The Turkey Baster – Don’t Breathe
Is there a scene this year that has been more controversial than the turkey baster scene in Fede Alvarez’s amazing Don’t Breathe? When Rocky (Jane Levy, ever the trooper) is caught by the Blind Man (Steven Lang), he straps her into a harness and prepares to impregnate with her with a very large sample of his semen in a turkey baster. It’s grotesque. It’s shocking. It’s reprehensible. Some viewers deemed it a direction that the movie didn’t need to take, using sexual assault as a plot device. Did it exist solely for shock value? Probably, but we’re not here to debate the morality of including the scene in a film. We’re here to talk about how messed up it is. This list would not be complete without Don’t Breathe‘s sure-to-be-infamous turkey baster scene.
Care to Crack a Rib? – The Autopsy of Jane Doe
André Øvredal’s The Autopsy of Jane Doe is probably the closest most of us will ever come to seeing an actual autopsy on screen. The autopsy takes up a good chunk of the film and is tastefully done, but that doesn’t prevent it from being nauseating. The entire autopsy qualifies for this list, but if you had to single out one particular moment, it would be when Tommy (Brian Cox) uses a pair of pruning shears to crack open Jane Doe’s rib cage. You don’t see it, but you hear it. And that is more than enough to get the point across.
Beating Up Baby – The Witch
Why did people complain about there being a lack of horror in The Witch? A baby is mashed to a bloody pulp (off screen) and the titular hag bathes in its blood in the film’s first 20 minutes. The breastfeeding scene is also quite horrifying, but dead babies take precedent on a list like this.
Killer in the House – The Eyes of My Mother
Nicholas Pesce manages to fill all 77 minutes of his directorial debut with scenes that are alternately terrifying and heartbreaking. The film depicts the The obvious scene to pick from the film would be the one in which Francisca (Kika Magalhaes) kidnaps Lucy’s (Flora Diaz) baby, but it is the scene in which her Mother (Diana Agostini) lets a stranger (Will Brill) into her home. The results are appropriately appalling, but it is filmed with such finesse by Pesce that it becomes appallingly beautiful, if there is such a thing. Brill’s understated performance is what sells it, making him one of 2016’s scariest villains by a long shot.
Demon Revealed – The Wailing
Na Hong-jin’s The Wailing is a very, very long movie. The film’s 156 minute movie are deliberately paced and intricately plotted, always keeping you guessing. The final 30 minutes of the film are a barrage of revelations, the most disturbing of which is that *gasp* the Japanese man they suspected of being a demon all along actually was a demon! That may sound anticlimactic, but The Wailing excels at planting doubt in the viewer even when things seem most certain. The image of the demon’s true form is sure to stick with you long after the credits roll.
Which scenes from 2016 horror films disturbed you the most? Let us know in the comments below!
