Do You Let Your Child Watch Scary Movies?

I grew up watching slasher films, rated R from the time I was 5. So I wasn't scared of anything. Well I was sort of scared of the Exorcist. But Jason, Michael...didn't phase me. I didn't watch one thinking - oh my I take a knife and murder people - it will make me cool..I was smart enough to know right from wrong and fake from real. my hubby doesn't understand this, his Mom was the polar opposite of mine lol...

I think the movies now though are tons more gory - Saw, Hostel.... these just gross me out. Really I think it depends on your child, what THEY can handle..my oldest saw Saw at her friends house - she said it was stupid - she knew it was fake, etc...I didn't like it but then again nothing phases her in movies, I talk to her from a young age about fake vs. real...she knows the news is real, movies are fake, cartoons, sitcoms...fake..Documentaries on NatGeo and the like are real...you HAVE to talk to your kids.

Fri, 2009-10-30 19:47

We dnt do scary movies My 5yr old daughter gets scared and won't sleep She does good with intense action movies but not scary I often have to send my daughter out of the room because my Hubby loves Chiller Channel. the only scary one she can handle is Monster House Movie

Tue, 2009-10-27 11:08

It's interesting to watch my daughter develop and find out what makes her little synapses fire. She's two, almost three, and her favorite movie in the world is Finding Nemo. She's probably (bad mommy!) see it 3 dozen times in her little life. And yet, she still covers her eyes for two parts: when the divers come and take Nemo away, and when Bruce the shark goes all crazed. She begs to watch the movie daily, but seems to know she can't handle seeing those two small minutes.

On the other hand, I was watching the movie 300 while her father was giving her a bath. She came out in her pajamas and climbed on my lap, and was instantly locked into a battle scene, quietly, just watching it all. And you know what she said? "Mama, it's so pretty." I haven't seen any mental ramifications yet.

Horror/slasher/gore (except zombies, I love zombie flicks!) movies don't come through our front door. But I'm not laying the smack-down on all "scary movies" just yet.

Fri, 2009-10-23 16:50

First, I was about to make the same point fitmamastoll made -- exactly, there is a difference between horror and suspense. Even within that, there's a difference between some suspense and totally freaky suspense, and creepy horror versus slasher-type horror. Of course, sometimes they mix, but I see a lot of nuance. Scary is scary doesn't really fly with me, whether discounting or allowing something.

We've actually been talking a lot about this in our house recently too. My son, 7, loves suspenseful movies and scary stuff. He loves reading scary stories, wants to go to a haunted house, all that. We have limits, more than most parents I know, but they're nuanced. It's funny Harry Potter was mentioned -- my son is crazy about Harry Potter, will probably be Harry
for Halloween (again), and I've written before on Pottermania and reactions to it. I think the stories are good, and in the end convey a good message, so since he reads each corresponding book before the movie comes out, it's a pretty easy call, as opposed to something where I'm more worried about whether he'll pick up the correct messages from the movie. We've seen a handful of other movies too -- he loved Coraline, actually -- but we always talk about the messages going into and coming out of watching a movie, and we always watch them together. We do this with all movies, not just "horror" ones.

We're actually really strict about the amount of violence he can see, but we've let him watch Harry Potters 1-5, one or two of which were PG-13. This wasn't an accident (though aside from these, he's strictly G and PG). For one, we've only just let him watch 4 and 5. Secondly, there isn't much actual on-screen violence; rather, it's implied and communicated and only shown when absolutely necessary (but the severity of it is not downplayed, which is also good). And third, he's really smart and a crazy-advanced reader and plot-understander -- we're reading the whole series (we're about to finish Deathly Hallows tonight, actually), and by the time each movie comes out, he's intimately familiar with the storyline, each thing that happens, the characters' struggles and motivations ... I made the mistake of asking "where are we?" before picking up Deathly Hallows last night, and he spent fifteen minutes telling me about how and why Draco Malfoy feels conflicted. All that to say, if 1) the story has an actual good message in the end; 2) that message is conveyed and prioritized over gratuitous scary stuff and 3) there is almost no gratuitous gore; then I give the green light for a scary movie. It's very much a case-by-case thing.

It works out OK, because I apparently never grew up, and I love scary stuff too. And I do recognize there are some (many) storylines and elements that my son will be too young for for a while still, and like Alice, I'm quite glad that he's still innocent in that way. (He referred to Spiderwick Chronicles the other day as a "really really scary movie." I think we're still doing OK.)

Also, I strongly differentiate, and I far prefer spooky, with a message, to run-of-the-mill violence with no clear message. Parents of one of my son's friends let them watch Wolverine the other day. I would definitely have disapproved had they asked. I was not pleased. The thing that struck me the most was that my son was really bothered by the violence, I mean really bothered, which made me sad but which I also take as a good sign -- but also, it was compounded in his mind because he didn't understand it. Why were they slashing and shooting each other? Why did that one guy with no mouth and knives for arms die? What's going on?

It's all about the message.

I want there to be SOME take-away message, even if the majority of the film is meant to freak you out. Some kind of story. But if there is a good message, and the kid can handle it, it's pretty fun to be freaked out.

Fri, 2009-10-23 11:02

This time of year really sparks the subject of what's scary and what's not. What is scary is completely unique to age and experience. I have a friend who's son was deathly afraid of the lint balls that you pull from the dryer lint trap. I mean horrified. I had another friend who's child had nightmares about boxes- just boxes. Fear of the unknown I guess.

Scary movies are one of those things parents have a right to control, but it's also one of those things that are like, "my kid will never eat candy", or, "we're not using pacifiers", right up until it happens behind your back, or circusmtances provoke you personally to give in and let it happen. My daughter wanted, and didn't want to see Coraline- all at the same time. I screen movies first. I screened Coraline and told my daughter that she would think it was too scary and that she probably wouldn't like it. Coraline is scary in the way that foreign horror films are scary: it's portends. It's not so much the gore as it is the idea of what's in the shadows- the darkness, the foreshadowing, the thrill of what's next- similar to the feeling of being on a rollercoaster. (Of course some foreign horror does have gore, but Coraline does not. If you're a film buff like me, you may find it was quite beautifully done.)

If you're into scary movies, chances are you'll eventually allow your kids to have a go at it. If you don't approve, either your kids will develop your attitude toward it, or eventually take an opportunity to go rogue and just "see". I think the thrill factor alone makes a lot of kids curious enough to do it eventually, even when they're afraid. It's innate. Parents decide when/if their children will have those experiences....but only to a point.

My friend (a horror movie enthusiast) wrote an article about her experience with her mother here:

http://judgementalzine.com/index.php/2009/07/slash-trash-gore-a-love-story

I laughed myself silly! Check it out!

As for my 7 year old and me- when I told her I was sending Coraline back to Netflix, she insisted on seeing it first. She did get her spooky fix, but told me that she wasn't scared at all. We bought our own copy, 3D glasses and all. Spoiler Alert: In the end Coraline (the little girl), faces her fears, overcomes them, and learns some AWESOME lessons about too much of a good thing, handling matters yourself, AND appreciating your own parents, despite their flaws. Also, the spooky things that happened, were all just a dream...or was it? ~muahaha~

Fri, 2009-10-23 10:45

Absolutely not! First, I think their is a major difference between scary or horror and suspenseful. But, my husband and I don't watch horror/scary movies either. We're both of the opinion that movies should either be a life-lesson type of movie or just for fun-laughter. Watching a movie should make you feel good. Movies should promote something positive. I don't let my kids watch anything I haven't seen first or anything I am not willing to watch myself. There are aspects of the Harry Potter films for example that can be a bit scary/suspenseful but not horrifying. I rarely take my kids to the "movies" because you just never know for sure. We have a weekly family movie night where we pick one movie for our little ones 7 and under and a second movie after they go to bed for our teen and us. That way, if there are issues that arise in the movie that we think should be discussed afterward we do it in a fun-way that still gets the point across. As a parent I do not think there is anything gained by a child watching a horror film (even if they say they like it). Generally, it may start off innocent enough but gradually the films grow in intensity and pure gore and evil. The child/teen grows more and more numb to the gore/evil and wants more the next time. Would you really want your child to grow up thinking/feeling that watching someone cut a person into a pieces, or being tortured is no big deal? This kind of gradual desensitization is what they use in foreign military camps to train their soldiers to torture captured individuals. Teens especially are in an environment that their peers think it's "cool" to watch these films but we are teaching our kids it's not cool at all. Granted you cannot watch your kids every minute and they may sneak one in at a friends house or something on a sleepover but we do our very best to monitor and prohibit these kind of films and they know why. Our family is about "positivity" at it's core and we practice what we preach so the kids follow our lead without a big deal.

Fri, 2009-10-23 08:22

I know some people may think, "Oh my child is only 1, she doesn't understand what is going on in the movie to be afraid," but I think even infants can pick up on the vibe of a movie. The music, the way you are acting, the noises, the images. They may not know what is going on, but they will know that it is scary, stressful, vulgar and so on.

For that reason, we do not watch scary movies when our daughter (2 years old) is around. Really that goes for any movie that would not be appropriate for her to watch. Children are just so much more aware of what is going on than we realize. If a movie can mess with an adults mind and freak us out, can you imagine how terrifying it must be to a child?! Especially since they don't know the difference between what is real and what isn't. To them their imaginations are reality sometimes.

As Rebecca was saying towards the end, when my children are older, I may very well let them see movies with adult content in them. Not scary, slasher, murderer, freak shows. However, when children are in their teens, there are some amazing films that are rated R that I think can really open a teen's eyes to the world around them in a positive way.

I think it is important for parents to screen or research movies before their child watches them. As we all know the rating system can not always be trusted. It's important that parents make a judgement on a movie based on the morals and standards of that particular family. For some families Shrek is a great movie, for others it was way out of line.

What I'm curious about is how do young children understand what is scary? Before Moanna turned two, she woke up crying because she had a bad dream that snakes were in her bed! That is a nightmare that I would have. How does a two-year-old know to be afraid of snakes in her bed? She's never seen it on TV, and it's never been talked about in front of her. If a two-year-old understands that, I think parents are foolish to think that their children do not understand what is going on in a scary movie.

Thu, 2009-10-22 21:32