Horror quiz
Oct. 23rd, 2002 08:53 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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aerindipity
1. Name the three movies that have frightened you the most. Feel free to explain why.
A. Halloween. The original, first watched on MTV (back when a movie on MTV was a rare exception) back the early '80s, scared the living shit out of me. Even with commercial interuptions and editing for tv. Having seen it any number of times since then, I'm still impressed. It's not a very gory movie (the opening scene being the only nearly graphic moment, really), nor a very violent one (after the opening murder, only three people are killed, and one is seen only from a distance), but it set the tone for every slasher flick done since then.
B. The Thing. There have been any number of movies that used paranoia as a theme (see any of the Bodysnatchers movies, of course, and many Romero and Cronenberg movies). Few of them have been as apolitical as this one, though, which dumped the entire cast (all male, because Carpenter didn't want there to be any hint of a romantic subplot to undermine the rest of the movie) in Antarctica, and set it up so that not only could any character die, but any character could be The Thing. Not to mention, this movie had effects that still scare today, and which are a lot better than most CGI-fests.
C. Alien. Simply the creepiest horror movie ever. It's perfectly suspenseful from beginning to end, and Harry Dean Stanton's death has become the standard by which all Cat Scares will be judged
Note that these were the three films that frightened me the most. There are plenty of other great horror films -- Psycho just missed making the list (it's still damned scary), and many great films -- Romero's Dead trilogy, all three of Raimi's Evil Dead flicks, Cronenberg's '70s stuff like Shivers, the first two Scream movies (as well as other Craven works, like Last House on the Left, The People Under the Stairs, and The Hills Have Eyes), Pitch Black, Hellraiser, Freaks, The Sixth Sense, most of the early Universal horror flicks, etc -- are worth watching (and sometimes better films), but not as scary.
2. Do you have an irrational fear?
Public speaking.
3. What is the scariest book you have ever read?
I dunno. Books don't scare me at the same level. When I was young, the novella "The Mist," by Stephen King creeped me out, but that was largely due to it's being set in the same town I went to summer camp in. Unlike film, with books, the classics have more of an effect on me -- the short tales of Poe, some of the more coherent Lovecraft, Henry and M.R. James -- but the recent horror books, much as I love them, just don't scare me, per se.
4. Have you ever seen a film or read a book that frightened you so much you couldn't finish it?
No. Unless you count "Cool World," or "My Stepmother is an Alien," but those films scared me because they sucked, and I couldn't finish them. Nothing's ever frightened me that much for real.
5. Was there something that frightened you as a child that seems silly now?
When I was eight, I went to day camp on a bright yellow school bus. One night, I was watching TV, and they showed a commercial for a movie called, "The Children." The plot was basically that a bright yellow school bus drove through some sort of ominous Dark Cloud, and the children became zombies whose hands could kill folks with acid. This scared the living shit out of me, and I refused to go to camp the next day, and didn't feel comfortable on that bus all summer.
Years later, in college, the movie was on late night tv. I watched it, and, to be blunt, it was bad. Laughably so. A C-rate Night of the Living Dead, really, with every scene a variant on the Karen Cooper part. Just bad. But finally watching it was nice and cathartic.
6. Have you ever had any encounters with anything paranormal? Seen a ghost, used a Ouija board, had a precognitive dream?
Nope, nope, nope, and nope. Remember the whole skeptic thing?
7. If you made your own horror movie or wrote a horror story/novel, what would it be about?
Werewolves. I've been working (on and off, mostly off recently) on one. I love the idea of the primal beast within being unleashed, and think there's lots of room to explore that (unlike Vampires, who really have been overused at this point).
8. If you could be (or should I say had to be) any creature of the night (e.g., a vampire, a werewolf), what would you be?
A werewolf.
9. If you could communicate in a direct way with one deceased person personally known to you, who would it be?
My stepfather.
10. If you could communicate in a direct way with one deceased person *not* personally known to you, who would it be?
My father. Might be cheating, but my few memories of him are so vague and distant, I can't say I really knew him. If I have to choose someone I never met (even if I was too young to remember), I'd go for Kip Marlowe.
aerindipity1. Name the three movies that have frightened you the most. Feel free to explain why.
A. Halloween. The original, first watched on MTV (back when a movie on MTV was a rare exception) back the early '80s, scared the living shit out of me. Even with commercial interuptions and editing for tv. Having seen it any number of times since then, I'm still impressed. It's not a very gory movie (the opening scene being the only nearly graphic moment, really), nor a very violent one (after the opening murder, only three people are killed, and one is seen only from a distance), but it set the tone for every slasher flick done since then.
B. The Thing. There have been any number of movies that used paranoia as a theme (see any of the Bodysnatchers movies, of course, and many Romero and Cronenberg movies). Few of them have been as apolitical as this one, though, which dumped the entire cast (all male, because Carpenter didn't want there to be any hint of a romantic subplot to undermine the rest of the movie) in Antarctica, and set it up so that not only could any character die, but any character could be The Thing. Not to mention, this movie had effects that still scare today, and which are a lot better than most CGI-fests.
C. Alien. Simply the creepiest horror movie ever. It's perfectly suspenseful from beginning to end, and Harry Dean Stanton's death has become the standard by which all Cat Scares will be judged
Note that these were the three films that frightened me the most. There are plenty of other great horror films -- Psycho just missed making the list (it's still damned scary), and many great films -- Romero's Dead trilogy, all three of Raimi's Evil Dead flicks, Cronenberg's '70s stuff like Shivers, the first two Scream movies (as well as other Craven works, like Last House on the Left, The People Under the Stairs, and The Hills Have Eyes), Pitch Black, Hellraiser, Freaks, The Sixth Sense, most of the early Universal horror flicks, etc -- are worth watching (and sometimes better films), but not as scary.
2. Do you have an irrational fear?
Public speaking.
3. What is the scariest book you have ever read?
I dunno. Books don't scare me at the same level. When I was young, the novella "The Mist," by Stephen King creeped me out, but that was largely due to it's being set in the same town I went to summer camp in. Unlike film, with books, the classics have more of an effect on me -- the short tales of Poe, some of the more coherent Lovecraft, Henry and M.R. James -- but the recent horror books, much as I love them, just don't scare me, per se.
4. Have you ever seen a film or read a book that frightened you so much you couldn't finish it?
No. Unless you count "Cool World," or "My Stepmother is an Alien," but those films scared me because they sucked, and I couldn't finish them. Nothing's ever frightened me that much for real.
5. Was there something that frightened you as a child that seems silly now?
When I was eight, I went to day camp on a bright yellow school bus. One night, I was watching TV, and they showed a commercial for a movie called, "The Children." The plot was basically that a bright yellow school bus drove through some sort of ominous Dark Cloud, and the children became zombies whose hands could kill folks with acid. This scared the living shit out of me, and I refused to go to camp the next day, and didn't feel comfortable on that bus all summer.
Years later, in college, the movie was on late night tv. I watched it, and, to be blunt, it was bad. Laughably so. A C-rate Night of the Living Dead, really, with every scene a variant on the Karen Cooper part. Just bad. But finally watching it was nice and cathartic.
6. Have you ever had any encounters with anything paranormal? Seen a ghost, used a Ouija board, had a precognitive dream?
Nope, nope, nope, and nope. Remember the whole skeptic thing?
7. If you made your own horror movie or wrote a horror story/novel, what would it be about?
Werewolves. I've been working (on and off, mostly off recently) on one. I love the idea of the primal beast within being unleashed, and think there's lots of room to explore that (unlike Vampires, who really have been overused at this point).
8. If you could be (or should I say had to be) any creature of the night (e.g., a vampire, a werewolf), what would you be?
A werewolf.
9. If you could communicate in a direct way with one deceased person personally known to you, who would it be?
My stepfather.
10. If you could communicate in a direct way with one deceased person *not* personally known to you, who would it be?
My father. Might be cheating, but my few memories of him are so vague and distant, I can't say I really knew him. If I have to choose someone I never met (even if I was too young to remember), I'd go for Kip Marlowe.
