10 Horror Movies With Spine-Chilling Opening Sequences
6. The Empty Man
With an opening sequence spanning nearly 25 minutes, The Empty Man almost feels like a film told in two parts.
Whilst the main narrative deals with teens ensnared by a demonic urban legend (think Slenderman, Bye Bye Man or *insert derivative Hollywood cliche here* Man), the extremely cold open follows four backpackers in mountainous Bhutan. One of their group, Paul, falls through a crevice and is found catatonic in front of a giant skeleton, muttering "touch me and you'll die".
As Paul's friends rush him to an abandoned shack nearby, the elements set in and they are trapped by blistering snow for three days. On the fourth morning, the group finds Paul missing and treks back to the crevice to find him. As he sits staring out and whispering, Ruthie, already troubled by hallucinations and nightmares, suddenly murders her friends before sharing a look with Paul and jumping to her death.
The sheer oppressiveness of the barren landscape, aided by the sound of blistering winds and dirge like throat singing in the soundtrack, create a truly suffocating environment. While it's tempting to say this could easily be turned into the full feature, perhaps it's best for our nerves that this is over in half an hour.