The horror film that scared my mother...
Aug. 7th, 2011 07:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatGuillermo Del Toro has just remade the 1973 telepic - Don't Be Afraid of The Dark, which he considers the scariest and creepiest television horror film ever done. My mother would agree with him.
John Newland’s 1973 made-for-TV drama “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark” is widely considered a high water mark for feature-length broadcast productions. Produced as an ABC movie of the week, it belonged to a series that also included Steven Spielberg’s “Duel” and the early Michael Douglas vehicle “Shattered Silence,” among many others. Those with adolescent memories of watching Newland’s movie usually recall its genuine frights, an experience made particularly resonant by the capacity to watch it within the solitary environment of one’s own home.
--http://www.indiewire.com/article/la_film_fest_review_dont_be_afraid_of_the_dark_remakes_the_original_minus_m/
Your probably thinking - eh...so what? Right? But...
My mother doesn't scare easy - well not when it comes to horror films at any rate. I think the only thing that scares my mother is heights.
Jaws? Not scarey. Them? Not scarey. The Giant Spider in Return to the King? Really not scary. Alien? Nope. Didn't jump. At all. No fear. Not a glimmer. I had to leave the room during it. But my mother - a rock. She watched all the puppet-master and dolls films, which I also left the room during. And has been known to read many a serial killer novel without so much as a shudder. Halloween, no problemo. Nightmare on Elm Street? She thought it was silly. The Haunting - eh, not frightening. But Don't Be Afraid of The Dark - a tv movie starring Kim Darby and Jim Hutton, which she watched really late at night while scrubbing the kitchen floor in the early 1970s that scared her. Really scared her. She told it to me, the story. I've never seen the film, not sure I can. Her re-telling of it - kept me awake at night. When I mentioned the title of that film to her over the phone this afternoon - she said - oh yeah, creepy movie, that's the one with Kim Darby in it. She even remembers the actress's name.
According to the review, the plot is more or less the same - except, it's a little girl not an adult neurotic housewife and it is more like Pan's Labrynthe or more dark fairy-tale than horror flick in structure. In other words...Del Torro has tamed the film that scared him. It appears to have lost much of the original chills. In part because it is psychological horror, and Del Torro much like Spielberg - often shows too much, and with psychological horror - less is always more. Also, it's a film that works better if you are watching it in the confines of your own home (in my mother's case, a house with a fire place and basement) and not on the big screen. Some horror films work better on tv. Some in the movie theater. The Ring was scarier when I got home and looked at my tv set, as was Poltergiest. But on the movie screen, not so much.
The plot? In the original a neurotic housewife and her business executive husband move into her family ancestorial home, which she spends her time restoring with her prissy decorator. At one point, she discovers a locked one which she opens, and the bricked up fire-place - which she asks the old handy-man to help her open up. But he tells her that her grandmother had it bricked up for a reason.
And not to open it up. She tries to do it herself, but is only able to open up the portion that allowed people to remove the ashes from the fireplace. After this happens, voices start whispering to her from behind the bricks. Then she begins to be terrorized by the creatures, but no one believes her or sees them. She asks what they want, and they say - they want her...that whomever freed them must now join them and become one of them. [It's a dated film that says a lot about how far women have come from the 1970s.]
I can see why it scared my mother - situational more than anything else. She was a young housewife married to a business executive husband, who looked a great deal like Jim Hutton (tall and skinny with black hair) - whose husband was away a lot on business trips. Also we had a fireplace. I think that is how horror and comedy work - anything really - it has to resonate on some emotional level with the viewer. If you don't live in a house with a fireplace or for that matter are a housewife who is alone a lot - it probably won't scare you all that much. Alien didn't scare her - because it didn't resonate on any level emotionally. I'm not sure why Alien scares me - I think it was the whole monster infecting you then bursting out of your stomach thing that bothered me. I can't watch horror films or read horror novels that involve parasites or people turning into monsters or critters. That has always bothered me. The Island of Doctor Moreau with Michael York drove me nuts as a child, and I still can't make it through The Fly with Jeff Goldblum or Altered States with William Hurt (both classic horror flicks.)
Not sure how good the remake will be. The trailer looks suitably creepy as does the marketing campaign, but the reviews are luke-warm at best. Also, something tells me that Del Torro didn't go with the creepy, yet low-budget 1973 ending.
John Newland’s 1973 made-for-TV drama “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark” is widely considered a high water mark for feature-length broadcast productions. Produced as an ABC movie of the week, it belonged to a series that also included Steven Spielberg’s “Duel” and the early Michael Douglas vehicle “Shattered Silence,” among many others. Those with adolescent memories of watching Newland’s movie usually recall its genuine frights, an experience made particularly resonant by the capacity to watch it within the solitary environment of one’s own home.
--http://www.indiewire.com/article/la_film_fest_review_dont_be_afraid_of_the_dark_remakes_the_original_minus_m/
Your probably thinking - eh...so what? Right? But...
My mother doesn't scare easy - well not when it comes to horror films at any rate. I think the only thing that scares my mother is heights.
Jaws? Not scarey. Them? Not scarey. The Giant Spider in Return to the King? Really not scary. Alien? Nope. Didn't jump. At all. No fear. Not a glimmer. I had to leave the room during it. But my mother - a rock. She watched all the puppet-master and dolls films, which I also left the room during. And has been known to read many a serial killer novel without so much as a shudder. Halloween, no problemo. Nightmare on Elm Street? She thought it was silly. The Haunting - eh, not frightening. But Don't Be Afraid of The Dark - a tv movie starring Kim Darby and Jim Hutton, which she watched really late at night while scrubbing the kitchen floor in the early 1970s that scared her. Really scared her. She told it to me, the story. I've never seen the film, not sure I can. Her re-telling of it - kept me awake at night. When I mentioned the title of that film to her over the phone this afternoon - she said - oh yeah, creepy movie, that's the one with Kim Darby in it. She even remembers the actress's name.
According to the review, the plot is more or less the same - except, it's a little girl not an adult neurotic housewife and it is more like Pan's Labrynthe or more dark fairy-tale than horror flick in structure. In other words...Del Torro has tamed the film that scared him. It appears to have lost much of the original chills. In part because it is psychological horror, and Del Torro much like Spielberg - often shows too much, and with psychological horror - less is always more. Also, it's a film that works better if you are watching it in the confines of your own home (in my mother's case, a house with a fire place and basement) and not on the big screen. Some horror films work better on tv. Some in the movie theater. The Ring was scarier when I got home and looked at my tv set, as was Poltergiest. But on the movie screen, not so much.
The plot? In the original a neurotic housewife and her business executive husband move into her family ancestorial home, which she spends her time restoring with her prissy decorator. At one point, she discovers a locked one which she opens, and the bricked up fire-place - which she asks the old handy-man to help her open up. But he tells her that her grandmother had it bricked up for a reason.
And not to open it up. She tries to do it herself, but is only able to open up the portion that allowed people to remove the ashes from the fireplace. After this happens, voices start whispering to her from behind the bricks. Then she begins to be terrorized by the creatures, but no one believes her or sees them. She asks what they want, and they say - they want her...that whomever freed them must now join them and become one of them. [It's a dated film that says a lot about how far women have come from the 1970s.]
I can see why it scared my mother - situational more than anything else. She was a young housewife married to a business executive husband, who looked a great deal like Jim Hutton (tall and skinny with black hair) - whose husband was away a lot on business trips. Also we had a fireplace. I think that is how horror and comedy work - anything really - it has to resonate on some emotional level with the viewer. If you don't live in a house with a fireplace or for that matter are a housewife who is alone a lot - it probably won't scare you all that much. Alien didn't scare her - because it didn't resonate on any level emotionally. I'm not sure why Alien scares me - I think it was the whole monster infecting you then bursting out of your stomach thing that bothered me. I can't watch horror films or read horror novels that involve parasites or people turning into monsters or critters. That has always bothered me. The Island of Doctor Moreau with Michael York drove me nuts as a child, and I still can't make it through The Fly with Jeff Goldblum or Altered States with William Hurt (both classic horror flicks.)
Not sure how good the remake will be. The trailer looks suitably creepy as does the marketing campaign, but the reviews are luke-warm at best. Also, something tells me that Del Torro didn't go with the creepy, yet low-budget 1973 ending.