Let's see... when I was about four or five, I saw some version of A Christmas Carol - the scene where Scrooge went to hell kinda' traumatized me.

Heh, was that the musical one with Albert Finney? Because I saw that right around the same age. The hell part didn't quite come across to me (and they usually cut it during the annual TV airings), but the reveal of the Ghost of Xmas Future freaked my shit out the first time around.

I think watching The Haunting ('63 version) in a house with the lights out and my parents gone probably was the most traumatic (around age 9) in terms of sleepless nights.

Seeing Suspiria at 13 probably freaked me out the most, though (as I'm sure I've posted many times before). It also changed forever what it would take to scare me.

what was your most traumatizing formative movie-going experience.

Santa Sangre. Ruined a perfectly good date with a guy who was just months away from realising he was gay, so very narrow window of exploitation there.

Wait...okay, perhaps that's how things should have turned out, but I'm hardly that good a person.

Am I the only Buffista that's seen that movie, or just the only one to be scarred by it?

Am I the only Buffista that's seen that movie, or just the only one to be scarred by it?

I saw it on home video, so while it was undeniably freaky, it wasn't especially scarring. I also found it horribly sad in the end.

Heh, was that the musical one with Albert Finney?

I don't think so. It was an old B&W version.

But I remember we saw it in the Shawano WI theater....

I don't think so. It was an old B&W version.

Probably the Alistair Sim version, then.

Is that ... Saint Blood? I'm not sure why I'm trying to translate it that way, but I know I haven't seen it.

I can't think of a movie that really scarred me, although the boat scene in the original Willy Wonka really freaked me out as a kid.

the boat scene in the original Willy Wonka really freaked me out as a kid.

Heh.

The Oompa-Loompas kinda' scared me.

For me, it was Violet turning into a blueberry.

I also found it horribly sad in the end.

It was the end that scarred me. Sort of how the end of Oldboy just made me reel. Recast the whole movie in another light, and also made me not want to let anyone touch me for the next hour. My arms were just hyper-sensitive.

It was just so fucked up. The movie had been la-la-la-messed up, and then blammo! No, it's worse than that.

Is that ... Saint Blood?

Holy blood.

Kids film that freaked me out--those damn flying monkeys in Wizard of Oz.

Movie I saw on TV that freaked me out--don't remember the name of it, but I think it was a Mia Farrow film in which she played a blind woman. There was a scene where she was drawing herself a bath and filling up the tub, not knowing there was a dead body in it. Gives me the chills remembering it even now!

Also saw a Frankenstein flick which might have been a Hammer film, in which there was lots of ballroom dancing scenes with one of the women wearing a choker that covered up the fact that her neck had been stitched back into place.