Do You Let Your Child Watch Scary Movies?

It's October, and it seems like everyone is lining up to see the latest creepy flick, Paranormal Activity. But for little kids, movies as seemingly benign (at least from the commercials) as Coraline can be traumatizing. After all, kids and scary movies go together like ice cream and ranch dressing. Or do they? Are your kids not bothered by frightening films? Mindy Roberts of The Mommy Blog asks, "Do you let your kids watch scary movies?"

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Candie
2 yearss ago

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.

nicoleballet
2 yearss ago

I think it depends on the child. I know a handful of friends (including my husband) who will still refuse to watch ET. And he was a NICE alien. For me it was Witches (based on the Roald Dahl book). When those ladies took off their wigs and their shoes and they had warts and NO TOES! AH! My brother and I were pretty sure they were coming to kill us in our sleep.

mommytoall
2 yearss ago

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

Barbasaurus
2 yearss ago

Like most everything, it depends on the child. But it makes me kinda sad that the overwhelming majority of moms commenting and vlogging give a big "NO" to "scary" movies. Scary will be defined differently by each one of us, but in regards to exposing kids to good old-fashioned Halloween spookiness, I think a good dose of creepy crawly is good! It's truly just like anything else they see on TV. For example, Voldemort in Harry Potter is just as much a fictional character as Handy Manny (did you see the one with the spooooky ghost in the bell tower?... it's actually a great example of introducing "scary" as fun; my two-year-old walks around saying, "spoooky ghost" and laughs based on that episode). By telling kids that it's not real, they can open up and enjoy it a little. I'm not a big fan of overly sheltering kids; I think they'll grow up scared. That being said, my parents let me watch just about everything when I was little, and I'm now a huge horror fan. It can go either way: they'll like it or they won't, but why not start small when they're young and let them decide as they grow, just like anything else?

Candie
2 yearss ago

Ditto, I did too lol...and mine are pretty much not scared of anything, I do have one that is, but she doesn't watch them with us.

KidsArtMum
2 yearss ago

I am very aware of scary movies and TV. Mostly I guess because I hate to be scared myself!! Hate it! so no I do my best to stick to the Sesame Street side. My eldest is 5 now and I am still yet to take him to the movies because i'm worried he won't like the darkness of the theatre. Perhaps thats taking it a bit to far but it's saving me cash lol. my business = http://www.kidswallart.com.au

ZestyBee
2 yearss ago

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.

Arizona Writer
2 yearss ago

See, and I would never in a million bajillion years let my son have the smallest glimpse of most of 300. It seems weird to me, really, that people put "war" in some category other than gore and killing. If it's something about which he cannot readily have a pretty decent understanding, and especially if there's large-scale killing, it's a huge no until he's, I don't know, 47? I'm not judging, really. Just commenting that people seem to see things differently. I've been read the riot act a few times for letting my son read Harry Potter, much less watch the movies. And while I'd rather there be boobs all over the place in a movie he happens to see than one gun, I'm sure there are plenty of people who differ on that as well. It's really all about what take-away message our kids get and whether they can handle it, and we just do our best as parents to figure out what their abilities to understand and their limits are. No one has a perfect system.

ZestyBee
2 yearss ago

I've gotten some flack, definitely, for the 300 thing from my mom-friends. My rationale, I think, is that movie's particular blend of artistic merit and historical context/fantastical storytelling. War is war, fighting is fighting, yes I know. And yet, would I show the kid Pearl Harbor? Not on your life. So here I am, blundering along, making the best choices that I can, day by day. I'm guessing the next war movie Koi will be viewing next? Disney's Hercules.

EmmieB
2 yearss ago

And here I am chiming in with an adamant YES. Certainly it will be age appropriate - when he is three he won't be watching Coraline...but when he's 6 or 7? Sure. We'll save The Shining for High School, though. I love film. I love the creative process, I love the interpretation, I love the emotions... I just love film. And that is obvious in our house. So I won't shelter Bunny from film that might be "too scary" or "too sad" unless he expresses that desire. I won't let him watch anything I haven't seen first probably until he's a teenager, so I can know what's coming and we can talk about it. But I feel that watching scary, suspenseful, sad, etc movies at home in a safe environment is a safe way for children to learn to handle those emotions. Because they can turn it off, turn on the lights, pause it and talk to mommy and daddy about why it's not real, or whatever they need to do to feel safe again. I want my kids to recognize the Fight or Flight instinct if it spools up and know how to handle it. But I'm with Rebecca - no slasher movies. Mostly because the plots are awful, the special effects budget is smaller than the casting/directing budget and that last original one came out so long ago the film is probably rotting in it's canister. If I'm going to spend two hours watching a movie with my son I don't want to feel like banging my head against a wall the entire time.

Do You Let Your Child Watch Scary Movies?

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