Steven Spielberg has made no secret of the fact that one of his most influential filmmaking idols is Alfred Hitchcock, who is commonly nicknamed “the Master of Suspense.” Whether he’s making a movie about the wrath of a 25-foot great white shark or a soon-to-be-opened dinosaur-infested theme park, Spielberg always takes full advantage of the endless possibilities provided by cinematography, editing, and music to create as much suspense as possible.
This has made him one of the most prominent and popular directors working in Hollywood over the past 50 years. So, here are the 10 most suspenseful sequences from Spielberg’s filmography.
10 Voting On The Thirteenth Amendment (Lincoln)
Steven Spielberg is such a masterful filmmaker that even when the outcome of a scene is a well-known historical fact, he can still keep you on the edge of your seat.
And even when a scene essentially boils down to each U.S. state voting “yes” or “no” on whether or not an amendment to the Constitution will pass, it’s riveting. So much is at stake — the end of both the Civil War and slavery in the United States — that the vote is a nail-biting sequence.
9 The Truck Chase (Duel)
Steven Spielberg got the gig directing Jaws, a movie about a shark’s relentless hunt, after Universal executives saw his made-for-TV movie Duel, about a truck’s relentless hunt.
Throughout the movie, David Mann is pursued by a mysterious Peterbilt 281 tanker truck. The film culminates in a terrifying chase in which the truck mercilessly comes after Mann.
8 The UFOs Surround The House (Close Encounters Of The Third Kind)
When the UFOs surround the house in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, there’s a bright, ethereal, orange light glowing through the windows and the keyhole in the front door. While Jillian frantically locks the doors and cowers in the kitchen, her three-year-old son Barry curiously approaches the front door, and opens it to invite in the alien visitors.
This scene exemplifies Spielberg’s ongoing cinematic portrait of the innocence of children. The light of the UFOs could signify danger, or it could signify something wondrous. The adults only see the risk of danger, whereas the child has a sense of wonder.
7 The Mine Cart Chase (Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom)
The Indiana Jones team had originally conceived the mine cart chase set piece for Raiders of the Lost Ark, but they couldn’t find a place for it, so they saved it for the sequel.
The sequence is breathtakingly cinematic, with mine carts zipping around the rails at breakneck speed, and teetering over pits of lava on every sharp bend.
6 The Rome Assassination (Munich)
Steven Spielberg doesn’t often make gritty, violent movies, but when he does, the violence is brilliantly shot. This can be seen in Munich, Spielberg’s dramatization of the Israeli government’s response to the 1972 Summer Olympics massacre.
When one of the massacre’s conspirators is tracked down to Rome, where he’s living as a poet, Avner Kaufman and his team head down there to kill him. The build-up to the scene is intense, as we know what’s coming, and the final death blow is so blunt and brutal.
5 Celie Shaves Mister (The Color Purple)
Celie initially doesn’t hear Mister’s calls to shave him because she’s swept up in a book. He beats her before handing her a straight razor and forcing her to shave his face. Mister tells Celie, “You cut me and I’ll kill you,” but we can see in her eyes that she’s seriously considering slitting his throat with the razor and ending the abuse.
The audience is on the edge of their seats through the whole scene. Shug manages to stop Celie from killing Mister, but she stands up to him in a later scene instead.
4 The Prisoner Exchange (Bridge Of Spies)
The prisoner exchange is the culmination of Bridge of Spies’ conflict. The U.S. government has captured Soviet spy Rudolf Abel, and the Soviets have captured CIA pilot Gary Powers. American lawyer James Donovan travels to Berlin to broker the exchange, and it’s incredibly tense.
The scene was actually shot on the Glienicke Bridge — whose nickname, “Bridge of Spies,” provided the title for the movie — where the prisoner exchange really happened in 1962.
3 Indy Escapes From The Temple (Raiders Of The Lost Ark)
In the opening sequence of Raiders of the Lost Ark, we’re introduced to Indiana Jones — one of the greatest icons in the history of cinema — in the most suspenseful, action-packed way possible. Indy infiltrates an ancient temple, steals an artifact, thinks he’s gotten away with it scot free...before the temple starts to collapse.
Indy outruns the booby traps, but falls into a chasm as he tries to jump across it. The vine he holds onto starts to break, and the only door out of there is quickly closing. Indy manages to escape at the last second, and then a boulder starts tumbling towards him.
2 “Get Out Of The Water!” (Jaws)
As a whole, Jaws is a masterclass in Hitchcockian suspense-building, but it’s most prominent in the beach scene. When Mayor Vaughn refuses to close the beach in the wake of a shark attack, Chief Brody watches the shore, anxious that something terrible will happen.
Spielberg makes spectacular use of in-camera techniques like a split diopter shot to build the tension. And then, when the shark finally strikes, we get that iconic dolly zoom on Brody’s face, exemplifying his terrified reaction.
1 Raptors In The Kitchen (Jurassic Park)
There are some extremely tense set pieces in Jurassic Park, but none are more frightening than the scene in which Lex and Tim are hunted through the kitchen by a bunch of velociraptors. The visual effects in Jurassic Park hold up surprisingly well today, considering how primitive the technology was, and this particular scene is filled with inventive camera angles.
For example, the shot of Lex desperately trying to close the cabinet she’s hiding in as a raptor charges at it, though it turns out to have been charging at a reflection.
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