The Horror

This post has no relation to other recent post (really, Julie?  And all of your posts are usually so carefully planned!), but for some reason I have been thinking about horror movies that made me cry.  I know the reason: an Entertainment Weekly review of a new book about some of the good, old horror movies of the 70s.  You may or may not know that I was a film major in college, and my favorite genre was always horror.  And gore.  Sort of different, and some movies encompass both.  But, dang, I loved that stuff.  I was quite the little award winning horror movie maker in college.  It's hard to love it now as a mom in my thirties, but I still have a soft, mushy, bloody place in my heart for the genre.

Not that it really scared me, but I don't think that was the point.  Most of the movies either made me laugh or marvel at the stupidity, both excellent reasons for watching movies.  However, here is my (very short) list of horror movies that were so scary they made me cry.  And not as a kid.  Like, within the last fifteen years.

1.  Texas Chainsaw Massacre - The original, duh.  The end, where the girl makes it to the truck and she's hysterical? I have the exact reaction.  Leatherface put us through so much, will we ever really escape?

2.  Poltergeist - This movie is scary as shit.  A clown doll.  Need I say more?  Because I can: freaky little girl, creaky old stumpy woman, skeletons in the swimming pool, vortexes in the bedroom walls, trees attacking kids...  And it was all so real!  Plus, all of that horrible stuff happened to the cast and crew of all of the movies and their sequels.  Not right.

3.  28 Days Later - I cry at regular intervals throughout this movie.  Nothing scares me as much as fast moving zombies.  (Let's not have the are they zombies argument right now, thank you.)  I think the stress of this movie may someday give me a heart attack.

4.  The Blair Witch Project - No matter what you think of this movie now (and, you'd better think about it), seeing it on opening night before anyone knew that it was a work of fiction was one of the scariest experience of my life.  I THREW UP in the bathroom during the film.  Okay, it turned out I had mono, but still.  And after the movie, a fight broke out in the lobby because some woman brought a little kid to the theater, and a guy was screaming at her and I think a punch was thrown.  All in all, a warped event.  But the movie itself is pure genius.  Will anyone ever look at a basement corner the same way again?  And it also reminds us all how much camping sucks.

So, what movies scare the tears out of you?

PS Did I already blog about this?  Or have I just thought about blogging about it, so it all seems familiar?  Whatevs.