Scariest Movie Scenes of All Time, According to Top Horror Directors

Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett (ABIGAIL)

The commence of the home trespass in The Strangers (2008)

I don’t slimk anyone took a breath the entire scene. We assembleively gasped when he eunites behind her and we all screamed when she uncovers the shades and sees him up seal on the other side of the prosperdow. It’s a masterfilledy orchestrated scene, from the engage of handheld lengthy apshows to the haunting Joanna Newsom song and Liv Tyler’s pitch-perfect carry outance. From this scene on, all the idle whispering and chatter fadeed as the movie held the audience by the throat.

Leigh Whannell (WOLF MAN)

The blood test in The Thing (1982)

The blood test scene in John Carpgo in’s The Thing is a high water label of dread for me. Kurt Russell’s character MacReady is using a ffeeblethrower to heat up a wire and then stab it into a blood sample apshown from every member of the science team. We understand that the blood will react and uncover which of them has been apshown over by the alien, and the suspense is untolerateable. As a filmoriginater, I’m always trying to come up with scenes that dedwellr suspense but do it in a way that is somehow recent. This scene does that so well. It’s so terrifying, but it’s such a distinct setpiece. Spropose testing each person’s blood becomes the engine of suspense, and it’s straightforward – but when the scene explodes, it gets me every time. In a movie that is, in my opinion, perfect in every way, this remains the highairy. The first time I saw it I could nakedly see at the screen…but even now, after the dozens if not hundreds of times I’ve seen the film, it still labors.

The euniteance of the tprospers in The Shining (1980)

Everyone alerts you that the first time you shoot a difficult drug into your veins that the rush can be so strong, there’s a danger you might dedicate the rest of your life trying to discover that experienceing aget. For me, that rush came not from a necessitatele but from a rented VHS tape at a frifinish’s hoengage. A kid on a tricycle pedaled thcdisorrowfulmireful the halls of an vacant boilingel and turned a corner to discover two paengageing tprosper girls. An electric shock ran thcdisorrowfulmireful me. Pure dread that seemed to stop time. I’ve hunted that thrill ever since.

Whistle and I’ll Come to You sheet scene (1968)

Among the most prosperous horror sequences in film is the climax of the BBC’s changeation of M.R. James’ story Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come to You My Lad. It was the first M.R. James gpresent story changeed for television in this period and gave birth to the series A Gpresent Story for Christmas that began in 1972. I first saw it after the liberate of The Witch by the recommfinishation of my frifinish and writer Robin Carolan. It’s 40 minutes of sluggish-burn atmospheric and downtake partd horror that all directs up to perhaps the best articulation of a shroud-appreciate gpresent and of sleep paralysis in film. I watch it about once a year.

Parker Finn (SMILE)

The vacant apartment in Kairo (“Pulse”) (2001)

Kiyoshi Kurosawa is a master of atmosphere and tension, and KAIRO (aka PULSE) is a frightening case study in both. The sequence where the character Yabe scatterigates an vacant, foreboding apartment take parts out in utterly dreadful silence as he scatterigates meaningfuler into the depressed, hollow space. When he accomplishes a dead finish plastered with strange red labelings, we’re helderlying our breath, hopeless for him to turn around and exit. But then an unsettling choral cue shatters the silence, and suddenly, we want him to not turn around, to not face the horror standing on the far side of the room. Our eyes can fair nakedly originate out the gpresent of a woman, standing perfectly still in the depressed. The gpresent approaches Yabe, but her transferment is wrong and nightmarish, as if she’s walking on the bottom of some etheauthentic ocean. Yabe stumbles back and hides behind the sole piece of furniture in this dreadful space: a small couch. But Kurosawa isn’t done with us yet, as the gpresent peers over the couch, staring down at Yabe, as he (and we) screams in the horrible depressed.

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods (HERETIC)

Winkie’s Diner in Mulholland Drive (2001)

A scene in wide dayairy. A shatterquick diner with summarize flourishes that incite Seinfeld. A mid-day chat with an associate. Elements that don’t coincide with originateing a suffocating ambience, and yet here is David Lynch in filled order of tone at its most horrifying: the Winkie’s Diner scene in Mulholland Drive.

Then you retain the dialogue. Almost wooden at times, and yet pitch perfect for the finish goal as Patrick Fischler’s character recounts a dream. And we’ve all had frifinishs recount a dream. If you’re anyslimg appreciate us, you tune out instantly, becaengage there’s zero sapshows – wantipathyver you’re about to hear is imaginary. There’s no authentic world danger.

So why does this scene labor so well? Why, as soon as Patrick Fischler commences reminiscing his afraid nightmare, do we become so entrenched in every word? Is it the floating sealups? Or the downtake partd anxious glances to his frifinish at the cash enroll, satisfying the prophecy of his dream? We’re witnessing a cinematic alchemy, one that we dare not overscrutinize, for dread that it’ll pierce the magical spell of what Lynch is casting over us.

Lynch then does the inevitable: we walk with the characters behind the diner, to see if the nightmare tolerates any truth. The camera drifts past a payphone, into the vacant trash-filled lot behind every restaurant you’ve ever walked thcdisorrowfulmireful in LA. And beorderlyh the afternoon sun, there’s a graffitied cinder block wall, defending a dumpster. There’s noslimg distinct here, and yet we experience our pulse rapidening beyond meastateive. Our hearts pounding from our chest until… THE NIGHTMARE STEPS OUT. This scene has buried itself meaningful into our neural trerent as the scariest we’ve ever seen promiseted to film. Thank you, Mr. Lynch.

This story euniteed in the Oct. 23 rerent of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.