Yesterday was Halloween and that calls for a list of the scariest movies. If you know me at all, you know that I love movies and one of my favorite genres is horror movies. One of the reasons I love movies so much is that I am able to transport myself into the plot, suspend my disbelief, as it were. Horror movies scare the hell out of me and I love it. I’ve never been able to figure out why but from my earliest movie going experiences I can remember peeking between my fingers at the 1960’s Hammer horror films, with Christopher Lee as Dracula (still my favorite) and asking my sister if I could sleep on the floor of her room after watching one of a Friday series of late night horror movies called “Chiller!”. I had a hard time distilling the list down to just five but I went with ones that elicited the most visceral responses; that made me try to reacquire my disbelief. So here goes:
5 - Jaws – scared the hell out of me probably because I loved swimming and all of a sudden there was this force of nature that would literally eat me. While the effects now look a little hokey, at the time, it terrified me. I can remember being nervous while swimming, even in swimming pools.
4 – Halloween – the original is so frightening before the sequels bestowed Michael Myers with all kinds of supernatural powers. It was so spooky to have this faceless, emotionless killer stalking the streets of a typical town. Donald Pleasance is perfect in convincing the audience of the evil of the killer.
3 – Evil Dead 1 & 2 – basically the same movie with the second one made with more money. While this movie series was eventually transformed into a comedy in later versions (even in #2 where it starts to creep in), the original was scary as hell. The theme of ancient evil called forth unwittingly by an isolated professor using the Necronomicon and then having that evil prey on a group of young partiers stuck a cord with me. The ending was also disturbing, which I won’t ruin for you.
2 – Insidious - A new movie this year that scared the living bejesus out of me. Victimizing a child is always scary (Stephen King has made a career out of it). There were a couple of scenes that literally had me jumping out of my seat, especially when the demon appeared suddenly at a dining room discussion. This movie pushed another one of the same type, The Entity, out of the top five. Interestingly Barbra Hershey was in both movies.
1 – The Exorcist – Hands down the most scared I have ever been in my life. I’ve been shot at and was not as scared as I was during this movie. I can remember begging the characters not to go down the hallway leading to the possessed girl’s room again. This movie haunted me for years. Trying to sleep after watching the movie for the first time, a less than beloved household cat perched on top of a dresser next to my bed and the moonlight made her eyes glow. I was petrified until I figured out it was the soon to be airborne feline.
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