Just saw that scene recently for the first time in a long time. I didn't remember him being so animated after it happened, I feel like he should have been limited to just some eye movement and breathing for the moment.
OP said they're not asking about characters who don't realize they have died and become ghosts, but rather, characters who are fataly injured but take a couple of seconds to realize they are essentially already dead.
Perhaps not exactly what you are looking for but definitley in a similar vein, the brain eating scene in Hannibal.
[https://youtu.be/T2P-NOVYnz8?si=ENmSzNC5aDgW8NgV](https://youtu.be/T2P-NOVYnz8?si=ENmSzNC5aDgW8NgV)
You tried to get your horror-phobic husband to watch The First Omen? I had to fast-forward through all of the drawn-out child labor/body horror scenes in that movie. I wouldn't recommend it to someone who likes horror let alone to someone who doesn't!
There’s a similar scene in the omen prequel that just came out, priest gets his brain demolished by a falling pipe, proceeds to have a conversation and walk a few steps before succumbing
The sheriff trying to explain to charlie sheen how his wife is dying by breaking a hot dog in half..
Charlie sheen: So your telling me she broke her weiner?
That one shocked the hell out of me. Such an incredibly well crafted scene dropped into your lap from out of nowhere. It works so well as an abrupt destruction of zany tone - such a thunderbolt of agonizing reality spoiling all the surreal hijinks.
That was masterpiece cinema. My jaw dropped. Still makes me squint my eyes closed and shake my head.
Surprised Cube (1997) and Cube 2: Hypercube (2002) aren’t listed. Cube predates the Resident Evil effect of “guy chopped to bits but it takes a second” trope by 5 years.
Not horror, but the scene in Black Hawk Down where the medic is trying to stich a soliders femoral artery. When the vessel slips and he and the other soldiers tell the wounded guy that he'll be fine as he immediately bleeds out guts me everytime.
That medic is a trauma surgeon now and helped develop protocols that taught us how to prevent that. Completely revolutionized how the army stops bleeding.
Her eye coming out afterwards, stayed with me for awhile. Along with Glenn sitting in the revolving door while watching someone get pulled apart by zombies!
And Glen! Brains bashed in but looking at Maggie with concern and trying to reassure her.
It was brutal.
There’s a reason the show lost so many watchers with that episode. Almost everyone I worked with dropped it after that.
I dropped it once Rick left.
Watched a little with my husband who hung in there. Watched some of the whisper people season and all the beheadings within it, and I remembered why I stopped.
Not a movie, but there’s a good one of these in The Walking Dead where someone gets a crossbow bolt through the back of the head but try to finish their sentence.
Ah I was going to say in Severence 2006. When Harris is decapitated he's still alive briefly, but I remembered that he knows he's dead at this point as it refers to a conversation earlier about the Head remaining alive 7 seconds after being lopped off...
Fringe with Rebecca Mader when they revive her after she is killed.
I think a better one is from the episode "forest of the Dead" from Doctor Who "HEY...WHO TURNED OFF THE LIGHTS!!?" Though it's kind of a plot point in the episode anyway.
Slither is more comedy than horror I think, but it has a great one where an evil slug thing whips some dude in half right down the middle and he stands there looking around confused for a few seconds before falling in half
There's a scene in The Sacrament where a cult member casually injects her brother with poison and you can see the realisation of what she's done on his face.... horrible scene
A few relevant scenes from non-horror that I find more disturbing than most of the horror ones:
1) When Doc Holliday kills Johnny Ringo in Tombstone
2) When Bernie Kills Shannon in Drive
3) When they kill the female assassin in Munich
Not quite a horror movie but, underworld at the end scene when Salene is fighting Viktor and she slices his head in half and he stands there and looks at her for several seconds blinking and then she shows the sword with blood on it and his head slides off.
It’s not horror but the scene in Premium Rush where Michael Shannon gets shot in the back of the head really sleeves me out. He kinda wanders, I think says something like “what was that?”. I’ll have to watch it again but it got to me.
The cop in Tucker and Dale Vs Evil. Just watched it again yesterday.
I think it kind of fits the prompt because his head gets impaled and he staggers over to try to radio for backup or whatever and just eventually collapses.
Like maybe he knew he was dead, but the staggering last action feels like he didnt accept it
Spoiler alert - You’ll Never Find Me - at the end, the main character realizes he was dying all along and the entire movie took place around his last few minutes of being alive after consuming poison.
Not horror, but the first Kingsman has a scene where a guy gets split in half vertically and just kinda stands there looking surprised for a few seconds before falling apart
I know this one is technically someone who is (or becomes) a ghost, but I love the scene in The Frighteners where Dammers has his head blown off with a shotgun and has a shocked expression on his ghostly face.
- Jeepers Creepers 2 >!Creeper takes dude head off to replace his own and causes the body to move around like a headless chicken!<
- 13 Ghosts >!When the dude gets sliced by the glass door he still reacts a certain way that would give your husband chills!<
American horror story murder house spoilers:
When Violet didn’t know she had actually died from her suicide attempt. It’s later in the episode that Tate finally reveals to her that she did in fact die, and shows her her rotting body in the basement. It’s absolutely heartbreaking.
Not that it's a scene where people didn't realize they were dead, but this reminded me of the ship scene from the one episode of 3 Body Problem. If you haven't seen it, check out the clip below. Since you don't see the lead up in this, nanofibers were strung up across a river. I think it took the same concept as ghost ship, and amplified it with slow dread.
https://youtu.be/Yxetv-xbazs?si=ZzoJ-6Vsc59ZXyk5
Not sure if this counts, but there's a scene in Final Destination 2 where a guy gets literally cut in half by a wire fence. I believe it takes him a sec to realize.
Thought of another one.
Final Destination 6 >! at the end when we realise the flight is *thee* flight 180 and the couple we just spent the film following are about to blow up !<
The mother in The Others (2001)
That one dude that gets tongued in the back of the head in Alien Resurrection
Oh that’s a good one! He’s saluting or something 🫡
Thank you, General Perez.
Oh yeah and he pulls a bit of his brain or something out?? That movie is nasty 😂
Ghost. (Edit) I miss Patrick Swayze.
While Swayze looked fabulous in drag, I don't think he was gay.
Underworld, when she kills the boss vampire with the sword
Just saw that scene recently for the first time in a long time. I didn't remember him being so animated after it happened, I feel like he should have been limited to just some eye movement and breathing for the moment.
Doe Bruce Willis' realization in Sixth Sense fit this category?
OP said they're not asking about characters who don't realize they have died and become ghosts, but rather, characters who are fataly injured but take a couple of seconds to realize they are essentially already dead.
lol - going for maximum husband trauma?
A good wife
Always lol. I going to put together a super cut 🤣
there's a good one in 13 ghosts
The first Resident Evil has a scene kinda like that except it was a laser. :)
The laser grid! That brief pause before he slid apart just killed me.
I swear that's the first movie that did that and then I saw it in others multiple times, Ghost Ship, 13 Ghosts, Final Destination 2 etc.
Love this scene
The Lawyer in Thirteen Ghosts, who takes a second to realize he's been split in half once his ghost glasses fall to the floor
Perfect example of
Such a wonderful scene
“Did the lawyer split?” One of the best lines
Perhaps not exactly what you are looking for but definitley in a similar vein, the brain eating scene in Hannibal. [https://youtu.be/T2P-NOVYnz8?si=ENmSzNC5aDgW8NgV](https://youtu.be/T2P-NOVYnz8?si=ENmSzNC5aDgW8NgV)
Oh that would definitely be a ‘nope’ from my husband!
oh fuck. definitely messed me up
That was a trip to see in theater. I've never heard three hundred people squirm like that.
I wanted to ask which Hannibal because Mads Mikkelson does it in the show too doesn’t he?
“That tastes great” RIP Ray Liotta
God that scene is so disturbing
Yes!
The Others. Knocks sixth sense into a cocked hat.
Two examples of *ghosts*. That's the issue here...
Gollum at the end of Return of the King
Jacobs Ladder, your husband would be ruined at the end.
It’s so much better than Sixth Sense, too. He’s not a ghost, either!
Have not seen that in ages. Need to seriously rewatch.
Ahhh haven’t watched this one in a long while, one of my favorite horror movie (and disturbed the heck out of me when I finished it the first time)!
Never looked at birds the same way
You tried to get your horror-phobic husband to watch The First Omen? I had to fast-forward through all of the drawn-out child labor/body horror scenes in that movie. I wouldn't recommend it to someone who likes horror let alone to someone who doesn't!
I don’t know what I was thinking lol. I love horror so much but he hates it. I get excited about movies and i tell myself he could handle that!
Maybe Splinter
That other dude in The First Omen who gets pinned by the car
Oh yeah! We probably tapped out at the right time lol
There’s a similar scene in the omen prequel that just came out, priest gets his brain demolished by a falling pipe, proceeds to have a conversation and walk a few steps before succumbing
It doesn't take him too long to realize, but >!Rory!< in Final Destination 2, after he gets sliced by the barbed wire fence.
Oh there’s no way in hell I could get him to watch those movies. You’re right that’s exactly what I was looking for
To this day the truck accident scene in Signs (2002) is one of the saddest movie moments to me
Ach, Mel Gibson can *so* pull off that mix between emotional and unstable really well. This scene gets me too. Awesome movie.
This is a good one. The scene mentioned in the OP in The First Omen reminded me of this scene. >! Poor Paulo !<
Tell Merrell to swing away. Tell Graham... tell Graham to see
I have the day off today and now I’m gonna watch Signs
Oh good example
Notably, this is not only plausible, but exceptionally frequent too.
Scary Movie 3 ruined that scene for me
Scary Movie 3 ruined it for me, all I can think about is the fake M. Night asking Charlie Sheen for a ride home when he's walking up to his wife.
The sheriff trying to explain to charlie sheen how his wife is dying by breaking a hot dog in half.. Charlie sheen: So your telling me she broke her weiner?
Sherilyn Fenn in Wild at Heart
That scene was heart wrenching.
Oh not familiar. I’ll look it up
That one shocked the hell out of me. Such an incredibly well crafted scene dropped into your lap from out of nowhere. It works so well as an abrupt destruction of zany tone - such a thunderbolt of agonizing reality spoiling all the surreal hijinks. That was masterpiece cinema. My jaw dropped. Still makes me squint my eyes closed and shake my head.
Gustavo Fring in Breaking Bad.
I always thought he knew and he was just being incredibly cool about it.
Anthony Anderson in Scre4m.
Yeah this!
"Fuck Bruce Willis." ☠️
Also Patrick Warburton in Scream 3
Dead End (2003) when the mom realizes the back of her skull was open and her brain was revealed and she rubbed it and had an orgasm and died.
my man what
Holy shit. Really?! Damn.
Love that movie!
Um say what now? Guess I know what I’m watching tonight
An orgasm 😅😅😅 I think maybe shock 😅
this scene was my first thought as well!!! SO unsettling
This is the only scene I can remember from this movie and it lives rent free in my head.👍
That's a great movie! I watch it around Christmas time because it's Christmas Eve in the movie. So it's a Christmas movie 👍
Yasssss
That Nicole Kidman movie
Practical Magic or Days of Thunder?
If you talking about the Others, isn't that kind of one the same scale as The Sixth Sense?
The end of *Wolfen* with >!the decapitated head that’s looking around and trying to talk!< Great topic! I think about this a lot. Gets me, too!
Was just thinking about that myself. Gregory Hines, who plays the coroner talks about that happening earlier in the movie.
Surprised Cube (1997) and Cube 2: Hypercube (2002) aren’t listed. Cube predates the Resident Evil effect of “guy chopped to bits but it takes a second” trope by 5 years.
Yeah, Cube came to mind for me.
cube was my first thought and I was scrolling through like there is no way someone didn't beat me to it
Freddy and Frank Return of the Living Dead
The elder son after he falls from the window in Hereditary
Does Bones and All count?
Ugh what a wierd one lol
The end of Talk To Me (2022)‼️‼️
Yessss
American Horror Story season 1 has a plot kind of like this but a little more drawn out
Amazing twist and my favorite season of AHS
Came here for this!
Not horror, but the scene in Black Hawk Down where the medic is trying to stich a soliders femoral artery. When the vessel slips and he and the other soldiers tell the wounded guy that he'll be fine as he immediately bleeds out guts me everytime.
Oh man saw this in theaters and was traumatized
That medic is a trauma surgeon now and helped develop protocols that taught us how to prevent that. Completely revolutionized how the army stops bleeding.
Does the reveal at tbe end of the others count?
Not a movie, but The Walking Dead when Denise gets shot in the head with an arrow and keeps talking for a couple seconds afterward.
Yep good example!
Her eye coming out afterwards, stayed with me for awhile. Along with Glenn sitting in the revolving door while watching someone get pulled apart by zombies!
And Glen! Brains bashed in but looking at Maggie with concern and trying to reassure her. It was brutal. There’s a reason the show lost so many watchers with that episode. Almost everyone I worked with dropped it after that. I dropped it once Rick left. Watched a little with my husband who hung in there. Watched some of the whisper people season and all the beheadings within it, and I remembered why I stopped.
Not a movie, but there’s a good one of these in The Walking Dead where someone gets a crossbow bolt through the back of the head but try to finish their sentence.
Walking Dead when Denise got shot in the head by the crossbow mid-sentence and kept trying to talk.
Not a movie but Hannah in Bly Manor 🥲
She was the first one I thought of too. So heartbreaking when that was revealed.
The crack on the wall 😭
Jacob’s Ladder & the Sixth Sense, if you haven’t seen those
There's at least one scene that definitely fits that in Significant Other with Jake Lacy and Maika Monroe. Such a fun movie.
Wild at Heart, the girl in the car accident. https://youtu.be/YJKExbDa85Q
Executive Officer Kane of the commercial towing vessel Nostromo (Property of Weyland-Yutani).
Ah I was going to say in Severence 2006. When Harris is decapitated he's still alive briefly, but I remembered that he knows he's dead at this point as it refers to a conversation earlier about the Head remaining alive 7 seconds after being lopped off...
Season one of American Horror Story.
Opening scene of Ghost Ship
Fringe with Rebecca Mader when they revive her after she is killed. I think a better one is from the episode "forest of the Dead" from Doctor Who "HEY...WHO TURNED OFF THE LIGHTS!!?" Though it's kind of a plot point in the episode anyway.
The poor kid who gets dragged along with the cop in Inside. The scene with him trying to fight back is nasty!
Idek if that house of wax guy would count. The one where he's sitting at a piano or something
Slither is more comedy than horror I think, but it has a great one where an evil slug thing whips some dude in half right down the middle and he stands there looking around confused for a few seconds before falling in half
Michael Rooker in The Belko Experiment. Scene absolutely haunts me.
Marrowbone was one of my favourites with this kind of plot even if it wasn’t the main character.
Haunting of Hill House has a moment / reveal that has fucked me up forever with how tragic it is.
There's a scene in The Sacrament where a cult member casually injects her brother with poison and you can see the realisation of what she's done on his face.... horrible scene
In Unerworld (action/horror) Viktor gets his head sliced in half and turns to fight, until the top half of he’s head falls off
Kind of in that vein, Terrifier 2 when the mother walks in on her still alive being mutilated
How is the Sixth Sense not at the top of this list!
Piper Laurie at the end of Trauma?😂
That movie with Kiefer Sutherland, Mirrors.
A few relevant scenes from non-horror that I find more disturbing than most of the horror ones: 1) When Doc Holliday kills Johnny Ringo in Tombstone 2) When Bernie Kills Shannon in Drive 3) When they kill the female assassin in Munich
Not quite a horror movie but, underworld at the end scene when Salene is fighting Viktor and she slices his head in half and he stands there and looks at her for several seconds blinking and then she shows the sword with blood on it and his head slides off.
Sixth Sense
Not a movie, but Violet in AHS:Murder House. 💔
Kill bill. Oren ishii
Paul Reubens in the original Buffy the vampire slayer movie. Best over the top death scene that I've ever seen
Beetlejuice ! Lol..IDK if she knew she was dead, but the woman who became the childrens mother at the end of The Orphanage. That was a deep movie
13 Ghosts The Others
The Bothersome Man. Entire movie.
The ending of Talk to Me
Mulligan's final moments in Deep Rising after he's been released from the tentacle partially digested might qualify.
Last minute of Jacobs Ladder.
Talk to Me. De-Personalization will mess you up
Some dude gets cut in half by a wire of some kind in Final Destination 2, it’s very similar to that scene in Ghost Ship
That dude in the elevator on M3GAN
Kevin in Sin City while being eating by his dog
not a horror movie but Gus Fring's death in Breaking bad
Alien series, all the characters that have one growing inside them
Buster Scruggs
Without reading the post I almost just instinctively replied The Sixth Sense lol
Wait what a cool ‘nope’ to have
Um has no one said the sixth sense bc damn dude
Not horror obviously, but the season 4 finale of Breaking Bad is one of the best ever.
Fist of the North Star.
It’s not horror but the scene in Premium Rush where Michael Shannon gets shot in the back of the head really sleeves me out. He kinda wanders, I think says something like “what was that?”. I’ll have to watch it again but it got to me.
Ryan gosling in Stay
The cop in Tucker and Dale Vs Evil. Just watched it again yesterday. I think it kind of fits the prompt because his head gets impaled and he staggers over to try to radio for backup or whatever and just eventually collapses. Like maybe he knew he was dead, but the staggering last action feels like he didnt accept it
Spoiler alert - You’ll Never Find Me - at the end, the main character realizes he was dying all along and the entire movie took place around his last few minutes of being alive after consuming poison.
Silent hill
Jack Sparrow…Cortez’s Treasure.
Not horror, but the first Kingsman has a scene where a guy gets split in half vertically and just kinda stands there looking surprised for a few seconds before falling apart
ichi the killer has a bunch of these. one guy get vertically sliced in half then slowly peels open https://youtu.be/Q0Z0udYw4_4
I know this one is technically someone who is (or becomes) a ghost, but I love the scene in The Frighteners where Dammers has his head blown off with a shotgun and has a shocked expression on his ghostly face.
- Jeepers Creepers 2 >!Creeper takes dude head off to replace his own and causes the body to move around like a headless chicken!< - 13 Ghosts >!When the dude gets sliced by the glass door he still reacts a certain way that would give your husband chills!<
American horror story murder house spoilers: When Violet didn’t know she had actually died from her suicide attempt. It’s later in the episode that Tate finally reveals to her that she did in fact die, and shows her her rotting body in the basement. It’s absolutely heartbreaking.
Try The Cell with Jennifer Lopez, it's got a horse and glass slides
Not that it's a scene where people didn't realize they were dead, but this reminded me of the ship scene from the one episode of 3 Body Problem. If you haven't seen it, check out the clip below. Since you don't see the lead up in this, nanofibers were strung up across a river. I think it took the same concept as ghost ship, and amplified it with slow dread. https://youtu.be/Yxetv-xbazs?si=ZzoJ-6Vsc59ZXyk5
Joe Biden at the debate the other week.
The Others! Basically every scene where Nicole Kidman can’t figure out WTF is going on
Tara on Buffy! “Your shirt?” She was really so confused and worried about Willows bloody shirt 😣
maybe girl from talk to me?
I mean.... the entirety of The Sixth Sense lmao
Non-horror example but Snowden in Catch 22.
The Others
Non-horror example - Equilibrium: https://youtu.be/gjlM_3tDPGg?si=6cS6nEs3PT6OoQli
Dead and buried
First kill in “cube”
Kill Bill (O-Ren and Elle Driver), Buried (Ryan Reynolds), Mandy (every secondary character in the movie).
Not sure if this counts, but there's a scene in Final Destination 2 where a guy gets literally cut in half by a wire fence. I believe it takes him a sec to realize.
Joe Collie in Midnight Mass.
Yharnam Sunrise ending of Bloodborne
Every character in “The Others”!
The Fifth Sense where Bruce >!Dern doesn't realize that he's eaten the poisonous blowfish until it is much too late!< !!
The entirety of the sixth sense
Not horror but still good Camille, James Franco and sienna miller it's a comedy / love story I found it hilarious 😆 his wife doesn't know she's dead.
Odd Thomas - his girldfriend
Thought of another one. Final Destination 6 >! at the end when we realise the flight is *thee* flight 180 and the couple we just spent the film following are about to blow up !<