10 Most Shocking Jump Cuts In Horror Movie History

Set in the 1600s, Robert Eggers’s The Witch sees a Puritan family make a new home for themselves on the border of a menacing forest. However, when a witch steals their infant son, the settlers begin to turn against each other as paranoia and superstition sets in.

As the witch continues to torment the family, the slow-burn tension is gradually brought to the boil, with one harrowing sequence occurring in the middle of the night.

Here, the mother (Kate Dickie) is approached by apparitions of her dead sons and proceeds to breast feed the baby whilst her other children are confronted by an unseen presence in the barn. We know something terrible is about to happen, and when it’s revealed that the witch is also in the barn, we believe the worst has happened.

But as her cackles echo into the night, a jump cut takes us back to the mother where it’s unveiled that a crow has been pecking at their breast this entire time.

The jump cut catches us off-guard just when our terror is at its peak and forces us to witness what's arguably the most disturbing image in the film for an uncomfortable length of time.