The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms and the six-year-old

When I was six, my dad took me to see a movie called, The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms.
Later, while being queried by investigators from the state family-services department, he lamely explained that he thought he was taking me to see "Bambi".
Seriously though, I have just finished watching the film in question, and I have to admit, they should have thrown my dad in the clink and thrown away the key.
Made in 1953 The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms may have been the first of the "Nuclear Testing Unleashes Monsters" genre.
The special effects, by then master Ray Harryhausen may arguably seem "quaint" by today's sandards, with all the computer-imaging razzlemedazzle. But, believe me, they hold up very well and are therefore believable enough to make the intrinsically chilling scenario all the more so.
I must inject an autobiographical note again to explain why this film for me had that extra-special "scare the crap out you" factor.
I grew up in Brooklyn and was very familiar with most of the places upon which the Beast was unleashing his unholy wrath---Yep, the terrifying behemoth decides to go On the Town and visits Manhattan and does some steppin' that Gene Kelly never would have choreographed.
He later visits Coney Island--- I went there all the time--- where he wreaks his final havoc and meets his end (without revealing too much, I can only say it was a good thing Lee Van Cleef wasn't afraid to ride on roller coasters).
Cut to a six-year old, being put to bed by his father that night, who gamely keeps telling him "It was only a movie---you know, make believe!"
Why did there have to be a thunderstorm that night, the sound of which sounded just like the monster's blood-freezing roar? I remember running to my apartment window, from where I could see the Coney Island Parachute Jump, wondering if the beast was on a destructive rampage there.
And so it went for about four nights, my dad assuring me it was only a movie, as the bags below my eyes got increasingly larger with stored up night terror.
I know one risks the danger of being dismissed as an "old-fogey", but they rarely, rarely, make them as good as those horror films from the 50's and the 30's.
The filmmakers back then knew what really made your blood drop in temperature and the hairs go up on the back of your neck. And it had little to do with spectacle.
It was all about subtlety---unobtrusively and secretly connecting with those primal ancestral fears that lie deep within us all.
One only wishes that those who would aspire to make films of true horror today would take a lesson from the masters of decades ago.