02x05 - Chilling Children

[bunniefuu]

male narrator: Thinking
about having children?

- Aah!
- [screams]

narrator: You might wanna
watch this first...

[crowd screaming]

The girls hate Carrie
because she's different.

[dramatic musical sting]

She is the hero
wronged by society.

[scary music]

And, society,
this is what you get.

♪♪

Bring them back here.
Right here to me!

♪♪

You say a child
is a bad seed...

Everyone knows what you mean.

Something that's supposed
to be so innocent

becoming so evil.

[screaming]

And now it's something
that can harm you.

You don't know what's going
on inside that kid.

Leave us alone.

Maybe they're just being
a weird kid,

or maybe you're about to die.

"Children of the Corn" is,
like,

the ultimate creepy kid flick.

We want to give you peace.

You're just like,
"Oh, these kids are (bleep)."

[laughs]

What could be
more frightening

than your child gone wrong?

[screams]

People without children don't
realize how lucky they are.

[screams]

[eerie music]

♪♪

[screams]

narrator: The chilling
children of horror

come in many forms.

Help me.

narrator: Some are born with
the seeds of evil

lurking inside them.

[screams]

narrator: A few are good kids
possessed by evil entities.

And I'm the devil.

narrator: And then
there's Carrie,

a good girl who does
some very bad things.

Based on Stephen King's
terrifying debut novel,

"Carrie" begins
with blood and trauma.

Sissy Spacek plays a teenage
girl so sheltered and naive,

that when she has
her first menstruation

in a high school shower,
she thinks she's dying.

Help me!
Help me!

Have a tampon.

narrator: And her classmates
brutally shame her for it.

Hey, Norma,
Carrie's on her period.

I don't even think we're
thinking about what happeed,

or what's wrong with her;

we're just dis...
just repelled by her.

It's really about
how mean kids can be,

and if you're different,
we're gonna t*rture you.

You know?
And you will pay for it.

girls: Put it on, put it on,
put it on, put it on!

narrator: The traumatic
passage into womanhood

awakens Carrie's
latent psychic powers.

[horrific musical sting]

[lightbulb shatters]

Carrie's tormenters are
punished for their cruelty.

Bad girl Chris
is out for revenge,

while good girl Sue
wants to atone for her sin.

She persuades her boyfriend to
ask Carrie to the senior prom.

If you don't have a date
to the prom next Friday,

would you like to go with me?

♪♪

I always saw him
as conflicted,

but always very virtuous,
wanting to do the right thing.

I've been invited
to the prom.

Prom?

narrator: The abuse
Carrie suffers at school

pales next to what she endures

from her hyper-religious
mother.

[screams]

It's extraordinary to me that
people were frightened by me

because it was such a... it was
like a vacation for me,

and I hadn't laughed that much
in a long time at myself.

The boys.
Yes, the boys.

[tense music]

After the blood come the boys
like sniffing dogs.

Really, you have in Margaret
White someone who is terrified

that the world is going to

tear her daughter apart,

and almost preemptively,
she starts to tear her apart

before the world
gets a chance to do it.

Mama, I'll get them.
Please sit and talk to me!

[scary music]

[thunder cracks]

I'm going, Mama.

narrator: Carrie's prom shows
director Brian De Palma

at his best,

balancing technical
virtuosity

with strong
emotional storytelling.

The prom scene took
two to three weeks to sh**t.

It was the longest sequence
in the film.

It was the big set piece,
of course.

Nobody I've worked with has
done as many takes as Brian.

That prom scene is just
really muscular filmmaking.

Like, just what he's doing
with the camera

is so exciting.

Why am I here with you?

[laughs]

Because I asked you.

You know,
even when they're dancing,

and the camera's
revolving around them,

and it just starts spinning
out of control,

it shouldn't work,
and it's... it's really uncanny.

Carrie, we're here.

She's, you know, been
cocooned for her whole life

with this oppressive
religious mother,

and then finally
she gets a chance

to emerge
as this beautiful butterfly.

[laughter]

You really begin to feel
this sense of hope.

[dramatic musical sting]

And then what happens
after that

is just tragic.

Can I have your ballot,
please?

narrator: Carrie's enemies
rig the ballots

so she becomes prom queen,

and so they can spring
a terrible trap.

I think everyone always
responds to that movie,

where, like,

"We just want it to turn out
differently this time."

♪♪

She's happy; you know, she's
just happy for the first time,

and we're so happy to see that

and dreading what
we know is coming,

and then it all explodes.

♪♪

[gasps]

Drenched in blood,
Carrie snaps,

and her psychic powers erupt.

♪♪

Sissy Spacek's eyes...
she's covered in blood,

but her eyes
are really big and blue.

[laughter]

I remember the first time
I saw that,

I think I backed up
a little bit and went,

"Oh, no, oh, this is bad.
This is bad.

I've never seen her mad yet.
I haven't seen her mad yet."

♪♪

She splits, and De Palma
splits the screen.

[electrical crackling]

And when
Carrie's personality splits,

and she just looks, it's like
the other side takes over.

It's like in the beginning

she has this little bit of
power with the drop of blood,

but when she's covered
in blood,

that's when it really
comes out,

and she's like,
"I'm going to make you pay."

[screaming]

Somewhere inside every girl,

they can relate to this idea

of feeling like, "My power
has been taken away from me,

"and what would I do

if I got all that power
and then some back?"

[dramatic musical sting]

narrator: After laying waste
to her graduating class,

Carrie goes home

to the less than
comforting arms of her mother,

who's decided her daughter
must die.

[gasps]

Piper Laurie raises
the Kn*fe...

[gasps]

Aah!

And then they dd
that whole sequence

where the knives "whoos"
they twirl through the air.

[gasps]

You know when I first saw i,
I didn't know how they did it.

I was wearing
this iron vest underneath,

and each place
I was going to be hit

there was a block of wood
underneath

and a hole in the costume
with a wire stretched out

to the prop man.

And this Kn*fe
or can opener would travel

until it hit me,

and then I would react.

Aah!
Aah!

That one particular scene
was always my favorite.

[somber music]

♪♪

And I thought
the movie was over,

so I was really
% completely satisfied,

and then of course the arm
comes out of the ground

at the end.

[screaming]

Carrie has the greatest
jump scare ending ever.

[screaming]

That ending changed movies.

If you were making
a horror movie,

you had to have a jump scare
at the end,

or the audiences were pissed.

narrator:
Decades after its release,

"Carrie" remains

one of the all time
great horror classics,

because while fashions
may change,

the misery adolescence
is timeless.

Everybody sympathizes
with Carrie.

The character of Carrie White
continues to resonate

generation after generation

because she is sort of,
like, this heroic character

for anybody has been
marginalized or bullied

or has had
an oppressive parent.

[crowd screaming]

It is a warning to all of us
to be kind to each other

because you don't know
what monster you're making.

narrator: It's understandable

that a gentle soul could be
pushed to the breaking point,

but some children
defy understanding.

Like the anel-faced tikes
with m*rder in their hearts.

♪♪

narrator: What is
the nature of evil?

[screams]

narrator:
Is it learned behavior?

Or are some kids
just born bad?

[screams]

narrator: When a child kills,

do we blame the parents?

- Say good-bye.
- No!

narrator: Or faulty brain
chemistry?

[tires screeching]

[terrifying music]

Those difficult questions
are at the heart of two films

made half a century apart

in two very different
Americas.

What are all
these people watching?

People like me.

narrator: "We Need to Tk
About Kevin" from

and "The Bad Seed" from .

♪♪

"We Need to Talk About
Kevin" is an evil child film

for the era
of school sh**t.

♪♪

Through disjointed flashbacks,

the film traces
the relationship

of a reluctant mother
to her son.

Kevin's an inscrutable
psychopath

who makes her life hell
as a oddler

and ends up a teenage
mass m*rder*r.

[children screaming]

What could be
more frightening

than your child gone wrong?

I mean how organic is that?

How horrendous would that be?

Because you're there
for at least years, man.

[laughs]
However your kids comes out,

you have a responsibility.

♪♪

It's almost just
every parent's nightmare

than anything else.

[crowd screaming]

It's highly relatable,

because I think every parent

experiences
that "what if" moment.

You know, what if my daughter
or son did this or that?

narrator: Kevin's guilt-ridden
mother is haunted

by not knowing if her child
was born bad,

or if her failures as a mother
made him a monster.

[thumps]

There's a very contemporary
kind of engagement

with the discussions of
what's sometimes referred to

as the Mommy Wars.

Just a continual question

of how much time, energy,

and emotional attachment

do mothers need to give
to their children?

And you know, all kinds of
guilt accorded to mothers

who supposedly do not give

enough emotional time
and energy to their children.

[sarcastic] Looks like
someone's having a nice day.

Enjoying yourself?

I'm sorry?
Ooh!

I think culturally,
that's what we do to women

who don't always live up
to the ideal of, like,

"Oh, my God,
I love my beautiful child.

My child is just
the most wonderful thing."

I don't like that.
[yelling]

Mommy was happy befow
wittle Kevin came along.

You know dat?

Basically,
I think it's an expose

on how difficult
parenthood can be.

Now Mommy wakes up
every morning

and wishes
she was in France!

You never know exactly
what you're gonna get, right?

You're a little clammy.

You feeling okay?

Never better.

narrator: Today,

the idea of a seemingly
normal American kid

committing coldblooded mass
m*rder is a sad fact of life.

In , it ws shocking.
- [crying]

[dramatic musical sting]

narrator:
The pigtailed psycho k*ller

at the heart
of "The Bad Seed"

is -year-old Rhoda Penmark.

She's the original
evil child of horror.

If you say a child
is a bad seed,

everyone knows what you mean.

It's part of the, uh...
the Lexicon now.

"The Bad Seed"
is one of the more chilling

child horror stories

because there's not
a supernatural element to it.

She's just an evil kid.

- Good morning, Miss Fern.
- Good morning, Rhoda.

Always smiling, always nice,
always clean-cut,

and then pure evil
behind your back.

You've got them hid,
but you'd better get them

and bring them back here,
right here to me!

[dramatic musical sting]

Patty McCormack
is the bad seed.

It'd had been a play first
on Broadway,

and she having played it
onstage,

really knew that character.

I thought I'd seen some
mean little gals in my time,

but you're the meanest.

And she made it real.

I know what you think.
I know everything you think.

♪♪

Rhoda just thought she
was right about everything...

And had no problem,
once she had a goal,

and achieving that goal
no matter what the cost,

and slowly through the film,

the mother realizes

that her daughter
is different.

[laughs]

Is it true that when blood
has been washed off anything,

a policeman can still find
if it's there?

♪♪

narrator: "The Bad Seed"
arrived in the mid s,

one of the most conservative
periods in American history.

The generation that grew up
during the Great Depression

believed in strict discipline
and frowned on selfishness.

Rhoda embodied
their worst fears

about their own children.

I was a child of the ' s,

and, you know, they hit you...
you know what I mean...

when you were naughty.
[laughs]

No one called Child Services,
you know?

You made up your mind
in one second!

So it was so fun to be free
of the constraints

of the time.

And I told him I'd hit him
with my shoe

if he didn't give me the medal!

I think the film is
definitely at least hinting

at the idea that
sort of capitalistic greed

is at the heart of social decay

and maybe
of Rhoda's pathology.

Could I have both stones?
The garnet too?

- Rhoda!
- [laughs]

You know, that kind
of rugged individualism

in some ways
kind of creates monsters

like Rhoda, you know,

who are willing to do
whatever it takes

to get what they want
and to succeed.

It's just a more
pointed version

of what capitalism
encourages everybody to do.

I wish she were mine.

narrator: What could be
more frightening

than a lone predator stalking
us behind a mask of innocence?

A pack of young wolves

thirsting for your blood.

♪♪

narrator: You can never be
entirely sure

what kids are thinking.
- [screams]

narrator: Or what they might
do next.

Aah!

narrator: When you gather
them together,

that unpredictability
leads to fun, troubling,

and transgressive
horror films.

[scary music]

Kids are a bit of a mystery,
and so in that mystery,

you can tuck
some really dark forces.

Maybe they're just being
a weird kid,

or maybe you're about to die.

[horrific musical sting]

narrator: Few children
in film history

are as mysterious or as deadly

as the ones
in "Village of the Damned."

♪♪

Five months after everyone
in an English village

falls unconscious,

strange children are born.

They are emotionless,
hyper intelligent,

and have the power to read
and control people's minds.

They're so malevolent,
and they're so powerful,

and you can't imagine
the human race ever surviving

the w*r with these kids, the
way they get inside your head.

narrator: We never know
what led to their birth,

but we instantly see

that they are convinced
of their absolute superiority

to their parents.

You have to be taught
to leave us alone.

narrator: And that they have
a hidden agenda.

Leave us alone.

♪♪

It's also the innate fear
that parents have,

that your child is here
to replace you.

What are you going to do
with that power?

Father,

we know what
you're trying to find out.

It'd be better if you
didn't ask these questions.

We want to learn from you.

They're here
because you're leaving...

All right,
that'll be all for the day.

And they're gonna take over.

And the anxiety is that
they're not gonna wait.

narrator: It's no coincidence

that the children
bear a strong resemblance

to fanatical h*tler Youth.

Director Wolf Rilla's family
fled n*zi Germany

when he was .

He had seen the indoctrination
of minors firsthand.

The Nazis were neither
the first nor the last

to realize
that ideology can be used

to turn children
into pitiless K*llers.

The s, Cambodia's
Khmer Rouge used teenagers

to carry out
a genocidal campaign

that left nearly
million people dead,

including a sizable number
of their parents.

Very loosely adapted from
a short story by Stephen King,

written when the Khmer Rouge
was in power,

"Children of the Corn"

begins with the mass m*rder
of all the adults

in a small town
by young religious zealots.

- [grunts]
- No!

- Ay!
- [grunts]

- Stop it!
- [grunting]

What "Children of the Corn"
did,

like a lot of, you know,

button-pushing movies
of the ' s,

is that it made kids K*llers.

[gasps]

Mom!

In the ' s,

it was very taboo
to see kids k*lling adults,

kids picking up knives,
kids being violent.

Don't do it!
[screaming]

"Welcome to Nebraska."

narrator: Three years
after the m*ssacre,

two travelers find themselves
under att*ck

by the town's
corn-worshipping kids.

Aah!

- Oh!
- [screaming]

Outlander!

[children shouting]

narrator:
They're deemed outlanders

who must be sacrificed
to an invisible god

called "He Who Walks
Behind the Rows."

children: k*ll, k*ll, k*ll,
k*ll, k*ll, k*ll, k*ll, k*ll!

I kind of love the concept

of taking something
so innocent and pure

and turning it into
something cruel and malicious.

children: Praise God!
Praise the Lord!

As parents,
that's the last thing you want.

You wanna shield your child

from everything wrong
in the world,

and so to see them become a
part of it is like a nightmare,

which makes it scary.
[laughs]

♪♪

narrator: The death cult is
led by child preacher, Isaac,

whose grammatical
eccentricities

rival Jedi Master Yoda.

Question not my judgment,
Malachi.

I am the giver of His word.

narrator:
Isaac's surly lieutenant

is the scenery chewing
Malachi.

We want to give you peace.

Bring in the blood
of the outlander!

Outlander!
Shut your mouth.

- [grunts]
- Aah!

It's one of those movies
that somehow

just got exploited to death.

Like, the VHS s audience

just loved watching
"Children of the Corn" movies

for some reason.

[otherworldly warbling]
- No!

[screaming]

[expl*si*n]

Well, what all these movies
had in common

was they were about kids

supernaturally punishing
their enemies,

and I think that that
is something

that is extremely attractive
to young people

who feel that they have
no control over their lives.

What is it with this corn?

[scoffs]
You got me.

Look, there's a little girl.

[uneasy music]

♪♪

narrator: But for a truly
terrifying look

at children turning
on adults,

there's a deep-cut horror film
you have to see.

♪♪

Tom!
What's she doing?

♪♪

There's a movie called
"Who Can k*ll a Child?"

A Spanish movie which,
um, involves

an entire island
filled with murderous children.

[playful commotion]

[horror music]

♪♪

It's like the protagonists
are surrounded by wild dogs.

They look cute,
but they're gonna bite you.

[eerie psychic tones]

narrator: The children are
infected by a psychic virus

that compels them
to k*ll every adult.

Adults are powerless
to defend themselves

because who can k*ll a child?

No!
Tom!

You don't wanna
punch a child.

You don't wanna kick a child.

They're scary, but you're like,

"I can't do anything.
It's an actual child."

♪♪

And so it's
a very unnerving thing

to watch a scary child

or a child with a Kn*fe
or anything like that.

[g*nsh*t]
- [gasps]

narrator: The real horror
of these films

is watching children
blinded by ideology,

lacking empathy,
filled with rage,

capable of anything.

[screams]

narrator: In other words,
children behaving like adults.

[g*nsh*t]

Few films have
better expressed

the fear that our children

are twisted reflections
of ourselves than "The Brood."

♪♪

[grunts]

narrator: Mutant children
begin murdering people

a man's bitter ex-wife
doesn't like.

Nola?

[screams]

narrator: He suspects
it's connected

to her psychiatrist's
radical treatment for anger.

[screams]

This is David Cronenbers
masterpiece,

"The Brood."
- Aah!

That was another movie
that I saw as a young person

that just, um, kind of cracks
open your mind, you know?

[unsettling music]

David Cronenberg
is one of the few directors

who's able to take
an exploitation subject

such as a horror film

but make it personal to him...

[screaming]

[screams]

And if it is possible,

and I think it is possible,

to make an art/horror
film,

David Cronenberg is one
of the few who can do it.

And the thing
with "The Brood"

is he calls it
his horror version

of "Kramer vs. Kramer,"

because he was going through,
like, a bitter custody dispute

at the time, and "The Brood"
is his way of, um...

[laughing]
Dealing with it.

Art Hindle plays the husband

to this woman
played by Samantha Eggar,

who has left him and gone

and joined this, uh,

experimental therapy commune

which is run by a doctor
named Hal Raglan,

played by Oliver Reed.

Right now you're dreaming.

From what Frank tells me, it
was lousy from the very start.

You never had anything
real together.

The husband
has been sending the daughter

to go visit periodically
and then he starts to believe

that the mother
is harming the daughter

because the daughter
keeps coming home with bruises

and marks on her body.

And that's very
unfair of him.

That's very arrogant of him.

You mus'n't be too hard
on him, Nola, sweetheart.

He's just trying to be
a good protective father.

She needs to stay very
far away from her child, uh,

but her body is reacting
to this rage

and manifesting these weird

creature children.

[snarls]

♪♪

They're children, Frank.

Or exactly, they're
the children of her rage.

They're motivated
only by her anger,

whether that anger is conscious
or subconscious.

I mean, when... when Nola got
cross with Candy last weekend,

annoyed really,
the brood b*at her.

A lot of films have an idea

of one of your, like, fears
or anxieties being made flesh,

and in that movie,
they actually do it.

That's what the movie is about.

People are so angry

that some people can develop
physical welts

through their anger,

and one woman can actually
develop extra beings,

she is so angry.

[brood snarling]

- [cackles]
- Aah!

The look of them, it was
so imaginative, you know?

They have no navel,
and they can't speak,

and they have a cleft palate.

It's just, you know,
they were born of something

that should never
have happened.

There's a really creepy sh*t

where they kidnap
the main character's kid,

the two parka monsters,

and they're just three kids
walking down a road

in the snow
and a car drives past.

Kids in horror together

is always something
that's unsettling to watch.

Ooh, you do...
this margin.

♪♪

A scene, like, where
the school teacher is m*rder*d

by the brood in front
of the kids

is so deeply distressing...

- [screams]
- Don't... oh!

- [screaming]
- Aah, ow!

[screams]

You know,
the guardian is, like, k*lled

in front of the kids by these
monsters is, like, terrifying.

One most of the most, like,
terrifying scenes in cinema.

[children whimpering
and crying]

And I'm sure that's a scene

where a lot of critics
wrote that film off

on the basis
of that scene alone.

It was like, "No, you've
crossed a line here."

♪♪

Art Hindle discovers
what's happening

and he has to confront her.

[dramatic music]

♪♪

When he actually sees
what his wife is doing...

[laughs]

And you see her manifesting
one of these...

these children and licking it

like a... like a mother cat
licks a newborn kitten.

It is sensational.

Oh, God, Nola.

No.

I disgust you.

The film is not
especially sympathetic

towards the mother,

the female character,
Samantha Eggar.

You hate me.

But if you talk to
a lot of women

who love that film, you know,

they get very different things
out of it.

seconds after you're born,
you have a past,

and seconds after that,

you start to lie to yourself
about it.

The anxiety
around having children,

around loving children,
loving them too much,

um, wanting to destroy them...

What if there's a sort
of mutant quality to the...

to the children
we bring in to the world?

narrator: The ultimate message
of the film

is that broken marriages
create broken children.

I love the end
of "The Brood"

where it closes in
on the little girl,

and you see the rage blisters
developing on her arm.

She's Mommy's girl.

narrator:
Society expects parents

to love their children
unconditionally,

no matter how awful
they may be,

but everyone has their limits.

[horrific musical sting]

♪♪

Honey?

Frank?

Somebody kicking again?

No, it stopped.

narrator: Some men
have problems adapting

to the increased
responsibilities

and stresses
that come with fatherhood.

We're slowly but surely
poisoning ourselves,

you know that?

Fine world to bring
a kid into, fellas.

narrator: The problem
is particularly acute

when your child
is a monster baby.

[horrific musical sting]

[screaming]

"It's Alive" was made
in the mid ' s

by Larry Cohen.

And it's the story
of an experimental drug

that has the effect

of turning these babies

into little demonic...

You know the song "Baby Shark?"
[laughs]

[wailing]

Baby sharks.
You know, they are babies,

but they have giant fangs,
and they're carnivorous.

Rick Baker did this baby
which, you know,

is... is fairly inanimate,

and... and so you've gotta be
careful how you cut around it

because it's not really
very mobile.

It's more of an idea.

And it's a very clever movie.

narrator: "It's Alive"
was a low-budget movie

that explored big ideas.

It's a human, doctor.

That's what's disgusting
to you, isn't it?

It kills like an animal.

And when we find it,

we're gonna have to destroy it
like one.

narrator: The rampaging baby
isn't evil;

it's a frightened
and confused newborn.

The real villains
of "It's Alive"

are the mother's
untrustworthy doctors

who are being paid off
by drug companies

to push
their defective products.

We have an opening
on the board

of our research
and development department.

Now, we wouldn't want people
to lose faith in us, would we?

In the ' s and ' s, there
was a drug called Thalidomide

that was sold
to expectant mothers,

and it created
horrific birth defects.

Mrs. Davis, I don't suppose
you took the pills I gave you?

You really should, you know.

Maybe it's all the pills
I've been taking over the years

that brought this on.

This is a movie
that came out of a real horror.

Where are you?
Look out, Charley!

- [snarling]
- [screams]

[g*nsh*t]

"It's Alive" dramatizes
the idea of, you know,

a monster kind of born,
you know,

and it's because
of environmental factors

so it works in that
whole eco-horror theme,

but it's also just very much
about the idea, you know,

that for men,
childbirth is something

over which they're going
to exercise little control,

and, you know,

what's going to happen,
you know, with this birth?

[baby screaming]
- [screaming]

With his monster child
on the loose,

the father's life
falls apart.

Mr. Davis,
what did it look like,

if you were to describe
it to us?

Leave me alone.
I've got nothing to say.

narrator: When the story
gets out, he loses his job;

he's harassed by the media;

and his family life crumbles.

Get outta my way!

I don't know
what it looks like.

- Where is your baby?
- Never mind my baby!

Leave my wife out of it,
you understand me?

John Ryan in "It's live,"

an absolutely
amazing performance.

He's really powerful,
really compelling.

And why is everybody
looking at me?

Yeah.

Like it's my own flesh
and blood or something.

[tragic music]

Well, it's not,
understand?

♪♪

It's no relation to me.

narrator:
By the film's climax,

the father
is helping the police

chase his k*ller newborn

through the storm drains
of LA.

There's the innate funny
of, like,

guys with shotguns going out
to hunt babies.

[agonized screaming]

That moment when
he realizes, like, he can't

'cause it's his child
is just... that's amazing.

That's an incredible sequence.

Can you hear me, Frank?

It can't be saved!
It's gotta die!

[baby crying]
Do you hear me, Frank?

[suspenseful music]

♪♪

John Ryan's dealing with
those conflicting emotions

of, "My kid's a monster,
but he's my kid.

I must protect him,"

and that's, you know,
a primal urge.

[baby crying]

narrator:
Like many confused patriarchs

who weathered
the social storms

of the ' s and ' s,

the father comes to accept
his problem child.

[sirens blaring]

It can't hurt anybody!

Hey, look, if you fellas sh**t,
you're gonna sh**t me.

Now, put the w*apon down.
Look, it's harmless.

Take it easy.
Take it easy.

[crying]

narrator: Other films
have tried to recapture

the shock of "It's Alive."

- Aah!
- [screaming]

[screams]

narrator: But no one has
even attempted to top

the ultimate evil baby movie:

"Eraserhead."

♪♪

narrator:
Of all the movies ever made

about the terrors
of parenthood,

nothing to compares
to David Lynch's masterpiece,

"Eraserhead."

[terrifying music]

♪♪

"Eraserhead" is not what
people would think of

as horror in the traditional
sense, but, boy,

that's what makes horror
such an interesting genre,

'cause you can fit
so many things in it.

Because as an adult,

I can't think of very many
movies I found that disturbing

and horrifying and scary.

♪♪

Lynch is just one
of those filmmakers

who... he opens the medium up
for you, you know?

Like, you watch a Lynch film
and you realize,

"Oh, like, there's so much
that can be done."

[smoke exhausts]

narrator: "Eraserhead's"
plot defies description,

but it begins as the movie's
protagonist, Henry,

arrives for dinner
with his girlfriend, Mary,

at her parents' house.

[moaning]

It's completely surreal
and a completely alien world,

but so sticks
to its own rules,

that it just attains
a reality all its own.

[crying]

She'll be all right
in a minute.

[cries]

Every time I see the film,
I see something different.

I have a different experience.

Scenes that disturbed me
now make me laugh,

things that made me laugh
now disturb me,

often simultaneously.

You're very bad trouble
if you won't cooperate.

[heavy breathing]

Well, I...

Mary!

Mother!
[crying]

So much of Lynch is sort of,
like, deliberately wrong.

There's a baby.
It's at the hospital.

- Mom!
- And you're the father.

That's impossible.
It's only been...

Mother, they're still
not sure it is a baby!

It's premature,
but there's a baby!

And it's just wrong
in the right way.

The first thing you see
onscreen in "Eraserhead"

is, like... is Henry, his head
is just floating in space,

and he's emitting all of these
umbilical weird creatures

out of his mouth.

[organ music]

♪♪

And then when you see
The Lady in the Radiator,

they're falling
from the ceiling,

and she's stepping on them.

[bursting squish]

She's stepping on these
creatures that he has...

These, like,
weird, ugly creatures

that he's birthed.

[bursting squish]

And then she's just singing,
"In Heaven Everything is Fine."

♪ In heaven ♪

♪ Everything is fine ♪

♪ In heaven ♪

♪ Everything is fine ♪

It's, like,
she's just assuring him,

like, "No matter what
kind of ugly creature

you give birth to,
everything's gonna be okay."

♪ You got your good things ♪

♪ And I've got mine ♪

So many people told me
how weird it was,

and I didn't... I go, "Oh, this
is a movie about a guy

"you know,
afraid of getting married

and having a kid, you know?"
[laughs]

[baby crying]

[wind howling]

And you watch it,
and you go,

"I bet this guy was, you kn,
married and had a kid

and was freaked out."

Shut up!

[baby continues crying]

Shut up!

And then I, you know,
read his book,

and, yeah, he was.
[laughs]

You know, it was just, like,

it was an artistic expression
of his fears.

I can't stand it!
I'm going home.

Getting this girl pregnant
who's a little crazy,

and she doesn't like him,
and, you know,

and they have this really
acrimonious relationship.

You're on vacation now!

You can take care of it
for a night!

And the fear
of having a baby,

and what if that baby
is deformed?

[rain pours]

"Eraserhead," I think,
more than any evil child film

perfectly encapsulates
the anxiety of a parent.

[pained gurgles]

[tense music]

That what you will
give birth to

is this uncontrollable monster.
[laughing]

♪♪

I always remember
when the baby's crying,

and it's in the night

and then he turns on the light

and... and the baby has all
the sores over his face.

[pained breathing]

Jack Nance goes...
both: "Oh, you are sick."

[laughs] I was like,
"Jesus Christ."

[panting and crying]

[disturbing music]

Of course the ending
where he kills the baby.

♪♪

I mean, every time
I see that film,

I'm shocked at that ending

because it seems
to rush at you.

♪♪

And just knock the wind
out of you.

[blaring industrial humming]

I guess he transcends,
right?

And then he's embraced
by The Lady in the Radiator.

[blaring industrial humming]

You don't know exactly
what it meant literally

to know what it meant
figuratively, subtextually.

[soft piano music]

It's a pretty unique movie

that stands alone, you know,
in that way.

[crying]

It's really unnerving,
but it means something.

It's not just kind of surface
and there for effect.

It's just very honest
and heartbreaking.

♪♪

[scary music]

narrator: The chilling
children and terrible tykes

of the movies
can be frightening,

especially if you're a parent.

[screams]

narrator: But they can also
be oddly comforting.

[screaming]

narrator: Showing us
that no matter how

difficult your son
or daughter may be,

things could be much worse.

♪♪

So if you're thinking
of having a baby,

but having second thoughts,
don't worry.

Your kids will
probably turn out just fine.

- [screaming]
- [screaming]