How Nope Tricks Your Ears

This is entirely off topic, but this is what makes crowd crush so deadly. You can't tell the difference between someone enjoying a concert or show, and them being slowly crushed to death. One of my biggest fears if I go to a concert that could happen.

The way that JJ keeps its victims screaming for hours or days isn’t just horrific, it’s clever and makes sense in-movie. What is the first, most basic impulse most people have upon hearing a scream? To look towards the source. And when does JJ identify and attack its prey?

I like how in the third act, after they stop treating Jean Jacket like and unknowable horror, and more like a wild animal, the film almost completely drops the visual ambiguity usually associated with UFO films. Jean Jacket is just there, out in the open, in broad daylight.

“what if it’s not a ship” is genuinely one of the best plots for a sci fi/horror of all time.

I think the screams of Jean Jacket’s victims was really vital for making something as simple looking as a UFO scary. It is completely and entirely silent whenever it moves. No whoosh, no gust of wind, absolutely nothing. That is, until you hear the screams. But the thing is: once you hear the screams, it’s too late. By then, it’s already right above you. And the screams are only a peak of what’s to come if you end up becoming it’s next victim.

for most of the movie i was never sure whether i was hearing the wind, a horse, people screaming, or the sound of an alien spaceship. maybe the best sound design i’ve ever heard in a film?

There was an article that said something along the lines of: "a character in a movie hears a mysterious noise behind a door. They slowly walk up to open it, leaving the audience to fear what could be behind. The door opens and there is a 10-foot spider on the other side, but the audience is relieved, saying 'It was a 10-foot spider? I thought it would be 100 feet!.' Later, the same thing happens, but with a 100-foot-spider, they would react the same, exclaiming 'It was a 100-foot spider? I thought it would be 1000 feet!.'" Fear is not the spider behind the door, but the door itself.

the unnatural stillness and silence in nope's soundscape reminded me of how nature, more specifically animals, know to retreat before an earthquake hits. it's like the bugs and wind of the dessert surrounding the ranch knew jean jacket was coming before the characters did

The scene where we're inside Jean Jacket, watching the people slowly die, screaming, was one of the most horrifying things I have ever watched. It helps that I have claustrophobia, but for a good 15 minutes after that scene, I was absolutely not okay. I needed to step outside the theatre to catch my breath

I agree, the long tracking shot as Gordy was killing people, absolutely terrifying.

The scene when the people were eaten and we saw them in the creature was the most disturbing to me. It’s terrifying to think that one second they were having fun watching a show, and the next they were all swept up into something. They don’t know what happening, and they’re in a dark tight place, and they’re terrified and trapped. The fact that we don’t know what’s happening either makes it all the more scary, the ambiguity

Scenes with a lack of sound frighten me, especially coming from a rural area that's in the middle of the woods. "They heard something in the surrounding woods" is scary, yeah. But "they heard nothing at all in the surrounding woods" is even scarier. Because when animals quiet down, it usually means there's something to fear among them. A predator, for example. Those crickets stopping their chirping the moment the UFO let out a cry is a PERFECT example.

Obscuring during the Gordy scenes really drove home the theme about spectacle. We as the audience want to see what we know we shouldn't see but can't help it. Our imaginations run wild but we crave the confirmation.

I don't think I'm claustrophobic but the alien digest scene made me feel so sick hurrghhh its like being stuck in those kids play areas where the tubes are sweaty and narrow and really warm gross

what i really love about Nope is that they made the UFO itself the alien. there were no otherworldly lifeforms that were controlling it and beamed themselves down to earth and then attacked the humans. the UFO is the otherworldly lifeform. i know that for me personally, this made the movie even more terrifying. i was waiting for a confrontation with aliens the entire time and suddenly it was revealed that we had had a confrontation with the alien many scenes before. just brilliant

For more context about the monkey paw story, the son died by falling into a grinder so when they wished for him to come back to life and the banging on the door started it’s up to our imagination what’s behind that door.

As someone who usually hates horror, probably due to modern tropes, watching the trailer to Nope I was oddly ecstatic to go watch it, and it really delivered, it was a scary, fun and cathartic ride.

So I work at an amusement park, and let me tell you the screams that I hear on the daily are NO DIFFERENT from this movie. Splash Mountain from a distance sounds exactly like Jean Jacket and it is TERRIFYING. Fantastic work, I'm scarred for life, 10/10.

I’m deaf and this has been brilliant for helping me to understand sounds and human perception of it.

Oh man the scene where the people are being sucked into the UFO’s mouth, and you could hear their screaming and the sound of them being pressed against the creature’s body, was one of the more haunting scenes for me. I had never realized how the audio contributed so much to my horror, but you explained it perfectly. I love this movie so much…