Thursday
Oct312019
This is Halloween
Thursday, October 31, 2019 at 10:00AM 
Everybody give a scream! What's the scariest thing you've ever seen in a movie? After the jump I'll share a few of mine. I can't even put into words how much these four moments freaked me out on first time screenings...
Reader Comments (32)
The only things that scares me is micheal Myers and the shark in jaws
The day after I saw Alien for the first time, I had really bad heartburn. You can imagine. I was terrified it was a chestbuster. Then I kept telling myself, it was just a movie. Then I'd get terrified again.
those red eyes staring thru the 3rd floor window in the original Amityville Horror...
The opening sequence of Night of the Living Dead ('68)
The phone booth scene in Rosemary's Baby (makes you fully realize how alone Rosemary is, how vulnerable)
The double murder at the opening of Suspiria ('77)
Virginia Madsen & Kasi Lemmons saying "Candyman" 5x in the mirror (I was all NO DON'T STOP)
The lights turning on in the hall in the dead of night in Paranormal Activity
Lots more but those are the ones that come to mind at the moment.
The hospital jump scare in Exorcist 3 made my sister throw her popcorn in the air so hard, they're probably still finding kernels in the ceiling at the Ocean County Mall cinema all these years later.
For me, though, I'm still haunted by the end of The Invitation.
cliché but the twins in the hall as young Danny turns the corner -- The Shining. Gets me every time.
If we're just limited to movies:
Eraserhead Baby
"Reverend" Harry Powell, The Night of the Hunter
Eleanor Iselin, The Manchurian Candidate
Joker's Murder Tape, The Dark Knight
If I did choose i'd talk up a scene in the cult horror House of the Devil were a character no spoliers at who is shot mid sentence point blank that scared and shocked me,if you haven't seen it please give it a go for old school 70's vibes,early Greta Gerwig and scares.
Zelda in the original Pet Sematary. Not a scary movie whatsoever but those brief shots kept me up at night for a solid three weeks.
The first time I saw Jaws I was very young (7 years old) and while the movie has since not struck me as particularly scary (though I love it to this day) both the opening, the kid dying, and the severed head made me freak out.
The closet jump scare in the ring remake (that move weirdly unnerved me quite a bit the first time I saw it).
The entire bat scene in the Shining. Duvall's hysteria is the scariest stuff in the whole movie IMO. Should have gotten a special award for that scene.
The last ten minutes of 'Hereditary'. Easily.
The last ten minutes of 'The Blair Witch Project'. Easily.
The night scenes in the original 'Paranormal Activity'.
When Murnau's Nosferatu rises from his coffin.
The revenge scene in Browning's Freaks.
The opening scene of the Coen Brothers A Serious Man.
Klaus Kinsk's Nosferatu pouncing on Bruno Ganz after the latter cuts his finger and draws blood.
The scene in Dreyer's Vampyr where the protagonist is put into the coffin.
When Jeff Goldblum's Brundle discovers the consequences of his experiment, followed by the bathroom scene in Cronenberg's version of The Fly.
The abortion scene in that same movie.
The scene where they operate on the victim and remove her face in Franju's Eyes Without A Face.
When Bambi's mother gets killed.
The mouse that Bette Davis serves to her scene partner, Joan Crawford, in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane (1962). The film is all elegant, also mean, of course, as if it was written by Tennessee Williams, so the scene struck me as a concession to the producers' bad taste at the time or something. I was alone late at night in front of tv in the dark and knew there was something on the tray, but I could never ... you know? Today I find the scene one of the best and summarizes the kind of relationship that sisters and actresses had, but at the time I was surprised by the spine. It's my favorite horror because it has drama. For me horror without drama doesn't scare, it's pure aesthetics.
PS: I fantasize that Baby Jane is a disguised sequel to All About Eve. Margo Channing's future after the movie's ending when the actress leaves her career for the love of handsome director Bill. 😂 This way the movie gets scarier.
The ending of The Vanishing (the original, not the remake).
The "interview" scene in Haneke's Code Unknown in which Juliette Binoche realizes she's trapped.
The coffee scene from Mulholland Dr. about nightmares
The end scene from El Libro de Piedra
The staircases scene from El Incidente
The old lady from The Others
The look of Sissy Spacek in Carrie
Tim Curry as Pennywise (just looking a picture of him gives me chills)
@Feline Justice: couple of corrections: It's a rat that Bette Davis serves up in Baby Jane, not a mouse, and the author is not Tennessee Williams, but rather one Henry Farrell. Great movie, I don't find it particularly scary but it is a very dark and gripping melodrama, for sure.
Just a few that stand out:
The first time I saw the Alien stomach burst-through. I was 7 and not prepared at all. I think I cried.
When the guy is trapped in the closet as the anti-God possesses the other girl in Prince of Darkness. I remember praying.
When Mills and Somerset discover the sloth victim in Seven. Maybe the grossest scene in cinema history.
The demons chasing Allison through her brownstone in The Sentinel.
Jaws--When Richard Dreyfuss is underwater and about to enter that hole in the boat when that fisherman's head without the eyeball floats through. That was the loudest I've ever screamed in a movie.
The bag scene in Audition.
And then pretty much everything else after that.
Oh! And the slowwwwww approach of the first ghost in A Tale of Two Sisters.
That scene gets me every time I watch INLAND EMPIRE. Every. Friggin'. Time.
Thanks for including it.
Rob,
Thanks - I never know the difference. I know it's not a Tennessee Williams adaptation, it was just a mention.
The moment when Vera Myles meets the real Mrs. Bates in Psycho. Because of this movie I prefer horror movies to be black and white and less explicit, more suggestive.
The opening scenes of The Blair Witch - it does the build-up so well
The phone booth in Rosemary's Baby
The opening scene of The Exorcist where Merrin uncovers the figurehead
Several moments in the original Ring, including the TV coming on while the girl is at the fridge, the woman's footsteps in the street, the video itself, the well with the light fading, and the you-know-what scene
The abduction in the original The Vanishing - and the climax
The interiors of the hotel in The Shining - and Wendy desperately trying to get out of the bathroom window
The cowboy scene in Mulholland Drive
Bruno staring straight ahead in the tennis match in Strangers on a Train
I could go on but I have freaked myself out enough!
I still have not been able to watch the end of "Audition".
I remember being scared while Sara Goldbfarb lost her mind in Requiem for a dream. Also, a week ago I watched the first episode of When they see us. It was so brutal and it's really scared knowing it is based on a true story. Humanity scares me the most.
Childhood is the right time to watch horror movies, right? You may not understand certain themes proposed by the story, but the chances of being impressed are greater. Some movies that scared me as a child lost their voltage when I reviewed them older. One of the exceptions is 1982's Poltergeist. A movie not only scary but also uncomfortable from beginning to end where I highlight two moments among so many:
1- The skeletons in the swimming pool with poor Jobeth Williams.
2- When the sinister toy clown attacks the frightened boy.
And the wonderful music of the tireless Jerry Goldsmith who made among others Alien, The Omen, Planet of the Apes, Gremlins, Basic Instinct, Mulan, Chinatown, L.A. Confidential and so on ...
The behind-the-scenes stories of the movie are equally terrifying and everything that surrounds it.
The original The Vanishing still gives me nightmares after more than 25 years! It's just too realistic.
Audition right up to the moment of the big reveal.
The first time I saw Diabolique I learned I had never really been scared before.
The ghosts in The Innocents. And they don't even do anything!
Repulsion at about four or five points in the story, but especially the first time she closes the wardrobe door with the mirror on it.
I should also give a shout out to vintage Disney cartoons. The very first movie I saw in a theater was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and the scene where the witch is struck by lightning scared the crap out of me, and a whole auditorium full of pre-teens. What a gas! And then he topped himself with his next movie Pinocchio. The scene where the boy turns into a donkey was totally terrifying.
Nathaniel, I'd love to hear more about why these four moments in particular freaked you out. Just cuz you've obviously seen SO many movies so what was it about these four scenes especially that stand out for you in terms of terror?
Movie: Rosemary Baby, 1968
Scene: The Satanic Ritual
Done 10 years earlier or 10 years later wouldn't have the same effect. One of those untouchable, timely films, with the director going to the limit of what could be shown. And what a cast! Everyone deserves the Oscar, not only Ruth Gordon, who is amazing, funny, lovely and scary at the same time - one of the best winners in the category.
In the extended version of The Exorcist, when Regan went down the stairs like a spider. And on The Ring, when they are in the ferry and the horse gets loose.
What movies terrified me as a kid: the boy turning into a donkey in Disney's "Pinochio", the shrieking ants in "Them" ( which still freak me out)
About that INLAMD EMPIRE scene, a YouTube user named pu171103 expressed it better than I could: "You really have to watch the whole film to get the impact of how scary it is. Honestly I could probably show you all the things in this film that terrified me and in isolation and without context they aren't scary at all. Even in the film it's not a startling jump out at you kind of scary, it's a very deep difficult to describe feeling of terror."
I would also mention those scenes from other films:
Kairo - The Ghost Lady
Pi - Subway scene
Paprika - The Parade
It Follows - The Giant
REC - Ending
Caché - you know what scene
2001: A Space Odyssey - Beyond the stargate
I Stand Alone - "you have 30 seconds to stop watching this film"
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - The Dinner
Martyrs - Ending
Good call for Binoche scene in Code Unknown.