The Baby Elizabeth Awards (disturbing images in movies &
Posted: Fri Feb 03, 2006 12:23 pm
The Baby Elizabeth Awards!
OK, I'm too young to remember The Exorcist, but I do remember the climax of Raiders of the Lost Ark. But, as disturbing as both of those movies' imagery were, the thing that really kept me up for weeks had to be the second of the three parts of "V: The Final Battle," particularly the birth of the baby with the forked snake tongue. That scene stuck in my head for months. Ever since then, that's been the standard to which all other disturbing movie images have been compared. Those that make the cut earn the coveted Baby Elizabeth Award. Here are the current other title bearers...
"Wonder Woman" TV series: "Melting androids." In one episode, android dopplegangers are disguised as important political figures. When exposed, they melt in a way that I found very visually disturbing as a child.
Star Trek: the Motion Picture: "transporter malfunction." Science Officer Sonak and another officer are beamed aboard the newly refitted Enterprise before the transporter is working properly. When they abort the transfer, what Starfleet gets back "doesn't live very long... fortunately." Now I understood what Dr. McCoy was always kaveching about.
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: "Khan's pets." the Ceti Eels in the ear scene really bothered me as a kid. Still gives me the willies.
Twilight Zone: The Movie: "kid without a mouth." Scared the crap out of me then, and it came back to haunt me when The Matrix reprised the image.
The Company of Wolves: "skin-peeling werewolf." the scene in which the werewolf shapeshifts by ripping off his human skin. Scared the crap out of me when I first saw it, but two decades later, I'm a spiritual therianthrope myself. It's got to be one of the best werewolf movies ever made, based more on folklore and old fairy tales than modern horror.
Fire in the Sky: "sugical procedure." Travis Walton is shrunkwrapped and subjected to eye surgery without sedation. UFOlogists and paranoid weirdoes will be glad to know that they made that part up--it's not what he said really happened. Still, I didn't know that until more than a year after I saw the movie.
Alien: Resurrection: "kill me." You know the Alien series had to have an entry here.
The Matrix: "Unable to speak" the scene where Mr. Anderson gets his mouth melted. Extra hebbie jeebie points for stretching the scene out and throwing in an implantable abdominal parasite.
John Carpenter's The Thing, "runaway head." The whole movie deseves the award, but the crowning moment would have to be when the crew attempt to recuscitate what they think is their fallen friend, but is instead the shapeshifting monster. Its chest suddenly collapses, forming teeth that bite the hands off the guy holding the defibrillator. It then turns into a horrific mess, while the crew burn most of it. Its head comes off, grows legs, and crawls away.
In 2006, I've given an unprecedented two awards within weeks of each other. One goes out to a movie that hasn't even been filmed yet. I've been given inside information, the details of which I'm not at liberty to discuss.
Freeborn (working title): "warehouse scene." If this scene makes the final cut and lives up to the images generated by the script, it's likely to be a real shocker. The movie is about werewolves, but intentionally breaks from the conventional formula, portraying lycanthropes as intelligent beings with layered motivations. Most are not evil, but, saying more would give too much away.
The Brothers Grimm: "gingerbread face-stealer." Having been deconditioned to melting mouths, I was still notably unsettled when someone's whole face was stolen. (Trekkies might point out that the episode "Charlie X" did this back in the sixties, but it was done quickly and didn't dwell on it.) The movie almost got the award for a scene earlier where a possessed horse spits spider webs and eats another kid.
Rejected applicant: Howling IV: The Original Nightmare: "melting puddle shapeshift." A werewolf shapeshifts by the human form melting into a puddle of goo, and the creature crawls out of it. Poorly done, so it loses shock value, and all the while demonic voices are dubbed over, which get really annoying.
Observations: I appearantly have a thing against distorting the body, particularly the face. A lot of the things that bother me the most involve bizarre and unexpected transformations. The scenes that bothered me the most are realistically done special effects--they look believable. Similar effects that look fake don't have the same impact. That suggests that, in spite of my fascination with lycanthropy, I'd probably wet myself if confronted with the real thing. Watch me panic, begging the genie to let me change my wish as the full moon starts to rise.
OK, I'm too young to remember The Exorcist, but I do remember the climax of Raiders of the Lost Ark. But, as disturbing as both of those movies' imagery were, the thing that really kept me up for weeks had to be the second of the three parts of "V: The Final Battle," particularly the birth of the baby with the forked snake tongue. That scene stuck in my head for months. Ever since then, that's been the standard to which all other disturbing movie images have been compared. Those that make the cut earn the coveted Baby Elizabeth Award. Here are the current other title bearers...
"Wonder Woman" TV series: "Melting androids." In one episode, android dopplegangers are disguised as important political figures. When exposed, they melt in a way that I found very visually disturbing as a child.
Star Trek: the Motion Picture: "transporter malfunction." Science Officer Sonak and another officer are beamed aboard the newly refitted Enterprise before the transporter is working properly. When they abort the transfer, what Starfleet gets back "doesn't live very long... fortunately." Now I understood what Dr. McCoy was always kaveching about.
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: "Khan's pets." the Ceti Eels in the ear scene really bothered me as a kid. Still gives me the willies.
Twilight Zone: The Movie: "kid without a mouth." Scared the crap out of me then, and it came back to haunt me when The Matrix reprised the image.
The Company of Wolves: "skin-peeling werewolf." the scene in which the werewolf shapeshifts by ripping off his human skin. Scared the crap out of me when I first saw it, but two decades later, I'm a spiritual therianthrope myself. It's got to be one of the best werewolf movies ever made, based more on folklore and old fairy tales than modern horror.
Fire in the Sky: "sugical procedure." Travis Walton is shrunkwrapped and subjected to eye surgery without sedation. UFOlogists and paranoid weirdoes will be glad to know that they made that part up--it's not what he said really happened. Still, I didn't know that until more than a year after I saw the movie.
Alien: Resurrection: "kill me." You know the Alien series had to have an entry here.
The Matrix: "Unable to speak" the scene where Mr. Anderson gets his mouth melted. Extra hebbie jeebie points for stretching the scene out and throwing in an implantable abdominal parasite.
John Carpenter's The Thing, "runaway head." The whole movie deseves the award, but the crowning moment would have to be when the crew attempt to recuscitate what they think is their fallen friend, but is instead the shapeshifting monster. Its chest suddenly collapses, forming teeth that bite the hands off the guy holding the defibrillator. It then turns into a horrific mess, while the crew burn most of it. Its head comes off, grows legs, and crawls away.
In 2006, I've given an unprecedented two awards within weeks of each other. One goes out to a movie that hasn't even been filmed yet. I've been given inside information, the details of which I'm not at liberty to discuss.
Freeborn (working title): "warehouse scene." If this scene makes the final cut and lives up to the images generated by the script, it's likely to be a real shocker. The movie is about werewolves, but intentionally breaks from the conventional formula, portraying lycanthropes as intelligent beings with layered motivations. Most are not evil, but, saying more would give too much away.
The Brothers Grimm: "gingerbread face-stealer." Having been deconditioned to melting mouths, I was still notably unsettled when someone's whole face was stolen. (Trekkies might point out that the episode "Charlie X" did this back in the sixties, but it was done quickly and didn't dwell on it.) The movie almost got the award for a scene earlier where a possessed horse spits spider webs and eats another kid.
Rejected applicant: Howling IV: The Original Nightmare: "melting puddle shapeshift." A werewolf shapeshifts by the human form melting into a puddle of goo, and the creature crawls out of it. Poorly done, so it loses shock value, and all the while demonic voices are dubbed over, which get really annoying.
Observations: I appearantly have a thing against distorting the body, particularly the face. A lot of the things that bother me the most involve bizarre and unexpected transformations. The scenes that bothered me the most are realistically done special effects--they look believable. Similar effects that look fake don't have the same impact. That suggests that, in spite of my fascination with lycanthropy, I'd probably wet myself if confronted with the real thing. Watch me panic, begging the genie to let me change my wish as the full moon starts to rise.
scary stuff...
Well-made and all, just creepy...
I KNEW you'd have to have the slimey melty puddle TF in there! GEEZ. 
YA MIGHT SAY IT'S A "QUIRK." 
