best horror movie review

To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories .

• What Is Cinema?

The 32 Best Horror Movies to Keep You Up at Night

The best horror movies tend to be trendsetters, whether by launching a subgenre, introducing new visual techniques, reinventing familiar tropes, or employing clever marketing schemes. Everyone has a different favorite, but it's the rare genre where people—even those who prefer their Halloween films on the cozy side—tend to agree on a handful of paragons. You'll find grisly slasher flicks, eerie ghost stories, creature features, and psychological freakouts in equal measure here, making this a guide to the best horror movies of all time for beginners and repeat viewers alike.

32. The Wicker Man (1973)

Long before Midsommar came about, The Wicker Man supplied pitch-black horror set in broad daylight. A religious police sergeant (Edward Woodward) travels to a rural Scottish island to investigate a young girl's disappearance, but the locals' culty Pagan practices prove equally concerning. His eerie interactions play like fish-out-of-water social comedy, but any sense of security disappears in the lead-up to an electrifying finale that involves a folk hymn, a human sacrifice, and a lot of eccentric Scandinavian dancing.

31. The Others (2001)

The Sixth Sense is often hailed as horror's greatest twist ending, but what if The Others ' is even better? A Gothic ghost story starring an immaculate Nicole Kidman as a pious mother who moves her two strange children to a remote mansion they quickly suspect is haunted, this is a chilling exercise in atmospheric tension. Like so many horror film narratives, it's about grief—but the titanic payoff is what sticks with you. Two decades later, it's worthy of canonization.

30. Cat People (1942)

It may be mellow by today's standards, but Cat People has ascended from popular B-movie to respected classic. A Serbian fashion illustrator (Simone Simon) engaged to a thoughtful engineer (Kent Smith) believes an ancient curse will turn her into a panther upon arousal, which is a pretty solid metaphor for the shame that accompanied sex in the censhorship-heavy '40s. Using noirish shades and a couple of well-placed jump scares that influenced future horror editors, Cat People is a relic rich enough to earn a bloated Paul Schrader remake in 1982.

29. A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

Wes Craven began his career as a gonzo provocateur (see: The Last House on the Left, The Hills Have Eyes ) and eventually became a master of commercial crowd-pleasers. A Nightmare on Elm Street brought much-needed humor to the slasher craze, establishing Freddy Kruger as a fedora-wearing jokester who doubles as literal nightmare fuel.

28. The Omen (1976)

Hollywood spent the '70s trying to replicate the success of The Exorcist . Nothing came as close as The Omen , which summoned a demon by way of a 5-year-old Antichrist named Damien ( Harvey Spencer Stephens ). This was 1976's biggest summer hit, withstanding the critics who unjustly dismissed it.

27. Misery (1990)

Before there were stans, there was Annie Wilkes (a disconcertingly sweet Kathy Bates ). She's one of those villains you know by name, shorthand for an overzealous admirer who'll stop at nothing to get what she wants from her favorite entertainer, romance novelist Paul Sheldon (James Caan). When Annie learns Paul has killed off her favorite literary protagonist, she wages warfare in an icy remote cabin where no captive's ankles are safe.

26. Eraserhead (1977)

Many of David Lynch 's films borrow horror elements, namely Blue Velvet , Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me , Lost Highway , and Mulholland Drive. But his debut, Eraserhead , is the director's most straightforward genre piece, which is a weird thing to say about a surreal freakout that rose to prominence as a go-to midnight movie. The highlight is the unnerving sound design, a fizzy collection of static, mewling, and urban oddities that heighten the story of a misfit (Jack Nance) caring for an unseemly baby in a dank apartment.

25. Don't Look Now (1973)

Grief and the passage of time are two of horror's consistent preoccupations, and Don't Look Now turns them into a spectral saga about a couple ( Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland ) who travel to Venice while mourning the death of their daughter. There, they see apparitions of a young girl in a striking red coat who evokes the child they've lost, leading them down an occult rabbit hole.

24. Wait Until Dark (1967)

Audrey Hepburn weaponized her sweet persona in this terrifying home-invasion thriller, playing a blind housewife who has to ward off criminals inside her Manhattan apartment. You're not sure she'll pull it off, which turns Wait Until Dark into a pins-and-needles wallop that uses dim, angular corners to sustain suspense.

23. What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

Call it hagsploitation if you want, but What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? remains one of the most delicious psychodramas ever made. Bette Davis and Joan Crawford milked their on-and-off rivalry to play sisters living out their troubled history as bitter adults. One is an unbalanced alcoholic (Davis) obsessed with her past as vaudeville's "Baby Jane" Hudson, the other a paraplegic (Crawford) whose own success came to a halt after a mysterious car accident. Together, they trudge through middle age in a mansion where Jane enacts various forms of phsychological terrorism. The pacing is a bit inconsistent, but the movie's demented kicks haven't dissipated.

22. The Fly (1986)

Several David Cronenberg movies could grace this list: Videodrome is his smartest, The Brood his most visceral, and Dead Ringers his most chilling. But The Fly is the ideal sweet spot between Cronenberg's potentially alienating outlandishness and his ability to craft a mainstream horror movie. The director's biggest hit brought what the schlocky 1958 original was missing: sophisticated effects and a giddy Jeff Goldblum . Chronicling an unconventional scientist whose teleportation experiment accidentally infuses him with the DNA of a housefly, the movie poignantly explores disease while never losing its verve.

21. The Blair Witch Project (1999)

No one would fault you for censuring the found-footage fever The Blair Witch Project induced. Most of the movie's imitators are mere gimmicks, whereas the OG was an ingenious feat of both filmmaking and marketing. Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez took a Hi8 camcorder into the woods of Maryland, gave their actors limited instructions, and made off with an all-timer. It's also one of the most profitable movies in history: Shot and edited for less than $1 million, Myrick and Sánchez recouped their budget on a Sundance acquisition deal alone. Then came the gargantuan worldwide grosses ($248.6 million), buoyed by a PR campaign that left the public unsure whether what they were seeing was real or fictional. No found footage will top this once-in-a-lifetime achievement or its chilling final scene.

20. Carrie (1976)

The pig's blood. The hand popping up from the gravesite. "Breasts, Mama. They're called breasts." Carrie is famous for its enduring imagery, so it's easy to forget how both profound and humorous the Stephen King movie adaptation can be. Sissy Spacek earned her first Oscar nomination for the title role, playing a lonesome high schooler whose physical awakening sparks further extremism from her hyper-religious mother ( Piper Laurie , also Oscar-nommed). Beneath the mayhem is a story about a girl coming into her own and the terror that inspires in others. Brian de Palma has flirted with horror on other occasions ( Sisters , Blow Out , Body Double ), but this is the director's purest genre exercise.

19. Candyman (1992)

A precursor to Get Out , this supernatural slasher showpiece dared to tackle race in America mere months after Los Angeles erupted into riots over the brutality police inflicted on an unarmed Rodney King. Candyman links inner-city racism to 1800s slavery, following a graduate student ( Virginia Madsen ) as she investigates an urban legend about a Black ghoul ( Tony Todd ) who stalks the Chicago housing project where he was killed by a savage lynch mob. It's a tour de force that peppers its entertaining menace with a dose of intellectualism.

18. Night of the Living Dead (1968)

George Romero established the zombie-movie template with this scrappy black-and-white independent sleeper that's often considered an allegory about the atrocities of the Vietnam War. Influenced by the novel I Am Legend , Romero and co-writer John Russo made Night of the Living Dead for approximately $880,000 in today's money. The grainy aesthetics make it feel unsettlingly real. Even without sophisticated special effects, some spectators likened Living Dead 's violence to pornography, proving the film had hit a nerve.

17. Frankenstein (1931)

In the 1930s and '40s, Universal Pictures was Hollywood's signature horror house. Starting with 1931's Dracula and spanning The Mummy, The Invisible Man, The Black Cat , and The Wolf Man , the studio invented creature features as we know them. The best of the bunch is Frankenstein , a Gothic adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel that cemented how we would forever imagine the titular scientist's laboratory monster (Boris Karloff). Many sequels, spin-offs, remakes, and parodies have followed, but none would shock like the sight of Dr. Frankenstein's ogre chucking a trusting young girl into a lake .

16. Peeping Tom (1960)

By the late '70s, everyone knew what a slasher movie was. But when Peeping Tom arrived in 1960, audiences weren't yet conditioned to expect the bloodthirst that would define the subgenre. People were shocked to see a movie told from the perspective of a voyeuristic serial killer (Carl Boehm) who records his murders with a hidden camera so he can watch them in the comfort of his London apartment. He's as much protagonist as he is antagonist, if only because he's such a detailed character, elevated by the gorgeous Eastmancolor—a single-strip alternative to laborious Technicolor—that director Michael Powell used.

15. Audition (1999)

Japanese horror traveled westward in the '90s and early 2000s, prompting American diehards to look beyond their own country for the genre's gutsiest work. Cure, Ringu, and Kairu are great, but Audition is the J-horror pinnacle, a deceptive slow burn with one of the most disturbing final acts committed to film. What starts as a simple premise about entitlement—with the help of his producer friend ( Jun Kunimura ), a widower ( Ryo Ishibashi ) stages mock movie-casting trials to find a new wife—turns into a revenge saga as meaningful as it is gnarly. When his chosen sweetheart ( Eihi Shiina ) flips the script using a syringe and a wire saw, Takashi Miike 's film becomes a disquisition on wounds of all kinds.

14. Suspiria (1977)

Four decades before Luca Guadagnino turned it into a slice of art-house philosophizing , Suspiria was a phantasmagoric caffeine drip. It's part slasher movie, part supernatural thriller, part body-horror whatsit about witches at a German dance academy. Directed by the outré Dario Argento , the unclassifiable gem is suffused in blood-red palettes and a pulsating score that prog-rock band Goblin recorded before cameras even rolled. Argento's original 35mm print was lost for many years before being mysteriously discovered at an abandoned Italian cinema in 2017, at which point the cult favorite enjoyed a renaissance, right in time for Gudagnino's update.

13. Jaws (1975)

Jaws has a lot of firsts to its name: the first proper summer blockbuster, Steven Spielberg 's first big hit, the first major movie shot on the ocean, and the first movie to cross $100 million at the box office. The ostinato that begins John Williams ' score—a long, ominous *daaaaah-dah—*still strikes fear into hearts everywhere, and sharks have been in desperate need of a rebranding ever since.

12. Get Out (2017)

Jordan Peele has grown more ambitious with his later features, Us and Nope , but Get Out remains his crowning achievement. The sketch writer capitalized on his intuitive understanding of comedy to make a horror movie that's as funny as it is scary and as exciting as it is socially resonant. Few directors balance those poles seamlessly, and few in recent memory have added so much to our cultural vernacular (the Sunken Place, "I would have voted for Obama for a third term if I could"). In Daniel Kaluuya , Peele found a pitch-perfect proxy for his twisty tale about a Brooklyn photographer who tries to ignore many, many red flags while accompanying his white girlfriend ( Allison Williams ) on a trip to visit her wealthy family. Everybody wants to make their own Get Out , but no one has come close.

11. Poltergeist (1982)

Two years after Jack Torrance's " heeeere's Johnny ," little Carol Anne Freeling (Heather O'Rourke) turned away from her staticky television set and gave her own spring-chilling warning: "They're here." But who? Uncertainty made it frightening. The "who" turned out to be phantoms that move objects and bring trees to life, sucking Carol Anne into a portal requiring paranormal intervention. Directed by Tobe Hooper (with a crucial assist from Steven Spielberg ), Poltergeist —with its Oscar-nominated visual effects and affecting performances from JoBeth Williams , Craig T. Nelson , and Zelda Rubinstein—is an exemplar about the demons of suburbia.

10. Diabolique (1955)

This master class in suspense isn't based on a true story, but you can feel its DNA all over today's crime obsession, true and otherwise: the domestic discord, the vengeance scheme gone wrong, the what-did-they-get-themselves-into fallout. Hitchcock desperately wanted to make Diabolique , which is based on a novel by the French duo Boileau-Narcejac. Henri-Georges Clouzot got there first, casting his wife, Véra Clouzot, as a boarding-school proprietor who plots to kill her domineering husband (Paul Meurisse) with the help of his mistress (Simone Signoret). The movie's ghostly interiors foster a dread that builds toward a thrilling, unpredictable climax.

9. Scream (1996)

After a glorious run in the '70s and '80s, horror hit something of a downward slope in the '90s. Tropes had grown too shopworn, and narrative preoccupations too familiar for an era that let all sorts of mid-budget adult genres thrive. Leave it to Wes Craven to resuscitate what we'd lost. In Scream , he and writer Kevin Williamson dissected slasher clichés while serving them up wholesale. They created another indelible protagonist in Sidney Prescott ( Neve Campbell ), who took the reins after Drew Barrymore ’s bravura "do you like scary movies?" opening and—until a recent pay discrepancy —long ruled the still-effective Scream franchise.

8. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre transcended the exploitation at its core by being about something: a family whose working-class slaughterhouse jobs were rendered obsolete by industrialization. They just so happen to be murderous cannibals who gleefully hack away at a group of teenagers who stumble upon their remote farmhouse. Tobe Hooper ’s visceral movie, partly inspired by real-life serial killer Ed Gein, captured the chaotic ethos of the mid-'70s, all the way to the unforgettable image of bloody Sally Hardesty (Marilyn Burns) hysterically laughing as she flees Leatherface’s rampage.

7. Psycho (1960)

Both the slasher genre and the crime-thriller genre are indebted to Psycho , the defining work of Alfred Hitchcock’s career. In committing Robert Bloch’s 1959 novel to film, Hitch made the villain his film’s most complex figure. Norman Bates (the ever-underrated Anthony Perkins) is a dissociative loner with mommy issues that are every bit as shocking as the early muder of marquee star Janet Leigh. Psycho changed moviegoing forever: Breaking with the era’s norms, audiences had to arrive on time, lest they miss crucial details. Beyond that, the movie mainlined violence and sexuality in ways that would influence Hollywood for decades.

6. Alien (1979)

Whether Ridley Scott ’s Alien should be classified as science fiction or horror feels irrelevant when the movie is so damn scary. Long hallways and clinical white interiors turn the Nostromo spacecraft into a haunted house, substituting ghosts for H.R. Giger-designed xenomorphs. The genre wasn’t known for fearless heroines before Sigourney Weaver showed up as Ellen Ripley, a generation-defining lion who outlived all the fussy men around her.

5. The Shining (1980)

The lore surrounding The Shining is as memorable as the movie itself. Stephen King didn’t think Stanley Kubrick successfully adapted his novel, nor did many critics when it first opened. Kubrick asked so much of Shelley Duvall on the set that she became overwhelmed and physically ill. And the plot itself prompted enough interpretations to merit an entire documentary that interpreted the interpretations. Altogether, that mythology only amplifies the film’s impact, making it even more layered. A hair-raising masterpiece about a hotel caretaker ( Jack Nicholson ) losing his mind over the course of one frigid winter, The Shining is a Rorschach test in horror form.

4. Halloween (1978)

Halloween ’s opening scene alone makes it immortal. In five resourceful minutes, John Carpenter crafts what could be a standalone short, using a seemingly unbroken first-person perspective shot filtered through the eyes of a 6-year-old boy who puts on a mask and kills his teenage sister. That boy, of course, was Michael Myers. Carpenter never intended for him to become a decades-spanning franchise baddie laden with overblown mythology. Halloween was a shoestring independent project: Everything feels and looks organic, creeping through fictional Haddonfield, Illinois, in ways that startled viewers anew. Horror continues to strive for the same unbridled pleasure—and for scores as influential—but few boogeymen live up. 

3. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

The Silence of the Lambs is the only horror movie that has won the Oscar for Best Picture, in part because it can't be confined to one label. In a sense, cannibalistic serial killers Hannibal Lecter ( Anthony Hopkins) and Buffalo Bill ( Ted Levine ) are window dressing for a psychological drama about an FBI trainee ( Jodie Foster ) wrestling with the demons of her childhood. But the artful complexities don't make those slithery scoundrels any less scary. In Jonathan Demme’s gifted hands, every character is a fully-formed human being—something that can’t be said of many horror villains. Everything builds toward the harrowing night-vision climax in which a breathy Clarice Starling confronts her fears in pitch black.

2. The Exorcist (1973)

Often hailed as the scariest movie ever made, The Exorcist is the rare auteur-driven hit whose datedness hasn’t dulled its shock. Part of that is owed to William Friedkin ’s chilly atmospherics, and part is because, at its core, this is a sympathetic story about a mother ( Ellen Burstyn ) fighting desperately to protect her daughter ( Linda Blair ). In addition to inspiring umpteen copycats that couldn’t measure up, The Exorcist prefigured the so-called Satanic panic that gripped America in the 1980s and '90s.

1. Rosemary’s Baby (1968)

A landmark of feminist horror was made by a man who later confessed to raping a 13-year-old girl. Somehow, that contradiction doesn't dampen Rosemary’s Baby , a movie that continues to influence droves of horror filmmakers. Its story comes from an Ira Levin novel, and its effectiveness is owed as much to Mia Farrow ’s stirring performance as it is to Roman Polanski ’s slick direction. This is arty horror at its most mainstream, a studio movie full of odd idiosyncrasies unlikely to see a wide release today. But it’s every bit as perfect as it was in 1968, turning the story of a chic Manhattinite who rightfully suspects her neighbors (Sidney Blackmer and the great Ruth Gordon) are running a Satanic cult with the help of her husband (John Cassavetes) into a deep statement on womanhood.

Next up, browse our guide to the best Halloween movies on Netflix .

More Great Stories From Vanity Fair

RFK Jr.’s Family Doesn’t Want Him to Run. Even They May Not Know His Darkest Secrets.

Report: Donald Trump, Famously Beard-Averse, Has Reservations About J.D. Vance’s Facial Hair

An Epic First Look at Gladiator II

Looking for Love in the Hamptons? Buy a $275 Ticket for the Luxury Bus.

The Dark Origins of the True-Crime Frenzy at CrimeCon

Palace Insiders on the Monarchy’s Difficult Year

The Best TV Shows of 2024 , So Far

Listen Now: VF ’s Still Watching Podcast Dissects House of the Dragon

Matthew Jacobs

Movie Reviews

Tv/streaming, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors, black writers week, the best horror movies of 2020.

2020 was scary in a very unexpected way, but one of the genres to really critically impress was horror. These are the best horror movies of 2020, determined by the weekly reviews on this site. All of these best horror movies were given 3 stars or more by the assigned writer, and you can find where to watch the best horror movies by clicking on each review and seeing its online availability at the top. If you thought 2020 was terrifying, check these out...

Simon Abrams

Anything For Jackson

Brian tallerico.

Climate of the Hunter

Color Out of Space

Peter sobczynski.

Come to Daddy

Mark dujsik.

Extra Ordinary

Roxana hadadi.

Tomris Laffly

Ghosts of War

Gretel & Hansel

Odie Henderson

I'm Thinking of Ending Things

Monica Castillo

Sheila O'Malley

Christy Lemire

Justine Smith

Filed under:

• What to Watch

The best horror movies you can watch right now

From Netflix to Hulu to Max, the eeriest, scariest, and best horror to watch at home... or else

If you buy something from a Polygon link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement .

Share this story

• Share this on Facebook
• Share this on Reddit
• Share All sharing options

Share All sharing options for: The best horror movies you can watch right now

Whether it’s something gory and macabre, silly and irreverent, or eerie and unsettling, the genre of horror is as rich and varied as the multitude of ghosts, ghoulies, and homicidal maniacs that go bump in the night.

Looking for the best horror films available to stream on Netflix, Hulu , Max , and Paramount Plus ? No worries, we’ve got the goods. We’ve combed through the libraries of each of the major streaming platforms to bring you a list of our most recommended horror movies. Here are the best horror movies you can stream right now, from old classics to new hits. Our latest update added Invasion of the Body Snatchers , Sinister , and Totally Killer.

Editor’s pick: Invasion of the Body Snatchers

Director: Philip Kaufman Cast: Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Leonard Nimoy Where to watch: Prime Video

Invasion of the Body Snatchers has a timeless, perfect premise: What if the people you know weren’t themselves anymore? What if they had been replaced by something that looked like them, talked like them, and remembered like them, but didn’t feel the same? It’s viscerally upsetting, even as an idea, which is probably why this story has been remade nearly a dozen times since the original was released in 1956.

But for all the remakes, the 1978 version of the movie stands out as a particular highlight. Starring Donald Sutherland and Leonard Nimoy, Philip Kaufman’s version of the story imagines a San Francisco slowly overrun by aliens who steal the faces of humans. The lurking paranoia of the original movie is similarly on display in this one, but its real step up is in the effects department.

Where the original movie left the body snatching mostly to the audience’s imagination, this version shows the process in all its gross, gooey, alien detail. Fresh, formless bodies slide out of pods while sentient threads of plant fur creep across victims, giving details and features to the newly printed doubles, all before the person’s old body disintegrates. It’s a wildly effective, extremely off-putting effect that the movie makes tremendous use of to both heighten its paranoid atmosphere and justify it. All that, and the movie has one of the greatest endings in horror movie history. — Austen Goslin

Annihilation

Director : Alex Garland Cast : Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Gina Rodriguez Where to watch: Paramount Plus, free w/ ads on Pluto TV

Annihilation might be the creepiest movie about plants ever made (with all due respect to The Ruins .)

Annihilation follows a group of scientists (played by a phenomenal group of actors) investigating an area struck by a meteor. The area that was hit has slowly spread and grown into what’s now known as The Shimmer, an area where nature seems to be taking over everything around it, but it’s a different kind of nature; strange, unnaturally green plants grow over everything, and creatures (animals and humans) slowly merge with the vegetation around them. At the center of all of this is a lighthouse the group must reach. Annihilation helps realize this strange Earth-but-not incredibly well, with beautiful and haunting production design and a finale as memorable as any horror movie on this list. — AG

Blair Witch

Director: Adam Wingard Cast: James Allan McCune, Callie Hernandez, Brandon Scott Where to watch: Prime Video, Hulu

Sequels to The Blair Witch Project are very dicey propositions. After Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 was greeted as a disaster immediately after release, the franchise stalled out and the idea of returning to the black forest faded from the minds of aspiring horror filmmakers. But in 2016, writer Simon Barrett and director Adam Wingard, the duo behind the excellent You’re Next , went back into the woods for a new Blair Witch sequel. And it’s actually pretty great.

The movie follows James Donahue, the brother of Heather from the first movie, as he sets out to investigate what happened to his sister. James and some friends, including film student Lisa, set out on an adventure through the Maryland woods and, of course, run into some very creepy activity when they get there.

Blair Witch isn’t interested in trying to recapture the formal magic of the first movie, exactly. There’s no mistaking this one for a documentary, and there’s clearly a lot more going on production-wise than a few kids in the woods with a video camera. It’s decidedly a studio version of found footage, but that isn’t a bad thing; it means the movie is full of delicately framed shots that really capture and amplify the terror of this new group of kids stuck in the woods. And when things really start to pop off in the second half, it means that we get careful, tantalizing, terrifying glimpses of whatever lurks in the darkness, but never too much to ruin the scare. —AG

Director : Gaspar Noé Cast : Sofia Boutella, Romain Guillermic, Souheila Yacoub Where to watch: Digital rental/purchase on Amazon, Apple

Climax isn’t for the faint-of-heart — and we’re saying that in the context of a horror movies list. The movie is set at an all-night dance party inside a gymnasium, which turns sour after someone spikes the sangria with a little too much LSD. Climax is told in beautifully disorienting long takes that go from dozens of minutes of uninterrupted and propulsive dance sequences to hazy walks through hallways as the camera mimics the dizzy stumbling of the movie’s characters. As the psychedelics kick in, so too do some of the attendees’ long-held feuds, leading to disastrous and horrifying consequences. It’s rare that a movie truly defies description, but if you’ve got a strong stomach and a will to see something you haven’t before, Climax is the perfect movie for you. — AG

Crimes of the Future

Director: David Cronenberg Cast: Viggo Mortensen, Léa Seydoux, Kristen Stewart Where to watch: Hulu

Microplastics: They’re everywhere !

They’re in our lungs , our blood , our food and drinking water ; even the air we breathe . What the fuck is it doing to our bodies? We don’t really know, but David Cronenberg’s 2022 body horror drama sure has an idea of what it might mean for our children. Crimes of the Future imagines a world where humans have lost the ability to feel pain. In addition to that, several people have developed a disturbing disorder which causes their bodies to spontaneously spawn new organs.

This new reality has spawned a trend: Live surgery, wherein performance artists plagued with this condition tear into their own bodies in an effort to shape meaning out of this strange new biological fact. Viggo Mortensen stars as Saul Tenser, a world-renowned performance artist who, alongside his partner Caprice (Léa Seydoux), stands on the cutting edge — both literally and figuratively — of this cultural phenomenon. When Saul’s activities catch the attention of a mysterious group of evolutionary activists, as well as the lascivious eye of a government employee named Timlin (Kristen Stewart), he’s forced to confront what he — and everyone else around him — is changing into, and whether what that is can even be considered “human” anymore.

As macabre as it is moving, grotesque as it is sensuous; Crimes of the Future is an exquisite work of science fiction horror where surgery is the new sex and our very bodies have rebelled against us for the incalculable destruction we have inflicted on the planet. It’s a film that exists in intimate conversation with the anxieties of our present, as well as one that represents a stunning return to form for one of cinema’s most forward-thinking directors. Howard Shore’s growling, guttural score is engrossing, while the leading trio of performances by Mortensen, Seydoux, and Stewart are a virtual match made in heaven in bringing to life this speculative slice of post-human hell on Earth. In short: It’s a great film and highly recommended, but whatever you do, don’t see it on a full stomach. Trust me. —Toussaint Egan

Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa Cast: Kōji Yakusho, Tsuyoshi Ujiki, Anna Nakagawa Where to watch: Criterion Channel

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s 1997 horror masterpiece Cure follows Kenichi Takabe (Kōji Yakusho), a Japanese detective frustrated by an inexplicable rash of seemingly unconnected murders that nevertheless all appear to be connected, despite none of the perpetrators having known each other or having any recollection as to what possessed them to do it. When Takabe’s investigation leads him to a suspect, a student of psychology and mesmerism known as Mamiya (Masato Hagiwara), he finds himself plunged into a conspiracy that threatens to engulf anyone who gets too close.

In Cure , violence is less an act of premeditation or passion as it is a virus, coursing its way through the bloodstream of society, corrupting innocent bystanders not unlike aberrant cancer cells attacking from within without ever understanding why they did so in the first place. How do you confront a horror like that, much less stop it? The answer is as simple as it is terrifying: You can’t. —TE

Encounters of the Spooky Kind

Director: Sammo Hung Cast: Sammo Hung, Chung Fat, Dick Wei Where to watch: Criterion Channel

This Halloween , I had one goal: Finally watch Sammo Hung’s jiangshi ( Chinese hopping vampire ) martial arts comedy Encounters of the Spooky Kind. It was finally added to streaming via the Criterion Channel earlier this fall after years of being unavailable digitally. And reader, my priorities were correct, because this movie is an absolute blast.

Best known for his collaborations with childhood friends Jackie Chan and Yuen Biao, Sammo’s excellence as a director, choreographer, and performer are on full display in what is frequently a one-man show.

Sammo directed the movie, co-wrote it, choreographed the action, and stars as Bold Cheung, a pedicab driver and skilled martial artist who’s also kind of a dolt. He is dared to spend the night in a haunted house with a hopping vampire — a dare he accepts, because he is “Bold” Cheung, after all. What follows is a Looney Tunes-style slapstick action horror movie with legitimate scares (the vampire makeup is terrific: gray with a gross texture, like a wet papier-mâché mask), dazzling rhythmic martial arts choreography, and perfectly placed dashes of comedy (there’s even an extended Duck Soup homage).

Sammo is truly one of the greatest directors to ever do it, but he doesn’t get the proper credit globally because of the genres (and nation) he’s primarily worked in. The jaw-dropping choreography and onslaught of funny bits are outstanding, but it’s his skill with the camera that has always separated Sammo from his counterparts.

Bringing it back to his old friend Yuen Biao for a second — Biao co-stars as the silent vampire, and does a terrific job selling the undead creature’s fight sequences with stiff limbs and startling hops. This movie is colorful, funny, scary, tense, and an incredibly fun time. If you like the Evil Dead movies, this is one you must check out; Sam Raimi basically directly ripped one of Spooky Kind ’s fight sequences for Evil Dead II . — Pete Volk

Eyes Without a Face

Director: Georges Franju Cast: Pierre Brasseur, Édith Scob, Alida Valli Where to watch: Max, Criterion Channel

Georges Franju’s influential 1960 film is a master class in supernatural fantasy horror. An unsettling tale about a plastic surgeon (played by Pierre Brasseur) who kidnaps young women and performs surgery on them to try and find a face replacement for his daughter (Édith Scob), Eyes Without a Face is equal parts haunting and beautiful. Scob’s iconic face mask in the movie was later referenced in her role in the also-excellent Holy Motors many decades later. — PV

Director: Clive Barker Cast: Andrew Robinson, Clare Higgins, Ashley Laurence Where to watch: Prime Video, AMC+, Tubi, Pluto, Hoopla

Clive Barker’s 1987 directorial debut adapts his 1986 novella The Hellbound Heart to tell the story of Larry (Andrew Robinson) and Julia Cotton (Clare Higgins). The Cottons are a married couple who move into the home of Larry’s recently deceased brother, Frank (Sean Chapman), with whom Julia had a previous affair. After inadvertently being resurrected by a drop of blood spilled by Larry on the floor of the house’s attic, Frank seduces Julia into luring new men to the house so that he can drain their life force and fully regain his mortal form. Surrounding this core narrative is the the story of the Lament Configuration, a puzzle box Frank acquired before his untimely death. When solved, it conjures hellish beings known as Cenobites to the mortal plane of existence, which indulge in hellish exercises of sadomasochistic mutilation. Easily the best and most enduring of the Hellraiser movie series, Barker’s 1987 original is a must-watch for horror fans. —TE

Director: Ari Aster Cast: Toni Collette, Alex Wolff, Milly Shapiro Where to watch: Max, Kanopy

Hereditary is a victim of its own success. The poster child for the misguided term “elevated horror,” and the subject of more than a few memes (particularly around telephone poles), the thing that often gets lost about Hereditary is that it’s actually really fucking good. And it’s damn scary too.

The movie follows Annie Graham, a difficult mother of two, who just lost her mom. During the funeral service, Annie notices quite a few people are here to mourn the mother she thought had no friends. She eventually learns this group of old people all belonged to the same bizarre semi-cult her mother did. And that’s where the witchy stuff starts.

From there everything descends into a complicated mishmash of tightly coiled family drama, supernatural plotting, and years-old resentments, and it’s absolutely excellent. Who’s to say which is scarier in this movie, the verbal immolation or the literal one?

Even if you’ve seen it already, you probably owe this movie a rewatch. You definitely remember that it’s good, but you probably don’t remember just how great it really is. Hereditary is elegantly creepy, right up until the point that it becomes terrifying. You can’t really ask any more from a horror movie than that. — AG

Director: Bong Joon-ho Cast: Song Kang-ho, Byun Hee-bong, Park Hae-il Where to watch: Prime Video, Hulu, Peacock, Mubi, Hoopla, Kanopy, Crackle

The Host was Bong Joon-ho’s follow-up to the smash success serial killer drama Memories of Murder . A critical and commercial success, it was the highest-grossing South Korean film ever after its release and won Best Film at the Asian Film Awards and the Blue Dragon Film Awards.

Years after chemicals are dumped into the Han River, a huge mutated fish monster emerges and kidnaps a young girl. Her father (Song Kang-ho) sets out to find and rescue her, before being kidnapped by the American scientists responsible for its existence. A fun monster thriller that doubles as insightful commentary on U.S. intervention, ecological disasters, and much more, The Host is a high mark in Bong’s impressive filmography. — PV

Director : Nobuhiko Obayashi Cast : Kimiko Ikegami, Miki Jinbo, Kumiko Ohba Where to watch: Max, Criterion Channel

Few movies are as weird and excellent as Nobuhiko Obayashi’s House .

The bizarre ghost story follows a group of school girls who take a vacation to a haunted mansion in the countryside of Japan. Everything starts off well enough, but before long the kids are being attacked by demonic gates, getting eaten by pianos, or opening portals to hell — all with visually an inventive silliness few movies have ever matched. House isn’t all that scary, but it is weird in all the best ways, and nothing else looks or feels like it. — AG

In the Mouth of Madness

Director : John Carpenter Cast : Sam Neill, Julie Carmen, Jurgen Prochnow Where to watch: Digital rental/purchase on Amazon, Apple TV, YouTube

Among the wildest movies John Carpenter has ever made (and that’s saying something), In the Mouth of Madness follows insurance investigator John Trent (Sam Neill), who is hired to find a missing fame horror novelist. Things become increasingly unhinged as the plots of the author’s books and the various monsters seem to invade the real world. Neill, a staple of this list, is absolutely fantastic responding to the horrors of hell, slowly becoming exactly as off-kilter as they are. By the time the movie makes it to the third act, the door to hell is halfway open and Trent is ready to dive headfirst into the void, which is honestly how every movie’s third act should go.

This is also the third in Carpenter’s apocalypse trilogy, which also includes two other stone-cold classics, The Thing and Prince of Darkness . They aren’t on this list, but you should watch them anyway. — AG

Let the Right One In

Director: Tomas Alfredson Cast: Kåre Hedebrant, Lina Leandersson, Per Ragnar Where to watch: Hoopla, Kanopy, Plex

A 12-year-old Swedish boy finds a friend in a vampire who looks roughly his age, but is actually an old vampire permanently trapped in the body of a young child. The film is kaleidoscopic, each viewing revealing something different than the last. The first time I saw the film, I was a pessimistic college student, and I read the central relationship as a warning about the parasitic nature of love. After college, the children’s bond reminded me of the impermanence of youth, and why growing up is a mixed blessing. This past year, I was far more focused on the girl’s relationship with her caretaker, an older man who sacrifices everything for her existence.

The film was adapted from John Ajvide Lindqvist’s 2004 novel of the same name, which inspired not just this Swedish film, but a 2010 American adaptation, a comic-book prequel, and two stage plays. The latter has its own legacy — it was adapted by the magnificent National Theater of Scotland, and it eventually had a run at St. Ann’s Warehouse in 2015. Few books inspire so much additional great art. So I suppose I’m recommending the book just as much as the film. — Chris Plante

Director: James Wan Cast: Annabelle Wallis, Maddie Hasson, George Young Where to watch: Max, Tubi

There was just no way to see it coming. After the Conjuring and Insidious franchises, plus blockbuster turns with Furious 7 and Aquaman , James Wan could have cashed in chips to make another moody franchise-starter to stretch his jump-scare muscles. Instead, he made Malignant , a high-emotion giallo stuffed into dingy ’90s direct-to-video pastiche like some kind of horror-movie turducken. Wan pulls back the layers in an almost tedious fashion: The pregnant Madison (Annabelle Wallis) is first the victim of domestic abuse, then she encounters another killer, and then she starts dealing with psychotic episodes tied to her childhood imaginary friend Gabriel, and theeeeen it’s revealed… Well, please go behold it.

Strung together with a melodramatic cover of The Pixies’ “Where Is My Mind,” reveling in horror tropes to the point of parody, the final twists of Malignant are some of the most gratifying lunacy of the year, and the acrobatic actor Marina Mazepa brings it all home in a display of gruesome ballet. I won’t explain anything more out of fear of spoilers — just get on the Malignant train. Wan put his dream (nightmare?) on screen for us all to enjoy. — Matt Patches

Director: Frank Darabont Cast: Thomas Jane, Marcia Gay Harden, Laurie Holden Where to watch: Freevee

Any fan of Stephen King worth their salt knows that the so-called king of horror has a lot of movie adaptations of his work . Few films have managed to eclipse, let alone successfully adapt, King’s capacity for horror storytelling, with the exception of (a) Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining and (b) Frank Darabont’s The Mist .

Darabont’s third adaptation of a Stephen King story, the film stars Thomas Jane ( The Expanse ) as a Hollywood poster artist living in Maine who, along with his wife and son and the rest of his neighbors, takes shelter in a supermarket in the wake of a mysterious storm that covers the town in a deadly mist.

Supernatural, otherworldly horrors abound throughout The Mist , but the greatest horror of all is — you guessed it — humanity itself, as seen in the way the townspeople succumb to the temptation to scapegoat those among themselves under the influence of a local religious fanatic. The ending is a gut-punch and sincerely one of the most chilling in any mainstream horror film of its time. If you’ve managed to go unspoiled until now, I won’t ruin the surprise, but needless to say, it’s worth it. —TE

Night of the Living Dead

Director: George A. Romero Cast: Duane Jones, Judith O’Dea, Marilyn Eastman Where to watch: Max, Peacock, Criterion Channel, Shudder, Kanopy, Tubi, Pluto TV

The movie that launched the modern zombie film in the United States, George A. Romero’s debut feature was written, directed, photographed, and edited by the nascent zombie film master on a shoestring budget, which only adds to the eerie atmosphere and grounded terror. In this film, a group of survivors hide out in an abandoned house in western Pennsylvania at the start of a zombie apocalypse. Led by the level-headed Ben (Duane Jones), the group not only has to deal with the conflict of zombies trying to break in, but internal conflicts stemming from disagreements on how to handle their precarious predicament.

Night of the Living Dead is the first example of Romero’s typical blend of jaw-dropping (and stomach-churning) practical effects and astute social commentary. Fun fact: This movie came out a month before the MPAA film rating system, which meant a heaping amount of controversy when children were able to see the quite graphic movie in theaters. And another fun fact: Night of the Living Dead was never copyrighted and is in the public domain because of an error by the original theatrical distributor. — PV

Director: Andrzej Żuławski Cast: Isabelle Adjani, Sam Neill, Heinz Bennent Where to watch: Shudder

Outside of the most ardent of cinephile circles, Andrzej Żuławski isn’t a name that inspires enthusiastic recognition in the United States. Known for his transgressive brand of arthouse cinema, Żuławski’s career was stymied by Communist authorities in his homeland of Poland, with many of his early films being either heavily censored, banned, or, in one instance, nearly destroyed upon release. It also doesn’t help that the few films of his that have been released in the States have since gone out of print — though that appears to be changing soon .

If you do know Żuławski’s name, it’s likely for his 1981 psychological horror film Possession , a film whose cult status among horror connoisseurs has only been amplified in the decades since its release by its difficulty to obtain on physical media or to view online. Fortunately for everyone, that’s no longer the case.

Set in Cold War-era West Berlin, Żuławski’s film stars Jurassic Park ’s Sam Neill as Mark, a Russian spy who returns home to find that his wife, Anna (Isabelle Adjani), has left him and wants a divorce. When Anna refuses to divulge why, only saying that she has not left him for someone else, Mark grows suspicious and has her tailed. What he eventually discovers is a horrifying secret beyond his comprehension, one which awakens a long-dormant wellspring of anxiety, resentment, and despair between the two that threatens to tear apart not only their small family, but their very sanity as well.

Inspired by Żuławski’s own tumultuous divorce in 1976 and his subsequent struggles with suicidal ideation, Possession blurs the line between the autobiographical and the phantasmagorical, with hysterical performances by Neill and Adjani that vacillate between disturbing, comical, and disquietingly sympathetic. An inspiration for everything from Ari Aster’s Midsommar to the 2016 music video for Massive Attack’s “ Voodoo in My Blood ,” Possession is an essential watch for any serious horror fan. —TE

Directors : Jaume Balaguero, Paco Plaza Cast : Manuela Velasco, Ferran Terraza, Martha Carbonell Where to watch: For digital rental/purchase on Amazon, YouTube

One of the best and most disturbing found-footage movies ever, [REC] follows a TV reporter and camera person who follow emergency workers into an apartment building, only to discover the dark truth inside: Some of the residents are turning into monsters. Set squarely in the zombie-craze of the mid-2000s, [REC] ’s undead creatures owe quite a bit to the raving cannibal infected of 28 Days Later , but the Spanish movie’s flesh-eaters are quite a bit creepier and more disturbed than their predecessors. While many found-footage movies obscure their scariest moments, [REC] uses the format to enhance its creeping dread and drag out the character’s slow careful exploration of the apartment building, ramping the tension up to 11 just in time for the downright terrifying finale. — AG

Director: Scott Derrickson Cast: Ethan Hawke, Clare Foley, Fred Thompson Where to watch: Max

A desperate true crime writer, played by Ethan Hawke, moves his family into a house that once played host to an extremely gruesome crime in Scott Derrickson’s terrifically dark horror gem, Sinister . Despite the fact that this movie preceded the latest renaissance of true crime by several years, Hawke seems to have a perfect bead on the genre’s worst creators. He’s one of the all-time-bad horror movie parents, throwing his kids into untold danger all in the hope of writing a new book that could save his career.

Of course, by the time he realizes he’s actually put his family in the path of genuine danger and certain death, it’s already too late for him to write a single word. It’s a straight-over-the-plate premise that feels like you’ll see the scares coming a mile away, but Derrickson takes the story to darker and creepier places than you’d ever expect at first glance, turning it into one of the most terrifying horror movies of the 2010s. — AG

Director: Egor Abramenko Cast: Oksana Akinshina, Fedor Bondarchuk, Pyotr Fyodorov Where to watch: Digital rental/purchase on Amazon, Apple TV, YouTube

If you’re hungry for a great piece of contemporary Russian sci-fi horror (i.e., something not directed by either Andrei Tarkovsky or Yakov Protazanov), then Egor Abramenko’s 2020 directorial debut is just the film you’re looking for.

Set during 1983 at the height of Cold War tensions, Sputnik (which for your information is Russian for “fellow traveler”) centers on Tatyana (Oskana Akinshina), an uncompromising young psychiatrist with a staunch attitude with regard to the ends justifying the means. Tatyana is recruited by the Soviet military to treat Konstantin (Pyotr Fyodorov), a wounded cosmonaut and the lone survivor of a mysterious satellite crash. Only upon arriving at the remote hospital facility housing the patient and interacting with him does Tatyana come to realize the horrifying truth: Konstantin did not in fact return from space alone; rather, his body has now become the unwitting host to an organism unlike anything seen on Earth. Caught between her duty to study the creature and her desire to save Konstantin from further harm, Tatyana must make a hard decision upon which the very survival of all humanity may rest.

What makes Abramenko’s debut so compelling is how it takes the basic premise of the “trolley problem” thought experiment and twists it repeatedly (and successfully) to dramatic emotional effect. Akinshina ( The Bourne Supremacy ) delivers a convincing and compelling performance as Tatyana, a woman forced to confront and overcome the uncompromising attitude that had once assured her success but now threatens to endanger not only another man’s life, but potentially the lives of everyone on the planet along with her own soul. Fyodorov, for his own part, delivers a sympathetically complex (and on occasion, implicitly sinister) performance as Konstantin, a Russian “hero” torn between his perceived duty to his country and his emotional obligation to a loved one he all but abandoned before embarking on his most recent mission. The creature design in this movie is terrific, as is the cinematography and the film’s score.

Having previously been slated for a world premiere at the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival and subsequently dumped on video-on-demand in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Sputnik is exactly the kind of horror movie this list was intended to spotlight: a kind of rare gem of intellectually and viscerally stimulating horror that otherwise goes unappreciated if not given the opportunity to shine. —TE

Director : Dario Argento Cast : Jessica Harper, Stefania Casini, Flavio Bucci Where to watch: Kanopy

One of the best-looking movies of all time with one of the best soundtracks of all time. What’s better than that?

Dario Argento’s Suspiria tells the story of Suzy Bannion, an American dancer who moves to Germany to study at the prestigious Tanz Akademie. It just so happens that the academy is run by witches. As the facade of the school unravels, Suzy’s fellow students slowly start going missing or dropping dead in increasingly bizarre and horrible ways.

While the plot for Suspiria is interesting, what really makes the movie great is how it looks and how it sounds. Everything about the production design, the costumes, and the colors is eccentric in ways no other horror movie has ever matched. Couple all that with the incredible and haunting soundtrack from European rock band Goblin, and Suspiria becomes an unforgettable horror classic that everyone should see at least once. — AG

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre

Director: Tobe Hooper Cast: Marilyn Burns, Gunnar Hansen, Allen Danziger Where to watch: Peacock, Tubi, Freevee, Pluto TV

Another shoestring production gone huge, Tobe Hooper’s 1974 masterpiece made over $30 million at the box office on a budget of around $140,000. The movie follows a group of friends who find themselves hunted by a family of cannibals in the middle of Texas, and is a chilling, violent fever dream that permanently lodges itself in the minds of those who watch it.

Eight films have followed, including a Netflix version in 2022, but the original stands out as an unhinged encapsulation of pure chaos and terror. At a tight 83 minutes, the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre is well worth the small time investment to catch up on one of the most influential horror movies ever made. — PV

Director: John Carpenter Cast: Kurt Russell, Wilford Brimley, Keith David Where to watch: Digital rental/purchase on Amazon, Apple TV, and YouTube

John Carpenter’s postmodern creature feature takes the idea of alien monsters and makes them simultaneously more recognizable and more gross and unworldly than in any other movie in history. The Thing , the second adaptation of the excellent novella Who Goes There? , remains thrilling, terrifying, and absolutely disgusting more than 40 years after its release.

The Thing follows a group of researchers working at an Antarctic base. Suddenly, a dog from a local Norwegian camp rushes into their base, with Norwegian men hot on its heels, trying to kill it by any means necessary. However, once the American crew takes the dog in and shelters it, they discover it’s an alien that can transform into any living creature, mimicking it perfectly — and that makes every one of them a suspect.

It’s one of the great paranoid thriller premises of all time, but it just so happens to also be filled with gross and fantastic alien gore. There’s nothing quite like The Thing . — AG

Totally Killer

Director: Nahnatchka Khan Cast: Kiernan Shipka, Olivia Holt, Charlie Gillespie Where to watch: Prime Video

Totally Killer is a slasher with a sci-fi twist, not unlike the fabulous Happy Death Day movies. The movie follows Jamie (Kiernan Shipka), who has to go back in time to the 1980s to stop a masked serial killer before he kills her mom in the future. When she arrives in the past, however, the high school versions of her mom (Olivia Holt), her dad (Charlie Gillespie), and every other adult in her life aren’t exactly who she thought they’d be.

While Totally Killer isn’t the scariest horror movie on this list, it is undeniably one of the most fun. The cast elevates an already funny script thanks to some fantastic and ridiculous line readings, and the movie has a few novel approaches to time-travel shenanigans that keep the concept from ever overwhelming the movie or dragging it down with too much science. Totally Killer is endearingly silly with just the right amount of sweetness, making it one of the most fun and unique slashers of the last several years. — AG

The Unfriended movies

Director: Levan “Leo” Gabriadze ( Unfriended ); Stephen Susco ( Unfriended: Dark Web ) Cast: Shelley Hennig, Moses Storm, Renee Olstead ( Unfriended ); Colin Woodell, Rebecca Rittenhouse, Betty Gabriel ( Unfriended: Dark Web ) Where to watch: Digital rental/purchase on Amazon, Apple TV, and YouTube

As many people have learned over the past few years, there aren’t that many things scarier than a video call you can’t leave.

A masterfully contained horror movie that makes full use of its (at the time) groundbreaking gimmick, Unfriended is a tense teen horror movie that takes place entirely on a character’s laptop screen. Definitely watch it on a laptop if you can, and check out the very good sequel Unfriended: Dark Web if you dug this one. — PV

From our list of the best horror movies on Netflix :

Levan Gabriadze’s Unfriended pulls the audiences through the screen — almost literally. Viewed entirely from the perspective of a computer desktop, 2014 supernatural horror film centers around a Skype call between a group of high school students who are joined by an unknown presence known only as “billie227.” What at first appears to be a prank swiftly morphs into something much more horrific, as the mysterious stranger begins to reveal terrifying secrets about each of the friends before killing them off one by one. Unfriended is thoroughly gripping extrapolation of our always-online world, a world where vengeful poltergeists and doxxing exist side by side and no secret or offense goes undiscovered or unpunished. —TE

Director: Jordan Peele Cast: Lupita Nyong’o, Winston Duke, Elisabeth Moss Where to watch : Digital rental/purchase on Amazon, Apple TV, YouTube

Jordan Peele’s already a horror master just three movies into his career, but Us probably still doesn’t have the reputation it deserves. His 2019 psychological slasher had the unfortunate fate of following up the cultural phenomenon of Get Out , so it had a hard time breaking through, in the way that sophomore projects often do. But taken on its own terms, Us is a fantastic little horror movie with tons of atmosphere and an underground society’s worth of great scares.

The movie follows the Wilson family, whose vacation is interrupted by the arrival of a group of doppelgängers who match up with each member of the family perfectly. The clones, it turns out, are called Tethered, and where they come from is very complicated. But before any kind of explanation of the Tethered, what we see is a parade of violent attacks, home invasions, and some very tense encounters between Lupita Nyong’o and herself.

Us may not be Peele’s best movie, but it is a fascinating mix of slasher thrills and world- building, supported by a fantastic cast all operating at their A games. While the entire cast is great, Elizabeth Moss is a particular standout for her extremely brief but extraordinarily loathsome role as one of the family’s friends. Her performance gives this movie so much of its weird off-kilter vibe, and leads to some of its most unstintingly and gleefully over-the-top violence. Alongside the terrifying tone, Peele manages to build an entire second world underneath our own, and will give you a very unhealthy fear of what you’re really seeing when you look in the mirror. — AG

• Best horror movies
• Best horror TV
• Best 2024 horror movies so far
• Best horror movies on Netflix

The best movies new to streaming this July

The best horror movies of the year so far, ranked by scariness, the 30 best movies on netflix right now.

The 25 Best Horror Movies of the 2020s So Far, Ranked

Your changes have been saved

Email Is sent

Please verify your email address.

You’ve reached your account maximum for followed topics.

The 10 Best Supernatural Psychological Thrillers, Ranked

The 15 best horror movies of all time, according to letterboxd, the 10 best horror movies that are also great dramas.

While some may bemoan the lack of variety when it comes to action blockbusters of late , the horror genre has been thriving in recent years. Though the 2020s is still a relatively young decade, the years spanning 2020 to 2023 have already seen many great horror movies get released, with filmmakers exploring the genre in new and creative ways, finding interesting approaches to scaring, unsettling, and thrilling viewers.

What follows can only be viewed as a work in progress, given the decade won't be over until 2029, but nonetheless, these movies represent the best of the horror genre in the 2020s so far. Those who want modern films that are horrifying and disturbing might find the following titles worth exploring, with these contemporary horror films (and potential future classics) being ranked below from good to great.

25 'Infinity Pool' (2023)

While David Cronenberg remains a noteworthy filmmaker within the horror genre, his son, Brandon Cronenberg , has also risen to prominence as a director in recent years. His latest film, Infinity Pool , is a truly alarming piece of horror, centering on a vacation at an island resort that takes a dark, twisted, and unpredictable turn.

20 Unpredictable Movies You Should Go Into Blind

The less you know the better.

It's got stomach-churning horror mixed in with some very unsettling science fiction themes, which ensures Infinity Pool ends up as a disturbing and memorable film. It also features one of Mia Goth's best (and most committed) performances to date, with this being far from the only great horror movie she's appeared in recently.

24 'You Won't Be Alone' (2022)

Set in Macedonia during the 1800s, You Won't Be Alone is an effectively unsettling blend of fantasy and horror. Its story revolves around witchcraft and shape-shifting, with the basic premise involving a young girl who's transformed into a witch, and then what happens when this young girl tries to integrate into life in a nearby village.

It goes a good deal deeper than that, though, offering things that you might not expect to see in a horror movie based around witchcraft . It succeeds largely because of its strange and unpredictable story, and its very bold visuals, the latter of which makes You Won't Be Alone as entrancing as it is scary.

23 'M3GAN' (2022)

Unsettling dolls will always be a reliable source of horror, and this is a fact that M3GAN understands well. Its title character is a doll powered by AI to make her more realistic and able to bond with her owner, yet things become complicated when the doll becomes too protective of the young girl she's paired with.

As a horror movie, it's probably on the goofier side of things, and isn't too traumatic as a result, thanks to having some self-aware humor and a somewhat comedic tone. It might not offer too many surprises, but it certainly provides enough of a spin on doll-related horror to provide some decent entertainment value.

22 'Men' (2022)

Men was a movie that unsurprisingly divided audiences upon release , largely thanks to its slow pace, unusual creative decisions, and bizarre ending. It starts off steadily enough, centering on a young woman who goes and stays in the countryside to emotionally recover after a personal tragedy, only to experience some truly strange things while on her own in an unfamiliar locale.

10 Movies Like 'Midsommar' That Will Definitely Scar You

"Midsommar lovin', had me a blast."

Alex Garland's a director probably best known for his science fiction works, but 2018's Annihilation took on sci-fi themes and horror elements in equal measure, and then 2022's Men sees a further step into the horror genre. It's an uneasy and unusual film, unlikely to be for everyone, though it's bold enough to make it recommendable to horror fans.

21 'Censor' (2021)

The set-up for Censor is already disturbing enough, as it follows a protagonist named Enid whose job at the British Board of Film Classification involves looking over alarming films and footage. But this is a horror movie, so things naturally get worse at a point, with Enid coming across one film that feels reminiscent of an unsettling childhood memory.

It's a psychological horror film that sees its protagonist's mind unravel as she revisits a dark chapter in her past, with things revolving around her disappeared sister. Censor's a very direct movie, clocking in at just 84 minutes, but proves to be effectively scary and undeniably unnerving throughout.

20 'The Black Phone' (2021)

Scott Derrickson's a filmmaker best known for his horror movies, though directing 2016's Doctor Strange did mix things up a bit for the director. He returned to horror in a big way with The Black Phone , which is a frightening and tense thriller about a young boy who's kidnapped, and then finds himself able to communicate with his kidnapper's past (now deceased) victims.

It uses a confined setting well, The Black Phone's simplicity also ends up being one of its greatest strengths, with it ultimately being a film about a desperate fight to stay alive. It's also notable for giving Ethan Hawke what might be his most strikingly villainous performance yet, as he plays the kidnapper here scarily well.

19 'Possessor' (2020)

Three years before Infinity Pool , Brandon Cronenberg shocked and alarmed horror fans with the queasy Possessor . If it's not the most shocking horror movie of the 2020s so far, then it has to be right up there, pulling no punches content-wise while telling a story about identity, assassinations, and mind control.

10 Killer Movies to Watch if You Love 'American Psycho'

"I have to return some videotapes."

It's uncompromising in a way that feels as though Brandon Cronenberg is trying to outdo his father, David Cronenberg. He might well be successful here, because Possessor goes to places with its violent and sexual content that very few other movies lately, making it one of the most daring works of horror in recent memory.

18 'Swallow' (2020)

Swallow technically premiered in 2019 at the Tribeca Film Festival, but wasn't widely distributed until early 2020. Put simply, it's a psychological horror/thriller movie about a pregnant woman who finds herself strangely compelled to eat various inedible objects, with this putting her in danger and placing a strain on her family life.

It uses this strange premise to explore serious themes around trauma and mental illness, all of which makes it constantly tense throughout. It's a difficult and despairing movie at times, but those qualities apply to a good many effective horror movies, so depending on what you're looking for, it's arguably more of a blessing than a curse when it comes to Swallow .

17 'Titane' (2021)

Not only was Titane a horror movie that debuted at the Cannes Film Festival , it also won the top prize at the festival in 2021: the Palme d’Or . It's about a woman who has a very strange connection to cars (to put it one way), and what happens to her after she goes on the run following an alarming crime spree.

It's a movie that takes all sorts of strange twists and turns as it goes along, feeling like the sort of movie that could end up at any strange destination it feels like. This makes the experience of watching Titane as thrilling as it is nauseating, with this being an overall extreme horror movie that takes no prisoners while showing viewers things they may not exactly want to witness.

16 'Smile' (2022)

After building anticipation thanks to some inventive marketing , Smile released to fairly strong reviews and success at the box office . It's about a therapist who's haunted by the death of one of her patients, and finds herself experiencing increasingly unsettling things in the wake of this tragedy.

10 Low-Budget Horror Movies That Aren't Found Footage

These horror movies didn't need big budgets to make audiences scream.

It manages to combine psychological horror with supernatural elements to great effect, making for an engaging horror movie that builds well over its runtime. Though it might not reinvent the genre by any means, it offers a good amount of scares and, like many horror films lately, also effectively explores themes surrounding trauma and mental illness.

15 'The Invisible Man' (2020)

2020's The Invisible Man is quite different from the classic Universal series with which it shares a name. Older movies based around The Invisible Man were goofier and often functioned as comedies, but this modern take on the premise of a man who - to no one's surprise - is invisible proves to be much more intense.

It's about an abusive man who fakes his death and then uses powers of invisibility to stalk and torment his ex-partner. The idea of someone being out to get you while remaining unseen is inherently frightening, and even if this is the main source of horror found in The Invisible Man , it does thankfully function as something that sustains an entire film.

14 'Prey' (2022)

Continuing the iconic and action-packed Predator series in a novel way, Prey takes a familiar foe back to the distant past in a very successful way. It sees a member of the Predator species appear in the early 1700s, and centers on a Comanche warrior named Naru who encounters the alien, leading to an intense and extended one-on-one battle/fight for survival.

Thanks to having a new setting and approach to the series, Prey inevitably breathes new life into the Predator franchise and stands as easily the best film within it since the 1987 original. It might be more of an action/thriller film than a horror film, but it still manages to be tense and exciting in parts, and is overall very entertaining.

13 'The Empty Man' (2020)

The titular Empty Man is an urban legend within the world of The Empty Man , and a figure who's said to be behind the disappearances of various teenagers in a small town. The film becomes about a cop trying to solve this series of disappearances, with things becoming more unsettling once it seems likely that something supernatural is indeed involved.

"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."

It's ambitious with its blend of mystery, horror, and thriller elements, and ends up being surprisingly long, at 137 minutes. But it largely stays compelling throughout, and is atmospheric and eerie enough to make it qualify as one of the more underrated horror movies in recent years.

12 'Host' (2020)

When the COVID-19 Pandemic was underway, plenty of movies were put on hold due to lockdown restrictions and quarantine measures. It was during these early days of COVID that filmmakers had to find novel ways to make films, if they didn't want to wait for restrictions to end, which helped give birth to inventive movies like Host .

The entire movie takes place on a computer screen, with various friends holding a séance over Zoom, and then realizing that doing so has put them all in danger. It turns limitations into strengths, and while its presentation and premise might be limited, it's creative and novel enough to make for an engaging watch (the brief runtime of just 57 minutes also helps).

11 'Freaky' (2020)

Freaky Friday was originally a children's novel about a mother and daughter who find themselves having switched bodies one day, with this story having several film adaptations (arguably the most well-known was from 2003). Freaky takes some inspiration from this story, given it's about a serial killer and a teenage girl switching bodies.

It's obviously a lot more violent as a result, but it balances all the bloodshed and murder with a good amount of comedy quite successfully. It takes the whole body-swap genre (if it can be called a genre) to some new, interesting places, and overall executes its somewhat ridiculous premise with an admirable level of confidence.

10 'Beau Is Afraid' (2023)

Ari Aster broke out in a big way in 2018, thanks to the release of the traumatic family drama/demonic possession movie that was Hereditary . 2019's Midsommar might also rank among the best horror movies of the 2010s, but come 2023, Aster directed a completely different kind of film heavy on trauma and general unpleasantness: Beau Is Afraid .

Freakishly good horror movies.

It's hard to summarize Beau Is Afraid succinctly, given it's three hours long and indulges in being unpredictable and all over the place. It is effective at feeling like one extended nightmare or fever dream alongside also being darkly funny and something of an adventure film. For better or worse, there's not really much else out there like it.

9 'Talk to Me' (2022)

Talk to Me is another modern horror movie that understands how grief and trauma can be just as scary - or perhaps even scarier - than anything supernatural. It follows a group of young people who take part in a party game that apparently lets people communicate with the dead, but given this is a horror movie, certain rules are disobeyed, and anarchy follows.

It's got an incredibly fast pace and a premise that's able to instantly hook you as a viewer, refusing to let go until the end credits roll. It's genuinely creepy and balances the supernatural horror with the more grounded, dramatic side of things well, all adding up to make Talk to Me one of the better horror films in recent memory.

8 'Crimes of the Future' (2022)

The title for Crimes of the Future is particularly accurate, as it does indeed take place in the future, and narratively, it unfolds a bit like a film noir/old crime movie , too. It's overwhelming and also subdued in equal measure, taking place in a world filled with so many mutations and transformations that human behavior now seems largely unrecognizable from how things are today.

The plot takes several strange turns throughout, with things sort of revolving around art, the proposed next stage of human evolution, and some larger conspiracy. It's all very weird and filled with the body horror you'd expect from a David Cronenberg horror movie, showing he still has what it takes to compete with his son's recent movies, like Possessor and Infinity Pool .

7 'Pearl' (2022)

Though Pearl is a prequel to another Ti West -directed and Mia Goth-starring 2022 horror movie, it's able to be enjoyed with or without that context. It's set during 1918, and more or less centers on its titular character's troubled family life and struggles with repressed feelings, as well as her deep desire to one day be a star.

Movies that'll have you crying tears...of blood!

When things don't necessarily go the way Pearl hoped they would go, bad things start happening and the film eventually becomes a horror movie. Earlier in the film, it's more of a character study/drama, with the title character's downfall being quite tragic and upsetting while also serving to explain why she is the way she is in the previously-released X .

6 'Barbarian' (2022)

With a story that begins one way, shifts dramatically into something else after the first act, and then does another dramatic shift later on, Barbarian feels like the kind of movie where the less that's described plot-wise, the better. It involves a double-booked Airbnb, a house that contains some unusual secrets, and various people who might not be what they initially seem.

As a horror movie, it's not quite one of the scariest out there, but it might well be up there with the most fun. It emphasizes thrilling entertainment and some pitch-black humor over copious scares, but it can certainly be unsettling and eerie when it needs to be. Barbarian's just overall a very good time, and movies with plenty of sharp twists and turns pulled off successfully should always be celebrated.

The 30 best horror movies that will haunt you long after the credits roll

From monsters and slashers to haunted hotels, here are the best horror movies to watch right now

Anniversaries and milestones in film history play an important part for fans in marking out key moments for us to celebrate our favorites, and the best horror movies of all time have some big birthdays looming. 

By recognizing when a groundbreaking horror movie was released, and how much time has passed, we can appreciate the importance of a film’s legacy for the genre, look back at particular trends and eras, and gain perspective on where we are now. It can also be the perfect excuse to revisit a classic and remind ourselves just how good we’ve had it over the years by giving some extra love to the best horror movies that have ever graced our screens. 

This year there are some huge horror movies celebrating anniversaries, with the formative found footage film The Blair Witch Project turning 25, seminal slasher A Nightmare on Elm Street hitting the big 4.0., the quintessential sci-fi horror Alien marking its 45th year, and hicksploitation masterpiece The Texas Chain Saw Massacre hitting 50.

And the festivities don’t stop there. Throughout 2025 and 2026, Robert Eggers’ The Witch hits double digits, The Descent enters its 20s, Sidney Prescott and her classmates reach their 30s (well, the ones that survived the events of Scream), The Silence of the Lambs turns 35, The Shining and An American Werewolf in London both mark 45, Jaws, Carrie and The Omen all have their 50th, and Psycho reaches the grand old age of 65.

So get the fizz on ice, light some candles, and pop on one of the best horror movies of all time to celebrate the birthday babies of the horror genre – what better opportunity to work your way through these classics than by recognizing the landmark occasions that first brought them screaming into the world?

Read more: New horror movies | Best Netflix horror movies | Best witch movies | Best haunted house movies | Best horror movie remakes | Best horror movie sequels | Best vampire movies | Best horror comedies | Best horror movies for scaredy cats | Best zombie movies | Cheap tricks horror movies use to scare you | Best Shudder movies | The best movie drinking games

• Want more horror movies? Try a free trial at Shudder today

30. The Orphanage (2007)

The movie:  J.A. Bayona’s 2007 Spanish-language spookfest The Orphanage is one of those brilliant horror movies that scares the life out of you and breaks your heart in one ghost-child-filled go. Produced by Guillermo Del Toro, it received a rapturous reception when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and went on to delight horror fans and critics alike, becoming one of the 21st century’s most universally loved ghost stories. Belén Rueda turns in a spectacular and affecting performance as Laura, a woman who brings her family back to her childhood home, only for her young son to start communicating with an invisible friend before disappearing under tragic circumstances. 

Sign up for the Total Film Newsletter

Bringing all the latest movie news, features, and reviews to your inbox

Why it’s scary: It’s got all the gothic atmosphere you could hope for from a ghost story set in an old Spanish orphanage: big spooky house, stormy weather, bleak landscapes, familial trauma. On top of that, the film features one of the most eerie children in horror history in the form of little sack-headed Tomas. Throw in some truly terrifying ghostly kids games, mysterious disappearances, and a now legendary twist ending, and this is one dark and deadly nail-biter you won’t forget in a hurry.

29. Near Dark (1987)

The movie: Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow’s Southern Gothic vampire flick follows Caleb (Adrian Pasdar), a young man forced to join a travelling band of bloodsuckers after he’s bitten by one of their crew - his beautiful and brutal love interest, Mae (Jenny Wright). Bill Paxton, Lance Henrickson, and Jenette Goldstein add to the fray, with stellar performances across the board bringing the neck-tearing terror to life. It’s a tale of vampires as family, told in a neo-Western style that breathes fresh life (or death) into the ubiquitous subgenre and which has garnered a cult following over the years thanks to its striking visuals and set pieces.

Why it’s scary: The unpredictability and savagery of the vampires in Near Dark leaves a lasting impression. These are blood-soaked killers on the rampage, killing to feed but also apparently for fun, and the group includes not only unhinged immortals as you’d expect them but also an unsettling vampire child in Joshua Miller’s Homer. It’s made very, terrifyingly clear that once the sun goes down there’s no escape, so you had better pray for daylight. 

28. The Descent (2005)

The movie: If there was a dip in caving and bouldering trip attendance back in the mid-noughties, it’s probably the fault of Neil Marshall’s truly terrifying claustrophobic creature feature. Sarah’s friends want to make her feel better after the tragic death of her family so, instead of y’know, buying her some gin , they take her on a caving trip. Unfortunately, the movie wouldn’t be on this list if the six women were there to have a heartwarming, gently comedic adventure where they all grow as people. From the moment this lot lower themselves into the darkness below the Appalachian mountains, it’s very clear that getting back out into the light again isn’t going to be likely. 

Why it’s scary: The claustrophobia of The Descent is horribly real. Before you even discover what’s lurking down there - with a night vision reveal so spectacular that it goes down in jump scare history - this cave system is stone horror. The women are experienced explorers but every shot of squeezing through tiny spaces as rubble gently falls, every huge cavern only lit in one tiny corner by their flares, and every step they take further into the abyss is heart-racing stuff. And this isn’t an unlikable crew of barely fleshed out American teens, pun intended, these characters and their complex relationships truly matter. This is beautifully grueling, not to mention empowering, filmmaking. Witness the UK ending of this cult classic and you’ll need more than a cheeky G&T to cheer you up afterward. 

27. 28 Days Later (2002)

The movie: Let’s get the undead elephant out of the room first. Danny Boyle’s horror is a zombie movie. Yes, they can run, but it’s important to think of this horrible lot as part of the same family tree as Romero’s finest. Maybe they wouldn’t have Christmas dinner together but they’d at least send cards and maybe some gift cards for the necrotic kids. The important thing is, regardless of their speed, these zombies are still the destroyers of worlds. When Jim (Cillian Murphy) wakes up in a hospital bed - a lot like our friend Rick in The Walking Dead - he staggers out into an apocalyptic London that will never be the same again. 

Why it’s scary: 28 Days Later feels like a nightmare. Complete with a quite often heartbreaking as well as heart-pounding soundtrack, this feels like the truest glimpse at the modern British apocalypse as Jim and his fellow survivors quest for safety in Scotland. The Infected are truly horrifying, survivors are suspicious, and the fallen British landscape is an impressive feat of cinematography. Throw in excellent performances from everyone involved and 28 Days Later is a gory feast for the eyes and the heart. 

26. The Witch (2015)

The movie: Self-described as a 'New England folk tale' – although it’s more like a fairy tale from hell - Robert Eggers’ terrifying period drama follows a Puritan family after they are ejected from their colony. Screaming 'don’t do it' at the screen just doesn’t work as William (Ralph Ineson) takes his wife Katherine (Kate Dickie) and his five children into the deep, dark woods to survive alone on a farm. It’s not spoiling anything to say that it doesn’t go particularly well. Following Thomasin, the eldest daughter of the family played by Anya Taylor-Joy in her first credited role, we witness the tense unraveling of a dysfunctional family faced with the horrific prospect of an outside force staring out at them from the trees. 

Why it’s scary: It’s love or hate time with this divisive movie, but lose yourself to The Witch and suddenly everything is scary and you can’t put your shaking finger on exactly why. Every perfectly constructed shot of the family attempting to survive in the wilderness is cranked into fear-ville with a constantly surprising hellish score of strings and vocals. This means that when true horror eventually does hit after a torturous slow burn of tension, it’s like Eggers has masterfully wired you in for shocks and you didn’t notice. From the unnerving skip and shrill voices of the young twins to the monstrous goat known only as Black Phillip, there is unique horror lurking in The Witch that just doesn't go away. 

25. Evil Dead 2 (1987)

The movie: So many Evil Dead 2 questions, so little time. Is it a remake? Is it a sequel? Would it actually be physically possible to switch out your missing (presumed possessed) hand for a chainsaw with relative ease? Well, thankfully, Bruce Campbell himself has answered the first two and explained that Sam Raimi’s cabin-based comedy horror is, in fact, a 'requel.' Whereas the original Evil Dead followed a group of twenty-somethings to a holiday house from hell, the sequel revolves exclusively around Campbell’s Ash and his girlfriend Linda as they attempt to survive after playing a reading of the Necronomicon aloud. I'd be remiss if I didn't warn you about someone being beheaded with a garden tool post-reading.

Why it’s scary: Evil Dead 2 is perfect comedy horror. While it might not send you shrieking away from your screen, there’s a delightfully depraved viscerality to proceedings. Eyes in mouths, wall to wall gore, chainsaws feeling like the only option. It’s worth noting here, too, that if you do want something a little less punctuated with the word ‘groovy,’ then the Evil Dead remake from Fede Alvarez is truly something that can get under your skin. Where Evil Dead 2’s grim is played for much-appreciated laughs and you’ll embrace the physical effects, Alvarez’s reboot errs distinctly on the unnerving side, making them a perfect double bill. 

24. An American Werewolf in London (1981)

The movie: Comedy horror is nothing new. The best horror movies have been walking that bloodied tightrope between making us laugh and making us scream for decades. An American Werewolf in London, from legendary comedy director John Landis, is a masterclass in this particular circus trick. David and Jack, two American backpackers - don’t worry, it’ll be one in a minute - find themselves wandering the Yorkshire moors after dark, and instead of staying safe in The Slaughtered Lamb pub, decide to continue their journey. The locals even tell them they’ll be fine if they just stick to the path… 

Why it’s scary: When two become one and Jack brutally falls to a mysterious lupine predator on the moors, a bitten David is taken to hospital in London. Regardless of what this says about the NHS’s ability to deal with werewolf wounds, it means that when David sheds his human skin to become a creature of the night, there are plenty of iconic places for him to gorily slaughter his way through. Once you get over the first transformation sequence - a true CGI-free agonizing marvel of lengthening bones, hewing muscle, and popping joints - this human canine’s tensely directed jaunt through the London Underground will absolutely ruin your late-night travel plans. And, while you’ll get to stop to laugh at Jack’s zombified ghost repeatedly rocking up to tell David to end his own life, the horror here is very real as his relationship with his nurse girlfriend threatens to have the heart, quite literally, ripped out of it. A masterwork.

23. Carrie (1976)

The movie: It’s only right that the master of horror literature Stephen King should feature on this list (not once but twice) with an incredible back catalogue of big screen versions of his books. In 1976, director Brian De Palma adapted King’s first published novel Carrie, and in the process created one of the greatest horror movies of all time. With an impressive cast including Sissy Spacek, Piper Laurie, Nancy Allen, Betty Buckley, William Katt and John Travolta, this story of a painfully shy teenage girl who is sheltered by her hyper-religious mother and violently unleashes her telekinetic powers after being humiliated by classmates at her senior prom, is a seminal look at female adolescence, repression and revenge. 

Why it’s scary: Aside from the horrific acts of King-esque bullying undertaken by her peers, and an explosive final act that sees Carrie claim her power at long last to stand up against her tormentors in blood-soaked, fire-scorched fury, much of the true terror of the film comes from Piper Laurie’s performance as Carrie’s mother, Margaret White. She’s a religious zealot who cruelly keeps her daughter from the real world with rabid fervour, mercilessly shaming her and locking her in cupboards, and creating an environment in which Carrie has no choice but to detonate. The film also has one of the most surprising final moments in horror, in true just-before-the-credits jump scare brilliance. High school can be a killer.

22. Suspiria (1977)

The movie: Less a movie and more an assault on your senses, not to mention your stomach, Dario Argento’s Suspiria follows young dancer Suzy as she arrives at a famous ballet school. Unfortunately, she doesn’t heed the girl running in the other direction and finds herself surrounded by horrific murder as young women are picked off artfully one by one. Still a gory cut above the remake, Argento’s original faced multiple cuts around violence on release and was one of the films at the bloody center of the 1980s video nasty panic. It doesn’t take long to see why.    

Why it’s scary: Nothing about Suspiria is easy to experience. Every color forcing its way into your eyeballs like technicolor violence, every murder intent on you watching each moment in agonizing detail from angles only a madman would select, and a soundtrack so disturbing that you’ll feel like you might have accidentally found Hell’s playlist on Spotify. Depraved, stylish, and beautiful, Suspiria is an experience not to be missed. You don’t have to like it, but even after all these years, this is a true nightmare of a horror movie waiting patiently to sneak into your brain.  

Read more: The Suspiria remake is beautiful, brutal, and shocking

21. Candyman (1992)

The movie: The original Candyman film, based on horror writer Clive Barker’s short story The Forbidden, was a success upon release and subsequently gained a loyal following throughout the '90s thanks to its regular appearance at teen sleepovers as a VHS rental. Helen Lyle (Virginia Madsen) and her study buddy Bernadette Walsh (Kasi Lemmons) are researching folk tales and urban myths in Chicago, and land themselves in the midst of the Candyman legend - the only-too-real tale of a murdered enslaved man who haunts and terrorises the residents of a housing project with his hooked hand. Helen’s tenacity, slight white-saviour complex and likeness to Candyman’s old love see her become his new obsession… and then his victim.

Why it’s scary: Tony Todd’s titular Candyman lurks in the shadows and the subconscious of the project Cabrini-Green, and his imposing stature and deep lyrical voice catapulted him into modern horror monster cult status. The film is renowned for its beauty and its brutality, with evocative direction from Bernard Rose, a stunning score from Philip Glass, and visceral kills from its central character. Candyman is scary in all the best ways: it delivers gore and jump scares to test the most seasoned of horror fans, and the kind of tension that comes from a feeling of grim relentlessness and inevitability. In short, dare to say his name five times into a mirror and you and the people you love are doomed to die a horrible hooky death.

20. Halloween (1978)

The movie: Who'd have thought an old Star Trek mask could be so terrifying? Director John Carpenter created a modern classic when he gave his villain a blank William Shatner mask to wear while he stalks babysitters around the fictional town of Haddonfield, Illinois. The movie created another icon, too, in Jamie-Leigh Curtis, who'd become both a scream queen in her own right, and the template for all final girls to follow. Who cares if the first scene makes no sense? This is a movie that starts with a child-murdering his sister while wearing a clown mask and if that's not scary, you need your horror fan status revoked immediately.

Why it's scary: Pretty much the original stalk-and-slash, Halloween set standards that have rarely been matched. Carpenter composes his shots to keep you constantly guessing, blending both claustrophobia and fearful exposure, often at the same time, to create a deeply uneasy sense of vulnerability wherever you are and whatever is happening. Also, that soundtrack. Composed by Carpenter himself. There is a reason that pounding doom-synth is still the soundtrack for oppressive horror. As a great follow up too, get the 2018 sequel into your eyes. The new Halloween removes all those messy other sequels and does a perfect job of showing the real trauma of growing up as a victim of The Shape himself. 

Read more: The best Halloween movies rewatched, reviewed, and ranked

19. Get Out (2017)

The movie:  Mid-20's photographer Chris is driving out to rural New York to meet his girlfriend's parents for the first time, but he's a little nervous. "Do they know I'm Black?" he tentatively asks Rose, but she's having none of it: "My Dad would have voted for Obama a third time if he could have!". Phew! What could possibly go wrong? Everything. Everything can go wrong, Chris. Turn back now. This isn't just going to be slightly socially awkward. 

Why it's scary: Bubbling with resonant social commentary, layered with hard-hitting goosebumps, and sprinkled with uncompromising humor, Get Out is a modern horror masterpiece in every sense of the word. Not content with scaring you just for its 90-minute run-time, director Jordan Peele wants to draw your attention to the real frightening truths rooted deep in the identity politics of contemporary America, and his grand reveal is more horrific than any jump scare could ever hope to be. 

18. Don’t Look Now (1973)

The movie: Based on Daphne Du Maurier’s short story of the same name, Nicholas Roeg’s dreamy 1973 masterpiece is a tale of grief, psychic connection and faith. The wonderful Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland play a married couple living in Venice after the accidental death of their young daughter, and who encounter two elderly sisters bringing a warning from beyond. Roeg’s subtle film plays with time and reality through innovative editing and montage, and is visually striking as only the very best horror movies can be. It’s a quintessentially '70s horror that has aged gracefully to become a classic of the genre.

Why it’s scary: There are certain images that permeate throughout and beyond the horror genre, and surely Don’t Look Now’s little figure in its little red coat has to be one of them. Flashes and glimpses, whether within visions or amongst Venice’s winding, claustrophobic streets and canals, create a sense of visceral tension and outright terror. Add to that disturbing imagery shown in disorienting visuals, an ever present suffusion of death and a general feeling of mortal peril, and this is one horror movie that will be haunting you long after it’s ended.

17. Nosferatu (1922)

The movie: The earliest horror movie on our list by far, F.W. Murnau’s 1922 silent vampire film Nosferatu remains one of the most influential and most spine-chilling in the genre. An unauthorised adaptation of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula, this film from the German Expressionist school sees Max Schreck play Count Orlok, who journeys from his homeland to settle in a small town and becomes obsessed with his real estate agent's wife as a ‘plague’ ravages the local community. Weird how the symptoms seem to include bite marks on people’s necks, but who are we to make assumptions? Widely agreed to be the first depiction of a vampire in cinema, Nosferatu is the film that started it all and it could be argued is still to be surpassed.

Why it’s scary: Before vampires were sexy, they were scary. Max Shreck’s makeup in Nosferatu, including a now-iconic bald head, batlike ears and rodent-like pointed teeth, creates a genuinely nightmarish image of a monster who is out to drink you dry. The German Expressionist style of the film compounds the frights, with angular designs discombobulating the audience, uncanny movement from Shreck adding to his repugnance, and deep shadows stretching out to consume all in their path. Nosferatu might be over 100 years old, but its subtitle ‘A Symphony of Horror’ holds true to this day.

16. Night of the Living Dead (1968)

The movie: In 1968, George A. Romero directed, filmed and edited one of the most celebrated and influential zombie movies in horror history, and made a name for himself for years to come as the go-to guy for movies about the marauding undead. Starring Duane Jones, Karl Hardman and Judith O’Dea, the simple and confined story sees a ragtag group barricade themselves in an old farmhouse to hide from a horde of flesh-eating ghouls. Through its vision of slow-walking corpses stalking small-town America for their prey, and classic lines like “They’re coming to get you, Barbara”, Night of the Living Dead informed the zombie subgenre and became a perfect example of how an independent filmmaker with a camera and a dream - and some animal entrails - can change the game forever.

Why it’s scary: Like many of the best horror movies of all time, Night of the Living dead isn’t just about what it appears to be on the surface. Sure, it’s a zombie movie and the ghouls are out to kill and munch on your flesh, but it’s often the subtext of Romero’s movie that causes the real goosebumps. It’s a film more deeply about people under siege, claustrophobia and paranoia, power struggles and American civil rights, and over 50 years later the closing moments still pack a punch that will leave audiences reeling.

15. The Wicker Man (1973)

The movie: If the above image doesn’t strike a sense of menace into your heart, it’s time to mainline Robin Hardy’s folk horror directly into your eyes. No, The Wicker Man isn’t just about reaction gifs and mocking the bee-packed Nicolas Cage remake. If nothing else, watching Edward Woodward’s journey to Summerisle is essential background reading for the 21st Century spate of rural scary movies. The ideal accompaniment for the modern nastiness of Ari Aster’s Midsommar or Ben Wheatley’s Kill List, The Wickerman’s appeal is in its sheer terrifying simplicity. Policeman goes to island on the hunt for a missing girl. Policeman discovers all is not what it seems. Oh, and indeed, dear.  

Why it’s scary: It’s a horror message that we’re all quite used to by now but humans being the real monsters never seems to get old. The inhabitants of Summerisle might seem somewhat comedic and there are more than a few moments of genuine humor in here, but The Wicker Man is fuel for your trust issues. Why should you truly believe what anyone says?  How can you actually go to sleep in a world full of human beings? The fear of the unknown is potent as Woodward’s Neil Howie blunders into a world with its own set of rules and beliefs. And, if you have managed to somehow not know how it ends, the reveal is still absolutely devastating.  

14. Psycho (1960)

The movie: Alfred Hitchcock’s proto-slasher classic is now over 60 years old and still packs the sort of punch that elevates horror films into the realms of cinematic legend. In case you don’t know, Psycho follows Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) as she goes on the run after stealing a shedload of money from her boss, ending up at a motel run by the unassuming Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) and his domineering mother. What unfolds is a shocking story of identity and murder, with some of the most iconic sequences in film history playing out in beautiful black and white under Hitchcock’s inspired watchful eye.

Why it’s scary: Well… there’s that shower scene for starters. Not to mention the sort of tension only Alfred Hitchcock - the Master of Suspense - can conjure in that certain way he did, making it look so easy but which was actually the kind of illusive genius that made him a household name. Scenes of voyeurism are characteristically played out for both Norman and the audience, creating an atmosphere of impending doom, and genuinely chilling moments of frenzied stabbing from the movie’s killer (no spoilers here, no matter how long it’s been around) make the blood run cold... especially down a certain famous plughole. Set all this to Bernard Herrmann’s sublime score of screeching strings, and you’ve got something truly special that’s not to be missed by any fan of horror or cinema. 

13. Alien (1979)

The movie: Arguably one of the greatest science fiction movies ever made also just happens to be one of the greatest horror movies too. It doesn't seem fair, does it? The original Alien from Ridley Scott sends the crew of the Nostromo to investigate a distress call from an abandoned alien spaceship as innocently as any gang of hormonal teenagers headed off to a remote cabin in the woods. And, just like those teenagers, not many of them are going to survive to tell the tale. Sigourney Weaver makes for the ultimate Final Girl here. 

Why it's scary: There's nowhere more horribly isolated than a spaceship light years away from home and Giger's alien is as terrifying a monster as you could wish for. The dread goes much deeper than teeth and claws though. This creature represents a multilayered, bottomless pit of psychosexual horror, its very form praying on a raft of primal terrors. Plus, the visual ambiguity of Scott's direction during the final act is an absolute masterclass in 'What's that in the shadows?' tension. Ignore the recent xenomorph-packed movies, turn off the lights and watch this and Aliens to reignite your passion for the true horror of Scott's vision. 

12. The Omen (1976)

The movie: At the sixth hour of the sixth day of the sixth month (get it?), a certain baby was born who would change the world forever. And not just within the world of The Omen. Damian is the ultimate evil kid - the spawn of Satan himself - and he’s here to wreak havoc on the lives of his ‘adoptive’ parents, the Thorns (played masterfully by Gregory Peck and Lee Remick) and everyone around them, including David Warner’s photographer-cum-buddy-cop Jennings. So exemplary is this creepy child that he has become the go-to reference for all little “Damians” going forward. 

Why it’s scary: Richard Donner’s The Omen is a masterclass in quality horror filmmaking but don’t let that put you off, horror fans - there’s plenty of shock and schlock to be had here too. As Damian unleashes his dastardly plans on the world around him, people are hanged, shot, decapitated, defenestrated, impaled, savaged by rottweilers and a sinister nanny - the lot. But perhaps what is most scary about this occult offering is the sense of inescapability that runs through the frightening deaths that pepper the film - if Damian has you in his sights, there’s very little you can do to outrun your fate.

11. Hereditary (2018)

The movie: Home is where the heart is. It’s also where the worst horror lives, hiding just beneath the surface of the perfect family life. A harrowed Toni Collette leads Ari Aster’s very first (!) feature film as the mother of a grieving family. The death of her own mother has sent shockwaves through their home and, to keep this review spoiler-free, the future isn’t looking exactly, errr, bright either. 

Why it’s scary: It’s fair to say that at no point does Hereditary feel safe. Nowhere during its two-hour run time do you feel like you can stop and take a breath, or even make a guess as to what’s coming next. Is this a supernatural movie? Is this an exercise in grief, similar to the Babadook? Is there even a difference between these two ideas? Every shot of Collette’s artist painstakingly creating miniature dioramas feels like a threat and every awkward conversation between the two teenagers of the family leaves a sickening feeling in the pit of your stomach. Why? There's no putting your finger on the exact reason. It might have split cinema audiences but Hereditary is a tour de force of modern horror that will leave you reeling long after its grueling third act. We’re just not going to tell you why .

Read more: Intelligent, emotional, and terrifying, Hereditary is near-perfect horror.

10. Scream (1996)

The movie: By the late '90s, horror was looking a little tired. The masked slasher trope was staggering along in a dire need of a cup of very strong espresso. What it got instead was Wes Craven’s Scream which, despite being parodied into Inception levels of postmodern irony since, reinvigorated the genre with its perfect blend of knowing comedy and scares. Neve Campbell, Rose McGowan, and Drew Barrymore as teenagers talking fluent horror movie while being picked off by a genre-obsessed serial killer? Oh, go on… Add in Courtney Cox - at the giddy heights of Friends fame - as intrepid news reporter Gale Weathers and Scream is a modern horror classic.

Why it’s scary: Just because something is self-referential doesn’t mean it can’t be truly terrifying. The Scream mask, based on Munch’s painting, might have been twisted into stoned bliss by Scary Movie , but it still manages to unsettle and thrill. Scream’s scares remain unpredictable too. Victims fall to this slasher’s knife with disturbing regularity and as we grow attached to our genuinely likable quipping heroes, the end game becomes all the more stressful as we wonder who will survive to the credits. Craven’s Nightmare on Elm Street scare talents guarantee terror all the way to the end. Why don't you, liver alone , eh?

9. A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

The movie: Just like a certain dungaree-clad possessed doll, Freddy Krueger fell firmly into killer clown territory as the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise evolved over the years. Sure, he’ll spray your organs all over the walls but you’ll die laughing, right? Look back at Wes Craven’s original movie, though, and Freddy isn’t to be trifled with. Our selective memories mean we often forget that this serial child killer’s burns come from him being incinerated by an angry mob of parents. Living eternally through their fear and guilt, Freddy becomes the ultimate boogeyman when he dons his favorite murder glove and goes after a whole new generation of Springwood spawn while they slumber.    

Why it’s scary: Bed is meant to be safe. Secure. Free of razor-sharp blades ready to plunge through your chest at any given moment... Robert Englund’s Freddy might be horrible to look at but it’s the very idea of falling asleep and never waking up again that’s the true terrifying kicker here. The desperation of Heather Langenkamp’s Nancy and her friends as they strive to stay awake to stay alive. No amount of caffeine or loud music can save you now, dreams are waiting and that’s where a maniac lurks menacingly in the dark to end your life. Yes, the whole movie is worth it alone for Johnny Depp’s spectacularly splattery death scene, but A Nightmare on Elm Street isn’t one to press the snooze button on. 

8. Jaws (1975)

The movie: Before Jurassic Park , before ET , and an eternity before the majority of the cast of Ready Player One were brought screaming into existence, there was Jaws, Steven Spielberg’s toothy horror. And yes, this is a horror movie. Jaws, one of the original blockbusters on account of the number of people literally queuing round the block only to flee the cinema in terror, is horrifying. It doesn’t matter that the shark looks a little ropey now when he gets up close and personal, the story of Amity Island’s gory summer season as Chief Brody desperately tries to keep swimmers out of the water is the stuff of horror legend. And, let’s face it, you’re already humming the score.    

Why it’s scary: The reason that Jaws haunts you long after the credits roll is simple. One viewing and this particularly vindictive shark can potentially ruin every trip to the seaside. Every gentle paddle as waves lap at your toes. Every skinny dip. Every precarious trip out onto the ocean wave on anything smaller than the Titanic. Spielberg doesn’t pull any punches either. Dogs die, children die, heads float out of sunken boats. No one is guaranteed to see the credits here, especially not the three men who head out to sea to slay the beast. With legendary performances and a monster that will never leave you, Jaws is the ultimate creature feature. 

Read more: 11 big dumb shark movies to guarantee you'll never go swimming again

7. Ringu (1998)

The movie: In the late ‘90s and early ‘00s, a rash of J-horror films came out of Japan to scare the bejeezus out of audiences, and perhaps none so notable or influential as Hideo Nakata’s Ringu. Journalist Reiko Asakawa and her ex-husband Ryuji investigate the mysterious death of Reiko’s niece, a highschooler who died one week after watching a notorious video tape linked to an urban legend that appears to be petrifyingly true and now threatens the couple’s son. They uncover the story of Sadako, a young girl with deadly psychic powers and her unfortunate demise, and seek to bring peace to her memory before it’s too late. The VHS technology may seem a little dated in the age of digital streaming, but there’s nothing out-of-touch about the fear generated by Nakata’s incendiary horror filmmaking.

Why it’s scary: Oh we don’t know. Maybe there’s nothing scary about the relentless ringing of a telephone that means you’ve only got seven days to live, haunted video tapes showing surreal footage that leads to people being literally terrified to death, the idea that you have to pass on the curse to someone else or die, or lank black haired ghost girls crawling their way out of deserted wells… maybe it’s just us.  

6. The Blair Witch Project (1999)

The movie: Ever wondered why no one’s out camping in the woods these days? It’s not that millennials really need to be within one hundred feet of a charging point at all times, it’s just the fact that a full generation of us saw The Blair Witch Project in our early teens and we just really like to sleep inside now. This now almost mythical, found footage horror follows three young documentary makers as they journey to Burkittsville in Maryland. Heather, Mike, and Josh start off interviewing the locals about the local legend of The Blair Witch, a particularly nasty tale you’d hope was just to keep children eating their veggies, before heading into the woods where the witch apparently resides. Given that all that’s ever been found are these tapes, there's not exactly a happy ending. 

Why it’s scary: What’s waiting for Heather and co in the woods is terrifying enough, as strange noises drift through the trees and they descend into a directionless spiral of madness and anger, but what’s equally scary about The Blair Witch Project is the perfect blurring of reality and fiction. This is Heather Donahue, Michael Williams, and Joshua Leonard. These actors were sent out into the woods and their horrifying ordeal is thanks to the filmmaker's insistence on mentally torturing them every night. Released in 1999 and reigniting the popularity of the now horror staple found footage genre, the movie’s marketing even touted it as real. Every wobbly shot, every scream, and every stick figure that the three find are there to tell your brain that these people really went into the woods and never came back. Oh, and the ending is like being punched in the gut by nightmares. 

5. The Silence Of The Lambs (1991)

The movie: Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins star in this horror - yes horror - film about a young FBI agent hunting serial killer Buffalo Bill (Ted Levine) and the incarcerated cannibal brought on to assist her. Jonathan Demme’s film won ‘the big five’ prizes at that year’s Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Adapted Screenplay, and gave licence to an audience who wouldn’t normally gravitate towards horror movies to delve into the scary underbelly of cinema’s darker side. In turn, novelist Robert Harris’ character of Hannibal Lector became one of film’s most recognisable villains under the assured - and deliciously camp - steer of Hopkins’ teeth-gnashing performance, and we were given one of our strongest and most compelling female leads with Foster’s Clarice Starling.

Why it’s scary: Moments of sickening violence intersperse with strong procedural storytelling to create a truly nail biting experience. Lector is a man beyond us - a genius who can outthink, outfight and outrun those entrusted with keeping us safe. Add in Levine’s Buffalo Bill, a beast of a man intent on making himself a human suit, and characters we care about not becoming bloated corpses with their skin flayed off, and you’ve got a serial killer shocker for the ages. Not to mention that to this day, a denouement in a pitch black basement, soundtracked by the desperate cries of a kidnapped woman, is one of the most terror-stricken - and cathartic - sequences in horror cinema. 

4. The Shining (1980)

The movie: Even if you haven’t watched Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece, you’ll know of The Shining. You’ll know Jack Nicholson’s (apparently ad-libbed) "Heeeeeeeere’s Johnny" and you might even be aware that if you’re handed the keys to room 237 in a hotel, you might want to switch it for another suite. But what if you haven’t? What if you have been snowed up in a mysterious hotel with only hedge animals for company? Well, The Shining follows a man and his family as he takes on the role of winter caretaker at a resort hotel known as The Overlook. Given that this is a Stephen King adaptation (albeit one that that horror author hates so much that he made his own movie), the winter months don’t go well. The Overlook Hotel, it turns out, doesn’t really like people.

Why it’s scary: There's a reason that this is the top of this veritable pile of screams. The Shining feels evil. From Jack Nicholson’s deranged performance as a man descending into murderous insanity to Kubrick’s relentless direction as we hypnotically follow Danny navigating the hotel corridors on his trike, this is a movie that never lets you feel safe. Like Hereditary earlier in this list, The Shining is like being driven by a drunk mad man. What’s coming next? Lifts of blood? Chopped up little girls? The terror that lurks in the bath of room 237? This is not a horror movie made of boo scares or cheap tricks, Kubrick’s film is a lurking, dangerous beast that stays with you long after your TV has gone dark. 

3. The Thing (1982)

The movie: Perhaps you’ve been buried in snow and have missed John Carpenter’s ultimate creature feature. Entirely understandable. Why don’t you come closer to the fire and defrost? The title might sound hokey but The Thing remains one of the most gloriously splattery and tense horrors of all time as a group of Americans at an Antarctic research station - including Kurt Russell’s R.J MacReady - take on an alien, well, thing that infects blood . It might start off taking out the canine companions,  but it really doesn’t stop there.

Why it’s scary: The Thing is a movie of physicality. There’s intense paranoia and horror sprinkled in as the party begins to fall apart as the infection spreads but it’s the very real, oh-so-touchable nature of the nasties at work here that’s so disturbing. The practical effects - the responsibility of a young Rob Bottin and uncredited Stan Winston - are the true stars as arms are eaten by chests, decapitated heads sprout legs, and bodies are elongated and stretched. The macabre vision of these murderous monsters at work is never anything less than true nightmare fuel.

2. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

The movie: Some movie titles are vague, letting you gradually work out their meaning as the narrative slowly unfurls in front of your eyes like a delicate flower in tea. Then there’s Tobe Hooper’s grim, sweaty horror movie. There is nothing delicate here. Its titular weapon needs to be sharp but The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a blunt instrument of horror. This is a tour de force of violence as five young people leave the safety of the world behind and journey into dusty Americana. What they find in one house when they innocently enter looking for gas is such death and depravity that the movie is still, decades on, a disturbing endurance test. 

Why it’s scary: The funny - and there is humor here, it’s just not there on the first watch - thing about the Texas Chain Saw Massacre is that there’s actually very little blood. There’s the iconic Leatherface, inspired by Ed Gein in his fleshy face covering, and a death scene involving a hook that will make you look down and check your body is still there, but very little viscera. Gore is something that your brain mentally splashes everywhere to try and deal with the horror on screen here, to cope with the screams of pure terror and iconic disturbing soundtrack. It’s suffered plenty of clones over the years, not to mention a Michael Bay-produced glossy cash cow remake, but nothing can replicate the sheer desperation and violent honesty of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. It would almost be dangerous to try.  

Read more: The real Texas Chain Saw Massacre – how a '50s grave-robber inspired a horror classic

1. The Exorcist (1973)

The movie: And here we are. It almost feels predictable that William Friedkin’s masterpiece, now in its 50th year, is still looming near the top of so many horror features. But watch The Exorcist and you’ll understand why. This is the tale of Regan, the daughter of a successful movie actress who one day occupies herself in the basement by playing with an ouija board. If you have ever wondered why your parents don’t want you playing with this innocuous-looking toy, a young Linda Blair probably has something to do with it. Using the ouija board as gateway, an unwelcome guest takes root in the little girl and the rest, as the titular exorcist arrives, is cinema history. 

Why it’s scary: Much like The Shining, The Exorcist is not safe. Unpredictable, visceral, and primeval, this is a movie based on the simplest of premises but even in its happiest moments, is absolutely anxiety-inducing. With a now near-mythical production, William Friedkin’s relentlessness for ‘authenticity’ meant his actors were frozen in a refrigerated bedroom, physically pulled across sets to replicate the demon’s physical prowess, and, of course, splattered with warm pea soup. The result is a horror movie that you’ll probably never say you actively enjoy, but will find yourself rewatching, just to feel the sheer terror of Friedkin’s battle of good vs evil in all its disturbing glory once again.

Becky Darke is a London-based podcaster and writer, with her sights on film, horror and 90s pop-culture. She is a regular contributor to Arrow Video, Empire, The Evolution of Horror and The Final Girls.

Longlegs director opens up on directing Nicolas Cage in new horror: "It's like having a racehorse in your movie"

Longlegs star Maika Monroe teases "very unexpected and super interesting" sequel to hit horror It Follows

Epic first Gladiator 2 trailer sees Paul Mescal fight Pedro Pascal, a rhino, and a Colosseum full of sharks

Most Popular

• 2 Still Wakes the Deep review: "A moody, ambient piece of short-form horror fiction"
• 3 Destiny 2: The Final Shape review – "an incredibly well-executed expansion that nicely rounds off a decade-long journey"
• 4 Nine Sols review: "Metroidvania blended with Soulslike elements and the execution is nothing short of astonishing"
• 5 The Rogue Prince of Persia Review: "a roguelite with few fresh ideas that's mainly being propped up by its slick combat"
• 2 Longlegs review: "A little Nicolas Cage goes a long way in this deeply disconcerting experience"
• 3 Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F review – "A return to the action thrillers of the '80s"
• 4 Despicable Me 4 review: "Full of nostalgic value and Minion-induced hilarity"
• 5 A Quiet Place: Day One review – "Lupita Nyong'o and Joseph Quinn are excellent in this gripping spin-off"
• 2 The Bear season 3 review: "Equal parts delicious and depressing"
• 3 Star Wars: The Acolyte episode 5 review: "Mounting tensions come to a head in an explosive confrontation"
• 4 Doctor Who episode 8 review: "A thrilling climax to a season that has made this 61-year-old TV show feel young again"
• 5 Doctor Who episode 7 review: "Real potential here to make it an epic, Gatwa-worthy finale"

The 50 Best Horror Movies

As the great Sheriff Leigh Brackett once said in John Carpenter’s Halloween , “It’s Halloween. I guess everyone’s entitled to one good scare.” It’s a good line, sure. But one good scare? And only at Halloween? Talk about stingy! Here at Empire , we like to believe that you can have the bejeezus frightened out of you any day of the year, as many times as you like. Whether it’s seminal slashers, creepy killer clowns, or arthouse works of elevated horror that cut to the quick of society’s most terrifying taboos that get your heart pounding and your cheeks clenching, of this much we can assure you – you’ve come to the right place to find your next sleepless night.

At the dead of night, in an abandoned house along an old Texan dirt road, the Empire team gathered to conjure up a list of the 50 greatest horror movies ever made. From genre titans, to fun frighteners, or modern masterworks, there’ll be something here to make even the hardiest of horror connoisseurs among you double-check your doors are double-bolted by the time you’re done. So draw your salt circles, count the cutlery in your kitchen drawer, take a deep breath, and come with us as we guide you through the films that thrill us and chill us the most. Here’s Empire ’s list of the 50 best horror movies…

READ MORE: The 20 Best Zombie Movies

READ MORE: The 20 Best Vampire Movies

READ MORE: The 100 Best Horror Movie Characters

READ MORE: The 50 Best Horror Movies Of The 21st Century

50) It: Chapters One and Two (2017 & 2019)

Counting both films as one – which, essentially, they are – gives us an unprecedented single six-hour epic based on Stephen King's loose, baggy, monstrous novel. Two generations, 27 years apart, share the screen time to relate the lifelong battle of the Losers' Club against unknowable evil cosmic entity Pennywise, who uses a clown as his avatar. Mad, exhausting, occasionally terrifying and surprisingly warm, just like its literary source. A future classic.

Read the Empire review for Part 1 here , and Part 2 here .

49) Saw (2004)

Occasionally forgotten in the wake of its many sequels, the original Saw is a cracking, gonzo low-budget shocker: stylish, well written and boasting a killer surprise at the end. While the seeds of the tortuous future instalments are sown by the police investigation happening in the background, the central premise is thrillingly lean: two strangers, locked together in a room, and they don't know why. Tell us you're not hooked.

Read the Empire review here .

48) Hellraiser (1987)

It's hard to remember now just how different Hellraiser was when it arrived in the late '80s. In a horror landscape of teens getting slashed, Clive Barker's debut as a director was an adult domestic drama, albeit with supernatural underpinnings, violence, gore and glimpses of a fascinating larger universe, the rules of which arrived almost fully formed. The sequel would dive deep into that, but here, at core, we have a love triangle and a Faustian pact: a sort of weird mashup of Marlowe and Chekhov, told with low-key visual panache. The S&M demon Cenobites – and chiefly Doug Bradley's Pinhead, obviously – get all the attention in spite of being only featured briefly. But surely the real triumph here is Uncle Frank…

47) Drag Me To Hell (2009)

"You shaaaamed me!" rasps Lorna Raver's Hungarian gypsy at Alison Lohman's bank employee, who's made the unfortunate mistake of not granting her another extension on her mortgage. Cue a curse to end all curses: visitations from a demon called the Lamia. While the punishment doesn't seem entirely proportionate, the results offer a wild, raw and wickedly entertaining ride with Sam Raimi at his funhouse best throughout. Justin Long, the loyal hubbie on the other side of Lohman's hellish bubble, takes on the horror staple role of disbelieving agnostic. You'll want to shake him by the end.

46) Audition (1999)

The film that broke director Takashi Miike internationally doesn't initially seem like a horror film at all. We follow a widower's attempts to get back in the dating game with a younger squeeze, via the rather dodgy and disingenuous audition process to which the title refers. And it's only when we realise the object of his desire has literally been waiting by the phone for days – apparently in an apartment empty of anything but something ominous in a sack – that we begin to realise something is very, very amiss. And then there's the foot-sawing and the eye-needles. Kiri, kiri, kiri…

45) Cat People (1942)

With Universal knocking out horror films like there was no tomorrow, RKO tasked producer Val Lewton with creating some similar action. The results were not what the studio expected. Far from the monster mash they'd asked for, Cat People opted for more psychological chills, and a still surprising concept centred on a woman who's afraid to consummate her marriage because of her belief that sexual climax will turn her into a panther. Paul Schrader's '80s remake took full advantage of the modern potential for FX and erotica, but Tourneur's more subtle scares are all about stalking and shadows.

44) The Devil Rides Out (1968)

The Devil Rides Out marked a new direction for Hammer horror, swapping classic gothic fantasy for a modern Dennis Wheatley occult potboiler. Richard Matheson's cracking screenplay streamlines and improves the novel; the pacing and dialogue are sharp; and the performances, particularly from the incomparable Charles Gray and, as always, from Christopher Lee, are top notch. The studio would return to Wheatley with To The Devil A Daughter a couple of years later, but they missed a trick by never bringing back Lee's Duc de Richleau: the paranormal investigator – who brings hell down on his unsuspecting friends here – featured in eleven of the author's novels. His cases could have run and run.

43) A Quiet Place (2018)

When you have kids, your whole perspective shifts – there's a big bad world out there, and the best you can hope for is to protect your children from it, or prepare them for what they'll eventually face. John Krasinski's high-concept monster movie – you make noise, you die – takes that central notion and channels the terror into a series of near-unbearably tense sequences. It's the emotional hook of Krasinski's Lee and wife Evelyn (played by Krasinski's real-life wife Emily Blunt), and their attempts to keep their kids safe, that becomes A Quiet Place 's secret weapon. A film to leave you breathless, in every sense.

42) Kill List (2011)

Kill List begins like a fairly straightforward thriller. Two hit men take on an assignment. They have the kill list. They have to kill them. Bish bash bosh. But as you watch, small hints of the film's true nature slowly appear. An odd symbol is scratched on a bathroom mirror. A doctor offers bizarre, medically dubious advice. The soundtrack broods like a rumbling storm cloud overhead. Ben Wheatley's masterful grip on slow-building tension – informed by his love of 1970s Brit folk-horror – crescendos to an almost unbearable, shocking finale.

41) Nosferatu (1922)

Roger Ebert once said, "To watch Nosferatu is to see the vampire movie before it had really seen itself." This is Dracula before it became cinematic legend; before Christopher Lee, before Gary Oldman, before Count Duckula . Though technically not Dracula at all – Bram Stoker's estate refused to grant the production rights – it's perhaps the quintessential incarnation of the Transylvanian vampire. But its influence, from technical innovations to Expressionistic lighting style, spreads far beyond the horror genre. The imposing shadow of Max Schreck – whose surname means "fright" in German, and whose unique visage led to all sorts of rumours about his origin  – is as iconic as movies are ever likely to get.

40) Poltergeist (1981)

Moving into a family home on an ancient burial ground presents the kind of real estate conundrum even Kirstie and Phil would be hard-pressed to help with. The problems faced by the Freeling clan in this much-mimicked Tobe Hooper/Steven Spielberg horror involve supernatural beasties, vortexes on the landing, floating objects and some major interdimensional child-napping. That's just about every supernatural domestic catastrophe in the handbook, short of finding the Dyson is haunted and the guinea pig is Satan. Despite the restriction of its PG rating (it was initially R-rated but changed on appeal), the result remains a refreshingly scary brew.

39) The Conjuring (2013)

The birthplace of the TCU – The Conjuring Universe – it’s easy to forget just how great James Wan’s The Conjuring really is. Disinterested in subverting the ‘demonic possession’ subgenre, Wan instead delves into the casefiles of real life paranormal investigators Ed And Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga – perfectly paired) to tell a character-driven story about a family whose farmhouse home has been invaded by the devil. The plot may be nothing new, but Wan’s approach – gently guiding us into the Warrens’ world, establishing their love for one another, and then pitting their faith in each other and God against an entity tearing their family apart – is nothing short of masterful. A precision-tooled exercise in tension and release, by the time the resident evil does surface at the film’s climax, it’s almost a relief.

38) Day Of The Dead (1985)

George Romero originally conceived this as "the Gone With The Wind of horror movies" before slashed budgets swiftly torpedoed his dreams of a zombie epic. No matter, the doyen of the undead merely served up another chewy allegory for humanity's doom laden with gory moments enhanced by Tom Savini's magisterial make-up designs. Following on from Dawn Of The Dead with the world in the grip of a full-scale zombie infestation, the survivors head south (in practically every sense) to a bunker in a swampy corner of Florida. There, a crazed doctor tries to turn the shufflers – including the iconic 'Bub' (Sherman Howard) – back into productive members of society. The subtext, again, is clear: the zombies are the least of our problems in a world driven by violence and greed.

37) Dracula (1958)

Directed by the incomparable Terence Fisher, written by Jimmy Sangster, pairing Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee (with Lee getting actual lines for the first time), and going all out for colour, glamour, sex and blood, Hammer's Dracula aligns the elements and distils the formula that powered the studio for the next two decades. Sangster's bold screenplay at once eviscerates Bram Stoker's novel and sets the narrative free. With the locations transposed and limited to Romania and half the 'dramatis personae' excised, we're left with a lean adventure. The Lugosi film is an eerie slow-burn, but Hammer's is a swashbuckler. Lee, of course, gets to be urbane and darkly seductive, but there's also genuine savagery to the moments when he gets to bare his teeth.

36) It Follows (2014)

A strong contender for the best horror film of 2014, It Follows runs with its brilliant central concept and never drops the ball. We never really learn what the 'It' is, except that it's a mysterious entity that's somehow sexually transmitted, manifesting as a variety of shuffling injured strangers, or sometimes as people known to the victims it inexorably pursues. It's an interesting twist on the slasher movie ‘promiscuous teens get killed’ trope, with the wrinkle that if you find yourself affected, you can just shag someone else and get rid of it, like a chain letter. That rule takes the film to some very dark places.

35) Hereditary (2018)

There are some traditional frights in Hereditary – jumpy moments, squirmy tension, and unsettling imagery. But it’s the gut-wrenching emotional horror that stays with you – the very worst possible thing happening, the guilt of it, the devastation that ripples out and affects everyone around you. Aster delivers a heart-crushing rug-pull in his debut feature that is genuinely unforgettable – and from there he ramps up the bumps in the night, the body-horror, and the spine-tingling creepiness like a nightmare that just won't end. Its ending has proven divisive, but whatever your thoughts on the final reel, it's a shattering experience along the way.

34) The Fog (1980)

A chilly yarn about ghost pirates exacting their revenge on a small coastal town, The Fog is so explicitly a campfire tale that it even begins with a scout troop sitting around a seaside blaze, with time for just one more story. Carpenter's follow-up to the classic Halloween saw some post-production tinkering to make the scares more explicit, and when you know that you can definitely spot the reshoot joins. But it doesn't affect what remains perhaps Carpenter's most purely atmospheric film.

33) The Babadook (2014)

Slightly mis-sold by a trailer that made it look like a standard – though impressive – monster movie, The Babadook 's greatest trick is in not really being about the titular thing at all. Rather, it's a film about a mentally-unravelling mother's difficult relationship with her young son. The 'dook itself is just another spanner in the works. Subverting expectations, the film seems to set up Amblin-style hijinks from a resourceful kid, but those elements never come to pass, and his backpack of tricks is ultimately useless. The rules are right there in creepy storybook: you can't get rid of the Babadook. The eventual solution for its defeat – but not eradication – is something like genius.

32) The Bride Of Frankenstein (1935)

James Whale's sequel to his own original Frankenstein reunites the director with Boris Karloff's classic monster and with Colin Clive's hapless scientist: this time tasked with creating a mate for the creature. As before, there's immense pathos in the monster's plight – ultimately rejected by his stunning, shock-haired "bride" Elsa Lanchester. But there's more mischievous wit in the second outing, largely thanks to Ernest Thesiger's cherishably waspish Doctor Pretorius. "Yes," he observes dryly at the reveal that the monster can now speak. "There have been developments..."

31) Raw (2016)

A French flesh-munching art-horror that really sticks in your teeth, Julia Ducournau's film manages to be a full-blooded horror, a darkly funny family drama, and a coming-of-age film all in one. When Justine begins a veterinary course at university – where her older sister also studies, and where her parents first met – she's battered and bewildered by a series of initiation rituals. It's not long before her stringent vegetarianism is replaced by an unstoppable craving for meat, leading to some truly nauseating developments. Shocking, unrestrained, and strikingly original, Raw is a rich, layered meal of a film for anyone who can stomach it.

30) Dracula (1931)

Though perhaps creaky by today's standards, Tod Browning's Dracula remains seminal for its place in horror history, as well as for its eerie central performance by Bela Lugosi and the scene-stealing of Dwight Frye. The film is strongest in its opening stretch, as Frye's Renfield visits the stunning, colossal set of Dracula's castle, meets the sombre count – dwarfed by his cobwebbed surroundings – and falls foul of the vampire's ethereal brides: a sequence of exquisite beauty. Subsequently it's a bit more plodding, and the ending is oddly rushed. But there are still unforgettable elements along the way. Well worth watching with Philip Glass' 1999 score – unless you prefer the almost-silence of the original.

29) Midsommar (2019)

After the sheer, unrelenting darkness of Hereditary , just one year later, writer-director Ari Aster stepped out into the bright sunlight – and made that utterly terrifying too. Midsommar 's sun-bleached visuals are just as nightmarish, pitching everything into the realm of the uncanny as Florence Pugh's grief-stricken Dani loses her grip on reality at a festival hosted by Swedish cultists. As with his previous film, Aster grounds the horror in emotional devastation – this time in a searing deconstruction of a toxic relationship, as Jack Reynor's cowardly boyfriend Christian backs out of breaking up with Dani when she suffers a sudden family tragedy. Creepy, deeply unsettling, with brutally gory jolts – and an undeniable sense of beauty. Just bear witness to its instantly iconic flower-wreathed finale.

28) Don't Look Now (1973)

Nic Roeg's hugely influential take on Daphne du Maurier's short story is more than just a simple horror movie. It's also a moving and insightful study of marriage, particularly the way it creaks like the hull of a ship under the duress of loss and grief. But, yes, ultimately it's scary in a way that's cranked up several notches by its eerie backdrop of Venice in off-season, weird encounters with spiritualists, and that red-coated hobgoblin. Julie Christie (lost in her grief for her drowned daughter) and Donald Sutherland (adrift in his) are note-perfect as the central couple, but Roeg's direction and editing – particularly in the famous sex scene – lend the movie the feel of a beautiful but shattered mosaic.

27) Let The Right One In (2008)

We all know children are terrifying, but Let The Right One In takes spooky kids and makes them almost too relatable for comfort. Simply trying to survive like countless vampires before her, Eli (Leandersson) strikes up a bittersweet friendship with social pariah Oskar (Hedebrant), offering him salvation from his less-than-ideal home situation. Based on John Ajvide Lindqvist's bestseller and set in Stockholm, it's not just the threat of being offed by a vampire that make this an incredibly effective Scandi scarefest, with themes of loneliness, anxiety and alcoholism helping it slip effortlessly into your bloodstream. It's no surprise Hollywood clamoured for a remake .

26) The Innocents (1961)

The title's different, but The Innocents is otherwise an elegant and extremely faithful adaptation of Henry James' perennial classic chiller The Turn Of The Screw . A governess takes charge of two creepy children who appear to be being haunted by previous incumbents of their rackety estate. But the film preserves James' crucial ambiguity: are the children really in danger from ghosts, or from a sort of supernatural Munchausen-by-proxy stemming from their hysterical guardian? The answer's up to you.

25) The Descent (2005)

Somewhat like Aliens , Neil Marshall's masterstroke here is in keeping the monsters off screen for a good hour. And after the almost unendurable cave-bound claustrophobia of the first half, it's almost a relief when they finally show up to provide a more solid, familiar focus for the audience's fear. Before that comes an unbearably tense series of character clashes and potholing injuries: a pressure-cooker building to a head of steam that brutally climaxes with a shocking accident and the full reveal of... well, we won't spoil it for those who haven't explored the depths themselves. From then on it's intense action all the way to a devastating conclusion. American audiences got an upbeat ending from which the sequel continues. Here in the UK, the final moments are horrifyingly bleak.

24) The Witch (2015)

With its meticulous period setting and language, The Witch comes across as much like The Crucible as it does your average demonic possession horror. But in actual fact, there's really nothing average about The Witch at all: a devastating psychological ordeal that works as well taken at face value (the goat IS the Devil) as according to more complex theories. The cryptic events are never fully explained, leaving The Witch ambiguously unsettling.

23) 28 Days Later (2002)

Debates raged in some corners of the horror community about whether the fast-moving "infected" were zombies or not. Seriously, who cares? That's not the meat of why Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland's tale of a destroyed society is so effective. Like all great horror movies, it's about us rather than "the other", and peers into the dark heart of humanity. How far would you go faced with such a situation? You may not love the answer. And there's so much to admire visually, with a Day Of The Triffids –esque emptied London, shot guerrilla-style in early mornings.

22) Night Of The Living Dead (1968)

Whenever you watch an episode of The Walking Dead or read a Max Brooks novel or even fiddle with your smartphone on Plants vs Zombies , you have George A. Romero to thank. Nobody else has contributed more to the modern conception of zombies than the bearded genius from the Bronx, and no film has kickstarted a subgenre so enduring or fruitful. Night Of The Living Dead is scary, sure (its violence caught audiences by surprise at the time) but it's also surprisingly witty: a socially cognisant satire from a politically loaded time. Little wonder that Quentin Tarantino once claimed the "A" in George A. Romero stood for "A Fucking Genius".

21) Get Out (2017)

Few horror films have had as instant and seismic an impact in recent years as Get Out . Jordan Peele's hugely entertaining and incredibly potent satire portrays societal horrors in clear-sighted, direct style through the story of Chris – a young Black American who prepares to meet his white middle-class girlfriend's parents over a nightmarish weekend. It's a concept that Peele plays out perfectly, needling the awkward areas of social interaction and (barely) amplifying the Black experience in the contemporary US, with fantastic performances from Daniel Kaluuya, Bradley Whitford, Catherine Keener and Alison Williams. So sharp and smartly-made, it even caught the Oscars' attention, winning Best Screenplay for Peele and earning nods in Best Picture, Director, and Leading Actor.

20) Suspiria (1977)

Nobody makes horror quite like Dario Argento. With Suspiria , the Italian genio set the Video Nasties era of censorship and moral panic ablaze, and set the template for his "Three Mothers" trilogy. All his hallmarks are there: dark supernatural elements at play; bravura camera acrobatics; bloody, extreme violence; themes of obsession and sexual aberration; and a vibrant, hyperreal technicolour palette. Think The Umbrellas Of Cherbourg , but with witch-demons instead of umbrellas. Luca Guadagnino’s remake – with its Thom Yorke soundtrack and multi-roling Tilda Swinton – is well worth a look, too.

19) The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

Five years after Scooby-Doo first aired, Tobe Hooper similarly put some teenagers in a blue van to endure a scary mystery. Their experience was rather different. Maybe they should've brought a dog, although it's doubtful it would have helped them. Actually quite light on gore, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre nevertheless remains a uniquely gnarly, punishing experience, from its grotesque production design to its family of cannibal freaks and its stand-out villain Leatherface. Some have suggested an intriguing Vietnam-era subtext about America eating its young, but the film functions perfectly well without it on a pure, primal level. Burns' screams ring in your ears long after the exhausting last act is over, and the final shot of Leatherface dancing with his saw is an indelible image.

18) The Omen (1976)

Boys, eh? Muddy-kneed, conker-smashing little blighters... all running around and falling over and, in Richard Donner's timeless chiller, turning out to be the Antichrist. The unwitting adoption of devil child Damien (Harvey Spencer Stephens) has horrifying consequences for parents Gregory Peck and Lee Remick in one of the bleakest collisions of faith, religion and superstition in the genre. It's not held in quite the same critical esteem as The Exorcist or Rosemary's Baby these days, but make no mistake, The Omen is still a powerful potion.

17) Psycho (1960)

Imagine a trip to see Psycho in 1960. Its deliberately oblique marketing, fronted by Hitchcock himself, would have prepared you for a motel to feature prominently but not much else. The opening 20-odd minutes must have seemed like a pretty standard noir set-up, with Janet Leigh eloping with a bunch of money and the tantalising possibility of a new life that lasts precisely as long as her next trip to the shower. Then came the full-bore shock of that brutal knifing, each stab driven home by Bernard Herrmann's jarring score, unexpected and almost entirely without precedent. Audiences must have wondered if it wasn't Hitch himself who, in the nicest possible way, was the real psycho here. (Also, don’t sleep on Psycho II , one of the most unexpected, underrated gems in sequel history!)

16) Ring (1998)

Not the first adaptation of Kōji Suzuki's novel, but the one that brought the terrifying Sadako Yamamura to international attention. Suzuki's sci-fi tinged material is jettisoned in favour of more horrifying ambiguity, and Nakata's film is an intriguing collision of Japanese folk horror (the well-dwelling, black-haired, chalk-skinned Sadako is clearly descended from the ghouls of Japanese tradition) and more modern concerns about viral media and moral panic. It's a slow burn, but worth the unsettling journey to its most famous set piece.

15) The Blair Witch Project (1999)

It wasn't the springboard its director and crew might have hoped after banking $250 million from their nano-budget horror, but the legacy of The Blair Witch Project continues apace. It's instructive to see how little Adam Wingard's surprise sequel deviated from the set-up and formula of the original (bunch of kids head into the Black Hills, record the results on the shakiest of shakycams) 17 years later. At the time, it sparked a revolution in the genre. Since then have come dozens of imitators, although even the best of them struggle to replicate the original's disorientating chills. Twigs and bits of foliage have never been so scary, and that ending? Still one of the movie scenes that scared us the most .

14) Dawn Of The Dead (1978)

Building exponentially on the bedrock of 1968's Night Of The Living Dead , Dawn Of The Dead sees Romero firing on all cylinders a decade later. Largely confined to an abandoned (well, almost) shopping mall as the undead pandemic rages outside, this is as much a tense, base-under-siege action thriller as it is a horror movie. But there are creepy scares and gonzo gore by the bucketful, while Romero takes sly philosophical swipes at class and racial politics and mindless consumerism. A Day , a Land and a Diary would follow, but never quite reclaim these horror heights.

13) Carrie (1976)

Carrie was among the first films to utilise that most terrifying supernatural force: puberty. Stephen King's novel recognised the trials of adolescence as ripe ground for horror, and found a worthy suitor for his first cinematic adaptation in director Brian De Palma, who brings the tale to life with sadistic relish and intelligent, daring camerawork. Sissy Spacek, meanwhile, imbues Carrie with childlike innocence and genuine pathos, blotted only by mild bouts of, erm, telekinetic murder. It's a testament to her range that, come that prom finale, you find yourself feeling simultaneously sympathetic and scared shitless.

12) An American Werewolf In London (1981)

A comedy-horror that skimps on neither, American Werewolf manages to be properly scary, blackly funny, and, in the relationship between lycanthrope David Naughton and nurse Jenny Agutter, genuinely moving. It's a deft juggling act, confidently performed by director John Landis who, while he remains immensely likeable, was arguably never this good again. An American director in England, his sense of the country never descends into twee American En-ger-land clichés, and even the stock lines and characters – "Stay off the moors!" – are performed in such a way that they never grate. It's a loving homage to bygone scares that nevertheless feels entirely modern almost 40 years later.

11) Rosemary's Baby (1968)

Like a twisted cross between The Exorcist and What To Expect When You're Expecting , this occult classic is no movie to watch when you're considering settling down to family life or planning a foray into the property market. Neighbours, quite literally, are a hellish proposition for Mia Farrow and John Cassavetes' newly-weds as they settle into their new Manhattan brownstone. Outside their four walls, dark forces swirl – and we're not talking about the velour furniture. The film's commanding tight interior scenes and mood of slowly-building paranoia make what follows claustrophobic and endlessly creepy.

10) The Wicker Man (1973)

The Wicker Man shouldn't really work. An outsider's view of a mythical Scotland, written and directed by Englishmen and scored by an American, replete with songs to the extent that it's practically a musical, it's a minefield of elements that could all have gone horribly wrong. And yet, it's all so right: that weirdness is a crucial part of the unsettling whole; Edward Woodward's hapless investigations leading inexorably to that final, devastating reveal. There's plenty of humour, but it never feels like Woodward isn't in real, frightening trouble; the climax is as inevitable as it's horrifying. It's easy to laugh at the remake , but even Hardy himself failed to recapture the dark magic with his belated Wicker Tree . The Wicker Man is unrepeatable.

9) A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984)

There have been, at time of writing, nine film entries in the Nightmare On Elm Street series, including a reboot, a crossover, and a sequel rather prematurely titled The Final Nightmare (which it was not, obviously). None quite compare to Wes Craven's remarkable original. Taut, witty, and nightmarish (clue's in the title), Elm Street stands out on the map during a decade hardly short of horror hits, and, in Freddy Krueger, presented the most terrifying boogeyman ever to don knitwear.

8) Jaws (1975)

It followed shorts, Duel and The Sugarland Express , but Jaws truly announced the arrival of Steven Spielberg as a major talent. Massive production issues became the mother of real invention and needing to keep the toothy villain off screen as much as possible just ratcheted up the tension that much more. Primal fears fuel a thriller that also feels human thanks to Scheider, Shaw, Dreyfuss and the rest. Not forgetting John Williams' iconic, simple and terrifying score. Jaws sticks in the brain and makes the heart beat that much faster.

7) The Exorcist (1973)

There are horror movies with infamous reputations – and then there's The Exorcist . This is a film which prompted cinema exhibitors to routinely offer 'barf bags' for queasy patrons; which had St John's Ambulance on standby at screenings to aid the regular fainters; which was accused of corrupting young minds with subliminal imagery. Amid the noise and furore, William Friedkin's achievements were almost ignored – how he deftly blended the religious and psychological with themes of unconditional faith and maternal love. And yes, it's head-spinningly frightening .

6) Evil Dead II (1987)

Sam Raimi's eternally groovy cult favourite Evil Dead II has an energy and a spirit that is entirely its own. After a reported rights kerfuffle from his original film, Raimi set about half-retelling the 'Book of the Dead' legend, revisiting Ash (Campbell) and his cabin in the woods – this time with a sparkier tone and more opportunity for Raimi's hyper-kinetic camera-gymnastics. The tightrope between supernatural horror, badass action and genuine spooks has never been walked so confidently, and it forever cemented Campbell as a cult hero. Good... bad... he's the guy with the chainsaw for a hand.

5) Scream (1996)

Genre deconstruction had been done before, but Kevin Williamson's canny, clever, extra-meta screenplay in the hands of Wes Craven made Scream that much more special. Taking the slasher film apart didn't stop the bloody tide of rip-offs and spoofs that followed, but it gave audiences a fresh eye with which to view them. Added to that, great work from the likes of Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox, David Arquette and scary phone voice maestro Roger L. Jackson means that it functions as an effective scarefest within its own self-referential trappings.

4) The Thing (1982)

Who can you trust? And when you rely on other people to survive, what does that do to the paranoia levels? That's the key to John Carpenter's freezing chiller, set at a remote Antarctic research station. An otherworldly discovery brings blood, guts, body horror and twisty storytelling, all anchored by Kurt Russell's charisma and Rob Bottin's exemplary effects work. It'll make you itch with suspicion and recoil at the more gruesome scenes. The Thing deserved a fairer shot on release; thank goodness it has long since earned cult status.

3) Halloween (1978)

Many have tried to imitate John Carpenter's style and mood in the years since he carved his way into the horror pantheon, but few, if any, can match him. Inspired by Hitchcock, he found the scares lurking within suburbia, making them instantly relatable to the audience. And he's helped by a combination of the simple horror of Michael Myers and the naive-yet-tough charm of Jamie Lee Curtis' heroine. You can largely ignore the sequels and reboots: stick to the original to see a true master of the creepy, tension-building story at work.

Read the Empire review here

2) Alien (1979)

It's not easy to make a film that can rank among the best in both the horror genre and the world of science fiction, but Scott and writers Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett make it look easy. It wasn't simple to wrangle everything together on a relatively tight budget, but the results are all up there on the screen. The sterile environment of the Nostromo might not seem like the most inviting place for terror, but space is dark, cold and horrifying and H.R. Giger's icky creation upped the fright levels. And then there's that cast, topped by Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley, one of the greatest characters in movie history . In the cinema, or at home, everyone will hear you scream.

1) The Shining (1980)

Stephen King hates it, of course. Contemporary critics were lukewarm. Initial box-office returns were middling. The Academy Awards flatly ignored it. Stanley Kubrick, unbelievably, was even nominated for a 'Worst Director' award at the inaugural Razzies. (He 'lost' to Robert Greenwald's Xanadu ). It wasn't a fun shoot either, by all accounts. Kubrick forced Shelley Duvall to do 127 takes of one scene, a record according to The Guinness Book Of Records . The infamous "Here's Johnny!" scene took three days and 60 doors. Both lead actors left the shoot exhausted and resentful. What a difference a bit of hindsight makes. As with a lot of Kubrick's work, time has been kind, and it now seems blindingly obvious that The Shining is a masterpiece without parallel: precise, meticulous, surreal, visually astonishing, a shimmering study of a descent into madness. The ultimate horror movie.

– Read the 100 Greatest Movies list

– Read the 100 Greatest TV Shows list

– Read the 50 Best Romantic Movies

The Best Horror Movies of 2023, Ranked: ‘Talk to Me,’ ‘Scream VI,’ ‘Skinamarink’ and More

By William Earl

William Earl

• Archegos Founder Bill Hwang Found Guilty in Fraud and Racketeering Case Involving ViacomCBS Stock 12 mins ago
• Despite Emotional Send-Off, Ellen Pompeo Returning to ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Season 21 for at Least 7 Episodes 1 day ago
• Amazon MGM Studios’ Debra Birnbaum Joins Ovarian Cancer Research Alliance Board 1 day ago

2023 was a unique year for horror, with films ranging from microbudget fare to Hollywood sequels making headlines. Before revealing the top spots, here are some honorable mentions:

“Saw X” — Even though it’s the 10th chapter in the long-running franchise, “Saw X” takes a decidedly back-to-basics approach by going back in time and making the menacing Jigsaw killer, John Kramer, the protagonist. After he’s duped into paying for a fake miracle surgery to cure his cancer, Kramer seeks revenge on the faux doctors in the only way he knows how. The twists are plentiful and the traps are stomach-churning, and by going back in time, the film dodges some of the overly-complicated plotting of previous chapters.

“M3GAN” — Although it was saddled with a PG-13 rating, America’s new favorite killer doll proved to be a box office sensation and a fun theatrical watch. Owing plenty to the 2019 reboot of “Child’s Play,” this tech-gone-wrong feature was filled with enough viral moments and GIF-able kills to keep the momentum going through a thin plot. Hopefully the sequel will capitalize more off of Allison Williams’ strong performance and create an even darker experience.

“Sick” — “Scream” creator Kevin Williamson co-wrote this low-profile COVID movie, a cozy mystery that felt right at home on streaming. Set primarily in one location, the claustrophobia of the central house made for a bloodthirsty experience able to gloss over budgetary restrictions. Although the ending got a little crazy, it’s nice to see a throwback slasher go for broke, with Williamson clearly having a ball again.

“The Wrath of Becky” — This amusing and violent genre picture stars Lulu Wilson as teenage assassin Becky, who targets Proud Boy-esque goons in the sequel to the 2020 neo nazi-killing first feature. Seann William Scott is a hoot as the leader of the all-male organization that is about to cause serious destruction if Becky doesn’t get to them first. They’ve stolen her dog and killed her only friend, setting the stage for some “Home Alone” meets “John Wick” mayhem. The final act ratchets up the tension and a funny coda begs for a sequel.

Birth/Rebirth

A haunting, heartbreaking riff on the Frankenstein tale, a doctor losing her grip on reality brings a dead girl back to life — yet the child’s mother slowly realizes her baby isn’t the same. Anchored by Judy Reyes as the bereft parent who is willing to do anything for her daughter and Marin Ireland as the doctor focused on a breakthrough at any cost, the dread and grief are dense. But director and co-writer Laura Moss is adept at managing multiple tones at once, balancing the joy of the revived little girl with the deep unease of knowing that things aren’t alright.

Stream ‘Birth/Rebirth’ on Prime Video .

Knock at the Cabin

Audiences’ mileage may vary with M. Night Shyamalan depending on the film, but this intimate apocalyptic thriller benefits from great ideas and the director’s keen eye. Evil lurks around every corner as a small family (beautifully played by Jonathan Groff, Ben Aldridge and Kristen Cui) has their vacation in the woods interrupted by four desperate strangers, all claiming that the apocalypse will happen unless one of the family members kills another. Dave Bautista is a standout as a gentle giant teacher trying to convince the couple using his brain versus brawn. A cerebral event with a controversial ending, “Cabin” is Shyamalan’s most impactful work in years.

Stream ‘Knock at the Cabin’ on Peacock .

An underseen gem, “Influencer” smartly skewers social media culture in ways that are surprising, with twists that are impossible to predict. Emily Tennant stars as Madison, an influencer who travels to Thailand for a paid vacation. To say anymore would ruin the nasty tricks, but the film is kept on the tracks via realistic views of technology and influencer economy. MVP goes to Cassandra Naud, a fellow traveler who has secrets of her own. Sexy and shocking, this sun kissed mystery is twisted enough to search out.

Stream ‘Influencer’ on Shudder .

The Blackening

A sugary treat for horror fans, “The Blackening” is one of the best genre comedies since 2000’s “Scary Movie.” Filled with wacky characters and clever twists on well-trodden tropes, “The Blackening” succeeds in throwing dozens and dozens of gags at the screen. They might not all work, but the pace is enough to keep audiences laughing. One of the most joyous theatergoing experiences of the year, this film has already made a whopping $16 million on a $5 million budget, proving strong word of mouth is enough to fill seats. The action opens with Jay Pharoah and Yvonne Orji giving a sly nod to the “Scream” series and never lets up, even through a funny mid-credit scene. Hopefully writers Tracy Oliver and Dewayne Perkins are able to make a sequel to this rollicking satire.

Stream ‘The Blackening’ on Apple TV+.

One of the freshest chapters in the long-running slasher series is the most recent, a big surprise filled with lots of great setpieces, nods to previous installments, and wonderful actors. Picking up after 2022’s “Scream,” the main two sisters (Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega) have moved to New York City, only to be pursued by yet ANOTHER Ghostface. The cast rocks, with some welcome returns (Ortega, now in movie star mode; “Scream 4” alum Hayden Panettiere) and new players (“The Other Two” charmer Josh Segarra; a game Samara Weaving; Dermot Mulroney, acting to the cheap seats). It’s rare that the sixth installment of a slasher franchise can get pulses moving, but some great fight scenes and lore building make for an electric watch.

Stream ‘Scream VI’ on Paramount+ and Prime Video.

Brooklyn 45

Ted Geoghegan’s historical séance thriller is filled with style and heart far beyond what’s expected from a real-time movie primarily set in one room. As a group of WWII vets gather right after the war so their friend can try to contact his recently deceased wife, they’re in for much more than they bargain for once spooky stuff starts happening. The cast of character actors exudes a lived-in feel for this group of soldiers, and key twists in the first and third act are truly jaw-dropping. Anne Ramsay and Kristina Klebe are particularly impactful as women trying to figure out how to escape their predicament, and New York horror legend Larry Fessenden delivers some delicious moments.

Stream ‘Brooklyn 45’ on Shudder.

No One Will Save You

A compact, fleet alien adventure, Kaitlyn Dever is magnificent as Brynn, a troubled loner whose world is turned upside down when aliens descend upon her house. The most interesting wrinkle is that, because of a traumatic incident in her past, she’s convinced that no one in her small town will be inclined to help her keep the extraterrestrials at bay — even if the end of the world is near. An impressive element of the film is its nearly dialogue-free script, which amps up Brynn’s isolation to unbearable levels. From the fast-moving set pieces to inspired creature design, “No One Will Save You” is a wonderful riff on a creature feature. It’s too bad Hulu didn’t release it in drive-in theaters, where it would have been a perfect fit.

Stream ‘No One Will Save You’ on Hulu .

When a nun claims that she’s pregnant through immaculate conception and expecting special twins — namely, the Messiah and the Antichrist — it’s no surprise that the Vatican wants to get involved. This wild premise is the basis of Lee Roy Kunz and Cru Ennis’ “Deliver Us,” a gorgeously shot low-budget film that relies on fire and brimstone imagery to bring unease. Consistently bubbling with gory, unsettling ideas, the journey of Father Fox (played by Kunz) and his examination of Sister Yulia (Maria Vera Ratti) is constantly oscillating between dreams and reality, metaphors and the literal. Offering outrageous images with gorgeous settings, lighting and cinematography, “Deliver Us” is a unique recommendation for audiences seeking something both over-the-top and deathly serious.

Stream ‘Deliver Us’ on Prime Video .

In My Mother's Skin

A supremely unsettling fairy tale set at the end of World War II, “In My Mother’s Skin” is a Filipino film about a young girl named Tala (Felicity Kyle Napuli) who must protect her little brother Bayani (James Mavie Estrella) and sick mother Ligaya (Beauty Gonzalez) when their father is taken away for potentially hiding gold from Japanese soldiers. As the trio begins to run out of food and resources, a beautiful fairy (Jasmine Curtis-Smith) begins offering hope, as evil spreads in Ligaya. “Skin” doesn’t reinvent the wheel but does a very solid job of genre mishmash, mixing Guillermo del Toro’s dark dreams and infusing them with possession horror and troubling gore. A nearly overwhelming slab of darkness, “Skin” is gorgeous and brutal until the last frame.

Stream ‘In My Mother’s Skin’ on Prime Video.

Thanksgiving

A slasher in the vein of ’80s holiday treats like “My Bloody Valentine” and “April Fool’s Day,” “Thanksgiving” is the movie horror superfan Eli Roth seemed destined to direct. Roth heads to his native Massachusetts for some throwback fun in this feature-length spin on his faux “Grindhouse” trailer. A year after a tragic Black Friday stampede, someone is killing off the residents of Plymouth. With game performances from final girl Nell Verlaque and Patrick Dempsey as the local sheriff, this bloody tale hits all the touchstones with a clear love of the genre.

Stream ‘Thanksgiving’ on Prime Video.

Evil Dead Rise

Lee Cronin’s gory tribute to the Sam Raimi series has plenty of Easter eggs for fans, but banks on the changed scenery of an apartment complex (vs. a cabin in the woods) to paint on a different canvas. A young aunt is stuck in a high-rise while as her sister becomes a Deadite hell-bent on killing her own children, and there is a massive amount of viscera as each gory scene keeps things unbalanced. Lily Sullivan and Alyssa Sutherland are top notch as the sisters, the former heroic and the latter evil as hell. A great wraparound tale, as well as a gnarly new monster added to “Dead” lore, leave things primed for a sixth movie.

Stream ‘Evil Dead Rise’ on Max .

Infinity Pool

Between his disruptive role on the last season of “Succession” and his performance in “Infinity Pool,” Alexander Skarsgård spent 2023 brutally skewering the wealthy. Directed by “Possessor” helmer Brandon Cronenberg, James (Skarsgård) is a novelist who marries rich and starts to enjoy the violent, sexual bacchanalia engaged in by those staying on vacation destination Li Tolqa. But if the 1% have too much fun, they’re cloned and killed for a price, something which seems obscene to Foster at first but then gives him a thrill. The film is a blend of psychedelic images and distressing brutality, watching James as he sheds his humanity like a second skin. Mia Goth does excellent supporting work as a seemingly normal tourist who soon swings into batshit mode and walks away with the movie.

Stream ‘Infinity Pool’ on Hulu .

Beau Is Afraid

Another divisive stunner, Ari Aster’s “Midsommar” follow-up analyzes anxiety with such a microscopic lens that it’s hard to breathe through long stretches. Joaquin Phoenix plays the titular Beau, whose nerves get the best of him morning, noon and night. Living in a rundown near-future neighborhood, this three-hour beast is thick on satire and social commentary. The plot revolves around Beau’s constantly thwarted travels to visit his mother, who conjures the bulk of his anxiety. “Afraid” was an expensive bomb for A24, but it will inevitably find a cult audience on streaming. Give it 30 years and it’ll be taught in film school. In the meantime, this suffocating tale is a waking nightmare.

Stream ‘Beau is Afraid’ on Apple TV+ .

When Evil Lurks

Demián Rugna’s “When Evil Lurks” is one of the darkest films of the year, with gore and shocks that keep things from getting too heavy. Ezequiel Rodriguez and Demián Salomon are two brothers who accidentally unleash a demon into the countryside that can possess people and make them do terrible things. Cue many disturbing scenes where merciless, malevolent beings tear families apart in the blink of an eye. Some distressing violence against children and a character with autism elevate the intensity of this Argentinean co-production beyond American fare, but for fans of more extreme storytelling, “When Evil Lurks” is a highlight.

Stream ‘When Evil Lurks’ on Shudder .

From festival darling to A24’s highest-grossing horror title domestically, “Talk to Me” was the talk of horror fans over the summer. With inventive imagery and shocking gore, twin brothers Danny and Michael Philippou elevate the style they developed on their YouTube channel RackaRacka to tell the story of moody teen Mia (a fearless Sophie Wilde). When a supernatural party trick that communicates with the dead becomes a viral sensation, Mia tries to connect with her late mother, and the results are terrifying. The Philippou brothers keep everything off-kilter: All of the characters are worth caring about, even the annoying ones; places of refuge like hospitals and well-lit parties become insidious quickly; and there is a very real sense that this is exactly how dumb, young teens would act if they could easily pierce the veil between the living and the dead.

Stream ‘Talk to Me’ on Prime Video .

Skinamarink

Easily the most divisive film of the year — and one that seems unlikely to get knocked from this top spot — Kyle Edward Ball’s debut feature walks the tightrope of narrative and art piece; anxiety and tedium; fantasy and reality. Shot at his childhood home for $15,000, Ball recreates the specific fears of growing up better than scores of auteurs could imagine. For those willing to suspend attention spans to dive into something completely new, “Skinamarink” will alter perceptions of how things go bump in the night.

Stream ‘Skinamarink’ on Shudder .

More from Variety

Quincy jones, james bond producers barbara broccoli and michael g. wilson and more to receive honorary oscars at governors awards, tony ratings have a long gap to clear, despite efforts to mimic larger shows, academy ceo bill kramer on oscars’ future, ‘exploring’ gender-neutral acting categories and upcoming abc negotiations, film academy shuts down digital magazine a.frame, lays off editorial staffer and contributing freelancers (exclusive), why verizon’s latest play could make it the netflix of streaming bundlers, oscars invite 487 new members: lily gladstone, catherine o’hara, jessica alba, ‘rrr’ director s.s. rajamouli and more, more from our brands, the best early prime day deals on apple products, paris police are cracking down on counterfeit luxury goods ahead of the olympics, apax partners sells final 10% stake in genius sports, the best loofahs and body scrubbers, according to dermatologists, alf star benji gregory dead at 46.

Bloody Disgusting’s Top 15 Best Horror Movies of 2022!

This year brought the return of Ghostface, Predator, Pinhead, Michael Myers, and Leatherface. Beyond the franchises, 2022 unleashed an onslaught of new releases that introduced new voices and horror icons to the genre. The indie scene continued to thrive, but horror surprised audiences at the box office more than once.

In other words, horror continues to dominate while it stretches its boundaries and flexes its creative muscles. The best horror movies of 2022 induced thrills, chills, delightfully gory kills, and even a few tears. If there’s one thing this past year made clear, it’s that horror-loving audiences are ready for a return to crowd-pleasing, fun horror that doesn’t skimp on scares.

Because it was such a strong year for horror, here are the top 15 best horror movies of 2022.

15. Hellraiser

The arbiters of pain and suffering are back in the Hellraiser franchise’s eleventh feature, this time with a reimagining by The Night House  director David Bruckner and screenwriters Luke Piotrowski and Ben Collins. A cold open introduces debauched billionaire Roland Voight (Goran Visnjic) and his experimentation with the iconic puzzle box. Six months later, recovering addict Riley (Odessa A’zion) laments to her lover Trevor (Drew Starkey) that she’s strapped for cash after the latest blowout fight with her brother Matt (Brandon Flynn). Matt’s skepticism about Trevor and his concerns that Riley will relapse seem accurate when Trevor offers Riley a get-rich gig that entails breaking into Voight’s mansion. It’s there that Riley finds the mysterious puzzle box, unwittingly summoning sadistic supernatural beings from another dimension.

Piotrowski and Collins opt for straightforward simplicity here that lets Bruckner’s imagery do the heavy lifting. There’s a deep well of mythology without any handholding. Jamie Clayton ’s inspired performance as the Hell Priest, the Cenobite leader, impresses most of all.

14. The House

Netflix’s stop-motion animated anthology weaves together three creepy tales tethered to one house. The segments span time and tone, telling of a low-income family, an anxious developer, and a fed-up landlady who all become tied to the same mysterious house. Daughter Mabel (Mia Goth) navigates a mounting house of horrors as her parents lose themselves to newly acquired luxury in the first story. The second sees unwanted pests swarming and waylaying a developer’s plans, while the third segment closes the darkly comedic and unsettling anthology on an uplifting note amid an isolated dystopia.  The House occasionally unnerves but always taps into deep-seated dread. The animation is breathtaking, and the symbolism bears repeat viewings.

Directed by Emma de Swaef, Marc James Roels, Niki Lindroth von Bahr, and Paloma Baeza, The House  features voice acting by Mia Goth, Claudie Blakley, Matthew Goode, Mark Heap, Miranda Richardson, and Helena Bonham Carter.

Kill List ‘s Neil Maskell stars as the eponymous Bull, a gang enforcer that adores his son Aiden (Henri Charles). But Bull mysteriously went silent for a decade, gone without a trace. Now, he’s back and searching for his old gang, who are surprised to see him. It quickly becomes apparent that Bull is on a rage-fueled mission for payback against an egregious double-cross. At the top of his hit list are father-in-law and local crime boss Norm (David Hayman) and Bull’s drug-addicted wife Gemma (Lois Brabin-Platt), who happens to be Norm’s daughter. More than carving his path through personal justice, Bull wants to find his son.

The latest by Paul Andrew Williams ( The Cottage ,  Cherry Tree Lane ) reads like a classic, gritty crime thriller turned vengeance quest but plays like a horror movie in many ways. The bloody kills, the creatively staged deaths, and an unrestrained killer marries a crime revenge-thriller with a slasher.

Writer/Director Nikyatu Jusu establishes herself as a rising voice in horror straightaway with her feature debut, Nanny . Anna Diop stars as Aisha, a woman who recently emigrated from Senegal and currently works as the nanny for the daughter of a wealthy couple (Michelle Monaghan and Morgan Spector) living in New York City. Aisha’s trying to save enough money to bring her son overseas but struggles with remorse over leaving him behind and her employers’ increasingly volatile home life. It coincides with a haunting presence that invades her dreams and waking life, threatening to shatter the American dream she’s working so hard to achieve.

Nikyatu Jusu blends magical realism with horror and drama, creating a distinct fable that slowly works its way under your skin and culminates in heart-shattering devastation.

11. Bones and All

Leave it to  Suspiria  director Luca Guadagnino and writer David Kajganich to spin an achingly tender and thoughtful coming-of-age romance between a pair of cannibals with an insatiable need to devour flesh.  Bones and All , an adaptation of Camille DeAngelis‘s novel, uses the road trip format set in Reagan-era America as a provocative and macabre means of exploring the monstrous need for survival and human connection. The cannibalism is grisly; Guadagnino never shies away from flesh-ripping acts of feeding. And the filmmaker doesn’t ease viewers into it; it’s a headfirst plunge meant to shock. It’s a clever, macabre means of isolating its lead characters in their Otherness, slowly succumbing to their human desire for connection and understanding.

But beneath the viscera and grue is a tender and affecting tale of first love and discovery. It’s as elegant as carnal and carnivorous, and it’ll take a bite out of your heart if you let it.

Writer/Director Ti West nestled his ode to independent, exploitation filmmaking into the ‘70s set slasher  X . For its prequel, West rewinds the clock much further to pay tribute to the Golden Age of Hollywood. Mia Goth reprises her role as the repressed killer Pearl, this time exploring a much different, younger side.  Pearl makes for a vastly different viewing experience thanks to its drastic shifts in style, tone, and cinematic influences, but with enough connective tissue to enrich its predecessor. West and Goth play by their rules here, stylistically and narratively. West uses his cinematic influences to create something unique and audacious, and Goth cuts loose with an unrestrained performance.

This prequel is less about the body count – though there are plenty of bloody, violent deaths – and more about a slow unraveling of a mind that was broken from the start. 

Prey  takes its cues from 1987’s  Predator  in terms of simplicity and bloody action-horror. Its cultural specificity and period setting lend a sweeping period epic feel and introduce emotional stakes through its memorable characters. Set in the Great Plains in 1719,  Prey introduces Naru (Amber Midthunder), a young Comanche woman uninterested in fulfilling the domestic role her tribe expects of her. Naru wants to hunt, like her brother and respected hunter Taabe (Dakota Beavers). She sets out to test her mettle and protect her tribe when an unknown threat emerges across the ridge.

Prey may take place three centuries before Predator,  but it’s not a prequel so much as it is a film in conversation with the original. It’s a return to the simplicity that made the original so thrilling, led by an outstanding heroine in Naru and director Dan Trachtenber g ’s talent for injecting fresh ideas into beloved sci-fi horror franchises.

 8. Scream 

Ghostface and Jenna Ortega in Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media Group’s “Scream.”

James Vanderbilt   and Guy Busick’s screenplay evolves the franchise in clever and poignant ways. Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett dedicate  Scream to Wes Craven, and the horror master’s imprint looms large over their film. As intrinsic to the movie as Craven’s memory is, the filmmakers make one of the best horror movies of 2022 their own. 

7. The Sadness

The premise, which sees a viral mutation cause the infected to become sadistically violent, reads like a familiar setup in outbreak horror. It quickly becomes apparent that  The Sadness  refuses to adhere to the average viral horror movie. Director Rob Jabbaz keeps a death grip on the pulse of the current climate, delivering a rage-filled manifesto that aims to tick off every cinematic taboo possible and tests your gag reflex in the process. It’s transgressive horror of the highest, most aggressive order.

Heed all of the trigger warnings and then some. The filmmaker delivers his message with blunt force trauma, breaking all the rules along the way. The Sadness is a vicious anthem that keeps you in its grip, forces you to stare into the abyss, and dares you to look away.

6. Deadstream

Joseph Winter as Shawn Ruddy – Deadstream – Photo Credit: Shudder

The feature directorial debut from husband-and-wife filmmaking couple Vanessa and Joseph Winter   follows a disgraced internet personality who attempts to win back his followers by livestreaming one night alone in a haunted house. It spirals into a gonzo horror-comedy full of bodily fluids, gore, and ghostly creatures that would make Sam Raimi proud. Every bit of the humor lands, too, making for a triumphant crowd-pleaser that hooks you from start to finish.

Deadstream  is a DIY labor of love, and the filmmakers somehow make wearing so many hats seem effortless. The small-scaled story feels larger than life through its characters, human and otherwise. The story beats may not always surprise, but the clever progression, balance of physical horror and comedy, and the go-for-broke gags ensure that it doesn’t matter. 

American Julia (Maika Monroe) uproots her life to accompany her half-Romanian husband Francis (Karl Glusman) to Bucharest for his high-pressure job. She’s left almost entirely on her own to adjust to a new country and culture, and it’s made even harder by the language barrier. Alone all day and increasingly at night, Julia stares out the window and notices an eerie face staring back. That feeling of being watched transforms into full-blown paranoia with the discovery that a killer named Spider has been stalking and decapitating women in the area. But is someone following Julia, or is it a byproduct of loneliness and culture shock?

Chloe Okuno’s ability to create eerie unease from an uncomplicated premise impresses. It’s a measured, moody psychodrama that allows Okuno to wear her influences on her sleeves, making them her own, until one bloody and satisfying finale that seals the deal on  Watcher being one of the very best horror movies of 2022.

OJ Haywood (Daniel Kaluuya) struggles to keep his recently passed father’s horse ranch afloat. The arrival of OJ’s lively sister Emerald (Keke Palmer) adds to his stress as he tries to maintain faithful responsibility toward the family ranch. But then, an eerie phenomenon begins swooping over their valley; the siblings become determined to capture it on camera. On the surface,  Nope is an accessible, straightforward sci-fi horror movie that nails its humor as much as it elicits gasps. Below is a darker examination of media and those it devoured and left behind.

Jordan Peele effectively captures the scope and spectacle of a summer blockbuster, packing it with chill-inducing moments, gasp-worthy thrills, and endless endearing characters. The filmmaker also continues his streak of layering scathing critiques within a horror crowd-pleaser that keeps you guessing.

3. The Innocents

The Innocents is a provocative look at the fine razor line between good and evil and the darker side of innocence. Four compelling performances ground the disturbing horror, adding complex emotions and morality to fuel the tension. Writer/Director Eskil Vogt crafts a stunning portrayal of childhood morality with a tale of four children discovering supernatural abilities over a summer. Vogt twists the knife further by setting it under the bright Nordic sun; the terror these kids commit happens right under the adults’ noses, often in plain sight, with no one the wiser.

The emotional authenticity found in The Innocents heightens the horror, creating one of the most viscerally disturbing depictions of childhood in recent memory.

Set in 1979, Texas, a group of aspiring adult filmmakers load up in a van and drive from Houston to the boonies to shoot. Producer Wayne ( The Ring ‘s Martin Henderson) enlists his girlfriend Maxine (Mia Goth), along with Bobby-Lynne (Brittany Snow) and Jackson (Scott Mescudi) to star. Then he rents a boarding house on the cheap from the reclusive elder Howard (Stephen Ure), who warns them to stay out of his wife’s sight. The porn production quickly devolves into a fucked up horror picture when things spiral out of control.

The lean, straightforward narrative gets straight to the goods and never wastes time on heavy exposition. It’s all in the little details and the talented cast making these characters feel lived-in with a shared history. X demonstrates why Ti West should be given full reign to go full throttle on deranged, savage, and intense horror comedies more often. 

After all, West directed not one but TWO of the best horror movies of 2022.

1. Barbarian

Writer/Director Zach Cregger (“The Whitest Kids U’ Know”) eschews conventions in  Barbarian to keep audiences on edge, making for one of the most delightfully unhinged viewing experiences in recent memory and the year’s biggest horror surprise. A simple rental nightmare sets up an intense pressure cooker scenario with no limits to the midnight madness. At its core,  Barbarian presents two sides of the same coin reacting to one hellish scenario. From it, it unleashes one sadistic and gruesome horror thriller unafraid to be as biting with its pitch-black humor as its horror.

All rules get tossed out the window in Barbarian , including its unconventional narrative structure, resulting in a confrontational and chilling feature that leaves you breathless. 

Horror journalist, RT Top Critic, and Critics Choice Association member. Co-Host of the Bloody Disgusting Podcast. Has appeared on PBS series' Monstrum, served on the SXSW Midnighter shorts jury, and moderated horror panels for WonderCon and SeriesFest.

You may like

Martin Scorsese Is a Big Fan of the Ti West x Mia Goth Trilogy

‘X’ Trilogy Producer Kid Cudi Teases Another Upcoming Collaboration with ‘Ti West’

‘Terrifier’ – Funko Unleashes a Wave of Art the Clown POP! Vinyl Toys!

Celebrating 6 of the scariest stop-motion effects in horror.

Stop-motion animation is responsible for some of the most heartwarming moments in the history of film, but even the most ardent fan of Claymation has to admit that there’s something inherently uncanny about puppetry where you can’t see the strings. The very act of bringing an inanimate humanoid figure to life recalls spooky tales of monsters and dark sorcery, so it’s not surprising that stop-motion has also been used as a tool to scare .

And with modern media like The Shivering Truth and Robert Morgan’s Stopmotion reminding us that animation can convey terror just as easily as cartoony laughs, we’ve decided to come up with a list celebrating six of the scariest stop-motion effects in horror.

For the purposes of this list, we’ll be considering any film that utilizes stop-motion to bring a character to life, be it as a brief photo-realistic special effect or traditional animation.

As usual, don’t forget to comment below with your own favorite animated effects if you think we missed a particularly frightening example of stop-motion horror.

With that out of the way, onto the list…

6. Pennywise – It (1990)

Modern television shows often boast blockbuster budgets and film-quality special effects in order to compete with theatrical releases, but the made-for-TV productions of the 90s taught us to manage expectations when it came to bringing supernatural monsters to life on the small screen.

And while we all remember Tim Curry’s performance as the real highlight of 1990’s It mini-series (as we should, with the actor basically carrying the experience on his sexy shoulders), he was aided by a series of clever special effects meant to show off the evil clown’s shape-shifting powers. Personally, I think the creepiest of these effects was the brief use of a stop-motion puppet during the series’ infamous shower scene, where Pennywise reshapes himself to travel through a drain.

Visually, the mini-series isn’t on the same level as the Andy Muschietti adaptations, but the eerie nature of the animation here cements the stop-motion Tim Curry puppet as a memorable moment in claymation history.

5. The Mysterious Stranger – The Adventures of Mark Twain (1985)

A criminally underseen classic, Will Vinton’s animated celebration of Mark Twain’s life and imagination is by no means a horror film, but this mostly wholesome experience briefly makes an unexpected detour into disturbing territory when the filmmakers decide to reference Twain’s The Mysterious Stranger – also known as The Chronicle of Young Satan.

Featuring trippy animation and impressive facial work, this single disturbing sequence has largely outshined the rest of the film with its bizarre portrayal of Lucifer and the folly of humankind. That’s why it’s become a staple of scary video compilations everywhere, with some online users even claiming that the scene is so unsettling that the movie must be cursed.

4. Otik – Little Otik (2000)

More of an art-house fairy tale than a proper genre film, Jan Švankmajer’s experimental fable differs from the other live-action movies on this list due to the simple fact that its special effects aren’t actually trying to emulate reality.

Telling the story of a childless couple that adopts a humanoid-looking tree stump only to have to deal with the consequences of the creature’s insatiable hunger, Little Otik makes excellent use of jerky animation to enhance the film’s atmosphere. There’s an unmistakable otherworldly vibe here that could only have been accomplished through stop-motion craftsmanship, and I wish we’d see this kind of thing pop up in more movies.

3. Full-Body Werewolves – The Howling (1981)

Joe Dante’s classic creature feature may have been overshadowed by the other famous werewolf movie from 1981 , but that doesn’t make its groundbreaking special effects any less impressive. While Rick Baker and his team were only tasked with bringing a single werewolf to life in John Landis’ film, Rob Bottin had a whole tribe to deal with, making the results that much more impressive.

Of course, the eeriest of the flick’s creative decisions has to be the use of stop-motion in all of the wide shots featuring the werewolves’ full bodies. The technique could easily have felt cartoony and out of place, but there’s something appropriately off-putting about the monsters’ unnatural movements here – which is why The Howling makes it onto this list.

2. T-800 Endoskeleton – The Terminator (1984)

We may take the T-800’s iconic skeletal design for granted these days, but that explosive moment in the original Terminator where it’s revealed that Schwarzenegger’s robotic endoskeleton survived the tanker explosion must have been one hell of a twist back in ’84. And while Arnold’s robotic performance and the gnarly gore effects accompanying it are simply legendary, I think the film’s scariest moments were achieved in an animation studio.

Another case of a filmmaker using stop-motion to bring monstrous wide-shots to life, uncanny frame-by-frame puppetry was the perfect choice to set up the antagonist’s desperate final form. In fact, I’d argue the stop-motion version of the iconic robot is its scariest iteration across the entire franchise, with only the messy Terminator Salvation coming close to competing with its grimy charms.

1. Cthulhu – The Call of Cthulhu (2005)

From Antrum to Late Night with the Devil , I’m a sucker for faux retro cinema, which is why I can’t help but bring up Andrew Leman’s silent Lovecraft adaptation, The Call of Cthulhu . Championed by the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society, this ambitious indie production presents itself as a 1920s adaptation of the short story of the same name, utilizing period-accurate visuals as it brings Lovecraft’s most iconic creation to life.

Granted, the puppet looks a little goofy in clear lighting, but the narrative build-up to the great old one’s reveal makes it an incredibly unnerving moment, especially when you consider that we’re only really watching an insane sailor’s recollection of these events – not necessarily what actually occurred. And like some of the other movies on this list, the creature’s unnatural movements only add to the eldritch horror.

‘The Bride!’ – ‘Frankenstein’ Movie Starring Christian Bale Gets New Release Date

‘Send Help’ – Sam Raimi Directing Horror Movie for 20th Century Studios!

“Uzumaki” – Adult Swim Announces Voice Cast for Junji Ito Adaptation

‘Duchess’ Trailer – A Violent New Action Thriller from ‘The Descent’ Director

You must be logged in to post a comment.

The Best Horror Movie Of 2024 Arrives With A Perfect 100% Critic Score

Every year there are a few buzzed-about horror movies released, but I haven’t seen this much hype for one in a good long while. The movie is Longlegs, hitting theaters this upcoming weekend, and it’s a strange name for what appears to be an incredibly terrifying, incredibly good film.

As it stands, with 25 reviews in, Longlegs has a perfect 100% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes , not a very common achievement for a mainstream horror film. Here’s a synopsis of the movie:

“In the 1990s, new FBI agent Lee Harker was assigned to an unsolved case involving the Satanic serial killer known as Longlegs. As the investigation becomes more complicated with occult evidence uncovered, Harker realizes a personal link to the killer and must act quickly to prevent another family murder.”

The cast is pretty great too. It stars Maika Monroe (It Follows), Alicia Witt (OG Dune), Blair Underwood (Rules of Engagement), Kiernan Shipka (The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) and Nicholas Cage (everything). Monroe in particular is cementing her status as a true icon of horror after starring in both this as It Follows, which I’d consider to be an all-time great horror film, and one of my favorites. Cage as the killer (this is not a secret) is being praised as unsettling well beyond what we thought may have been possible from him.

What’s so good about it? I was impressed with this high praise from Cinematic Reel’s David Gonzalez:

“Not since the likes of Zodiac and The Silence of the Lambs has a serial killer entry disturbed me the way Oz Perkins’ Longlegs did. It’s a psychologically relentless descent into the macabre that’s sure to crawl its way under your skin and never leave.”

I think my favorite piece of trivia about director Oz Perkins is that he played a character named “Dorky David” in Legally Blonde in 2001. But since then he’s directed a couple horror movies, but none that blew up the way we’re seeing here.

There were some early reactions to the movie in surprise screenings, and this one’s probably my favorite:

"No lie. Longlegs was so insane that a woman behind us started crying halfway thru lmao 10/10 movie."

For reference, here are some of the highest rated horror movies of last year, 2023, where none hit a full 100%:

• When Evil Lurks – 97%
• Huesera: The Bone Woman – 97%
• Attachment – 95%
• Talk to Me – 95%
• M3GAN – 93%
• Influencer – 92%

So, if you liked any of those, and this is scoring better, well, get ready. And these comparisons to Blair Witch, Silence of the Lambs and Zodiac are something else, as it’s not just a few people saying that, but many. I cannot wait. The movie is out July 12 in select theaters.

Follow me on Twitter , YouTube , and Instagram .

Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy .

LONGLEGS Is a Very Weird, Very Upsetting, Thoroughly Captivating Horror Show

The current state of horror means we’re getting a deluge of films trying to outdo each other in sending chills up the spine. This has resulted in some of the most interesting and risk-taking movies in the genre. While A24’s plaudits for “elevated horror” are fairly passé at this point, I think NEON are the ones releasing just as heady scary films but with a far more sinister edge, often much more my speed. Their latest is Osgood Perkins’ Longlegs , which has had one of the most striking ad campaigns in decades. The movie, I’m happy to report, is just as striking.

I’m glad I didn’t have to write this review within the first day or even the first few days after seeing Longlegs . If I had, I would have likely given the impression I didn’t like it, or at least that I didn’t think it was as good as people said. Comparing any movie to Silence of the Lambs is bold to say the least. As a serial killer FBI procedural, Longlegs is not particularly complicated. Many aspects of the investigation are supremely obvious, others completely out of left field. But as a horror movie, as an exploration of creeping dread and occult uncanniness, Longlegs burrows under your skin and stays there for weeks.

The basic story follows newly minted Oregon field agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) as she uses her inexplicable intuition to aid Special Agent Carter (Blair Underwood) in one of the Bureau’s most baffling cases. Several completely unrelated men have killed their entire families and themselves over the past several decades. No physical evidence suggests any other person took part. However, each crime scene had a letter written in strange symbols, signed “Longlegs.”

It won’t give anything away to say Nicolas Cage plays the titular Longlegs, and his appearance is so upsetting they won’t show it in ads. It takes a while for the movie to show him, too. While we know this, who exactly Longlegs is, what he does, and how he does it are the real mysteries at the film’s heart. Harker delves deeper into the strange occult circumstances of these massacres, her own connections come to the surface as the inevitability of Longlegs’ masterplan begins to take shape.

Perkins’ directing style and passion for slow and creeping dread in his movies pays off big time in Longlegs . However, unlike some of his more languorous outings, here he punctuates the moody quiet with loud and shocking moments. It constantly keeping the audience nervous about what will come next. For the first two-thirds of the movie, I sat completely wrapt in squinting, white-knuckle anxiety about what might lurk in the corners of the slightly fisheyed frame. What terror could hide in the shadow just behind Harker?

The last third is a different matter. I liken the experience of watching Longlegs to watching Hereditary for the first time. The movies are quite different, but both of their climaxes mixed terror with puzzlement in me. Some of the plot is so obvious I assume there must be something more. Other parts are legitimately silly. So much so that when everything falls into place I thought, “Wait, this is what the movie’s doing?” In both cases my brain got in the way of my body’s reaction to what I was watching. Parts of Longlegs feel so at odds with the rest of it. It contains moments of humor I’m not entirely sure were intentional. People next to me at the screening laughed uproariously toward the end. I can’t decide if they were laughing at or with the movie.

However, and I hate to advocate for turning off your brain when watching anything, Longlegs is a vibes movie first and foremost. It’s not a crime movie with horror elements, it’s a weird horror movie with the FBI. Perkins, I think (I hope) understands what scares us about occultism is also pretty goofy. This is why I’m happy I got to sit with the movie before writing this. Initially I was prepared to say it looks good, that Underwood’s performance is tremendous, but that it’s trying to get by too much on Cage’s creepy look and strangely mannered performance. And now? I just go “yeah, of course it does. That’s why it’s awesome!”

I think Longlegs is a legitimately superb example of a horror movie that knows what it’s doing, knows it’s playing in a very tamped-down sandbox, and uses that to thoroughly unsettle and affect the audience. Tight plotting be damned, this movie’s got moxy! The next dozen times I watch it, I won’t care that the mystery isn’t anything special. It’s got those performances in that setting with those shocks. What more could you want?!

Longlegs opens in theaters July 12.

Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus . You can find his film and TV reviews here . Follow him on Instagram and Letterboxd .

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE...

• Privacy Policy
• Do Not Sell or Share My Information Opens in new tab

v2.08 – © Nerdist All Rights Reserved

We earn a commission for products purchased through some links in this article.

Longlegs review: Unforgettable horror is one of the best movies of the year

Believe the hype.

But even in such a strong year, Longlegs stands alone from the rest of the pack.

Arriving in cinemas this week with a 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating (at the time of writing) and a wave of enthusiastic responses, we wouldn't blame you for thinking Longlegs can't possibly live up to the hype – but it absolutely does.

In keeping with the excellent marketing campaign for Longlegs , we'll be brief on the details of what to expect. If you picture The Silence of the Lambs , only much darker tonally and plot-wise, then you're on the right track.

The movie opens at an indeterminate time as a young girl comes face-to-face with the serial killer known only to the police as Longlegs ( Nicolas Cage ). He's been on a killing spree for decades, and the only clues left behind at each murder scene are notes filled with occult symbols with seemingly no rhyme or reason.

Enter gifted FBI agent Lee Harker ( Maika Monroe ) who is recruited by Agent Carter ( Blair Underwood ) to hunt for Longlegs. But as she starts to delve into the murders, Longlegs appears to take as much of an interest in her.

It's a case that shakes Harker to her core – and you'll be left equally rattled.

Before we even get to the technical craft on display, Longlegs is elevated by two excellent performances by Maika Monroe and Nicolas Cage. Without stars of their talent, you'd still be scared, but you wouldn't be emotionally invested too.

Lee Harker is a difficult character, socially awkward and standoffish, but Monroe – already a genre star with the likes of It Follows and The Guest – conveys the emotion and pain behind who she is. You might initially want to compare her drive to that of Clarice Starling, yet Monroe ensures she's her own unique hero.

On the other side is a truly unrecognisable Nicolas Cage as Longlegs. It's a fearless, transformative performance by one of the most dynamic actors around, and up there with his very best. Vocally, there are the occasional 'Cage rage' flourishes, but it's the softness of Longlegs that proves the most unsettling.

The visual transformation has smartly been kept out of marketing and writer/director Osgood Perkins teases you with glimpses here and there. It's a way into the movie that Longlegs is revealed in all his glory, and the effect is impactful.

Another thing that might surprise you about Longlegs is that, despite it covering very dark ground, it's rarely gratuitous. There are stark images – a blood-spattered 'Happy Birthday' banner here, a family of corpses in a bed there – but it's not overly gruesome.

Often, Perkins leaves it to your imagination and relies on tone to creep you out. From the crisp, wide cinematography by Andrés Arochi (which leaves vast spaces around characters) to the haunting sound design from Eugenio Battaglia, the movie crafts an oppressive atmosphere where everything is just so slightly 'off'.

You can't relax at all during Longlegs , and you'll come out of it feeling a bit dirty as though there's something you can quite shake off. If that sounds like an unpleasant viewing experience, conversely you'll also not want to look away as it's so compelling in its bleakness.

If you're after jump scares, you won't find many here aside from an extremely effective one in the cold open. But that relative absence of a quick jolt is replaced by a lingering dread throughout, so you will still be terrified.

As Longlegs begins to wrap up, you might start to worry that it might not stick the landing. After an intense confrontation, it appears as though the story is done, but Perkins surprises you with a smart, surprising development that leaves you wanting a rewatch.

It's the bloody bow on proceedings that cements Longlegs as not just one of 2024's best horror movies, but one of the year's best movies overall.

You are not ready for the unforgettable and chilling experience that is Longlegs .

Longlegs is released in cinemas on July 12.

Sign up for Disney+

Apple TV+ 7-day free trial

Watch Power Book II: Ghost season 4 in the UK

PS5 Slim Consoles

Amazon Music Unlimited free trial - pay nothing for 3 months

Best cheap headphones under £80 to buy in 2024

Digital Spy Holidays - trips with TV experts

Echo Spot - Amazon Prime members save 38%

Buy The Bear's 'Original Beef' t- shirt

Buy Alison Hammond's outfits

Buy Cat Deeley's This Morning outfits

Shop Sky TV, broadband and mobile

Movies Editor, Digital Spy  Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor.  Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies , attending genre festivals around the world.   After moving to Digital Spy , initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.  

.css-15yqwdi:before{top:0;width:100%;height:0.25rem;content:'';position:absolute;background-image:linear-gradient(to right,#51B3E0,#51B3E0 2.5rem,#E5ADAE 2.5rem,#E5ADAE 5rem,#E5E54F 5rem,#E5E54F 7.5rem,black 7.5rem,black);} Movie Reviews

Kill isn't the action movie you're expecting

MaXXXine review

Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F review

Fancy Dance review

Is Nicole Kidman's Netflix movie worth a watch?

A Quiet Place: Day One review

Kinds of Kindness review

The Bikeriders review

Inside Out 2 review

Hit Man is the best Netflix movie this year

Bad Boys: Ride or Die review

Best Horror Movies On Prime Video Right Now (July 2024)

Our monthly update of the scariest movies on prime video right now..

Amazon Prime Video’s catalog can be a bit more challenging to navigate versus the neatness of Netflix or Hulu. There are no subcategories or breakdowns, just an endless scroll of fifty-ish pages loaded with titles. Don’t expect many Amazon Originals in their horror section either — these seem to be limited to Blumhouse’s “Into The Blumhouse” collections and not much else. You’d think this is where horror movies come to die, but that’s only if you don’t have a guide.

Clicking through every page of Prime Video’s horror section, you’ll find some real gems hidden between backyard-made uploads that Amazon loosely vets. The problem is, “hidden gems” are just that — hidden. I’m talking “Page 15” for an outright horror icon or anything before the 2000s. Curation seems like an afterthought, just whatever’s available at the time. To make perusing easier, we’ve highlighted the best horror films currently streamable on Prime Video, updated monthly as we sink deeper into their catalog of neverending pages.

Best Horror Movies On Prime Video

Please note: This list pertains to U.S. Amazon subscribers. Some titles may not currently be available on international platforms. This article is frequently amended to remove films no longer on Amazon and to include more horror movies that are now available on the service.

Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum

Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum is based on a real-life “haunted” psychiatric hospital of the same name, which adds to the horror. Jung Bum-shik’s found footage thriller is fiercely disturbing, using first-person advantageously as content creators take on the spiritually rotten locale. It’s structured like any Grave Encounters-type premise where ghost hunters encounter actual evils, but execution elevates above less composed examples. Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum is flippin’ scary — that’s why it needs to be on your watch list as soon as possible.

Everyone has that cheesy, gory, goofy-but-lovable horror flick that’s their comfort watch, and for me, it’s John Gulager’s Feast. Monsters attack patrons in a Nevada roadside bar — that’s it. Writers Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan are sneaky, though. Gulager and his team have a blast subverting every expectation the deceptively straightforward structure suggests, starting with cheeky title cards that introduce characters through typical stereotypes like Eric Dane as “Hero” or Jason Mewes as “Edgy Cat.” It’s a meta move that pays off with big laughs thanks to a fantastic cast (Henry Rollins, Judah Friedlander, Jenny Wade), toying with the audience because you’d expect the guy who plays “Hero” to stay until the end — right? You’ll have to watch to find out, and I highly suggest you do.

Ti West and Mia Goth have created a beautiful partnership starting with X, but Pearl is where Goth shines brightest. As a prequel that lets Goth play a 1918 farmgirl with starstruck dreams, it’s barebones in storytelling but incredibly meaty regarding Pearl’s larger-than-life personality. I described Goth’s performance as “Cinderella, Norman Bates, and Annie Wilkes” rolled into one, a sight to behold. West and Goth collaborated on Pearl’s script over a few short weeks, which is evident in slighter parts, but try ignoring Goth’s command of the screen as she spirals into delusional psychosis.

Dark Harvest

If you’ve ever thought, “You know, there aren’t enough horror films that endanger children,” check out Dark Harvest. David Slade’s adaptation of Norman Partridge’s book brings to life a rural American ritual where young boys participate in a Halloween "run" to hunt a deadly creature, Sawtooth Jack. A unique blend of practical and digital effects brings Sawtooth Jack to life with grotesque realism, and gore effects are top-notch as an evil Jack-O-Lantern entity slaughters boys of all ages. Dark Harvest is a cornfed folktale that might be a little anemic in its recreation of 1960s period aesthetics, but doesn’t waste Halloween appeal that’s as dark as it is deadly.

Adam Green’s most known for the Louisiana slasher franchise Hatchet, but I’d argue Frozen is one of his best. No, this isn’t a Disney remake with cheery songs — just freezing temperatures and hungry wolves. Shawn Ashmore, Kevin Zegers, and Emma Bell are stuck on a ski lift after hours due to an operator handover and unclear instructions. That’s the movie, focused and frost-bitten, but it’s hardly disappointing. As the three friends try to survive the elements, dangers mount and panic escalates. Green gets to the point and lands the concept, making big chills out of little means with a wintery twist.

Every few months, I think about what a shame it is that Hell Fest never got a sequel or prequel. It’s one of my favorite Halloween rewatches, and my appreciation grows yearly. Gregory Plotkin’s haunted attraction slasher feels like a horror movie takeover of Universal’s Halloween Horror Nights in all the right ways. Amusement park thrills prey upon the ease with which any psychopath could pose as a scare actor, as Plotkin plays up the holiday’s inherently spooky aesthetics. If it’s October, you bet I’m going to force my friends to watch Hell Fest again.

Speaking of Halloween movies with “Hell” in the title, why not try Hell Night? Linda Blair stars in an ‘80s slasher that mixes hazing, haunted houses, and wacky kill sequences into one tasty holiday treat. It’s an old-school midnighter breed that isn't known for immaculate quality, but that matters less because director Tom DeSimone has plenty of fun with the concept. Four pledges must endure an initiation ritual that sees them spend the night at “Garth Manor,” but as you might predict, the mean-spirited prank leads to dead bodies. It’s not an outright horror comedy, but you’ll probably laugh anyway, and that’s alright. Have fun with Hell Night; it’ll only enhance the experience.

The Monster Project

By 2017, the found footage subgenre had long been oversaturated with cheap Blair Witch and Paranormal Activity imitations. Thankfully, Victor Mathieu dared to be different with The Monster Project. YouTubers who typically film fake monster encounters decide to search for some real-deal subjects, which they ultimately find. A skinwalker, a vampire, and a girl suffering demonic possession gather in a house to be interviewed on the night of a lunar eclipse, and that’s when everything goes wrong. The YouTuber crew becomes trapped in a rental house with their three real-life monsters, fighting for survival. Monster effects are better than expected, and the found footage shooting style works with Mathieu’s dedication to in-your-face action. Frankly, it’s one of my favorite hidden gems of the first-person subgenre.

Zombeavers is what SYFY Originals dream about being when they grow up. Jordan Rubin’s loving satire of ridiculous B-movies is indeed about zombified beavers accidentally created by truckers played by John Mayer and Bill Burr. From there, things only get goofier and more entertaining. The concept of werebeavers is introduced, beaver puppets run amok, and flesh-ripping gore gets downright nasty. Rubin holds nothing back as he charges full-sprint into an asinine concept that could only succeed by taking the biggest swings, which the film does. It’s a doofy, proudly dumb, tail-thwappin’ good time of a horror-comedy.

Breaking Surface

Breaking Surface is a thrilling and straightforward premise executed to the max. Joachim Hedén’s aquatic horror tale is about sisters who love diving together — one sister gets trapped underwater beneath falling rocks, and the other tries to pull off an improbable rescue. Madeleine Martin and Moa Gammel deliver above-and-beyond performances as siblings fighting for one’s life, generating tension from the scenario and their love for one another under immense duress. Hedén faces the horrors of Mother Nature as any of us might unluckily encounter, contrasting feelings of hopelessness against his characters’ will to live. It’s just good wilderness horror, pinning our nerves to the bottom of the ocean’s floor.

Michael Cooney’s supremely 90s horror movie Jack Frost begs an important question: What if Child’s Play, but a snowman? That’s the concept in a nutshell. A serial killer is involved in a car accident, gets doused with genetic research chemicals, and fuses with the snow outside. It’s a highly unserious Christmas horror movie about what would happen if Frosty ever snapped, but Cooney works about as well as he can with the lower-budget gonzo material. Cooney leans hard into the festive spirit with a bevy of seasonal deaths as Jack cracks cheesy one-liners you’d expect from a slasher villain snowman. It’s goofy as heck, knows its role, and delivers plenty of fun for B-Movie fans seeking horror schlock during the holidays. They even got Shannon Elizabeth to show up and die!

Uncle Peckerhead

Despite preconceptions outside the genre, there is such a thing as "Feel Good Horror." Uncle Peckerhead fits the brand, about a scrappy punk band named Duh that unknowingly lets a monster join their first-ever tour. Every night for thirteen minutes, the band's roadie "Uncle Peckerhead" (aka "Peck") turns into a flesh-munching creature. As the tour progresses, Duh learns to love their murderous companion — especially when he tears apart sleazy promoters or club owners. Writer and director Matthew John Lawrence does well to honor indie punk-rock aesthetics through the unexpectedly sweet journey with plenty of rebellious spirits, rad tunes, and spilled blood.

Totally Killer

If Hot Tub Time Machine turned into a slasher, you'd get Totally Killer. It's a comical horror film that's comedy-forward in terms of balance, frequently poking fun at easy 80s stereotypes like railing cocaine on the regular. Kiernan Shipka is delightful in these moments as a "wokester" modern girl trying to comprehend how anyone made it out of the 80s alive — then the horror hits. A masked maniac reminds us that we're watching a slasher movie where teens die horribly, and scares attempt to wash away comedic brightness. It's never totally in balance, but sure can be killer.

Yes, the Nicolas Cage Dracula film is worth your time. It’s a humorous take on escaping toxic relationships led by Nicholas Hoult as Dracula’s famous familiar Renfield that twists iconic vampire lore into a unique new form. Renfield eats bugs to become super powerful, and Dracula works with drug kingpins — you have to accept that Renfield (the movie and the character) just wants to have fun. Oh, and it’s gratuitously bloody? Renfield hits the right notes for a contemporary vampire flick that aims to entertain with broad horror strokes, and Cage is as deliciously batty as you’d hope.

Mutant Blast

Here's one you probably haven't heard about yet. Mutant Blast is a Troma-produced piece of B-Movie mania that features gross-out practical effects, full-body rat mamma costumes, and so much more insanity. It's a nuclear doomsday movie, a zombie apocalypse movie, a mutant monster movie — a little bit of everything that fans of kooky horror movies love. Where else can you find a French lobster wearing a business suit with an intense hatred for dolphins? I promise you've never seen anything like the grotesque, often hilarious, and freakishly inventive Mutant Blast.

From the minds behind Reno 911! and many other goofball comedy productions comes a demonic comedy that puts laughs first and hellspawn terror second. Hell Baby isn’t revolutionizing the horror-comedy, but for those who enjoy Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon’s sense of humor (a vast range of maturity levels), there’s some solid gold haunted house schtick to be found. A cast of reliably funny people including Rob Corddry, Leslie Bibb, Keegan-Michael Key, and so many more familiar faces make Hell Baby more entertaining than it should be — look no further than Kumail Nanjiani’s insane long-take gag as a stoned cable guy trying to drive away without drawing attention. Hell Baby gets the job done as a means of silly satanic entertainment that pokes fun at exorcisms, Vatican heroes, and other horror tropes.

Smile is a textbook definition horror movie that's scary, composed, and adheres to commen genre expectations. Sosie Bacon leads a film where seeing a haunting grin means you're about to become an evil entity's next victim. Storytelling lacks tightness as characters come and go from the absurd scenario, but the scares are all aces. Writer and director Parker Finn understands the bread and butter of most horror experiences: primetime chills. Finn's movie exists to make you scream and scream you shall. I'm not sure everything about the ending works for me personally? But it's still worth the stream for the adrenaline spikes alone.

Torn Hearts

In the mood for some honky-tonk horrors? How about a movie where Katey Sagal stars as a once-famous country music sensation who torments an aspiring duo after they show up on her doorstep begging for a collaboration? Director Brea Grant feeds off Nashville's music scene as newbie band Torn Hearts tangles with their idol — Sagal's Harper Dutch — who soaks their insides with booze and starts breaking down their psyches. Good music, bad attitudes, and jaded celebrity commentaries are the key ingredients that make Torn Hearts such a boot-scootin' blast to watch. The trio of actresses embraces madness in harmony, and while their standoff isn't without some disbelief, it's still one hell of a performance I'd grant an encore.

Nikyatu Jusu's Nanny is one of the better original Prime Video horror releases as of today's date. Anna Diop stars as immigrant Aisha, with Michelle Monaghan as her upper-class boss. Terror is based on international folklore and damning conversations until an absolute gut punch of a finale drives home Jusu's fragile vision. We love a horror film that reminds us how movies don't need fictional monsters — life itself is frightening enough.

Run Sweetheart Run

Subtle is something that Run Sweetheart Run is not, which I find a feature, not a bug. Ella Balinska plays a single mother in Los Angeles who is being chased by a misogynistic, womanizing, possibly supernatural predator after a blind date (Pilou Asbæk plays “bad” so well). It’s not pulling punches or sugarcoating commentary. There’s a John Carpenter-esque feel as Balinska’s target flees through a dystopian version of LA where everyone is on her pursuer’s payroll, but also less dystopian based on how characters interact with the fleeing woman. It’s a fight for survival, a bloody satire on women fending for themselves, and a vicious chase flick that’s only taking home run swings.

From the guy who directed killer elevator and killer Santa movies (Dick Maas) comes Uncaged, about a monstrous lion terrorizing Amsterdam. A blend of CG and animatronic effects bring the lion to life, as a veterinarian leads hunters through the Dutch capital. Maas is known for having a flair for the outrageous, which doesn’t escape Uncaged. The film’s ideas are grotesque and a bit bonkers, amassing a showy body count while indulging darkened humor. If you’re into Mass, B-Movies, and beastly creature features, give Uncaged a whirl.

Nia DaCosta’s Candyman — say it five times — succeeds as a thoughtful requel in remake camouflauge. The creative team sees an opportunity to challenge Bernard Rose’s original by viewing its legacy through a Black lens, which gives a complementary perspective. New elements are introduced (mirror travel), the universe of Candyman expands, and effects teams splatter some righteous gore as trauma is exploited as art. There’s a poignant conversation at the center of Monkey Paw’s Candyman update, one that unifies the worlds of cultural reflection and representative horror in a tasty way.

Hell House LLC

Stephen Cognetti's Hell House LLC is a spectacularly scrappy take on found-footage Halloween horrors. Haunted attraction creators select an abandoned hotel in upstate New York for their next production, and opening night ends with fifteen dead. Hell House LLC sells itself as documentary footage that recounts the tragedy of Hell House — what went wrong, all the supernatural signs that attraction makers ignored. It's one of its decade's better independent horror efforts, especially considering how it maximizes every advantage of found footage styles. Minimal budgets, seasonally creative scares, and in-your-face screams are the calling cards of Hell House LLC.

Mariama Diallo's Master turns systemic racism into a ghost story that haunts collegiate halls. Regina Hall shines as the first Black master at Ancaster, a predominantly white New England college. There are legends of haunted dorm rooms thanks to witch hangings nearby, but Hall's character encounters prejudice that's far more horrifying. The paranormal element of Diallo's story becomes the unseen but campus-wide stoking of hatred that's ingrained in Ancaster's traditions. Horror becomes a conduit for protest as well as a frightening accent on a few occasions, but most impressively, Diallo keeps thematic emphasis tight and tense throughout the university thriller. It's spooky, frustrated, and particular with its monsters — horror continues to be as punchily political as always.

Rob Grant’s Harpoon is so sarcastic, caustic, and spiteful. I say that with glee. It’s the darkest of dark comedies, cutting to the chase about humanity’s vile core. Three “friends” are stranded on a boat and devolve into the worst versions of themselves — somehow even worse than the betrayers and hotheads they were on land. There’s also a harpoon on board, hence the title. Brett Gelman narrates as Richard (Christopher Gray), Jonah (Munro Chambers), and Sasha (Emily Tyra) try to survive heatstroke, dehydration, and themselves. Drifting on waters that are much calmer than tensions aboard, which is all I want to reveal about this laugh-out-out slice of human misery.

The Taking Of Deborah Logan

Found footage fans already know why Adam Robitel's The Taking Of Deborah Logan is on this list. Deborah Logan (Jill Larson) permits a film crew to document her battle with Alzheimer's, but the production becomes more nightmare than informational research. Threads between mental illness and possession are pulled so delicately until jarring scares deliver thunderous horrors. Deborah's condition worsens as the camera rolls and evolves past medical explanations. Then we reach an open-wide finale moment that's been gif'ed a million times, assuring mass acclaim around Robitel's debut.

We Are Still Here

Haunted houses are part of any horror fan's comfort formula but can present storytelling problems. Why remain in an estate that aims to harm you? Or possess your family? Ted Geoghegan's We Are Still Here works as a New England ghost story because characters played by Barbara Crampton and Andrew Sensenig believe their new abode's strange occurrences are signs from their deceased son. A calmness keeps them settled until their assumptions are proven very, disastrously wrong. It's a third-act for the ages that pays off slower burns when Geoghegan unleashes more bloodshed in its closing remarks than some entire movies accomplish. Eat your hearts out, A24. Here's how you sustain elongated simmers with a proper climax.

If you’re in the mood for a horror-comedy slasher, may I direct you towards Conor McMahon’s Stitches? British comedian Ross Noble plays an undead clown who reanimates to slaughter the now-teenage children responsible for his accidental party death. Death scenes are over-the-top and emphasize practicality, like when a boy’s head inflates like a balloon or brains are scooped like ice cream blobs. It’s wild fun and even sets up a mythological cultish vibe as Stitches is somehow tied to a graveyard clown congregation, which begs for a sequel. That ship has probably sailed, but for everyone who misses the lunacy of 80s slasher romps? Stitches should be a headliner act.

Classic horror staples don’t often find their way onto Prime Video, but Clive Barker’s Hellraiser remains the exception. Pinhead makes his theatrical debut serving sadomasochism as the only flavor on Barker’s menu. Cenobites explore new torturous carnal pleasures, no longer able to decipher between pain and pleasure. So begins a gory affair where bodies are pulled apart by hooks as leather demons bring such sights to show the humans caught in their path. Oh, and there’s skinwalking to boot? Hellraiser lives its name by bringing Hell unto Earth, whether you’re talking about the disgusting gratification on-screen or the slew of unappetizing sequels.

House On Haunted Hill

Yes, 1999’s House On Haunted Hill is an underrated aughts-era example of gothic decadence — but let’s not forget the William Castle original. Vincent Price and Carol Ohmart star as untrusting partners who so entertainingly scorch each other with hateful words, setting a proper murder mystery afoot. Since we’re talking about a 1959 haunted house whodunit, there’s less stress put on inky ghosts and more on the macabre charisma of Price and his character’s guests. Survive the night and win a handsome sum of cash — leave, or worse, and forfeit. The latter becomes harder as the evening turns gravely severe in this delicious horror puzzler that still holds its mansion-mania charm.

If you’re a sucker for horror rock musicals, you should crank Rob Stefaniuk’s Suck. A host of rockstars from Alice Cooper to Henry Rollins roll through this vampire take on selling your soul for everlasting fame. Admittedly, it’s not precisely high-brow since Malcolm McDowell plays a vampire hunter named Eddie Van Helsing. Still, musical interludes and the film’s goofy commentary on stardom strum the right chords. Moby, Iggy Pop, Alex Lifeson — Suck has it all in terms of talent. If only “The Winners” had any of the listed legends in their actual band, they wouldn’t have to morph into bloodsuckers for attention.

In This Article

Where to Watch

IGN Recommends

Our expert, award-winning staff selects the products we cover and rigorously researches and tests our top picks. If you buy through our links, we may get a commission. Reviews ethics statement

• Services & Software

The Best Horror Movies to Stream on Max

Dare to watch one of these scary flicks.

Max  hosts a lot of content, but how's its horror selection? Titles rotate throughout the year, and right now you can catch newer horror films like Midsommar and classics like Carrie. You may find a flick that lets you skip a scary-long search.

If you're ready to make a spooky selection, here are eight standout horror movies on Max. All these films received generally favorable reviews or better, according to Metacritic. If you're wondering what Max is all about, here's  more on the streaming service , which unites the HBO Max and Discovery Plus libraries. 

Midsommar (2019)

Horrors take place in broad daylight in this haunting film from Ari Aster. Set at a midsummer festival in a remote Swedish village, Midsommar has plenty of disturbing surprises in store for its guests. Prepare for some shocking scenes and a gripping performance from Florence Pugh.

It Comes at Night (2017)

This grim horror film is about a family living in a secluded home in the aftermath of an unnamed cataclysm and what happens when a desperate couple with a young child enters the picture. The terrors aren't supernatural, but this harrowing flick will haunt you.

Evil Dead Rise (2023)

A family accidentally unearths some unimaginable evils in this gory supernatural horror story. It's the fifth entry in the film franchise after The Evil Dead (1981), Evil Dead II ('87), Army of Darkness ('92) and Evil Dead (2013).

The Witch (2015)

This historical horror movie pretty much guarantees nightmares. The disturbing flick centers on a family in 1630s New England and marks Anya Taylor-Joy's film debut. Over the 90-minute flick, strange and shocking things happen to a farmer and family who've relocated to a remote area on the edge of a forest. 

Black Swan (2010)

Black Swan is a surreal psychological horror movie about a talented ballerina's unraveling. Natalie Portman's character Nina feels pressure to embody not only the innocent and elegant White Swan but the dark and sensual Black Swan for the leading part in a production of Swan Lake. But she doesn't fit the latter swan's mold as much as newcomer Lily (Mila Kunis) does. The film follows her obsessive hunt for perfection.

Eraserhead (1977)

David Lynch's first feature-length film will make you feel like you're in a bizarre nightmare. The 90-minute black-and-white horror flick is packed with odd sounds and imagery, and the result is incredibly eerie. Don't even get me started on the main character's freakish, otherworldly looking "baby" (that's oddly still kind of cute?). There are messages about men and parenthood here, but even setting aside the bigger picture, Eraserhead's surreal world is absolutely worth a visit. 

Night of the Living Dead (1968)

George Romero's first horror film is an easy recommendation. A group of survivors take refuge in a house while members of the undead swarm outside. The influential flick is often regarded as the first modern zombie movie , and while it may not offer Freddy Krueger-level frights, you'll be drawn in by the characters at the center of its story. You're going to want to leave the door open for this one (but in the case of an actual apocalypse, keep it very, very shut).

Carrie (1976)

It's more Stephen King, and you have to watch Sissy Spacek's Oscar-nominated portrayal of the prom queen at least once in your life. Why not now?

Related stories

• The Best Horror Movies on Netflix
• The Best Horror Movies on Prime Video
• The Best Movies on HBO Max

Services and Software Guides

• Best iPhone VPN
• Best Free VPN
• Best Android VPN
• Best Mac VPN
• Best Mobile VPN
• Best VPN for Firestick
• Best VPN for Windows
• Fastest VPN
• Best Cheap VPN
• Best Password Manager
• Best Antivirus
• Best Identity Theft Protection
• Best LastPass Alternative
• Best Live TV Streaming Service
• Best Streaming Service
• Best Free TV Streaming Service
• Best Music Streaming Services
• Best Web Hosting
• Best Minecraft Server Hosting
• Best Website Builder
• Best Dating Sites
• Best Language Learning Apps
• Best Weather App
• Best Stargazing Apps
• Best Cloud Storage
• Best Resume Writing Services
• New Coverage on Operating Systems

Advertisement

Supported by

Critic’s Pick

‘MaXXXine’ Review: Fame Monster

Mia Goth returns to Ti West’s horrorverse as an actress fleeing a mysterious stalker and a traumatic past.

• Share full article

By Jeannette Catsoulis

A psychosexual thriller imagined in blood red and cocaine white, “MaXXXine,” the third installment in Ti West’s nostalgia-soaked slasher saga, is part grungy homage to 1980s Hollywood and part sleazy feminist manifesto. Darker, moodier and altogether nastier than its predecessors — “X” (2022) and, later that same year, “Pearl” — this hyperconfident feature is also funny, occasionally wistful and deeply empathetic toward its damaged, driven heroine.

That would be Maxine Minx (Mia Goth), the sole survivor of the dirty-movie cast massacred in “X.” Now a successful porn star, Maxine, eager to break into mainstream movies, has relocated to a Hollywood of spectacular seediness. It is 1985 and, as in real life, a killer known as the Night Stalker is terrorizing the city, the so-called Moral Majority is hyperventilating on the sidelines and rock musicians are fighting accusations of satanic intent. In one pungent shot of Maxine’s boot grinding her cigarette stub into the silent film sex symbol Theda Bara’s star on the Walk of Fame, West underscores the transience of the celebrity status that Maxine so desperately seeks.

“I will not accept a life I do not deserve,” she declares, repeating the mantra taught by her father, a preacher seen in speckled, black-and-white flashback. Securing a role on a low-grade horror sequel brings her under the wing of its industry-toughened director (a perfect Elizabeth Debicki). Yet Maxine is constantly distracted: Her friends are dying, and two homicide detectives (Bobby Cannavale and Michelle Monaghan) want to question her; a Louisiana gumshoe (Kevin Bacon, a skeevy vision in crumpled suits and gold-capped incisors) keeps randomly accosting her; and a mysterious, black-gloved stalker haunts the film’s shadows. No wonder Maxine is plagued by panicked recollections of her traumatic past.

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and  log into  your Times account, or  subscribe  for all of The Times.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber?  Log in .

Want all of The Times?  Subscribe .