"Also the Thriller video scared me but the Thriller view master scared me more. "
Ha me too! One of the slides has Jackson's monstert eyes popping out at you. I frecently pulled out my old ViewMaster for my nephew, but decided to take out the Thriller one...
Based on how recent most of these movies are, it seems that a lot of folks here are really young.
When I was a kid it was Christopher Lee as Dracula who had me losing sleep.
"If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers." Thomas Pynchon, GRAVITY'S RAINBOW
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." Philip K. Dick
My blog: http://www.roscoewrites.blogspot.com/
Wizard of Oz -- the flying monkeys. Didn't help that when I was a little kid, back in the days when the movie came on tv once a year, my older brother would always hide behind something in the room and jump out at me during the flying monkeys' attack scene, which would freak me out all the more.
I've mentally blocked out the Pleasure Island scenes for years until I re-watched Pinocchio on a whim with my younger cousins. Dear lord, it all came back to me. The film itself holds up incredibly well, one of my favorite animated features for sure.
Also the silent movie thread reminded me of seeing Lon Chaney's Phantom unmasked for the first time. Sure, it was already iconic but the way it is shot, even in the most static era of scene shooting got a jolt out of me. Plus the mask was not terribly appealing either.
And I guess I was not so much scared of the Wizard of Oz as upset by it. By the time I watched it, I had a steady diet of Disney animated weepies of lost characters and abandonment that I expected some trials and tribulations. Like John Waters, I got most upset that Dorothy left pretty, technicolor Oz back to black and white Kansas. Also probably explains why Return to Oz scared me more as a child. The beauty was gone.
"Like John Waters, I got most upset that Dorothy left pretty, technicolor Oz back to black and white Kansas."
Most of the Land of Oz was beautiful like Dorothy said. However, the film does largely imply that it was a dream. It actually does not make sense for it to be real in the movie because how could Dorothy's hair go back to pigtails? And how could the house have gone back to Kansas too? She could not stay asleep forever. In the official sequel, 'Journey Back to Oz' Aunt Em was right when she said, "there is no Land of Oz except maybe in your dreams." And not long after that scene Dorothy's is knock out again with the gate hitting her head.
I can't find it online but read some essay that declared Wizard of Oz as being the most terrifying film ever and they singled out the witch's appearance in the crystal ball as being downright traumatic for kids. I recall being absolutely terrified by that as a kid- and it makes sense. Dorothy is in mortal peril, alone, imprisoned and suddenly Auntie Em appears- the comforting "Mother" figure who you expect will make everything right- only to see her struck down and replaced by the witch.
Hand down, Alfred Hitchcock's, The Birds. I think I was about 7 or 8 when I happened to come across it on TV and I haven't liked seagulls ever since!! It totally creeped me out as a child.
Hey Dottie!
Did your colleagues enjoy the cake even though your cat decided to sit on it? ~GuyfromGermany
When children being kidnapped in 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang' came up, it reminded of 'Annie'. That was at first difficult for me as a kid and then I would get worried that she was going to fall off the bridge.
In the 1999 film and the musical, the Hannigans were stopped even before they could take Annie out of Warbucks' mansion.
I think it definitely is meant to be a dream in the Wizard of Oz movie. But, I admit, this may be a childhood preconception and maybe if I saw it now I'd find it more vague... As a kid I was Oz obsessed (I joined the International Oz Club when I was 7), and so had had all the Baum books and some of the others either read to me, or read myself, at thesame time I was obsessed with the movie. I loved the movie--and I obnoxiously loved to tell anyone I could about all the changes between them--but I admit the dream thing drove me crazy, since even in the first book (which contradicts a lot of the later Baum books--such as that in Oz they later say nobody can die, but death is shown, and is a thread in the first one) it's clear that Oz isn't a dream.
(Is Journey Back to Oz an official sequel? I know they got the rights to many of the MGM elements, but... I should revisit it, I'd prob find i at least campy fun now with Paul Lynde and all).
I admit lots of the movies mentioned were stuff I simply was not allowed to see as a kid. My parents were pretty strong about not letting us kids, me in particular due to chronic bad dreams, see any "adult" horror films. Some stuff snuck through--Pet Semetary at an 8 year old's birthday party, and even TV commercials or posters for things like the Nightmare on Elm Street films terrified me, but not too much really till I was 13 or so and saw Scream and, though I admit it terrified me, I became kinda obsessed with horror--by that point most ofmy friends had been watching stuff like Friday the 13th since they were five or six it seemed.
Oz was a real place in the books, but apparently they made it a dream in the film because back then live-action films with fantasy elements were not successful or very well-received.
"Is Journey Back to Oz an official sequel?"
The Judy Garland discography website says that it IS indeed the official sequel.
Well yeah but that aspect doesn't mean anything more than publicity. They could have made an unofficial sequel and still said the same thing
I do know a major live action fantasy film was seen as a gamble--Alice in Wonderland in the earlier 30s didn't do too well despite a big cast--Oz only reeally was greenlit due to Snow White's success.
That Annie bridge part (which I admit, I found very exciting as a kid) is indicative of every ridiculous, over the top, big budget moment added for the film.
When I was about 7 I had a babysitter who was watching House of Wax with Vincent Price. It scared the crap out of me and she refused to change the channel. That and anything with vampires. I couldn't sleep without the covers pulled up to me chin for years.
