ET (1982)
Everyone’s favourite alien from outer space, this affectionately crafted and moving film made everyone believe a boy could befriend a wide-eyed intergalactic creature from another planet – and that it was possible to get through an entire box of Kleenex from uncontrollable blubbing, as the loveable alien finally says farewell.
But one of the film’s funniest scenes plays out in ET and Elliot’s psychic, symbiotic relationship, where ET plunders the home refrigerator for beers, gets tipsy, and causes Elliot to burp drunkenly in class.
American Psycho (2000)
A quick run-through of the usual incumbents you’d expect to find in your fridge would probably run to milk, cheese and tomatoes, to name but three. Least likely on the roster of refrigerator regulars would be a recently decapitated head – unless your name’s Patrick Bates (Christian Bale), America’s finest psycho, who matter-of-factly keeps the disgusting, severed head of a recent victim sitting quite comfortably next to the sorbet.
Requiem For A Dream (2000)
Often cited as one of the most depressing movies ever made, part of Requiem’s plot focuses on Sara Goldfarb (Ellen Burstyn) – a depressed, lonely old woman obsessed with losing weight and chomping diet pills like Smarties.
The cumulative result of her pill-popping and paranoia is a surreal, hallucinatory moment when she imagines her refrigerator is coming alive to get her. A dark, twisted manifestation of the previously untapped malevolent possibilities of a generally benign household appliance.
Ghostbusters (1984)
If there’s something strange in your neighbourhood – or your refrigerator, for that matter – you’d better call the Ghostbusters. There are plenty of places you could imagine a Satanic, growling, slavering, red-eyed and horned beast hiding, but the fridge of a New York professional musician Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver), isn’t one of them.
It’s particularly disconcerting for ‘buster' Pete Venkman (Bill Murray) who realises his wannabe girlfriend is possessed by Zuul, Gatekeeper of Gozer The Destructor. It's one of movies’ most memorable funny-but-also-a-bit-scary moments.
The term fridged (sometimes referred to as "fridging"😉 was popularized by comic book writer Gail Simone through her website "Women in Refrigerators." On that site, Simone compiled a list of instances of female comic book characters who were killed off as a plot device. It is named for a storyline in Green Lantern: A New Dawn, in which the villain Major Force leaves the corpse of Kyle Rayner's girlfriend, Alexandra DeWitt, literally stuffed into a refrigerator for him to find.
Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull (2008)
The disappointing response to the fourth Indiana Jones film was exacerbated by the scene in which he escaped a nuclear blast by hiding inside a lead-lined fridge – which catapults him across the Nevada desert to (albeit battered and bruised) safety.
The term ‘nuke the fridge’ has now entered the filmic lexicon as a pejorative phrase for ruining a well-loved franchise, and Spielberg has subsequently admitted it was his idea and, on reflection, probably not his best one.