Scary and Terrifying Movies that stick in the mind.

[Pure]

i'm speaking here of a pervasive mood of terror and dread, and its being conveyed images that won't leave your mind, even after years. i don't mean moments of shock/horror, like in *Psycho*.

*Night of the Hunter* sticks in my mind; i saw it decades ago. Rob Mitchum, a killer, presenting himself as a man of god, woos the mom and dispatches her. he then comes after the kids (who know the secret he wants to know), who've gone on the run. i still remember the image of the woman's (mom's) body underwater. the whole thing has a 'child's nightmare' quality, with evil clearly in the ascendency for most of the film. evangelical religion somehow makes it scarier..

 

[soflabbwlvr]

Wait Until Dark

I first saw this old movie in the late 70s. Audrey Hepburn stars as a recently blind woman in a basement apartment whose husband returned from a trip with the wrong luggage. She is alone when some drug dealers show up looking for the drugs that were hidden in a stuffed animal her husband carried home. Alan Arkin plays the bad guy who terrorizes the woman while searching for the drugs. The last twenty minutes of the film were so tense that I could hear every member of the audience gasping every time something happened, especially after Arkin took her cane away, forcing Hepburn to stumble around the apartment.

I rented this movie and watched it again many years later. It did not have the same effect on me. I don't know whether it was because I knew what was coming, or if it suffered from the reduction to the small screen. But for nearly 20 years that movie haunted my memories.

 

[TheeGoatPig]

Blindness. I saw it almost a year ago and I can't get it out of my mind. That movie is messed up. I didn't sleep right for weeks after I saw it. All of the torture that they put all of the characters in that movie through, it disturbed me to no end, and I don't think I will ever have to sit through it again. Once was enough for me, thank you very much.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

The Innocents 1960

 

[JT_Stone]

Yeah, Wait Until Dark is very good.

A Clockwork Orange features some of those disturbing scenes.

I love suspenseful movies but hate slasher films. I though the first Alien was really well done. Who can ever forget when the Alien makes his first appearance at the dinner table? It's not freak out material but it's such a creative concept that it is actually fun to watch.

 

[jayce1066]

Last House on the Left. I watched it in 1972 and it is still the only movie that I can honestly say that I wish I'd never seen.

 

[buxxxom]

For me it's two oldies but goodies.....Rosemary's Baby and Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte. Both of these terrify me for kind of the same reason. It's that the ones who you trust are the ones who you should be scared of. Plenty of times I've thought I might be the only sane one in whatever crowd I was in, but what if I'm the only crazed one? How would I know?

 

[Verdad]

For years I thought there was nothing scarier in the world than—dare I say it—The Omega Man.

I was seven or so when I saw a part of it on TV, and it made such an impression it took me about twenty years to get up the courage to see it again. Once I did, I couldn’t stop laughing.

The Omega Man is a cult 70’s movie, a version of I Am Legend with Charlton Heston as lone survivor in a post apocalyptic world inhabited by mutants, and it may be a lot of things, but blood curdling it ain’t. Funny how as kids we don’t notice the corniness or the silly make up or the music score which in this case alone gives it up (blaxploitation style in a would be horror!) and just accept it at face value.

For real dread, I’d say Event Horizon. I don’t know if it fits your bill of “sticking in mind”, but that movie builds up such total anxiety, claustrophobia, and hopelessness that husband and I turned the lights on 15 minutes into it, began lighting cigarettes halfway through it, and had to get dressed and take a walk after it, at 2 am, because we were both too jittery to go to bed. Afterwards I swore I wasn’t going to watch a horror movie ever again.

The movie is about a crew finding and investigating a hulk of a ‘cursed’ spaceship, which may sound silly enough until you get sucked into the tension.

 

[TheeGoatPig]

For real dread, I’d say Event Horizon. I don’t know if it fits your bill of “sticking in mind”, but that movie builds up such total anxiety, claustrophobia, and hopelessness that husband and I turned the lights on 15 minutes into it, began lighting cigarettes halfway through it, and had to get dressed and take a walk after it, at 2 am, because we were both too jittery to go to bed. Afterwards I swore I wasn’t going to watch a horror movie ever again.

The movie is about a crew finding and investigating a hulk of a ‘cursed’ spaceship, which may sound silly enough until you get sucked into the tension.

That one works for me. It really does have a genuine creepy factor that I can't ignore.

 

[R. Richard]

I never actually saw the video, but I was unfortunately there for the live perfomance. The Vice President Technologyof a firm that I was working for got up and gave a presentation on how to write real-time computer code. First of all, he had no idea of how to write real-tine computer code. Second, he cribbed ideas from work that was, in some cases, over a year old (no, I'm not making this up.) By the end of the idiot's career destroying presentation, then entire audience (except for the unfortunates employed by the same company) was laughing at the stupidity. I ripped off my badge (containing the company logo) and slunk out of the room stating, "No spika da English."

I still wake up screaming in the middle of the night.

 

[CharleyH]

i'm speaking here of a pervasive mood of terror and dread, and its being conveyed images that won't leave your mind, even after years. i don't mean moments of shock/horror, like in *Psycho*.

*Night of the Hunter* sticks in my mind; i saw it decades ago. Rob Mitchum, a killer, presenting himself as a man of god, woos the mom and dispatches her. he then comes after the kids (who know the secret he wants to know), who've gone on the run. i still remember the image of the woman's (mom's) body underwater. the whole thing has a 'child's nightmare' quality, with evil clearly in the ascendency for most of the film. evangelical religion somehow makes it scarier..

Aliens and Terminator 2. These are the only movies that have ever had me on the edge of my seat for years and each and every time I see these flicks. Albeit, Barbarella had me gripped for as many years ...nightmares about dolls with metal teeth. I saw the movie as a child and couldn't figure it out for years until I saw it again at 28 years old. Chomp chomp! Still hate braces.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I don't believe there has been a movie made that has ever frightened me or caused nightmares or sleepless nights.

Now you want to talk about real life, that's scary.

 

[rgraham666]

The Hitcher with Rutger Hauer. One scene still makes me shiver after all these years.

 

[Tx Tall Tales]

Trilogy of Terror - 1975.

Three stories starring Karen Black. The first two were Ok, but the third one, Holy Christopher - absolutely riveting.

Limited gore, limited special effects, just a weird little doll chasing a woman around her apartment. But if you ever meet anyone else who saw it back in the mid-70's just mention Trilogy of Terror and listen to them rave.

1990's remake was junk.

 

[squarejohn]

The Dark at the Top of the Stairs. George Brent and Bette Davis.

Sorry, Wrong Number. Barbara Stanwyck and Fred Macmurray.

Both of the above are 1940s movies. Not for those with weak nerves.

 

[cloudy]

Trilogy of Terror - 1975.

Three stories starring Karen Black. The first two were Ok, but the third one, Holy Christopher - absolutely riveting.

Limited gore, limited special effects, just a weird little doll chasing a woman around her apartment. But if you ever meet anyone else who saw it back in the mid-70's just mention Trilogy of Terror and listen to them rave.

1990's remake was junk.

This.

That was probably the scariest thing I've ever seen, and I just don't scare.

*shudder*

 

[Katyusha]

The Omega Man is a cult 70’s movie, a version of I Am Legend with Charlton Heston as lone survivor in a post apocalyptic world inhabited by mutants, and it may be a lot of things, but blood curdling it ain’t. Funny how as kids we don’t notice the corniness or the silly make up or the music score which in this case alone gives it up (blaxploitation style in a would be horror!) and just accept it at face value.

Never saw The Omega Man, but I saw I Am Legend and it terrified me beyond reason. I didn't sleep that night AT ALL, and I was terrified of the night for more than a year afterward. I would turn all the lights in the house on when it started to get dark and I had to sleep with the lights on for a long time. Sometimes I still get scared after dark. It was the idea of an out-of-control virus killing most of the world's population and turning the survivors, even the animal survivors, into monsters that did it.

 

[Guest]

. . . .

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFVyAjj3Bs0
THE SHINING

 

[cloudy]

Oh, my.

Was that the one where at the last bit she has a huge knife and is crouched down and flashes this evil grin to the audience?

I remember staying up really late as a kid to watch that - scared the hell out of me. Gives me goosebumps now.

That's the one.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_FqVXn9NX3fE/TCoFr8nsmXI/AAAAAAAAAqQ/ROqOdIJZV48/s1600/trilogy+of+terror_endingpic.jpg

http://www.filmfodder.com/movies/critical_eye/matheson/images/trilogy_of_terror.jpg

 

[Guest]

. . . .

 

[Boota]

I love horror movies, but I've never been scared by a movie. My wife has, but not by ones where things that can't really happen are the plot. The Hills Have Eyes, where the people are abducted. 8mm where they're making snuff films with runaways. That gets her.

 

[manyeyedhydra]

"Ring" (Japanese original) for me. It plays out like a typical ghost story. The characters do all the things they're supposed to do in uncovering the mystery and laying the unquiet spirit to rest.

...and it doesn't help them one little bit.

 

[Tx Tall Tales]

This.

That was probably the scariest thing I've ever seen, and I just don't scare.

*shudder*

My feelings exactly. My sister loves scare and gore, and I just laugh. But that one got to me. From when she first blindly reaches under the couch, right until the end.

I honestly believe that anyone who picks anything else, just hasn't seen it!

 

[amysmith2310]

Horror mean Shutter To Me

I recently saw the movie shutter and even though i could not recognize language of the movie(some asian language) the movie got into me and kept going on like a record set on repeat for straight two days...

However if talking about movie that psyched me out i think the award goes to the role played by Javier Bardem in no country for old men.....


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