The Five Scariest Kid’s Films… EVER

Big news for 80s film geeks. The Dark Crystal will be making a comeback as a 10-episode series, via Netflix. Yes, I’m a woman in her 30s and presumably not their target audience, but nonetheless, this made me quite excited. Yay – the nasty Skeksis are back!

It got me thinking about how different films were back then. These days, they seem a lot more sanitised, to the extent that my two kids will literally flee from the room if a bad guy so much as raises a menacing eyebrow. Times have definitely changed, and whilst this probably means fewer nightmares, I think films have lost something valuable as a result.

Here, in no particular order, are five films of a bygone era, which still manage to freak me out to this day.

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971)

Yes, I’ve started with a controversial choice. ‘That’s not scary at all’, I hear you cry. Well, allow me to politely disagree, because no other film terrified me quite as much as this one did. Let’s just pick apart the evidence. Firstly, this film is about a grown man luring kids to his chocolate factory, which is essentially a place of torture. Then, look what happens to those kids. One nearly drowns in a vat of chocolate (presumably very hot, as it’s in liquid form). Another nearly bursts as a blueberry. And don’t get me started on the poor kid who gets kidnapped by unnatural squirrels. Ugh. Let’s not forget the infamous tunnel scene too. If that wasn't the filmic interpretation of a bad acid trip, I'm not sure what is. “The danger must be growing, cause the rowers keep rowing!” Nasty stuff.

Return to Oz (1985)

This is a fabulous film, but it’s horrifyingly creepy. It even starts on a dark note, when Dorothy gets dragged to a mental asylum to receive electric shock therapy. When she enters Oz, things get steadily worse. The Wheelers (abnormally long-limbed creatures with metal masks) chase her through the ruined city and threaten to cut her into little pieces. There’s a witch that has a collection of decapitated heads, which she likes to swap sporadically for her own, as you do. And the Gnome King is a thoroughly menacing presence, sidling along the rocks and spying on people all the time. Seriously frightening stuff.

The Witches (1990)

Let’s face it, no film about child-hating witches was ever going to be a feel-good affair. However, this film’s got a seriously high level of menace. For example, there’s a scene where a child gets kidnapped and put into an oil painting, where she stays forever more - which is a horrific thought by anyone's standards. Angelica Houston’s astoundingly macabre performance as The Grand High Witch is enough to give anyone nightmares, and let’s not forget that classic moment where she peeled her face off, guys. You know the part I mean.

Watership Down (1978)

Okay, in retrospect it’s quite amusing that Channel Five once chose to show this film on Easter Sunday. I mean… had they never watched it? This is the ultimate way to destroy a child’s faith in the Easter Bunny forever! The film features scenes of pretty graphic violence, not to mention lots of dead rabbits. Very traumatic stuff.

Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang (1968)

Ah, what a lovely film. A beautiful tale of two children saving a rusty old car, which turns out to have a multitude of magical abilities. Nothing too scary here, apart from that one character. I’m talking (of course) about the monstrous Child-Catcher. The very name of the character is enough to put chills up your spine, but having to watch him leering through the window, rootling out the hiding children – man, this is deeply unpleasant stuff. Kudos to Robert Helpmann (the guy who played him) though. No-one could have made that part as eerie as he did.