Seriously.
If I were running for my life as if I were FOR REAL being chased by an axe-wielding hockey mask wearing person, such as the FICTIONAL (characters/people) in many of the Friday the 13th sequels, yes, I would have to say a criminal complaint on the terrorist/serial killer would be very much in order.
But I was never in danger of anything while watching that stupid cheap ass horror movie FOREVER EVIL that aired on USA Network's SATURDAY NIGHTMARES block circa 1989/1990.
I was never in danger of anything while watching HALLOWEEN 4: THE RETURN OF MICHAEL MYERS (1988).
I was never in danger of anything when I woke up at 11am and spent Halloween Day 1999 sour as a lemon after watching SLEEPAWAY CAMP (for some reason that film, the weather that day & the late rising just left me feeling really odd in a way I'd like to spend less time thinking about).
Yes, GHOSTBUSTERS II was a little scary I commented as much after leaving the theater in summer 1989 at the age 5. Does that mean I didn't enjoy the film?
Kids like being scared. It is not a criminal offense for a kid to be scared. It is not a criminal offense to scare a kid.
Obviously, there are situations where it can be considered a criminal offense. If you're scaring a kid and the kid seriously thinks they are in danger, then yes, you are guilty of child abuse. If a kid is scared of a movie that is playing in the other room or a room they are in, they either need to understand that the movie they are hearing and/or seeing is a projection of someone's creative mind before you begin playback or you need to turn the volume down to a low enough volume that the kid won't wake up while sleeping. Most kids by the age of 4 these days I would think would understand the difference between real life and something happening on a screen. Hence, no danger is involved if the kid is sitting in the room watching something scary unfolding on the screen.
Obviously, there are exceptions to this rule.
CRIMINAL MINDS (the TV show on CBS) depicts REAL situations that can be damned disturbing for even the likes of myself to even consider. For any good natured boy or girl, it can indeed be traumatizing.
GHOSTBUSTERS II is not a real life situation.
FRIDAY THE 13TH PT 4 is not a real life situation.
HALLOWEEN VII is not a real life situation.
Yes, people getting stabbed does happen. Personally I was expecting a lot more out of FRIDAY THE 13TH when I first saw it. I was extremely surprised as to how it became such a classic that is was at the time considered (late 1990s/most people in this 4K video game world would probably call it "Old school horror" since independent cinema is so much more easily accessed with the likes of Netflix and even mainstream horror movies are much more gory than they were in the 1980s and the decade that followed it).
BASKET CASE (1983) does not happen. Big globs of human flesh with a telepathic brain hellbent on revenge do not actually exist...not as far as I know. Revenge does happen. Blood spilt does happen. Brotherly love does happen. Deformity does happen. Plastic surgery does happen. There is nothing specific in BASKET CASE that is a complete fantasy. But nothing specifically happens in BASKET CASE. The manner in which the main "monster" kills his/its'(?) victims is not even clearly conveyed. The deformity of the "monster" is not even very clear. Is something like that even scientifically possible? Maybe. Maybe it's not only possible, but a very real situation that some people deal with. I can't say. I don't think anyone dealing with such a situation would appear on Oprah and say.
And there's nothing in GHOSTBUSTERS that I can say for a fact *does not happen*.
But both films - as well as FRIDAY THE 13TH - convey their respective stories with a grain of salt, tongue planted firmly in cheek, to where you'd have to be digging pretty deep into the realm of someone's closet in order to know just how real a lot of these things are or might be. A 5 year old does not believe in ghosts unless they have parents that tell them to believe in ghosts, just like kids don't believe in Santa Claus. unless you tell them to believe in Santa Claus. And even serial killers are practically a product of someone's crazy mind if you aren't warned to be on the lookout for a serial killer. I mean, even adults tend to be rather blase about the possibility of car theft, leaving their cars unlocked not only occasionally but routinely. The idea of something far worse happening is not even something many people even entertain the slightest notion of. And why should we? How many people born today are likely to die because someone else was born? The stats are pretty consistent. For every birth that eventually becomes a serial killer there's several hundred million more, 99.999% of which will survive said serial killer's birth and subsequent behavior. Granted, I haven't looked this up. That's a rough estimate. But honestly -- have you ever met someone who died because of a serial killer? Cancer, perhaps, most likely, if you've lived for any length of time with a social life bigger than mine, or perhaps child abuse and the emotional damage that causes, or perhaps HIV/AIDS or some rare blood disorder or something, but a serial killer? Some people reading this might be able to say they know someone who had a friend die at the hands of a school shooter or a terrorist or a basic serial killer, and maybe 1 or 2 out of the 15 or so people that read this blog actually did have a friend or relative that was murdered in cold blood, but even that's unlikely, although I don't intend to downplay the grief of knowing such carnage. I'm not saying we should all be carefree and act like the world's just dandy because most of us know that it isn't and we are if anything acting overtly in accordance with that fact. But the fact is you don't go to bed expecting someone to appear in your window with the intention of abducting you and never letting you see your parents again. You go to bed and you scare yourself with shadows knowing damn well that they're just shadows but getting the chills nonetheless.
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