Why this creepy melody is in so many movies

This deathly 13th-century song shows up everywhere.

Correction: Mozart’s Requiem isn’t a symphony, it’s a requiem: a type of Catholic mass for the dead. It was initially written for mass but later popularized and performed outside the church, as was Verdi's.

Think back to some of the most dramatic scenes in film history — from The Lion King, The Shining, It’s a Wonderful Life. Besides being sad or scary, they have something else in common: the dies irae. “Dies irae” translates from Latin to “Day of Wrath” — it’s a 13th-century Gregorian chant describing the day Catholics believe God will judge the living and the dead and send them to heaven or hell. And it was sung during one specific mass: funerals.

As Catholicism permeated world culture, the melody of the chant was repurposed into classical music, where it was used to convey a deathly, eerie tone. From there it worked its way into films — and if you don’t already know it, you’ve almost certainly heard it before: It’s played over and over in our scariest and most dramatic cinematic moments.

[Vox]

Correction: Mozart’s Requiem isn’t a symphony, it’s a requiem: a type of Catholic mass for the dead. It was initially written for mass but later popularized and performed outside the church, as was Verdi's.

[johnchessant]

In Home Alone, the Dies Irae theme plays every time Kevin sees Old Man Marley. But when they meet at the church and Kevin finds out he's not a serial killer, the music switches to Carol of the Bells, which uses the same four notes!

[Kriegter]

so this is what 'Play this song at my funeral' sounded like in middle ages

[jayclawwit]

Vox answers questions I don't ask myself but I'm kinda interested so, I'm here...

[Spoomn]

This is actually used a lot in Squid Game as well. The "death" song that plays includes this sequence of notes.

[Blueeyesinthesky]

It’s used in Mulan too when the Huns are getting ready to strike

[javierhernandez]

Frozen’s 2 gets added as basically the plot progression.

[victoriajenkins]

*Death has it’s own theme music*
That makes more sense than it should.

[j-me]

Regarding the minor key...years ago I was in a psychiatric ward for a time. There was a piano in the common area, and I played it often because we only had music during art therapy. Almost every song I know & love to play is in the minor key, and one of the other patients asked me why I didn't play many "happy" songs. I told him that if I tended towards happy songs I probably wouldn't be where I was right then.

[OnEwHoRiDesLinEs]

Vox knows how to construct an opener: “here’s four music notes that humans know mean death, and here’s why they mean death”

[peachy]

“Remember when Mufasa died?”

*immediately shuts laptop and cries*

[leewolf]

Can we just appreciate that monks in the 13 century so perfectly captivated a mood that it’s still used to this day!!! Pure genius.

[eligil]

This is literally the ‘Siren call’ in frozen 2

[VOLAIRE]

Pretty much the longest ongoing meme in music

[mollyrocksinmygreentea]

bruh time for my daily unnecessary knowledge

[serenitywingss]

the dies irae is also the Dead by Daylight main theme, as well as Frozen 2's Into The Unknown back vocal

[duchi]

*I actually never noticed the melody*
Until I watched this video

[jacobren]

Okay this is creepy
In my choir class we are singing “making christmas” from nightmare before Christmas and it has these notes. My choir teacher JUST talked about this today what it says in this video and now I got home open YouTube and this is on my recommended

[orangutan.manusiawan]

3:51 I like how "The Shining" is probably one of the scariest horro movies but then the intro looks like it was made from power point but still somehow managed to look menacing

[kekus_blickus]

When you realize, that the Shining theme is in Star Wars:
"Here's Johnny!" "Hello there"