overpriced Magic Cardboard. If you're trying to eat "healthier," this shit is asinine on principle alone. It's like, do any of you know how cereal was even invented in the first place?
I absolutely adore the detail of Kevin not knowing exactly what to do to comfort his sister so he thinks about what makes him happy and gets her juice.
@Socks_DoesNotExist what if I enjoy playing devils advocate and forcing people to think more critically about thier preferences? What if I just enjoy being a contrarian? Deal with it.
the line "can we watch something happy?" made me so incredibly sad, because it felt more like a sign that he has given up and felt exhausted by the constant dread that they both faced. it sounds like something someone would say when they're at the brink of giving up everything entirely and just want a sliver of hope, even the tiniest bit, to feel something.
i think not necessarily giving up, but a confused child that doesn't understand what happened trying to escape or at least distract himsef and try to find shelter in a comfortable familiar thing. it's exactly what i would say as a kid after hearing a scary story, it's what would distract one from being scared and make them feel better. i feel like that “ brink of giving up feeling“ isn't necessarily common in children, especially if this is a metaphor for abuse, you don't want to feel “something“, you just want to cheer yourself up and forget about it after that “thing you think is normal and you don't understand why it upsets you“ happens, because at that point it's the only thing you can do about it at that age and the only thing you know to do.
The part that really gets me is whenever the blood keeps splattering into the carpet. Seeing that a child is subjected to endless torture, and the one thing that she utters while we see her go through this is “mommy”. That just broke my heart in a way that no other horror movie has. Seeing a child go through so much pain and fear, and seeing her beg for one of the few people that made her feel safe is just so utterly terrifying.
@Guess I'll Die she is seen again, we see her having her head dissapear slowly then we see the pictures of the children headless and faceless. I hate how slow this movie is and how unsatisfying the ending is
@Simon Wheeler That's the whole point, he's trapped in an endless loop. If you turn on subtitles, during that scene it specifically says, "older scream" as the blood keeps reappearing indicating that Kevin has been forever trapped in the loop. Then, to support that, earlier in the film the "prest-o-change-o" music seems to indicate a time dilation where things start over, the implication being, I think, that this monster has trapped Kevin in an endless loop of being hunted and slaughtered, but it doesn't kill him at the same time every time which is why we hear an "older" scream. So I think the takeaway is that Kevin is trapped in the dark with this monster that hunts him and feeds off the fear it generates, never killing him at the same time every time which is why, in that one instant, we hear the "older Kevin" scream, and every time he dies the whole loop starts over with his 4 year old self.
Shout out to all the people who didn't feel this way because their parents kept the lights off all the time or they were always outside in the dark anyway lmao
Even adults still feel it. Like we've all been in a dark cold room at night and thought this will be a completely different place in the morning with the sun streaming in the window.
I really felt like this was about child abuse. Dad's gone. Doors gone. Then toilets gone. But first the phone call. The head injury. Kevin keeps "hurting himself" the eye. And also how the voice is like a guardian but also a tormentor when the toilet disappeared it really solidified this in my head because of horror stories where kids are abused and kept from using facilities. And locked away for let's say....572 days.
@Mercury I’m retired law enforcement and I can tell you it all depends on state. Here in Florida we take DV extremely serious. You make 1 single DV call and someone IS going to jail no ifs or buts about it.
I watched this film in a theater in my city, hosted by some horror group thing. The creator did a Q&A. There were like 5 people who asked if he was okay lmao
@Chig Bungus I haven't seen the film, but I have a feeling that it's absolute garbage. I've seen many horror films like what you're describing that have an audience for whatever reason and are very disappointing. Most people who are frightened by these types of film don't know what true horror is and are most likely to be scared by anything. Of course horror can be subjective, but when you're watching a 2 hour long movie waiting for something, anything!-to happen, it's clearly a sign that the film is a low budget cash in on hype. The director must be laughing all the way to the bank knowing he spent little on a pretentious film that offers nothing more than cheap jump scares and drawn-out scenes of inanimate objects with zero pay off. I can only imagine the director putting more effort on the film's trailer in order to intrigue and trick audiences into watching it.
If that was the case, good. One of the forgotten aspects of a horror film is to feel negative, whether it be anger, sadness, doom, etc. That's what a horror film is supposed to make you sense and remember even after it is over rather than it being just a thrill ride of scares. Unless the anger is due to the film being bad, that is not good. If not, it's a job well done. Personally, I thought the film was passable but definitely needed more purpose and direction.
Reminds me of that one Jack Stauber lyric from Nurpo: “He speaks of what adults can’t remember and children haven’t the words to describe.” You can never really remember how terrified you were as a child sometimes. At least not truly.
I was not abused or neglected as a child and I had gruesome, horrifying nightmares (even involving family members, like in this movie). Kids have some seriously freaky dreams; I think their fear manifests way differently in their dreams than it does for adults.
Fr bro, i had three dreams and one of them cannibalistic amalgamation of flesh chasing me through my old school, causing it to go into a lockdown, and all i knew was fear. The last dream was it appearing again, this time tormenting me through my tv, and me speeding up the clock in the video,and it saying you can’t escape it, then disappearing. Leaving me and my family in fear of what will happen next.
Its so weird that our brain can do this...literally why? The only dreams I remember are nightmares of getting chased, family leaving me behind/being unresponsive, hiding, getting attacked as a child. Where did this come from..like damm.
i watched skinamarink with subtitles, and i think the implication is that there are many instances of kaylee and kevin attempting to turn the lights on, but they no longer work. specifically in the kitchen at one point, you can hear the light switch clicking repeatedly, and nothing happens. i think it was the upstairs lights/staircase lights that first stopped working, which explains the flashlights.
Oh good to know! I was gonna say Wendi's comment about not reaching the light switches bothered me lmao. My 2yr old nephew knows how to reach the light switch ffs, moreso than me sometimes 😂I was babysitting him once and we were going outside and he reached to turn off the light before we went out since I had forgotten lol
I did skip ahead and with that in mind the scariest part for me was when the dad asked Kaylee to look under the bed There's nothing worse than a parent who is both someone you love but also someone you are compelled to obey ordering you to do something frightening for seemingly no reason
The whole film felt like a huge jump scare to me. I actually had to pause it and breathe for a second because my heart was beating really slow and hard almost the entire time because I was just waiting for anything.
The concept of innocent children being trapped in an infinite loop of torture because of a parent's mistake is impossibly upsetting. Even worse when you realize it can very easily be seen as a number of real life allegories.
@Mr.ManMan obviously nobody has ever been abused ever for any reason, especially not young children with shitty parents that would be crazy Would be bonkers, little bit zany.
I think this is representative of an abusive and manipulative mother. She has the dad trapped emotionally, so he nor the kids can leave. She tries to keep them loyal by telling them she and their father loves them, but in fact she takes out her anger on the kids. In these children's minds the mother is a "monster". Kaylee doesn't want to talk about their mother and has clearly understood how horrible their mother is, while Kevin still thinks she'll stop.
My mom was abusive and all that, this movie and the feelings unlocked something DEEP within me especially when that voice showed up, this guy is amazing at creating emotion in his audience.
Exactly what I was thinking! (though I wasn't sure what happened to the dad) Like the idea of a monster overtaking your mother is exactly how a child would cope, instead of accepting the harsh reality that your own mother is the monster. She seems to be having a mental/psychotic/violent episode. Their are so many clues that it seems so obvious to me, but that might be projection for sure. This film is so powerful
"She has the dad trapped emotionally" I got the vibe that the parents divorced or the dad took his own life and the mother who was already mentally unwell perpetrated abuse against the kids after the father was no longer in the picture to protect them.
29:45 I had night terrors as a kid, and they almost always involved me "waking up" from a nightmare in my room but my room felt fundamentally different and fundamentally _wrong._ That moment of thinking I'd woken up from a bad dream, thinking I was awake in my room but my room wasn't right, _that_ was the terror.
ive never had night terrors, but there was one night where i abruptly woke up during a power outage and it was terrifying. Because as soon as I woke up it was so dark, the only light coming into my room was the smallest bits of moonlight through the curtain of the window and it was so unbearably quiet without the hum of the fridge and other electronic appliances. I thought I was still dreaming because my room had never been that dark and silent before and it just didn't feel right
I had this same thing. Night after night I’d have this dream of child me finding all of the house just WRONG until I got to the basement where something horrific always happened to my family. It happened for years. To this day, I don’t leave my room at night. I especially DON’T go into the basement e v e r.
I love the way the "monster" is depicted because when I was little I wasn't scared of "boogyman" or clowns or ghosts or anything like that. But the fear was still there. Especially when I couldn't sleep.
EXACTLY, it was never really a specific or definable thing, of course things like horror media or scary imagery could give it shape every once in a while, but most of the time, it was just there, unseen but ever present and unquestionably dangerous.
I grew up with a mother who had severe mental health issues + alcoholism, and the moments of "can we watch something happy" or distracting your sibling by playing with toys or even simply having your parent tell you they love you before something HORRIBLE happens hits really close to home. this movie looks fantastic and very well done. EDIT: wanted to add a bit about the phone. a lot of times, CPS can only do so much in abuse situations. seeing the phone go from a phone to a children's toy and then back to a demon definitely shows how not only can the phone, a source of protection, can be made absolutely useless, but also can be used against you--I have no doubt that calling the police probably had severe repercussions for him.
This movie isn’t for everyone, but I found it to be the perfect visual representation for what it’s like to have a nightmare as a child. You are alone. Helpless. And it feels like you’ll never leave. It’s incredible.
It really encapsulates how helpless you feel as a child where you don’t understand what’s happening, you mostly “do as you’re told” even if you don’t know the person directing you, you can’t reach things and you don’t know how to use things, you don’t know the severity of situations, I mean, I think it perfectly captures it
Tbh, as someone with severe childhood trauma caused by my mother, I relate to the narrative of Skinamarink on a core level. My mother would scare me at night like this, try to silence my crying with threats, and prevent me from getting out through the windows or doors. I'd ask my sister to watch something happy just to escape the situation. To me, this movie makes sense a lot.
@Rick writes The last part. Its so hard to vividly re-tell how intense the abuse was. Which can be so frustrating. You are seeing it through a haze and forget a lot of details like specific insults and all...your brain is learning to forget the details fast like you are on some kind of survial mode. This can make it hard to actually get help and get taken seriously. I hated it, not being able to evoke that feeling and intensity in others so they dont take it serious enough.
I'm so sorry that happened to you. My mother too caused me so much trauma similar, even though I was molested by someone else and had some other authority figures physically hurt me, but none that even holds a candle to the trauma of my mom terrorizing me, even though nothing she did seems as 'severe' on paper because it was so mental-emotional. I hope you are well.
My very half baked theory is that maybe it's about post-partum depression and the abuse/neglect/abandonment that comes from it. Post-partum depression can be a terrifying thing, especially when psychosis is involved, and could possibly explain some things in this movie. Anyway, I haven't even seen Skinamarink. I came to this conclusion by watching this video! Let me know what you guys think!
As soon as I finished watching this movie I immediately knew that A. It's one of the best original concepts for a horror movie in a very long time and B. So, so many people are going to HATE this movie and it's going to get dragged so hard online Say what you will about Skinamarink, but it is a gosh dang MASTER CLASS in "Show Don't Tell". Just like you used to do as a kid alone at night in your dark bedroom unable to sleep, watching all the dark corners and inside your closet, you let your imagination fill in the gaps. What a genius move by a genius director! And on a budget of 15k no less!
@Mixtape Films I was going through some bad stuff and wanted to escape through a good horror movie. I saw the preview and thought this would be a GREAT horror movie. I was angry at the world and took it out on everyone. If anyone involved is reading, I apologize.
any horror work that preys on our natural fear can't help but get under your skin. that's why i love analogue horror, it captures the fear of the unknown and the ordinary better than any other horror medium, and skinamarink might be the best example of this
I like to think that the entity, bored after all the torture, let him go, and the door and face at the end were partially meant to symbolize what Kevin is left with: an empty history, and a future he must walk into with nothing but the trauma and pain he experienced in that house
I figured the mom had died before the movie starts. It seemed like the dad was taking care of both kids by himself. The line 'i dont want to talk about mom' reminds me of a young kid unable to process their mother is gone
@Malory Function it also explains why the demon/entity was so interested in taking the mother's form. If she's already dead it makes sense why they would use her as a fear tactic
The idea that someone who (in their mind) loves you can still with their actions, through accident or intent, (literally in the case of this film, figuratively in real life) trap you in an endless cycle of torture is just about the only subject matter in horror that can truly frighten me.
My interpretation of this movie is that of a mother being afflicted by post-partum depression and post-partum psychosis, slowly becoming abusive. Kevin's mind making sense of the trauma and abuse by imagining his mother as a literal monster. The windows and doors disappearing could be the mom locking the doors and windows to prevent them from escaping.
A trailer trash couple moved into the apartment beneath me for about eight months. They had two young boys and a newborn baby. They where constantly yelling, screaming at their kids, threatening to beat them, etc. Me and my neighbor reported them to CPS multiple times and nothing happened. Eventually the landlord told them they needed to move out because they had trashed the place. There where holes in the walls/doors, mountains of trash piled up everywhere, tons of bugs and roaches. I think about those three young kids all the time. Hell is real, and it's all around us. Its a place that the most vulnerable people in our world know all too well, they are trapped in it every day, and even though they live in the same physical space we do, they can't escape it.
This was my childhood except I was an only child. Mother was mentally ill and father was a drunk. They fought daily. We had to move to new trailer parks often because my mother would get us kicked out of them from flipping out on neighbors. I went to at least 2 schools per grade until 9th grade when I was removed from school. I’m 46 now and I’m over it, but it definitely shaped the first half of my life in a really bad way. CPS intervened a few times but nothing resulted of it.
Some people don't seem to take emotional and mental abuse seriously. A lot of kids grow up in that kind of environment, surrounded by screaming and hatred all the time, and as one of those children it is so damaging. It can destroy a kid's wellbeing and traumatize them into adulthood, but the law doesn't care unless someone gets hit. Even then sometimes it still doesn't. Poor kids.
I interpreted the ending of the entity showing itself as a response to Kevin asking to watch something happy, like a statement that it was feeling great joy from toying with him like this. Left a sick feeling in my gut :')
Me and my friend watched this in an old amc, we were the only ones there. After we finished the movie, we joked that we'd been transported into another dimension, but it really did kinda feel that way. Plus we live in Indiana, and so the drive home in the dark with the strange urban-suburban-country layouts definitely didn't help.
I feel like addiction plays some part in the sinister nature of the creature/entity. The looping being a recurring theme and addiction being a constant cycle would make sense. Maybe the mother/creature she becomes was a result of an addiction. This could easily bleed into the abusive and neglectful themes that show up as well. This film could be the result of a woman who tore her family apart and the demons she created in doing so.
This movie feels like hallucinations you would have at age 7-4 at a middle of the night. Your creativity is so high you can imagine anything and it can fear you, so you cope with the light of the television and toys. Truly a underrated masterpiece. Scared the living hell out of me. Felt like all of my fears combined into one in one movie.
@yoda apologist I have traveled for years upon years, following this reply to an opinion But I still cannot locate who required this input to the conversation.
I’m in my mid 20s and I have watched a lot of horror in the past 10-15 years. Not a lot of horror movies actually scare me at this point. But then I come across creators like Kyle and you can just tell that this is someone who is passionate about the art of movies, visual storytelling and horror. It is a rare find and I admire the work 🎉
I love the little detail with Kevin bringing his sister the juice... It just feels so authentic and absolutely like something I would've done for someone when I was little.
I’ve written about this recurring nightmare that I had as a child but the windows didn’t actually disappear, I would half wake up in random trap houses with one my parents having dragged me along with them to get their fix after giving me “medicine” to make me sleep. So the windows were boarded up in said trap houses, toilets were missing, there wasn’t electricity, etc. My first memory of this was at age 4. I caught on to what was going on at age 6 and then I’d usually get left home alone with my baby brother. I made his bottles from the age of 6 so he’d stop crying and I changed his diaper, clothing and gave us a bath every few days. Sorry for over sharing
as a kid I used to be convinced that if I didn't hide under the covers when I went to bed, then the grim reaper or some kind of undead ghoul would come out of my closet and kill me. this is definitely reawakening that fear lol. Bravo to everyone who made this film
@leon kennedy overheating but not daring to move an inch out of the safety of the blanket because you dont wanna get killed by the pile of clothes shaped like a Mandela Catalogue alternate
In my honest opinion, feeling that you're not safe in a place where you're supposed to feel safe and secure is one of the worst feelings that you could experience. Home is a place where you're supposed to feel as if nothing can harm you, but if you do, then something is horribly- *horribly* wrong.
Oh, the joys of an abusive childhood. Now that I'm in my 20s, I'm realizing how fucked up my mental (and physical) health is because of the lack of a sense of security and safety in my formative years.
In regards to your story -- I'm a psychology major, and I was fascinated by the way you retold your story! You mentioned "Trauma" is a strong word, (and it is), and there's 2 points I wanna make in regards to that: 1. Typically nowadays when we talk about "Trauma" as a child, we don't use that word because of the weight it carries. We nowadays call it an "ACE" -- an 'Adverse Childhood Experience' -- because the word "trauma" is so often referred to with extreme abuse. Abuse=/ trauma all the time. An adverse childhood experience is, by definition, anything that's unusual in childhood that the person carries with them that alters the way they think/perceive the world around them. ACEs can be small -- like your story, for example, where the 'effect' it had on you was realizing you were vulnerable -- or they can be large, such as losing a parent early on . ACEs are not always abuse-focused (although they CAN be, any typically in those cases 'trauma' can be used). ACEs aren't always a *really bad thing*. Don't get me wrong, they CAN be, but they also could do things like make a child grow up faster than they need to. ACEs are also not always indicative of underlying mental health conditions ( -- and, for the record, neither is trauma). I'm wondering if you're so hesitant to call it 'trauma' due to that *connotation* of the word, rather than what the word actually means in psychology. I would definitely call it an ACE, since it emotionally impacted you so hard. That experience alone doesn't make your childhood bad, doesn't make your parents bad, doesn't make you mentally ill or anything of the sort. 2. The word 'trauma's connotation is really frustrating for both therapists and researchers. We end up having therapy patients who absolutely refuse to call what they experienced 'trauma' when it undoubtedly is. This is difficult. People (ESPECIALLY grown ass adults) will be like "people nowadays are calling EVERYTHING trauma!!" without fully understanding what the field of psychology is referencing when it says the word. Its kind of like the difference between a 'theory theory' and a 'scientific theory'. People who don't know the difference between common usage of the word and actual precise usage will think that people are simply making a mountain out of a molehill or trying to talk bad about their parents. That's essentially *why* psychologists have to adopt this new term/new language, so that when we talk to others, we can accurately say what it means. idk if that was helpful or at the very least interesting. Hope anybody who read learned something!
The scene with Kevin with the knife and hearing him cry made me so upset and want to go run upstairs and cuddle my baby brother who just turned 5. This movie is very effective at making you feel helpless and desperate to do something if you really let it pull you in.
when u watch the movie through the perspective of kids trapped in an abusive household with drug addicted parents it becomes more depressing that scary
I haven't watched the film, however after watching this video from Wendigoon I realized it seems very reminiscent of my own unique childhood. My father was terrifying, abusive, did multiple drugs, and used psychological torture to convince my mom to delete herself (she didn't btw). My memories of childhood in my house usually were during nighttime, with few lights being on, while my mom was off to work, and I was alone with my father. Whom I thought would kill me or beat me to death as he was loud and demonic from my point of view. During the night I never felt safe, being alone in my dark room I would wait from something to hurt me, and would keep my eyes open while in the darkness peeking under the door to see into the hallway. The terror from the scenes of this film, were EXACTLY how I felt 3-5 years of age. Until he mysteriously vanished from my life...
This movie reminded me of how I felt about bedtime and the dark. When I was 8, I had a classmate who was checking out a zombie book with hyperrealistic imagery, which slowly disturbed me the more I looked at it. Eventually, I had asked this classmate to turn the cover away from me and he did, until a friend snatched it and began chasing me with it. Well, as you'd expect, I had a nightmare that night from the scary imagery, but I hallucinate in the pitch black after nightmares and this was before we had a nightlight in my brother's and I's shared room. I woke up to the pitch black in my bed, but then I saw it, slowly fading into sight, was a blurry face that the more I focused on, the more I could see the detail. It got closer, and closer. I tried waking up my little brother but he didn't budge, still very asleep. I started to hyperventilate, crying as the undead, warped face remained right infront of mine no matter where I looked. I tried calling for my mom and stepdad, but no one answered. I tried to hide my face into the pillows, something that usually worked, but I almost felt it's presence. Eventually, I fainted from fear. Every night until I was 12 years old, I never felt safe in my room at night, I always felt watched, would always face my wall, tensed up until my entire body ached before I gotten the courage to look into my dark room, and when I recognized the light from under my bedroom door, I booked it out and would hide in the bathroom for hours. At 12 years old, my bio father gave us a night light (Because our mom and stepdad refused to get one) and I hadn't had an issue since.
Just a personal point: the way the mother talks about how she loves them is exactly the tone my father had when he said goodbye before he, uh, Skinamarinked himself. Very eerie
@Nightlight Having your brain stuck on those thoughts sucks, but remember that while you can't control what your brain does, you can control what *you* do. Having a song stuck in your head doesn't mean you want to listen to it. Same with this. You're doing a great job distracting from it, and you can get past it. If you can, get some help. If you can power through it for a while as your hormones settle, and it's still around, definitely get help. You can do this. *neck-snapping lack of segue* My day sucked, but I am watching KZclip now, and am in a decent mood again. Thank you for asking!
it also sounds like what my parents would say to me after they had hurt me somehow. like they would let a while pass and ignore it happened and just ask for a hug. no apology, just “love“.
@Nightlight we want you in this world, little dude. I know it seems hopeless, but your life is so important and your adulthood is literally up to you- you can create a life completely different than your life now. I suffered from deep depression at your age and I am so glad that I stuck around because now I’m happy and I didn’t put my family through a lifetime of pain and grief. Hang in there, please, kiddo.
Just want to say how glad I am how you laid out what happened in clear detail, because it felt a lot more cohesive than when I watched it last night! The experience of watching was like meditating in a nightmare, just transfixed by this pure dread I felt for nearly two hours with purposefully-confusing camera angles and noises. What an effective film.
Oh man I've totally had that "shadow in the corner of the room" moment when I was a kid. I woke up one night and in my closet (which had no door) was a pair of glowing green eyes and what appeared to be teeth. I froze. I couldn't tell if it was blinking or not because the glow wasn't that bright it was feint but definitely green. Eventually I worked up the courage to turn a light on and its was my Monster Face toy. Known to the generation after me as the Goosebumps Monster Head Maker I just found out.
I grew up in a extremely broken home with my sister thats a few year older than me, this captured the horror and trauma of neglect and being forgotten. I cannot tell you how much this movie put me back into my past. This movie was literally my childhood
Your analysis is Dead On. While I watched, I felt exactly the way I did after my parents would beat me up. And frankly, I needed this film. I needed to see my child’s eye perspective of what kept happening, and how I knew that no one would help me and that I was trapped in the house with the danger. Much respect to this film maker.
I think the mom is alive in the beginning, tells the son that "she loves him very much" and then hangs herself in the closet. The bones breaking sound is her neck snapping. That's why the boy is seen looking up, that's why the toys float up, there's so many shots of the ceiling. After a parents suicide, the remaining spouse will fall into a deep depression and the children suffer so much, especially if there is no outside help. I think this film is about not being able to escape the feeling of hopelessness (the doors disappear, the phone turns into a toy) after suffering a huge trauma as a child. The "demon" is a manifestation of all of that. The kids stay up late because the father has lost control, they're neglected, toys are everywhere, the demon tells the kids to do horrible things (some kids blame themselves) and the kids say "where's dad? maybe he went with mom" alluding that the dad might have killed himself too and left them all alone.
@SeaFR I mean I get the need for a quick scare or an easy narrative but (to me) stories can’t be anything more than good while handing itself to you on a silver platter Like eventually you’ve gotta want something a little more, something that makes you think, right? Especially with something as bizarre and artsy as this film Even if you don’t you should still at least appreciate the effort that goes into stories grander than simple ghosts murdering people I hope this doesn’t come off as a “holier than thou” thing because I don’t think that at all I’m just trying to express the wonders of multilevel narratives
Usually I don't like horror that targets children, for it always seems needlessly cruel and exploitive, but when it's done with the intention of showing fear and terror that only the perspective of someone so young, innocent, and ignorant can have, that's when it works better.
As a kid some nights I'd hear some noise in the house and just, freeze, as if any sound or movement would alert it to my presence and that'd be the end of me. I couldn't tell you what that "it" was, I just knew my life depended on it not finding me. Watching this movie put me back in that headspace. I was frozen the entire time.
As a kid who had ... To put it simply, a short childhood .. This movie just- .. Hits something in my brain. I would wake up to a quiet and lonely house more often than not, as both my parents had to work for us to be able to live. Even during the daytime it was always so .. Eerie. Obviously after a while I got used to it .. But the feeling never fully went away. This only got worse when my parents split up and my little brother and I constantly juggled between houses. This movie manages to tap into the anxiety of a child by themselves, even if they have a sibling there. It reminds me of the feeling when your parent takes longer to come home than usual and you're just .. Sitting there, wondering if when you told them "I love you" when they left for work is the last words you ever told them. Safe to say, this movie fucked me up, and I'm going to rewatch it in the near future
I actually just watched this today. It brings me back to being afraid of everything in my room at night. My family believes in the paranormal, so I constantly thought there were shadow people/shadow creatures everywhere. This brings me back to that in the most intense way. The other thing that gets me is the toy phone. The clip shown at 24:40 is... unnerving. Especially because the smile reminds me of the nightmare clown sequence from Brave Little Toaster. It feels so... oddly visceral. It was the only clip to actually scare me in the movie, and only cos it was so loud. Anyways. This was a really awesome movie, I'm def gonna watch it again.
As a kid, I had a repeating nightmare that struck several times over years and each time it was the most paralyzing terror ever, I was actually paralyzed in fear only seeing the monster in pitch dark, in my own house. So I had this nightmare again and again, until one time I was telling myself in the dream I had to do something, I couldn’t just be stuck in fear anymore. And from there it actually turned into a sequence of me in my kitchen actually getting up and defeating the monster, it’s still dark but now rather than pitch black there’s flashing lights and effects, like a tv show or game. Since then, I have never had that nightmare again. This just made me think of that.
I gotta say, this movie evokes a terror in me that I’ve only ever felt while trapped in a house with my raging abusive mother, being unable to call my father for help because my mother had my cellphone and she could pick up the landline if I tried to call from that. I’m amazed that a film can evoke such a feeling, and while (as a fan of horror and experimental films) I love this movie, I can safely say that I never want to watch it ever again Edit: I’m writing this comment before watching the analysis or reading through the comments section.
While I can’t personally remember any actual childhood experiences like the one Wendigoon describes, I remember having vivid nightmares about being trapped in my elementary school after dark, or waking up in the same room I fell asleep in and everything being “different” in a way I couldn’t adequately describe and feeling terrified by that unfamiliarity. I think that’s the reason liminal spaces are so appealing to me now. It’s like I have a desire in my adulthood to “investigate” those nightmare spaces that scared me as a child, and see what’s really lurking there.
Dialogue in this movie worked so well, tension had me on the edge of my seat. The final reveal of the face-like shape in the dark, felt in part so uncanny, because it was the first fully shown face in the entire movie.
My biological mom is bipolar, and also has struggled with drug use. I don’t see her very often, maybe once a year, but we do have contact with each other. A lot of this film really spoke to me, both in that regard and as someone who suffers from paranoia and delusions and has grown up dealing with a lot of untreated issues. One second a parent is loving and affectionate, the next they’re angry, vindictive, manipulative and, to put it simply, a monster. It’s confusing and terrifying and it’s not uncommon to feel “trapped”- especially when you still love the person, but the relationship is hurting you and you know that but don’t want to make things worse by trying to do something. It’s even worse when you’re younger. You don’t have the life experience to understand abusive behavior. So many kids have it pushed on them that they don’t get to have boundaries, and you’re told that adults are right and you are wrong, so you just bite your tongue and go along with it because you think it’s just “tough love” or that you don’t have another choice. I adore liminal, disturbing, obscure and experimental horror, especially when its done right and delivers a message, and I think this movie did it quite well.
I have to say, as a CSA survivor, this film perfectly describes how it feels; like you’re stuck in an unclean, twisted version of what childhood should be and even when you’re an adult, you’re somehow still there
I like the scene where the father tells his daughter to look under the bed. The cliche is checking under your bed for monsters, right? There's nothing there, but when she comes back up, her father is gone and her mother is there. Her mother is the monster and it doesnt even have to hide under the bed anymore.
@julie snoot I sometimes write things and realize I'm being rude later. I sort of apologized in a later message, but I was rude. It's a character flaw.
@Adam Smasher i'm all for discussing people's interpretations of media but why do you have to be so condescending and rude about it? i'm sure the original commenter would probably be more willing to listen to your points if you weren't being so rude about it for no reason
The general vibe and atmosphere of this film reminds me of the feeling that I used to get as a child waking up from a specific recurring nightmare. In the nightmare, I would be suspended in a vast, celestial black void. All alone in the abyss, I would have the sudden sensation of being crushed by some kind of unfathomable, monstrous machinery of death. Upon awakening in a cold sweat, the silence of my room would be deafening. I would be overcome with an intense feeling of dread, paranoia and danger. I remember feeling as though the walls of my bedroom became embodied with the hateful, predatory gaze of some kind of unforeseen malevolent force. These sensations would often last for about 10-15 minutes before which time I would gather the courage to return to my bedroom after seeking the comfort of my parents. Somehow, this film managed to mimic EXACTLY how I felt awakening from those recurring nightmares as an 8 year old. An absolute modern masterpiece!
I love with this movie there are so many theories and all of them can equally be true. Art is subjective so everyone can come to their own conclusions. For me personally, I came from a home with an abusive father, I see this as an abusive mother situation. The loss of exits, multiple times the voice telling the kids to do things(the mother), them not following, and them getting harshly punished, even the mother being loving to try and make up for what she did. The toys being taken away, people being changed from the abuse, and even the house is completely different as things get worse. The children see their mother as a monster.
my story is long but holy shit I had such an INCREDIBLY similar experience to your story at 26:47 that hearing yours freaked me out that someone else went through it. This was a shared experience between me, my older sister, and my younger brother. We were probably 6-7, 8-9, and 9-10 years old playing hide and seek (just us three or us and our parents I don't quite remember) in our house and we were in our spots. I'm not clear on which parent was supposed to find us, but all I remember is that we hid for long enough that it became worrying that it was taking them so long, because for an adult, finding three children hiding in a house isn't hard to do. We knew that much. I remember leaving my spot and going to the living room with my siblings, but I'm not sure if we decided together that we would do that. Regardless, the house just suddenly felt off. It was like gravity shifted, that's how strange it felt. I remember the way I saw my house was like if you desaturated an image, made it kind of black and white but still able to see color; that's how I experienced the unfamiliarity of it all. It was scarily quiet as well. Collectively, we knew, and I don't know how because I don't remember of us asking about it before we came to this realization, that our parents just...vanished. Being around them for so long, we knew the 'someone's behind me and staring at me' gut feeling when we knew our parents were in the house, and could come into wherever we were at any given moment. But this time, that feeling was completely nonexistent. We didn't even have to tell each other, we just understood that due to the lack of noise and feeling of their presences, mom and dad aren't here and started looking. I don't remember feeling scared because I thought they decided to prank us and hide us, to make look for I don't remember my siblings being scared either, so they possibly thought the same. But when we searched the house, yelling for them, we met back up with no luck. we started freaking out. We cried, we checked again, again, and again. Still no luck. We looked through the windows if they were outside, and they were not. We decided that we'd go to our neighbor's house, so we did. We didn't even get shoes, just bolted outside and next door. The three of us knocked on their door and told them "we don't know where our parents are, can you call them?" And then suddenly, out of absolutely nowhere, they call for us. They're outside in our driveway, walking towards us. Gravity returns, color is restored to its natural vibrancy, and nature sounds start up again. To me, that was how I experienced normalcy returning. When my parents were around, it was livelier, normal again. Here's the thing though. If they went outside, they would have told us, but they didn't say anything about leaving the game. If they weren't even playing with us, they would have still said something, but they didn't. No matter where they were, they would have heard us and responded, but they didn't. No matter what, they would have announced their exit or answered our calls, but never did. We asked them about this a few years ago and got an answer that made sense, so we know it was real and not a dream or just children not realizing something super slight had happened, like maybe mom and dad went to the bathrooms at the same time because we had two on that floor. I asked my siblings for more details on what I am unsure of, so I'll edit this when I get them.
This movie reminded me of the fears of my childhood I had completely forgot about. Like evil sorts of fears. Waking up in the middle of the night, the house being off, everything being wrong, your parents being gone sort of fears. It’s the fear of darkness. I can see why it’s so divisive since I think people get that or they don’t. For me it reminded me of something so ancient, primal and evil that I really shook me. It momentarily gave me back the fear of the dark, years after I completely stopped experiencing it.
I think it’s good to mention that the melody that plays when the toys and blood disappears is the same melody on the tv where the bunny phases out of reality
An interesting detail is when Kevin tries to call the police, but the monster turns it into a play telephone. It’s very reminiscent of being in an abusive household and being silenced by new, shiny things.
@Colby it makes sense when you consider that skinimarink is based on a short film the creator also made called "heck" and in it, the kid main character straight up says "I'm sorry I got cancer" and the kid is trying to take care of himself with a seemingly absent parent.
The description of that scene reminded me of when I'd call crisis lines as a child mid-panic attack during my mom's "episodes", they'd say they were sending help, and they'd call our local police, only for an officer to show up and lecture my sister and me for making things hard on my parents, telling us in all their years of small-town cop experience they knew no parents hated their kids no matter what they said or did, and that my mom was allowed to use up to lethal force on us to make us obey her (completely ignoring that this had all been started by my mom screaming at my little sister for something she didn't even do and slapping her across the face) everyone that showed up to "help" similarly excused the abuse and shamed the victims, but that one was the worst. I've never trusted cops or child welfare since then
@alex Barbosa it's very possible the demon could represent an abusive parent. Especially with the fact it came from their mom, and got rid of their dad
This movie hits completely different when you grew up in not just an abusive household, but a spiritually abusive one at that. Growing up with occult-like themes and being conditioned to think demonic beings are all around you, this movie invoked a completely different kind of terror in me and brought me back to when I was a child, only the nightmares were real. Absolutely terrifying from the deepest parts of my subconscious.
Seeing this in the perspective of innocent helpless children who dont fully understand and can't grasp the severity of what situation they are in. It really gives me a terrible feeling in my stomach. I felt absolutely helpless watching it
Your story about being left alone as a kid made me remember when something similar happened to me. I was about 6 or 7 and my Mom had taken my brother to his dance class and my Dad had gone to work. It was morning and the sun was out so it was less terrifying in that regard, but it was still just me and our dog in a silent, empty house with no explanation. I actually remember putting on Cartoon Network to try and make myself feel better, kinda like the kids in the movie. Of course, my Mom and brother came home fairly soon and she felt terrible about it, but this movie makes me think back on that and imagine if they didn't and things only got worse and worse.
this was the first time I wanted to cover my eyes watching a horror movie. I felt like this movie toyed with me the same way it toyed with Kevin and the more I found about this movie, the worse and more terrifying it became. It's not like other horror movies that have action and suspense, this one is quiet and it gets you out of nowhere.
It seems like it is an allegory for abuse. The time loop might represent how it repeats daily to the point of feeling trapped forever. The change from "close your eyes" to the mom not having a name seems to be the first steps into abusive behavior that then escalate to the point of not recognizing the person as mom anymore. If the parents are getting a divorce, it might be that the mom is punishing the children for reminding her of the father. Which would explain why its only started happening after that. The legos on the ceiling probably represents happy times moving further out of reach as further emphasized by the long stretching hallway.
Seems the most likely, although I don't think the mother is punishing them due to the devorse. Rather, I think the parents are still together, but the dad just can't or will not stop the mother, which is why the kids can't find him during the events (also puts some perspective on the phone call, the injury being described vaguely and kinda downplayed). Then the mom being gone and the demon being there would moreso be the kids not being able/willing to recognise the mother as their mother when she's abusing them. Which makes sense because the boy seems to still have a possitive view of their mom, while the sister, who is older, seems to realise that her mom is doing or has done something bad.
I personally think that maybe the parents had a divorce or issues and the mother decided to let or welcome an entity in the house (scene after she's on the bed, you here bones crunching and the hand on the door and screams of the mum), the entity taking the form of the mum, who we see sat in front of the TV and asking to play with the children.
and you know the part near the end where there's the figure on the bed slowly disappearing? that could be a metaphor for how she's losing parts of herself and disappearing from.. everything. the fact her back is almost always turned could be symbolising how she's turned her back on her children? refusing to see them as who they actually are?
There’s a lot interesting theories going around about this movie, but I’m wondering if Kevin’s fall down the stairs is the catalyst for this whole nightmare. I’m sure the theories of abuse and the parents (or one of them) “skinamarink”ing themselves fit in too, but after seeing the pieces of text like “572 days” and “mommy” as and endless loop happens COULD just be supernatural, OR Kevin could be stuck in a coma from his fall. Brain activity during comas is very interesting in how a lot of the censoring that your brain does normally turns off. Along with all the instinctive fears children have (such as fears of the dark, fears of death, etc.), any traumatic experiences Kevin might have had prior to his fall would definitely be uncensored and coming at him in the wildest ways imaginable if he was stuck in a coma. But that’s just my thoughts
When I was a kid, I always had to watch a happy movie after a scary one. This movie took me back to that time and that line at the end really made me realize that it was meant to.
This reminds me of so many nightmares I had as a kid and I just wanted to see what it all was about but I also found myself actively turning my phone away from me because I didn't want to see any of the potential scary stuff 😂 I'm just a wuss, I guess.
(Tw // speaking about childhood stuff) This film really resonated with me. The way it showed a “child like” pov just reminds me so much of the past. The tv on and Kaylee staying near Kevin reminds me of when me and my brother would stay up past our bedtime and watch adult swim. We used it as background noise to block out our parents yelling at each other or the sound of them throwing things. Adult swim was scary to me but it wasn’t as scary as dad or the way mom yelled. I didn’t realize it but my brother hated adult swim as much as I did, he only put it on so I wouldn’t have to entirely hear my parents. Kevin trying to take care of his sister reminded me of my older brother and everything he did to shield me from hearing my parents or being hurt by my dad.
This movie is such an accurate representation of what a child's fear feels like, we as adults can't really comprehend it anymore. We hear a strange noise and we fear an intruder, a 10 year old hears a strange noise and he fears the monster, but a 5 year old, a 5 year old fears that which he can't comprehend what it is, he fears the darkness despite not knowing what could be lurking within it. We all fear the unknown, but as we grow up, that which is unknown grows smaller and smaller. Idk, I really like it
At 5 I already could comprehend what I was afraid of(supernatural entities aka demons and grown-ups themselves). But I grew up in a very abusive household though.
I think we all have one nightmare that stays with us from when we're little kids. I still remember mine so clearly, even though I never remember any other dreams. I remember walking downstairs from my room when I was really young, and my family was sitting down in the living room talking, but as soon as I got down far enough to see them, they all went quiet and turned to look at me at the same time. They were all these nasty looking greenish skinned imposters of my family, it was fucking horrifying. Then, as if one of those dreams wasn't enough, I had a second one too. I was with my dad in the back seat of his truck, sitting in some grocery store parking lot, and we were talking to each other, everything was fine, but then he just went quiet. I called for him, and then that green imposter asshole just whipped around the seat and stared at me again. I was only like 6 or 7 when I had these dreams, and it never happened again. I'm 31 now, and I remember every detail of those things, they were so creepy. They looked like decomposing zombie type things wearing these dirty fake wigs and clothes, trying to make themselves look like my parents.
I'd argue the unknown grows larger as we grow up, so much larger, even despite all we learn. I don't disagree with the rest though, I think you're right. I just think it's even more disturbing that we learn so much growing up, yet we also learn that the more we learn, the more we learn exactly how much we don't know about everything. It's hard to put into words, but when we're kids, the scope of everything is so much smaller, the universe seems so much smaller, so a lot of the unknown doesn't even bother us. Then we grow up and realize just how impossibly massive everything really is, and how little human beings actually know.
Duuude this one messed me up 😅. As a parent watching this is so terrifying. It really hits on how permeable minds are at that young of an age, especially when being instructed or influenced by those around you that you're supposed to trust (like your parents). What hit me so hard was hearing your theory of it being the mom possessed and the demon using her as a tool to get the kids to do its bidding. Makes the knife scene make so much more sense and all the more terrifying. It's the very real horror of a parents influence over their small children and the power and danger that can come with that.
It was pretty obvious to me this is a metaphor for the psychological trauma and pain the children are feeling after their parents get divorced. They blame their mother for the divorce as she is the one who informed them of it. The children now live with their Dad and that’s why he calls her to let her know about Kevin’s fall. The whole movie is about the dissolving of a family and the house they grew up in becoming a scary, unpredictable place. In the weakest metaphor of the film, the children’s world is literally turning upside down. The unsafe element introduced to the home is the divorce. Where once having their mom in the house was expected, now that she’s moved out the children would be surprised if she were to suddenly be home. They are helpless to stop the divorce of fix their parent’s relationship or make things go back to the way they were.
since this movie is taking place in 1995, that brings up memories for me, as i was only 8. the movie took me back to when i had trouble sleeping a lot as a kid. i would wake up in the middle of the night, fearful of the dark, the unknown. it didn’t matter that there was a night light in my room. i felt incredibly alone, and unsafe, even though my parents were sleeping in the next room.
I was never in an abusive household, I love my parents a lot but for some reason I really connect to this pure fear. That pure terror of a child of being trapped and I wonder if it has anything to do with my disability or my other abusive relationship. I think it’s cause my safest place in my life if my room. My room in my house is my comfort place. The idea of being stuck in it without seeing the outside without my family strikes a deep sense of dread in my heart. I remember staring down the stairs of my room at night unable to get my parents because the darkness itself terrified me so I would just cry. Idk what I’m saying anymore but this film just really hit me
I think that 'Can we watch something happy' is simply just a statement of someone reaching their limit. And that's the only way they can express it. They're done; exhausted and giving up.
It's relatable. My brother and I retreated into videogames with the same kind of conclusion. Now it's so hard to imagine being able to actually fixing things, just retreat to the one place where we actually have control.
Whenever I saw that scene it made me really sad. He was just so done with everything around him and he was just looking for a small amount of comfort in his horrible circumstance.
I had reoccurring dreams/nightmares in one of the houses I grew up in. My dream would consist of me “waking up” and being all alone in the house with none of the lights working, and my voice being basically non existent. I remember calling out for my mom and nothing coming out. Would leave me absolutely terrified and I’d have to sleep with a nightlight until middle school. Even at 28 years old, I still get uneasy in the dark. Funnily enough, I’m more creeped out of being alone in a dark building than alone in the dark woods.
this reminds me of a ceiling fear I had when I was between 5-7 years old when I woke one night and see my mother sitting on the bed giving me her back and this terrifying idea paralyzed me for the first time in my life "what if I called her and she turned her head to me and her face is faceless?!!" then I always had this kind of fear when I was a child, weirdly enough it was always with my mother or grandmother, and those two were the most kind loving people I ever had. maybe it's just a childish fear of losing them or Separation anxiety especially it was at the age I started to go to school?
As a survivor of child abuse this movie is spot on for the fear you feel in that situation. I don't think thats necessarily the answer to "whats the movie about." but its just so accurate.
You telling the story of being a lil' guy and feeling fear for the first time, makes me think of one of your bigger interests growing up, and the direction of your channel in general. Ever since that overwhelming feeling as a kid, it would seem you have actively pursued finding that feeling again. Through your interest in the horror genre in general.. (while admittedly well balanced in my opinion with your faith) I can't help but be reminded of how addicts do something very similar. Less the healthy balance of a higher power, where you found a fun/exciting way to express your interests, they tend to chase that overwhelming feeling long enough that often times it results in the detriment of their own lives.. Obviously in no way am I comparing you to a drug addict, it's just incredibly interesting to me.. How the mind can work so similarly in people who, at the same time, can be so different from one another all seeking the same kind of feelings. Your channel is definitely something special brother! A rare gem that accurately depicts slight details and feelings throughout some horrific stories, but told through a heart full of Love and the kind nature of a genuine person. I think I can speak for all of your followers when I say Thank You! I look forward to every time I open KZclip and my dude has created another banger for us to enjoy!!!
i’m an absolute horror junkie and nothing turns me away, but this film genuinely disturbed me. the way it perfectly conveys child abuse and childhood trauma and the feeling of being alone and trapped without actually showing it outright scares me shitless. this movie is INCREDIBLE
As an abuse survivor, the doors and windows disappearing feels very similar to how you can't just leave an abusive household. As a kid, it was terrifying knowing that my dad would hurt my mom and I if we tried to leave the house. I don't think I could handle watching the movie, but everything I heard about it in this video resonated so much. It sounds like this movie potrayed childhood fear perfectly
I mean, all those thoughts about the theme and connections to ur life kind of go out the window watching it. had me tense the whole way through the film.
Bro.. I understand that as well. Being hit by my dad while my mom and brother were gone was so.. surreal. What was I supposed to do? run away? tell mommy? I don't even know her phone number! Daddy probably just hates me. It's all my fault. It goes on and on and on. I'm fortunate to have an amazing relationship with my father now. But, still... Not everyone can say that.
Dude. You totally captured my childhood fears. My nightmares were (and sometimes still are) about being left alone. They often had a "back rooms" aesthetic atmosphere. I would be spending time with my siblings and parents; but suddenly, they would all disappear. I would be left in a hotel pool, an office building, a cove, or my house. I would be in the dark, and it terrified me. I am a very sociable person, and being isolated in a dark place suddenly makes me feel vulnerable...
I haven't actually seen this movie but it looks really interesting and definitely something different to a lot of other horror films 🙂 I might definitely check it out 😍🥰
When you talked about the memory that came back to you about your childhood, a memory came back to me about my childhood that kind of evoked the same message of a child feeling vulnerable in a place they shouldn't. I am only 18 years old, so my memory feels a bit more recent, but I am guessing that I was around 7-9 when I had my small moment of terror. Thinking back on it, the situation itself was not scary, and I even joke about it with my family to this day, but the emotions I felt were extremely similar to the way this film made me feel (I did not watch the movie because I am too scared to lmao but just from the scenes you showed I still got those feelings) which was extreme helplessness and confusion. So, I was at my family's lake house during the summer for a weekend get-away, and I had gone there several times throughout my life (we usually go there several weekends each summer), so I was fairly familiar with the house and all of its rooms. One night I fell asleep in the room where I usually sleep at the lake house which was the kids room. It had two bunk beds (which would allow me, my two brothers, and one of my cousins to sleep in) and one small bed for my youngest cousin to sleep in. In the middle of the night after I had gone to sleep, I woke up for no reason at all: the room was pitch black, the weather was clear outside, and there were no sounds coming from inside the house either. For some reason I felt compelled to leave my room, which, to this day, I still cannot remember the reason I decided to get up instead of trying to go back to sleep. When I got up to leave the room, I could not see anything due to the darkness. After I finally found a door knob, I twisted it and pulled open the door, only to run into a wall that was right behind it. I had actually gone into the closet, thinking it was the exit to my room. What's more, I actually thought I was in my house back home which was the reason for this confusion. I had not figured this out after walking into the closet, so I panicked and tried to find the exit to the room I was in. Once I found the real exit, I stepped out into a hallway that was not familiar to me because, again, I thought I was in my house back home. Down the hallway to my right, I saw a window and the light from the moon outside poured through it. Unfortunately for me, I was still too scared to make any rational connections about what was going on around me, so my only thought was panic as there was no window at the end of my hallway back home. At this point I ran to the other end of the hallway to find what I thought was my mother's room, but it was in a slightly different position. However, I didn't question it from all of the changes I had encountered so far; my main goal at this point was to find my mom so I could feel protected from this real-life nightmare. As I ran into what I thought was my mom's room, I called her name and shook the lump in the bed that I thought was her body. My oldest brother sat up half-awake, and this incredibly startled me because the person in that bed was in fact not my mom. I then ran back into the hallway and plopped down right in front of the door to the children's room I had originally been sleeping in. Out of sheer confusion and helplessness, I pulled my knees to my chest and started bawling into my forearms. Soon after, my older brother came out of the room I thought was my mother's to see why I was acting so restlessly, and my mom came out of the room to the left of the kid's room that I was sitting in front of because she heard me crying as well. As soon as I saw her exit her designated room at our lake house I realized where I was and burst into more tears, only this time of relief. Right after I explained what had happened, she told me that it was okay then sent me back to bed. I fell asleep very quickly after that due to the exhaustion that the stressful moment had caused me. In the morning my mom, my older brother, and I explained to the rest of my family what had happened the night prior in a light and joking way. I have never taken the chance to really think about why I was so scared and why I was so unaware of my surroundings until seeing this video. This was a very refreshing moment for me to experience so thank you for that. Also, this is my first time coming across your channel; this video is great, and I cannot wait to watch more from you! (Last thing, if anyone was interested on the layout of the lake house in comparison to my actual home I will describe it right here because I feel like the way I told the story may have gotten confusing at times. Okay so, my house has a long hallway upstairs, and that is where I thought I was in my lake house. When I exit my room, to the very left of me is a hallway closet door. In front of me is my younger brother's room. Slightly to the right and in front of me are the stairs to the main floor of the house. To the right of me there are three more rooms. If I step out of my room to the right and face straightforwardly to the end of the hallway, my parents room would be right in front of me. To the right of my room is a closet, and on the other side of the closet is my older brother's room. Across from my older brother's room is the bathroom. Just to tie things together, to the right of my older brother's room is my parents room, and to the left of the bathroom is the stairwell to the main floor of the house. My lake house layout is quite different: I am still confused as to how I got the two hallways so mixed up. Okay, so, I am exiting the kid's room and in front of me is the wall on the other side of the hallway. If I look to my right, there is a door with a window on it at the very end of the hallway. If I were to be facing that door, having just exited the kid's room, the door to the kitchen and living area would be slightly in front of the door with the window on it, and to the left. From this perspective, my mom's room at the lake house would be across from the door to the kitchen, so to my right and slightly in front of the door with the window on it. Back to the perspective of being in the doorway, about to exit the kid's room, to my left there is a bathroom at the very end of the hallway. Slightly in front of and to the left of that bathroom is my aunt and uncle's room. However, on the night of my confusion my older brother was sleeping in there because he had outgrown the kid's beds and my aunt and uncle were not at the lake house that night. All right, well, that is all I have to say. I seriously doubt anyone will see this, and if they do, there is no way anyone will read all the way through. If you did though, thank you lots :))) .)
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overpriced Magic Cardboard. If you're trying to eat "healthier," this shit is asinine on principle alone. It's like, do any of you know how cereal was even invented in the first place?
Hey, can you give this a.h (Analog Horror) creator (300 dollars) he needs t for his series.
Mount Qaf
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I absolutely adore the detail of Kevin not knowing exactly what to do to comfort his sister so he thinks about what makes him happy and gets her juice.
@Nicholas i shall donate it to the hungry.
@C K bro i don't even care about this childish, god awful argument anymore lmao.
@Socks_DoesNotExist what if I enjoy playing devils advocate and forcing people to think more critically about thier preferences? What if I just enjoy being a contrarian? Deal with it.
@bowl4two you've earned an n word pass, here you go sir
@whiteydiamond you got them good. Best bait I've ever seen lmao
the line "can we watch something happy?" made me so incredibly sad, because it felt more like a sign that he has given up and felt exhausted by the constant dread that they both faced. it sounds like something someone would say when they're at the brink of giving up everything entirely and just want a sliver of hope, even the tiniest bit, to feel something.
The movie is effective at evoking feelings.
It made me want to hurt the entity 😡
@Carolina Silva stop trauma dumping smh smh
/j
@Carolina Silva ok
i think not necessarily giving up, but a confused child that doesn't understand what happened trying to escape or at least distract himsef and try to find shelter in a comfortable familiar thing. it's exactly what i would say as a kid after hearing a scary story, it's what would distract one from being scared and make them feel better. i feel like that “ brink of giving up feeling“ isn't necessarily common in children, especially if this is a metaphor for abuse, you don't want to feel “something“, you just want to cheer yourself up and forget about it after that “thing you think is normal and you don't understand why it upsets you“ happens, because at that point it's the only thing you can do about it at that age and the only thing you know to do.
The part that really gets me is whenever the blood keeps splattering into the carpet. Seeing that a child is subjected to endless torture, and the one thing that she utters while we see her go through this is “mommy”. That just broke my heart in a way that no other horror movie has. Seeing a child go through so much pain and fear, and seeing her beg for one of the few people that made her feel safe is just so utterly terrifying.
@Guess I'll Die she is seen again, we see her having her head dissapear slowly then we see the pictures of the children headless and faceless. I hate how slow this movie is and how unsatisfying the ending is
@Simon Wheeler That's the whole point, he's trapped in an endless loop. If you turn on subtitles, during that scene it specifically says, "older scream" as the blood keeps reappearing indicating that Kevin has been forever trapped in the loop. Then, to support that, earlier in the film the "prest-o-change-o" music seems to indicate a time dilation where things start over, the implication being, I think, that this monster has trapped Kevin in an endless loop of being hunted and slaughtered, but it doesn't kill him at the same time every time which is why we hear an "older" scream. So I think the takeaway is that Kevin is trapped in the dark with this monster that hunts him and feeds off the fear it generates, never killing him at the same time every time which is why, in that one instant, we hear the "older Kevin" scream, and every time he dies the whole loop starts over with his 4 year old self.
Nothing about this was scary its boring
@jaden park offend these nuts
it's offensive. the story writer is one sick...
Walking around your house in the dark as a kid is the most uncomfortable thing to do. You know it's your house, but you don't at the same time.
I don't really get scared of the dark anymore. I just remind myself of all the other things that could and have happened to me in life
Shout out to all the people who didn't feel this way because their parents kept the lights off all the time or they were always outside in the dark anyway lmao
“you’re not afraid of the dark you’re afraid of not being alone in the dark”
Even adults still feel it. Like we've all been in a dark cold room at night and thought this will be a completely different place in the morning with the sun streaming in the window.
I really felt like this was about child abuse. Dad's gone. Doors gone. Then toilets gone. But first the phone call. The head injury. Kevin keeps "hurting himself" the eye. And also how the voice is like a guardian but also a tormentor when the toilet disappeared it really solidified this in my head because of horror stories where kids are abused and kept from using facilities. And locked away for let's say....572 days.
@Knight Shane That's mommy's new boyfriend.
What about the no faces thing happening towards the end and the voices asking "what's your name"
@Mercury also, I’m sorry for what you went through brother. I wouldn’t wish abuse on my worst enemy, specially child abuse…
@Mercury I’m retired law enforcement and I can tell you it all depends on state. Here in Florida we take DV extremely serious. You make 1 single DV call and someone IS going to jail no ifs or buts about it.
the fact that you messaged the creator to ask if it was okay is so wholesome
I watched this film in a theater in my city, hosted by some horror group thing. The creator did a Q&A. There were like 5 people who asked if he was okay lmao
He had to bc if he didn't people wouldbe bitching about it.
Hes such a good dude, ive started to listen to his content whenever i work and its so wholesome
As someone who works at a movie theater, let me just say that not a single person who has seen the movie has walked out happy
@P2M not bad, just scary
That might actually be the desired effect. Lol
@Chig Bungus I haven't seen the film, but I have a feeling that it's absolute garbage. I've seen many horror films like what you're describing that have an audience for whatever reason and are very disappointing. Most people who are frightened by these types of film don't know what true horror is and are most likely to be scared by anything. Of course horror can be subjective, but when you're watching a 2 hour long movie waiting for something, anything!-to happen, it's clearly a sign that the film is a low budget cash in on hype. The director must be laughing all the way to the bank knowing he spent little on a pretentious film that offers nothing more than cheap jump scares and drawn-out scenes of inanimate objects with zero pay off. I can only imagine the director putting more effort on the film's trailer in order to intrigue and trick audiences into watching it.
@hiimdarius Right.
If that was the case, good. One of the forgotten aspects of a horror film is to feel negative, whether it be anger, sadness, doom, etc. That's what a horror film is supposed to make you sense and remember even after it is over rather than it being just a thrill ride of scares. Unless the anger is due to the film being bad, that is not good. If not, it's a job well done. Personally, I thought the film was passable but definitely needed more purpose and direction.
Reminds me of that one Jack Stauber lyric from Nurpo:
“He speaks of what adults can’t remember and children haven’t the words to describe.”
You can never really remember how terrified you were as a child sometimes. At least not truly.
This comment. Is underrated . Never thought I’d say that but DAMN
Glad I wasn’t the only one who thought of that!
I was not abused or neglected as a child and I had gruesome, horrifying nightmares (even involving family members, like in this movie). Kids have some seriously freaky dreams; I think their fear manifests way differently in their dreams than it does for adults.
Fr bro, i had three dreams and one of them cannibalistic amalgamation of flesh chasing me through my old school, causing it to go into a lockdown, and all i knew was fear. The last dream was it appearing again, this time tormenting me through my tv, and me speeding up the clock in the video,and it saying you can’t escape it, then disappearing. Leaving me and my family in fear of what will happen next.
Its so weird that our brain can do this...literally why? The only dreams I remember are nightmares of getting chased, family leaving me behind/being unresponsive, hiding, getting attacked as a child. Where did this come from..like damm.
Same here, I had horrendous night terrors as a young child especially during the winter for no reason at all
i watched skinamarink with subtitles, and i think the implication is that there are many instances of kaylee and kevin attempting to turn the lights on, but they no longer work. specifically in the kitchen at one point, you can hear the light switch clicking repeatedly, and nothing happens. i think it was the upstairs lights/staircase lights that first stopped working, which explains the flashlights.
Oh good to know! I was gonna say Wendi's comment about not reaching the light switches bothered me lmao. My 2yr old nephew knows how to reach the light switch ffs, moreso than me sometimes 😂I was babysitting him once and we were going outside and he reached to turn off the light before we went out since I had forgotten lol
Yeah even a toddler can reach a light switch so I doubt they’re too small.
I did skip ahead and with that in mind the scariest part for me was when the dad asked Kaylee to look under the bed
There's nothing worse than a parent who is both someone you love but also someone you are compelled to obey ordering you to do something frightening for seemingly no reason
This is the first horror video in a LONG time that made me actually feel tense and scared. I’m in my 20s and haven’t been this frightened by something
The whole film felt like a huge jump scare to me. I actually had to pause it and breathe for a second because my heart was beating really slow and hard almost the entire time because I was just waiting for anything.
The concept of innocent children being trapped in an infinite loop of torture because of a parent's mistake is impossibly upsetting. Even worse when you realize it can very easily be seen as a number of real life allegories.
In a way, fnaf (forever doomed to live painfully in a foreign body)
Huh sounds like real life
@The Man Of Somthing I dunnno well gee ZOINKS, Jinkies WOAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH ruff raggy very true of you
@Mr.ManMan obviously nobody has ever been abused ever for any reason, especially not young children with shitty parents that would be crazy
Would be bonkers, little bit zany.
@OLG great joke
I think this is representative of an abusive and manipulative mother. She has the dad trapped emotionally, so he nor the kids can leave. She tries to keep them loyal by telling them she and their father loves them, but in fact she takes out her anger on the kids.
In these children's minds the mother is a "monster". Kaylee doesn't want to talk about their mother and has clearly understood how horrible their mother is, while Kevin still thinks she'll stop.
My mom was abusive and all that, this movie and the feelings unlocked something DEEP within me especially when that voice showed up, this guy is amazing at creating emotion in his audience.
Reminds me of the game "Among the sleep"
Exactly what I was thinking! (though I wasn't sure what happened to the dad)
Like the idea of a monster overtaking your mother is exactly how a child would cope, instead of accepting the harsh reality that your own mother is the monster. She seems to be having a mental/psychotic/violent episode. Their are so many clues that it seems so obvious to me, but that might be projection for sure.
This film is so powerful
"She has the dad trapped emotionally" I got the vibe that the parents divorced or the dad took his own life and the mother who was already mentally unwell perpetrated abuse against the kids after the father was no longer in the picture to protect them.
29:45 I had night terrors as a kid, and they almost always involved me "waking up" from a nightmare in my room but my room felt fundamentally different and fundamentally _wrong._ That moment of thinking I'd woken up from a bad dream, thinking I was awake in my room but my room wasn't right, _that_ was the terror.
ive never had night terrors, but there was one night where i abruptly woke up during a power outage and it was terrifying. Because as soon as I woke up it was so dark, the only light coming into my room was the smallest bits of moonlight through the curtain of the window and it was so unbearably quiet without the hum of the fridge and other electronic appliances. I thought I was still dreaming because my room had never been that dark and silent before and it just didn't feel right
I had this same thing. Night after night I’d have this dream of child me finding all of the house just WRONG until I got to the basement where something horrific always happened to my family. It happened for years. To this day, I don’t leave my room at night. I especially DON’T go into the basement e v e r.
I love the way the "monster" is depicted because when I was little I wasn't scared of "boogyman" or clowns or ghosts or anything like that. But the fear was still there. Especially when I couldn't sleep.
EXACTLY, it was never really a specific or definable thing, of course things like horror media or scary imagery could give it shape every once in a while, but most of the time, it was just there, unseen but ever present and unquestionably dangerous.
There is nothing that could've broken my heart more, and yet still filled me with weird hope, than Kevin saying "Can we watch something happy?"
I grew up with a mother who had severe mental health issues + alcoholism, and the moments of "can we watch something happy" or distracting your sibling by playing with toys or even simply having your parent tell you they love you before something HORRIBLE happens hits really close to home. this movie looks fantastic and very well done.
EDIT: wanted to add a bit about the phone. a lot of times, CPS can only do so much in abuse situations. seeing the phone go from a phone to a children's toy and then back to a demon definitely shows how not only can the phone, a source of protection, can be made absolutely useless, but also can be used against you--I have no doubt that calling the police probably had severe repercussions for him.
This movie isn’t for everyone, but I found it to be the perfect visual representation for what it’s like to have a nightmare as a child. You are alone. Helpless. And it feels like you’ll never leave. It’s incredible.
@Mona Bale I remember being taught this tactic by a counselor I saw when I was a child
literally that is all it has to be thank you
The worst part is that it’s a nightmare, but we never see them wake up.
@Seth Malcolm exactly
It really encapsulates how helpless you feel as a child where you don’t understand what’s happening, you mostly “do as you’re told” even if you don’t know the person directing you, you can’t reach things and you don’t know how to use things, you don’t know the severity of situations, I mean, I think it perfectly captures it
anyone who suffers from childhood trauma will insantly understand what this movie is trying to do
Tbh, as someone with severe childhood trauma caused by my mother, I relate to the narrative of Skinamarink on a core level. My mother would scare me at night like this, try to silence my crying with threats, and prevent me from getting out through the windows or doors. I'd ask my sister to watch something happy just to escape the situation. To me, this movie makes sense a lot.
@Rick writes The last part. Its so hard to vividly re-tell how intense the abuse was. Which can be so frustrating. You are seeing it through a haze and forget a lot of details like specific insults and all...your brain is learning to forget the details fast like you are on some kind of survial mode. This can make it hard to actually get help and get taken seriously. I hated it, not being able to evoke that feeling and intensity in others so they dont take it serious enough.
I'm so sorry that happened to you. My mother too caused me so much trauma similar, even though I was molested by someone else and had some other authority figures physically hurt me, but none that even holds a candle to the trauma of my mom terrorizing me, even though nothing she did seems as 'severe' on paper because it was so mental-emotional. I hope you are well.
As someone who grew up with child abuse, this definitely invokes that feeling of fear I had. I'm actually crying a little
My very half baked theory is that maybe it's about post-partum depression and the abuse/neglect/abandonment that comes from it. Post-partum depression can be a terrifying thing, especially when psychosis is involved, and could possibly explain some things in this movie.
Anyway, I haven't even seen Skinamarink. I came to this conclusion by watching this video! Let me know what you guys think!
No
Yes!! I was thinking the same thing! Psychosis as observed by a child... :(
As soon as I finished watching this movie I immediately knew that
A. It's one of the best original concepts for a horror movie in a very long time
and B. So, so many people are going to HATE this movie and it's going to get dragged so hard online
Say what you will about Skinamarink, but it is a gosh dang MASTER CLASS in "Show Don't Tell". Just like you used to do as a kid alone at night in your dark bedroom unable to sleep, watching all the dark corners and inside your closet, you let your imagination fill in the gaps. What a genius move by a genius director! And on a budget of 15k no less!
@Adam Smasher
I genuinely hope ur doing better bro, but find better ways to cope in healthy ways :]
@Mixtape Films I was going through some bad stuff and wanted to escape through a good horror movie. I saw the preview and thought this would be a GREAT horror movie. I was angry at the world and took it out on everyone. If anyone involved is reading, I apologize.
Damn some of yall are getting too mad ab this
This movie was boring
I thought the same thing. I told my friend about it today. I told him it's really boring but really good.
any horror work that preys on our natural fear can't help but get under your skin. that's why i love analogue horror, it captures the fear of the unknown and the ordinary better than any other horror medium, and skinamarink might be the best example of this
I like to think that the entity, bored after all the torture, let him go, and the door and face at the end were partially meant to symbolize what Kevin is left with: an empty history, and a future he must walk into with nothing but the trauma and pain he experienced in that house
I figured the mom had died before the movie starts. It seemed like the dad was taking care of both kids by himself. The line 'i dont want to talk about mom' reminds me of a young kid unable to process their mother is gone
@Malory Function it also explains why the demon/entity was so interested in taking the mother's form. If she's already dead it makes sense why they would use her as a fear tactic
The dad could have been on the phone with his own parents
The idea that someone who (in their mind) loves you can still with their actions, through accident or intent, (literally in the case of this film, figuratively in real life) trap you in an endless cycle of torture is just about the only subject matter in horror that can truly frighten me.
... Oh
My interpretation of this movie is that of a mother being afflicted by post-partum depression and post-partum psychosis, slowly becoming abusive. Kevin's mind making sense of the trauma and abuse by imagining his mother as a literal monster. The windows and doors disappearing could be the mom locking the doors and windows to prevent them from escaping.
A trailer trash couple moved into the apartment beneath me for about eight months. They had two young boys and a newborn baby. They where constantly yelling, screaming at their kids, threatening to beat them, etc. Me and my neighbor reported them to CPS multiple times and nothing happened. Eventually the landlord told them they needed to move out because they had trashed the place. There where holes in the walls/doors, mountains of trash piled up everywhere, tons of bugs and roaches. I think about those three young kids all the time. Hell is real, and it's all around us. Its a place that the most vulnerable people in our world know all too well, they are trapped in it every day, and even though they live in the same physical space we do, they can't escape it.
Thank you for trying to help.
Jordan Peterson talks about Heaven and Hell and he is bang on
This was my childhood except I was an only child. Mother was mentally ill and father was a drunk. They fought daily. We had to move to new trailer parks often because my mother would get us kicked out of them from flipping out on neighbors. I went to at least 2 schools per grade until 9th grade when I was removed from school. I’m 46 now and I’m over it, but it definitely shaped the first half of my life in a really bad way. CPS intervened a few times but nothing resulted of it.
Some people don't seem to take emotional and mental abuse seriously. A lot of kids grow up in that kind of environment, surrounded by screaming and hatred all the time, and as one of those children it is so damaging. It can destroy a kid's wellbeing and traumatize them into adulthood, but the law doesn't care unless someone gets hit. Even then sometimes it still doesn't. Poor kids.
The fact that no one can help these children is going to make me cry
Edit: I am crying
@yoinky sploinky 🤝
We both cryin 😔🤝😔
I interpreted the ending of the entity showing itself as a response to Kevin asking to watch something happy, like a statement that it was feeling great joy from toying with him like this. Left a sick feeling in my gut :')
Me and my friend watched this in an old amc, we were the only ones there. After we finished the movie, we joked that we'd been transported into another dimension, but it really did kinda feel that way. Plus we live in Indiana, and so the drive home in the dark with the strange urban-suburban-country layouts definitely didn't help.
Only in Indiana💀
I feel like addiction plays some part in the sinister nature of the creature/entity. The looping being a recurring theme and addiction being a constant cycle would make sense. Maybe the mother/creature she becomes was a result of an addiction. This could easily bleed into the abusive and neglectful themes that show up as well. This film could be the result of a woman who tore her family apart and the demons she created in doing so.
This movie feels like hallucinations you would have at age 7-4 at a middle of the night. Your creativity is so high you can imagine anything and it can fear you, so you cope with the light of the television and toys. Truly a underrated masterpiece.
Scared the living hell out of me.
Felt like all of my fears combined into one in one movie.
When it’s happening to adults it’s scary. When it’s happening to kids it’s heart breaking.
Nah
@yoda apologist I have traveled for years upon years, following this reply to an opinion
But I still cannot locate who required this input to the conversation.
@yoda apologist Ok
I’m in my mid 20s and I have watched a lot of horror in the past 10-15 years. Not a lot of horror movies actually scare me at this point. But then I come across creators like Kyle and you can just tell that this is someone who is passionate about the art of movies, visual storytelling and horror. It is a rare find and I admire the work 🎉
I love the little detail with Kevin bringing his sister the juice... It just feels so authentic and absolutely like something I would've done for someone when I was little.
At one point you can hear one of them tell the other "I love you..." in a sweet little voice and that part broke me so hard.
I’ve written about this recurring nightmare that I had as a child but the windows didn’t actually disappear, I would half wake up in random trap houses with one my parents having dragged me along with them to get their fix after giving me “medicine” to make me sleep. So the windows were boarded up in said trap houses, toilets were missing, there wasn’t electricity, etc. My first memory of this was at age 4. I caught on to what was going on at age 6 and then I’d usually get left home alone with my baby brother. I made his bottles from the age of 6 so he’d stop crying and I changed his diaper, clothing and gave us a bath every few days. Sorry for over sharing
No I’m sorry, I hope you find someone or something that makes you happy you deserve it. :’)
Watching this by myself in the dark was one of the most intense, blistering horror experiences I've ever had
as a kid I used to be convinced that if I didn't hide under the covers when I went to bed, then the grim reaper or some kind of undead ghoul would come out of my closet and kill me. this is definitely reawakening that fear lol. Bravo to everyone who made this film
the grim reaper only comes for dead people, i guess young you didn't know that
@leon kennedy overheating but not daring to move an inch out of the safety of the blanket because you dont wanna get killed by the pile of clothes shaped like a Mandela Catalogue alternate
same omg. hiding under my blanket or comforter no matter how hot it got because that was the way to stay safe
In my honest opinion, feeling that you're not safe in a place where you're supposed to feel safe and secure is one of the worst feelings that you could experience. Home is a place where you're supposed to feel as if nothing can harm you, but if you do, then something is horribly- *horribly* wrong.
Me after I watch too much true crime when I’m home alone 😅
I haven’t watched the whole video yet...but I never feel safe 😅
Oh, the joys of an abusive childhood. Now that I'm in my 20s, I'm realizing how fucked up my mental (and physical) health is because of the lack of a sense of security and safety in my formative years.
I lived in one duplex and had neighbors who were obviously hiding people and it was fucking weird.
Never felt safe there.
It gets even worse when you realize that it you don’t feel safe in your own home, NOWHERE is safe
In regards to your story -- I'm a psychology major, and I was fascinated by the way you retold your story! You mentioned "Trauma" is a strong word, (and it is), and there's 2 points I wanna make in regards to that:
1. Typically nowadays when we talk about "Trauma" as a child, we don't use that word because of the weight it carries. We nowadays call it an "ACE" -- an 'Adverse Childhood Experience' -- because the word "trauma" is so often referred to with extreme abuse. Abuse=/ trauma all the time. An adverse childhood experience is, by definition, anything that's unusual in childhood that the person carries with them that alters the way they think/perceive the world around them. ACEs can be small -- like your story, for example, where the 'effect' it had on you was realizing you were vulnerable -- or they can be large, such as losing a parent early on . ACEs are not always abuse-focused (although they CAN be, any typically in those cases 'trauma' can be used). ACEs aren't always a *really bad thing*. Don't get me wrong, they CAN be, but they also could do things like make a child grow up faster than they need to. ACEs are also not always indicative of underlying mental health conditions ( -- and, for the record, neither is trauma).
I'm wondering if you're so hesitant to call it 'trauma' due to that *connotation* of the word, rather than what the word actually means in psychology. I would definitely call it an ACE, since it emotionally impacted you so hard. That experience alone doesn't make your childhood bad, doesn't make your parents bad, doesn't make you mentally ill or anything of the sort.
2. The word 'trauma's connotation is really frustrating for both therapists and researchers. We end up having therapy patients who absolutely refuse to call what they experienced 'trauma' when it undoubtedly is. This is difficult. People (ESPECIALLY grown ass adults) will be like "people nowadays are calling EVERYTHING trauma!!" without fully understanding what the field of psychology is referencing when it says the word.
Its kind of like the difference between a 'theory theory' and a 'scientific theory'. People who don't know the difference between common usage of the word and actual precise usage will think that people are simply making a mountain out of a molehill or trying to talk bad about their parents.
That's essentially *why* psychologists have to adopt this new term/new language, so that when we talk to others, we can accurately say what it means.
idk if that was helpful or at the very least interesting. Hope anybody who read learned something!
The scene with Kevin with the knife and hearing him cry made me so upset and want to go run upstairs and cuddle my baby brother who just turned 5. This movie is very effective at making you feel helpless and desperate to do something if you really let it pull you in.
when u watch the movie through the perspective of kids trapped in an abusive household with drug addicted parents it becomes more depressing that scary
@Isaiah Exile That sounds horrifying. I hope you’ve found peace.
I haven't watched the film, however after watching this video from Wendigoon I realized it seems very reminiscent of my own unique childhood. My father was terrifying, abusive, did multiple drugs, and used psychological torture to convince my mom to delete herself (she didn't btw). My memories of childhood in my house usually were during nighttime, with few lights being on, while my mom was off to work, and I was alone with my father. Whom I thought would kill me or beat me to death as he was loud and demonic from my point of view. During the night I never felt safe, being alone in my dark room I would wait from something to hurt me, and would keep my eyes open while in the darkness peeking under the door to see into the hallway. The terror from the scenes of this film, were EXACTLY how I felt 3-5 years of age. Until he mysteriously vanished from my life...
This movie reminded me of how I felt about bedtime and the dark.
When I was 8, I had a classmate who was checking out a zombie book with hyperrealistic imagery, which slowly disturbed me the more I looked at it. Eventually, I had asked this classmate to turn the cover away from me and he did, until a friend snatched it and began chasing me with it. Well, as you'd expect, I had a nightmare that night from the scary imagery, but I hallucinate in the pitch black after nightmares and this was before we had a nightlight in my brother's and I's shared room. I woke up to the pitch black in my bed, but then I saw it, slowly fading into sight, was a blurry face that the more I focused on, the more I could see the detail. It got closer, and closer. I tried waking up my little brother but he didn't budge, still very asleep. I started to hyperventilate, crying as the undead, warped face remained right infront of mine no matter where I looked. I tried calling for my mom and stepdad, but no one answered. I tried to hide my face into the pillows, something that usually worked, but I almost felt it's presence. Eventually, I fainted from fear.
Every night until I was 12 years old, I never felt safe in my room at night, I always felt watched, would always face my wall, tensed up until my entire body ached before I gotten the courage to look into my dark room, and when I recognized the light from under my bedroom door, I booked it out and would hide in the bathroom for hours. At 12 years old, my bio father gave us a night light (Because our mom and stepdad refused to get one) and I hadn't had an issue since.
Just a personal point: the way the mother talks about how she loves them is exactly the tone my father had when he said goodbye before he, uh, Skinamarinked himself. Very eerie
@S. Quinn that’s great you’re doing ok, and thank you :)
@Nightlight Having your brain stuck on those thoughts sucks, but remember that while you can't control what your brain does, you can control what *you* do. Having a song stuck in your head doesn't mean you want to listen to it. Same with this. You're doing a great job distracting from it, and you can get past it. If you can, get some help. If you can power through it for a while as your hormones settle, and it's still around, definitely get help. You can do this. *neck-snapping lack of segue* My day sucked, but I am watching KZclip now, and am in a decent mood again. Thank you for asking!
it also sounds like what my parents would say to me after they had hurt me somehow. like they would let a while pass and ignore it happened and just ask for a hug. no apology, just “love“.
I’m genuinely sorry you lived this experience. My heart is with you
@Nightlight we want you in this world, little dude. I know it seems hopeless, but your life is so important and your adulthood is literally up to you- you can create a life completely different than your life now. I suffered from deep depression at your age and I am so glad that I stuck around because now I’m happy and I didn’t put my family through a lifetime of pain and grief. Hang in there, please, kiddo.
Just want to say how glad I am how you laid out what happened in clear detail, because it felt a lot more cohesive than when I watched it last night! The experience of watching was like meditating in a nightmare, just transfixed by this pure dread I felt for nearly two hours with purposefully-confusing camera angles and noises. What an effective film.
Oh man I've totally had that "shadow in the corner of the room" moment when I was a kid. I woke up one night and in my closet (which had no door) was a pair of glowing green eyes and what appeared to be teeth. I froze. I couldn't tell if it was blinking or not because the glow wasn't that bright it was feint but definitely green. Eventually I worked up the courage to turn a light on and its was my Monster Face toy. Known to the generation after me as the Goosebumps Monster Head Maker I just found out.
I grew up in a extremely broken home with my sister thats a few year older than me, this captured the horror and trauma of neglect and being forgotten. I cannot tell you how much this movie put me back into my past. This movie was literally my childhood
I went through alot of abuse as a child and this movie reminded me SO much of it. They did an amazing job with portraying it in this manner.
Your analysis is Dead On. While I watched, I felt exactly the way I did after my parents would beat me up. And frankly, I needed this film. I needed to see my child’s eye perspective of what kept happening, and how I knew that no one would help me and that I was trapped in the house with the danger. Much respect to this film maker.
I think the mom is alive in the beginning, tells the son that "she loves him very much" and then hangs herself in the closet. The bones breaking sound is her neck snapping. That's why the boy is seen looking up, that's why the toys float up, there's so many shots of the ceiling.
After a parents suicide, the remaining spouse will fall into a deep depression and the children suffer so much, especially if there is no outside help. I think this film is about not being able to escape the feeling of hopelessness (the doors disappear, the phone turns into a toy) after suffering a huge trauma as a child. The "demon" is a manifestation of all of that.
The kids stay up late because the father has lost control, they're neglected, toys are everywhere, the demon tells the kids to do horrible things (some kids blame themselves) and the kids say "where's dad? maybe he went with mom" alluding that the dad might have killed himself too and left them all alone.
Neglect definitely felt like a core theme
@SeaFR I mean I get the need for a quick scare or an easy narrative but (to me) stories can’t be anything more than good while handing itself to you on a silver platter
Like eventually you’ve gotta want something a little more, something that makes you think, right? Especially with something as bizarre and artsy as this film
Even if you don’t you should still at least appreciate the effort that goes into stories grander than simple ghosts murdering people
I hope this doesn’t come off as a “holier than thou” thing because I don’t think that at all I’m just trying to express the wonders of multilevel narratives
this is such a solid interpretation. do you think the dad killed himself then, and that’s why the kid doesn’t really get a happy ending?
holy shit i think ur on to something here that makes a lot more sense
isnt this Matthew's theory?
Usually I don't like horror that targets children, for it always seems needlessly cruel and exploitive, but when it's done with the intention of showing fear and terror that only the perspective of someone so young, innocent, and ignorant can have, that's when it works better.
As a kid some nights I'd hear some noise in the house and just, freeze, as if any sound or movement would alert it to my presence and that'd be the end of me. I couldn't tell you what that "it" was, I just knew my life depended on it not finding me.
Watching this movie put me back in that headspace. I was frozen the entire time.
As a kid who had ... To put it simply, a short childhood .. This movie just- .. Hits something in my brain. I would wake up to a quiet and lonely house more often than not, as both my parents had to work for us to be able to live. Even during the daytime it was always so .. Eerie. Obviously after a while I got used to it .. But the feeling never fully went away. This only got worse when my parents split up and my little brother and I constantly juggled between houses.
This movie manages to tap into the anxiety of a child by themselves, even if they have a sibling there. It reminds me of the feeling when your parent takes longer to come home than usual and you're just .. Sitting there, wondering if when you told them "I love you" when they left for work is the last words you ever told them.
Safe to say, this movie fucked me up, and I'm going to rewatch it in the near future
I actually just watched this today. It brings me back to being afraid of everything in my room at night. My family believes in the paranormal, so I constantly thought there were shadow people/shadow creatures everywhere. This brings me back to that in the most intense way.
The other thing that gets me is the toy phone. The clip shown at 24:40 is... unnerving. Especially because the smile reminds me of the nightmare clown sequence from Brave Little Toaster. It feels so... oddly visceral. It was the only clip to actually scare me in the movie, and only cos it was so loud.
Anyways. This was a really awesome movie, I'm def gonna watch it again.
As a kid, I had a repeating nightmare that struck several times over years and each time it was the most paralyzing terror ever, I was actually paralyzed in fear only seeing the monster in pitch dark, in my own house. So I had this nightmare again and again, until one time I was telling myself in the dream I had to do something, I couldn’t just be stuck in fear anymore. And from there it actually turned into a sequence of me in my kitchen actually getting up and defeating the monster, it’s still dark but now rather than pitch black there’s flashing lights and effects, like a tv show or game. Since then, I have never had that nightmare again.
This just made me think of that.
I’ve never been in a theater so dead silent as when I saw this film. The tension was insane, I felt like everyone in the room was holding their breath
@M. Leenetta I think the low quality feel is what they're going for
If you like that first person view ‘stuff’ watch the movie Enter The Void.. I highly recommend that! 😉
@LoyalLackey what a giga Chad of a woman 💀
Ppl in the theatre I watched in walked out bc this shit was so boring
I gotta say, this movie evokes a terror in me that I’ve only ever felt while trapped in a house with my raging abusive mother, being unable to call my father for help because my mother had my cellphone and she could pick up the landline if I tried to call from that. I’m amazed that a film can evoke such a feeling, and while (as a fan of horror and experimental films) I love this movie, I can safely say that I never want to watch it ever again
Edit: I’m writing this comment before watching the analysis or reading through the comments section.
While I can’t personally remember any actual childhood experiences like the one Wendigoon describes, I remember having vivid nightmares about being trapped in my elementary school after dark, or waking up in the same room I fell asleep in and everything being “different” in a way I couldn’t adequately describe and feeling terrified by that unfamiliarity. I think that’s the reason liminal spaces are so appealing to me now. It’s like I have a desire in my adulthood to “investigate” those nightmare spaces that scared me as a child, and see what’s really lurking there.
Dialogue in this movie worked so well, tension had me on the edge of my seat. The final reveal of the face-like shape in the dark, felt in part so uncanny, because it was the first fully shown face in the entire movie.
My biological mom is bipolar, and also has struggled with drug use. I don’t see her very often, maybe once a year, but we do have contact with each other. A lot of this film really spoke to me, both in that regard and as someone who suffers from paranoia and delusions and has grown up dealing with a lot of untreated issues. One second a parent is loving and affectionate, the next they’re angry, vindictive, manipulative and, to put it simply, a monster. It’s confusing and terrifying and it’s not uncommon to feel “trapped”- especially when you still love the person, but the relationship is hurting you and you know that but don’t want to make things worse by trying to do something. It’s even worse when you’re younger. You don’t have the life experience to understand abusive behavior. So many kids have it pushed on them that they don’t get to have boundaries, and you’re told that adults are right and you are wrong, so you just bite your tongue and go along with it because you think it’s just “tough love” or that you don’t have another choice. I adore liminal, disturbing, obscure and experimental horror, especially when its done right and delivers a message, and I think this movie did it quite well.
I have to say, as a CSA survivor, this film perfectly describes how it feels; like you’re stuck in an unclean, twisted version of what childhood should be and even when you’re an adult, you’re somehow still there
I like the scene where the father tells his daughter to look under the bed. The cliche is checking under your bed for monsters, right? There's nothing there, but when she comes back up, her father is gone and her mother is there. Her mother is the monster and it doesnt even have to hide under the bed anymore.
It reminded me of a parent telling they're child to look away or keep their head down before something scary happens.
@Noot Noot maybe not super toxic, but more toxic than it needed to be. Thank you, though.
@Adam Smasher no harm no foul man, wasn't like it was super toxic or anything!
@julie snoot I sometimes write things and realize I'm being rude later. I sort of apologized in a later message, but I was rude. It's a character flaw.
@Adam Smasher i'm all for discussing people's interpretations of media but why do you have to be so condescending and rude about it? i'm sure the original commenter would probably be more willing to listen to your points if you weren't being so rude about it for no reason
The general vibe and atmosphere of this film reminds me of the feeling that I used to get as a child waking up from a specific recurring nightmare. In the nightmare, I would be suspended in a vast, celestial black void. All alone in the abyss, I would have the sudden sensation of being crushed by some kind of unfathomable, monstrous machinery of death. Upon awakening in a cold sweat, the silence of my room would be deafening. I would be overcome with an intense feeling of dread, paranoia and danger. I remember feeling as though the walls of my bedroom became embodied with the hateful, predatory gaze of some kind of unforeseen malevolent force. These sensations would often last for about 10-15 minutes before which time I would gather the courage to return to my bedroom after seeking the comfort of my parents. Somehow, this film managed to mimic EXACTLY how I felt awakening from those recurring nightmares as an 8 year old. An absolute modern masterpiece!
I love with this movie there are so many theories and all of them can equally be true. Art is subjective so everyone can come to their own conclusions. For me personally, I came from a home with an abusive father, I see this as an abusive mother situation. The loss of exits, multiple times the voice telling the kids to do things(the mother), them not following, and them getting harshly punished, even the mother being loving to try and make up for what she did. The toys being taken away, people being changed from the abuse, and even the house is completely different as things get worse. The children see their mother as a monster.
my story is long but holy shit I had such an INCREDIBLY similar experience to your story at 26:47 that hearing yours freaked me out that someone else went through it. This was a shared experience between me, my older sister, and my younger brother.
We were probably 6-7, 8-9, and 9-10 years old playing hide and seek (just us three or us and our parents I don't quite remember) in our house and we were in our spots. I'm not clear on which parent was supposed to find us, but all I remember is that we hid for long enough that it became worrying that it was taking them so long, because for an adult, finding three children hiding in a house isn't hard to do. We knew that much.
I remember leaving my spot and going to the living room with my siblings, but I'm not sure if we decided together that we would do that. Regardless, the house just suddenly felt off. It was like gravity shifted, that's how strange it felt. I remember the way I saw my house was like if you desaturated an image, made it kind of black and white but still able to see color; that's how I experienced the unfamiliarity of it all. It was scarily quiet as well.
Collectively, we knew, and I don't know how because I don't remember of us asking about it before we came to this realization, that our parents just...vanished. Being around them for so long, we knew the 'someone's behind me and staring at me' gut feeling when we knew our parents were in the house, and could come into wherever we were at any given moment. But this time, that feeling was completely nonexistent. We didn't even have to tell each other, we just understood that due to the lack of noise and feeling of their presences, mom and dad aren't here and started looking. I don't remember feeling scared because I thought they decided to prank us and hide us, to make look for I don't remember my siblings being scared either, so they possibly thought the same.
But when we searched the house, yelling for them, we met back up with no luck. we started freaking out. We cried, we checked again, again, and again. Still no luck. We looked through the windows if they were outside, and they were not.
We decided that we'd go to our neighbor's house, so we did. We didn't even get shoes, just bolted outside and next door. The three of us knocked on their door and told them "we don't know where our parents are, can you call them?"
And then suddenly, out of absolutely nowhere, they call for us. They're outside in our driveway, walking towards us. Gravity returns, color is restored to its natural vibrancy, and nature sounds start up again. To me, that was how I experienced normalcy returning. When my parents were around, it was livelier, normal again.
Here's the thing though.
If they went outside, they would have told us, but they didn't say anything about leaving the game. If they weren't even playing with us, they would have still said something, but they didn't. No matter where they were, they would have heard us and responded, but they didn't.
No matter what, they would have announced their exit or answered our calls, but never did.
We asked them about this a few years ago and got an answer that made sense, so we know it was real and not a dream or just children not realizing something super slight had happened, like maybe mom and dad went to the bathrooms at the same time because we had two on that floor.
I asked my siblings for more details on what I am unsure of, so I'll edit this when I get them.
This movie reminded me of the fears of my childhood I had completely forgot about. Like evil sorts of fears. Waking up in the middle of the night, the house being off, everything being wrong, your parents being gone sort of fears. It’s the fear of darkness. I can see why it’s so divisive since I think people get that or they don’t. For me it reminded me of something so ancient, primal and evil that I really shook me. It momentarily gave me back the fear of the dark, years after I completely stopped experiencing it.
I think it’s good to mention that the melody that plays when the toys and blood disappears is the same melody on the tv where the bunny phases out of reality
An interesting detail is when Kevin tries to call the police, but the monster turns it into a play telephone. It’s very reminiscent of being in an abusive household and being silenced by new, shiny things.
@Colby it makes sense when you consider that skinimarink is based on a short film the creator also made called "heck" and in it, the kid main character straight up says "I'm sorry I got cancer" and the kid is trying to take care of himself with a seemingly absent parent.
The description of that scene reminded me of when I'd call crisis lines as a child mid-panic attack during my mom's "episodes", they'd say they were sending help, and they'd call our local police, only for an officer to show up and lecture my sister and me for making things hard on my parents, telling us in all their years of small-town cop experience they knew no parents hated their kids no matter what they said or did, and that my mom was allowed to use up to lethal force on us to make us obey her (completely ignoring that this had all been started by my mom screaming at my little sister for something she didn't even do and slapping her across the face) everyone that showed up to "help" similarly excused the abuse and shamed the victims, but that one was the worst. I've never trusted cops or child welfare since then
It made me think of how easy it can be to trivialize a child's complaints about abuse and get away with it.
@alex Barbosa it's very possible the demon could represent an abusive parent. Especially with the fact it came from their mom, and got rid of their dad
This movie hits completely different when you grew up in not just an abusive household, but a spiritually abusive one at that. Growing up with occult-like themes and being conditioned to think demonic beings are all around you, this movie invoked a completely different kind of terror in me and brought me back to when I was a child, only the nightmares were real. Absolutely terrifying from the deepest parts of my subconscious.
Seeing this in the perspective of innocent helpless children who dont fully understand and can't grasp the severity of what situation they are in. It really gives me a terrible feeling in my stomach. I felt absolutely helpless watching it
Your story about being left alone as a kid made me remember when something similar happened to me. I was about 6 or 7 and my Mom had taken my brother to his dance class and my Dad had gone to work. It was morning and the sun was out so it was less terrifying in that regard, but it was still just me and our dog in a silent, empty house with no explanation. I actually remember putting on Cartoon Network to try and make myself feel better, kinda like the kids in the movie. Of course, my Mom and brother came home fairly soon and she felt terrible about it, but this movie makes me think back on that and imagine if they didn't and things only got worse and worse.
I just love Wendigoom so frikking move. So solid. So concise. So genuine. We need more of him!!!
this was the first time I wanted to cover my eyes watching a horror movie. I felt like this movie toyed with me the same way it toyed with Kevin and the more I found about this movie, the worse and more terrifying it became. It's not like other horror movies that have action and suspense, this one is quiet and it gets you out of nowhere.
It seems like it is an allegory for abuse. The time loop might represent how it repeats daily to the point of feeling trapped forever. The change from "close your eyes" to the mom not having a name seems to be the first steps into abusive behavior that then escalate to the point of not recognizing the person as mom anymore. If the parents are getting a divorce, it might be that the mom is punishing the children for reminding her of the father. Which would explain why its only started happening after that. The legos on the ceiling probably represents happy times moving further out of reach as further emphasized by the long stretching hallway.
Seems the most likely, although I don't think the mother is punishing them due to the devorse. Rather, I think the parents are still together, but the dad just can't or will not stop the mother, which is why the kids can't find him during the events (also puts some perspective on the phone call, the injury being described vaguely and kinda downplayed). Then the mom being gone and the demon being there would moreso be the kids not being able/willing to recognise the mother as their mother when she's abusing them. Which makes sense because the boy seems to still have a possitive view of their mom, while the sister, who is older, seems to realise that her mom is doing or has done something bad.
I personally think that maybe the parents had a divorce or issues and the mother decided to let or welcome an entity in the house (scene after she's on the bed, you here bones crunching and the hand on the door and screams of the mum), the entity taking the form of the mum, who we see sat in front of the TV and asking to play with the children.
Or the father is punishing the children for the mother leaving.
the showage of her going into the closet and changing into a monster makes me think it might be an allegory for substance abuse
and you know the part near the end where there's the figure on the bed slowly disappearing? that could be a metaphor for how she's losing parts of herself and disappearing from.. everything. the fact her back is almost always turned could be symbolising how she's turned her back on her children? refusing to see them as who they actually are?
There’s a lot interesting theories going around about this movie, but I’m wondering if Kevin’s fall down the stairs is the catalyst for this whole nightmare. I’m sure the theories of abuse and the parents (or one of them) “skinamarink”ing themselves fit in too, but after seeing the pieces of text like “572 days” and “mommy” as and endless loop happens COULD just be supernatural, OR Kevin could be stuck in a coma from his fall. Brain activity during comas is very interesting in how a lot of the censoring that your brain does normally turns off. Along with all the instinctive fears children have (such as fears of the dark, fears of death, etc.), any traumatic experiences Kevin might have had prior to his fall would definitely be uncensored and coming at him in the wildest ways imaginable if he was stuck in a coma. But that’s just my thoughts
Being in a coma would explain why voices say things that don't relate to anything, and how partially open eyes would see only blurred facial features.
When I was a kid, I always had to watch a happy movie after a scary one. This movie took me back to that time and that line at the end really made me realize that it was meant to.
This reminds me of so many nightmares I had as a kid and I just wanted to see what it all was about but I also found myself actively turning my phone away from me because I didn't want to see any of the potential scary stuff 😂 I'm just a wuss, I guess.
(Tw // speaking about childhood stuff)
This film really resonated with me. The way it showed a “child like” pov just reminds me so much of the past. The tv on and Kaylee staying near Kevin reminds me of when me and my brother would stay up past our bedtime and watch adult swim. We used it as background noise to block out our parents yelling at each other or the sound of them throwing things. Adult swim was scary to me but it wasn’t as scary as dad or the way mom yelled. I didn’t realize it but my brother hated adult swim as much as I did, he only put it on so I wouldn’t have to entirely hear my parents. Kevin trying to take care of his sister reminded me of my older brother and everything he did to shield me from hearing my parents or being hurt by my dad.
It’s really the first horror movie to genuinely instill fear in me in a very long time
This movie is such an accurate representation of what a child's fear feels like, we as adults can't really comprehend it anymore. We hear a strange noise and we fear an intruder, a 10 year old hears a strange noise and he fears the monster, but a 5 year old, a 5 year old fears that which he can't comprehend what it is, he fears the darkness despite not knowing what could be lurking within it. We all fear the unknown, but as we grow up, that which is unknown grows smaller and smaller. Idk, I really like it
@v at age 6 I was born without a face
At 5 I already could comprehend what I was afraid of(supernatural entities aka demons and grown-ups themselves). But I grew up in a very abusive household though.
I think we all have one nightmare that stays with us from when we're little kids. I still remember mine so clearly, even though I never remember any other dreams. I remember walking downstairs from my room when I was really young, and my family was sitting down in the living room talking, but as soon as I got down far enough to see them, they all went quiet and turned to look at me at the same time. They were all these nasty looking greenish skinned imposters of my family, it was fucking horrifying.
Then, as if one of those dreams wasn't enough, I had a second one too. I was with my dad in the back seat of his truck, sitting in some grocery store parking lot, and we were talking to each other, everything was fine, but then he just went quiet. I called for him, and then that green imposter asshole just whipped around the seat and stared at me again.
I was only like 6 or 7 when I had these dreams, and it never happened again. I'm 31 now, and I remember every detail of those things, they were so creepy. They looked like decomposing zombie type things wearing these dirty fake wigs and clothes, trying to make themselves look like my parents.
I'd argue the unknown grows larger as we grow up, so much larger, even despite all we learn. I don't disagree with the rest though, I think you're right. I just think it's even more disturbing that we learn so much growing up, yet we also learn that the more we learn, the more we learn exactly how much we don't know about everything. It's hard to put into words, but when we're kids, the scope of everything is so much smaller, the universe seems so much smaller, so a lot of the unknown doesn't even bother us. Then we grow up and realize just how impossibly massive everything really is, and how little human beings actually know.
Duuude this one messed me up 😅. As a parent watching this is so terrifying. It really hits on how permeable minds are at that young of an age, especially when being instructed or influenced by those around you that you're supposed to trust (like your parents). What hit me so hard was hearing your theory of it being the mom possessed and the demon using her as a tool to get the kids to do its bidding. Makes the knife scene make so much more sense and all the more terrifying. It's the very real horror of a parents influence over their small children and the power and danger that can come with that.
It was pretty obvious to me this is a metaphor for the psychological trauma and pain the children are feeling after their parents get divorced.
They blame their mother for the divorce as she is the one who informed them of it.
The children now live with their Dad and that’s why he calls her to let her know about Kevin’s fall.
The whole movie is about the dissolving of a family and the house they grew up in becoming a scary, unpredictable place.
In the weakest metaphor of the film, the children’s world is literally turning upside down.
The unsafe element introduced to the home is the divorce. Where once having their mom in the house was expected, now that she’s moved out the children would be surprised if she were to suddenly be home.
They are helpless to stop the divorce of fix their parent’s relationship or make things go back to the way they were.
I think this could be an allegory for addiction and how it can tear a family apart through the lens of paranormal powers and childhood trauma.
since this movie is taking place in 1995, that brings up memories for me, as i was only 8.
the movie took me back to when i had trouble sleeping a lot as a kid. i would wake up in the middle of the night, fearful of the dark, the unknown. it didn’t matter that there was a night light in my room. i felt incredibly alone, and unsafe, even though my parents were sleeping in the next room.
I was never in an abusive household, I love my parents a lot but for some reason I really connect to this pure fear. That pure terror of a child of being trapped and I wonder if it has anything to do with my disability or my other abusive relationship. I think it’s cause my safest place in my life if my room. My room in my house is my comfort place. The idea of being stuck in it without seeing the outside without my family strikes a deep sense of dread in my heart. I remember staring down the stairs of my room at night unable to get my parents because the darkness itself terrified me so I would just cry. Idk what I’m saying anymore but this film just really hit me
I think that 'Can we watch something happy' is simply just a statement of someone reaching their limit. And that's the only way they can express it. They're done; exhausted and giving up.
It's relatable.
My brother and I retreated into videogames with the same kind of conclusion.
Now it's so hard to imagine being able to actually fixing things, just retreat to the one place where we actually have control.
Yeah that part was so visceral and transports you to a moment when as a child you thought the same thing
Whenever I saw that scene it made me really sad. He was just so done with everything around him and he was just looking for a small amount of comfort in his horrible circumstance.
Yeah, I mean he's spent like 1/6 of his whole life in hell. Now he's been caught and fighting for so long, he's just given up.
I had reoccurring dreams/nightmares in one of the houses I grew up in. My dream would consist of me “waking up” and being all alone in the house with none of the lights working, and my voice being basically non existent. I remember calling out for my mom and nothing coming out. Would leave me absolutely terrified and I’d have to sleep with a nightlight until middle school. Even at 28 years old, I still get uneasy in the dark. Funnily enough, I’m more creeped out of being alone in a dark building than alone in the dark woods.
this reminds me of a ceiling fear I had when I was between 5-7 years old when I woke one night and see my mother sitting on the bed giving me her back and this terrifying idea paralyzed me for the first time in my life "what if I called her and she turned her head to me and her face is faceless?!!" then I always had this kind of fear when I was a child, weirdly enough it was always with my mother or grandmother, and those two were the most kind loving people I ever had.
maybe it's just a childish fear of losing them or Separation anxiety especially it was at the age I started to go to school?
As a survivor of child abuse this movie is spot on for the fear you feel in that situation. I don't think thats necessarily the answer to "whats the movie about." but its just so accurate.
You telling the story of being a lil' guy and feeling fear for the first time, makes me think of one of your bigger interests growing up, and the direction of your channel in general. Ever since that overwhelming feeling as a kid, it would seem you have actively pursued finding that feeling again. Through your interest in the horror genre in general.. (while admittedly well balanced in my opinion with your faith) I can't help but be reminded of how addicts do something very similar. Less the healthy balance of a higher power, where you found a fun/exciting way to express your interests, they tend to chase that overwhelming feeling long enough that often times it results in the detriment of their own lives.. Obviously in no way am I comparing you to a drug addict, it's just incredibly interesting to me.. How the mind can work so similarly in people who, at the same time, can be so different from one another all seeking the same kind of feelings.
Your channel is definitely something special brother! A rare gem that accurately depicts slight details and feelings throughout some horrific stories, but told through a heart full of Love and the kind nature of a genuine person. I think I can speak for all of your followers when I say Thank You! I look forward to every time I open KZclip and my dude has created another banger for us to enjoy!!!
i’m an absolute horror junkie and nothing turns me away, but this film genuinely disturbed me. the way it perfectly conveys child abuse and childhood trauma and the feeling of being alone and trapped without actually showing it outright scares me shitless. this movie is INCREDIBLE
As an abuse survivor, the doors and windows disappearing feels very similar to how you can't just leave an abusive household. As a kid, it was terrifying knowing that my dad would hurt my mom and I if we tried to leave the house. I don't think I could handle watching the movie, but everything I heard about it in this video resonated so much. It sounds like this movie potrayed childhood fear perfectly
@hmmmblyat 👀
There are so many layers of horror to this movie. And to life unfortunately
Pizza
I mean, all those thoughts about the theme and connections to ur life kind of go out the window watching it. had me tense the whole way through the film.
Bro.. I understand that as well. Being hit by my dad while my mom and brother were gone was so.. surreal. What was I supposed to do? run away? tell mommy? I don't even know her phone number! Daddy probably just hates me. It's all my fault. It goes on and on and on. I'm fortunate to have an amazing relationship with my father now. But, still... Not everyone can say that.
Dude. You totally captured my childhood fears. My nightmares were (and sometimes still are) about being left alone. They often had a "back rooms" aesthetic atmosphere. I would be spending time with my siblings and parents; but suddenly, they would all disappear. I would be left in a hotel pool, an office building, a cove, or my house. I would be in the dark, and it terrified me.
I am a very sociable person, and being isolated in a dark place suddenly makes me feel vulnerable...
I haven't actually seen this movie but it looks really interesting and definitely something different to a lot of other horror films 🙂 I might definitely check it out 😍🥰
When you talked about the memory that came back to you about your childhood, a memory came back to me about my childhood that kind of evoked the same message of a child feeling vulnerable in a place they shouldn't. I am only 18 years old, so my memory feels a bit more recent, but I am guessing that I was around 7-9 when I had my small moment of terror. Thinking back on it, the situation itself was not scary, and I even joke about it with my family to this day, but the emotions I felt were extremely similar to the way this film made me feel (I did not watch the movie because I am too scared to lmao but just from the scenes you showed I still got those feelings) which was extreme helplessness and confusion.
So, I was at my family's lake house during the summer for a weekend get-away, and I had gone there several times throughout my life (we usually go there several weekends each summer), so I was fairly familiar with the house and all of its rooms. One night I fell asleep in the room where I usually sleep at the lake house which was the kids room. It had two bunk beds (which would allow me, my two brothers, and one of my cousins to sleep in) and one small bed for my youngest cousin to sleep in. In the middle of the night after I had gone to sleep, I woke up for no reason at all: the room was pitch black, the weather was clear outside, and there were no sounds coming from inside the house either. For some reason I felt compelled to leave my room, which, to this day, I still cannot remember the reason I decided to get up instead of trying to go back to sleep. When I got up to leave the room, I could not see anything due to the darkness. After I finally found a door knob, I twisted it and pulled open the door, only to run into a wall that was right behind it. I had actually gone into the closet, thinking it was the exit to my room. What's more, I actually thought I was in my house back home which was the reason for this confusion. I had not figured this out after walking into the closet, so I panicked and tried to find the exit to the room I was in. Once I found the real exit, I stepped out into a hallway that was not familiar to me because, again, I thought I was in my house back home. Down the hallway to my right, I saw a window and the light from the moon outside poured through it. Unfortunately for me, I was still too scared to make any rational connections about what was going on around me, so my only thought was panic as there was no window at the end of my hallway back home. At this point I ran to the other end of the hallway to find what I thought was my mother's room, but it was in a slightly different position. However, I didn't question it from all of the changes I had encountered so far; my main goal at this point was to find my mom so I could feel protected from this real-life nightmare. As I ran into what I thought was my mom's room, I called her name and shook the lump in the bed that I thought was her body. My oldest brother sat up half-awake, and this incredibly startled me because the person in that bed was in fact not my mom. I then ran back into the hallway and plopped down right in front of the door to the children's room I had originally been sleeping in. Out of sheer confusion and helplessness, I pulled my knees to my chest and started bawling into my forearms. Soon after, my older brother came out of the room I thought was my mother's to see why I was acting so restlessly, and my mom came out of the room to the left of the kid's room that I was sitting in front of because she heard me crying as well. As soon as I saw her exit her designated room at our lake house I realized where I was and burst into more tears, only this time of relief. Right after I explained what had happened, she told me that it was okay then sent me back to bed. I fell asleep very quickly after that due to the exhaustion that the stressful moment had caused me. In the morning my mom, my older brother, and I explained to the rest of my family what had happened the night prior in a light and joking way.
I have never taken the chance to really think about why I was so scared and why I was so unaware of my surroundings until seeing this video. This was a very refreshing moment for me to experience so thank you for that. Also, this is my first time coming across your channel; this video is great, and I cannot wait to watch more from you!
(Last thing, if anyone was interested on the layout of the lake house in comparison to my actual home I will describe it right here because I feel like the way I told the story may have gotten confusing at times.
Okay so, my house has a long hallway upstairs, and that is where I thought I was in my lake house. When I exit my room, to the very left of me is a hallway closet door. In front of me is my younger brother's room. Slightly to the right and in front of me are the stairs to the main floor of the house. To the right of me there are three more rooms. If I step out of my room to the right and face straightforwardly to the end of the hallway, my parents room would be right in front of me. To the right of my room is a closet, and on the other side of the closet is my older brother's room. Across from my older brother's room is the bathroom. Just to tie things together, to the right of my older brother's room is my parents room, and to the left of the bathroom is the stairwell to the main floor of the house.
My lake house layout is quite different: I am still confused as to how I got the two hallways so mixed up. Okay, so, I am exiting the kid's room and in front of me is the wall on the other side of the hallway. If I look to my right, there is a door with a window on it at the very end of the hallway. If I were to be facing that door, having just exited the kid's room, the door to the kitchen and living area would be slightly in front of the door with the window on it, and to the left. From this perspective, my mom's room at the lake house would be across from the door to the kitchen, so to my right and slightly in front of the door with the window on it. Back to the perspective of being in the doorway, about to exit the kid's room, to my left there is a bathroom at the very end of the hallway. Slightly in front of and to the left of that bathroom is my aunt and uncle's room. However, on the night of my confusion my older brother was sleeping in there because he had outgrown the kid's beds and my aunt and uncle were not at the lake house that night. All right, well, that is all I have to say. I seriously doubt anyone will see this, and if they do, there is no way anyone will read all the way through. If you did though, thank you lots :))) .)