My Annual Scary Movie Month

When I was younger I hated horror movies.

I hated stuff that made me feel scared or anxious or anything that would bury its way into my brain and give me nightmares forever.

This all changed when a breakup rendered me completely miserable.

I distinctly remember my sister saying “You know what you need? Something to drink….and horror movies!” and proceeded to pour me the tallest Southern Comfort in human history, excitedly putting a disc in our DVD player.

We got sloshed watching the Ring and the original Evil Dead.

As much as I winced at the incoming jump scares and was most certainly sure Samara was coming for me, I was surprisingly compelled by the lore and story of both films.

I also noticed my enjoyment of the special effects, which varied between eras.

At the very least, it was distracting me from my heart break.

Thus began my teeth gritting dive into scary movies.

When I was cripplingly depressed and the thoughts wouldn’t stop, I’d watch a horror movie or a thriller and scare myself into forgetting about it, at least until my head hit the pillow.

Soon enough, I found myself critiquing them, blasting my friends when they got home about the ridiculous plot of this film and the stupid dialogue in that movie.

As a result of my incessant watching, my house mates have been pulled into the genre, and even the more timid of my friend groups have experienced at least one of my horror movie choices.

When life got busier, I didn’t have as much time to just watch movies, unless my mental illness gave me an excuse.

So I decided I would dedicate a whole month every year to watching as many scary movies as I possibly could. Every year I create a list of potential movies to watch, with the hope I will get through all of them in the month.

I’ve been doing this since 2020, and I have not looked back.

Watching to Inspire

Horror movies utilize so many creative choices, from fake blood to animatronics and set design.

Its always fascinating for me to see how each film approaches problems, styles and fearful impact.

If you watch something like the conjuring, you’ll notice that the house is set up with the perfect props to make you question a figure in the background, there’s mirrors set up so that you become distracted making sure nothing is being reflected, art catches the eyes, curtains feel too stiff to be trusted, the light that bounces from a chandelier makes it look like shadows are coming for the protagonist.

Its truly brilliant stuff, especially when you can recognise the effort.

There’s also the music, the fashion design, the way a character applies their lipstick, being drawn to the characters interactions, picking favourites, trying to weed out the traitor or monster among them.

Horror is like a massive puzzle with a grim aesthetic.

There is power in the grotesque, it is part of humanity.

Even the nature of how humans exist is horrifying to some.

This can all be expressed in the horror genre, there is space for everything in fear.

The choices that are made are all made on purpose to create an energy, and depending on those choices, the film flops or slaps.

Watching to Desensitize

This might seem silly, but at a certain point I became sick of being scared of everything.

I was scared of the dark, I was scared of ghosts, I was scared of intruders, I was scared of giant men standing outside my window. All kinds of fears.

Horror movies helped me change those fears.

The first fear I tackled was my fear of ghosts, I always reasoned they were real, because you cannot disprove their existance, and that scared me.

However, watch any horror movie with ghosts, most of them are vicious on their own grounds, for their own reasons, you just happen to be the brunt of that rage.

Unless you’ve done something to enrage them, so just…don’t?

I realised, I have not done anything to incur enough karmic debt for ghosts to be mad at me. Heck, I’m not even buying property!

I started talking to the ghosts instead (yes I still believe in ghosts), I make lil peace offerings, I try to check the vibe, they get names, if they want, and now I just introduce myself every time I move house.

This may seem very silly, but honestly, it puts my mind at ease.

And we still don’t know for sure about ghosts.

Because of this, I’m able to walk into a room in the middle of the night and close the door, I can go down a pitch black hallway, and I no longer fear the houses I live in.

Its cheaper than therapy.

Watching to Relate

Some of the truest and most deep cutting horror movies base themselves around struggles people genuinely experience.

Split revolves around trauma and mental illness, evolving into something more monstrous, disarmed only when confronted with someone who had a similar background to them.

Black Phone follows the ghosts of abducted children, and the strong bond between two children trying to cope with their abusive father.

Human tragedy is moving, especially when victims come out on top.

Horror movies are where I find the most characters I relate to, having a background of childhood trauma myself.

Horror has also helped me reframe much of what happened to me, every horror movie needs someone who comes out on top.

I am the survivor of my own horror movie, I am Ash with a chainsaw for an arm grinning madly.

I have slayed most of my mental demons.

Lets hope I don’t get transported through time and space though, modern medicine thank you very much.

Even if its Dani smiling at the end of Midsommar, everyone enjoys victory for the one who got it the worst.

I will never watch all the horror movies in the world, nor would I ever want to watch the Human Centipede films, but I want to watch as many films as I can.

I’ve watched some of the most interesting films on Horror binges.

Movies like Animas, a Spanish horror about a girls life literally falling apart around her, while her best friend copes with his abusive father.

I’ve also had some of the biggest laughs at some horror movies that end up being spoofs or dark comedies in the end.

No matter what I always have a great time binging horror movies across October, and sometimes I even sketch parts of the films.

So stay tuned for my weekly reviews this October, I will be summarizing the viewing experience at the end of each week!