"Why We Crave Horror Movies"

Horror movies are not my favorite thing in the world. But there is nothing like a sleepover where you purposely pick out the scariest movie so that you can get scared together with your friends. See, I like horror movies when I can watch them with my closest friends. There's something about being in the company of your closest friends that doesn't make the horror movies so scary. Other than sleepovers, though, I generally do not watch horror movies. Occasionally, I will watch one if it's on T.V. But it has to be in the middle of the day, with the sun shining and birds chirping. I have never seen a horror movie, except for Disturbia which really wasn't that scary of a movie, in the movie theaters. I just do not like the idea of the horrifying images being displayed on a massive screen and make the monsters larger than life when they are scary enough as it is on the tiny T.V. screen in my living room. I also don't like the idea that I cannot turn the lights on if I get too scared. No thank you, I will not be put through that torture.
But Stephen King has a point in this essay. Even though I do not really like horror movies, I still enjoy watching them and being scared. I think that he is totally correct in saying that we are all mentally insane. We are. What else explains the huge turnouts and profits from horror movies. These movies are sick and twisted and just generally messed up. Yet people flock to see the newest horror movie. And they are just getting worse and worse. I watched Nightmare on Elm Street one time and I didn't get scared even though I was only twelve at the time. That movie was made in the 80s and was scary then but things have changed since then. Horror is becoming more and more gruesome as years go on. I just want to know if the people who come up with these movies are seriously insane. How can they have these ideas about people torturing other people and of these frightening monsters and be normal? Not that i can define normal at all. But still, they are kind of messed up.
I see where King is going in this essay. Our human nature craves sick things, whether it be books, movies or jokes. We crave it because it is so far from the norm of a regular day. It is a way for us to step out of reality and relieve that desire for something mentally wrong.