JAWS, ALIEN, IT, STRANGER THINGS, PSYCHO, THE SHINING, POLTERGEIST: Iconic Scenes ReImagined In Pop Up Books

Pop up books were once the tablets of a generation. Where we now see kids watching videos and playing games on tablets and smartphones, you forget about the once indomitable pop up book. The pop up book was the home cinema of your imagination as a child. Pop up book enthusiasts tend to be all ‘grown up’ these days. But as we all know, real adults don’t exist.

Oldrids & Downtown decided to get creative and have reimagined some of film and TV’s scariest scenes as pop up books for children, so you can bask in nostalgia and still get your kicks. Who’d have thought that Jaws could be all cute and cuddly, eh?

Jaws
Responsible for one of the most iconic musical pieces in cinema history, Jaws is your classic pulse-raising thriller. It has a big shark. It has a beach full of people. I’m sure you can figure out the rest.

The release of Jaws was a watershed moment in cinema and still enjoys a huge amount of cultural significance to this day. Nautical fun for the whole family.

Alien
Alien was way ahead of its time, winning Best Visual Effects at the Academy Awards in 1979. The most famous scene from this film is the ‘chestburster’ scene which has been depicted here. Officer Kane discovers that his niggling chest infection is a lot more serious than that. How? When a small alien creature literally bursts out from within his chest cavity, of course. Alien went on to enjoy much success and pushed the envelope of effects in cinema.

IT
We have one question for Stephen King: who hurt you? Stephen King is arguably one of the greatest novelists of our time. He has boiled story-writing down to a science and it seems his imagination knows no bounds. On the flip side of that, his imagination also seems to be a little twisted too. The second film adaption of ‘It’ was a box office smash in 2017, taking in over 700 million dollars. If you weren’t scared of clowns before, you will be after watching this…

Stranger Things
Netflix launched one of their most successful series, Stranger Things, in 2016 and it was a hit. Everything about it is really, really good. The characters, the storyline, the effects, the 80s nostalgic feels and perhaps the best thing about it, the title sequence. Using classic synth sounds they made a genuine musical masterpiece to open the show. Season three is coming in July 2019, so buckle up for more inter-dimensional thrills and spills.

Psycho
The 1960 chilling thriller Psycho features one of the most iconic scenes of horror history. Alfred Hitchcock worked meticulously to create this sequence, using over 77 close-up shots. The three-minute passage in the film took about six days to capture, such was Hitchcock’s perfectionism. All that hard work paid off as the film bought in roughly 50 times more money than it cost to make.

The Shining
Another iconic director, another Steven King novel. The Shining, directed by Stanley Kubrick, is a psychological horror that has stood the test of time. Jack Nicholson plays Jack Torrance, a writer whose sanity begins to unravel when he takes a job as a winter caretaker of a snowed-in hotel. Built on a Native America burial ground, the hotel sends Torrance into a murderous fever. The film generated a lot of conversation not just for what was happening on camera, but off of it too.

Lead actress Shelley Duvall was famously given a hard time on set. Her lines frequently changed, she was constantly criticised by Kubrick and her treatment actually amounted to bullying. Duvall was pretty much psychologically tormented the whole time she was on set. It did lead to one of the most memorable performances in cinema history, but unfortunately, it’s as much a performance as it is a genuine breakdown caught on camera. If anything, it just makes the film even more chilling…

Poltergeist
Another 80s classic, Poltergeist was one of Spielberg’s top thriller moments. This was the most successful film of the year 1982 and delivered many memorable scenes. One of the opening scenes is depicted here when young daughter Carol Anne makes contact with the poltergeist through the TV. It took quite a lot for the Freeling family to finally decide to leave their haunted house. You’d think an animated murderous tree would have been enough to do the job, but they stuck it out. A supernatural thriller for all ages.