The 14 Scariest Moments In Non-Horror Movies

There's a time and a place for scares. We've paid our money and have earned our right to jump out of our seats at least twice during a typical horror movie. But what happens when frightening moments catch us off guard? Even children's films have jump scares; these days, no type of movie is really safe.

Villains who belong in the most X-rated of horrors, yet somehow show up in family-friendly movies. Those "Did you see that?" moments that make you look incredulously at the person sitting next to you. Stunned silence or nervous scared laughter that ripples across a cinema audience, reaching all the way to full-on existential dread that lingers long after the credits have finished rolling. Here are some moments of cinematic horror where you absolutely didn't expect them. So, dim the lights (but not too much — you never know what's hiding in the shadows) and let's go...

Aside from a brief introduction while robbing a Gotham Bank owned by the mob, this is our first proper introduction to Heath Ledger's Joker. He appears, uninvited, in the middle of a mob meeting, placing a pencil vertically on the table, tip pointing towards the ceiling. A roomful of disbelieving and accusing eyes stare back at him, nonplussed. "How about a magic trick?" the Joker asks.

Signaled by his boss, a lackey moves to approach the Joker. In a practiced and elegant single move, Joker pushes the man's head propelled towards the pencil. The dead lackey falls out of sight, pencil presumably embedded well and truly in his eye socket. "Ta-da! It's... gone!"

Bloodless and swift, with the only immediate effect being a roomful of temporarily stunned mobsters and a similarly stunned cinema audience. A microcosm of the Joker in a single part of a single scene: unpredictable and psychopathic. After all, isn't showbiz all about making an entrance?

Oddjob, Jaws, Auric Goldfinger, Francesco Scaramanga, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, and the Child Catcher — all members of that hallowed elite pantheon of movie villains adapted from Ian Fleming books.

Sprite of limb, crooked of nose, and black of heart, the Child Catcher, villain of the proto-"Fast and Furious" movie "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang," is a terrifying presence. But, much like Ash has a certain admiration for the Xenomorph in "Alien," one has to respect the Child Catcher's commitment to the role. With that nom de guerre, there's no messing about. His name is both a title and a mission statement, a role this terrifying lank-haired specter pulls off with aplomb. Neat wheels too: an extravagant fairground carriage that can Optimus-Prime itself into a cage to hold his victims.

Played by dancer Robert Helpmann (who, naturally, was quite caring in real life), the Child Catcher cuts a devilish figure, his black suit and top hat disguised by gaudy ribbons and a colorful coat. Like the Pied Piper, the Child Catcher lures "kiddie-winkies" to their doom, albeit using candies and lollipops. With his penchant for sweets, he's the nemesis of both young children and dentistry; Roald Dahl and Ian Fleming have a lot to apologize for.

Purists might argue that the most horrific thing about "Superman 3" is that it was the start of the rot for Christopher Reeve's Man of Steel, but I'll instead highlight a particular moment that gave this writer nightmares for years.  As evidenced by the presence of comedic legend Richard Pryor, the humor in "Superman 3" is a lot more pronounced than in the two preceding movies. Whereas the first two "Superman" films have a lighthearted touch and a playful irreverence, this movie feels like a comedy vehicle for Pryor that just happens to feature a blue-suited red-caped Kryptonian as the straight man.

So, a certain moment in the final act comes completely out of the blue. When poor Lex Luthor substitute Ross Webster's supercomputer becomes self-aware, preventing any attempts to deactivate it, Webster's sister, Vera, tries to escape. A flurry of sparks halts her in her tracks, and the computer tractor beams her into the machine's wiry innards.

To young impressionable minds, what follows is as traumatic as that scene in the uncut "Evil Dead". Vera screams as metal panels are welded to her face, arms and hands, the ghastly noise only ceasing when a panel is grafted over her jaw. They open again, transformed into unblinking spheres of silver, and Vera is reduced to a cybernetic extension of the super-computer. 

It's okay, though. There's a funny bit where Richard Pryor pretends that he can fly later on, which makes it all better, right? 

Many groups of friends have somebody like Joe Pesci's Tommy DeVito — someone who's funny and confident, but is plagued by insecurity. However, few of them are as flawed as Tommy; he's also unbalanced, entitled, and possesses a hair trigger temper.

In a film already casually spattered with dark moments, Tommy DeVito's big rant in the restaurant is a standout. He's telling a story that causes the assembled throng to collapse in laughter, and fellow mobster Henry makes the casual remark that DeVito is a funny guy. Tommy's face drops as he demands to know what Henry means. "I'm funny how?" he growls.

The mood and tempo change instantly, the music softening and the tension between the men palpably growing. Tommy's protestations go on uncomfortably long, as a terrified Henry tries to talk his friend down, eventually gathering enough nerve to tell him to go forth and multiply. Tommy smiles a wise-cracking grin, and the tension is released like the air from an over-inflated balloon. He was joking all along. It's just a single scene, but it's a masterclass in storytelling, telling you all you need to know about Tommy. Still, you'd be forgiven for forgetting to breathe during the 90 seconds the scene takes to unfold.

The Star Trek universe is a relatively bloodless one, unless you count the floating lavender globules of Klingon plasma in "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country." So, moments of true horror in Trek are not only few and far between, but memorable when they do rarely appear.

The Ceti Eels in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" are nightmare fuel, tiny little chitinous creatures that enjoy nothing more than burrowing into ears and wrapping themselves around a lovely cerebral cortex. This has the side effect of making the poor victim susceptible to suggestion, and eventually causes madness and an agonizing death.

Khan uses the eels against two crewmembers of the USS Reliant, Captain Terrell and Commander Pavel Chekov, placing the hungry bugs into their respective helmets before putting them back on. It's excruciating, watching the tiny nightmare crawling along a helpless Chekov's cheek before it slowly crawls across his lobe and into his open ear canal. He's screaming for the entire duration, only silenced when the tiny thing's hugging his brain like a long-lost friend.

Putting aside the very concept of the Oompa-Loompas, who seem to have a well-choreographed dance routine prepared for every form of accident in the chocolate factory — how sinister is that? – no list of unexpected horror moments would be complete without this one. Roald Dahl was equally as complicit as Walt Disney in terrifying young minds — the witches reveal in "The Witches" and the bad giants in "BFG" to name but two — but very few kids' movies have a scene in which a live chicken is decapitated.

Willie Wonka, man-child, sociopathic narcissist, and owner of the titular chocolate factory, takes the children on a boat ride into the center of his operation. What should have been a sedate meander down the river ends up as the child-oriented equivalent of "Apocalypse Now," only rather than meeting Colonel Kurtz at the other end the kids are confronted with a variety of factory rooms that don't even begin to meet health and safety regulations.

As the boat increases in speed, Wonka singing his inane song the whole time, hellish imagery flickers on the walls, including cockroaches, eyeballs, and the aforementioned chicken; it's like something from Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights, only with more artificial coloring and sweetener. Who would ever have suspected that the river Styx was made of chocolate?

In the '80s, we were constantly reminded that nuclear bombs would kill us. Television ads, leaflets pushed through our doors, and every news headline delivered the news. Our entertainment did, too. American adults had "The Day After," a TV movie about a nuclear attack on the US, and the UK had "Threads," a drama that showed the effect of a nuclear strike on Sheffield. But those aired late at night, and were clearly intended for an adult audience.

And then there was "When the Wind Blows," a 1986 animated film that follows an adorable elderly couple, Jim and Hilda, who live in rural England. We see their daily lives as their transistor radio reports on increasing tensions between Russia and the US. Jim and Hilda attempt to build a bomb shelter, and their efforts verge on the comical. Hilda's naivety is particularly adorable; they survived World War II with pluck and stiff British upper lips. Why should World War III be any different?

And then the missiles fly and fall, and we witness the aftermath. The lovely grandparents stagger from their ramshackle shelter into the irradiated smog, drinking contaminated water from their taps. We watch in horror as their gums bleed, their hair falls out, and they start to run out of food, all in the ruins of their once-lovely cottage, which is now engulfed in permanent darkness. Good night, kids! Sleep well.