It’s a horror movie... so why do they do that?

RULE 1 Never split up. Especially when being pursued by a creature that a) has acid for blood or b) doesn’t function within normal space/time constraints or c) has a chainsaw or d) is clinically insane, very unstable and under a lot of pressure or e) all of the above.

RULE 2 Never go down to the basement. Or up to the attic, for that matter. Or the lonely garden shed. Or the cupboard under the stairs. Monsters like to hide in the dark and if you stand very still, they can be heard sniggering behind their tentacles at you being so stupid as to come down here alone and unarmed.

RULE 3 Keep your pants on. Here is how this rule works: anybody in a horror movie who is about to have sex or is having sex, or is feeling rather jammy about the sex they’ve just had is about to die. All sex is punishable by death.

RULE 4 If you think you’ve seen or heard something, then you probably have. Random noises, shadows, things not where you left them - it all adds up to imminent death. Also if you find yourself with stigmata, a revolving head or paws where your feet used to be, chances are it’s a little too late. If furniture begins to move, the light fittings are laughing at you, or stuff is flying across the room, call a priest and run away. The sound of chainsaws revving is also a good reason to be elsewhere.

RULE 5 If you can see Donald Pleasance anywhere at all, run like fuck.

RULE 6 Don’t pick the wrong time and place. Lumbering men in graveyards are not as alive as they used to be. Ask yourself this: why do undertakers nail coffins shut? Exhuming graves "for a laugh" is not funny. You will not always get rescued by a priest claiming "he kicks arse for the Lord" and no matter how hard you wish, Buffy is probably off having her nails done on the night you get ambushed by a bunch of unrealistic demons in the park. Always check for exit wounds, and try not to turn up just as the sun is setting. On Hallowe’en. On the anniversary of the town massacre. With a nearly empty tank in the car. In impractical shoes that make you fall over whilst running away.

RULE 7 People who fly without aeroplanes are not to be trusted. Think Salem’s Lot. If you live above the ground floor, and something is tapping at your window, do not tentatively open the curtains. I’m telling you right now, categorically, that there’s nothing out there that’s going to make you glad you did. This rule also applies to disembodied voices or ghosts of deceased loved ones that lead you away from the house and out into the woods. In your pants. At night. To the gentle strains of chainsaws being revved in the distance.

RULE 8 Never go back to a lit firework. Actually, never go back to a dead body. Assuming you’ve been smart enough to turn up armed with something deadlier than a week-old cheese toastie and managed to dispose of the undead, run away! Don’t go and stand over it, or poke it with a short stick, or lay down next to it. This is ridiculous behaviour.

RULE 9 Reading aloud from books made of skin and written in blood gets no sympathy.

RULE 10 Nothing good is ever going to happen to you in a morgue.