I SCREAM, YOU SCREAM: MY 10 FAVORITE HORROR JUMPSCARES
In the realm of horror cinema, jump scares have become a staple, evoking visceral reactions and leaving audiences on the edge of their seats. These sudden, startling moments are employed to elicit intense fear and adrenaline rushes, often relying on unexpected occurrences or loud noises to jolt viewers from their comfort zones. However, beyond their ability to provoke immediate scares, jump scares also serve as a means to heighten tension, build suspense, and create a pervasive sense of unease throughout the narrative. It has become a trope, to be sure, a device used (and in some cases, overused) throughout the horror genre, but used effectively, it can terrify and excite us, and take an everyday horror film and elevate it into a classic. There are few films that can make me jump in terror, make me feel sheer, exhilarating fear, ones that are executed to perfection in terms of story, cinematography, and excellence in horror filmmaking.
AUDITION (1999)
THE GIST : Seven years after the death of his wife, company executive Aoyama is invited to sit in on auditions for an actress. Leafing through the resumés in advance, his eye is caught by Yamazaki Asami, a striking young woman with ballet training.
THE JUMP: For the first half of the film, AUDITION appears to be a fairly benign,if somewhat surreal comedy about a lonely man trying to find love. Then the bag scene happens. Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) rings Asami (Eihi Shiina), who pretends that she has not been expecting his call, but in reality, she has been waiting by the phone for four days straight. And yeah, that’s unnerving to say the least, but what makes this scene truly horrific is the large bag sitting behind Asami. As the phone rings, the bag suddenly moves, lunging across the room while making a strange growling sound. At this point, viewers have no idea what is in the bag and that in itself makes the scare even more terrifying. The scene is framed perfectly by Takashi Miike, who innocuously places the bag in the background of the shot, letting only the sound of the phone ringing be heard. When we later discover that the bag contains a man who has had numerous body parts removed (another fantastic scare), the audience is shocked and appalled, but nothing compares to that initial feeling when we first see the bag move. This moment is when the tonal shift of the film happens, and from there, it’s all downhill and deeply upsetting.
Watch the scare below:
FRIDAY THE 13TH (1980)
THE GIST : Camp counselors are stalked and murdered by an unknown assailant while trying to reopen a summer camp that was the site of a child’s drowning.
THE JUMP: The original FRIDAY THE 13TH is full of atmospheric shots and beautifully designed kills, but for most of the film, the jump scares are infrequent and, at best, mediocre. That is until the film’s final sequence. Each of the camp counselors have been killed one by one, leaving Alice (Adrienne King) as the sole survivor. Now, as Ms. Voorhees (Betsy Palmer) is finally dead, Alice rests on a canoe floating in the middle of the lake. It finally seems like a moment of peace and safety for Alice, and possibly for us as the audience. Because the movie is over, right? The jump scare works for a number of reasons. The lull of the music suggests something insidious is creeping around the corner. And the presence (or rather, the absence) of Jason Voorhees looms over the whole film. The plot twist that it is Jason’s mom and not Jason committing the murders is breathtaking as a narrative element, but it also furthers this final jump scare. As an audience, we don’t expect Jason to be there (or to be anywhere for that matter). His mother is revealed as the murderer BECAUSE her son died. So, at this point in the film, subconsciously, we’re left thinking – now that Ms. Voorhees is dead: who is left to scare us? Well, evidently, Jason was, because when his horribly decayed and disfigured body jumps out of the waters of Crystal Lake and grabs Alice in the canoe, it's a brilliant and completely unexpected scare that absolutely shoots through your entire being.
Watch the scare below:
TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2 (1986)
THE GIST : Leatherface is up to his cannibalistic ways once again, along with the rest of his twisted clan, including the equally disturbed Chop-Top. This time, the masked killer has set his sights on pretty disc jockey Vanita “Stretch” Brock, who teams up with Texas lawman Lefty Enright to battle the psychopath and his family deep within their lair, a macabre abandoned amusement park.
THE JUMP: A chainsaw-wielding maniac in a mask made out of human skin suddenly bursting from the shadows is never not gonna be startling. Thus that callback to Leatherface’s debut in the original TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE really ups the ante in the 1986 sequel. The tension is already high when radio station employee Vanita (Caroline Williams) finds herself seemingly alone with Chop Top (Bill Mosely), one of Leatherface’s family. The two wind up on either side of a door opening onto a darkened room, when the lights suddenly come up to reveal Leatherface ready to do his thing, chainsaw roaring. It’s the framing that makes this one special, with the villain suddenly appearing without so much as a cut or camera movement, and it is enough to make you jump out of your seat.
Watch the scare below:
REC (2007)
THE GIST : A television reporter and cameraman follow emergency workers into a dark apartment building and are quickly locked inside with something terrifying.
THE JUMP: The found footage horror film REC follows television reporter Angela (Manuela Velasco) and her camera operator Pablo (Pablo Rosso) as they document a night at a fire station. After accompanying the firefighters during an emergency call, they and the entire fire crew get stuck in an apartment building, where a mysterious infection is turning people into aggressive, zombie-like creatures. In the movie's most heart-stopping jump scare, the camera pans around a dark attic - until an infected boy suddenly jumps out to attack. Tapping into primal fears (what’s scarier than a zombie child?), this jump scare fully leverages the claustrophobic atmosphere in REC, and is even more unnerving due to the terrifying implications of the infected boy's ordeal.
Watch the scare below:
CARRIE (1976)
THE GIST : Carrie White, a shy and troubled teenage girl who is tormented by her high school peers and her fanatically religious mother, begins to use her powers of telekinesis to exact revenge upon them.
THE JUMP: By default, Carrie’s (Sissy Spacek) destruction is due to Sue’s (Amy Irving) gesture, even though her intentions lacked cruelty compared to the other students. For a film to seek out the truth in the dark hallway of high school, the final scare of CARRIE reminds audiences of the guilt that wakes them in cold sweat. Through Sue’s perspective, she redeems her abuse of popularity by letting Carrie end senior year on top, giving her a taste of acceptance. But Sue’s naivety in thinking that her friends were going to accept Carrie as a popular girl was her downfall. By the end of the film, everyone at the prom is dead, as well as Carrie and her mother, with nothing left of their home except some dirt and crude wooden cross that says, “Carrie White burns in hell.” We see Sue’s mom on the phone talking to a friend, and saying that the doctor thinks that Sue is young enough that she’ll forget all about the horrific things she has seen in time. We then see Sue approach the cross at Carrie’s house, flowers in hand, as the soft flute score plays. Sue’s eyes are filled with tears and she looks downright angelic as she goes to lay down the flowers, as we, the audience think, oh how lovely, Sue was the only student that actually cared about Carrie. As she does, Carrie’s bloody hand pops out of the ground, grabbing Sue, and we suddenly see Sue screaming in her bedroom in terror, her mom trying to comfort her. The trauma Sue has endured, not only by what she has experienced, but also due in part to her own actions will never be forgotten, and will haunt her forever. It’s a horrific jump scare because up until then, we thought there was hope of some shred of sympathy and love for Carrie, at least in her death, but there is only terror and trauma that will last long after.
Watch the scare below:
THE DESCENT (2005)
THE GIST : After a tragic accident, six friends reunite for a caving expedition. Their adventure soon goes horribly wrong when a collapse traps them deep underground and they find themselves pursued by bloodthirsty creatures. As their friendships deteriorate, they find themselves in a desperate struggle to survive the creatures and each other.
THE JUMP: The jump scare is an obvious one, both for those who know the film and even indeed when you are watching it. Trapped deep underground, surrounded by solid rock and with no clear idea of where to go, one of our heroes uses the night vision setting on her camcorder to look around the cave. By this point, the viewer is aware that the six women are not alone down in this tunnel system, and therefore we anticipate that something is going to appear and most likely attack. Thus, the jump-scare of the crawler appearing in the viewfinder is heavily foreshadowed. But that does not stop that appearance as being utterly, perfectly terrifying. It’s exceptional in how it works in the structure of the film. A simpler, dare I say cheap, jump scare works as a release of tension, a squealing tea kettle after a period of quiet bubbling. But here, the jump scare is the beginning, the signaling of a transition in the film after both the audience and the characters realize there is no escape. Seeing the still figure of the creature standing behind one of our characters, knowing how dark it is in there, the full scope of the danger hits us. This is a jump scare that escalates the threat, rather than releases it, and it’s what makes it so effective, even on subsequent viewings.
Watch the scare here:
SHOCK (1977)
THE GIST : A couple is terrorized in their new house haunted by the vengeful ghost of the woman’s former husband who possesses her young son.
THE JUMP: Anchored by a fantastic performance from the great giallo queen, Daria Nicolodi, SHOCK keeps a tight focus on the story, to great effect. It’s a classic haunted house premise, but the scares and tension in this one somehow work brilliantly, aided in no small part by the creative camerawork and haunting, percussive score. By the end of the film, horrible truths have been revealed about the death of Dora’s (Daria Nicolodi) husband. His suicide was staged, and Dora actually killed him, with her new husband covering it up and walling him up inside their house. In the last few minutes of the film, the ghost of her ex-husband has reached the zenith of his rage, tormenting Dora with moving walls, hovering box cutters, and possessing her annoying child. But the most surprising of all sees Dora climbing up the stairs after just murdering her new husband with a pickaxe, hearing the sobs of her little boy Marco upstairs. She goes into his bedroom, and we see him under the covers, but when she touches him, the body turns over and it's revealed to be her dead ex-husband, his throat slashed. If that’s not enough of a scare, director Mario Bava immediately delivers the second blow as she runs out of the hallway to see her son Marco at the end of it. He shouts happily, “Mama!” running towards her, but as soon as he gets there, he immediately transforms to the form of her dead ex-husband (a simple, but effective camera trick). It's a masterful tactic from Bava, giving the audience no time to relax as we are dealt one jump scare, and immediately hitting us with another, even bigger one.
Watch the scare below (sadly, the best one I could find on YouTube):
JAWS (1975)
THE GIST : When an insatiable great white shark terrorizes the townspeople of Amity Island, the police chief, an oceanographer and a grizzled shark hunter seek to destroy the blood-thirsty beast.
THE JUMP: In a film about a shark terrorizing a local beach, the biggest jump in JAWS arguably comes from the shark's third victim. We first meet fishman Ben Gardner when Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfess) arrives in Amity Island. In the ensuing frenzy to win the bounty offered by Mrs. Kintner, Gardner and his first-mate are determined to be the ones to claim the prize. Sadly, his boat is attacked by the Great White, which Hooper and Martin discover while searching the waters at night. Hooper suits up and dives down to inspect the remnants of the boat. He comes across a large hole in the side of the boat, and heads towards it when suddenly, the severed head of Ben Gardner comes floating into the shot. We have the same reaction as Hooper, who, in terror, drops the shark’s tooth he found down there as he scrambles to the surface. It’s a great, unexpected scare, as throughout the film, Spielberg has conditioned the audience to listen for that musical cue (“dun-dun…dun-dun…dun-dun, dun-dun, dun-dun…”) to tell us that the scare is coming. In the case of this scene, there is none of that, only the silent sound of the deep, dark waters of Amity Island. We expected Bruce the Shark, and got poor Ben Gardner instead.
Watch the scare below:
THE THING (1982)
THE GIST : In remote Antarctica, a group of American research scientists are disturbed at their base camp by a helicopter shooting at a sled dog. When they take in the dog, it brutally attacks both human beings and canines in the camp and they discover that the beast can assume the shape of its victims. A resourceful helicopter pilot and the camp doctor lead the camp crew in a desperate, gory battle against the vicious creature before it picks them all off, one by one.
THE JUMP: Even though John Carpenter has downplayed the jumpscare technique as a “cheap trick, he’s responsible for quite a few of them – and damn good ones at that. He usually juices those shocks with musical stingers and sound effects (that he himself creates), but one of the most shocking scenes in his filmography comes with no music cues whatsoever. It arrives at a point where the film’s suspense has built to a critical level, as several members of an Antarctic research outpost have been killed and perfectly imitated by an alien creature. Up to now, there’s been no way of knowing which of them are doppelgangers; we only know not everyone is who they appear to be. After a disastrous encounter (which also provides a classic jump moment), helicopter pilot R.J. MacReady (Kurt Russell) suspects the alien is a collective organism, and every part of it has its own instinct for self-preservation. He devises a crude test, in which he takes blood samples from each of the men, then prods each sample with a red-hot wire. We’re not sure the test even works until the wire contacts the sample from Palmer (David Clennon), a deadbeat stoner who’s not even one of the prime suspects. The blood doesn’t just try to get away from the heat… it screams and leaps from the dish. This epic scene still catches first-time viewers off-guard, and it works so well because Carpenter hangs so long on the almost silent tension that threatens to burst out of that room, as MacReady methodically tests the men’s blood samples one by one, a flamethrower in hand, ready to go. The whole film is a masterclass in building suspense, and this brilliant moment is the apex of that.
Watch the scare below:
THE EXORCIST III (1990)
THE GIST : Set fifteen years after the original film, THE EXORCIST III centers around the philosophical Lieutenant William F. Kinderman who is investigating a baffling series of murders around Georgetown that all contain the hallmarks of The Gemini, a deceased serial killer. It eventually leads him to a catatonic patient in a psychiatric hospital who has recently started to speak, claiming he is the The Gemini and detailing the murders, but bears a striking resemblance to Father Damien Karras.
THE JUMP: While not historically significant as the original, THE EXORCIST III is notorious thanks to one heart-stopping jumpscare scene (plus, it's just an awesome movie). Throughout the film, Detective Kinderman (George C. Scott) has been engaged in a battle of wits with the spirit of “Gemini Killer” James Venamun (Brad Dourif), now inhabiting the body of Father Damien Karras. Stuck in his cell, the Gemini is still capable of carrying out his M.O. by possessing the bodies of fellow patients. The peak moment comes late one night, after Kinderman has ordered a lockdown of the entire hospital. We know something terrible is going to happen – the night-shift nurse fits Gemini’s victim profile – but director William Peter Blatty isn’t letting us off that easy. That’s what makes the jump so effective: we know it’s coming – we just don’t know when, or what form it will take. Blatty primarily keeps the scene in a wide shot, a stroke of genius, because it lulls the audience into a false sense of security. We can see the whole area, the camera doesn’t move much, and there’s even a security guard sitting for most of the scene. We relax, because Blatty misdirects us into thinking this is a moment we can let our guard down. Like a master of slight of hand, he even provides a scare a few minutes earlier and we think that’s the worst of it. But as soon as that figure shrouded in white comes barreling out of a doorway with a giant pair of shears, you can’t help but feel your heart jump into your throat. It’s not only one of the supreme horror movie jump scares, it’s also a master class in how to balance suspense and shock in the same scene.
