At some point over the past few years, I became aware of the fact that I have definitely seen hundreds of horror movies—or, at least, over a hundred horror movies. This seems too absurd to consider. It does not feel like I could have seen even a hundred movies, let alone a hundred of a particular genre. But like everyone, I watch movies with some regularity, and like most people, I continue to age. For whatever reason, I am more open to watching horror movies than most other genres. I seldom find myself watching this or that prestige drama film (even the ones I should) but I’ll watch nearly any ol’ horror movie, so long as there is a chance that it’ll be decent or at least have some interesting imagery. For this reason, I have now cultivated a long list of horror movies that I like and a slightly shorter list of horror movies that I love. Without realizing it, I accidentally became more passionate about horror as a film genre than any other. This was never the plan.
Thankfully, there is at least one month a year where everyone else is on the same page as I am.1 Who doesn’t want to watch a scary movie in October? And so, for some time now, I’ve been maintaining a list of 31 horror movies (that I think are) worth watching over the course of October. The list is designed for a few purposes: First and foremost, it is a representation of my taste. All of the movies on this list are movies that I enjoyed and would watch again. Second, I have tried to capture some diversity in the genre; some movies are actually scary, some are not, some movies are mind-rendingly upsetting and others are just a lark. Third and finally, I have tried to include both undeniable classics and personal favourites. The list is not meant to demonstrate how cool and obscure my taste is,2 nor is it a pat list of the WatchMojo Ultimate Top Scariest Spookiest Horror Flicks for Spooky Month.3 No movie has been included in this list because it is a classic,4 though I also did not shy away from including a few of them—they are classics for a reason, one can only assume.
So, with only a little more ado, I present to you the Lotus Eater list of 31 Horror Movies That I Think You Should Watch in October. If you happen to watch any of them, please let me know what you thought—even (or especially) if you didn’t like it. If you happen to watch all of them, come to my house and I will give you a crisp one hundred dollar bill from my living room window.
1. ALIEN (UNITED STATES, 1979)
If forced to choose an absolute favourite horror movie, I almost always pick Alien, and for that reason, it earns the top spot in this list. There are very few movies that I find as sickeningly-tense or as grindingly-dreadful as Alien. Every aspect of it feels carefully-calibrated to ratchet up tension for the viewer in a way that simply was not done in horror movies before 1979.5 There are a few films on this list that I knew about for years and years but had always assumed were beneath me in some way; Alien is the chief example of this. I figured it was just a dumb slasher movie with an admittedly-cool monster but little else to offer. Nothing could be further from the truth. Its unmistakable blend of organic and inorganic imagery,6 its teeth-cracking tension, its meditation on labour relations and bodily autonomy and sexual violence; each of these is blended seamlessly into a movie that also happens to be extremely entertaining and (still, nearly 50 years later) unmatched in the genre. Every part of Alien is handled so masterfully that it still manages to surprise me every time I watch it. There are few movies on this list that I could recommend more highly or widely.
2. NOROI: THE CURSE (JAPAN, 2005)
“Realism” is not a trait that I esteem especially-highly in nearly any form of art, though perhaps least of all in horror.7 That said, if you did want to make a horror film that felt “realistic,” Noroi demonstrates one of the most compelling ways to do so. Presented as a paranormal documentary, Noroi forces its audience into the same sort of conspiratorial schizoid cognition experienced by its subjects. Seemingly-unrelated events feel as though they must be connected, coincidences feel unmistakably meaningful, and behaviours that might otherwise just be unusual take on a sinister significance. This apophenic slow burn meanders through a series of unsettling places, people, and things, until it culminates in one of the more memorable climaxes on this list. Noroi is not “realistic” because it depicts events that “could actually happen”; its realism is found in the way it makes you feel and think, and in the lingering sense that You Do Not Understand the World As Well As You Think You Do.
3. GINGER SNAPS (CANADA, 2000)
CRTC regulations require me to source no less than 10% of this list from Canada. Thankfully, as is the case with most cancon laws, this is no great obstacle, as Canada has produced no small number of memorable horror films. Ginger Snaps is, to me, the most charming of these Canadian contributions, due in no small part to its unmistakably-millenial-mall-goth aesthetic and its amateurish quirks. Set in an Ontario suburb, Ginger Snaps feels like a cross between an after-school special and a 1980’s B movie. It explores the complications of sexual development and patriarchy through the lens of—what else?—werewolves. Assuming that you don’t mind a little low-budget jank, Ginger Snaps presents a surprisingly-funny and genuinely-touching story with a setting and characters that will feel fondly-familiar to anyone who was getting a little goth with it back around the year 2000. If you ever wished that Buffy the Vampire Slayer was both grosser and more Canadian, Ginger Snaps was made for you.
4. BARBARIAN (UNITED STATES, 2022)
Speaking of humour, you have probably by now seen at least one of Zach Cregger’s three forays into horror: Barbarian, Weapons, or the recent Resident Evil. Although I liked Resident Evil a great deal, and Weapons a considerably-lesser deal, Barbarian is by far his strongest offering. Barbarian manages to be so consistently-shocking, so consistently-funny, and so consistently-ghastly that it produced for me one of the most memorable cinema experiences on this list.8 The nature of horror films can make them intrinsically-difficult to describe with any detail, assuming that you wish to advocate for watching them; surprise and discovery are so integral to the enjoyment of horror, more than nearly any other genre of fiction. This is doubly-true for Barbarian, which manages to subvert the expectations of its audience repeatedly throughout its modest runtime, refusing to stay put in the sub-genre where you swear you last left it. And if you are hoping that Zach Cregger’s comedy pedigree has left a lasting impact on his approach to filmmaking, I do not think that you will be disappointed.
5. EYES OF FIRE (UNITED STATES, 1983)
If you have ever seen The Witch and wished that it was a bit stranger, a bit more psychedelic, a bit more unsettling, then have I got a film for you. Although the films share a similar setting and are suffused with similar themes, Eyes of Fire is an altogether dingier affair. Absent is any of the slickness of modern conceptions of satanism or witchcraft, replaced by something far more Primordial and far more difficult to Comprehend or Behold. This results in a film that is undoubtedly-imbalanced when compared with the delicate precision of Eggers’s work but is nonetheless (or perhaps consequentially) memorable and haunting in its own right. If you are easily put off by an amateurish performance or noticeably-aged special effects, then this film is not for you; alternatively, if you fancy yourself a fan of folk horror, then you owe it to yourself to check out perhaps the most influential American entry in the sub-genre.9
6. THE WITCH (UNITED STATES, 2015)
I consider it sort of gauche to mention a movie in one of these briefs if it is also discussed directly elsewhere in the list. I’ll try not to make a habit of it but let’s quickly move past the impropriety by discussing The Witch. For whatever reason, when I first saw The Witch, I didn’t quite take to it. I’m not sure why that was exactly, though I think it had something to do with how even-keeled and flawless it felt in comparison to Eyes of Fire. After enjoying the rest of Robert Eggers’s films, I decided to return to The Witch and a second viewing left a considerably-stronger impact on me. A demonic possession story and family drama set around the time of the European colonization of America, it is well-served by its subtitle “A New-England Folktale.” A dark beauty hangs over the film: nearly every shot is alluring, even in isolation, and each performance is uniquely-haunting in its own way. It is not my favourite of Eggers’s films—that honour falls very comfortably with The Lighthouse—but it is the one that most belongs in a list of horror movies to watch in October.
7. THE FLY (CANADA, 1986)
The Fly is by no means David Cronenberg’s best movie but it might be his most grotesque. If you’re like me, you already know the plot of The Fly thanks to a particularly-disgusting Halloween episode of The Simpsons. For the uninitiated, here’s the gist of it: a scientist developing a teleporter accidentally merges his DNA with that of a fly and begins to transform into Something in Between the Two. I have never seen the original 1950’s film but I’d be willing to bet that Cronenberg’s take on it is considerably more gruesome and upsetting. Although I think that the movie lacks the incisive vision of some of Cronenberg’s other movies (e.g., Videodrome, Crimes of the Future), The Fly manages to be one his most memorable thanks to Jeff Goldblum’s off-kilter performance and the wide variety of impressively-hideous practical effects. Does this look like a sick man to you?
8. EXHUMA (KOREA, 2024)
While I would love to open this brief by saying something profoud about Exhuma, here is the actual pitch: it is maybe the coolest movie on this list. Although it deals with some heady topics—folk religion and ritual, war crimes, wealth inequality—it lands somewhere between exorcism horror and adventure shonen.10 In practice, this results in a movie that is less scary than it is captivating, filled with striking imagery and slick characters, such as: an extremely cool and competent shaman; her taciturn protégé; a legendary master geomancer coaxed out of retirement; a dippy but earnest mortician; and a terrifying ghost played by an actual 7’3” Korean basketball player. Fair warning, though: like an adventure shonen, Exhuma also occasionally engages in some plot exposition that some might regard as pace-killing, though I personally enjoyed these digressions into the exact mechanics of feng shui and how they relate to proper burial and colonialism. You probably know by now whether or not you would love this movie.
9. WE’RE ALL GOING TO THE WORLD’S FAIR (UNITED STATES, 2021)
There is no other movie on this list like We’re All Going to the World’s Fair. There might not be any other movie like We’re All Going to the World’s Fair. A profoundly lonely film, World’s Fair features basically only two actors, and documents an isolated adolescent’s participation in an online “challenge” that purports to produce disturbing psychological effects in those who undertake it. It meditates on identity and solipsism and the rampant atomization that seems to characterize modern life, and manages to capture the feeling of Being Online in a way that few things11 can. It also has music by Alex G.
10. THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (UNITED STATES, 1974)
I learned about The Texas Chainsaw Massacre from a trailer for the remake that would play when I was a kid. It terrified me. The only trailer that scared me more was for something called Darkness Falls. I don’t know why I was being shown these trailers with such regularity but I can basically guarantee that neither of these films is either scary or worth watching. As I aged, I came to assume that the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre12 was also unlikely to be either scary or worth watching. I was wrong on both counts. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is a genuinely terrifying, ghastly, abominable thing, though it also happens to be surprisingly beautiful. Each scene is more sickening than the last, every character more unlikeable, grotesque, or repelleant than the next.13 At the risk of invoking a thesis that I have no intention of fleshing out, the movie feels like such a perfect encapsulation of (one segment of) the American spirit, especially at that particular moment of the 20th century. The ending of the movie is so shocking and sublime that I still find it hard to believe. “Slashers” are by no means my favourite flavour of horror, but if there is one slasher worth watching, it is this one.
11. ODDITY (IRELAND, 2024)
I watched Oddity for the same reason as everyone else: because it’s got that freaky guy in it. We love the freaky guy, don’t we folks? Turns out there’s a lot of other stuff worth seeing in there too. For example, Oddity has the unique distinction of having the most effective jump scare of this entire list, one that still brings me shivers if I think about it for too long.14 It also has a truly unique and compelling premise: a blind medium and keeper of the occult investigates the death of her twin sister in a big strange house in the Irish countryside. Its characters are captivating and the scenarios it contrives are so painfully-tense that I will not soon forget them. And yes, it has Olin Boole. People are always asking me whether Oddity has Oline Boole. The answer is yes. Of course it has Olin Boole.
12. CURE (JAPAN, 1997)
It is strange to recommend Cure to others because it feels as though that movie bestows a curse on anyone who watches it. The actual text of the film is no more upsetting or gruesome than any other on this list—indeed, it is in many ways one of the least gruesome—and yet it leaves the viewer with a thick psychological residue that proves difficult to remove. Its premise is not an entirely unfamiliar one: the movie follows a detective investigating a string of strange murders. What sets Cure apart is the style and tone with which it approaches the procedural format and the unique way in which its mystery is unraveled. A gloom hangs over every moment of the film. Every character is likeable in their own way but morose; each seems to be struggling with some gnawing awareness, some unpleasant truth wriggling just beneath the surface of their consciousness. This nagging feeling is passed on to the viewer in turn, a social contagion no more preventable than the common cold. These feelings seem to be the primary animus for the director, Kiyoshi Kurosawa,15 as they are present to some extent in nearly all of his films. Though the topic is explored more directly in some of his other work, nowhere it is examined more effectively than in Cure.16
13. HEREDITARY (UNITED STATES, 2018)
Listen. I know we all know about Hereditary. We all know about Ari Aster and those two movies he made that everyone liked and those other two movies he made that most people didn’t.17 The thing is: Hereditary is basically as good as everyone says. It is just as terrifying and upsetting and heartbreaking as its popularity would indicate. Seeing it in a packed theatre was one of the most memorable cinematic experiences I have ever had as people genuinely gasped, screamed, jumped, and writhed in response to what they saw on the screen.18 Toni Collette’s audacious performance made me care about her family drama in a way that very few horror movies can. The mystery and lore unspooled by the movie was truly enthralling and the imagery it employs still lingers with me today, 8 years later. It is frankly a miracle that Aster was able to squeeze so much juice out of the demonic posession sub-genre, a format that has otherwise barely progressed since 1973.
14. THE EXORCIST (UNITED STATES, 1973)
The Exorcist is perhaps the most notable entry on the list of “so-called classics that I always assumed were not worth watching on account of their popularity and cultural penetration but turn out to be incredible.” Unlike Alien or The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, I knew a great deal about The Exorcist before ever seeing it. I was born into a world where knowledge of The Exorcist was already universal: its lines, its scenes, its special effects, these were all so much the subject of reference and parody that it felt like I had seen the movie.19 Worse, it felt as though it defanged the movie; Even if it was good, even if it was scary, how could it possibly be either after I’d seen Scary movie 2 singing scean and girl [sic]? It turns out though that the movie is just as haunting as its reputation would indicate, even if you have seen its story played out in about fourteen different children’s cartoons. The movie oscillates between being quite beautiful and deeply unsettling, but its true strength is the stunning performance of Linda Blair (who plays the possessed child). Freaky little kids are common fare in horror films but I don’t know if The Exorcist has ever been surpassed in that regard. If you haven’t bothered watching it because it feels as though you’ve already seen it, I would recommend giving it a shot. Even if you hate it, you still get to hear those famous tubular bells.20
15. CREEP (UNITED STATES, 2014)
Creep explores one of the scariest things of all: a guy being weird. One of only a couple ‘found footage’ movies on this list, Creep manages to do something truly unique with the format, largely carried by the strength of its performances. The movie stars its writer and director, which is probably how they were able to make the film for a couple thousand dollars. It is a very funny, very surprising, and genuinely creepy movie. The entire thing feels as if it was improvised—and to a large extent, I imagine it was ad-libbed—which gives it a remarkable feeling of authenticity, like you have just stumbled upon someone online who is earnest to a fault and clearly socially-maladroit. It’s probably one of the least “scary” movies on the list, but it is deeply uncomfortable, and for many, that is far worse.21
16. CUBE (CANADA, 1997)
Cube might have my favourite title of any movie on this list. It’s definitely my favourite movie named after a prism.22 It also taps into several things that I love in horror movies: rules, games, and a need to escape. What could be more compelling than this? A group of strangers awaken inside of a large cubic room. Adjacent rooms are also cubic. The rooms are rigged with fatal traps. Sounds like a perfect Saturday afternoon, honestly. Do other people like Cube? I honestly have no idea. No one ever talks about it. For me, it gets by on its extreme weirdo factor and its incredible setting. The whole thing takes place inside a damn Cube. What do you want from me?
17. IN THE EARTH (UNITED KINGDOM, 2021)
Do me a favour. Stop reading this and go and watch Ben Wheatley’s 2011 film Kill List. I’ll wait. Okay, thank you for doing that. What did you think? Don’t worry, I can hear you. Now that you’ve seen Kill List, I feel much more comfortable recommending you his film from 10 years later:23 In the Earth takes places in the remote English countryside during a pandemic. A scientist and his guide hike deep into the wilderness to make contact with an agricultural researcher who has gone dark. There, they encounter some Very Old Forces, and some people who wish to understand Them. In a strange way, In the Earth is a more successful adaptation of the book Annihilation than is the movie Annihilation. It is a very Weird film and (much like Kill List) forces the viewer to confront and accept things that she cannot ever hope to understand.
18. POSSESSOR (CANADA, 2020)
Father Cronenberg has already made an appearance on the list. Time for the Son—and there is no better way than with Possessor, a movie that is so clearly inspired by David Cronenberg’s work that you might be tempted to accuse Brandon Cronenberg of having ripped him off if they hadn’t shared a bathroom for so many years. Clearly borrowing heavily from the sticky themes in works like A Scanner Darkly, Possessor takes an altogether more brutish and nasty approach to dissecting the topic of identity, the power of the role, and the relationship these have to the Self. As you might surmise from that description, you’re probably better off going into this one fairly-uninformed, but here’s a single-sentence amuse-bouche to try and sell you on it: An assassin takes control of other people’s bodies in order to carry out her work, but it seems to be having some side effects. This is probably one of the most viscerally-unpleasant movies on this list but: if it is your thing, it is probably very much your thing.
19. POSSUM (UNITED KINGDOM, 2018)
Speaking of being viscerally-unpleasant, let me tell you about Possum. A man returns to his home in a small English town. He has been let go from his job and is carrying little else but a large puppet—a spider with the face of a man. He is intent on getting rid of it but struggles to do so. Possum is a very slow and very quiet film. At no point during this movie will you feel comfortable. The entire thing is coated in a thick grime that makes it repulsive to behold, much less approach. It is also a very heartbreaking film. You cannot help but watch impotently as every dingy corner of the story is unfolded and then presented to you like a dead animal. Mother, Father, what’s afoot? Only Possum, black as soot.24
20. WHEN EVIL LURKS (ARGENTINA, 2023)
Let’s finish out this unofficial little trilogy of trying films with a movie that is actually too callous and cynical for me to recommend to most people. When Evil Lurks is an Argentine demonic possession film with the unique innovation of crossing it with a sort of pandemic mechanic. Living beings possessed by a demon cannot be killed by the typical violence you might expect in a horror movie; doing so only causes the possession to spread. Unfortunately, these beings themselves are incredibly violent. They are violent in a way that will make you, the viewer, gasp and writhe and probably utter a few blasphemies. They can only be stopped by finding and ritually killing patient zero: the Rotten, the person who first became host to an unborn demon. When Evil Lurks tends to provoke very strong reactions in people. Generally, these are positive reactions, if tinged by a deep sense of discomfort. That said, I have heard of others being completely and utterly repulsed by it, so. Fair warning.
21. KAIRO (JAPAN, 2001)
If you’ve seen one J-horror movie, it was probably Ringu. And if you’ve seen a second J-horror movie, it was probably Ju-On: The Grudge. But if you’ve seen a third J-horror movie, it was probably Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s25 genre-defining classic Kairo.26 Kairo presents a thesis in the form of a paradox: perhaps the interconnectivity of the internet can spread loneliness. This idea is surely familiar to you now but in 2001 must have been quite novel. This is, at least, one of its first ideas. The movie takes some very surprising turns and sort of feels like three different horror movies smashed into one. I will tell you this: I have a lot of difficulty watching this movie. It’s not that I find it scary, per se—though this movie does have one infamously terrifying scene—but rather that it leaves me feeling unsettled for a long time afterwards. There is something about its ghosts, its stain, its doors, its nooses and screens, there is something about all of it that stays with me for a little longer than I would like. I can still hear that awful voice on the phone repeating “Tasukete. Tasukete. Tasukete.”27 Graded alongside the rest of this list, Kairo is not an especially gruesome or adversarial film but There is Something About It. Perhaps that is just Kurosawa’s signature impact.
22. INCANTATION (TAIWAN, 2022)
As is the case with many found footage films, Incantation finds a rather clever reason for presenting itself to you: Li Ronan is desperate to help her sick daughter and is begging you, anyone who is watching, to pray with her, to chant an incantation that will help heal her ailing child. The movie then proceeds to explain how and why this came to be. Incantation is first-and-last a heartbreaking tale of a mother desperate to be reunited with her sickly daughter. It’s the in-between that is the tricky bit. The movie untangles a twisted web of an insular cult, folk religion, and occult rituals, all of which are related to poor little Dodo’s illness, though it isn’t yet clear how. I did not know much about this movie before watching it, though I expected to like it. I certainly did not anticipate just how much I would enjoy it though, just how engaged by it I would be. Hou-ho-xiu-yi, si-sei-wu-ma.
23. TITANE (FRANCE, 2021)
I first found out about Titane while receiving a tattoo. The artist and I share a taste in movies and so she asked me whether I’d seen Titane. Nope, never heard of it. She told me to just watch it without looking anything up. That’s basically a surefire way to trick me into watching a movie. Needless to say, I was not disappointed. That’s why it’s on the list. I know that there are those who mislike the work of Brandon Cronenberg. I think that some find his work to be a sort of weak-tea simulacrum of his father’s. I suspect that those people would not feel the same about Julia Ducournau’s Titane. This movie pushes its body horror back into the familiarly-uncomfortable territory of early Cronenberg: erotic, taboo, vile. I see no reason to contravene my tattoo artist’s method: If you are a fan of body horror and if you are tolerant of genuinely-uncomfortable taboos, you should watch Titane. Have fun!
24. RED ROOMS (CANADA, 2023)
Rounding out the Francophone portion of this list, we have Red Rooms, another film that does not shy away from the taboo. The film opens with the trial of a man charged not just with murdering three young girls, but with broadcasting the killings online in the the mythical “red rooms.”28 Kelly-Anne, a fashion model and online gambler, dutifully attends each day of the trial, sleeping outside the courthouse to ensure that she can get a seat to watch the court proceedings dissect some of the most heinous acts imaginable with a clinical sterility. The film slowly unveils the relationship between Kelly-Anne and the “red rooms”, calling into question the separation betweeen audience and perpetrator, complicating the idea of finding entertainment in real-world violence. Red Rooms is a very unique, very audacious film. It is so beautifully-shot that you sometimes forget just how ghastly the movie’s subject matter is. That beauty helps to pull you into its amoral vacuum, until it spits you out and leaves you to wonder what your role is in all of this.
25. THE LAIR OF THE WHITE WORM (UNITED KINGDOM, 1988)
Okay, let’s do a fun one. Peter Capaldi plays a goofy archaeology student excavating a convent in a small town in the English countryside. He finds a large serpentine skull and relates it to a legend of a large snake-like creature that was supposed to have been slain in the village in the distant path. The mystery uncoils as a local enigmatic dowager is revealed to be a snake-like creature herself and an acolyte of an ancient snake god. The movie is strange, psychedelic, and often quite funny—sometimes intentionally, sometimes not. Its practical effects and sets alone are worth the price of admission; the crazy plot is just a bonus. Oh, and Hugh Grant is in it too. Fun!
26. THE BLACKCOAT’S DAUGHTER (UNITED STATES, 2015)
Alright, back to gloomtown. I have a mixed relationship with Osgood Perkins. I liked The Blackcoat’s Daughter so much that I was practically giddy when Longlegs was announced.29 Unfortunately, I found that movie to be incredibly disappointing—so much so that it made me question my original evaluation of The Blackcoat’s Daughter. Perhaps I saw something in it that was never really there? But I still stand by that first assessment: The Blackcoat’s Daughter is a very quiet and lonely movie, though you are never alone when watching it. There is always Something just outside the frame, just on the edge of sensation or conscious thought. The story covers two girls at a Catholic boarding school who have been left there alone with the nuns during a winter break. Both are struggling with isolation and abandonment, though in very different ways. The film examines these struggles directly, bringing them to their extreme. How far would you go to never be alone?30
27. MANDY (BELGIUM, 2018)
If you have ever wanted to see Nick Cage fighting a bunch of cenobites riding motorcycles, you don’t really have a lot of options. But you do have Mandy, a film that is sort of like a cross between the work of Frank Frazetta and Zdzisław Beksiński but sprinkled with some high-test 1970’s psychedelics. It’s been widely-known for many years now that Nick Cage is back but I would argue this return began with Mandy, which was the perfect vehicle for Cage’s unique brand of over-the-top-so-clear-he’s-acting-but-it’s-somehow-good style of performance. The story itself is somewhat pat: a revenge plot against a generic American cult with a penchant for human sacrifice. It’s everything in between that made the movie into an instant classic: the colours, the sounds, the slavish devotion to its kaleidoscopic aesthetic and the rule of cool. Mandy is a horror movie, there is no doubt about that—but it is never really scary. Nick Cage’s stoic lumberjack character is far too powerful, too clad in the armour of love and protagonism to be in any real danger. I would recommend watching this movie with friends if you can because the hooting and/or hollering you’ll be doing just won’t feel right if you’re alone.
28. AUDITION (JAPAN, 1999)
Audition is a romance about a middle-aged widower who stages auditions for a fake movie in order to find himself a girlfriend. Movin’ on. kiri kiri kiri kiri kiri
29. THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT (UNITED STATES, 1999)
When I first learned of The Blair Witch Project, I found it terrifying. I was a very young child and so I (sort of, mostly) believed the marketing around it: it was real footage from real people who actually went missing. Once I got a little older, I realized that that was of course ridiculous, and as happened with The Exorcist, the cultural ubiquity of the film convinced me that it was unlikely to be scary or worth watching. Once again, however, this heuristic had led me astray. It turns out that The Blair Witch Project is far more subtle than the parodies and references had led me to believe, though it is every bit as terrifying as its reputation had suggested. You almost certainly know the deal by now: Three film students head into the woods with cameras to investigate the local myth of the Blair Witch. Hijinx ensue! Though the found footage format did not begin with The Blair Witch Project, perhaps it should have ended with it; the bar was set in 1999 and I am not sure that it has been cleared since.31 If you are around my age or, god forbid, younger, you have probably seen two dozen movies that are direct descendents of The Blair Witch Project. Very few (if any) of them are worthy heirs.32 Once you’ve seen the original, you will be loath to ever watch another The Taking of Deborah Logan or some such.33
30. TRICK ’R TREAT (UNITED STATES, 2007)
It makes me sad that Trick ’r Treat is the only anthology on this list. I think that the horror anthology is an underexplored medium. Many horror stories probably should be told in about a third of the length of a standard feature film. Why not slap a few of those bad boys together and call it a movie? The issue is that there are just not that many of them that I love. I like Creepshow, Creepshow could have been on this list. I think I watched some of V/H/S but I don’t remember it. I should probably check some of those out, there are probably like seven of them by now. Anyway, Trick ’r Treat is—that’s right—a Halloween-themed horror anthology that weaves together several stories set in Warren Valley, a town where “the holiday and all of its strange traditions are taken very seriously.” It’s got Dylan Baker being a creep, it’s got Brian Cox being a curmudgeon, it’s got Anna Paquin being a coquette. What else could you want?34 This truly is a wonderful movie to watch on Halloween and it feels like a genuine celebration of the holiday (and of horror movies), rather than just an excuse for gore or torture or misery. If you have made it this far in the list and you haven’t seen Trick ’r Treat, then you should really put it in the queue for this month.
31. HELLRAISER (UNITED KINGDOM, 1987)
You thought that I would put Trick ’r Treat last just because it is Halloween-themed? Absolutely not. This is my list and I am choosing to bookend it with my other favourite horror movie: Clive Barker’s sadomasochistic supernatural masterpiece, Hellraiser. You may not have seen Hellraiser, but you probably think you know what it is: that guy with the needles in his head, Pinhead, goes around killing people wantonly. Wrong! He’s barely in the movie! And his name is Hell Priest! You are right, however, that it is filled with wanton violence. The movie is also a celebration of the wonders of practical effects and fake blood and flesh and leather and hooks and makeup. I love the way Hellraiser looks and sounds and how absolutely unrepentantly disgusting it is. I like how it gestures at deep and intriguing lore without plumbing its depths and I love that cube.35 If you are not already interested in an extremely gory horror movie inspired by extreme S&M and 1970’s punk and queer aesthetics, Hellraiser is unlikely to make you into a convert. But if that does sound like your sort of thing, well… We have such sights to show you.36
I think this was my first time talking about movies (with any length) on this website. That is because I do not really feel confident in my ability to speak cogently about film, even though it is a very precious medium to me. I do feel comfortable, however, saying “here is a horror movie that I like”; no intellectualism required, no deeper knowledge of the art and its history necessary, and it is totally unimpeachable—what, are you going to tell me that I shouldn’t like a movie? If you have read this far, thank you very much. Please let me know if you happen to watch any of these movies on my recommendation. And if you have already seen most or nearly-all of these movies, let me know and I will give you a prize. Okay, see you all next year.37
Some final errant thoughts:
I have been maintaining some version of this list for several years now, though never with any text accompanying each entry. There were many films that have either been removed from the list or felt like they should have been on it. There are a variety of reasons for a film’s omission: there was something already too similar on the list; the movie is too ubiquitous38 or too recent;39 I don’t really remember the movie very well anymore or I forgot about it entirely. Here are some of the titles that have been either removed or rejected from the list: Suspiria, It Follows, Us, The House of the Devil, Midsommar, Silence of the Lambs, Color Out of Space, The Void, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Halloween, The Shining, Rosemary’s Baby, The Crow, Creepshow.
The one movie that I really wish I had included was The Halloween Tree. I only remembered it as I was writing the Trick ’r Treat entry. It’s a made-for-TV children’s cartoon based on a story by Ray Bradbury about a group of children who go on a journey to save their friend and, along the way, learn about the Halloween-related cultural practices of the world. It is a very sweet movie with a lot of striking imagery and a fairly-shocking ending. If you are in the mood for something Halloweeny that has almost no chance of scaring you (or a child), you can’t go wrong with The Halloween Tree. Oh, and everyone should also watch Over the Garden Wall. ok that’s it goodbye
Footnotes
This is a bit of a misrepresentation, I think, since it seems to me that having a Taste for Horror is about as common these days as extremely large G-Unit shirts were at St. Matthew’s Elementary in 2001. This is a great joke if you were in and around St. Matthew’s Elementary in 2001.↩︎
clearly, given the first entry on the list↩︎
This had way more millenial quirk when I first wrote it. I had to tone it down because the thought of it living in perpetuity on my website disgusted me. Even its current form is difficult to countenance but at least it does not use the word “spoopy.”↩︎
Sorry, Friday the 13th.↩︎
As far as I know, anyway, and that’s good enough for me. “ohhh what about night of the hunter” do you hear yourself right now↩︎
Even invoking the aesthetic of Alien is to do it injustice because there is no amount of plaudits I could give it here that would suffice. The xenomorph, the Nostromo, the outfits and analogue computers and dripping bechained hallways, they are all so compelling that they would carry the movie on their own, even without the excellent performances, writing, editing, and so on. Entire books have been written about the look of Alien and so you and I should both probably just go read those instead of indulging the farce that I could adequately describe them any further.↩︎
I am least concerned about whether something is “real” than if it is “true,” though that is a discussion for another time.↩︎
though not the most memorable cinema experience on this list↩︎
I saw this film in a reportory theatre some 10 years ago and was instantly captivated by it. Unfortunately, there was no good way for me to share this experience with others: the only easily-accessible version of it was an absolutely abysmal DVD rip that had been uploaded to YouTube and subsequently-forgotten. Thankfully, this has changed in recent years, as a 4K restoration was released as part of the beautifully-named folk horror collection All the Haunts Be Ours and is available to stream on one of those silly subscription services. I actually was unaware of this new restoration until writing up this section and being surprised to find high-quality stills of the film. This is especially-silly because I have wrestled with buying All the Haunts Be Ours many times before, never having noticed that it included this version of Eyes of Fire. I was too busy being beguiled by Penda’s Fen.↩︎
I mean this in a strictly-positive way.↩︎
other than being online↩︎
heretofore referred to simply as “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”↩︎
and I absolutely include the protagonists in this evaluation↩︎
I explicitly tried not to include too many repeats from the same directors on this list unless the entries were significantly different from one another. For that reason, neither of Damian McCarthy’s other films—Caveat or Hokum—are included in this list, though they have every right to be. I mention this because Caveat happens to have one of most effective non-jump scares of any film in recent memory. I genuinely see it in my mind’s eye at night sometimes when I am alone in the dark and it freaks me out. I’ve wanted to go watch a clip of it again to see if I could disarm it but I risk making the image even more vivid. I am generally fairly-immune to scares of any sort, jump or otherwise, and so I have to give it up for Damian McCarthy. The man knows how to spook my horses.↩︎
no relation↩︎
For whatever it is worth: Cure is not just an excellent horror movie but one of my favourite movies in general. Kiyoshi Kurosawa is an extremely unique filmmaker with a very distinct vision and his filmography is well-worth further perusal.↩︎
Midsommar very easily could have been on this list but, as discussed in Footnote 14, I mostly tried to limit directors to a single entry. I am a huge sucker for folk/cult horror and so Midsommar should have been my favourite of his films but put simply: I think that Hereditary is a better film. As for Beau is Afraid and Eddington: both are very interesting, very flawed movies. I can’t really recommend them unconditionally to anyone, though I also don’t recommend not watching them.↩︎
Plus it was before we all decided that being on our phones and having full-volume conversations in the movie theatre was actually fine.↩︎
Play this maze game for me real quick.↩︎
Generally speaking, I don’t know that there is any need to watch any sequels to The Exorcist. That said, apparently The Exorcist III has some unique strengths. It was written and directed by William Peter Blatty, who wrote the novel on which The Exorcist was based along with its screenplay. It stars Brad Dourif, who I love, but the real reason to watch it is probably this scene.↩︎
Its sequel is good too.↩︎
Triangle isn’t bad but that’s a shape, not a prism.↩︎
The issue is that I think Kill List is a superior film but that it doesn’t necessarily belong on this list. In some ways, Kill List is a horror movie. However, in some very important ways, it is not. I mean, you’ve seen it now. You understand.↩︎
You know what’s fucked up? This movie was written and directed by (the guy who plays) Garth Marenghi and the whole thing is subtext!↩︎
no relation↩︎
Also known as Pulse, which is confusing because it also had a terrible American remake released in 2006 called Pulse.↩︎
“Help me” in Japanese.↩︎
“Red rooms” are a real online urban legend, though a largely-debunked one. The idea is that there are places on the dark web where you can pay to watch livestreamed snuff films.↩︎
but in a very stoic masculine way↩︎
If you’re face blind, you get to watch this movie on hard mode. Good luck!↩︎
I actually like Incantation more than The Blair Witch Project, but the latter is still a better found footage movie, if we are grading on that specific dimension.↩︎
present list excluded, of course↩︎
though i did like that final scene↩︎
And that’s not even including my favourite story, which features an actor whose name I don’t know and whose character can’t be easily described using a word beginning with the letter C.↩︎
it’s called the Lament Configuration! how sick is that??↩︎
The God Hand from Berserk are clearly modeled after the cenobites from Hellraiser. And Dark Souls was heavily inspired by Berserk. So, what I am saying is: You can basically thank Hellraiser for Elden Ring. On behalf of Clive Barker, you are welcome.↩︎
just kidding, i am never doing that again↩︎
You don’t need me to tell you to watch The Shining.↩︎
You don’t need me to tell you to watch Obsession.↩︎