Sunday, October 25, 2009

haiku's Top 5 Horrors

The very young haiku using his
homemade giant lizard shrink gun.


THE FUTURIST! asked haiku to compile his favorite scary movies for the SHOCKtober blog series. It seems haiku does not watch many scary movies and, at first, made a roster of fright films that included Steve Martin's Pink Panther reboot and Howard the Duck, but THE FUTURIST! tossed that list in the trash bin and told him it was to be actual SCARY movies ... with zombie killers and monsters and such.

It seems haiku was an avid monster fan as a child. In the photo above, he can be seen making believe he is battling Gamera, Ghidorah or Godzilla in his backyard. haiku loved those monster movies and constructed a monster lizard shrink reducer gun out of a shoebox, some old Polaroid camera parts, a car radio antennae, and a mayonnaise jar lid. Tragedy struck, however, after his friend Bing convinced haiku that his sister's pet chameleon was a successfully shrunken mutant radioactively (once large) lizard monster. haiku, afraid that the reducer ray effects would soon wear out and that the lizard would again reach gargantuan size and destroy parts of the tri-state area with fiery breath blasts, flushed Bing's sister's lizard down the toilet. This caused emotional distress on the part of Bing's sister which caused parents in both families to scold haiku and punish him. The worst part was, however, that haiku had harbored a secret crush on Bing's sister and she never spoke to him again. This resulted in huge psychological trauma in haiku and he can't watch any Tokyo Monster stomper movies anymore without weeping. Bing's sister is now a stripper known as Cammy Meleon. Small moments of young trauma have such rippling effects later in life. * sigh *

And now:

haiku's
Top 5 Scary Movies
for SHOCKtober!
(no giant lizard monster movies included)

1.
Psycho (1960)
Not only my favorite horror film, but one of my
all-time favorite films. Gets better with every viewing.

2. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931)
Amazing direction and camera work.
Not to mention a deliciously lusty Hyde played by Frederic March.

3.
The Shining (1980)
Probably the only film on my list that's genuinely scary,
though only at parts -- I don't have a high tolerance for fright.

4.
Carrie (1976)
Not really scary, but a whole lot of fun.
The last 20 min. are especially great.

5. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)
This scared me so bad as a child that I couldn't sleep
for two days after seeing it. Not so scary the second time
around as an adult, but still a good movie.

Thank you, haiku.

3 comments:

Dara said...

Very good. I haven't seen the '70s version of Body Snatchers, but if haiku recommends it I'm sold!

Paul (Random Numbers) said...

Carrie terrified me only a few years ago, what a shocking film!

THE FUTURIST! said...

haiu would also probably recommend the original GODZILLA, KING OF THE MONSTERS, but he'd most likely pass out due to his hysterical gasping sobs.