Boo!

Oct 14th 2009
Karen RoseOn Writing!

58 Responses to “Boo!”

1. hvitveis on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:07 am #

   First to go!

   I cannot see horror. So there is no point in trying, because I will spend the entire time behind a pillow with my fingers stuffed in my ears. Jurassic Park is the scariest I can deal with. In my case it is about the music. When that anticipation-something-scary-will-pop-out-any-minute-now soundtrack starts it freaks me out. The mute-button is my friend. It drives my boyfriend mad, hence the fingers in the ears.

   As for phobias, I am afraid of Exams but I have not overcome it yet. Since I am studying in university, it is quite a problem..They had a program about phobias on tv in norway and a tv-personality came forth and admitted her phobia of fluffy kittens. They tried to start curing it, with gradual exposure and she was sweating, growing pale and freaking out looking at a small fluffy kitten.

2. Judy F on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:51 am #

   I don’t do horror either. I can do suspenseful but not the creepy crawly scary ones. They just freak me out. I can handle one person or so getting killed and trying to figure out who did it. But monsters and unnatural things nope.

   Phobias I guess this might count, I don’t like crowds or going places where I don’t know anyone. I am getting better I can go to booksignings much easy now then I used to.

3. MizMacgyver on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:54 am #

   I don’t do horror movies, not even slightly scary ones. I don’t like things jumping out of nowhere in my face, I don’t like chainsaws, knives, spiders, snakes, poltergists, aliens, hungry houses, maddened pets or any of the other horror movie creatures. Like hvitveis I can watch Jurassic Park but I am a nervous wreck afterwards because of those things jumping out of places. Nerves just can’t take it. I have a near phobia for spiders, in my opinion anything with more than four legs is unbearable. 6 legs are too many, 8 are just over the top.

4. MizMacgyver on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:55 am #

   I mean, have you seen what insects and spiders look like under a microscope?? That is why they use them for horror movies.

5. Lori Handeland on 14 Oct 2009 at 4:39 am #

   Love horror movies. I bet no one’s shocked by that.

   One of my favorites is a recent one titled 30 Days of Night. Also like Cursed. But my total favorite is Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Watch it EVERY Halloween as I own my own personal copy.

   Anything to do with my kids scares me. And that’s a scared I don’t like. I do like horror movie scared if that makes sense.

   I can’t think of any phobias I’ve overcome. I don’t like to drive over high bridges, as I think I’ve mentioned, especially over water. When we drove to St. Louis I made someone else drive into and out of town.

6. LisaK on 14 Oct 2009 at 5:16 am #

   I absolutely can’t watch horror movies. I can’t even read or hear about them, even that totally freaks me out. There was that guy in my class two years ago and every wednesday he used to sit right behind me in the music room of our school and talk to his neighbour about the latest creepy movie he has seen. Every. Wednesday. I will never forget that. Belong to the most shocking experiences in my life (and remember, I only heard another talk about them).

   I think the problem is that I’ve got an imagination too vivid for my own good. I need only hear or read a an icky thing and I can totally see it in my mind’s eye right away. So eventually, I scare myself. But imagine what really watching a horror movie would do to me. I think I would faint right away…

7. B on 14 Oct 2009 at 5:29 am #

   When I was younger, I absolutely LOVED horror movies. At 11-17, you could totally bring it on. It didn’t matter how creepy the ghost and how messed up the movie was. I was up for it. It wasn’t until a couple years ago that I started just covering my eyes while in the movies. Now, I won’t even go to a real scary movie which has a Ghost. Heck, I started getting scared of Ghost Whisperer and Supernatural after two seasons watching them. Just out of nowhere.
   I love my blood and guts — everything from Freddy Krueger to Saw V (I love the series, by the way) I’ll do. But creepy ghosts? Totally lost my ability to watch. I just hope I never get too scared to watch Medium, because it’s one of my very favorite shows.
   Fear I’ve overcome? Flying. Kind of. I get really nervous before, but once I get in the plane, I’m fine. Which is good.

8. Cail on 14 Oct 2009 at 5:56 am #

   Karen, I do not, will not, under any circumstance watch horror movies. I will on occasion watch a good suspense (like Sleepy Hollow, and I did see Sixth Sense- but that was peer pressure.) I don’t like having nightmares.

   I’m sure I’ve told this story before, but I’m quite a bit claustrophobic. I had successfully been riding the NYC subway system for many years when the train I was in, squished someone as we came into the station. Instead of letting us poor folk get off the train nice and quickly, they kept us in there for far too long. Needless to say we were in the ‘ideal’ location to witness what had occurred to stop us from getting off. Anyways, took a few train rides after that, but started to have full blown panic attacks every time the train slowed down/ paused without immediately opening doors. I avoided the trains for a good 3 years, then decided that enough was enough. I started to take the above ground train a few stops at a time, then the underground one a few stops. I remember the satisfaction of taking the train under the river. I also learned a bit more about the traffic control system, and new exactly what they were doing, and about how long it would take.

9. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 6:35 am #

   Cail – I agree on the peer pressure of Sixth Sense. Mr. R wanted to see it. Of course he guessed it right away and was good enough to let me be surprised, but smug enough to share later that he’d guessed. I’m glad I saw it. It’s a masterful direction job. But it freaked me for days!

   Hugs on the subway phobia. I don’t like small spaces like elevators and unexpectedly become frazzled, then frantic. Usually when I’ve gone without sleep.

10. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:01 am #

    Lori, I really felt for folks who were afraid of bridges the other day! I was on my way home from Tampa and have to cross the Sunshine Skyway bridge. It’s huge. I personally love it as you get the best view of Tampa Bay from there.

    But we went through the toll gate and traffic came to a standstill. There had been a car fire/murder/suicide on the bridge! Traffic was stopped up to the very top of the bridge. Two bodies were found and then the bridge was a crime scene. Luckily we could exit off the bridge still and via the rest stop, cross under the toll road and go the opposite direction.

    We had to go way out of our way to get home by a different road. What should have been a one hour drive turned into nearly four hours. We were just inconvenienced. I felt sorry for people actually stuck on the bridge.

11. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:02 am #

    B – I wonder why you developed a fear suddenly? I hope you don’t become afraid of Medium, too

12. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:04 am #

    Lisa K – I agree on having too active imagination. Sometimes Mr. R will say something outlandish that might be scary if it were actually possible. He knows me well and will look at my grimace and say, “You’re imagining it, aren’t you?” And of course, I am.

13. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:05 am #

    hvitveis and Miz – I’ve never even seen Jurassic Park. That’s what kind of wuss I am!

14. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:05 am #

    Judy F – I’m also nervous about crowds where I don’t know anybody. Next time we’re together, we’ll stick together and brave the crowd!

15. Pesky on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:31 am #

    I am not a horror movie fan, I watch them through my fingers, I jump at every little movement on the screen, I scream loudly… Which means to Artboy and ITGuy I am the perfect person to sucker into going to a horror movie with, since they torment me through the entire thing. I have to be really careful when they are in town to make sure that “wanna go see a movie” isn’t “Look Godzilla is out!”

    I got back at Artboy however…can you say “Hey wanna go see the new Vampire flick?”…then it turns out to be Twilight…

    Phobias I’ve overcome: Huh, I’m kinda a suck-it-up girl but having a mother off the Emerald Isle I’d say the snake think definitely still on my top 10 list of things to keep the heck away from me…so not so much overcome.

    Spiders: Still don’t like em, but I don’t need someone else to squish them and remove them from the room anymore. They always seemed like they could come out and eat me whole. One day I looked at one and realized I’m bigger than it is. So now we live in peace…kinda. I vacuume them.

16. Pesky on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:32 am #

    Oh! Karen! You’ve got to go see Zombieland if you want scary funny. Warning: First 15 minutes are horrendously gorey but once you get past that it’s great!

17. Amy Scott on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:42 am #

    I love older horror movies! However, I have been known to put a pillow in front of my face or watch from between my fingers, but I love them. The older the movie the better… I’m not big on re-makes. I loved Silence of the lambs, it’s not really a true horror, but it creeps me out every time. There was a movie out a few years ago called The Strangers which was really good as well. I get really creeped out by movies based on true stories, or where you can kind of see the story actually happening in real life… not so much the movies where the man is dressed up in a costume hacking teenagers to bits.
    I have 2 big phobias, Snakes and touching door handles or railings in public. I have yet to overcome either, but I am working on the door handle thing. I carry a bottle of hand sanatizer in my purse, which has really helped. I don’t think I will ever get over my snake phobia.

18. Janae on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:49 am #

    I watched horror movies as a teen, but haven’t really watched since then. I just don’t like being scared, or watching movies with horrible plots either. Occasionally, there were bad dreams. I remember after Archnophobia (which is soemthing I don’t have!), dreaming that 1000s of spiders were scurrying over me.

    I’m a bit claustrophobic. I have to really not think about it at times, like riding the subway or an elevator. Fortunately, they’re not something I have to worry about on a daily basis.

19. Lori Handeland on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:58 am #

    Oh, eek, K-Ro. That would be a total nightmare for me. I’m glad y’all got out of there and weren’t stuck.

    I agree with Pesky. Zombieland is funny scary, but they could have toned down the gore in the first 15 minutes for me.

20. elsiehogarth on 14 Oct 2009 at 8:00 am #

    Halloween is my favorite holiday. I love Horror Movies. The scarier the better. Since October 1st, I pulled out all my Horror movies and every night I watch one. I love the Universal classic horror movies: Dracula-Bela Lugosi, Frankenstein/the Mummy-Boris Karloff, the Invisible Man/Phantom of the Opera-Claude Rains/Vincent Price and the Wolf Man-Lon Chaney Jr.

    Bette Davis is one of my favortie actresses. Loved her in Now, Voyager, The Little Foxes, All About Eve and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane.

    My biggest fears are being in an enclosed area and drowning or burned by fire.

21. nancyg on 14 Oct 2009 at 8:07 am #

    I used to watch horror movies when I was in my teens, but Nightmare on Elm Street (the 1st one) did it for me. The main girl’s name was Nancy and Freddy Krueger would say her name & I’d get chills. Then a friend crept behind me in the theater & grabbed my shoulders – I belted out a blood-curdling scream!

    I can’t read Dean Koontz or Steven King anymore… I have to put down the book, check every window & door lock. and every noise I hear is terrifying…

    Phobias? heights… oh the horror, the horror! We have “high 5″ and mix-masters here in Dallas – sky high highway routers – will go to just about any length to avoid them. Sometimes I bite the bullet & will ride a high roller coaster or the ferris wheel at the State Fair (usually when my girls make fun of me), but that’s about it. I’ve parasailed & still want to do sky-diving & take a hot air balloon ride just to say I did it anyway.

    Not too scared of the creepy-crawlies or snakes. You learn pretty young here in Texas how to identify poisonous vs. non-poisonous, so I just avoid the rattlers & cotton-mouths…

22. Lisa H on 14 Oct 2009 at 8:15 am #

    Karen R- I do not like horror movies! They scare he %#@& out of me. My all time worst movie that I cannot even see a photo from or a trailer or anything is “The Exorcist” I despise that movie.

    One of my favorite movies which is kindof a horror movie is “Misery” based on the Stephen King book. That is one great movie and something I can watch (except for the hobbling scene)

    I haven’t overcome my phobias of: fear of insects, fear of enclosed places, fear of painful death!

23. Madeline Hunter on 14 Oct 2009 at 8:27 am #

    I am not a fan of horror. I am okay with horror lite, which is what suspense books are, I think. There is a line, though, and I like books and movies where, for all the “horror” you are confident in the hero or heroine’s ultimate triumph.
    I still remember going to see Night of the Living Dead when in college. I was roped into it by my roomie, so she would not have to spend the evening alone with the guy who had roped her in. (the things I do for friends. . . .!) So I’m watching this movie which is not my kind of thng at all, and when the zombies were approaching, I started getting suspicious. The jerk she was with assured me it all ended well. Ha! I guess Romero thought the ending was ironic.

24. Claudia Dain on 14 Oct 2009 at 8:48 am #

    Nope, not a fan of horror. OTOH, I don’t consider Sixth Sense horror. Was it? I wasn’t scared and it wasn’t gory, so I don’t think of it as horror. Scary? Gory? Not interested.

25. kay on 14 Oct 2009 at 9:04 am #

    I love horror movies, if they are truly scary and not gory. I have to be careful when I watch them because I have a tendency to scare myself. My favorite movie from the old days, that I cannot watch after dark, is The Uninvited with Ray Malland and Gail Russell. Black and white, pretty good special effects and pretty creepy. I also love Ghostbreakers with Bob Hope, funny and creepy. The most recent one that gave me the creeps was The Others with Nicole Kidman. And, there was no gore factor in any of them. I also like to watch Dracula with Bela Lugosi, not necessarily scary, but great moody camera work. Scary books: It and The Exorcist.

26. amy1242 on 14 Oct 2009 at 9:07 am #

    Also, not a fan of horror. I DO however, want to see Zombieland! The trailer had me in stitches! I used to like horror movies, but then I grew up and moved out on my own. Not enough room in my tiny little apt for me and horror movies. I tried it a few times and regretted it as soon as I had to get up in the morning for work and school. No sleep. Every normal noise made me think of something evil or dasteredly. As for phobias, most of mine were minimal (spiders, fly’s, ticks) and I got over them by having to kill them for my kids sake. I still don’t like swimming in lakes and oceans (fish are good to eat but creep me out when I’m made to swim with them). And germs. Like Amy S, I carry hand sanitizer with me and use it often. Must be an Amy thing.

27. Candis on 14 Oct 2009 at 9:37 am #

    I’m not a fan of “slasher” movies, but I do like a good scary flick. The last one that freaked me out was Blair Witch project. But there was one I watched when I was a kid that still freaks me out and I have no idea what it was called. All I know is that do not EVER go near a dark swampy pond with dead trees surrounding it.
    I honestly can’t wait to see Paranormal Activity. It hasn’t come to the Boise area yet, but once it does, I’m dragging Rachel with me to see it.

28. JudyPatooty on 14 Oct 2009 at 9:49 am #

    I loved watching Christopher Lee play Dracula when I was a kid, but I won’t watch modern horror movies! They’re just too terrifying for me!

    Heights scare me and I basically avoid having to face that fear whenever possible! However, I have gone on two hot air balloon rides and, for some strange reason, they don’t trigger this fear. At least as long as I don’t look down over the edge of the basket!

29. Sabrina Jeffries on 14 Oct 2009 at 10:02 am #

    I’m kind of weird. I love horror movies, but some kinds I have to stay away from because they freak me out. Although as I get older, I’ve gotten better about watching them and just accepting that I’m going to be freaked out for a few days (your books, by the way, scare the pants off me, which I just LOVE).

    The ones that stick with me are always supernatural. Killers on the loose in films make me yawn, unless it’s a taut thriller like Silence of the Lambs, which I enjoyed but which didn’t actually scare me. It’s the things I can’t see that scare me.

    These movies freaked me out and stuck with me forever: a very old movie called The Sentinel, The Ring, the TV miniseries It, Candyman. These movies were the kind of horror I love without it giving me trouble sleeping at night: The Fallen, The Skeleton Key, The Devil’s Advocate.

    Like you, Claudia, I’m not sure about Sixth Sense. The first half scared me thoroughly, but I loved the movie.

30. Karen Hawkins on 14 Oct 2009 at 10:39 am #

    I loved Sixth Sense and HATE horror movies. Like Claudia, I don’t think the Sixth Sense really was a horror movie … it had some horrible moments in there, but it didn’t try to scare the bejeebers out of me; it explained why I shouldn’t be scared … and I wasn’t.

    I love that the whole premise of the movie was to face your fears — even the scary ones.

    When I was a child, during a huge storm, water poured through our back screen door and flooded the kitchen. I ran to shut the door, slipped on the water, and my foot hit one of our fish tanks and shattered it, cutting my foot. While that storm raged, first a neighbor, then my mother (she’d gone to the library), and finally an EM team tried to stop the bleeding while I lay there, listening to the thunder and thinking I was going to die. I didn’t, of course, but for years whenever it would thunder I would get scared. Finally my dad, bless him, started taking me to the back porch during storms and he’d sit with me and hold my hand and tell me that the storm hadn’t hurt me before and wouldn’t now. After about six months, it worked. Now I love storms and always will.

31. Suzanne Enoch on 14 Oct 2009 at 10:58 am #

    I’m generally not a fan of bloody horror movies, but I do like a good scary movie.

32. ladydawgfan on 14 Oct 2009 at 11:27 am #

    I like haunted house movies, but without the gore. I can’t stand “teen slaughter” flicks, where everyone gets killed in the most gruesome manner possible, and usually while having sex or in the shower (or both ). My favorites are Poltergeist, The Stand, Rose Red, and an old George C Scott movie called The Changeling (absolutely the best haunted house movie EVER!!).

    I don’t really have any phobias to speak of, although I am not comfortable around open heights (tall ladders, rope bridges, etc.).

33. elsiehogarth on 14 Oct 2009 at 11:31 am #

    amy1242: Zombieland is really funny. I’ve already seen it, at the movies, twice and on Fast Pass TV like 5 times. If you can make through the blood splatter, seeing weird black sludge coming out of people’s mouths, in the beginning, you’ll be fine. See it for free on http://www.fastpasstv.com and right now they have Surrogates, Love Happens, All By Myself, Pandorum, Jennifer’s Body, Band Slam and Cloudy with a Chance of Meat Balls.

    JudyPatooty: Christopher Lee was great as Count Dracula in Taste the Blood of Dracula and Dracula A.D. 1972. I also liked Peter Cushing as Dr. VanHelsing in the Brides of Dracula and all his Frankenstein movies as Baron Frankenstein. The 60’s and 70’s Horror movies were very good because they were kind of cheesy.

    Karen Rose: The Exorcist is a movie that I only saw once and never again. My Mom and I are crazy horror fans and she took me to see it and I was 16 years old. All I can say is that night, after seeing that movie, I slept with my parents.

34. Julia London on 14 Oct 2009 at 12:00 pm #

    Can’t take horror movies since seeing the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which was filmed a few miles from where I lived. Not a big fan of scary, period.

    I have never been a fan of Halloween, either. Give me a holiday that centers around real food and booze anytime, but candy and people knocking on your door all night? No thanks

35. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:25 pm #

    Sorry, I’m back! I had some minor unexpected issues pop up today and had to play chauffeur for the fam.

36. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:30 pm #

    Pesky, I vacuum spiders too. Or I would if I could find my vacuum…

    Amy – I agree. The ones that can happen in real life scare me a lot more. Maybe that’s why I love suspense! The house that ate people movie from last night left me unsettled, but I wasn’t all horrified.

    I did watch a Japanese movie with Mr. R years ago – these people kidnapped a child who accidentally died. The child came back to haunt the you know what out of them. You were half “you go, dead girl!” and half terrified to bits.

37. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:38 pm #

    Janae, I also don’t have to do a lot of elevators. Living in FL, there are a lot of one story structures. Lucky for me!

    Elsie, those classic horror flicks have something that all today’s gore misses, I think. There’s a really creepy one with Lon Chaney (the original) who plays a guy who’s running from the law and poses as a guy in the circus without arms or legs. That’s not the creepy part, by the way – it’s what he does later. It’s a silent, as I recall. Bothered the heck out of me!

38. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:41 pm #

    NancyG – I don’t care if they’re poisonous or not. I’d die of heart failure if I saw a little skinny non-poisonous one!

    Lisa – I’m wincing as I type. I’ve never seen Misery, but I think everyone knows about that hobbling scene. WINCE.

    Madeline – I assume NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD doesn’t have a happy ending? Did you know there’s a Broadway show? Mr. R wants to see it (of course).

39. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:43 pm #

    Claudia – the sight of all those dead folk with their brains oozing out in Sixth Sense didn’t make you cringe? Girl, you’re braver than I!

40. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:54 pm #

    Kay, I’ve heard good things about The Others. I may add that to my Netflix list – but I’ll probably chicken out, LOL.

    amy – It’s amazing what terrors we’ll face for our kids! I used to worry what would happen if a snake came between me and my kids. Now they’re old enough so that they run faster than me, so they’re on their own!

41. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 1:58 pm #

    Candis – I never saw Blair Witch. That’s the kind of flick I avoid. Dark creepy forests never end well.

    Judy P – I’m glad you can enjoy the hot air balloons! Interesting that they don’t trigger your fear. I’d think that would send it into overdrive.

    SABRINA!!! I saw the Sentinel and I’m still creeped out by the memory of that old lady sitting in the chair at the end. There was a scene in a swimming pool as I recall. Verrrrry creeeepy.

42. Fiona on 14 Oct 2009 at 2:00 pm #

    Karen, I love scary books, but hate scary movies. I agree with loving the movie MISERY. The acting was so good. I liked SIXTH SENSE, too. Excellent acting and deception.

    I am terribly afraid of heights. It has gotten worse as I’ve gotten older. I can’t seem to get over it.I used to be terrified of spiders, but my youngest son loves all kinds of bugs. Now, I look for spiders to point out to him when we are outside. I can appreciate the dew on a web, and their intricate patterns.

    I still don’t LIKE spiders, but the terror is gone. I guess my son has taught me to not reflexively stomp on them.

43. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 2:01 pm #

    Karen H – awww – your dad sounds sweet.

    Suzie – I’m not sure I like them either way (gory or scary).

    Julia – what is CPSE going to be this Halloween?

    Ladydf – I’ve never seen a teen slasher movie, but I can be pretty sure it’s not my cup of tea. Mr. R and I are both George C Scott fans – I’ll have to get him to order Changeling on Netflix!

44. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 2:04 pm #

    Elsie – I guess your parents thought twice before taking you to more scary flix if you slept with them afterward! My kids kick. THey’d be on their own.

    Fiona – I can appreciate the intricate web as long as I’m looking at it and not walking into it. There is a shuddering ickiness about walking through a web and having it all over you.

    Ew.

45. Paula on 14 Oct 2009 at 2:11 pm #

    I don’t do horror movies. As a child I used to watch Dr Who from behind the sofa or exit the room when it came on.
    Phobias: Thunder storms – still don’t like them but I am not terrified by them like I used to be I’m sure it is because I’ve got the boys now and don’t want them to pick up on it. I also used to be petrified of the dark as a child and funnily enough my eldest doesn’t like the dark and if we have a power cut in the night within minutes he is awake!!

46. Claudia Dain on 14 Oct 2009 at 2:52 pm #

    Karen, I guess I thought of The Sixth Sense as more of a mental puzzle than horror. Alien I’d classify as suspense sci fi, not horror. I think of horror as pure ick. Blood, guts, not much plot; Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Saw, Friday the 13th, like that. I even think of Misery as suspense on steroids, but still not horror. Maybe my definition is too narrow?

47. Judy F on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:04 pm #

    Karen Ro its a deal…

    I enjoyed The Six Sense that to me is more suspense then horror. Horror to me is Friday the 13th etc. Another movie that I love is Deceived. Very suspenseful.

    Off to walk 2 miles. LOL

48. Sabrina Jeffries on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:04 pm #

    Claudia, what would you consider the Exorcist (which I’ve never seen, by the way)?

    Good horror, for me, is very psychological, but maybe MY definition is wrong. Maybe psychological thriller would be better.

49. Sabrina Jeffries on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:06 pm #

    KarenR, there have been two Sentinel movies, I think. The one I saw had Burgess Meredith in it and was about a house that held the gate to hell. Is that the one you saw? It’s been so long since I saw it that I don’t remember much about it except that I couldn’t sleep for several nights after.

    Yes, I have WAY too overactive an imagination.

50. Claudia Dain on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:41 pm #

    I’ve never seen all of The Exorcist; I started to (in the theater) but walked out when she started getting tossed around on the bed and had body parts going in weird directions. So horror? For me, yes. It’s the physical grossness that makes it horror for me. I didn’t find The Exorcist scary. I found it gross.

    Did anyone see Cloverfield? I loved that movie. I don’t think it’s horror, or is it?

51. Claudia Dain on 14 Oct 2009 at 3:43 pm #

    OTOH, I read The Exorcist and loved it. Wasn’t scared at all. I can read *anything* and not get scared. I can get disgusted, but not scared.

52. B on 14 Oct 2009 at 4:48 pm #

    I’ve been reading answers and decided to comment on a few things.

    The Exorcist doesn’t scare me at all. Maybe it’s because I don’t believe in this whole Devil thing. I watched it when the latest version came out not so long ago, and I was like, okay? And I’m a ‘fraidy cat.

    The Sixth Sense, on the other hand, was right in my Daredevil phase. I was 11, and you had to be 12 to enter the movie theater. I was more than happy to put some make up on, and I did look older, so they never carded me. So, I went to the movie. It scared the sh*t out of me. I looked under my darn bed and my closet for over a week. Maybe it was then that I started getting scared. But it took me a long while to stop watching these movies. I saw all the way t The Ring 2. And, honestly, am tempted to check Paranormal Activity.

    Claudia, I *tried* to watch Cloverfield, but the one camera thing didn’t work for me. I started feeling motion sickness and had to leave the theater before I passed out or threw up. But people at the theater were very nice and I ended up watched “Water Horse: Legend of the Sea” that day. ehhh

53. B on 14 Oct 2009 at 4:53 pm #

    Once in a while, I decide to ‘try’ some movies, see if I’ll man up a bit, and watch some things. I watched “One Missed Call” and “The Eye” not too long ago at all. Usually, a movie scares me, I just close my eyes and listen to it anyway. Isn’t exactly what would call money well spent, but…
    My favorite horror movie??? It’s trashy and called “Haunted”, I think, with Catherine Zeta-Jones and Owen Wilson (I think). I watched it when I was 10 or 11, and I absolutely LOVED it. I often wonder if (and believe that) I would be afraid if I watched it again today.
    I really liked The Ring 2, too. I covered my eyes half of it, but the story was nice! :p

54. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 6:31 pm #

    God, I can’t even think about the Ring without thinking of 5 teenaged girls squealing ALL NIGHT in my living room. I think my daughter and her friends weren’t even that scared – they just liked screaming.

    I know the premise for most of these flicks. Scared enough from the premise!

    Sabrina – yes, it was the house that held the gate to hell. I couldn’t sleep for nights after that, either. I saw it on TV while I was babysitting, I think. When the couple came back, I screamed. Luckily they liked me, so I got another job later, LOL.

    Good horror for me is psychological as well. I remember seeing one trailer while in the theater. It was a trailer for a Sally Field movie where Keifer Sutherland had done terrible things to her daughter. I was disturbed all the way through the movie I was watching (not a horror) and then couldn’t sleep for a long time.

    It’s the stuff that I think can happen that keeps me awake.

    Except for the last few years. I have some kind of sleeping disorder and fall asleep within a minute of my head hitting the pillow. Sometimes 30 seconds. But if a dream wakes me, I’m awake the rest of the night.

55. Karen Rose on 14 Oct 2009 at 6:32 pm #

    Thanks for sharing your phobias, guys! It’s useful for me to think on as I plan my talk!

56. evlqn on 14 Oct 2009 at 7:05 pm #

    Just passing through on my way to do homework. I DO NOT DO “blankie” movies!! I see no point in scaring the stuffing out of myself. My ex-DH and my sons LOVE them. They used to go to all the horror cons all the time. My son has pictures of himself with Robert Englund in his Freddy outfit. Some of Elvira Mistress of the Dark also.
    One of their favorite Halloweens while they were teens was the year my oldest gave his brother a make-up jobe where one side of his face was melting and the eyeball was on his cheek. Yes my boys are sick and twisted, Lori would love them.

57. Patricia Barraclough on 14 Oct 2009 at 11:09 pm #

    I do NOT watch scary movies. I’ll have nightmares for weeks. I get creeped out way too easily, especially when I’m tired.
    Phobias – Heights get me. Some days I can deal with it but most, no. I can’t even be on the bottom looking up at someone on a ledge or balcony without having a fear they’ll fall. The odd thing is, looking down from a plane or hot air balloon doesn’t bother me.
    Spiders also do me in. I’ve tried, but can’t handle them. Snakes, no problem. I have a ball python and have handled snakes for years. I’ve worked with animals for years, and the only thing I haven’t been able to handle are the spiders. I took care of tarantulas when I worked at a children’s museum, but could never handle them. I’m allergic to spider bites . I have known people with pet tarantulas and have tried to hold them, but I just can’t do it. When I was in the Peace Corps, the spiders were just too big to smush, so I learned to deal with them. Didn’t kill any for almost 3 years. There was one that wouldn’t let me out of my room, really. It was on the floor in the middle of the doorway, front legs up and fangs extended. That one I killed.
    Have a fun Halloween.

58. Juanita Glass on 17 Oct 2009 at 10:28 am #

    Since my kids are grown and no longer need me to make costumes Halloween now means Brachs Candy Corn. I stock up for the winter during Halloween – one of my few vices! I’m too old for the ones I used to enjoy!!!!