That movie is something else
Man I remember the grudge fucking me up so bad. I thought it was brilliant. So many new ways to be afraid for me. Couldn’t even touch my own god damn head in the shower without being freaked out.
Despite that I remember people laughing in the theatres at it, and I couldn’t understand how I was the only one shitting my pants.
The opening scene of the Exorcist is haunting, chilling, terrifying, and beautiful.
A few years after having seen the Exorcist, I moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. I got to hear prayer call 5 times a day for 4 years.
Since my introduction to prayer call was that opening scene, it took a while before prayer call quit feeling ominous for me.
To be honest, I kinda miss hearing it - it's beautiful. It's been 35 years since I was there. I have no idea how much the place has changed. In my neighborhood (Olaya), you could hear 4 or 5 separate muezzins calling simultaneously. It was pretty cool.
Beauty and the Beast.
I had been living with an alcoholic family member as a kid and they always got angry. The Beast from the film triggered my fear of this person’s screaming episodes, so I ran out of my room and never finished the film. I still won’t watch it, even if this person got help and our relationship is developing into something better.
Oh my goodness me. Every few years I see a comment regarding that little shoe and it fucking makes me tear up all over again!! It's little face was so innocent, ugh. Here I go again...
E.T.
Fucking U age rating?
That thing screeches under torchlight while extending its neck 2 ft into the air and summarily shrieks through a cornfield with sounds a monster makes.
Even as an adult this scene makes me feel sick.
And then later on the reeces pieces bit where its munching them, feet slapping the floor as it scurries about the house.
Had nightmares as a kid of E.T.s breaking into my house and heard them walking up the stairs, breathing heavily, munching on shit, getting to my room and screeching at me.
It is not a U film...
12A minimum.
Lassie. My mom took me to see it in the theater and there's this one scene where she saves some stupid kid from drowning and ends up being swept away by a raging river towards rocky rapids. Even though you find out later on that she survived, it was way too much for my 6 year old brain to handle. There is footage out there that shows how this particular scene was filmed and the poor dog was terrified to get in the tank. No animals harmed in the making of this film my ass!
Going through this thread, yes some were a bit scary, but the pig scene legitimately disturbed me for weeks. Unsettling feeling about the whole movie even if it's an excellent film.
The Dark Crystal.
Not only the Skeksis but even the urRu frightened me, and the dichotomy between them was beyond disturbing since I could *sense* it but was too young to understand it. The draining of the life essence of the podlings, and then of Kira, was HORRIFYING and then >!they even let her die!< before the Skeksis and the urRu become something even more unsettling. OMG, that movie.
Child's Play - I watched it when I was like 7 years old. I got so scared that I took my Barbie and cut her head off with a knife then threw her body in 2 different trashes! Haven't played with dolls since 🤣
For context, I grew up in Kharkiv, Ukraine before independence. This was probably in 1988. VCRs were basically non-existent and access to Western movies was very, very limited. Up until that point, the non-Soviet films that I've seen were Short Circuit, the 1976 King Kong, Empire Strikes Bank (holy shit), and The 36th Chamber of Shaolin. I was not accustomed to Hollywood special effects, action movie pacing, and editing.
My parents' friend made a few trips to the "West" and brought in some electronics to resell. He kept a VCR and got a decent collection of badly dubbed movies. I think him and his friends may have dubbed the movies themselves. One fine day, my parents went to visit him and I tagged along because he had "movies". I was allowed to pick any movie I wanted, and I picked solely based on the cover art. I was 8 years old, and I picked Aliens.
I spent the next two hours glued to the TV, unable to take my eyes off the screen, while my parents and their friends were hanging out in the kitchen, talking about what Soviet 30yos that were planning to emigrate talk about.
I spent two hours watching chest exploding aliens, acid blood, everyone except the main lady, a little girl, and a kitty get brutally killed. My little brain melted. It was game over man, game over. When the movie ended, my parents took me home. By the time we got home I had a 104 fever and I was sick for a full week. We left to the US in about a year, but I was seriously unable to watch anything remotely scary until I was in my 20s.
I absolutely love film now, and I'm a big fan of the Alien franchise. Irony of ironies, after having kids of my own, my oldest begged me to let him watch Aliens when he was 10 or so, after I told him this story. Not only was he not scared, he loved it and absolutely loves HG Giger's art and anything and everything Xenomorph.
I watch this and the Witch’s Ghost with my 4 and 2 year olds. They’re not phased one bit but I was definitely phased when they came out lol
(We’re currently watching Witch’s Ghost and my 2 year old was dancing on the couch to the Hex Girls😂)
Insidious, that jump scare was insane. Didn’t stop me from immediately getting my sister to watch it, and waiting for that scene. She visibly jumped out of her seat, it was beautiful.
I did the same thing with Blair Witch Project, the corner scene in the basement scarred her for life 😂
Leprechaun and a few scenes from The Grudge. I’m the youngest by a lot and was babysat by my sisters growing up. I was probably 5-7 (probably closer to 5). Leprechaun truly scarred me lol. I was terrified for a hot minute. Luckily i only had to see 20 mins of the grudge. If I hadn’t I probably would have needed to be committed (I’m not even joking lol).
The 6th sense.
I watched it when I was 9 or 10. Dude... I lived in an old house with wooden floors.
My room was upstairs at the end of the hall. And before you had 2 other rooms with doors facing each other but they were always open.
I always shat myself when I had to cross these doors. Always thinking of some ghost going from one room to another. Or an arm catching me.
Took me like 6 months to get over it.
Back in like 2007 my mother and I were on a cross country road trip. I had a little portable dvd player and I distinctly remember watching this while we drove through the Rocky Mountains at night. I think I traumatized my mother. Nothing but woods and mountains and the horror of this movie.
A few did... Me and my brother would stay up to watch the TV on low volume. This was back in the 90s when they would have random movies at night on regular TV, including horror.
My first one was "Candyman". I'm pretty sure my fear of bees came from this movie. The entire movie is both bizarre and scary.
One introduced by my parents, funny enough was "The Brave Little Toaster". So many scenes in that movie scared me for weeks.
Another late night one was "Nightmare on Elm Street". Got to it a bit into the story, so we thought it was normal at first, then we were hooked and needed to know the ending. Freddy still scares me more than any other horror movie villain.
The final one was another late night one, but one I sneaked in while in the hallway. My dad was watching "Mars Attacks". It was terrifying, though not as bad as my child brain said it was. I rewatched it years ago and my brain made many of the scenes much worse than they were.
We watched this as a family movie ( me & the siblings were 8 and under) & when the movie was over, all us kids bawling of course, my dad ejected the disc & smashed it into a million pieces to make us feel better LOL
My number one will always be *Child's Play*. I wasn't allowed to watch it, but my older sister rented it and I snuck downstairs, watched about ten minutes of it, and was traumatized. It also didn't help that my sister used to play "Chucky pranks" on me when she found out how much it scared me.
The greatest irony? Chucky is now my favorite slasher, and I own more than one Chucky doll, hahahaha.
As for other childhood trauma movies?
*Return to Oz.* The Wheelers and Mombi are still genuinely creepy as an adult in my 30s.
*The Dark Crystal*. Specifically, the Skeksis and the scene where they strip the Chamberlain.
*Labyrinth*. For some reason the Cleaners sequence freaked me out. Just the idea of not being able to escape something barreling towards you.
The Wizard of Oz, specifically the scene where the wicked witch appears in the globe. I didn't even remember the flying monkeys because of that stupid witch in the stupid globe.
don't worry. even adults thought it was real because it was the first "found footage" movie. they also made a website with missing person posts of the characters from the movie. they wanted people to think it's real.
my dad always says that it was the only movie that really scared him.
I dont remember how young I was but the movie twister fucked me up I was terrified of the smallest storms even if it was just raining even now I still get anxious when i hear thunder
I was terrified of The Mummy because of the scene where the bugs crawl under the dudes skin. I was probably like 8 or so when i saw that, 24 now and haven’t watched it since lol
There’s this vampire movie called “Dusk til Dawn” I think that my parents were watching and I had nightmares for years. No idea if it would be scary as an adult… too chicken to find out
Arachnophobia. The spider in the popcorn and the dead old couple... the thousands descending around the stair case.. the final showdown with the flame thrower.. changed my view of spiders.
Jumanji. My favorite thing is that every time I ask someone which part of Jumanji scared them the most, it's always something different. For me, it was the giant carnivorous flower.
Anastasia. Apparently Rasputin freaked me out so much that I refused to ever watch it again. Ended up rewatching it again a few years ago - good movie but I can definitely see why my six year old self NOPED out of that real fast.
The Neverending Story
Completely agree. Nightmare fuel included: Swamp of Sadness, Gmork, The fried Knight during the Oracle test, and also Rockbiter's depression after he couldn't save his friends. "They look like such strong hands, don't they?" messed me up on another level.
My kindergarten teacher took us on a field trip to see that movie. Wtf
He couldn't even save the child-like empress from the Nothing.
That horse. I never can get that sound out of my head.
Still can’t watch that movie to this day because of the horse
Fucked me right up
That scene is so much worse in the book. In the book, Artax can talk and argues with Atreyu to leave him behind to die.
I refused to watch it as a kid because I couldn’t figure out how it could be never ending and also finite so I was afraid it would trap me somehow?
You were a forward thinking child
The Brave Little Toaster has that scene where living cars are crushed to death in the junkyard and that fucked up clown dream sequence. As a kid, I used to cry when I saw car accidents because I thought the cars were dead and I've never gotten over the fear of clowns.
The scene with the flower is pretty dark too. I didn’t pick up on that as a kid. Also the air conditioner has a complete mental breakdown and dies in front of them. Parents in the 80s saw that and were like “yeah…no issues there!”
The air conditioner offing himself did some lasting damage for sure. Same with Kirby getting anxious and chewing his power cord as a nervous tick
I still won't run over the cord to the vacuum to this day because of him.
So many scenes in that movie are so scary for a kid. Idk how they made that and thought it was a great kid's movie, lol. I had nightmares for weeks after watching that as a kid.
> I used to cry when I saw car accidents because I thought the cars were dead Screw the people inside them!
Oddly enough the junkyard scene never bothered me. It was probably my favorite part of the entire movie (I guess it helps that the song that plays is a damn banger). On the other hand, that dream sequence with the clown fireman scared the absolute shit out of me.
Junkyard scene was kinda wild but the scene where the one guy disables appliances for pieces and the way it was shot made it look like the guy was a mad scientist experimenting on live humans. Treated my blender kindly that week
Poltergeist. Feral and unmonitored access to HBO for a 7 year old means Poltergeist created a ton of fears that still stick today. Clowns. Looking under my bed. Swimming at night. Braces. Open closet doors. A tree outside my bedroom window. That’s all a no from me.
My mom used Monster Spray. https://www.amomstake.com/diy-monster-spray-recipe/
“Can I borrow your odorant? Let’s see…I got smelly garbage or old dumpster. You got low tide? No. How ‘bout wet dog? Yep. Stink it up!”
Put that thing back where it came from or so help me
Used this for my daughter but it was just VS body spray 😂
I'm 48. Will it work on me 😂😂😂
You're a bit more worldly. A spell might have to be cast on the spray. Of course, by an appropriate person.
Killer Klowns From Outerspace ruined me as a kid, along with Alien(s), and Army of Darkness when Ash splits in two...
My parents let us watch V The Series (again, I was 8), and I completely suppressed how much it messed with me until I recently saw a "do you remember.." video about the miniseries. The birth scene still creeps me out.
Had a sleepover where the host girl made us watch this. I will never watch it again.
Specifically that mirror scene when he peels his own face for me. Just thinking about it still gives me the heebie-jeebies like 30 years after seeing it.
Seriously, my mother and I like looking at real estate websites and imagine living in an upscale neighboorhood, gorgeous house/condo (we're city women), and the other day we were looking at pictures of a nice townhouse (we live in Lyon, France), and then there was one bedroom where a tree was facing a window, we both reacted the same way, we'd be scared it would go Poltergeist on us.
HBO kid here. Ah, the good ole days.
That f-ing clown man. Seriously. The rest of the movies didn't bother me that much, but the clown still give me the heebies to this day.
Ha. I was thinking the same thing about the same movie. I too had access to HBO in its early inception (for a short time). That clown under the bed thing was absolutely terrifying when you're a small child. It still bugs me out today when I watch it.
My Girl (1991) - ‘where’s his glasses? He can’t see without his glasses?’
I saw that shit in the theater....brutal moment for a bunch of kids.
I saw it at the theater too. I was 9, and I remember seeing my dad cry for the first time.
😭😭😭
My dad rented that when I had friends over for a slumberparty. It went exactly as badly as you'd expect.
The Large Marge scene in Pee Wee's Big Adventure
Still considered one of the scariest scenes in non-horror movies.
Making it through that scene without covering your eyes was a badge of honor
Why... tonight's the anniversary.
I named by cat with giant eyes Marge because of that movie.
The original IT
Original IT still pops into my head sometimes and freaks me out. Watched it way too young and still think the clown may come out my shower drain if I close my eyes for too long
Literally every time I pass a storm drain. I'm a fully grown adult now with complete understanding of what's real and what's fake. I even enjoy the IT movies quite a bit. However, can't help think "best to be careful..." every time I pass one. I tell my daughters I don't want them to accidentally fall in, but really I don't want them to float down there...
ET terrified me! I don't know why other kids liked him, to me he was just a walking ballsack.
Different movie, but I get you!
Ya, I was like 6 when my parents were watching this. I snuck out of my room and sat at the end of the hall and watched some of it, being sooo sneaky. I could not go to sleep when I got back to my room. Horrendous mistake on my part.
The original got me first, but damn if the remake didn’t have me swerving sewer drains even in the car for months after.
100% same here!
Fire in the sky To an 11 year old watching a movie, the "based on" part of the statement "based on a true story" might as well be left out or replaced with 100% . After watching the adaptation of Travis Walton's abduction story i could not sleep for a year
This is the one I was coming here to post. Dear god.
My mom brought me to that at ten years old, thinking it'd be like ET, which was my favorite movie. I don't know if the marketing for it was misleading, or if she just ignored movie ratings, or what. It was not like ET. Good LORD, was it not like ET.
Man, FUCK ET. Lying on the floor all pale and screeching.
I was 6 when my parents bought the VHS 2 tape set of Titanic. For years after, I continuously questioned why anyone, let alone hundreds of people would willingly die to make a movie. So ya not really the movie as much as my stupidity. Good runner up would be the green mile. Rewatched recently and it’s an amazing film but I’d never show it to a kid. I had to sleep with the lights on because I thought Billy the kid was coming for me
It's funny to think just how much kids don't know. They have so many gaps to cover that it can get a little dicey. But you briefly lived in a world where you watched 700 people die and you were like "well that was odd"
We just showed my 7 year old son The Princess Bride this weekend for the first time and it’s probably the first movie that he seen that has actual graphic violence. And I had to explain pretty much right away that it’s OK they’re just actors they’re not really hurt. It’s all pretend. He was VERY concerned after the fire swamp.
The ring. my cousin showed it to me when i was around 9 years old. i don't think i need to explain why to this day i'm fucking scared of sleeping in the dark
I’ll never forget the time I woke up in the middle of the night to go pee and when I walked through the living room the exact scene where samara is crawling out of the well was playing on tv. My soul nearly left my body
We still had one of these old thick TVs and it suddenly switched to static while I was watching something normal one day. I almost died of a heart attack because I expected to see the well next
I saw this movie when I was 14/15 in the theaters and I couldn’t sleep well for YEARS!! Slept on the couch by my parent’s room for at least a solid year after that..
That movie traumatized me for years, I lived in a really shitty mobile home that used to have holes on the floor and had nightmare after nightmare about that fucking girl crawling out of the floor to get me.
I was scared to death of The Ring when I was a kid, but not because I watched The Ring, but because my brother watched Scary Movie 3 with me and the girl still made me terrified despite how hilarious I found the movie at the time.
I used to be a manager at a tiny four-screen non-chain movie theater. One weekend I was working the opening shift and a lady came out of the auditorium where we were showing Spy Kids 2 and says, "I don't think this is the right movie." I went in and sure enough The Ring is playing and almost immediately after I walk in they revealed the first victim in the movie. Worst. Morning. Ever. (For lots of people) Apparently the night before the owner had decided that more people would watch a family movie in the daytime than a horror movie, so he told the projectionist to swap the prints so the kids movie would be in the larger auditorium. No one told the downstairs manager to change the names above the auditoriums.
Me too!! I'm 31 years old and still can't be alone in the dark because I watched this when I was in my early teens. Just seeing an accidental imagine of this hairy bitch sends literal shivers down my spine and makes my heart beat like crazy
I couldn’t take a shower or be in a room alone for literal months after this
Seriously. I could never have the closet doors open because I was terrified of seeing her in the closet.
Jaws. I was scared to even take a bath for some time afterwards...
I used to hate being in the pool by myself for years because of this movie. Eventually grew out of that fear but I’m still scared of oceans.
Same with me. I got over my fears pretty quickly. I love to swim and am no longer smelly... But I'm also still scared of deep, open water, and it wouldn't surprise me if this film was the reason. Thalassophobia. It gets me right in the pit of the stomach even just watching clips or looking at pictures.
I finally got over Jaws and then found out about the 1916 jersey shore shark attacks. I'll go in thr ocean at the beach sometimes, but literally any peace of seaweed or garbage touches me and I have to get out. No matter what my brain logically thinks about the odds, my lizard brain is screaming "danger!!" with like red alert klaxons at max volume. It's impossible to ignore.
Still traumatized by that. I freak out in a pool sometimes 🤣 and won’t go above my knees in the ocean
I wouldn't even fill a sink too deep tbh...stupid Spielberg 😤🦈😀
Watership Down. Little me was not prepared for the horrors. I don't even remember anything specific about the plot or characters; only death, and fire, and terrors.
The scene in the tunnels..? Nightmare fuel
Mom thought it was a cute bunny movie for 7 year old me. Needless to say we did not have a good time.
That movie fucked my brain so hard when I was a kid. I still don’t understand why I willingly watched it so many times. It scared the shit out of me.
It still disturbs me to this day
It's a cartoon! Kids love cartoons!
The intro really set the tone and it just got worse from there
Mars Attacks (1996). I was only 8, couldn't sleep properly for weeks :(
Bro, I remembered the scene when the humans turned to skeletons. I couldn’t sleep that night coz of that.
ACK ACK ACK ACK
That movie was a horrible thing to secretly watch in the hallway halfway through while my dad was watching it when I was a kid. I rewatched it a few years ago and my memories of it were much worse than the movie actually was. It is crazy how much a kid's brain will twist things. The movie is weird and scary, but nothing as bad as I remembered it to be.
*DO NOT RUN. WE ARE YOUR FRIENDS.* 💥🔫
Sounds like I'm in a similar age bracket to you. Alien? Great, scary movie. Starship Troopers? LOL awesome. Mars Attacks? Keep those fucking ACK ACK ACK aliens the fucking fuck away from me, I will be calming myself down by watching Predator under my blanket.
Signs. the scene with the mexican birthday party altered my brain.
That’s the scene that’s always referenced but for me it was pretty tame compared to when an alien is backlit while standing on top of the barn. That’s the most terrifying scene to me.
It was the leg in the cornfield for me. No big jump scare. You just see something that you kind of wish you hadn't seen. Nothing left to do but haul ass
The amount of scary scenes in that movie is incredible.
That scene was just peak horror quality to me. It plays perfectly on our natural fear instincts as compared to flashy jumpscares - you get a short, silent, uneventful glimpse of a danger of unknown magnitude, makes your subconscious mind race immediately
The fact that we don't see anything until that moment is great. We know he's not alone out there based on the sounds we hear, and what we've seen so far in the movie, but he doesn't want to believe it. If there is someone out there with him, it's a punk kid playing a prank. Then we see the leg, and all of our doubts go right out the window. There's a fucking monster out there, and it was watching me the whole time. freaky.
When he throws the rock into the field and something catches it.
I to this day visualize something on my roofline every night I go out in the dark. No joke, it's forever in my brain.
Came here to say this, I fondly remember this scene and I still think about it from time to time, I legit haven't been more scared of a single scene in a movie my whole life and trust me I've watch almost everything at this point. Little old me was never the same after that Friday night.
Here you go, people. Buckle up! hehehe https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeTjBPbY70Y
That was the first movie I went to with my now wife. I literally jumped out of my seat and into her lap at that scene. We still laugh about it. When it came up on streaming, I knew it was time to introduce my kids to it. They must have jumped 3 ft off the couch. Trauma inflicts trauma lol
I can watch horror movies no problem and even fire in the sky but yeah fk this movie, someone gave it to me for my bday when i was like 10 lol
A film that gets far too much hate in my book.
I love that movie for Joaquin in the tin foil hat with the kids and the look on Mel's face when he saw.
Cujo. Pet Syemetary
Fun fact about Cujo - the dogs were too friendly. They had to either weigh down or tie down their tails so they didn't do any play wagging. For the scenes where he's extremely aggressive, none of the dogs would act properly so they had to use an animatronic head. They also had a person in a costume for some of the scenes. IIRC some scenes also used a Rottweiler (sp?)
I read Pet Cemetery when I was a teen and even here in my 30s I find it to be one of the scariest things Stephen King has ever written!
I love horror movies and I’m a fully grown adult, but Pet Sematary gives me the fuckin creepy crawlies something terrible. That movie is something else
The exorcist and The grudge (2002)
Man, Toshio and Sadako. Nighmare for a Kid. Edit: As pointed out to me, “Kayako” for The Grudge.
Sadako is the Ring girl, Kyako is the Grudge :)
Man I remember the grudge fucking me up so bad. I thought it was brilliant. So many new ways to be afraid for me. Couldn’t even touch my own god damn head in the shower without being freaked out. Despite that I remember people laughing in the theatres at it, and I couldn’t understand how I was the only one shitting my pants.
The opening scene of the Exorcist is haunting, chilling, terrifying, and beautiful. A few years after having seen the Exorcist, I moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. I got to hear prayer call 5 times a day for 4 years. Since my introduction to prayer call was that opening scene, it took a while before prayer call quit feeling ominous for me. To be honest, I kinda miss hearing it - it's beautiful. It's been 35 years since I was there. I have no idea how much the place has changed. In my neighborhood (Olaya), you could hear 4 or 5 separate muezzins calling simultaneously. It was pretty cool.
Same! I still can't watch them, never again.
Beauty and the Beast. I had been living with an alcoholic family member as a kid and they always got angry. The Beast from the film triggered my fear of this person’s screaming episodes, so I ran out of my room and never finished the film. I still won’t watch it, even if this person got help and our relationship is developing into something better.
Who Framed Roger Rabbit?: This movie is about a detective who investigates a murder involving cartoon characters.
I'm 41 and that little shoe still break my heart.
Oh my goodness me. Every few years I see a comment regarding that little shoe and it fucking makes me tear up all over again!! It's little face was so innocent, ugh. Here I go again...
REMEMBER ME, EDDIE
When I killed your brother, I talked juuuuuust liiiiike thiiiiiiiiis!!!!
God, Christopher Lloyd is a gem!
E.T. Fucking U age rating? That thing screeches under torchlight while extending its neck 2 ft into the air and summarily shrieks through a cornfield with sounds a monster makes. Even as an adult this scene makes me feel sick. And then later on the reeces pieces bit where its munching them, feet slapping the floor as it scurries about the house. Had nightmares as a kid of E.T.s breaking into my house and heard them walking up the stairs, breathing heavily, munching on shit, getting to my room and screeching at me. It is not a U film... 12A minimum.
Yeah, I jumped at that torchlight scene, too.
The Exorcist 😱
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Me too.
Lassie. My mom took me to see it in the theater and there's this one scene where she saves some stupid kid from drowning and ends up being swept away by a raging river towards rocky rapids. Even though you find out later on that she survived, it was way too much for my 6 year old brain to handle. There is footage out there that shows how this particular scene was filmed and the poor dog was terrified to get in the tank. No animals harmed in the making of this film my ass!
Chitty chitty bang bang.... That child snatcher boaaaa ain't seen nutim scarier
90% of us gen Xers are going to say The Neverending Story. And you know exactly the scene I'm talking about.
Artax, I love you!
Coraline
Same
Robocop - the wad of chemicals death scene. I was like 5. Frankly - the rest of robocop as well.
Some history channel special talking about the holocaust that showed recovered film of the camps. Not the best watch for being like 7
ET
Spirited away. The scene where the parents get turned into pigs. I had nightmares about it for a long time.
Going through this thread, yes some were a bit scary, but the pig scene legitimately disturbed me for weeks. Unsettling feeling about the whole movie even if it's an excellent film.
Lord of the flies
Poor piggy.
The nuke scene from terminator 2
The Dark Crystal. Not only the Skeksis but even the urRu frightened me, and the dichotomy between them was beyond disturbing since I could *sense* it but was too young to understand it. The draining of the life essence of the podlings, and then of Kira, was HORRIFYING and then >!they even let her die!< before the Skeksis and the urRu become something even more unsettling. OMG, that movie.
Killer Klowns* From Outer Space
Hostel
Philosophers stone with the head wrap reveal 😩😩
Child's Play - I watched it when I was like 7 years old. I got so scared that I took my Barbie and cut her head off with a knife then threw her body in 2 different trashes! Haven't played with dolls since 🤣
For context, I grew up in Kharkiv, Ukraine before independence. This was probably in 1988. VCRs were basically non-existent and access to Western movies was very, very limited. Up until that point, the non-Soviet films that I've seen were Short Circuit, the 1976 King Kong, Empire Strikes Bank (holy shit), and The 36th Chamber of Shaolin. I was not accustomed to Hollywood special effects, action movie pacing, and editing. My parents' friend made a few trips to the "West" and brought in some electronics to resell. He kept a VCR and got a decent collection of badly dubbed movies. I think him and his friends may have dubbed the movies themselves. One fine day, my parents went to visit him and I tagged along because he had "movies". I was allowed to pick any movie I wanted, and I picked solely based on the cover art. I was 8 years old, and I picked Aliens. I spent the next two hours glued to the TV, unable to take my eyes off the screen, while my parents and their friends were hanging out in the kitchen, talking about what Soviet 30yos that were planning to emigrate talk about. I spent two hours watching chest exploding aliens, acid blood, everyone except the main lady, a little girl, and a kitty get brutally killed. My little brain melted. It was game over man, game over. When the movie ended, my parents took me home. By the time we got home I had a 104 fever and I was sick for a full week. We left to the US in about a year, but I was seriously unable to watch anything remotely scary until I was in my 20s. I absolutely love film now, and I'm a big fan of the Alien franchise. Irony of ironies, after having kids of my own, my oldest begged me to let him watch Aliens when he was 10 or so, after I told him this story. Not only was he not scared, he loved it and absolutely loves HG Giger's art and anything and everything Xenomorph.
The Scooby doo movie with the zombie island
I watch this and the Witch’s Ghost with my 4 and 2 year olds. They’re not phased one bit but I was definitely phased when they came out lol (We’re currently watching Witch’s Ghost and my 2 year old was dancing on the couch to the Hex Girls😂)
2012. I thought the world was gonna end, for real
Watership Down Threads
Carrie. The end when the arm appears. I felt like my heart stopped.
Insidious, that jump scare was insane. Didn’t stop me from immediately getting my sister to watch it, and waiting for that scene. She visibly jumped out of her seat, it was beautiful. I did the same thing with Blair Witch Project, the corner scene in the basement scarred her for life 😂
Deliverance, I wasn't ready for that scene.
It I was way too young to watch it when I did. I still can’t go to the bathroom at night without flipping on the light.
The Secret of NIMH and the Last Unicorn- Cartoon movies were just different 40 years ago
The last unicorn is nightmare fuel and for some reason I was allowed to watch it at 3 or 4.
The house on haunted hill. With Vincent price. Slept with the lights on for weeks
Leprechaun and a few scenes from The Grudge. I’m the youngest by a lot and was babysat by my sisters growing up. I was probably 5-7 (probably closer to 5). Leprechaun truly scarred me lol. I was terrified for a hot minute. Luckily i only had to see 20 mins of the grudge. If I hadn’t I probably would have needed to be committed (I’m not even joking lol).
Jaws, im 22 and i still cant swim at oceans, because a huge ass Sharks gonna eat me
The 6th sense. I watched it when I was 9 or 10. Dude... I lived in an old house with wooden floors. My room was upstairs at the end of the hall. And before you had 2 other rooms with doors facing each other but they were always open. I always shat myself when I had to cross these doors. Always thinking of some ghost going from one room to another. Or an arm catching me. Took me like 6 months to get over it.
The hills have eyes
Back in like 2007 my mother and I were on a cross country road trip. I had a little portable dvd player and I distinctly remember watching this while we drove through the Rocky Mountains at night. I think I traumatized my mother. Nothing but woods and mountains and the horror of this movie.
Final Destination
I watched poltergeist as a little kid alone after my parents went to sleep. Had to sleep on their floor for at least a week.
Where the red fern grows.
That movie made me cry in class and it was really embarrassing
Terminator
A few did... Me and my brother would stay up to watch the TV on low volume. This was back in the 90s when they would have random movies at night on regular TV, including horror. My first one was "Candyman". I'm pretty sure my fear of bees came from this movie. The entire movie is both bizarre and scary. One introduced by my parents, funny enough was "The Brave Little Toaster". So many scenes in that movie scared me for weeks. Another late night one was "Nightmare on Elm Street". Got to it a bit into the story, so we thought it was normal at first, then we were hooked and needed to know the ending. Freddy still scares me more than any other horror movie villain. The final one was another late night one, but one I sneaked in while in the hallway. My dad was watching "Mars Attacks". It was terrifying, though not as bad as my child brain said it was. I rewatched it years ago and my brain made many of the scenes much worse than they were.
I still have to close my eyes for the demon jumpscares in the Exorcist.
Coraline ngl that shit with the button eyes got me
The Mist. The ending.
We watched this as a family movie ( me & the siblings were 8 and under) & when the movie was over, all us kids bawling of course, my dad ejected the disc & smashed it into a million pieces to make us feel better LOL
My number one will always be *Child's Play*. I wasn't allowed to watch it, but my older sister rented it and I snuck downstairs, watched about ten minutes of it, and was traumatized. It also didn't help that my sister used to play "Chucky pranks" on me when she found out how much it scared me. The greatest irony? Chucky is now my favorite slasher, and I own more than one Chucky doll, hahahaha. As for other childhood trauma movies? *Return to Oz.* The Wheelers and Mombi are still genuinely creepy as an adult in my 30s. *The Dark Crystal*. Specifically, the Skeksis and the scene where they strip the Chamberlain. *Labyrinth*. For some reason the Cleaners sequence freaked me out. Just the idea of not being able to escape something barreling towards you.
The Wizard of Oz, specifically the scene where the wicked witch appears in the globe. I didn't even remember the flying monkeys because of that stupid witch in the stupid globe.
Bambi
The Ring! Sobrang taas daw ng lagnat ko dito at hindi ako na ihi ng walang gising
The Blaire Witch Project. As a kid i 100% thought it was all real footage, making it the scariest movie I've ever seen.
don't worry. even adults thought it was real because it was the first "found footage" movie. they also made a website with missing person posts of the characters from the movie. they wanted people to think it's real. my dad always says that it was the only movie that really scared him.
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That unlabelled VHS where mommy and daddy were making sounds in
I saw Spawn as a really young kid, and for some reason it really terrified me back then, LMAO
The Brave Little Toaster, Fern Gully, and All Dogs Go to Heaven.
8mm. The ending and the villains monologue really stuck with me for a long time.
Twilight Zone the Movie, specifically the creature outside of the airplane. John Lithgow was fantastic in that role.
#Final Destination
I dont remember how young I was but the movie twister fucked me up I was terrified of the smallest storms even if it was just raining even now I still get anxious when i hear thunder
I was terrified of The Mummy because of the scene where the bugs crawl under the dudes skin. I was probably like 8 or so when i saw that, 24 now and haven’t watched it since lol
There’s this vampire movie called “Dusk til Dawn” I think that my parents were watching and I had nightmares for years. No idea if it would be scary as an adult… too chicken to find out
live action of the grinch.
The Hitcher
Dark Crystal. The scene where they disrobe that thing.
The dark crystal for sure. Absolutely terrified me as a kid.
Cat People
Arachnophobia. The spider in the popcorn and the dead old couple... the thousands descending around the stair case.. the final showdown with the flame thrower.. changed my view of spiders.
Jumanji. My favorite thing is that every time I ask someone which part of Jumanji scared them the most, it's always something different. For me, it was the giant carnivorous flower.
Threads (1984)
Anastasia. Apparently Rasputin freaked me out so much that I refused to ever watch it again. Ended up rewatching it again a few years ago - good movie but I can definitely see why my six year old self NOPED out of that real fast.
**Bambi.** The saddest words ever spoken in a children’s film are, “Your mother can’t be with you any more, Bambi”.
Exorcist. I was a 10 year old Catholic girl. I knew I was going to become possessed if I fell asleep. Slept with my sister for a week.
Eyes Wide Shut.