Essay On “Suspense In Horror Films“

9 Pages 2292 Words

English Essay
suspense in film!


I have been studying two films "Scream" by Wes Craven and "Psycho" by Alfred Hitchcock.
I will be looking at how both directors created the suspense to entertain the audience. Both of these films are examples from the horror genre. I have been analysing the "shower scene" in Psycho and the "Casey Becker scene" in Scream.
Alfred Hitchcock was born 13th August 1899, in London. He was a famous director, who based his career on making suspense films. He was also known as "Master of suspense".
His example of a suspense situation is by placing a bomb underneath a table. This is a good example because it uses dramatic irony, because the audience knows what is about to happen, that the bomb is about to go off, so it builds up the climax and gives out the suspense.
Wes Craven was born August 3rd 1939 in Cleveland, Ohio, in the United States. He has made numerous horror films, such as "Nightmare on Elm Street", "Shocker" and "People under the stairs". Due to this, he has now become known as "Fright Master"!
Psycho was one of the most famous films ever made. In this film Alfred Hitchcock has used many different camera shots to create the ultimate feeling of suspense for the audience.
The "shower scene" is very famous due to all the editing.
The scene starts when Marion arrives at the Bates Motel. Everything seems normal at the start, but things slowly start to change.
When Marion asks for a room, Norman reaches for a key, but his hand movement is quite suspicious because, he first reaches for cabin "3", but moves his hand back to reach for number "1" instead. By choosing cabin 1, Norman seems to have already doomed Marion to death. By letting Marion stay in cabin 1, he knows that he will be able to spy on her.
When Marion steps into Norman’s "Parlour", she is confronted by lots of stuffed birds on the wall. The birds are exp...