Why Do We Like Being Scared?

When I was a kid, I could watch a man get his head chopped off in a horror movie, provided I watched through the gaps between my fingers. I’d spend the next hour pretending I wasn’t terrified, then lie awake wondering whether the bastard might somehow find his way into my bedroom. Naturally, I’d be back in front of the television the following weekend, ready to put myself through the whole miserable experience again.

I wasn’t particularly stupid as a child. At least, no more than the average kid whose parents let him watch movies that probably warranted a closer look at the rating. Saturday morning cartoons provided whatever wholesome influence I was getting. I understood the difference between fiction and reality. I knew the monsters weren’t real, although that knowledge became considerably less reassuring once somebody turned off the hallway light.

For all that, I loved being scared, and apparently, I’m not alone. People were telling frightening stories long before Hollywood discovered how much money it could make from rubber masks and fake blood. Legends about creatures lurking beyond the village probably kept children from wandering into the woods after dark. I suspect plenty of adults repeated those tales because they enjoyed watching their neighbors squirm. They would have made excellent horror directors.

The Pleasure of Almost Dying

Fear does a respectable job of keeping us alive. Without it, our ancestors might have spent considerably more time trying to pet things that wanted to eat them. Your heart starts pounding, which is useful when encountering a bear but seems excessive when the threat is a man wearing a hockey mask on your television. I’ve jumped at enough cheap scares to know my nervous system doesn’t always consult me before making a decision. Fortunately, a movie monster can only do so much damage from the other side of a television screen.

There’s actually a name for our willingness to scare the hell out of ourselves: recreational fear. It’s the same reason people climb aboard roller coasters and willingly let some stranger fling them around at sixty miles an hour. Personally, I’d like to know the guy tightening the bolts was paying attention that morning. But people enjoy the ride because they expect to survive it. Horror movies offer a similar bargain. We get to spend ninety minutes convinced some maniac is going to kill us, then turn off the television and go looking for something to eat.

The Monsters We Grew Up With

For those of us raised during the explosion of horror entertainment in the seventies and eighties, fear became something we could bring home. Halloween helped establish the modern slasher craze, and Friday the 13th demonstrated just how profitable it could become to murder teenagers in isolated locations. By the time A Nightmare on Elm Street arrived, the video store offered enough inventive ways to die that choosing a movie could become an evening’s entertainment.

The villains became celebrities, with Freddy Krueger selling merchandise and Jason Voorhees becoming the face of an entire franchise. Michael Myers somehow managed to achieve similar fame despite possessing roughly the conversational skills of a garden rake. Before long, we anticipated their appearances and developed favorites. The monsters became familiar companions, even while they continued slaughtering everyone unfortunate enough to share their zip code.

After enough horror movies, we start recognizing the warning signs. That ominous musical cue tells us somebody’s about to make a terrible decision, usually involving a noise that no sensible person would investigate. We can practically predict which unfortunate teenager will discover the body. Of course, a clever filmmaker knows when to exploit those expectations, catching us off guard just when we’ve convinced ourselves we know what’s coming.

Fear Is Better With Company

Horror is also considerably more entertaining with company. Watch a frightening movie alone, and you might find yourself checking the locks afterward. With friends, everyone becomes a comedian, particularly when somebody screams at a jump scare and spends the next ten minutes being mocked for it. Before long, half the entertainment comes from watching the people sitting beside you.

Haunted attractions understand the appeal of being frightened in a group. Watching your ordinarily fearless friend lose his dignity because somebody jumped out from behind a curtain is worth the admission price, particularly when the bastard spends the remainder of the evening insisting he wasn’t scared.

The Things That Follow Us Home

You can spend two hours watching some lunatic stalk teenagers through a darkened house, only to discover that the shadow beneath your own bedroom door has become considerably more interesting. An unfamiliar noise downstairs suddenly warrants investigation, preferably by someone else.

A Nightmare on Elm Street can make a perfectly ordinary bathtub seem suspicious long after the credits roll. There’s something wonderfully unreasonable about watching Nancy get attacked in the tub and then regarding your own plumbing with distrust. I imagine plumbers have enough trouble without Freddy Krueger getting involved.

I know perfectly well that Freddy Krueger isn’t waiting for me to fall asleep, but that doesn’t prevent my imagination from occasionally making a nuisance of itself. Reason can explain why there’s nothing to fear. Convincing the rest of me is another matter.

Perhaps that’s why we keep returning to horror. We can entertain frightening possibilities from relative safety, then go home and pretend the creaking floorboards upstairs are nothing worth investigating. Or maybe we simply enjoy watching some poor bastard get chased through the woods. Either explanation works for me, although I wouldn’t mind if somebody left the hallway light on.

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Featured Image: Scared kids watching movie with dog – magnific