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Originally Posted by neverending
Perhaps part of the problem here is equating a jump with being scared. They're not the same thing at all.
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I totally agree! I do think that jump scares used in moderation and in appropriate scenes can be used as a tool to make a scary scene even more scary - but they are not scary on their own. They're not going to stay with you once they're done - unlike those truly scary scenes that you will think back on years later. I've heard some people say that they find them physically unpleasant, but that's not the same thing either.
Quote:
Originally Posted by neverending
Getting someone in a movie audience to jump is really quite easy- it's just mechanics, and has nothing to do with plot or characters, and actually instilling a feeling of dread in a viewer. This is a major problem with both modern horror films and horror audiences.
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Again I agree - but to be fair, some jumps are actually pretty cleverly done. As a life-long horror fan, I can predict most of the jumps before they happen. But sometimes, if they are totally unexpected, they can be pretty effective.
One scene that comes to mind is one in the original Spanish version of REC - where that body suddenly drops from the top of the stairs, and you absolutely didn't see it coming. That combined with the fact that the image itself was disturbing and that, at least to me, the movie was quite scary, made that jump scare work very well.