The ’80s movies we loved as kids that we’d never show our own children, from ‘The Watcher in the Woods’ to ‘Flowers in the Attic’

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There’s something special about 1980s movies. As kids in that decade we got to rent or buy movies on videotape for the first time in history, and that gave us access to watch a movie we loved over and over again. Who can blame us for getting extremely attached to some movies even while they may have slightly traumatized us? Think kids held captive in the attic by their own mother, two sisters being haunted by a teen in another realm, and lots of things that were way over our heads. Whether a movie was intended for kids or not, many movies that simply had kids in it appealed to us. Here are some of the films that will never be forgotten for all the right or wrong reasons. 

Why ’80s kids got handed the scary stuff first

The entire rating system for movies changed in the mid-1980s. Until the summer of 1984, movies were given a rating of either PG or R, with nothing in between, which meant PG ratings were granted to an enormous amount of films we’d now file under PG-13 or higher.

Steven Spielberg told The Hollywood Reporter how the middle ground finally came to be. He said, “It was sort of a perfect storm of movies that I either produced and directed. It all sort of came together and created this parental objection…and I agree with that, but I also felt it would’ve been unfair to have labeled either of those films [Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Gremlins] with an R rating. I called Jack Valenti and I said, ‘Let’s get a rating somewhere in between PG and R.’ Jack was proactive about it, completely agreed, and before I knew it there was a PG-13 rating.”

Valenti, then the head of the MPAA, was cautious about touching the system at all. He told the trade in June 1984, “It’s a fragile thing. But an overwhelming number of exhibitors, producers and well placed observers seem to think a change is needed, and I am willing to go along with it.”

That left a lot of the 1980s without these protections, but as more and more people got VCRs, protecting kids from R-rated movies just wasn’t very easy. Children could borrow VHS tapes from each other, and they could watch a film with an R rating when parents weren’t paying attention. (Hey, it was the 1980s.) 

‘The Watcher in the Woods’ was Disney’s great unsolved trauma

My sister Holly and I grew up watching The Watcher in the Woods when it aired on the Disney Channel in the 1980s. Bette Davis starred in this very strange movie that captivated kids with its scary plot and spooky seasons. According to the AFI Catalog, Disney was initially so unhappy with the film that “on 20 May 1980, Disney cancelled the film’s screenings, hoping to recut the film, utilizing available footage,” then spent roughly a million dollars on new effects before quietly reopening it regionally in October 1981. It carried a PG rating.

It’s a movie that’s beloved by many kids of the time period even if it did give us a few nightmares. Lynn-Holly Johnson, who starred in Ice Castles, and Kyle Richards played sisters in the film. Johnson told Remind Magazine, “Kyle played my little sister. She was very experienced compared to me. She had done many projects and been around many film sets because of her sister [Kim Richards] who worked for Disney.  When we reshot the Watcher’s ending at Pinewood Studios in England, I was already there shooting 007’s For Your Eyes Only.  One funny thing I do remember was that when we went to reshoot, Kyle had grown about 6 or 8 inches taller in that year since we had wrapped the film.”

‘Mommie Dearest’ became a playground punchline

Mommie Dearest was a powerful memoir about child abuse, but the film adaptation became a campy classic. Several lines of dialogue were repeated for laughs, especially after it was played often on cable. Faye Dunaway has spent decades untangling herself from it, and she told Entertainment Tonight, “I should have known better, but sometimes you’re vulnerable and you don’t realize what you’re getting into.” 

‘Three Men and a Baby’ was haunted by an ongoing rumor

Three Men and a Baby is a feel-good comedy, but it had some adult themes that kids either overlooked or felt very grown-up for knowing about them while watching. My sister Holly was embarrassed to go to a slumber party where the kids went to see it at the cinema, but the other kids didn’t bat an eye.

In addition to being a great success at the box office, Three Men and a Baby was plagued by rumors about a ghost story, because there was a shape in a window during one scene, and word spread that it looked like a boy who supposedly died in the apartment.

Tom Selleck set the record straight and told TODAY, “The story was that this kid died in the house where we shot the movie, this little boy. Well, we shot on a soundstage, they built a set and all. It looks a little spooky, but the story is ridiculous. The ghost of the soundstage?” It was only a cardboard standee of Ted Danson. His character was an actor in the movie, so he had kept a standee in the house.

‘The Worst Witch,’ ‘Creepshow,’ and ‘Poltergeist II’ owned the sleepover

The Worst Witch, adapted from the book Jill Murphy wrote as a teenager, ran on cable every October and Tim Curry has a special role in the movie as the Grand Wizard dressed in gold lamé. A young Fairuza Balk, who had also played Dorothy in Return To Oz, starred in the film as the “worst witch” Mildred Hubble. It’s set at a boarding school for witches, so I always thought of this when I heard Harry Potter books mentioned. The movie wasn’t really scary, but it had some spooky moments. I loved it.

Creepshow was an EC Comics tribute framed around a boy whose father throws his comic books in the trash, but these stories got very dark and weren’t for kids. Many of us 1980s children watched it anyway. (I grabbed it because I had a crush on Ted Danson, which also inspired the Three Men and a Baby repeating viewings.)

Poltergeist II was a truly horrifying movie. While I wouldn’t say it was better than the original, I personally felt it was a lot scarier. That is mostly because of the brilliant performance by Julian Beck. He was dying of cancer while filming the movie, and his portrayal of the horrifying Reverend Kane is unforgettable. One of the scariest scenes I watched as a kid was Kane walking up a suburban street singing a hymn with his focus on poor Carol Anne. That might sound pretty harmless, but you’ll understand if you watch the film.

The ’80s tearjerkers that taught kids what death was

One Magic Christmas is rated G. Roger Ebert counted the bodies and lost patience, writing inhis review: “Did there have to be three deaths in the family, in addition to unemployment and no toys under the tree?” He also warned parents, “I don’t think too many sugarplums are going to be dancing in their dreams after they get home from this one.” Even given the grim tone and stories covered in the movie, my sister and I watched it every Christmas season. It was one of Sarah Polley’s first roles on film, and I’ve been a lifetime fan.

Testament went further. It’s a nuclear war film in which a suburban mother watched as her children die one by one, and plenty of kids watched the end-of-times flick without anyone thinking twice. Jane Alexander, who was nominated for an Oscar for her work in the movie, told Letterboxd Journal, “The truth is, for me, when any people come up to me, that’s not the first film that they come up to me about, but those who have seen it are riveted. They have been riveted, for as many years as have gone by.”

Then came the rest of the emotional gauntlet. There was Beaches and its lifelong friendship with a tragic ending. Just Between Friends stars Mary Tyler Moore. When her husband, played by Ted Danson, dies, she discovers her best friend was his mistress. Irreconcilable Differences starred Shelley Long and nine-year-old Drew Barrymore as a child taking her parents to court. Savannah Smiles romanticized kidnapping in a way, but kids remember it as sweet while most adults rewatch in mild alarm. Zelly and Me is a lovely, forgotten 1988 film about a girl raised by a cruel grandmother, with Isabella Rossellini as the nanny and David Lynch, of all people, acting in it.

The movies we absolutely were not supposed to be watching

Desperately Seeking Susan wasn’t made for children, but kids watched it constantly, because Madonna was in it. What 1980s kid didn’t adore Madonna? Director Susan Seidelman told i-D, “I wasn’t afraid to work with a musician who wasn’t a trained actor or actress, but who had an interesting attitude.”

Flowers in the Attic got passed between middle schoolers like contraband, but it had a lot of totally shocking, taboo elements to the story. Pet Sematary unsettled its own author. Stephen King wrote the screenplay based on his novel, and he even made a cameo as the minister in the movie. However, Screenrant reported that King disliked aspects of the movie.

Cujo was brutal to make and brutal to watch, and Dee Wallace told Parade, “Well, shooting Cujo was close to hell. [Laughing] You know, it was so much emotion and so much energy.  It was a hard shoot and it’s my favorite film. I just feel like I gave everything I could give. I’m really very proud of my work in that film.”

So would you actually press play?

Do you regret all the scary or over-your-head movies you watched as a kid? I don’t. I remember a lot of movies I loved in the 1980s with a great deal of affection. Poltergeist II may have terrified me, but I have cherished memories of watching it with my sister throughout our lives. My sister died at the young age of 51, and some of my happiest memories of our childhood were in all the movies we watched, even all the horror ones. When I watch them now, I feel the joy we had then, and I think reliving our childhood joy and getting that satisfying nostalgia means that most of the 1980s kids have no regrets about even the scariest, weirdest movies we loved. 

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