Hello and welcome! You've somehow managed to find "Greta Scared Stupid"- a blog dedicated to documenting my month-long introduction (and possibly obsession) over the horror film genre. I, Greta, will be watching (at least) one horror movie per day throughout the month of October. I've never really been big into scary movies, probably in part due to being absolutely terrified when I was taken to see Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas in theaters at the tender age of six. Realizing that of the few horror flicks I've actually seen, I really enjoyed a lot of them, I decided to dedicate the month of October to expanding my horizons in the genre.
I've been collecting suggestions from friends for the past few weeks and the day has finally arrived. I didn't get a chance to get to Reckless Video today, so I had a limited selection of movies to choose from my personal collection. I've decided to only watch movies I have not seen before (I'm sorry, Troll 2), so that really limited my options. Luckily, I bought The Exorcist a few years ago for $3 at a post-Halloween sale. Being the scaredy-cat I am, I never got around to watching it. Lo and behold, it became my first movie. Might as well start of with a bang, right?
My mother told me once that she saw the trailer for The Exorcist and had nightmares for a month (I guess it runs in the family). It has quite the legacy as being the scariest movie of all time (or rather the best horror film of all time, which is a somewhat different description). I found a pretty awesome website with its own list of the 100 Best Horror Films, and The Exorcist is ranked numero uno.
So what did I think of it? With my very inexperienced lens of horror films: I liked it. I was nervous that I might scare myself too much too soon by watching this one first, but it turned out to be much less creepy than my expectations (honestly, the music was the scariest part to me). It also had much more background and character development than I expected. The famous scenes are definitely gruesome, most notably when Regan (Linda Blair) stabs herself with a crucifix and then later attacks her mother (Ellen Burstyn) with her crotch and a bureau (ouch!), and of course, the infamous split-pea-soup vomiting. Beyond the main plot of sweet little girl possessed by the devil, there are definitely other stories going on: Father Karras is grappling with the loss of both his faith and his mother; Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) is totally failing as a single mother/actress by getting her director killed and letting her daughter become possessed; and for some reason Lieutenant Kinderman is way too forgiving in his murder investigations (wow didn't see that one coming with a character name like that!).
Probably the weirdest side-plot in this movie, however, is the interplay between neurobiology vs. psychiatry (followed closely by psychiatry vs. religion). When Chris first takes Regan in for a check up on her new-found defiant and hyperactive behavior, the doctors prescribe Ritalin, saying they're not really sure what's wrong, but it's totally normal for kids to act this way and it seems to get better with a healthy dose of stimulants. Could the filmmakers possibly have been predicting the future overuse of ADHD meds in kids way back in 1973? Unlikely, but this part of the movie totally had me unintentionally amused. Maybe we should have just hired more priests for our ADD diagnosed kids.
Now that I've got the ball rolling, the blog up and running, and the boyfriend somehow convinced (manipulated?) into keeping me company during my scare-a-thon, I have to say I'm really excited. Stay tuned for a new entry for each day this month, and please suggest your favorite horror movies! I definitely am no where near having 30 more to watch, and I'm totally open to suggestions.
Until tomorrow!
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