to ask what are the most horrific/traumatising/terrifying films you have seen?

[WillyW8nker]

Doesn't have to be horror, can be psychological terror etc. Films that stayed with you and made you think.

Mine are Irreversible, the Poughkeepsie Tapes and Spoorloos (the original Dutch version of The Vanishing).

Come and see is one of the best war films ever made.

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned The Orphanage, ( by the same people as Pan's labyrinth). On The Beach starring Anthony Perkins, about nuclear fallout from World War Three drifting towards Australia and everyone waiting for it to reach them, at the end a young couple poison their baby and then themselves...has haunted me for years.

Last King of Scotland

Another vote for Requiem for a Dream. I saw this years and years ago and I'm still reminded of it regularly.

I started watching Donkey Punch and had to turn it off; god knows why I found it so unsettling!

The Amistad. Horrifying film about slavery. Can't bring myself to watch it ever again, haunted me for weeks to think of what people can do to other people.

Oh my god The Orphanage!

Wolf Creek gets me too, because it felt like they spent so long setting the characters up before it all goes wrong...

Also The Exorcism of Emily Rose. Watched it when I first went off to uni, and kept waking up in my room at halls at 3am

Anne Frank Remembered - made me cry

4 months 3 weeks 2 days a Romanian film about illegal abortion in 1980s.

Pan's Labryinth - I had no idea what I was walking into. spoiler I couldn't believe the little girl died at the end, I was shouting in fury all the way home - as if it wasn't miserable enough without that happening!

The Ring - I saw it while I was travelling in the US (so staying in a hotel room). Woke up in the middle of the night needing a wee and right opposite the end of my hotel bed was an enormous tv. Took me ages to find the courage to get out of bed.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo - another one I was completely unprepared for. All I knew was that the book (which I hadn't read) had been a huge hit. I had no idea how bloody grim it was.

The Sound of Music.

Perpetual I only saw half of the Exorcism of Emily Rose - I seem to remember we had it on in the background while putting together some flat-pack furniture, of all things - but I still think of it occasionally if I wake up in the small hours ...

Se7en . But in recent years, The Constant Gardener was v upsetting

Bad Boy Bubby yes!! arghh!!! it was a bit of a cult film with my friends when I was in early 20s

Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, the original. The rape scenes are harrowing then she's in so much pain she can't walk, that was appalling.

The Revenant, the bear attack was horrific then the casual way Tom Hardy (sob!) stabbed the guy's son made me really upset, stupid, when it's a film.

the vanishing is that where guy buries girl in a coffin alive to prove he has integrity or something>

Gobbolino, same here (I know my first name is Steven) saw it as a teen and it still haunts me, knowing it was true and that he died after all he'd been through too. So upsetting. Was on in recent years and I had to turn over. Once seen never forgotten.
Wolf Creek was awful… my brother ended up staying there (alone!) not long after watching it too

not a film, but Bangkok Hilton with Nicole Kidman was incredibly upsetting and haunting

Oh no alltoomuchrightnow, I haven't see The Constant Gardener but - having read an article on John Le Carre recently - mentioned to my husband over the weekend that we should watch it. Maybe I should rethink ...

ASheep My husband has never managed to watch Event Horizon all the way through either. I haven't seen it but as a result I'm intensely curious about it

The Elephant man, the old version, awful, pretty much turned me into depressed child for a while.

And Dr Zhivago, the character Tom Courtney plays, cold, devoid of emotion, clinical " we will kill and shoot its all for the cause the higher cause" - the enslavement of millions, the deaths of millions, and the shooting of those who happened to be born wealthy...I love Omas warmth and richness of character the romantic poet for whom life isnt perfect, in perfect contrast to the cold, clinical ordered Tom. Communism, socialism all frighten me. The lives then wrecked behind that communist wall....the gulags, the prisons, the taking away of intellgenica, - the mindless endless questioning....

Can't believe no one has mentioned The Texas chainsaw massacre!

As in, the original 1970s version. I spent the last 30 minutes trying not to be sick.

Gobbolino, same here (I know my first name is Steven) saw it as a teen and it still haunts me, knowing it was true and that he died after all he'd been through too

^^ oh crumbs yes - was awful awful awful awful

June, I just found it really upsetting. It's all things that could or have happened in Africa (as in, could be realistic - not a true story but could well be). What happened to the young wife in it and then the ending,. .. don't watch it if you are down! Don't get me wrong.. a great film… fabulous acting and scenery but! Wish I hadn't seen it, stayed with me. Terribly, terribly sad