The scene: A climax in the dark
Sensory deprivation has long been a part of some of the most terrifying sequences in horror film history; see, for example, the climax from Silence of the Lambs, highlighted in this list, or the two Don’t Breathe movies, or, in a kind of inverse of the idea, A Quiet Place and its sequel. All likely owe some debt to Wait Until Dark, the 1967 thriller about a recently blinded woman (Audrey Hepburn) who finds herself under siege in her New York apartment when a group of criminals begin casing the place to find a heroin-stuffed doll they believe is inside. (And yes, you read that right: Audrey Freaking Hepburn is an OG Scream Queen.) The movie’s finale, in which Hepburn’s Susy Hendrix is trapped inside her apartment with the criminals (and which features a jump scare for the ages), is a nerve-shattering crescendo for a movie Stephen King has described as among the scariest of all time.
