Some people detest scary movies and avoid them like the plague.
The rest of us relish the delicious chills and shocks they deliver.
But which would get your vote as the most frightening film of all time?
It seems that timing is crucial, with horror movies that we watch during our childhood or early teens having such an impact we remember those scares for a lifetime.
For me, that moment came in the mid-seventies with the film of Stephen King's cult novel, Carrie, which was already being surreptitiously passed around our Year 7 classes.
My best friend and I travelled into Newcastle by bus for a night-time showing and were so unsettled, particularly by the shocking final scene when a hand shoots from a grave, we were nervous wrecks on our way home.
Strolling along a dark Hunter St, past the always rowdy Star Hotel, a shopkeeper slamming down a roller-door caused us to shriek so loudly we probably gave him an even bigger fright!
Ask anyone and the scary movie that really sticks in their mind is usually the one they saw as a teen.
Another that made its mark on me at around the same time was Suspiria, by Italian horror maestro Dario Argento.
Set in a spooky German ballet school, which turns out to be home to a witches' coven, it features some particularly gruesome scenes involving maggots, and is now considered a cult classic.
But as an adult, the horror movie that really affected me was another adaptation of a Stephen King novel, The Shining.
King reputedly loathed Kubrick's version, but seeing it at a rundown suburban cinema (especially going to the bathroom at interval to find the lights had blown!) was enough to give me nightmares about axe-wielding killers for weeks.
I think the creepiest scene in the whole film is when the terrorised wife has finally succeeded in locking the unhinged Jack in a coolroom.
As the lock slides open by itself, you realise much darker forces are at work than simply insanity brought on by isolation.
Classics like The Shining seem to retain their scare factor over the decades, despite advances in visual effects and CGI.
Roman Polanski's ground-breaking 1968 film, Rosemary's Baby, 1973's The Exorcist and The Omen from 1976 never seem to lose their edge.
The same can't be said for Hitchock's Psycho, unfortunately.
At the time, the killing off of the lead character so early in the movie during the iconic shower scene had audiences in shock.
But the scene, while meticulously shot, suggests rather than reveals the violence.
And audiences who grew up on splatter franchises such as Halloween, Friday the 13th and Scream, will probably be left wondering what all the fuss is about.
Such franchises, which also include the Nightmare on Elm St and Final Destination series, follow a highly predictable formula that usually involves attractive teens in skimpy outfits being slaughtered in increasingly gruesome ways.
In recent years, the Australian-produced Saw series took the torture/gore factor to even more extreme levels.
However, you don't need lots of blood and guts or a big budget to make a truly terrifying movie.
The use of video and "found footage" style has opened the door for films such as the Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity, made on a shoestring with no special effects or famous actors, to become smash hits.
Old-fashioned ghost stories have been given an original makeover by imaginative Asian film-makers, who have had audiences around the world flocking to the likes of The Ring, The Grudge, The Eye and Dark Water.
American remakes just don't seem to be able to recreate the eerie feel of the originals.
Australian film-makers are also making their mark in the horror genre, with one of those behind Saw, James Wan, producing one of the surprise hits of this year with the haunted-house tale, The Conjuring.
Like previous horror hits such as The Exorcist and The Amityville Horror, its claim of being based on a true story lends an extra menace.
Such is the case with the Australian-made Wolf Creek, with its unmistakeable parallels to the serial killings of Ivan Milat. The sequel has just received an enthusiastic response at the Venice Film Festival.
Our fascination with terror being unleashed on us in a darkened cinema shows no sign of waning, and good-quality horror movies still pull in the crowds like nothing else.
So what then, is the ultimate horror film, the one that stands out above all others?
Many would name the movie that is one of the highest-grossing of all time, created shock waves on its release, received 10 Oscar nominations and was the first horror film to be nominated as Best Picture...The Exorcist.
In the "What's Up?" segment each Thursday at 3pm on 1233 ABC Newcastle, Jeannette McMahon discusses aspects of popular culture, including music, film, television and fashion. You can also listen via our website at abc.net.au/newcastle.
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