10 Movie Scenes That Made Real-Life Impacts Like the Log Truck in Final Destination 2

The iconic shower death in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho may be the original poster child for the phenomenon of a movie death changing how people live their lives. Several people tell stories about their parents leaving the shower curtain cracked a bit so they could see any threats coming their way while showering.

Sometimes it’s not a single death or scene that causes a significant real-life impact. In the case of Jaws, it’s the entire movie.

The film’s story of a murderous shark terrorizing a beach town made people wary of returning to the ocean for years after its release. Some people even say that as kids, they were scared of entering any body of water, including kiddy pools, for fear of a deadly shark.

Another film whose impact can’t be narrowed down to one scene is the 1990’s TV movie adaptation of Stephen King’s It.

The movie is largely responsible for the many people afraid of clowns today. Tim Curry’s iconic performance as Pennywise made a lot of young viewers suspicious of anyone in clown makeup. Some fans are more specific with their fear, though, and say that if they ever lose something in a storm drain, they aren’t going looking for it.

Some deaths in horror movies come with valuable lessons, like keeping your feet where they belong in a car in case of a crash. In Quentin Tarantino’s Death Proof, a character likes to stick her legs and feet out of the windows and on the dashboard.

But when she’s involved in a deadly car crash, those legs are severed from her body. Several fans say this taught them to keep their feet firmly planted in any moving vehicle.

Speaking of car safety, multiple people cite the shocking beheading of Charlie (Milly Shapiro) after sticking her head out of a window in Hereditary as changing the way they feel about anything outside the car while driving.

Some people say they are more careful with themselves, and others are way more cautious about their dogs, who love sticking their heads out of the window.

One user says that the opening death of Drew Barrymore in the original Scream “caused a surge of people paying for caller ID.” Had Barrymore’s character Casey had caller ID, she could have ignored the call and just maybe survived the first ten minutes of the film where she’s quizzed on her horror knowledge.

After its release, several horror fans say that The Blair Witch Project affected their camping plans. One says they weren’t scared but had a much harder time convincing friends to go camping with them, and another says that it made them appreciate daytime, sunlit hikes much more.

The log truck death in Final Destination 2 may be the franchise’s most widely known death sequence. But it’s not the only one that’s changed people’s behaviors. The inciting roller coaster accident in Final Destination 3 made a lot of people decide against ever getting on a roller coaster again, even if they once loved them.

No, Fargo isn’t a horror movie, and no one was about to put themselves in a woodchipper. But as far as movie deaths or body disposals that became part of the cultural lexicon, we can’t ignore the use of a woodchipper in the Coen brothers’ crime comedy.

Final Destination 3 seems to have been the most impactful of the franchise, as several fans say that the tanning bed scene made them take a hardline stance on never getting in a tanning bed. There are even some people who once used tanning beds regularly that quit after seeing the movie.