Falling from a great height

SPLAT! Falling from a great height refers to a character who is either pushed, jumps and falls or leaps to their doom with the intent of killing themselves. This trope appears most often in murder mysteries and crime dramas, but has an equal presence in the action genre. The severity of the fall is governed not only by the height of origin point, but also by the density and texture of the destination point. If the height is significant enough, the fall can be fatal.

In film[]

Departed, The[]

In Martin Scorsese's The Departed, the character of Oliver Queenan is pushed off the top of a high building in Boston. He lands on the ground in front of Billy Costigan.

Dracula (1992)[]

In Bram Stoker's Dracula, the character of Elisabeta commits suicide by leaping to her death from a parapet at Castle Dracula into the Danube.

Haunting of Molly Hartley, The[]

Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, A[]

Dream demon Freddy Krueger manipulates the sleepwalking mental patient Phillip Anderson as if he were a marionette, using his own tendons as puppet strings. Leading him to a balcony at the Westin Hills Psychiatric Hospital, Freddy cut the virtual puppet strings, sending Phillip plummeting to his death. According to fellow patient Will Stanton, Phillip was wide awake the entire time, "...all the way down".

Rear Window[]

In the original Alfred Hitchcock classic, Rear Window, the villain Lars Thorwald attacks L.B. Jefferies in his apartment, pushing the injured man out the window of his Greenwich Village apartment. Jeffries survives however, though he does suffer a second broken leg (the first was already broken from a previous incident).