Waking Up Screaming

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Real life fear is perhaps one of the strongest for most people. It can really happen. And its something awful. That's all there really needs to be.

But I'm not necessarily talking about say a "typical" monster flick (or story or myth, remember these fears can derive from anything not just entertainment and media).

For instance, we can forget about slasher films and the spoof horror stuff of the eighties. I don't think I know a single person still frightened of any of that. At the time Friday the 13th and all that came out, that stuff was powerful because of the suspense and the shock and awe of the graphic killing. Here we are today, cheering them (Freddy, Jason, etc.) on as they cut a path through fields of teenagers.

To me, that's not real fear anyway. It's just not scary.

The movies and media nowadays are turning around when it comes to horror. Yes, monsters aren't real, but we live in an age where technology can do a pretty darn good job at tricking our senses into believing it is real, if not for a night or a nightmare. If you let them, that is.

My wife loves the new Evil Dead movie. (I know that movie's extreme in every way but it has its horror.) She will NOT let me play it at night before we bed down. I left it on in the bedroom one night, and she woke up to it playing in the night when she had to use the bathroom. She said she had to muster the courage to get up and head to the john.

None of this should mean anyone should be scared of our modern "monsters" but I just always try to challenge people to immerse themselves in the experience, turn off the lights, and stop pointing out the movie flaws lol. Skim over those minor "punctuation errors" so to speak.

Lots of the things that scare us on this forum have been techniques utilized lately in books and movies. The unseen. The unsettling movements, the very real....

All monsters aren't giant lizards that hide in our closets, or slashers chasing us in the woods.

Lately, they are glimpses of wretched things that disappear around corners in our dark hallways.

When you run into a slasher IRL, come back and talk some more smack. A crazy guy with a large knife gets your attention. What are you, 19?

 

[SecondCircle]

When you run into a slasher IRL, come back and talk some more smack. A crazy guy with a large knife gets your attention. What are you, 19?

So, that was such a knee jerk that I think you did a back flip.

Calm down and read slowly JBJ. As I said, I agree very much that real life scenarios are probably some of the scariest, because of the fact that they could happen. Your guy with a knife qualifies. I think everyone would be terrified of being chased by a guy who wanted to kill you with a knife. If some isn't scared of this, then they are the guy with the knife.

What I was referring to was the tired old "Jason and Freddy" slashers depicted in cinema a few decades ago. They ain't scary. Unless... you, perhaps, are afraid of them?

All I was suggesting (not demanding) is that while REAL LIFE can be and is indeed VERY FRIGHTENING, that there have been leaps in the entertainment industry that transcend just trying to copy and paste "scary monsters and slashers" on the screen. We are seeing a lot more of what scares us on a baser level now, even many of the things listed here.

Not saying anyone "has" to be scared of fictional things, but that we just open our mind a little and immerse ourselves in the fiction.

Else, none of the fantasy here at lit would work... would it?

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

So, that was such a knee jerk that I think you did a back flip.

Calm down and read slowly JBJ. As I said, I agree very much that real life scenarios are probably some of the scariest, because of the fact that they could happen. Your guy with a knife qualifies. I think everyone would be terrified of being chased by a guy who wanted to kill you with a knife. If some isn't scared of this, then they are the guy with the knife.

What I was referring to was the tired old "Jason and Freddy" slashers depicted in cinema a few decades ago. They ain't scary. Unless... you, perhaps, are afraid of them?

All I was suggesting (not demanding) is that while REAL LIFE can be and is indeed VERY FRIGHTENING, that there have been leaps in the entertainment industry that transcend just trying to copy and paste "scary monsters and slashers" on the screen. We are seeing a lot more of what scares us on a baser level now, even many of the things listed here.

Not saying anyone "has" to be scared of fictional things, but that we just open our mind a little and immerse ourselves in the fiction.

Else, none of the fantasy here at lit would work... would it?

From what I've read most of the writing doesn't work, for one reason: There's no experience behind it. On the other hand readers scream IMPLAUSIBLE when the story is as real as Death. No experience, again.

I collect articles from old newspapers. Some are beyond horrible, and very real. Dad and the kid go fishing, Dad steps behind a bush to pee, and a gator grabs the girl. Or Ma runs to the aid of her snakebit child, and the baby she was bathing drowns.

Real horror is when you drop the ball. Lately, around here, Ma blabbers on her cell phone while Dad runs over their kid with his lawn mower.

 

[SecondCircle]

When I was younger, I lived (or whatever) in South Central Los Angeles. I would wake up at the end of a day's sleep, thinking that there were people out there who wanted to do me great bodily harm, probably ending in my death or worse. Actually there were people out there who wanted to do me great bodily harm, probably ending in my death or worse. I would then calmly think through things and realize that there the people out there who wanted to do me great bodily harm, probably ending in my death or worse, should have been afraid of me. I would then go out to shoplift supper and, probably, do great bodily harm to those who had it coming.
I have never understood the fascination with horror stories.

You've experienced very real fear, and I guess made others feel that fear.

Horror stories are of the things scare us. When you read s horror story, you've probably read someone else's real fear. Doesn't matter what it is. We all are afraid of different things. We have real as well as imagined fears. I would assume (not unkindly, mind you) that by experiencing the very true terrors of the real world, you don't see how anyone could be scared of the fake shit in horror movies or stories.

And the answer to that conundrum I think is that fear, as a human instinct, doesn't care if the experience is real or all in our heads. The emotion will happen regardless of whether something is logical or not.

It could be having enemies pile up day to day, making you feel like you have to watch over your shoulder every second of the day, and making you suspicious of anything and everything around you. It makes you never want to leave your home, for fear that you have to face the things that await you outside your door. It makes you wish someone could make things alright again, that life doesn't have to be so damn worrisome and stressful all the time.

Whether these feelings are attributed to a bad neighborhood full of real monsters, a terrible abusive past, a fearful childhood, the sounds that scratch every single night, the pitch black chaos of the woods at night, or tales of the things that should not be... fear doesn't give a shit. Its a natural, human reaction.

You may not be unnerved by stories of fictional things. But dome people use fiction to escape reality, to find something different than the usual... only to be chased right back.

 

[BuckyDuckman]

So, Lit, I'll ask you. What scares you? Why? How would you classify it? Is it real world monsters living nearby or on your morning news? Pagan witchcraft? Demonic entities? Ghosts or wretched spirits trapped in a loop of never ending torture? Creatures that should not be? Heights? Deep water where who knows what could lurk? Space and time dimensional twists? Miley Cyrus?

Are there specific films you watched that flipped a terrifying switch that linger in your memory? A story you read that had you startled by every sound? A childhood fear that hasn't quite gone away? A strange phobia? Clowns?

There's my 16 part question. I should answer for it for myself soon, since that's only fair.

The idea of ghosts used to scare me. I remember desperately wanting to believe in the supernatural as a young teen. Then, as an older teen, my oldest brother was remodeling an old house. In the basement, they found an odd door and a mystery about what was behind it. He called so I could "investigate" and those old hopes/fears returned in a big way. It turned out to be little more than a root cellar portion of an old, unfinished basement with a dirt floor, but it gave me the creeps. As did "The Blair Witch Project."

I used to be a professional magician, which I think alters my perceptions of things. For example, in horror movies, I'm fascinated by the art of fooling people into thinking something horrific has happened. I'm a big fan of special effects and make-up.

As a much younger boy - say around 10-ish, I remember buying a couple "Tales from the Crypt" comic books and then one "Richie Rich" or "Archie" comic to read after I read the horror comics so I could sleep.

If I'm brutally honest, I guess what scares me most would be uncontrollable/inexplicable/inescapable situations. So, ghosts - because you can't hide from them. Slasher movies like "The Hitcher" (the original) are great. Zombie stuff creeps me out because they're unrelenting.

I go into stories/movies ready to suspend disbelief - so make it relatively believable and I'm down for it.

 

[colddiesel]

Fear of the unknown or unknowable

It's not a normal fear but sometimes an incapacity to make an emotional response tears people apart. First example. I have observed the close relatives, parents, siblings of unexplained suicides - they torture themselves - was there anything I could have done - was I a cause etc.

It is a fairly similar phenomena when someone goes missing. I was involved with a case where a child went missing in floods, all that was found were some slip marks on a river bank. The mother had a breakdown through the unresolved grief - was she dead- what did I do wrong etc.

Eight months after the child went missing the police eventually followed the advice of an aboriginal tracker who had said the kid might be found about 25 miles downstream in the Channel country. All they found was some clothes and a few bones - but it was enough for DNA. And the mothers slow recovery started from that date, the date she could begin to grieve. .

Mostly people fear that which is unknown rather than known. I served in the Army in the Malaysian insurgency and some men just don't seem to register fear of physical threats - then they worry themselves into a breakdown when they get one of 'those' letters from the wife or girlfriend back home.

 

[SecondCircle]

It's not a normal fear but sometimes an incapacity to make an emotional response tears people apart. First example. I have observed the close relatives, parents, siblings of unexplained suicides - they torture themselves - was there anything I could have done - was I a cause etc.

It is a fairly similar phenomena when someone goes missing. I was involved with a case where a child went missing in floods, all that was found were some slip marks on a river bank. The mother had a breakdown through the unresolved grief - was she dead- what did I do wrong etc.

Eight months after the child went missing the police eventually followed the advice of an aboriginal tracker who had said the kid might be found about 25 miles downstream in the Channel country. All they found was some clothes and a few bones - but it was enough for DNA. And the mothers slow recovery started from that date, the date she could begin to grieve. .

Mostly people fear that which is unknown rather than known. I served in the Army in the Malaysian insurgency and some men just don't seem to register fear of physical threats - then they worry themselves into a breakdown when they get one of 'those' letters from the wife or girlfriend back home.

Nothing could be more true. I think that the unknown is the biggest fear of all. Its what gives life to our other fears a lot of the time. The unknown is not something we can prepare for or predict, therefore our "natural" selves fear its happening because we will not know what to do to survive that unknown.

The unknown also leaves a gigantic gap in which our imagination takes over, creating infinite possibilities and terrors that root themselves deep into our psyche. Its actually the reason why those things we can't see are frightening. When we can't see it, our minds scramble to assemble a picture or an explanation for what is making the sound. Sometimes its logical, many times it's not.

The examples you've provided are good reasons why I'm not as scared of real life events like I am the fictional. Well, to put it a better way, when real life things happen, I am frightened by them, but I'm not always terrified of the thought that they could happen. Because I've gotten used to some wild shit before, and I just accept that terrible real world things are gonna happen. They are scary when they take place, and the thought of them taking place is a very scary one, but they don't terrify me passively throughout the day.

The unknown is a troubling thing constantly, and can easily build fear and suspense.

 

[SecondCircle]

I think that when creating horror, the "happy medium" principles often apply. The suspension of disbelief principle definitely applied to fictional horror.

It's gotta be believable to a certain point, and even if it's something that could never happen or is entirely fictional, it has to be presented in a way that immerses people into the fiction in a believable way.

So even, with fiction, when we are writing or directing something like ghosts or "unreal" horrors, they should use those base fears of ours to lead us to that monster in the dark. The worst mistake ever in horror is to simply reveal your horror outright, to draw back the curtains and push it on stage for the world to see first thing. It may still be horrific, but not in the same way as if it were hidden in the corner of your eye and making sounds in the darkness.