What's your favorite suspense scene?
That moment you hold your breath.
Your muscles tighten,
and you can barely look at the screen.
"- Tell me! Tell me! Tell me!"
- In this video, we're going to break down
some fantastic suspenseful moments
to see how these filmmakers can put us on the edge of our seats with sound,
image,
and editing.
Welcome to "The Director's Playbook".
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We will be spoiling the following movies.
And graphic content lies ahead.
Let's jump in.
Suspense is generated when we anxiously wait for something to happen.
And there are three necessary ingredients.
Time. Stakes. And Uncertainty.
Time is how long we wait for the conclusion.
The stakes give the outcome weight.
And uncertainty informs our level of anticipation.
Every suspense scene is a balance between these components,
but these are mostly established on the page.
How can formal elements like sound, editing, and cinematography
be used to elevate each of these to generate suspense on the screen?
Let's find out, starting with sound.
Creating suspense with sound can be just as compelling
as cinematography or editing.
Sometimes a loud and chaotic sound design works best.
"- What the f*ck do you need a medical book for?
- I've never had to give an adrenalin shot before!
- You have never given an adrenaline shot? - I don't had to..."
- But you can also use quietness to elevate tension.
In this scene, a lack of sound and the simple act of quietly waiting puts us on edge.
Let's listen to the Oscar-nominated work from
sound designers Lon Bender and Victor Ray Ennis.
Driver agrees to help Standard
pull off what is thought to be a simple in-and-out robbery.
"- If I drive for you, you get your money.
You tell me where we start, where we're going, where we're going afterwards.
I give you five minutes when we get there.
Anything happens in that five minutes and I'm yours. No matter what.
Anything a minute, either side of that, and you're on your own.
Hey."
- As the scene begins, Driver sets the timeframe.
"- I see you in five minutes."
- We're surrounded by quiet.
"- See you in four."
- All we can hear are the tiniest sounds.
Clothing.
Birds.
Footsteps.
We can even hear crickets.
The door and the sign being flipped.
Traffic in the distance.
The low engine rumble.
A train horn in the distance.
The minimal sounds also give us no indication what's happening inside,
which sustains our uncertainty.
So far these are sounds that suggest stillness,
which is the opposite of the urgency we might expect.
But then the sound of Driver's ticking watch reminds us time is running out.
An offscreen sound draws Driver's attention.
A mysterious and unexpected arrival.
Normally a music cue would confirm that the situation has taken a negative turn,
but without music, the scene feels more dangerous, vulnerable, and real.
Driver doesn't react.
All we hear is the tightening of his leather glove.
A signal that the stakes are now raised, and we should be prepared for anything.
Blanche finally exits with money
and our uncertainty drops just a little.
But the sound makes is still painfully quiet.
The steady clop of her heels and the jangling of her bracelets.
Then as the camera pushes in
as tensions are at their peak
the ambient background sound slowly fades out.
Everything except for the ticking watch.
Now with the soundtrack nearly empty, we hold our breath,
setting us up for this.
The tension from the robbery hits an all-time high
and we're immediately thrown into a very different type of suspense.
A loud and thrilling chase.
In a scenario like this, we would typically see and hear
the robbery inside the shop.
Instead, we remain outside waiting and wondering
as the quietness juxtaposes our anxiety about how this robbery will turn out.
By focusing on the tiniest details of sound, the suspense becomes palpable.
For a deeper dive into how "Drive" create suspense with sound,
check out our previous video linked in the description.
In the following example, we look at how suspense is manufactured with editing.
It is the editor who controls time and film.
How long do we wait and what happens in the meantime?
"- No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no."
- Some scenes are edited with chaotic pacing.
While others draw out the suspense.
Let's look at a scene in John Carpenter's "The Thing" edited by Todd Ramsay
and see how the suspense is driven by the editing.
Researchers in Antarctica are terrorized by a shape-shifting creature
that is able to take human form and could wipe out humanity if allowed to escape.
As they conduct a blood test to find out which one of them is currently 'The Thing'
the scene begins with the highest stakes possible.
"- We're gonna draw a little bit of everybody's blood."
As McCreedy explains the test,
we slowly survey our suspects.
"- Maybe every part of him was a whole.
Every little piece as an individual animal.
With a built-in desire to protect its own life.
You see when a man bleeds,
it's just tissue.
The blood from one of you Things won't obey when it's attacked.
It'll try and survive.
Crawl away from a hot needle to say."
- This wider shot has all the suspects bunched together on one side
while McReedy holds all the power on the left.
But once the blood has been collected, Ramsey keeps the shot sizes
as tot and claustrophobic as possible.
He does this by prioritizing the three most essential elements in this scene.
The Petri dishes of blood.
Heating the wire.
And the faces of the men.
By keeping these elements in close-ups, we magnify their importance.
And by only editing between these close-ups,
we become completely focused on the task at hand.
This consistency of close-ups also provides a valuable benefit.
All of these men are potentially 'The Thing'
and to maximize the uncertainty
Ramsey gives us no clue as to who it might be.
Each character is given the same close-up
and it is up to the viewer to decide who it might be.
Windows is tested first.
And Ramsey stretches out the time in the edit.
"- That's good.
All right, move back, over there."
- Over the next 30 seconds,
13 cuts delay the result and keep us on edge.
30 seconds is a long time to wait.
But the extra cuts, elevate our anticipation,
making the weight feel even longer.
Once Windows passes the test,
a wider medium shot of McCreedy gives us a moment to breathe as he resets.
"- I guess you're okay.
All right. Put that on and watch them."
- The testing continues by repeating the same pattern of shots.
Blood.
Wire.
Reactions.
With each negative test, our anticipation grows.
"- Then Clark was human, huh?
Which makes you a murderer, don't it?
- Palmer now."
- As McCreedy prepares to test Palmer, Gary speaks up.
"- This is pure nonsense. It doesn't prove a thing."
Distracting us just enough before this.
"- I thought you'd feel that way, Gary.
You were the only one that could have got to that blood.
We'll do you last."
- One of the best jump scares in a horror film
that leads directly into insanity and chaos?
"- What is it?"
- Suspense replaced with terror.
With minimal sound design, a static camera, and no music
the editing keeps us locked into this moment.
The pacing is calm.
But the shots are all claustrophobic
giving the audience ample time to try and guess
which of these men isn't who they say they are.
Besides sound and editing
let's move on to our final techniques using cinematography.
The imagery itself is yet another way to generate suspense.
Low lit scene raises our uncertainty.
A handheld camera heightens the panic.
While a slow steady camera creeps up from behind.
Cinematography drives the suspense in the basement scene in "Zodiac".
Shot by the late great Harris Savides.
In the scene Graysmith is interviewing
Mr. Vaughn about his connection to Rick Marshall,
a lead Zodiac suspect.
"- The poster that Rick drew.
The handwriting is the closest that we have ever come to a match."
- But then Graysmith discovers that Mr. Vaughn himself might be the killer he's after.
"- Rick didn't draw any posters.
- No, he drew this one.
- Mr. Graysmith.
I do the posters myself.
- That's my handwriting."
- In the beginning, the lighting is more or less even,
and the camera frames the characters in neutral medium and medium close up shots.
But then the scene turns.
What was a completely innocent situation has just become Graysmith's nightmare.
To amplify this, we get a much more claustrophobic framing.
"- It's not a problem.
Just down in the basement."
- We see Graysmith in closeup as Vaughn looms behind him.
Framing that clearly indicates how much the stakes have been raised.
"- Not many people have basements in California."
- Graysmith turns into another closeup.
But now the high contrast lighting accents his growing fear.
In the reverse shot, a low-angle of Vaughn lit from below
presents him as the imposing threat he has now assumed to be.
"- I do.
Come in, Mr. Graysmith."
- Graysmith follows him into the basement,
which is lit with naked light bulbs,
creating limited lighting and deep shadows.
The camera leads Vaughn and follows Graysmith deeper into the room.
And possible danger.
And the slowness of the camera movement draws out the time.
A sound draws his attention up to the ceiling.
"- You live alone?"
- Typically a low angle shot gives the subject a sense of power or authority,
but in this case, it brings the ceiling on top of him, trapping him.
"- Most Dangerous Game ran in May '69.
So, that would be about
nine weeks before the first Zodiac letter, correct?"
- Now, instead of under lit Vaughn is lit from above keeping his eyes in the shadows.
"- Uh, yeah."
- Vaughn steps back into the darkness, obscuring himself completely
and raising our uncertainty to new heights.
"- Do you think he saw the film in our theater and was inspired?
Graysmith hears another sound above and the camera pushes in tightening the pressure.
"- Are you sure there's nobody else in the house?
- Would you like to go upstairs and check?
- No.
Thank you.
Thanks for everything."
- The camera slowly retreats from Vaughn
as he turns out the light.
Graysmith too makes his retreat.
The camera quickly tilts some pans with him to match his panic.
And in typical horror film framing, Vaughn suddenly appears
capping off a nerve-wracking scene with one final scare.
"- It's locked."
- As Graysmith's fear grows,
the lighting on Vaughn becomes more and more sinister.
The framing and angles become more claustrophobic.
And the subtle camera movements accent his panic.
All to generate one of the most suspenseful scenes in the film.
No matter which techniques you use in a suspense scene,
it's helpful to use a shot list or storyboard to map it out.
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"- The suspense is terrible.
I hope it will last."