Category: Traumafessions

Not much scares me, and for the most part horror movies have always made me feel normal. My mother didn't much like me watching them when I was young (elementary age) so I would go over to my friends' places and get my fill of stuff like THE SHINING, IT, Freddy Krueger, whatever. When I was about 7 or 8 I was bragging to my mother (who was a child psychologist) how "fun" horror movies were. She turned on the TV (we had an old console T.V. and no VCR- this was in the early ‘90s) and said something like "We'll see how brave you are." (Something like that). The movie she was about to show me was the 1978 masterpiece INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS.

She knew I believed in aliens and I started out brave, but as the film continued and I kept seeing people "changing" into blank automatons and chasing, screaming, after the "real" people my little kid bravado turned sour and I began to seriously clam up. By the end of the movie I was breathing heavy, a combination of the movie and what my mother was doing- as I watched she became more and more emotionless until at the end, she turned to me, my sister and my friend and said in a blank, dead tone (to me). "You look frightened. Are you frightened?"

Still being at an age where reality and fantasy overlapped, I was frightened, but as she progressed with her little "experiment" the message of the movie (that anyone you know can "change" overnight, but still "look" like the person you love) began to take root. When I finally admitted I was "a bit" frightened she turned on me, shot her finger at me and screamed like a body snatcher!

I freaked out.

My sister and friend were hardly phased, but I ran upstairs and began looking for any plant in my room I could toss. When my friend's mom came to pick her up, my mother convinced the other mom to pull the same body snatcher scream on me (except the other mom had the good sense to stop after I began hyperventilating). My mother kept this up for days, and at school I became more and more emotionless, polite and robotic until they finally dragged me to the counselor's office (I was convinced she was "one of them" too).

For months I lived honestly believing that the body snatchers were taking over and that it would only be a matter of time before everyone was taken over, so for months I acted robotic, but at night I had night terrors (the beginning of a lifelong sleep disorder). The movie alone, at that age, would have terrified me, but Mommy made the movie real.

I can watch all of the BODY SNATCHERS movies now (I haven't seen the ‘50s version but the ‘78, ‘93 and '07 versions) and I do okay, but I still get the urge, to this day, to act robotic and stiff upon viewing these films… just in case.

UNK SEZ: Wow Lex, this has got to be one of my favorite traumafessions of all time (about one of my favorite movies too!). Thank you so much for sending it in. I'm not sure that I would recommend your mother's services as a child psychologist, but I feel a certain affinity with her sick sense of humor. More than anything though, I'm impressed with your vivid imagination.

Speaking of which, I really dig the painting that you sent in to accompany your traumafession…

Folks, can you believe how awesomely kindertraumatic Lex's artwork is? We're going to try to get Lex to share some more of her paintings with us in the future, but in the meantime if any of you are interested in contacting Lex about her work, she can be reached at insatiablexphile@yahoo.ca. If you are looking for somebody to illustrate something horror related, I think this is your gal! Thanks for sharing your talent with us Lex, very impressive!!!

So my childhood traumas consisted of the usual fair, including but not limited to: THE GATE, RETURN TO OZ, and the beginning scene in TROLL where the guy and his apartment are being turned into a plant? or mold? or mushrooms? That last one especially scared the crap out of me! However a very specific trauma, which no one seems to talk about, are video game traumas.

I have vivid memories of laying around on school nights watching my brother play the very first issued release of RESIDENT EVIL for Playstation. Wow what a great game! One of the first of its kind, labeled "survival horror." It had zombies, giant spiders, evil swamp creatures with razor sharp claws, zombie dogs, and it all takes place in a scary mansion in the woods! It is like taking my favorite horror movies and putting them into a game just for me, that I can control! I mean what more could you want! It is a playable horror movie!

There have sense been countless more names and sequels to the genre including SILENT HILL, which takes its idea and look from JACOB'S LADDER; but the original RESIDENT EVIL will always have a special place in my heart for giving me chills every time I hear that announcer say, "RESIDENT EVIL" in a overly forceful tone. Oh, and definitely check out the original opening with real actors. Just like bad B-horror, the acting is wonderfully terrible and it leaves an icky feeling in the pit of my soul! I love it!

Also, they have come out with the RESIDENT EVIL movie series, which is "ok" and has little to do with the games, but nothing can compare to that ultimate weirdo beauty that is the opening of RESIDENT EVIL:

UNK SEZ:: Big thanks to fellow Philadelphian Va on her traumafession. All y'all best check out Va's cool website VA's "THE CINEMA EXPERIENCE." Her illustrations are too awesome!

For as long as I can remember I've had a fear of wolves. I grew up in suburban Southern California, so there's no chance it was inspired by any real life encounters, but I do specifically remember two storybooks, with illustrations that inspired my nightmares for years. One of the books unfortunately had no cover so I don't know what the exact name was, only that it was a collection of fairy tales and stories probably published in the mid-to-late ‘70s. The story that especially frightened me was the WOLF AND THE SEVEN KIDS. For those not familiar, it's the story of seven goat kids, who are left alone while their mother goes shopping. A wolf arrives at the door and tries several ways to convince the kids to let him in. After he succeeds and eats six of the seven kids, the mother returns, cuts the kids out of the sleeping wolf's stomach, and then fills his stomach with large stones. He wakes up and heads to the well for a drink, where he falls in and drowns. I remember vividly that the wolf was black and had scary eyes with purple eyelids. Like I said, I have no idea what the book was called but if I ever come across the story in a used bookstore, I'll know it instantly by the illustrations.

The second book isn't hard to find at all. Barnes and Noble reprinted it several years ago and it has been in print ever since. It's called THE AESOP FOR CHILDREN with pictures by Milo Winter. Looks like the original was published in 1919, and the extremely old fashioned look of the illustrations certainly made it all the creepier for me. Coincidentally the story that scared me the most is the one called "THE WOLF AND THE KID." Even more than the story just flipping open to the page it was on was enough to freak me out because of the illustration (see above). Here's the text:

There was once a little Kid whose growing horns made him think he was a grown-up Billy Goat and able to take care of himself. So one evening when the flock started home from the pasture and his mother called, the Kid paid no heed and kept right on nibbling the tender grass. A little later when he lifted his head, the flock was gone.

He was all alone. The sun was sinking. Long shadows came creeeping over the ground. A chilly little wind came creeping with them making scary noises in the grass. The Kid shivered as he thought of the terrible Wolf. Then he started wildly over the field, bleating for his mother. But not halfway, near a clump of trees, there was the Wolf!

The Kid knew there was little hope for him.

"Please Mr. Wolf," he said trembling. "I know you are going to eat me. But first please pipe me a tune, for I want to dance and be merry as long as I can."

The Wolf liked the idea of a little music before eating, so he struck up a merry tune and the Kid leaped and frisked gaily.

Meanwhile, the flock was moving slowly homeward. In the still eveing air the Wolf's piping carried far. The Shepherd Dogs pricked up their ears. They recognized the song the Wolf sings before a feast and in a moment they were racing back to the pasture. The Wolf's song ended suddenly and as he ran, with the Dogs at his heels, he called himself a fool for turning piper to please a Kid, when he should have stuck to his butcher's trade.

Years later when I found this book for sale, I was surprised because while the illustrations still had the overall feeling I remember, I realized that many of the details I that had scared me as a kid must have been imagined. I could have sworn that the wolf in the picture was looking directly at me, whereas now he seems to be focused more on the goat. The fact that the wolf was green scared me, almost like his fur was so dirty it had fungus growing in it or something. He was also winking, (at me no doubt) as if to say "You're next." I could just imagine the devilish tune he must be playing on that flute, and the line about the Dogs recognizing "the song the Wolf sings before a feast" still sends shivers down my spine. It makes me think of kids in rural villages all throughout history hearing a strange flute song being played in the distance and their mothers saying something like, "You see? Don't stay out after dark or the Wolf will get you too!" And what's with the jaunty little handkerchief?! Wolves on their hind legs wearing clothing are obviously evil.

Part of what makes the Aesop book so frightening is the realism with which the animals are rendered, and there are plenty of other wolf illustrations in it. But for some reason this one was the one that really got to me. Many of my wolf nightmare featured a green wolf standing on his hind legs and wearing a handkerchief around his neck. Fortunately I don't remember any flute playing.

Eric S.

UNK SEZ: Eric, I may be able to point you in the right direction to track down that first book. THE WOLF AND THE SEVEN KIDS is a story by the Brothers Grimm (you can check out the ending of an animated version HERE). I suggest checking ebay to find the proper edition you are looking for. Let us know if you find it! As for everyone else, be sure to take a peek at Eric's blog The Ol' Sketchbook.

Well, I grew up knowing the legend RODDY McDOWALL as an ape in the whole PLANET OF THE APES movie series and that short lived T.V. show from the mid '70s. I rarely saw him without makeup. I did see him on a T.V. showing of THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE and I heard his distinct voice in a few cartoons. But asides from that I only knew him as Cornelius and Galen.

Then came his two appearances in FANTASY ISLAND as Satan. Oh boy! VERY creepy! Here I am used to him being the good ape and now he's the scary Devil! Asides from the end sequences of the two episodes he wore no makeup and wore a suit and look VERY convincing! Now, these clips are not out on DVD as of now. The first one is out on YouTube as a "minisode"…

O.K., I would see him again a bit later in LASERBLAST both in its original form and on MST3K, but his Devil was a good scary moment in my early teens!

UNK SEZ: Hey kids, here is a special traumafession from CHRIS McKINLEY, the producer and editor of one of one of our favorite fliks, MURDER LOVES KILLERS TOO, which is now available on DVD! Check it out and make sure you check out MLKT!

I'm with the folks who had commercials as their first run-in with things creepy or ridiculous. Long before I was allowed to see anything above PG, advertisers were doing work on my impressionable little brain. In my case, no advertiser gets more credit than the US Government.

The public service announcements for the War on Drugs get at least partial credit for warping my young sense of humor. Before I ever saw my first FRIDAY flick, those wonderful PSA's taught me that some of the funniest stuff on film comes from people playing material completely straight.

I gotta hope whoever actually put the spots together also secretly thought they were hilarious. Some of the humor in the spots was a little more subtle, (even though the "I wanna be a nurse" moment in this one is still laugh out loud funny to me):

But at some point they kicked it up a notch, and we started getting PAUL REUBENS, serious as a heart attack but in full on Pee-Wee character, talking about crack… with the best sound effects ever. I think this was a series with other actors doing spots too:

However… it looks like the best example is one that I never saw growing up, but would have loved. While looking these others up, I came across this GREMLINS PSA from New South Wales:

Really? Drinking & drugs are bad?? ‘Cause it looks to me like those Gremlins are destructively partying their asses off with zero consequences while Gizmo has storytime with a square Chinese dude. But maybe that's just me.

As a boy watching TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE: THE MOVIE, I couldn't help being envious of young MATTHEW LAWRENCE. To me, his involvement as the prisoner of DEBORAH HARRY seemed both terrorizing and titillating. DEBBIE is calm and cool, caging this boy and getting ready to cook him for dinner. Meanwhile, the middle LAWRENCE child desperately reads stories from this book in an attempt to distract her, and hopefully keep himself off the menu. My point being that at a young age, I found myself completely attracted to Chef DEBBIE's dominance over little MATTHEW. Even though it would have been terrifying, I always wished that I could switch places and be that boy in the cage, while the Blonde One pre-heated the oven, as well as my libido. Was I the only youngster to be turned on by this scenario? I still think TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE: THE MOVIE holds up today as a great and scary film, and my fantasies of being Ms. HARRY's little pet to be devoured have never gone away. Eat to that beat!

UNK SEZ: Ralphus, I second your love of DEBBIE but maybe not the cage thing so much. Did you know that currently you can watch TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE: THE MOVIE on the Youtubes starting HERE? Plus, check out this traumafession on the movie's segment THE CAT FROM HELL right around over HERE!

I don't think that anyone has addressed this trauma yet, and I'll wager that this is one that more than a few of us out there share…

"It's ten o'clock…Parents, do you know where your children are?" Since the 1960s, that's been a familiar late-night refrain from the bumper of many a local newscast. Its treatment varies with each station, some quite benign, but in Central Wisconsin in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, the local CBS affiliate dealt with it in truly ominous fashion. They had the announcer who also did the severe weather bulletins handle the voice-over, a sepulchral "voice of doom" who stressed the "your" with dark portent. It was implied that if your kids were out there, they were up to something horrible…that is, if you heard it as a call against juvenile delinquency.

See, on my channel, it was also accompanied by a black and white title card of an over-sized clock face. Running along the bottom were ghostly silhouettes of children, no older than 10 or 12, even some toddlers among them. (I can still see the little girl in a skirt and pigtails.) This wasn't THE WILD BUNCH we had to be on the lookout for – these were happy little children who could disappear at any time…and their mommies and daddies wouldn't be able to find them! I knew of other kids in my school who refused to even step outside of the house after 10pm lest they be snatched away forever by whatever lurked outside. It was never that bad with me, but it sure made me pull the covers up a little tighter – especially on Wednesday nights, after I had just seen NIGHT GALLERY on NBC.

But that's not all. This advisory was immediately followed by a commercial, frequently a spot for a movie that was being shown at one of our five area cinemas. Since horror films were usually platformed across the country and needed local media to be sold, this was when we got to see ads for films like LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, DON'T LOOK IN THE BASEMENT, and for me the most memorable of the lot, 1973's TORSO:

Nighty-night, kiddies, huh? I can still hear my mother saying "Jeez!" as she saw that! Ten o'clock was Terror Time, just another reason why the '70s were magical for a young horror fan.

UNK SEZ: It's 10 o'clock do you know where JOAN RIVERS is? Senski, it looks like the old ten o'clock parental heebie jeebie alert is still going on to this day. Watch this bizarre oddity I caught while fishing about the YouTubes (WARNING: This video may contain trace amounts of JOELY FISHER)…

I know have written in about anthropomorphic dogs and music videos before, but this video I recently saw combines both of those fears. This, like the Manson video, is a current traumafession and it is for the extremely disturbing video for Goldfrapp's "Number 1."

I am a huge Goldfrapp fan, and I love the whole "Supernature" album, especially the tracks "Ooh La La" and "Number 1." One day, I decided to go on Goldfrapp's website and watch both of these videos. "Ooh La La" was harmless, but then came the video for "Number 1."

I clicked on the video and a dog in a green nurses dress popped up on screen. The video was of a plastic surgery clinic were all the nurses and patients have dog heads and human bodies. I cannot even begin to describe the horror, so everyone will just have to watch the video themselves.

I love your site! So many buried memories…

My dad was a big slasher/gore fan, and he never had second thoughts about letting us kids watch with him. By the time I was 6, I'd seen enough red Karo and latex to be effectively desensitized. So it wasn't the usual horror staples that traumatized me. No, the one scene that still haunts my nightmares is from a made-for-T.V. movie called TERROR ON THE BEACH.

I tried to find the actual scene, but my memory is really hazy. I know it involved something floating in the water. I thought it was a body, but after watching the only youtube clip I could find, it looks like the bad guys are traveling with a male blow-up doll.

Is this what kept me up at night?

I'm hoping you can help me track down the actual scene.

Thanks!

UNK SEZ: Jessica, I had completely forgot about 1973's TERROR ON THE BEACH! I too caught that one on television at a very young age. It is remarkable how much it resembles WES CRAVEN'S THE HILLS HAVE EYES which would not come out for another four years (1977). No luck finding the scene you remember, but I have a hunch that the body you saw floating in the water was, in actuality, a mannequin that the hippie aggressors drug around with them. From what I've gathered, there is not much actual violence in this made-for-television thriller. Lack of violence aside, you can't beat a cast that includes DUEL's DENNIS WEAVER, LOOKER's SUSAN DEY and Oscar winner ESTELLE PARSONS (BONNIE & CLYDE.)

NOTE: T.V. movie and ESTELLE PARSONS fans, you can currently check out THE UFO INCIDENT based on the famous Betty and Barney Hill case starting HERE!

This one part in a movie from my childhood made me cry so hard. The crooks beating up Johnny Five. That was my personal nightmare.

AUNT JOHN SEZ: There, there Brayden, I know the scene is highly upsetting, but the legal proceedings that followed the savage beating were, believe it or not, even more disturbing. Studied by first year law students across the country, and still heavily debated in criminal prosecution circles, the beating of Johnny Five produced one of the greatest miscarriages of justice in the late ‘80s with the case of People v. DeBarge, et al. Traditionally, witnesses in criminal prosecutions utilized the Fifth Amendment to avoid answering questions that may incriminate them. In People v. DeBarge, et al., the witness for the defense opted not to take the Fifth, and instead took the unusual and unprecedented move of repeatedly badgering the prosecuting attorney with the singsong response, "Who is Johnny?" A subsequent courtroom appearance by then glamorous starlet ALLY SHEEDY, in what appeared to be an acid-wash apron, and a cardboard cutout of STEVE GUTTENBERG further deadlocked the jury, which led the prosecuting attorney to suffer a nervous breakdown and don a pair of GROUCHO MARX glasses. The judge had no choice but to declare a mistrial, and the perpetrators responsible for the beating walked. Whereas Johnny Five was repaired after his unfortunate attack, many Constitutional scholars feel that the justice system has never been the same since.