Movie scenes which almost gave you a heart attack (spoilers)

To qualify, the scene must have made you do at least some of the following:

  • spill your popcorn / drink
  • almost make you crap your pants
  • make your heart jump
  • make you scream
  • make the hairs on your neck stand up

My picks:

  • The hospital bed in the forest scene from American Werewolf in London.

  • The head from the sunken boat in Jaws

  • Candyman appears in the mirror the first time

  • The guy’s chest opens up while he is being revived in The Thing

  • We see the “girl” in the red coat’s face at the end of Don’t Look Now

What are your picks?

Okay, let me think…

The scene at the end of “Blood Simple.”

When Loren Visser gets stabbed in the hand…the knife just CAME

Ugh. Yeah, that one made me both groan aloud, cover my eyes, and beg for mercy. No popcorn, because I wasn’t in a theater (I saw it in my film class, so there was the obligatory big screen), but had I been eating anything, I can tell I probably would have vomitted it up.

The last scene in “Carrie” did the same thing. I didn’t see it in theaters, but again, I know I would have spilled something if I was eating anything.

My heart raced pretty much through the rest of the movie after the Sloth victim moved in Se7en.

Zoggie: I haven’t seen Blood Simple, so I think I’ll avoid that spoiler for now! I will rent it, especially after your recommendation.

Jadis: Me too, I agree with what you say about Se7en, but I’m really thinking of a particular scene which you weren’t expecting, and really shocked you. It has to be something which takes you by suprise.

The dinner time appearance of the newborn alien in Alien.

And the last scene of Carrie. My sister was sitting on the other end of the couch and then she was sitting in my lap pinching me.

The opening scene of Un Chien Andalou. I saw it at a 7:50 AM film class, which is a good thing because if I had eaten anything by that point it would’ve been all over the floor & my neighbors.

One Hour Photo. Robin William’s eyes in his dream. 'Nuff said.

samarm, I was referring to the moment where one of the cops was leaning over the Sloth victim and he appeared to be dead…and then all of a sudden, Sloth convulsed and made some horrible sound. If that doesn’t qualify as something unexpected, shocking and surprising, I’m not quite sure what would. As I said, my heart raced for nearly the rest of the movie. :wink:

When the mother is in the kitchen talking about what was wrong with Katie and then the quick shot showing Katie’s corpse in the closet, all bloated and accompanied by the haunting note of music in The Ring.

I remember spilling my coke over the Alien scene where they’re looking for the missing face-hugger in the lab and the metal intrument tray gets dropped.
The rest of that movie was scary. Good thriller at the time, and still is actually.

The red-eyed pig in the window of Amityville Horror was scary, too.

I’ll second that scene in The Ring .

Also, the scene in Jurassic Park where the T-Rex rips through the wall.

And the opening sequence of The Sixth Sense.

Well, in “Signs,” when they’re in the basement, and it just begins to dawn on them that there might be another way into the basement, and then they look and see… well, I won’t ruin it, but not only did I scream (along with my two girlfriends) but we also all slammed back in our chairs so hard, simultaneously, that I thought we might tip the whole row over.

I don’t usually watch scary movies.

The scene in Event Horizon when the two women crewmembers are trying to figure out the abandoned ship’s log. They both have their heads down as a flash of lightning illuminates the dark bridge, showing (clearly, but just for a sec) the blood and gore all over the walls, windows, etc! EEEK!

After that, I should have been smart enough to just leave the theater, but noooooooo…

The scene in Jurassic Park II - The Lost World, where the girl goes to crawl under the fence (door? It’s been awhile) and the raptor’s head pops through and it screams at her. This scene actually made me kick myself in the face.
– I had my feet up on the seat in front of me (the theater was almost empty) and when that scene happened, I jumped, my body jerked, and my knee slammed into my nose. Wheee… it was interesting.

The blod testing scene in John Carpenter’s The Thing when McReady is joking around when he puts the electrical wires in the blood and suddenly the blood jumps out the dish. When I saw it everyone in the cinema flew into the air and all landed in unison.

The scene near the end of Carrie, hands down!

In recent years two movies, both oldies (I don’t watch horror movies in the theatre since that would make me lose too much sleep).

  • Repulsion, when the camera moves and in the mirror you suddenly see the face of a guy.
  • Vertigo, right at the end in the belltower, when a figure comes out of the shadows. A girl in the audience involuntarily let out a small scream when she saw that; I jumped up as well.

In The Changeling, there is a scene in which a realtor takes George C. Scott out to see a house. Scott is quietly standing outside looking up at it, when a tiny little window up on the third floor suddenly breaks, tinkling into pieces.
This is the only time I have ever been at a movie in which my husband involuntarily jumped out of his seat.

– Definitely that scene in the Ring with Katie’s corpse. I never, EVER hide my eyes in any movie but that scene made me keep my hands up by my face for the rest of the movie

– Jurassic Park when the T-Rex is chasing them in the truck in the beginning.

– Poltergeist when the tree broke through the window

– The Sixth Sense when the little girl grabs Cole from under the bed

It takes quite a lot to get me scared when it comes to movies, but this scene actually frightened me so much that I started crying and almost left the theatre.

That’s how badly it affected me.