The five scariest scenes from movies that have nothing to do with horror
When going into a horror movie, we usually know what we’re in for.
Before we even hit play, we’re already feeling the anticipation – the calm before the storm, the pre-jumpscare nerves that linger in the hopes that whatever’s coming will be softened by the fact that we’re already expecting it. It doesn’t always work, and often we’re left peering at the screen through the gaps in our fingers anyway. But for the most part, we know what we’re in for.
The difference comes when we least expect it. With horrors, we’ve made a choice to immerse ourselves in creepy stories and atmospheres. We know what’s about to happen. But the worst and sometimes scariest scenes happen when we least expect them – when we’re watching something non-horror, relaxing in the false security of a safe genre, when something unexpected happens.
Most people, when they think of creepy scenes in non-horror movies, immediately think of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Or most of Requiem for a Dream, or that suspenseful build-up in The Green Mile. Some might think of the rippling glass of water in Jurassic Park, or Large Marge in Pee-wee’s Big Adventure. The point is, there are countless creepy surprises in films that it’s hard to remember them all, but the ones that stick with you, they’re lifers.
Some of them are scarier than some of the most horrifying scenes in actual horror movies. But that’s why they linger around like a bad smell – because they hit when your guard is down, burning images into your skull for the rest of time. Let’s take a look at some of the most ungodly of all time.
The five scariest scenes from non-horror movies:
The Child Catcher (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, 1968)
A character that creeps up on you at your most vulnerable, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’s Child Catcher has just about every nightmare-inducing quality imaginable – no matter your age. With a truly villainous look and a sinister presence, he roams the streets luring and locking up children, making him one of cinema’s most quietly terrifying figures.
What’s perhaps the most terrifying thing about the Child Catcher isn’t the literal presence of the character, however. What truly gets under your skin is when you start digging deeper into its symbolism, especially in a political setting, and the implications of a big, ominous presence that comes along and takes unwilling and innocent victims for no rhyme or reason.
The Boat Trip (Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, 1971)
A classic that wasn’t ever going to be left off a list like this one, the chocolate boat trip scene in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is one of the most iconic scenes in cinema history. It’s also naturally unsettling, enhanced by Wonka’s own psychological breakdown as we fall deeper and deeper into his whirling trap of dreams and technicolour.
It’s the image that stays with you, too. The visceral nature of the colours and images as they flash on the screen, the sinister nature of Wonka’s words as he slips further into insanity, saying, “So the danger must be growing. Are the fires of Hell a-glowing? Is the grisly reaper mowing? Yes, the danger must be growing…”
Other Mother (Coraline, 2009)
Most people would agree that Henry Selick’s 2009 animated masterpiece ought to be labelled as soft horror – or at the very least, something that hints at its chilling undertones beyond the polite tag of “gothic fantasy”. Even if Coraline doesn’t outright scare you, there’s something about its themes that lingers – that unsettling feeling of waking up in a world where everything looks the same, but feels ever so slightly, terrifyingly wrong.
The Other Mother’s real identity is enough to steal the show here, but it’s also the scene when she tells her daughter she’ll never leave, that she’s going to be trapped there forever, that feels especially disturbing. That, plus the fact that what ensues after Coraline throws the black cat at her is it ripping out the Mother’s button eyes – a scary concept no matter the setting.
The Ghost (Parasite, 2019)
Parasite is a masterpiece for many reasons. And it’s also pretty intense, too, especially as the atmosphere the entire time has been meticulously designed to keep you on your toes. The film experienced an impromptu resurgence around the same time that Emerald Fennel’s Saltburn was released to immense success, probably because of the thriller elements that make it difficult to predict how the movies are going to end.
But what makes Parasite more than just a thriller is how it tiptoes around horror elements with stark precision until you find yourself physically unable to look away. The creepiest moment is the scene when the kid sees the gruesome ghost as another means of manifesting the trauma in the unseen and the hidden, and how our minds catastrophise – often to a grotesque level – speaking to our instinctual dread that’s often hard to shake when you’re stuck in the crux of it.
The Wheelers (Return to Oz, 1985)
There’s almost absolutely nothing comforting about Walter Murch’s cursed 1985 classic Return to Oz. Anyone who was subjected to this as a kid will know what it’s like to live with the long-term haunt of just about everything wrong about this film, and everything wrong about the fact that it’s still on Disney+, traumatising legions of children to this day.
The worst, though, by far, is the scene with the Wheelers. On paper, they sound like the thing of nightmares – weird, part-human, part-bike beings with wheels for hands that come along and torment Dorothy with their sinister smiles and squeaky, echoey presence. There’s something liminal about the film’s atmosphere as a whole, but the moment the wheelers show up, you know you’ll never feel safe in the walls of a Disney movie ever again.
