I cannot watch horror movies. The moment I hear eerie music or am forced to sit through an unusually long scene in the dark, I get up, take a walk, and try to forget what I saw. Blood, ghosts, clowns, and such freak me out. It isn’t the sight of them that scares me (I love gory medical shows), but the suspense of not knowing who’s going to appear when. I double-checked behind my back just now–even the thought is anxiety-inducing. So, naturally, I decided that the cure to this would be to binge-watch several over the past few weeks (with the lights on, of course). 

I started my horror movie journey with the classics: The Exorcist and The Shining. The former made me cover my eyes and take long, deep breaths for an hour straight, but the story (which I was only capable of watching after previewing it on Wikipedia) was fairly interesting. There was a lot of gross medical imagery, which looked fairly fake at times – but was still enough to make me scared. I would never watch it again. The latter was more familiar to me, yet equally terrifying. However, if I zoned out for a moment, I could admire Shelley Duvall’s screaming power. I liked the acting performances in both and could see from how they’d scared me why they were objectively good horror movies (if you can even describe a horror movie as good), but I did not love either. 

Next, I moved to some more modern favorites: Hereditary and The Conjuring. Unlike the classics, the 21st-century advances in makeup and special effects made both of these much more disturbing. They both gave me a couple of jumpscares, but the Annabelle plotline felt so unreal that I was almost able to relax. 

The Jordan Peele cinematic horror universe was unnerving and deeply scary, but so well written, filmed, and acted, that I almost forgive him. 

My favorite horror movie, as expected, ended up being a bit of a cop-out. While the first few minutes of Midsommar use murder and darkness to scare its viewers, the rest of the movie is surprisingly calm. What’s awful about it is the psychological suspense that unravels. It gives you a good think and leaves you feeling a little nauseous, but its pastel color scheme makes it watchable. 

I’m still a little confused as to why anyone willingly watches these movies, and even more confused about how someone creates them. I’m proud of my perseverance in the land of horror, but I think I’ll go back to romcoms for the time being.