WTF - Haunted Movie Edition

My boys are moving into the scary movie phase, and I'm dragged along kicking and screaming, or rather sweating as I cover my eyes and peer between a small slit of two fingers.  They love the adrenaline rush of the movies, I try to tell them that real life sometimes is scarier than any movie.

The Shining.  It's about a family stuck in a snowy hotel, where Daddy loses his mind and chases the little boy around the hotel trying to kill him.
"Have you seen my husband after a week of Christmas Break in the snow with our boys?  He makes Jack Nicholson look like Mr. Rogers."

Rosemary's Baby - a tiny little woman learns that she is giving birth to the devil.
OK, in real life I wasn't really tiny, but there were times it crossed my mind that possibly I was the one giving birth to, well, you know.

Nightmare on Elm Street - Freddy Kreuger comes into your dreams and kills you in your sleep.  Luckily for us parents, we never sleep.  We have that psychotic person ALL DAY LONG.

Night of the Living Dead - A group of teens stuck in a farmhouse surrounded by catatonic, stumbling, white faced zombies.  Obviously, this director has not seen my kitchen on a school morning.  PLENTY of catatonic zombies.

Psycho - a crazy man in charge of a hotel, killing off the guests while his crazy mother lives there.  In our family, sure the crazy mother lives there, and once I did spy a child standing outside my shower curtain holding a weapon.  OK, it was a light saber, but it was scary none the less.

The Silence of the Lambs - no one forgets the scene where Hannibal talks to Clarice about the "lambs."  "I am sure you hear the screams of the little lambs as they went to slaughter, didn't you Clarice?"  That does not compare to the screams between two boys when there is only one Chocolate Chip Cookie left.  Or my screams when I realize I forgot to pickup wine at the grocery store.

Jaws - Man eating shark terrorizes a village.  My boys still hum the Jaws theme once a month as I circle the kitchen, opening and closing cabinets in search of sugar.  Of course, they KNOW don't touch the Milano cookies or Momma's going in for the kill.

Halloween - we watch in horror as Michael Meyers stalks and kills kids of Haddonfield, IL.  He hides in closets, behind doors, waiting on unsuspecting kids.  Folks, this happens every day in my house.  There is always a child hiding somewhere jumping out and scaring the crap out of his brother.  Better yet, they both fully enjoy scaring the pee out of me.  Literally.

Friday The 13th - Jason, turned crazy because of his mother, kills all the teens residing at Camp Crystal Lake.  As a mother, I am afraid that some of my decisions may lead to therapy bills in their future, but hopefully never a trip to Camp Crystal Lake.

As you can see, most of the inspiration for the horror movies comes from real life.  These directors take a look at screaming babies and see giving birth to the devil (yes, there are times at 3:30 in the morning we all felt that way,) or wonder as a parent if they are doing the right thing, (though preserving them in formaldehyde after they've died may not be a great idea) down to seeing teenagers and thinking that, "Boy, they really look like Zombies."

Maybe I can watch the new movies my boys are begging to see with a grain of salt.  If you look close enough  - sometimes truth is greater than fiction.