Dick
Senior HTF Member
- Joined
- May 22, 1999
- Messages
- 9,937
- Real Name
- Rick
Wait - I don't mean scenes that SHOCKED YOU or scared you for a second or two. I mean the sequences that built slowly from a dead calm until they created such suspense you could barely stand it, and sustained that tension for a good bit of screen time. They needn't be action sequences with explosions and car chases. They certainly needn't be horror movies (see below). I'm talking those beautifully-constructed sequences that had you clutching your chair arms and almost talking out loud to the characters onscreen. My top choices:
1] The twenty-minute climax of BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI, following the discovery that the river has gone down during the night.
2] THE CHINA SYNDROME, again at the climax, as Jack Lemmon tries feverishly (and unsuccessfully) to explain for a live t.v. audience his fear that the nuclear power plant he works at is unsafe, even as a swat team tries to break in to shut him up.
3] PSYCHO - the sequence in which Lila Crane (Vera Miles) chooses to go to the cellar to hide from Norman Bates. We know she is in horrible danger, because Hitchcock has so beautifully set her up for it in two prior murders.
4] Icabod Crane's horse ride home at the end of ICABOD AND MR. TOAD (aka LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW portion of the Disney double-feature).
5] The nocturnal walk taken by Frances Dee through the tall reeds in Val Lewton's classic I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE.
6] A somewhat similar sequence (perhaps inspired by Lewton)
in SIGNS, as Mel Gibson investigates his cornfield armed only with a flashlight.
Your experiences?
1] The twenty-minute climax of BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI, following the discovery that the river has gone down during the night.
2] THE CHINA SYNDROME, again at the climax, as Jack Lemmon tries feverishly (and unsuccessfully) to explain for a live t.v. audience his fear that the nuclear power plant he works at is unsafe, even as a swat team tries to break in to shut him up.
3] PSYCHO - the sequence in which Lila Crane (Vera Miles) chooses to go to the cellar to hide from Norman Bates. We know she is in horrible danger, because Hitchcock has so beautifully set her up for it in two prior murders.
4] Icabod Crane's horse ride home at the end of ICABOD AND MR. TOAD (aka LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW portion of the Disney double-feature).
5] The nocturnal walk taken by Frances Dee through the tall reeds in Val Lewton's classic I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE.
6] A somewhat similar sequence (perhaps inspired by Lewton)
in SIGNS, as Mel Gibson investigates his cornfield armed only with a flashlight.
Your experiences?
