10 Movie Scenes That Totally Tricked Your Brain

Miles Morales moves at 12fps to reflect his lack of experience.

James Bond Dr No.
MGM

More than anything else, cinema is a grand magic trick, projecting 24 frames per second in front of your eyes to give the impression that you're actually watching something truly real unfold.

Ever since film's inception, filmmakers have sought to heighten viewer immersion in their escapist worlds with creative, mind-boggling techniques designed to trick your brain in myriad ways.

This can range from extremely elaborate techniques that toy with the viewer's perception of images and sound, to lower-budget solutions which play devilish tricks hidden in plain sight.

Whatever the method, these 10 movie scenes all managed to get one over on just about every audience member with extreme ingenuity and technical skill.

The connection between the audience and a film can be severed if something isn't sufficiently rooted in reality - as we've all seen - but these films all used our own interpretation of the world against us to pull off brilliantly slippery cinematic sleights of hand.

You may not have consciously noticed even a single one of these tricks, but one way or another, your brain almost certainly did. Here's how the filmmakers did it...

10. The Aquarium Is Actually A Video Projection - Dr. No

James Bond Dr No.
MGM

Though the James Bond films are recognised today as some of Hollywood's glossiest productions, back at the franchise's inception things weren't quite so fancy.

The first ever Bond film, 1962's Dr. No, was produced on a svelte budget of just $1.1 million, and because legendary production designer Ken Adam was given just £14,500 to dress the sets, he had to get incredibly creative to give Dr. No's (Joseph Wiseman) lair an appropriately grandiose sheen.

While you'd never know simply by looking at it, the iconic "aquarium" on the wall of his lair is actually an ingenious fake. It's nothing more than video being projected against a screen and cleverly lit to replicate the luminance of a real aquarium.

Hilariously, because Adam only had the budget to buy stock footage of smaller fish, he had to blow up the footage to make the fish look larger.

In order to explain this effect to an audience who probably didn't notice anyway, Dr. No even says to 007 (Sean Connery) in the film, "The glass is convex, 10 inches thick, which accounts for the magnifying effect."

It did give us the legendary follow-up line from Bond, though - "Minnows pretending they are whales. Just like you on this island, Dr. No."

Contributor
Contributor

Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.