10 Movie Scenes That Will Give You Vertigo

A family climbing trip turns to disaster in the opening of this survival thriller. Siblings Peter and Annie are climbing with their father Royce when a climber above them drops his bag of ropes, narrowly missing them. The climber then falls, ripping his partner off the wall, and they slam into the family, catching their rope around Royce, slowly pulling their anchors out before he finally lets them fall.

The three of them are left hanging off Annie’s remaining anchor, which Royce realises will not hold all of them, so he orders Peter to cut the rope to save himself and his sister. Seeing the imminent fall about to happen is much more difficult to watch than the first part of the scene, which was over relatively quickly.

The scene is obviously shot in a studio, but it is so well acted and framed that this is easy to forget. The actors are literally shaking with the effort to hold on, and the contrast of Royce shouting at Peter to cut him loose interspersed with Annie in tears begging him not to, heightens the tension.

The cinematography is brilliant, cutting between close ups of the imminently failing anchor and long-range shots of the cliff. The family are shown either looking straight up or straight down from their position on the wall, making the viewer feel as though they are hanging on the wall with them.