Things that go Bump in the Night

 

 

October has always been my favorite month of the year.  As a child the city always had a parade on my birthday (Oct. 30^th), which I thought was darned nice of them.  I remember going to the Halloween parade, my dad hoisting me up on his shoulders so I could see everything.  In those days they threw lots of candy and the long line of revelers seemed to snake through town forever!  Years later my Mom and Dad enjoyed taking their grandchildren to see the parade.  It was still a special event for me because while they took the three little ones to enjoy the spectacle, I could catch my breath and relax.   I still remember how much I appreciated having that two hour span of time to myself.

I grew up in a time before we had the world at our electronic finger tips.  With only three TV channels from which to choose the selection was small, but so were our expectations.  During the month of October you could always count on one of the stations to show scary movies!  In this day and age our kids expect gore and special effects and 3-D and surround sound to heighten their enjoyment.  I can’t imagine anything better than being stretched out on the floor in front of our old black and white TV, a bag of Jones Potato Chips, a tub of Lawson’s French Onion Dip and my BFF beside me.  We would giggle and gasp and watch Frankenstein or the Werewolf or Dracula far into the night.  If we were lucky the movie was hosted by Goulardi, or Big Chuck and Hoolihan; Cleveland TV and Mansfield potato chips were the highlights of my October.

Makeup techniques, innovative masks and special effects have developed to the point of delivering nauseating realism.  I can’t remember the last horror movie I saw, but I’m sure I sat with my face in my hands through most of the thing no matter what it was.   It’s funny, but I love to read ‘stab and slasher’ novels, but I simply don’t want to watch it on the big screen.  Sensory overload I suppose.

I know there is a new genre of television that has become very popular; vampires and zombies are now a year round occurrence.  I’ve never seen The Walking Dead, but I’m sure the special effects are amazing.  You can keep all that.   For me evil is best displayed in the scenes in the old black and white films where Dracula (Bella Lugosi) is advancing on the sleeping man/woman/child. (I vant to drink your blood….blaaaa!)  A light shines on the eyes of the walking dead man, giving him the most eerie and terrifying look imaginable.  That’s the point in the movie where I’d start looking around me to make sure the drapes were completely drawn and there was no strange mist seeping under the front door!  No remake has ever come close as far as I’m concerned.  Watching Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt mince their way through a later edition really didn’t do much for me.

Frankenstein’s Monster was another favorite.  Boris Karloff was the best, and the scene where he’s throwing flowers into the water with the little girl breaks my heart every single time I watch it.  Yes, Frankie speaks for the misunderstood monster in us all.

Werewolves were another thing to worry about in October.  Lon Chaney was just a big, unattractive man with stringy hair sporting an ill-fitting suit…but he was an amazing werewolf!    Of course we all knew it was just a movie…but even at this age I think a wolf call would send me scurrying back into the house if there was a full moon. 

 For a child of the fifties and sixties those old movies were deliciously frightening cinema.  Even though they were made in the 30’s, I still watch them today when I run across one as I’m flicking through the zillions of stations we now have available.

Maybe I enjoy those old flicks because I wish the bad guys were as easy to identify today as they were way back then.   We all knew not to trust the guy in the long black cape.   Today evil takes many forms…but none of them is as easy to spot as Frankenstein or as predictable as a full moon.  Dealing with today’s bad guys isn’t as easy as arming yourself with a wooden stake, a garlic necklace or a silver bullet.  When I was young we knew evil couldn’t triumph over a crucifix, couldn’t withstand the pain of being doused with holy water, and could not cross the threshold of a church.   We believed evil could be contained, it had boundaries.  As it turns out, that’s not really true.  More’s the pity.

 

                                                                            

Life is Good