#57 THE
EXORCIST (1973)
# 56 PSYCHO (1960)
SUBLIMINAL SCARES!
Perhaps one of the
scariest scenes in The Exorcist was a small scene that most people can't
even recall seeing. While Father Karras is walking up the stairs from a
subway, and has a vision of his mother, there's a single frame spliced in
with this scary face. You can barely notice it when you're watching the
film, but you get a strange chill when you do.
Alfred Hitchcock
employed a similar technique with Psycho, 13 years before. While the
camera fades away from the institutionalized Norman Bates at the end of
the film, you can see a skull superimposed onto his face for a couple
frames of film.
-Robert Berry
rberry@retrocrush.com
