History ScreamDiscretionShot / LiveActionFilms

--> ''Mugger:'' Hey, what the--?! Urgh, aaahhh!

* In ''Film/AFieldInEngland'', the alchemist O'Neill takes his prisoner Whitehead into a tent. There is a long moment with the other prisoners covering their ears while Whitehead's horrific screams can be heard... and then he emerges from the tent in a [[TheUnsmile strange trance.]] The audience never learns what happened inside the tent. [[spoiler: Although given O’Neill’s creepy IHaveYouNowMyPretty attitude towards Whitehead in an earlier conversation, some viewers have speculated it was [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil very nasty indeed...]]]]

* Serves as a crucial moment in the film ''Mr. Frost'', starring Creator/JeffGoldblum. A psychiatrist treating a patient/SerialKiller (Goldblum) who claims to be {{Satan}} is approached by a former police officer who apparently believes the same. He gives her a video that the killer gave to him -- a "home movie" he shot of his crimes. She watches the video, but we never see it. Instead, we hear screams in the background as her face contorts in horror.

* ''Film/{{Alien}}'' features this at the death of Lambert. The camera cuts away from the Alien doing horrible things, to Ripley who reacts to Lambert's lingering death scream.
** There's another death wherein the camera cuts away from the death to the ''cat'', who is curled up cringing in fear but unable to look away from the horror.

* ''Film/{{Midsommar}}'' This happens not long after one of the visitors to the commune, Connie, tries to leave. Her blood curdling screams are later heard by three different characters. We don't see Connie again until the final 10 minutes of the movie where she is now [[spoiler:a bloated, waterlogged corpse being carted in a wheelbarrow by a cultist, confirming she was violently drowned off screen by members of the cult]].
* Serves as a crucial moment in the film ''Mr. Frost'', starring Jeff Goldblum. A psychiatrist treating a patient/SerialKiller (Goldblum) who claims to be {{Satan}} is approached by a former police officer who apparently believes the same. He gives her a video that the killer gave to him -- a "home movie" he shot of his crimes. She watches the video, but we never see it. Instead, we hear screams in the background as her face contorts in horror.

* Film/MenInBlackII: When Serleena eats the mugger at the beginning we don't see it directly. Instead, the mugger grabs her and holds her at knife point and drags her behind a huge bush completely obscuring the two from the audience. Then we hear the mugger suddenly become panicked and his legs fly up in the air kicking weakly. We hear his screams over the sounds of Serleena [[SwallowedWhole swallowing him whole]] as his boots are sucked down behind the bush. Serleena then confidently struts out from behind the bush with her stomach now large and distended.
--> ''Mugger:'' "Hey, what the?!- Urgh, Aaahhh!"
* ''Film/TheNightOfTheHunter'' applies this to a scene in which Creator/LillianGish's character, sitting up all night with a shotgun to protect her adoptive children from a SerialKiller, notices [[RuleOfSymbolism an owl catching a rabbit]]. We never see the two animals in the same shot, but we see the owl swoop from a tree branch, and then we see Gish's tired, unhappy face as the rabbit squeals in pain.
-->It's a hard world for little things.

* In ''Film/ReservoirDogs'' the camera "looks away" as Mr Blonde [[spoiler:hacks off Marvin's ear]]. Quicky subverted though, as the camera cuts right back to show the after effects.
* ''[[Film/CountYorga The Return of Count Yorga]]'' opens with one of the orphans, Tommy, playing with his ball near an abandoned graveyard just as Yorga is summoning his vampire brides to rise from their graves. When Tommy eventually notices them, he quickly flees only to run into Yorga himself in complete vamp GameFace. As Tommy screams, it cuts to the local fundraiser party.
* The ApocalypticLog on Miranda from ''Film/{{Serenity}}'' ends with the speaker trying to shoot herself before the [[TheDreaded Reavers]] get her. She's not quick enough. We don't see what happens next--but the ''Serenity'' crew does, and it's apparently horrifying enough to get tough-guy Jayne to say [[ICantLookGesture "Turn it off."]]

** ''Film/ANewHope:'' Darth Vader and a torture droid enter Leia's cell, and then the door slams shut, and the camera follows a guard walking past.
** ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack:'' When Han is being tortured, we can still see him when it just starts - resisting. Then flinching, then trembling and gasping in pain, and then, just before he loses control, it cuts to the passageway, where Lando Calrissian and Boba Fett can now hear him screaming through the walls.

** In ''Film/JurassicPark'', when Dennis Nedry gets a nasty surprise in the form of a ''Dilophosaurus'' eating him in the Jeep, the camera pans toward the ground as [[AccidentalInnuendo the Jeep is shaking wildly and he's screaming]].

* A particularly frightening example occurs in the notorious 1977 public information film ''{{Film/Apaches}}'', when Sharon wakes up screaming and crying in pain and calling for her mother in the middle of the night as the effects of the weed killer she unintentionally swallowed earlier that day, which would end up killing her, kick in. The only thing the viewer sees during that scene is the outside of her house as the lights turn on. This particular scene is [[NightmareFuel one of the film's most nightmarish moments]].

* In ''Film/WarOfTheWorlds'', [[spoiler:Ogilvy's death plays out like this. When Ray goes into the room and closes the door behind him, we hear a few grunts followed by Ogilvy screaming, while Rachel holds her ears tighter and sings louder to block it out. We don't hear anything else]].

* Subverted in ''Film/NoSuchThing'', when Beatrice must undergo spinal surgery without the use of anesthetics. Moments before the surgeons make the first incision, the camera cuts to the doctors watching from the gallery and the diegetic soundtrack drops out. The observing doctor's reaction to her screaming is enough to signal how painful the surgery is.
** The director stated that this was intentional: after all, NothingIsScarier.

* Film/MenInBlackII: When Serleena eats the mugger at the beginning we don't see it directly. Instead, the mugger grabs her and holds her at knife point and drags her behind a huge bush completely obscuring the two fromtheaudience. Then we hear the mugger suddenly become panicked and his legs fly up in the air kicking weakly. We hear his screams over the sounds of Serleena [[SwallowedWhole swallowing him whole]] as his boots are sucked down behind the bush. Serleena then confidently struts out from behind the bush with her stomach now large and distended.

* In the opening scene of ''Film/BatmanReturns'', when [[Characters/BatmanThePenguin the Penguin]] was [[AMinorKidroduction born]], his father hears his wife screaming as she gives birth, followed by the sounds of squawking-like crying. As the doctor and his aid leave the bedroom, Mr. Cobblepot runs in...and we hear his horrified yelled as he sees how grotesque his newborn son is.

* In the opening scene of ''Film/BatmanReturns'', when [[ComicBook/BatmanThePenguin the Penguin]] was [[AMinorKidroduction born]], his father hears his wife screaming as she gives birth, followed by the sounds of squawking-like crying. As the doctor and his aid leave the bedroom, Mr. Cobblepot runs in...and we hear his horrified yelled as he sees how grotesque his newborn son is.