Andy Gray asks, "What was the first movie you ever saw? And the first time you experienced terror in a movie theater?"
I remember wanting to see a movie in the theater, and not being able to, but I don't know if I had seen a movie before that time or not. I think the movie was Snow White, and Mom and I (and the boys, probably) were walking in a mall, and I saw a poster for the movie and asked if we could see it. It's hard to remember exactly what the place looked like, but I think we were in Turfland Mall, because Mom used to always take us to the Walgreens there.
She said no, and I thought it was unfair, but the truth was we really couldn't afford to go to the movies, and we probably didn't have time, either. What with Mom's 36-hour weekend work schedule and Dad's inconsistent journeyman wireman jobs, it was hard for us to get out a lot.
I do know that one time we managed to see E.T. at a drive-in. I think we had the station wagon at the time, because I remember lying on blankets in the back. You could lower all the seats behind the driver into a flat surface, so I think that's what we did. It was late at night, and I fell asleep. Years later, I finally watched E.T. in its entirety on TV.
There is one other movie memory from my youth that is also my scary movie memory. Mom took us to the theater to see Baby, a movie about a baby dinosaur. Only there were dinosaur hunters in the movie, and during one scene they attack and kill the baby's mother. The scene was so upsetting that we left immediately; I have never seen the whole movie, nor do I have any desire to.
I was always the type to be very sensitive to what happened in the story. Many things scared and upset me. As such, I have avoided standard horror movies into my adulthood.
During college I did discover that I enjoy some thrillers (Breakdown), gory action movies (Desperado), and dark comedies (Grosse Pointe Blank).
It's only in recent years that I've seen films like Carrie (and not in its entirety), Event Horizon (terrible--and not because it was scary, it was just stupid), and Piranha (which was hilarious). As longtime readers know, my attempt at watching Pulp Fiction was unsuccessful.
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3 comments:
That Pulp Fiction post was an interesting read. I know a couple of friends who have had similar reactions to movies. Though only somewhat connected, I can't watch TV shows like 'Everybody Loves Raymond' because as soon as things go wrong or get embarassing, I change the channel or leave the room. It's true for dozens of others TV series.
Since I don't know the original questioner, and I felt like adding my history, I'm going to tell you here.
My first movie, I'd have to say, must have been Dumbo. Now I can't say for sure, because I might have seen other Disney movies when I was much younger, but I do know that I saw Dumbo about a hundred times. It was my favorite movie when I was younger, to the point where I watched it at least weekly to 'calm down', or so I'm told. The reason? Well, maybe it started my attraction to animated works, but it was because of that mouse, Timothy. We shared a name and that was apparently good enough reason for me.
As for my first terror-related moment... I have to say that I always go back to Terminator 2. I was fairly young and my family had gone to the Ex or something and we were in this huge movie theatre with one of those gigantic screens. We walked in right during the narritive prologue, and when the Terminator stomped on that skull, you know, at the start? Well that *CRACK* was so loud and so sudden I jumped, literally. We weren't even in our seats yet, so I jumped right there in the entrance. My little brother started crying, and my mom decided that maybe we should see a nicer movie. ;p
From that point on, I was pretty much a rock when it came to movies. I sat through Alien and Aliens on TV at 2 AM with no problem, though my little brother ran upstairs and almost gave away that I was awake during the stomach ripping scene. I don't watch many 'scary movies' along the horror lines anymore. I just don't enjoy them, since all I'm left with afterwards is the taste of bad scripts and horrible plot points.
Though, I do still have problems with certain thing... The first would have to be E.T. We have this puppet/muppet/stuffed animal thing that they claim looks like a frog. It has this big wide E.T. head though. Well, my little brother is a brat, so he loved to throw the damned thing at me all the time at night. Needless to say, I quickly earned a little paranoia around the thing, and I hate it to death whenever they pull the bloody thing out. So E.T. started that, and now the alien himself creeps me out.
The second would have to be that Rubber Johnny video from a while back. I didn't even WATCH it! The second that creepy face showed up I closed the window, and had that .5 second instance burned into my brain. I had trouble sleeping for a couple of days because I could see it in the dark. <_<
This all leads to one ending question. I wonder how old I was when I finally understood the Pink Elephants scene from Dumbo...
Awesome, thanks for sharing your story!
(By the way, I haven't started on your drawing yet, but I have purchased a sketch pad and pencils, so that's progress...)
I am totally with you on the embarrassing scenes in sitcoms. I haven't seen Everybody Loves Raymond, but I have seen shows where things just get ridiculous and embarrassing and I empathized so much for the character that I just wanted to die. So yes, I changed the channel too :)
Friends was an exception. I watched every single episode of that show, I believe.
I don't remember when I first saw Terminator 2, but it was on video, long after it came out. I think I may have seen it before I saw the original. It ranks as one of my favorite movies now.
I decided not go see Terminator 3, because I figured with all the new special effects they would have found amazing new ways to kill people, and I was a little afraid to see that. That's the same reason I haven't seen the third or fourth Alien movie.
I saw the original Alien when I was either in high school or back home after my first year of college, and I thought it was great. I think Jurassic Park helped prepare me to see that movie, oddly enough.
Ah, Rubber Johnny. If you watch the whole thing, the creepiness is totally voided. It's just stupid. (Or at least, that's how I ended up thinking of it.) The way to keep something creepy is to give it less air time. So you turning off the movie means that it's all the more creepy for you...while those of us who watched the whole thing know that it's pretty dumb ;)
I remember hating the pink elephants scene, because I thought it was stupid and a waste of time. I tended to think that about anything I didn't understand, but in this case I'm pretty sure I did understand what was going on in that scene. In any case, I can't remember ever having an ah-ha! moment for it.
Oh, I totally jumped at that part too!
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