My heart
’s racing inside my chest, and a cold tingly chill runs down my
spine as I clench my fists and reach for the armrest next to me. My
attempts to avoid looking at the screen are futile; my eyes are
riveted to the petrifying scene taking place.
My heart’s racing inside my chest, and a cold tingly chill runs down my spine as I clench my fists and reach for the armrest next to me. My attempts to avoid looking at the screen are futile; my eyes are riveted to the petrifying scene taking place.
My friend, sitting next to me, jumps two feet in the air. I look at him with shock as he replies, “Sorry. Old football injury – just won’t go away.” This past Thanksgiving vacation, some friends and I decided (who knows why) to go see the new horror movie Gothika, with Halle Berry. I knew from the very beginning it would be a mistake, yet even though I’m terrified of scary movies, there’s something that always draws me right to them. Somehow, I find being scared to death is very exciting. Not only am I the girl who will have to sleep with the lights on and one eye open after watching a scary movie, but I’m also the first girl, when asked to see Gothika, to reply, “I’m down, lets go!”
During the entire ride home in my empty and, suddenly, very eerie car, I had to turn around every few seconds, because I thought the creepy ghost girl from the movie was in my back seat. I was convinced I’d see her standing in the middle of the road around every corner. When I pulled into my driveway at two in the morning, I made my mom come in her pajamas, rudely awakened from a comforting and deep slumber, just to meet me outside because I didn’t want to get out of my car by myself. But, do I learn a lesson from this experience? No. Never.
It’s not just Gothika that affected me. Oh no. My first horror movie was “It” by Stephen King when I was 7-year’s old. Yeah. No minor leagues for scary movies with me. I jumped right in. But I also refused to jump into a shower for a really long time after that, for fear that the not-so-friendly clown would pop out of the drain. (This may also be why I wasn’t the most popular second grader.) And to this day I avoid walking near the sewer drains on the sidewalk. I’m no fool, I know he lives down there.
After watching the Blair Witch Project, not only was I never going to go camping in the woods again, but I was also convinced for about two months that Blair the Witch lived somewhere in my one and half acre backyard of trees and grass. You couldn’t pay me money to go back there.
In my defense, though, I’d just like to say that part of the reason I was so freaked out over the Blair Witch movie was because my brother convinced me that all the footage was real and that the characters were not actors but real people who actually died. I didn’t discover my brother lied (I’ll get you back, Mike. It’s not over.) until almost a year later when I saw the girl in Blair Witch playing Freddie Prinze, Jr.’s girlfriend in “Boys and Girls.” Texas Chainsaw? Big mistake. The washer and dryer in my sorority house just happen to be, unfortunately, located in the basement. Yes, basement. The basement not only is the place where our washer and dryer fraternize together, but it is also the place where Mister Psycho Chainsaw Boy lives and takes all of his victim’s bodies apart. Needless to say, my mom’s been, and will be, doing my laundry ever since.
It’s almost as though I crave the immense suffering I endure after watching scary movies, a sick and twisted addiction. Scary movies always leave me with this creepy feeling that I can’t stand, yet I can’t miss out on any of it, either. And apparently I’m not alone in my powerful love/hate relationship of horror movies.
According to Leon Rappoport, professor of psychology at Kansas State University, the attraction to the scary movies is the same thing that attracts people to the roller coasters at the amusement parks.
“It goes all the way back to sitting around the campfire telling ghost stories and folk tales,” Rappoport said. “It’s a very prevalent, deep-seated, human characteristic to explore the boundaries where they can tolerate fear and anxiety, and then master that fear and anxiety by working through it.”
So why do people like to be scared?
“There is a pleasure that kids experience by exploring unconventional boundaries of these movies,” Rappoport said. “It’s sort of like forbidden territory when horror films come out, and parents or adults say they’re not fit for children. It makes them even more attractive.”
For the science part of it, (I know, it’s hard to believe there’s science involved with watching “Scream 2,” but there is. Fear is an ancient method of survival. Being scared is what makes animals and humans flee from danger and save themselves. Those who lacked a strong fear response were more likely to be killed. Fear makes nerves that begin at the eyes and ears lead to a part of the brain called the amygdala.
When you see a snake, for example, the amygdala makes you freeze, have a quickened heartbeat, or run very fast. But, seeing the snake also makes you use another part of the brain called the cortex. It analyzes the situation, and it finds that the snake is only made of rubber, then it tells your body to calm down. You can think of the amygdala as the engine and the cortex as the brake. The whole experience is like an addicting adrenaline rush.
I, for one, will always be an avid, yet petrified, fan of being scared to death by scary movies. The overwhelming pull of fear is too much for my morbid curiosity to resist. The only person I feel sorry for is my mom, who’s going to have to put up with me afterwards. Scary movies are a lot like boys; you can’t live with them, but you can’t live without them, either.
