Tomorrow night on Channel Five is number 8 on my list. I am tempted to just leave this blog entry with that. But really the story of this choice is really two stories. 1) about how I just don't do horror films and 2) a really good friend from university.

I don't do horror films. Really. Scary music comes on, I leave the room. Maybe we can trace it all back to early childhood memories of a brother who loved all those old black and white universal favorites like the Creature from the Black Lagoon and various Frankenstein's. Now having an older brother with a taste for the macabre wasn't all bad. He introduced me to the Godzilla oevre and well he absolutely loved both Omega Man and the Planet of the Apes series (yep, i've seen all five original films, the remake and can ever remember the tv series. is it any wonder I grew up to be a geek?) and well this love of Charlton Heston probably did presage my older brother's political leanings but I can watch all those films. No, I can. John Carpenter scares the bejeesus out of me. The Thing gave me nightmares. A different college roommate made me watch on video one night at her mother's (who was a big fan of Caligua and thought all master bedrooms should have a bathroom for the man and one for the woman. I, at the time, thought that was terribly over-the-top. I now see the wisdom of her home design). That same college roommate and her then boyfriend also made me go to see a Carpenter film in the cinema on Halloween. I enjoyed that Halloween. I was at university and had decided to go trick or treating despite it being my final year of university because I was inspired by the tale one guy told of how he had gone ringing doorbells in the neighborhood only to find Jimmy Stewart's house who had invited them all in for hot cocoa. I wanted to meet Jimmy Stewart. My friends agreed to drive me and another college student around Beverly Hills as we went door to door getting candy. My, you get large sizes of candy bars in Beverly Hills. That's all I am saying. That and I think a few domestic servants had been put on door duty. Anyway, took my haul back to the beat up old van that the then boyfriend drove and got talked into seeing what in my opinion is the scariest movie ever. Of course I use the term seeing loosely. As I remember it, the then boyfriend sat between me and the college roommate. We kept our heads buried into his shoulders. He explained what was happening on screen. Several years later, my younger brother was going through his horror film phase (reading fangoria, etc.) and came home with a video of Prince of Darkness. My then (almost married but called off wedding 8 days before) boyfriend was staying. Andrew said, "Do you want to watch?" I said, "No way. Its the scariest movie in the world. I am going to bed." The next day, after lunch my mother made me go and wake up said brother and boyfriend. I asked why they slept so late. It transpired that after they had watched the video, they had to stay up for several hours watching informercials before they felt ready to brave bed. Why would I put myself through that?

So anyway, number 8 isn't a horror film. Even if it is Mr. Carpenter. Again, I saw it at university with my first university boyfriend. We lasted a whole term (ten weeks and a week of finals) before breaking up at the Apple Pan and then going record shopping at Tower on Sunset. Needless to say, we remained on good terms after the break-up. I had come down to LA during the summer break to visit the new record shop that had opened near campus and well to see this film. Mainly because it had been written by the same guys who penned Buckaroo Banzai. I argue this is a better film. The guy concerned might disagree. Still, the day it came out on video, he drove up from the valley to my parents house and rented it so we could watch it again. Guess what I will be doing tomorrow night!