kindertrauma

Category: Traumafessions

5 Post- Childhood Kindertraumas By Ghastly1

Posted on By unkle lancifer

PRIME CUT (1972) Lee Marvin as a hitman, Gene Hackman as a guy named Mary Ann and Sissy Spacek in her screen debut; I'm sold. This one threw me for a loop because ostensibly it's a crime/action film but it suddenly takes a sharp left turn and goes to some very unexpected and unsavory places.

BONE TOMAHAWK (2015) I owe S. Craig Zahler an apology; I went into this thinking it was going to be absolutely terrible and for that I am sorry, because boy was I wrong. I love westerns and was going through a kick of watching a dozen or more at the time of seeing this. I knew nothing about it going in and was expecting a cheap UNFORGIVEN knock off. Instead, what I got was a western-cannibal-horror film and just like with PRIME CUT, it caught me off guard and left me disoriented. It's like THE SEARCHERS meets CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST and in probably the most memorable scene, I think even throws a nod to CUT AND RUN (1984) in there at the end. I liked it so much and was so impressed by it, I haven't seen it since my initial viewing because I want to preserve the memory. All I can say is, woah, that was intense.

WARLOCK MOON (1973) A pretty good supernatural horror film which has its flaws (especially in the foreshadowing department, in 1973, apparently colleges had cannibalism classes; which now that I think about it, compared to the stuff they teach today is positively wholesome) but also has a few genuinely intense, suspenseful scenes, which, putting myself in the characters place, actually increased my heart rate. Something it also does very well is, it leaves questions about the events of the film unanswered, which in supernatural horror films especially is important.

THE BUTCHER (1979) An ex-soldier turned butcher named Paul romances a teacher in a provincial French town beset by a string of murders. This is a quiet film which has a bit of Hitchcock to it; it doesn't go in for anything hysterical and there isn't much of a mystery as to who has been doing the deed. Instead, we get a bit of a subtle character study of a man whose mind has been stretched beyond its limit and is done with life; his own and others.

THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES (2002) In my opinion, one of the few truly scary films ever made. There is an otherworldly feeling to this film, so much mystery to it, so many unanswered questions, which is what makes it terrifying. I am still hesitant to watch it because Indrid Cold genuinely freaks me out.

5 Post-Childhood Kindertraumas By Mickster

Posted on By unkle lancifer

28 Days Later (2002) When I first saw this on the big screen, it was like having a dose of adrenaline. I kept thinking that I had too many windows in my house (that usually comes to mind with zombies of any kind). Another thing that struck me was how much I cared about the main group of four characters (Jim, Selena, Hannah, and Frank-I remembered their names without looking it up). I was anxious about their safety, and when one of them (if you know you know) was infected by a drop of blood in the eye, I wept because I was so invested in the survival of this, created by circumstances, family. It did give me nightmares about rage infected people chasing me down for several weeks after watching it.

The Orphanage (2007) I do not think this movie ever came to a theater close by, so I saw it on DVD back in the olden times when Netflix sent physical DVDs to your house. This one stayed in my head for a long time after viewing it mainly because of the crushing sadness when Laura (Belén Rueda) discovers what actually happened to her adopted son, Simón (Roger Príncep), who went missing early in the movie. I cried and cried over that particular reveal. But overall, this one has a great creepy atmosphere that sticks with you. I’m also a sucker for creepy sack masks like the one Tomás wears. If you like haunted house flicks, give this one a try, but be sure to have a box of tissues handy for the ending.

The Strangers (2008) This one I also watched at home and not in the theater. This one really got under my skin. Home invasion flicks really freak me out because it is something that could actually happen. In fact, I wrote a post about The Strangers about ten years ago (HERE). I still have not rewatched this one, and I'm not sure I'm brave enough to do it.

Sinister (2012) I went to a late showing of this creepy flick opening weekend, and then I went home to my empty house. This was not the best idea. I ended up turning on all the lights in the house. Professor and Princess, my two cats, thought I was nuts. I don’t know why I was so freaked out. I don’t have kids, and the big baddy in the flick was using kids; however, my logic doesn’t work very well in a dark, empty house. I vowed never to go to a late scary movie again. In fact, if I’m watching something scary, I usually chase it with something funny and light hearted. It makes for a more restful night’s sleep.

Skinamarink (2022) After all the buzz surrounding this one, I had to see it. So the weekend it hit Shudder, I watched it with my husband. This experimental horror movie had me on edge the entire time. I cannot quite pinpoint why. My husband got bored and wanted to go to bed, but I made him keep watching because I was too unnerved to watch the rest alone. Perhaps it brought back the time in my life when I was about Kevin’s age (Lucas Paul), and I was too scared to be alone in the house. My mom would go outside to hang up the laundry, and I would wedge myself between the screen door and the main door into the house to avoid being in the empty house. So, the thought of being trapped in the house with my parents missing took me back to being a frightened four-year-old. After watching the movie, I spent weeks pouring over reaction and analysis videos on YouTube about Skinamarink. I don’t know if I can ever watch it again. Oh yeah, f#%k that Fisher Price phone!

        Traumafession: Andreas from Germany on Invaders ('92) & Deadly Friend ('86)

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        Hello Sir, 

        My best friend and I were watching INTRUDERS on TV back in 1992 and were blown away. We recorded it and have re-watched it many times . 

        At that time we were reading lots of books about UFO and alien stuff. We certainly tried to escape from something back then when we were teenagers; maybe growing up or hidden sexual desires or conflicts. We had much fun with that flick but at the same time it gave my friend a good scare and he started to see aliens in his bedroom. The most iconic scene was the scene where the boy at the pond turns his head and reveals he is an alien. We've been still talking about that scene today and sending that pic to each other to this day. So this was how I stumbled over your homepage.

        You see even in Germany this flick has traumatized people over TV. It is broadcast at least once a year by cable TV somewhere. I think it is a good movie and the actors are very good. Except for Stephen Berkoff and Richard Crenna you don't see the other actors often. I couldn't believe this is the same Richard Crenna like in the RAMBO movies. I recognized him there later.

        My personal Kindertrauma on TV is "JAWS" and the "Deadly Friend". I nearly puked in my soup when I saw when Anne Ramsey's head is smashed with a basketball. I felt so ill I wrote a letter to the TV station and complained about that. I could not watch the movie for 20 years.

        So much for Intruders and for now.   

        Kind regards

        Andreas (Germany)

        5 Post-Childhood Kindertraumas By Unk

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER (’85)

        I thought maybe to switch things up a bit I’d share some movies that scared the crap out of me not as a kid but as an adult. The first title that came to mind was John McNaughton’s unflinching study of a guy named Henry (the great Michael Rooker in his all too convincing film debut) who has the nasty habit of randomly murdering people. It’s a brilliant film, I proudly own a physical copy of it but I have never watched it again after seeing it in a tiny Philadelphia art house theater during its original release. At the time I had recently moved from cushy suburbia to go to art school in the city and something about the film’s footage depicting a savage home invasion hit me with incredible force. I could not help imagining the same thing happening to my family (particularly my mother) who I was now so very far away from. Not to give anything away, but I also recall this film mercilessly disposing of its lone character with any shred of human decency. I’m going to challenge myself to watch this movie one more time before I die…I swear. Even If’s only to justify my purchasing of the DVD…I promise (gulp).

        THE HAUNTED (’91)

        Yes, I somehow got so legitimately freaked out by a made-for-TV movie that I had a hard time sleeping afterwards (full revisit HERE). I can laugh about it now but this televised reenactment of the allegedly true story of the haunting of Pennsylvania’s Smurl family had me worried that I was in danger of experiencing a supernatural interloper at any moment. I really got the true creeps. In my defense, it was rather late at night and my brain may have been a bit fuzzy with sleep but the fact remains that I gobbled up this questionable tale hook line a sinker. I’ve watched it many times over the years trying to decipher exactly what got under my skin and the closest thing I can come up with is that somehow Sally Kirkland of all people was so earnest in her performance that I couldn’t help but believe.

        IF I DIE BEFORE I WAKE (’98)

        I doubt many people have heard of this (presumably) straight to video home invasion horror flick but for my money it scared me more than the much more popular THE STRANGERS (2008). I guess anyone with any sort of empathy can’t help being mortified by a home invasion flick. It’s just the worst thing to imagine happening to others and let’s face it, it’s even worse when you imagine it happening to yourself. To be honest I think what made this flick so much more disturbing than others to me is the non-Hollywood, unglamorous, no-name (unless you include I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER’S Muse Watson as the head malicious intruder) cast who are convincingly presented as real people who could live next door to you.

        EDEN LAKE (2008)

        Handsome, happy go-lucky couple Steve and Jenny (Kelly Reilly and Michael Fassbender) decide to vacation at a lake where Steve eventually plans to propose. But wait, there’s a group of rowdy, rotten teens to contend with who are hell bent on triggering yours truly in a multitude of ways. Look, I can handle this movie fine (full review HERE), I even find it slightly cathartic in spots but oh my good lord, I cannot wrap my poor feeble brain around this film’s final gut wrenching, punch in the face, stomp on your toes, kick you in the shin, poke your eye out, land a shovel on your noggin’ final denouement. Oh, the cruelty. I want to hide under a table and just shake.

        THE LODGE (2019)

        I don’t know what was going on with myself psychologically when I went to see this epic monolith of relentless mental torture but it truly made me fear for my own sanity. There’s a sad, confused review of this cinematic mega-bummer lurking somewhere on this site (HERE) so I won’t drag myself through the punishing snow-covered briar patch yet again but suffice to say that never has a film left me with such an all-consuming sense of foreboding. Serial murderers, ghosts, home invaders, violent teen gangs are all frightening for sure but there’s something about the way THE LODGE fiddles with reality and mortality itself that truly chills me to the bone.

        My Kindertrauma:: Nina on The Twilight Zone Episode "Living Doll" & Talky Tina

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        When the blockbuster 1960s series called The Twilight Zone featured an episode entitled TALKING TINA, I was 6 years old, and a second grade student in a very strict and demanding Catholic school. I lived in an emotional state that ranged from hypervigilance to barely concealed panic- such an overwhelming atmosphere was this for a young child. One weekend in the fall of this particular year, my mother arranged, at my insistence, for me to spend the weekend with my great aunt Genevieve, a fairy godmother of sorts, who owned a rambling old Victorian home in Cape May, N.J. Genevieve was a hearth of hospitality and warmth, full of fun and mischief unparalleled by any other adult I knew, and a colossal reprieve from the exacting religious sisters who were my teachers and torturers. My aunt and I, from the beginning, shared a love of being frightened by the unexpected…..within the confines of fiction and movies, of course. On the Saturday night of my visit, after donning our flannel nightgowns and scattering blankets along her huge maw of a sofa, we cozied up to each other to watch TALKY TINA.

        The house was appropriately drafty and sibilant. As the delicious fear of the unknown enveloped me when the doll’s maniacal wickedness develops in the episode, I looked to my aunt, hoping to see my scared delight mirrored, but her eyes were closed, and her head slumped over. I was bewildered and terrified. I remembered that my mother, her niece, would exhort us to have fun whenever she witnessed our twin flame energies align, but she would also ask me not to let her get too excited. I never actually understood what felt like a looming subtext to my mother’s request, and always found this phrase strangely unsettling. My aunt had suffered a massive and fatal heart attack, as I sat next to her, thoroughly engrossed in the program. I took off, running out if the house, wailing and screaming uncontrollably until a neighbor came to my aid. I was shattered and whirling in terror. I feel so divided about sharing this experience, because my fear that the episode and I were somehow responsible for her demise, is a visceral feeling I have never been able to expunge, even after years of therapy, and the depression and shame I harbored as a young child paralyzes me to this day if anyone in my midst mentions The Twilight Zone.

        Traumafession:: Unk on The Exorcist ('73)

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        There’s not much that can be said about William Friedkin’s adaptation of William Peter Blatty’s brilliant novel THE EXORCIST that hasn’t been said before but I’ll give it a shot. Although I recently watched the film for the umpteenth time, I can tell you that there were many years in which I absolutely wouldn’t dare do so. I thought of it as akin to courting the devil and I guess my ultimate fear was that by watching it, I might become possessed myself. Looking back, I guess there was a lot of magical thinking and supernatural paranoia occupying my head as a kid. As much as I enjoyed watching babysitters and camp counselors get killed in creative ways as a budding horror fan, my bravery evaporated when it came to anything religious or especially, anything dealing with the devil. I believed in that Satan guy until one day I miraculously didn’t and what a relief it was.I still consider myself spiritual to a degree but these days I take everything I absorbed as a child from Sunday school with a hearty pinch of salt. Still, my mind remains open a wee crack, there are no atheists in foxholes after all and who knows what the future will bring. Anyway, when my abject fear of religion hit the high road so did my overwhelming terror of the demonic force in THE EXORCIST. That said, I highly doubt there will ever come a time when I don’t squirm like a worm on a hook during the medical procedures endured by Regan (Linda Blair. Those scenes always make me wince and stand to prove that there are some kindertraumas that you never grow out of.

        Luckily, you don’t have to be shaking in your shoes or freaking out in your footwear to enjoy THE EXORCIST. No matter your level of skepticism it’s still an expertly crafted masterwork with a hypnotic score, dynamic acting (the entire cast is impeccable) and an autumnal atmosphere that’s singularly seductive (that scene when Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) strolls through Georgetown sidewalks carpeted with fall leaves as trick or treaters pass to the tune of Mike Oldfield’s “Tubular Bells” is one of my favorite moments in all of cinema). Even though the lightening quick flashes of Captain Howdy’s pale visage no longer have me hiding under the couch, I’m very far from the mentality of a semi-recent audience I viewed it with who chuckled at every curse word thrown (philistines!). Happily too, I can say that a part of me relates to young Regan’s plight now more than ever before. I don’t know what it’s like to have my head turn three hundred and sixty five degrees but due to recent disappointments, I do understand the urge to stay in bed, use foul language and throw furniture at anyone who dares enter my immediate space. Even if you strip away the film’s blaring religious garments, there still stands a universal clash between the powers of darkness and light, positivity and negativity, and optimism and hopelessness to consider. No one religion owns this eternal struggle that we all participate in every day whether we’re conscious of it or not and you certainly don’t have to be religious to have faith in the power of good and the value of life. In this area, Blatty’s profound, surprisingly sanguine book is more adamantly persuasive than the film in relaying the idea that for as much evil as there is in the world, there is also clear, identifiable goodness as well. I always try to keep that in mind when the pea soup begins to gurgle inside me, waiting to spring forth.

        Traumafession:: E.G. on Open Season 2

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        First off: I am a very sensitive person, and this was especially true when I was a kid. Second: I do not enjoy animals being hurt for any reason. I worry constantly about the safety of my cats and dear god, if anything were to happen to them I’d lose my goddamn mind.So with that in mind, let’s get to the most unlikely source of nightmare fuel: Open Season 2!

        I had no problem with the first one. But see, the second one introduces this evil poodle named Fifi who wants revenge on the wild animals…..because one made him back into an electric light that we see the effect of. At that time I had a dog who had all sorts of weird but benign bumps, so a doggie with a big bump wasn’t too big a deal. Then we get to the electrocution proper. So this poodle, who is clearly traumatized, gets zapped by an electric fence. I wish I could say it was a silly thing where his fur pooped up and he got ash all over his face. Just cartoon ridiculousness. It was NOT.

        You can see this stuff that’s supposed to be fire but looks more like pink-orange acid blazing a hole in this poodle’s floofy head fur. I was legit concerned at the time that his brain would burn. The burning and the fear of brain roasting was bad enough. A few scenes later we see the effects of the damage…complete with a burn blister and scorched fur.

        I very nearly died at seeing all that horror. It upset me so bad I had to finish my lunch later (this was at a school, and the movie was supposed to be a reward for the class-it was not for me!). Thankfully we never finished it, but I read on the internet that by the end of the movie, the poodle’s fur is all burned off. I wouldn’t have survived that, I just know I wouldn’t. This memory still causes me pain to this day and even writing a creepypasta about it didn’t help (though I did wind up with a YouTube reading my pasta, and that was super exciting!). Add in the fact that my best friend at this time had a very sweet bichon named Sugar, who of course was also a white fluffy dog, and this was the worst nightmare fuel I’ve ever had. I don’t know what poodle-hating psychopathic decided to inflict this on innocent kids, but I hope karma bites them right in the-well, you know.

        I can’t escape this damn memory. I hope by the time you receive this, I’ll be doing something else and not thinking about this. I’m so sorry if any images accompany this post, folks. I’m so very, very sorry. But yeah, this is definitely trauma so I thought I’d share. I hope none of you have to go through what I did!-E.G.

        My Kindertrauma:: Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things ('72) By Avayander

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        What happens when an impressionable child who has been fed a steady diet of divine wrath stumbles upon a simple 70s horror movie innocuous enough to be broadcast in its entirety on daytime television? Why Kindertrauma of course!!!

        My Kindertrauma didn't come from one of the brilliant horror movies of the 70s. There are a lot of elements to this story that make me cringe, but the fact that it only took a low budget shocker to fry my electronics is one of the biggest. It would make more sense if my meltdown came at the hands of The Exorcist. Instead I have to admit that I was wound up so tightly that it only took exposure to Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things to make me snap. I must have been a fun kid.

        To understand how Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things kicked the box of bees in my brain I need to get into how the box got there in the first place. So if the subject of organized and disorganized religion makes you squeamish, best stop now. There's no pro or con bullshit in here though, just an individual story of a kid muddling up cosmic concepts because his mind was better suited for Legos and breakfast cereal.

        And muddle I did. By age eight I was already crammed with misunderstandings and contradictions that needed to be addressed, but Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things ensured I wouldn't get to gradually sort through my metaphysical junk drawer at my own pace. That movie found me at just the right time to wreak the most havoc on my psyche and when it was done I was literally left standing in an empty field afraid of what was left of the universe. That last bit is going to require some explaining, so…Kindertrauma ahoy! -Avayander

        UNK SEZ: Avayander sent us an awesome traumafession but it's a bit long so we will continue it in the comment section! Come join us!

        Traumafession:: M. Graves on The Brothers Lionheart ('77)

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        The Brothers Lionheart is a film I saw as a child that stuck with me because the two kid main characters die almost immediately and their afterlife is full of danger and struggle as well, and the film ends with them deciding to kill themselves again to get into yet another afterlife!

        The film starts by introducing the main character, a terminally ill boy who lives with his older brother. He's scared to die and his brother comforts him by telling him about the land you go to when you die, a magical valley full of adventure. An immediate gut-wrenching twist is that the older brother dies first, saving his brother from a burning building by jumping out a window and dying from the fall. Then the younger brother dies shortly afterward and the rest of the movie takes place in the afterlife. 

        The afterlife seems all fun and medieval at first and the brothers are re-united, but soon you find out that there are two valleys in this land, and the other has been conquered by an evil army of black-cloaked and helmeted soldiers backed by a dragon and they have to fight to make sure their valley isn't next. The rest of the movie is about the fight to overthrow the oppressive villains. At the end of the movie, they've defeated the bad guys and the dragon, but the older brother has been burned by dragon fire and is going to become paralyzed. He wants to die, and so the younger brother agrees to carry him to a cliff and jump to their deaths so they can get to the next magical afterlife, which will be peaceful. And after they do that, the movie just ends with a shot of their shared tombstone.

        My Kindertrauma:: Seth S. on The Shining ('80)

        Posted on By unkle lancifer

        One's fear of something can sometimes be about repeated occurrences. Seeing something once that sends a shiver up your spine – that's one thing. Seeing something more than once – worse yet, coming at you in concert: that's something altogether horrifying. A singular greeting to horror, multiplied by two, one can likely think of nothing worse. It's a promise to horror. And it's two-fold.

        Now, I'll admit I saw Stanley Kubrick's The Shining earlier than I should have in my young life. Luckily, my parents at least had the foresight that I wouldn't see it until it aired on national TV, but no amount of censorship can really transform The Shining into a family-friendly film. One wouldn't imagine that the cannibalistic Donner party could be made prime time appropriate either, but that doesn't stop father Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) from momentarily talking about it with his son Danny (Danny Lloyd). And that's alright too, because Danny had already learned about it on his own by watching about it on the television. And Jack assures his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall), "It's all right. He saw it on the TV." 

        Everything is alright on the TV. 

        When it came to The Shining, network TV cut from the film much of the blood that came crashing through the elevator doors, washing over the Overlook Hotel's lobby floor tile. It cut away when Mr. Hallorann (Scatman Crothers) served as a catcher's mitt for an ax in the hands of an enraged Jack. It certainly blurred out the woman's naked breasts in room 237, but the network couldn't easily remove the Grady twins from the film, and they were more frightening to me than anything that had to be cut out. Seeing the film for the first time, I was as alarmed as anyone when little Danny rounded that hallway corner on his three-wheeler to discover the spectral Grady girls waiting for him, and for me – and likely for others – the two were a central source of dread. 

        Yet unlike the other elements of the film that needed to be censored for prime time TV, all that made the Grady twins frightening was their portent. What made them terrifying was not an ounce of blood nor the insinuation of violence. It was what the Grady girls introduced to the film, what they beckoned to Danny and the viewer, seemingly echoing to him before the Torrance family moved to the Overlook. "Well, let's just wait and see," she says to him. "We're all going to have a real good time."

        And we would have a good time, over the course of the film. 

        We would also have an absolutely horrifying time.

        From memory, I can't write that my parents allowed me to watch the film for its full duration. But they didn't have to let me watch more than the film's first 30 minutes to traumatize me, in large part due to the Grady girls. They remain one of the most haunting ingredients of the production. There is something scary about the image of the girls' dead bodies in that hallway. (Few filmmakers have captured the realistically unnerving collapse of bodies like Kubrick, outside of Coppola or Scorsese.) But more alarming than the image of the girls' violent demise is the invitation that they first provided to me and the rest of the audience. That's what remains so haunting about Kubrick's production. It wasn't about the more surreal images in the hotel that visit us (and few could discomfit us more than the man dressed in the dog outfit). It wasn't about the circuitous garden maze that we – like Danny – ran through, trying to escape a murderous father who promised would never hurt us. It's not even about the nature of the maze itself, an ordinarily juvenile house of seek and discovery, which was only made more terrifying because the playground was suddenly ruthlessly real, even if it was meant to be nothing more than some gravel, landscaping, and subterfuge. 

        When I saw the film as a child, the fright of Kubrick's movie had much more to do with that first glimpse of two girls – not one, but two – in that wallpapered hotel hallway early in the film. It had to do with the manner in which those girls gently usher the audience into the film's mounting terror. While unexpected, their emergence – welcoming the viewer into another two hours of horror – should have seemed harmless, especially since I saw it like so many other people did on the television.

        Even when Jack Torrance tragically promised us: it's okay as long as we saw it on the TV.