Suspence & Shock

In thrillers the use shock and suspence is quite common, but they are very differnt devices.

Suspence is the use of building up tension for the viewer, an example of building up tension is Sabotage by Alfred Hitchcock. In Sabotage there is a scene where a child is transporting a package containing a bomb across london, but the child is unaware of the bomb in the package. This is what creates the tension for the viewer, and the tension builds as the timer for the bomb continues to tick away. This is suspence.

Shock is use to give the viewer a scare, an example of shock is in Children of Men. In Children of Men at the begining the main character enters a cafe to buy a coffee where people are watching the news, the character then leaves the cafe. After leaving the cafe the character puts his coffee down to pour a drink into it, but as he pick it up the cafe he was in instantly exploads thus causing the audiense to jump in shock.