Give Me A Good Old-Fashioned Scary Movie Anytime
I am a sucker for a scary movie. It seems, though, that when I want to watch one, I have to go back to the past. The current scary movies are missing one essential element – any meaning whatsover. Give me an old scary movie anytime. Here are a list of my favorites and why I love them. You’ll see that although they all have the prerequisite scary, suspenseful music as well as jump out of your seat scary moments, they all make a bit of sense and some of them may even have a message.
Psycho – This is the scariest movie of all time in my opinion. When I first saw this movie, I had no idea whatsoever what it was about. When Janet Leigh sits eating a sandwich with Norman Bates and Norman says, “A boys best friend is his mother” even my 12 year old mind knew something was up. A few moments later his calm, cool facade cracks and he is mad a Leigh, saying, “Oh, people suggest ever so delicately (that he put his mother away)” and it was clear that something was not right with this kid. I could never have guessed that seconds later Leigh would be murdered in the shower – no blood, no gore – just images of a slashing knife and crazy heart-pumping music.
Lesson: Don’t stop off at a vacant motel in the middle of the night, eat sandwiches with strangers, or comment on other people’s mothers.
Halloween – The original. Ok, this one did have some gratuitous sex scenes, but the suspense, music, and story were great. A high school girl, who doesn’t quite fit in, is babysitting. Her brother, who just happen to have murdered their sister on a Halloween Night years before, escapes from an insane asylum and returns to his hometown on Halloween to finish off the other sister. This one has a Leigh in it, too – Jamie Leigh Curtis, who is Janet Leigh’s real-life daughter. The brilliance of this movie is that the villain, Michael Myers, never dies, never strays from his course and is, amazingly enough, able to elude all law enforcement trying to find him. Having a crazy guy after you on Halloween is everyone’s biggest fear.
Lesson: Uh, don’t fool around on Halloween Night and if you have a chance to kill a villain don’t stop shooting until you know he’s dead. Plus, people wearing hockey masks are to be avoided at all costs.
The Birds – This movie is suspense at it’s finest. Woman follows man to his weekend, sleepy hometown and instead of romance finds a preponderance of cranky birds. No one knows why the birds are attacking or when they will stop. My favorite scene is when Tippy Hendrin is sitting outside a school smoking a cigarette. Behind her is your average jungle gym with a couple of birds on it. Soon there are a few more birds on it. A couple of puffs of her cigarette later and the darn thing is chock full of birds. Moments later the birds do attack but it is the building of the suspense that makes the movie. In the midst of all this bird craziness, is a story, Tippi finds in her new man’s mother a mother figure of her own.
Lesson: If you see a group of birds menacingly forming a tight little group, run for cover, don’t wait for them to make their move. And get out of town asap.
The Silence of the Lambs – Probably the second scariest movie I’ve ever seen. Clarice is a newbie FBI agent, trying to find a serial killer and needs to use the skill of Anthony Hopkins, a brilliant psychiatrist with one problem, he likes to eat people. While watching this movie, I actually smacked my face in horror. The relationship between Clarice and Hopkins was so interesting – he respected her enough not to eat her. The movie has great suspense, great music, and a great mystery. The audience actually finds the Hopkin’s character charming, even while they are repulsed by him.
Lesson: Don’t judge a book its cover. Try not to look so attractive that someone may want to eat you.
Tell me your favorite scary movies, old and new. Am I off the mark with my opinions on the new ones? Let me know. Most importantly, have a Happy Halloween!
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Some good ones here, Claudine. The scariest movie I ever saw was “When a Stranger Calls” (the original version from 1979). Don’t tell your kids’ teen-age babysitter about it! For a laugh, I love Mel Brooks’ take on “The Birds” in “High Anxiety”. He runs for cover but there is no roof, and the birds just go ahead and do their business on him. Literally!
I think I may remember that “When a Stranger Calls” I’ll check it out. Anything with Mel Brooks is worth watching, too.
I have looked in vain for the title of one of the scariest movies I ever saw.
It was made in the late 50’s, early 60’s, and was about a doctor who made a
house call to a sick scientists home. The doctor took some pills from the
scientist in error, and it turned him into a monster. One scene is where the
doctor ingest some of the ‘medicine’, turns into the monster, and stuffs a
witness into a commercial oven. Does anyone know the name of this movie?