Relate the first time you saw The Return of the Living Dead

ROTLD is my favorite horror film, period. Share your experience of the first time you saw it. When, how old you were, what you thought of it, etc.

For me, I can never forget it. It was a Sunday night, the night before 7th grade was supposed to start, to be exact. Earlier that day I was at the video store with my dad and he allowed me to rent this film, as my parents were always lenient with my movie choices. I was 12-years-old and the year was 1995. I popped the tape in, and lemme tell you, from the opening text about this film being true, I was frickin' hooked. Captivated. In awe. And scared outta my goddamn mind! The punk soundtrack, the characters, the snappy dialogue, the set design, the damn zombies that could run and talk, the unhappy ending - I'm telling you, I was floored.

Since that day Return of the Living Dead has been my favorite horror movie. No other horror film has been able to top it (lots have came close, of course, including Day of the Dead and A Nightmare on Elm Street, both of which I also saw & fell in love w/ around the same time).

Before returning that tape, I think I may have watched it at least another good 3-4 times. I don't think prior to that I had ever seen anything scarier than Tarman. And I'd seen a lot of horror films prior to that point. Ironically, I had seen the sequel first, back in the theater back when it originally came out! Dunno what the hell took me so long to finally catch up with the original. It's not like I hadn't seen the VHS cover dozens of times at the video store before.

One of the things I always find funny when I think back to those first few viewings over 20 years ago is I absolutely did NOT see the humor in any of it. I didn't find one iota of this film funny and it actually wasn't until a few years later, around '98 or '99, when I rented it again that I got how silly and hilarious it was. I'm pretty sure I had seen it in the intervening years on Monster Vision with good old Joe Bob, but still failed to find it funny!

I ended up making a copy of that rental tape with two VCRs and loaned it to a friend boasting about how awesome this movie is. He didn't find it to be anything special, so naturally out frienship just didn't last much longer, LOL.

In '99 the family finally got a computer and once I discovered eBay I bought an original Thorn/EMI clamshell case original that I kept until just a few months ago when I needed the cash. This was before DVD when all these older movies were out-of-print and for a popular film like Return of the Living Dead I believe I had to drop like some $40 on it. Crazy, huh, when nowadays you can get it brand new, in a much more convenient manner than going through a bidding war, for half that price?

Obviously I hold this film dear to my heart. So, what's your experience?

The calls are coming from inside the house.