When American horror movies began to stagnate in the 1990s, Hollywood began looking at Asian cinema for new ways to scare the pants off viewers. 1998's Ringu emerged as one of the best efforts in Japan's growing horror lineup, so it was only natural that DreamWorks chose to remake it as 2002's The Ring.
The concept for The Ring is simple and effective. An unsuspecting viewer watches a tape full of creepy imagery and a creepier girl. One week later, they're found dead from sinister but mysterious causes. And when our lovely heroine becomes the latest viewer, she has only days to save herself and her family from this deadly curse.
The Ring is one creepy movie, and that's why it's so effective. Director Gore Verbinski loads his adaptation with plenty of haunting imagery even while the tension seems always just at the boiling point. Even hardcore fans of the original were pleased to see The Ring diverge from the source material in some ways and take full advantage of its larger budget. Hollywood hasn't always found success in mimicking Japan's horror gems, but they certainly hit gold with The Ring.
- Before The Ring’s debut, the “killer video” ran as a commercial on television, with no mention of the film whatsoever.
- The Ring’s box office success opened the door for more Japanese horror remakes in the American market, including The Grudge and Dark Water.
- The Japanese maple, the red tree featured in the film, produces a fruit called a “samara.”
Striking a note somewhere between hallucinogenic nightmare and cop vs. serial killer suspense-thriller, The Cell made an instant impression on viewers through Tarsem Singh’s vivid and surreal visual style. The premise, a cop trying to find a serial killer’s next victim before she drowns in his Jigsaw-killer-esque contraption, is decent as is, but most of the film’s action takes place inside the mind of the comatose killer, giving way to the film’s artistic sets and sequences. The story is original, but it’s the delivery that makes this film a standout within the realm of psychological horror.
Jennifer Lopez as child psychologist Catherine Deane is actually not bad, giving a sensitive and compassionate performance that helps keep the audience anchored throughout the disturbing story, and Vincent D’Onofrio is memorable as multiple facets of the serial killer’s persona, from the pitiful youth to the menacing King. The film’s parallel storylines in the outside world and the killer’s internal self play against each other wonderfully, with the time-limit of the search for the drowning girl lending a sense of urgency to all the indulgent and striking imagery. Those visuals are very effective at driving the already macabre subject matter deeper under the skin of the viewer.
- A scene where Catherine chases Carl down a stone hallway is based on the painting “Schacht” by Alien designer H.R. Giger.
- Singh started his career directing music videos, including “Losing My Religion” by R.E.M.
- Lopez’s character falls asleep while watching the allegorical French animated sci-fi film Fantastic Planet (1973).
One of the great tragedies of art is that the level of introspection necessary to make something beautiful is inversely proportional to the amount of socializing you have to do to get anyone to notice it. That unfortunate contradiction is at the heart of Black Swan, in which Oscar-winner Natalie Portman plays a ballerina whose obsession pushes her to greatness, but away from other human experiences, and eventually into madness.
Darren Aronofsky films Black Swan like a subtle character piece, eventually letting his horrifying tale bloom into a kaleidoscope of self-destruction. The madness is real, for it is what our protagonist believes, and skillful filmmaking and exceptional performances make us believe it too.
- The story has many similarities with Satoshi Kon’s Perfect Blue, an animated film Darren Aronofsky purchased the rights to while making Requiem for a Dream.
- Darren Aronofsky’s films Black Swan and The Wrestler both originated from one earlier story idea, about a wrestler and a ballerina who have an affair.
- Natalie Portman met her husband on the set. In the film, he plays a dancer who says he’d never sleep with Portman’s character.
There is almost too much to love about Candyman. Philip Glass’s original score, with its gothic, funhouse-esque organ, helps elevate the story’s mythic nature. The pacing is deliberate, with exactly the right amount of jump-scares and shockingly gory visuals in just the right places, and some of them downright unexpected: Were any of us anticipating that the real Candyman would actually show up in the institution once Helen calls him to prove her sanity? Then there’s the story itself, which achieves an impressive balancing act between classic and inventive. It’s a slasher, but without the token knife-fodder, and Helen as the “final girl” transcends the stereotype to become a monster in her own right. Much of this originality has to be attributed to Clive Barker (producer and writer of the short story “The Forbidden,” which inspired Rose’s screenplay), whose signature is seen in the seductive, supernatural violence of the titular killer as well as the inversion of typical female stereotypes seen in most horror films.
One thing that’s maintained the horror genre’s popularity is that, like most literary mediums (pulp crime novels, early superhero comics) considered trashy or cheap by the mainstream, there’s always some telling facet of our cultural identity being explored beneath the blood and sex. Where Candyman excels is in its ability to keep this function of horror up-to-date as a modern fable about the brutality of life in urban, compressed neighborhoods, while fitting comfortably in among the very best films of the genre. Tony Todd’s Candyman, a towering figure with a tragic past, a bleeding hook for a hand, and a ribcage full of honeybees, absolutely deserves to stand alongside Freddy, Jason, and Michael Myers in the pantheon of supernatural killers.
- Two years before Candyman, Tony Todd portrayed Ben in the Tom Savini remake of Night of the Living Dead.
- Honeybees were bred for the film so they could be 12 hours old (so they’d look like mature bees but have weak enough stingers).
- Dean Corll, a real-life serial killer, earned the nickname The Candyman due to his habit of distributing free candy to local kids.
Lionel’s mother has been controlling his life as long as he can remember. Even when she dies from the bite of a Sumatran Rat Monkey, she comes back as a grotesque zombie, forcing Lionel to stay home and take care of her - and everyone she bites - until the situation finally gets out of hand. Er, MORE out of hand.
Peter Jackson didn’t invent splatstick but he came damn close to perfecting it with Braindead. It’s a bloody good comedy with cheeky performances and unforgettably gross set pieces. The zombie dining table scene alone would have made it a cult classic, but then Jackson pulls out all the stops for a finale that’s gorier - and funnier - than any zombie massacre before it. Or since.
- Considered to be the bloodiest movie of all time; 300 liters were used in the last scene alone.
- The Rat Monkey that spawns the zombie infection comes from Skull Island… King Kong’s home.
- Renowned magazine editor and horror expert Forrest J. Ackerman has a cameo as a photographer.
Anthologies are tough to pull off. Inevitably, they’re uneven, with one or more stories falling short. Worse, they’re hard to present as anything other than a collection of tales, with the occasional perfunctory framing sequence that fails to unify them except perhaps in general theme.
And then there’s this movie, which not only presents all of its creepy chapters as taking place on one particular Halloween night (extra credit for daring to tread on that holiday), but in a non-linear presentation that eventually rewards the viewer by lining everything up in seamless style. The presence of the mascot-like Sam only adds to the fun, as do delightfully disturbing appearances by actors like Dylan Baker and Anna Paquin. Thanks to this film, Halloween is no longer just the night He Came Home.
- Dougherty also directed the horror comedy Krampus.
- A sequel was announced in 2013 but has yet to materialize.
- But in 2017 the film did get a "scare zone" at the annual Halloween Horror Nights event at the Universal Orlando Resort.
The (questionably) real paranormal investigations of Ed and Lorraine Warren become fodder for one hell of a scary horror story — and lay the groundwork for many to come — in James Wan’s The Conjuring. It’s the tale of a family who fall prey to a malevolent spirit, who seek the help of the Warrens to save their family… in more ways than one.
The Conjuring has deliriously theatrical scares, and cinematography full of dark little nooks and crannies where you just know evil dwells. But this is more than just a spook house, it’s a spook house full of sensitive souls whose lives are devastated by forces they don’t understand. Lili Taylor, Ron Livingston, Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga and a score of talented child actors invite you into their lives before we see them threatened, and that makes the threats unbearably scary.
- In reality, the supposedly possessed “Annabelle” doll is a Raggedy Ann.
- The real Lorraine Warren has a cameo, and can be seen watching the fictional Warrens’ presentation.
- The producers thought the film would receive a PG-13. It got an R-rating anyway, just for being scary.
It seems as though no actor will ever truly surpass Bela Lugosi as the iconic movie Dracula, but Christopher Lee comes closest. His tall, overpowering, and eerily sensual performance in Horror of Dracula brought a new approach to the character and spawned a long line of successful Hammer horror sequels.
That approach extends beyond the character. Horror of Dracula is evil in Technicolor. For its time, this movie was LURID. Sexual, bloody, and violent. If it doesn’t seem debauched today, that’s because Horror of Dracula was one of the opening salvos of violent, erotic horror cinema. And it hit all its marks.
- Originally titled Dracula. The name was changed in America because the Bela Lugosi film was still regularly playing in theaters.
- Christopher Lee appeared in six of the eight sequels to Horror of Dracula. Peter Cushing appeared in four.
- In his first outing as Dracula, Christopher Lee has only 13 lines of dialogue, and only seven minutes on screen.
Maligned by Michael Myers mavens when it was first released, this standalone tale of a creepy mask maker and his sinister plan to murder children around the world on Halloween night via a combination of magic and science has since settled into its status as a cult classic. One thing’s for sure – Cochran is one of cinema’s most gleefully unapologetic villains, and you’ll be singing the Silver Shamrock jingle for months afterward.
- The film was partly inspired by Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
- Producer John Carpenter reworked the script from an earlier draft by Quatermass creator Nigel Kneale, who would disown the film.
- An early Famous Monsters article erroneously connected an explosion in this movie with the climactic hospital fire in Halloween II.
The Wicker Man is one of the most celebrated horror films to come out of the United Kingdom. It is also one of the weirdest. It’s the story of a devout Christian detective who travels to an island full of Celtic pagans, and suspects they have done something unspeakable to one of their children. Which would be pretty scary if those pagans weren’t the most delightful people imaginable: open minded, free spirited, intelligent, funny and wonderful singers to boot.
We know something must be wrong, but The Wicker Man throws us completely off the track by warping our expectations. We view the protagonist as the villain and the villains as the protagonists, or is it the other way around? Is it a twist or is the twist that there is no twist? Daring and unconventional, The Wicker Man is the perfect film for the right kind of horror audience. If you expect familiar thrills, seek elsewhere. If not, come hither…
- Christopher Lee appeared in the movie for free, and considered it one of his best roles.
- Twelve minutes were cut from the film in its original release. It's been re-released several times with lost footage edited back in.
- Lee returned (briefly) for Robin Hardy’s The Wicker Tree, which is not so much a sequel as a companion piece.
Somewhat underrated compared with some of Carpenter’s other beloved films like Halloween (1978) or The Thing (1982), The Fog has nevertheless managed to gain cult status and healthy respect for its faithful ghost story style. The setup of the campfire story and the arguably justifiable revenge angle of the ghosts are standout features, to say nothing of the expertly utilized, chilling device of the fog itself (made all the more scary by the zombie pirates hiding within). Carpenter’s film is a nod to classic horror stories like those found in Tales from the Crypt comics, as well as a real-life ship which was sunk and plundered off the coast of Galeta, CA. The director composed the score himself, because of course he did, utilizing similar simple-yet-unsettling techniques to those heard in Halloween.
Though Carpenter’s career at the time had failed to earn him much critical acclaim, his skill as a filmmaker is evident here. The small seaside town’s isolation from the outside world is heavily enforced with wide shots of the fog creeping in from the sea, and even the innovative use of DJ Stevie’s radio show and lighthouse vantage point can’t save those marked for the revenants’ vengeance. The Fog is more creepy than outright terrifying, but that’s part of what makes it such a memorable film.
- Three of the film’s actors, Hal Holbrook, Adrienne Barbeau, and Tom Atkins, appeared together in 1982’s Creepshow.
- An old diary can be spotted at one point with this text: "... my college education to work writing dumb s#!t in this f#@king movies props…”
- Darwin Joston portrays a coroner named Dr. Phibes, a nod to one of horror master Vincent Price’s most iconic roles.
Why come up with new despicable horrors when history is already full of them. Michael Reeves’ damning and disturbing Witchfinder General is the story of Matthew Hopkins, a 17th-century professional witch hunter who knows very well that there’s no such thing as witches, but uses his position to torture, murder, molest, and extort from paranoid townsfolk anyway.
Vincent Price has always been a master of smarminess but unlike even his most ghoulish other films, here he has no excuse. It’s disturbing to watch this lovable character actor dole out ungodly abuse with the knowledge that this violence serves no purpose but his own wealth. And although there is a daring attempt at a rescue, and even a hero of sorts, the film is Price’s first and foremost. Witchfinder General is forthright about its evil, and unapologetic about its horrors. It’s a movie that burns.
- Released in America as The Conqueror Worm to trick audiences into thinking it was one of Price’s popular Edgar Allan Poe adaptations.
- Reeves originally wanted Donald Pleasance to star, and had to change the script to accommodate Price’s persona.
- Vincent Price considered this one of his best performances.
Poor, poor Larry Talbot. All he wants to do is fix his relationship with his estranged father, and romance that nice girl who works at the shop in town. But a chance encounter with a werewolf brings out the worst in him, and soon he transforms when the wolfsbane blooms, and only a tragic end - his own, or someone he loves - can come of it.
The Wolf Man wasn’t adapted from a classic horror story - and even makes up a lot of the werewolf myths we take for granted today - but it feels like it was. George Waggner’s film captures the powerful sadness that all the great Universal Monsters feel in their hearts. We fear them, for they might kill us, but we understand their pain. And Lon Chaney Jr., giving his greatest performance, evokes that pain beautifully.
- The idea that werewolves can be killed by silver doesn’t come from an ancient legend. It was invented for this film.
- The Wolf Man is the only Universal Monster to be played by the same actor - Lon Chaney Jr. - in every film the character appeared in.
- The words “The Wolf Man” are never spoken in the movie.
The seemingly tired home invasion premise got an extreme wake-up call with You’re Next. With a mystery angle inspired by the works of Agatha Christie, a shockingly capable heroine, and giddily bloody sequences of violence balanced with the blackest of humor, this low-budget film rapidly developed a deserved cult following. The film begins with a family gathering in a vacation home and quickly dissolves into a bloodbath via lethal Rube Goldberg booby traps and other inventive methods of slaughter like death by inverted blender.
The whole cast being unknowns helps keep the truth of the killers’ identities a mystery, with Sharni Vinson standing out as the ultimate survivor-girl whose ability to outsmart and outfight her masked attackers is rarely seen in horror films. A touch of self-aware humor also keeps things lively, as when the mastermind behind the death-filled evening says helplessly to Erin, “How were we supposed to know that you were… really good… at killing people? Which is actually sort of weird, by the way.”
- Barrett, who wrote the screenplay as well as directed, portrays the Tiger Mask killer.
- Some of the dinner conversations were improvised and inspired by real-life experiences the filmmakers had with family members.
- The film was shot in four weeks, consisting mostly of night shoots from 7pm to 7am.
Mario Bava is one of the most colorful filmmakers in horror history, blasting his films with dazzling tones whenever it pleased him. But in his first outing behind the camera, it pleased him to make one of the most sumptuous black-and-white horror movies ever produced: Black Sunday, a tale of witchcraft and vampirism.
The story itself is full of castles and curses, and that’s all well and good, but the photography here is so strikingly black you could sink into it and get hopelessly lost. It makes all the film’s bizarre violence - spiked devil mask executions, eyeball socket-filling resurrections - pop more than a color version ever could. There’s nothing normal in Black Sunday to ground these horrors. This is just the world now, and it is full of evil… beautifully photographed, totally immersive evil.
- The directorial debut of Mario Bava, who became one of Italy’s most prolific horror filmmakers.
- To add to the atmosphere, even the sets of Black Sunday were painted black-and-white.
- Originally presented in America as a double feature with Roger Corman’s The Little Shop of Horrors.
At the start of a Golden Age in horror cinema, this oft-forgotten German-French production – shot in three different languages at the dawn of sound filmmaking, no less! – represents a crossover from silent movie production to the “talkies” with a story familiar to many horror and vampire aficionados. There’s a village under a curse and a heroic young occult student that must face the wrath of a vampire.
The film was not well received in its time but now has a reputation for its stunning visuals – including a strange dream sequence – and its slow, ambiguous approach to storytelling, which has become a favored form of horror tale-spinning today.
- Vampyr was inspired by the work of J. Sheridan Le Fanu, the Irish writer known for his Gothic and mystery stories.
- The film was shot with a largely amateur cast.
- At its Berlin premiere, the film was booed by the audience, leading Dreyer to later cut several scenes from it.
Unless you’ve seen House, you’ve never seen a movie like House. Nobuhiko Ôbayashi’s perplexing but endlessly fascinating haunted house tale is the story of a group of schoolgirls who travel to a country home and fall prey to head watermelons, finger-eating pianos, and killer cat paintings. Meanwhile, someone turns into a pile of bananas.
It would be nice to say it all makes sense in the end but that’s not what House is all about. It’s a film that takes you over the edge almost immediately, and doesn’t give you a chance to crawl out of the madness. This film’s silly, morbid, beautiful, and unpleasant imagery is your jailer now. You live inside of House. Nothing will be the same.
- Ôbayashi came up with this story after being asked to make a movie like Jaws.
- Many of the film’s surreal scares were suggested by the director’s pre-teen daughter, like getting fingers stuck in piano keys.
- The script languished in development hell for two years. None of the directors at Toho wanted to make it.
The second Universal Monster movie plays a heck of a lot like the first. The Mummy, like Dracula before it, is about an ancient undead evil that seeks love in a modern world, and is besieged by experts in mythology and handsome cads who couldn’t possibly imagine the woman they love being interested in a monster.
But it is also one of the most romantic of the classic monster movies, with Boris Karloff giving a sincerely affectionate performance as the title monster, who longs to bring his love back to the 20th century with him. And The Mummy bestows a majesty to its supernatural elements that make the film otherworldly and alluring.
- The image of Boris Karloff wrapped in bandages became iconic, even though he only appears in them for his very first scene.
- Before directing The Mummy, Karl Freund was the cinematographer on Dracula.
- The Mummy was named “Imhotep” after an architect of the pyramids, who was celebrated and deified after his death.
The makeup design may not hold up well today – although really, it remains a stunning piece of work – but this cautionary tale of science gone awry still has a way of crawling under your skin as a prime example of horror’s fascination with the human body and loss of identity. Scientist André Delambre swaps his left arm and head for that of a fly, and learns a thing or two about what separates us from the insect world.
- Legend has it Vincent Price and Herbert Marshall couldn’t look at each other without laughing during the scene of a fly with André’s head.
- The film’s use of a hydraulic press would later be echoed in the 1984 sci-fi thriller The Terminator.
- Two sequels, Return of the Fly (1959) and Curse of the Fly (1965), followed before the film was remade in 1986.
Crafting what was essentially a feature-length Twilight Zone episode, Shyamalan made his reputation with this film as a man that takes audiences on thrilling rides with a twist ending. The pairing of a brooding Bruce Willis with the troubled Haley Joel Osment proved a powerhouse combination for a film that was equal parts mystery and horror.
It’s tricky to talk about this movie without discussing the big reveal – and let’s be honest, it’s ridiculous to be spoiler-phobic about something from two decades ago – but we’ll still keep it under wraps here. Suffice to say, this is an atmospheric, haunting jaunt that rewards multiple viewings by encouraging you to go back and pick up on clues you may have missed. Do you see dead people?
- The color red is mostly missing in the film aside from moments where the real world is "tainted by the other world," according to Shyamalan.
- A Disney exec liked the script so much that he bought it for $3 million without getting the approval of the studio first.
- Osment's acting career began at the age of four. He had a wide variety of roles before landing his most famous part ever here.
With its thoughtful blend of classic monster-horror, family drama, and environmentalist (even outright anti-authority) elements, it’s easy to see why The Host earned director Bong Joon-ho comparisons to Spielberg. Particularly moving are the struggles of the Park family, with all their personal shortcomings, as they attempt to evade the authorities and recover Hyun-seo from a rampaging giant creature. Few monster films portray human desperation so well while also giving us a capably frightening antagonist.
A little more than a decade after its initial release, the film holds up remarkably well. The special effects, though passed between studios and workshops under budget constraints, remain solid, and the images of young, naive protesters bleeding to death in clouds of the fictitious “agent yellow” chemical are only more poignant (and, arguably, sardonic) after infamous protest movements such as Occupy Wall Street and the Arab Spring. Still, it’s the determination of the Park family, especially the young and courageous Hyun-seo, that makes The Host worthy of multiple viewings. That and the scene where the mutant fish monster vomits up a pile of human bones, of course.
- The director conceptualized the creature after reading a newspaper article about a deformed fish with an S-shaped spine.
- Once the design was complete, he nicknamed it Steve Buscemi and modeled its behavior after the actor’s role in Fargo (1996).
- The film’s loosely inspired by a real incident where a mortician in Seoul dumped large amounts of formaldehyde down a drain.
Mary Henry (Candace Hilligoss) survives a terrible car accident but in the aftermath, everything seems wrong. Strange music emerges from the radio, a strange man appears in her mirror, and he seems to be following her wherever she goes. Something is horribly wrong but is this madness? Is this more?
Carnival of Souls is an extremely low budget movie, but it has an earnestness that’s easy to latch onto. It’s a story of encroaching dread, of truth wrapping around you until it’s inescapable. It doesn’t matter if you know the movie’s tricks, because director Herk Harvey evokes a phantom atmosphere that sucks you in, and takes you with it, wherever it goes. And it’s going somewhere sorrowful.
- The only feature film directed or produced by Herk Harvey.
- The production crew consisted of only six people, including the director.
- Released without a copyright in the United States, placing the film in the public domain.
A young woman is convinced she turns into a deadly jungle cat whenever she’s overcome by passion, or anger, in Jacques Tourneur’s spooky and, for the time, rather bold look at marital strife. She marries a seemingly nice man but is afraid to truly reveal herself, setting in motion a series of events that lead to tragedy and horror.
Jacques Tourneur’s Cat People is rich with personal drama but, moreover, it’s truly ethereal. The film’s supernatural ideas are, mostly, left to the imagination, and in a world where so much is left unsaid — and so many things can lurk in shadows — the imagination is free to run wild.
- The first film produced by Val Lewton, who would go on to make many classic horror films.
- The now common technique called a “Lewton Bus” began here (a scene seeming to build to a scare, only to turn out to be harmless).
- Some of the sets from Orson Welles’ The Magnificent Ambersons were re-used, to save money.
Desperate to move out of her terrible apartment, a college student takes a babysitting job where there’s no baby, just an elderly woman who shouldn’t be disturbed. Jocelyn Donahue’s character misses that red flag and many, many more as Ti West’s subtle thriller comes to a slow boil, while the audience anticipates terror and our self-absorbed protagonist doesn’t know well enough not to.
It probably shouldn’t work, but Ti West’s deft storytelling and alluring cast — including Tom Noonan and Mary Woronov, who make their unusual request seem unusually reasonable — make this striking period piece into a gripping mood piece. It’s all build up, and it’s building to something, and it’s going to be SCARY.
- Shot on 16mm film, to capture the early 1980s filmmaking aesthetic.
- Released on VHS in an old-fashioned “clamshell” box, another 1980s throwback.
- Cult actress Mary Woronov came out of retirement to co-star.
The mystery of “Who Killed Laura Palmer” was a national obsession in the early 1990s, and although the answer was eventually revealed on the hit television series Twin Peaks, the series lost steam afterwards. Audiences lost interest, and they weren’t terribly interested in Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, the movie that revealed Laura Palmer’s horrible ordeal in disquieting detail.
Free from the fan furor, Fire Walk With Me reveals itself to be one of the most disturbing movies ever made. It’s a catalogue of human misery, and Sheryl Lee - giving as raw a performance as you could possibly hope for - embodies that misery. Meanwhile, the residents of Twin Peaks are so wrapped up in their own foolish subplots that they don’t notice her suffering, and become just more tools of her eternal torment. David Lynch is still David Lynch, so some of the scenes in Fire Walk With Me are impenetrable (or at least up for debate), but this may be his most harrowing motion picture. It is pain and guilt and trauma in a cage of celluloid, and although we can escape this movie, Laura Palmer never can.*
*Have you seen Twin Peaks: The Return yet?
- Series star Kyle MacLachlan asked for a smaller role in the film. Chris Isaak’s character was created to fill in the gaps that were left.
- Many cast members from the series filmed scenes that were cut from the finished film, including Michael Ontkean and Joan Chen.
- David Bowie was meant to reprise his role for Twin Peaks: The Return, but died before filming.
It’s too soon to decide IT’s true ranking among the best horror movies ever made, but it seems certain that it should be on the list somewhere. Andy Muschietti’s impressive adaptation of (half of) Stephen King’s classic novel captures the wistfulness of youth and the sheer anxieties that came part-and-parcel with fragile innocence, as a “Loser’s Club” of unpopular kids comes face-to-face with their boogeyman, a killer clown named Pennywise.
Evil clowns are, of course, a cheap shot. Lots of people are scared of clowns in principle, whether they’re child-eating supernatural deities or not. But Muschietti, actor Bill Skarsgård, and the film’s visual effects team manage to transform the entity into a cavalcade of nasty terrors, and keep the screams coming long after any other monster would have worn out its welcome. Heartfelt performances, a crackling sense of humor, and scares aplenty. IT has it all.
- In the story, Pennywise comes back every 27 years. IT was released 27 years after the original television mini-series.
- Originally set to be directed by Cary Fukunaga, who still has a co-writing credit.
- Will Poulter was originally cast as Pennywise.
A Cold War-era examination of American paranoia that has no equal, the original cinematic version of this story about an alien invasion by “pod people” has appropriately spawned a number of remakes, duplicates, and homages over the last 60 years, but the stark black and white imagery of the 1956 version remains powerful and disturbing. You’ll never look at your house plants the same way again.
- The film was so bleak, the studio demanded a framing sequence be added that gave the shocking tale a “happy ending.”
- Star Kevin McCarthy recreated his mad dash down the highway at the end of this film for its 1978 remake.
- That remake also featured Star Trek alum Leonard Nimoy and future Fly Jeff Goldblum!
In many ways, it all comes down to one single scene as Christine (Mary Philbin) sneaks up behind the titular Phantom, reaches tentatively for his mask, pulls it away, and reveals his shocked, horrifying visage to the audience. Lon Chaney’s makeup design remains iconic and effective, and even if watching a silent film presents a challenge to some modern viewers, that moment stands as a landmark in horror history.
- The 1910 Gaston Leroux novel that inspired this film led to many other adaptations, including the musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber.
- Some of the legends of Chaney’s suffering with his makeup, partly perpetuated by the man himself, later proved to be just stories.
- The steel-reinforced set recreating the Paris Opera House stood intact until 2014!
This Persian-language indie film was an almost overnight success, shot for under $60,000 and premiering to critical acclaim at the Sundance Film Festival. Like the edgy art-house films you pretended to like as a teenager, but actually cool, actually gripping, and actually pretty scary, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night exceeds in its slow, patient build and moody stillness. It utilizes elements from the spaghetti Western tradition to tell the story of a nameless vampire girl, who stalks the streets of the ghost-town Bad City in a long, cape-like chador, and a young man named Arash who catches her attention.
The film is filled with seedy characters practically begging to be devoured by the girl and with excellent, dramatic use of shadows, but it’s Sheila Vand as the vampire anti-heroine who takes things from “good” to “fantastic.” She creeps around almost imperceptibly, excruciatingly slow and deliberate in her movements whether she’s biting off someone’s finger or applying eyeliner; she’s the spiritual daughter of nearly every iconic vampire iteration, from Max Schreck’s Count Orlok to Tom Cruise’s Lestat, only superseding her predecessors in style and originality.
- Amirpour performed the long shot skateboarding sequences in the film as a stunt double for Vand.
- The film has spawned two comic book adaptations by indie publisher Radco Press.
- Amirpour’s second film, The Bad Batch, is another mashup which the director describes as “a post-apocalyptic cannibal love story...”
Technically a sequel, this second installment in the South Korean Whispering Corridors series is probably the most well-known of the movies, none of which share characters or connected storylines. Memento Mori is a classically surreal, stylish, and eerily beautiful ghost story of the modern, Eastern horror film tradition, made more notorious at the time of its release by its depiction of teenage lesbian romance (almost unheard of for a commercial film in the culturally conservative nation). It tells the tale of star-crossed couple Hyo-Shin (Yeh-Jin Park) and Shi-Eun (Yeong-Jin Lee), students at an all-girl high school, through the eyes of fellow student Soh Min-ah (Gyu-ri Kim), who discovers their shared diary. Hyo-Shin commits suicide after bullying from their peers causes Shi-Eun to leave her, and soon the school is terrorized by escalating paranormal chaos.
Told in nonlinear flashback which balances tender teen romance against the rage of a malevolent spirit, the story is suspenseful, frightening, and original. The socially-conscious sexuality angle, along with classic teen horror themes of torment and revenge, adds a lot more to the concept of memento mori (or remembering our own mortality) than most ghost stories are capable of delivering.
- Though often listed as Whispering Corridors 2: Memento Mori, the directors prefer the standalone title.
- There are five Whispering Corridors films in total, each with its own distinct, unrelated plot and characters.
- The main character’s name, Soh Min-ah, is derived from Gelsomina, the heroine of the Fellini film La Strada (1954).
A vegan veterinary student is forced to eat raw rabbit kidneys as part of a hazing ritual. It’s a vile and disgusting act, and to make matters worse, she’s developed a taste for it. And other kinds of meat. All other kinds of meat.
Julia Ducournau’s Raw is a stomach-churning film about appetites, of all kinds, and what insatiable hunger turns people into. Garance Marillier, as the increasingly cannibalistic Justine, fearlessly goes to inhuman lengths to satisfy her urges. So like it or not, we go with her, and either find some measure of understanding or shy away in revulsion.
Either way, what horror!
- The first theatrically-released film directed by Julia Ducournau, and her first feature film as a solo director.
- Audience members have been known to faint or vomit while watching this film at screenings.
- The “raw chicken” consumed by Garance Marillier was made out of sugar.
The Spanish-American gothic horror film The Others was an instant classic upon its release. It balances style and story as well as the best of its genre, utilizing suspense and a slow build to carry the audience into its simple-yet-surprising twist ending. Plenty of the story’s elements lend a foreboding, disorienting feel to the film, like the mysterious housekeepers who simply appear one day and seem to be hiding something. Then there’s the children’s allergy to sunlight which necessitates a state of near-constant darkness inside their home, or the whispered allusions to “what happened that day” when Nicole Kidman’s Grace supposedly went mad. And, of course, there’s the paranormal activity and strange figures appearing out of nowhere.
A fair amount of jump-scares keeps things interesting (the scene where the young daughter is playing with a puppet and suddenly turns around with the face of an elderly woman is memorable, to say the least) while the story takes its time delivering us to its conclusion. This is one of the best twist endings of all time simply for how fully fleshed-out it is, hinging as it does on an extremely simple premise: We’ve seen countless stories about the living being haunted by the dead, but what happens when we consider things from the ghosts’ perspective?
- The children’s disease, xeroderma pigmentosum, is real and extremely rare, with roughly 1,000 people afflicted.
- The story is inspired by an episode of the British television series Armchair Theatre (1970), which was also called “The Others.”
- Though set in Jersey, the film was shot in Santander, Spain. Amenábar wrote the script in Spanish before it was translated into English.
A truly pioneering horror film, Clayton’s The Innocents is an example of expert arrangement, with the deeply unsettling whole somehow managing to be more than the sum of its already-impressive parts. Based on a story by literary modernist master Henry James, with a screenplay written in part by another master of literature, Truman Capote, and with plenty of fear and desperation delivered in a top-notch performance by Deborah Kerr, The Innocents is still a marvel today. A blend of psychological and supernatural horror with a heavy dose of southern gothic, this film is singularly stylish as well as chilling.
Of course, if there are children in a gothic haunted house story, it’s a given they’re going to be creepy, and the giggling, secretive kids played by Martin Stephens and Pamela Franklin are no exception. Director Jack Clayton, like other horror directors who have worked with child actors, concealed some of the story’s more disturbing, sexual elements from his young stars, which makes their earnestly innocent performances as Flora and Miles all the more hair-raising. Between their parallel appearances with the sinister ghosts of the house and the film’s jarringly childlike music-box themes in the score, not to mention the dramatic use of shadow and flickering candlelight, The Innocents is ultimately an extremely successful experiment in atmospheric technique, helped by a story that’s both intriguing and repulsive.
- During the videotape sequence in The Ring (2002), the faint sound of a boy singing is audio sampled from The Innocents.
- Star Deborah Kerr and writer Truman Capote share the same birthday (September 30).
- The film is based upon the Henry James novella The Turn of the Screw.
2011’s Kill List is one of those movies that draws much of its power through the audience having no idea what to expect. But since that doesn’t make a very good explanation for why it belongs on this list or great horror films, we’ll try to do so without giving away any of its potent mysteries. The gist of Kill List revolves around a pair of ex-soldiers who now try to make a living as contract killers. But what makes this thriller absolutely horrific is in piecing together the enigmatic disaster in Kiev, and how it relates the the slow unraveling of reality that makes things start to feel like a brutally-violent take on Alice in Wonderland. Kill List is totally one of those movies that you’ll want to talk about, read about, and think about long after the credits roll.
- Ben Wheatley went on to direct 2016's fantastic Free Fire
- The cult symbol in the film looks incredibly similar to the logo of The Blair Witch Project
- Received six nominations from the 2011 British Independent Film Awards.
With its still-remarkable special effects, fantastical-yet-grounded premise, and utter gross-out moments, many would argue Scanners is Cronenberg at his best. Of course, the exploding head alone should cement this film on any horror “best of” list, but the movie is totally exemplary for so many reasons. Michael Ironside’s Darryl Revok is unforgettable; who else could have sold a villain so well while relying mainly on pulling faces and nodding his head during the “scanning” (telepathy/telekinesis) scenes? And the premise, involving shady corporate conspiracy, unwitting pregnant women, and secret psychic soldiers, is well-balanced by the presence of the rebel scanners united by Kim Obrist (Jennifer O’Neill).
While the story is solid, where the film really succeeds is in its joyfully excessive use of those effects. Everything gets set on fire, everything melts, everything explodes - from payphones to computers to human flesh. Coupling these dramatic flourishes with smaller touches in the acting and story, Scanners is so good it might, um, make your head explode.
- The novel The Naked Lunch includes telepaths called “Senders,” a clear inspiration for this film. Cronenberg adapted the book in 1991.
- One of many, many quotable moments of 1992’s Wayne’s World: “Did you ever see that scene in Scanners where that dude’s head blew up?”
- Darren Lynn Bousman (Saw II, III, IV) was announced as director of a Scanners remake back in 2007, though the film never came to fruition.
When Iris and Rose’s mother dies, it falls to them to take on her… “duties.” The less you know the better in Jim Mickle’s We Are What We Are, a creepy and gothic nightmare about the cult-like experience of a family that, for generations, has had to do terrible things in the name of tradition.
We Are What We Are features impressive and nuanced performances by actors who are forced to do things that other horror movies would exploit for shock value. And yet here they feel motivated, totally believable, regardless of their extremity. That realism makes the acts themselves all the more unnerving, because maybe this could happen.
Maybe it’s happening right now. To someone in your neighborhood. To someone you know.
- Jim Mickle didn’t want to make the film at first, because he objects to American remakes of foreign horror films.
- The film’s style was inspired by the works of Michael Haneke, Japanese horror films, and Martha Marcy May Marlene.
- Horror filmmaker and producer Larry Fessenden has a cameo.
Much of Henry’s notoriety among horror films comes from the controversy around its censorship and distribution: Though filmed in 1985, it was only picked up for limited release in 1990 in an unrated version. This is due in large part to the onslaught of graphic killings that makes up most of the plot. However, there’s a lot to celebrate about this enduring cult movie, which was shot in less than a month for $110,000. Michael Rooker’s breakout performance as serial killer Henry earned him tons of acclaim from critics, and has been praised for its grim realism (especially when compared to the more fantastic, supernatural villains of most slasher films). The long, uninterrupted takes and overall mundanity of most of the scenes only make the brutal murders more shocking. In particular, the film’s almost total lack of a police presence reinforces the ease with which Henry is able to continue getting away with murder, and gives viewers the horrible sensation that no one is coming to save the day.
The partnership between Henry and his fellow, seemingly unremarkable, everyman murder-buddy Otis comes to a somewhat predictable end, with Henry’s irritated attitude toward the too-eager Otis an early clue as to what’s coming, but their mentor/student dynamic also helps the film stand apart from other slashers. With its roots in a real-life story and its unique ending for the title character, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer remains a quintessential piece of the horror canon.
- McNaughton wanted to make a horror film but didn’t have the budget. Then he saw a doc about serial killer Henry Lee Lucas...
- The director of a play Rooker was in was also doing prosthetics for the film. He suggested he audition for the role of Henry.
- With the films The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover and Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!, Henry resulted in the creation of the NC-17 rating.
Almost more arthouse than horror, Herzog’s highly stylistic take on Murnau’s 1922 film manages to capture all the necessary elements of your typical Dracula adaptation while favoring a singularly slow, romantic vision. Herzog’s skill as a director is visible in the sweeping landscapes and deliberate camera work, and the film’s score lends an appropriately grandiose air. But Klaus Kinski as Count Dracula gives one of cinema’s most eerie and alarming vampire performances, thanks in part to the special effects-makeup: rat-like teeth, long trailing fingernails and a bulbous white skull are an updated nod to Max Schreck’s version of the character. The vampire is filled with despair at his own inability to die, and even his one driving motive of getting nearer to Lucy Harker is threatening in its undefined shapelessness. His low moans and frail demeanor, which give way to sudden moments of violence and power, remind us that this is, in fact, a horror story, and a chillingly effective one.
Nosferatu’s dreamlike sequences subtly add to the underlying sense of dread throughout the film, particularly as the Count draws closer to Lucy and the town of Wismar is overwhelmed with loose animals, rats, and mounting coffins. The ending might have spawned cheap sequels if left in the wrong hands, but Herzog’s mastery as a filmmaker makes this tale complete.
- There are two versions of the film - one in German and one with the actors speaking English. Herzog prefers the German version.
- The silent Nosferatu had copyright problems as an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. But by 1979 the novel was public domain.
- The original German title of the film is Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht (or Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night).
“Who’s going to believe a talking head? Get a job in a sideshow.” Re-Animator has it all: glowing green sci-fi goo, the living dead, excessive blood-and-guts realized through innovative special effects – the list goes on. But it’s the ambitious Dr. Herbert West (Jeffrey Combs) who completely steals the show. The young medical student discovers the secret to re-animating the dead, which of course has disastrous effects on those around him. But rather than the standard mad scientist or optimistic hero, Dr. West is in a class all his own: sure of his own brilliance, dry and sarcastic, a nerdy far cry from the typical macho hero types of most zombie or sci-fi horror films. His exasperation when Dr. Hill’s (momentarily dead) decapitated head refuses to stay upright in a metal pan is still one of the funniest slapstick gags in the broader horror genre.
The campy jokes that pepper Re-Animator only highlight the raw disgust of scenes where the dead fly face-first at the living, moaning wildly and bleeding all over themselves. The sheer amount and creativity of the gore on display in this film can only be described as gleeful. The deaths are inventive (a falling metal door and a bone saw come to mind), while the premise is old-school, and the achievement of this balance has helped Re-Animator remain a perennial favorite among horror fans.
- Gordon would direct a second film inspired by a Lovecraft story, From Beyond (1986).
- The vibrant green re-agent was created using glowstick fluid.
- The opening theme music and credits were inspired by the Hitchcock films Psycho (1960) and Vertigo (1958), respectively.
Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie’s marriage has been shaken by the unexpected death of their child, and a trip to Venice may not be what they need. But they encounter a pair of psychic sisters who insist their dead child is talking to them, and the possibilities begin to twist and turn their minds.
Don’t Look Now is, like many of the best horror movies, thick with atmosphere. But really, the rooms are filled with grief, a tangible sadness sold by actors at the peak of their craft, which so overpowers them that belief in the supernatural isn’t just possible, it becomes a necessity. And where it leads then is completely unexpected, and utterly shocking.
- The first film score composed by the great Pino Donaggio.
- Rumors swirled for years that Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie’s sex scene was not simulated, despite denials from the cast and crew.
- Nicolas Roeg had to cut nine frames — less than half a second — from the sex scene to avoid an X-rating from the MPAA.
The Master of Suspense dabbled in horror and (arguably) science fiction with this slow burn ecological terror tale about the avian population turning against their human neighbors. Using what at the time were cutting-edge effects, and generating the kind of claustrophobic scares that would one day become the bread and butter of the zombie genre, the movie depicts the collapse of the world we know with Hitchcock’s distinctive style. The movie would go on to inspire many other balance-shifting tales of a world gone mad, like M. Night Shyamalan’s laughable The Happening.
- The Birds is loosely based on a 1952 Daphne du Maurier story.
- The film features special effects spearheaded by Walt Disney’s Ub Iwerks.
- Hitchcock makes his usual cameo appearance accompanied by two of his own dogs.
There is a particular and tragic horror in watching horrible things happen, and being helpless to stop it. Carrie, based on the novel by Stephen King, asks you to watch as a helpless girl is abused by her religious zealot mother and by her sadistic classmates at school. We cheer her every little victory, we cringe at her every moment of pain.
So it’s despicably suspenseful to watch poor Carrie White, played with utter innocence by Sissy Spacek, get set up for the most wonderful night of her life… and then for the most unspeakable fall. Brian De Palma’s bravura filmmaking and willingness to portray cruel behavior in all its unfettered grossness makes us become one with Carrie White. We want her to stand up for herself, so that after what happens… happens… we find it difficult to truly blame her. Carrie makes you watch something horrible, and makes you think something horrible. And that’s truly horrible. And fascinating. And scary.
- Stephen King’s first published novel, and the first Stephen King novel turned into a movie.
- Sissy Spacek and Piper Laurie earned Oscar nominations for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress, respectively.
- Other actors who auditioned for the title role include Glenn Close, Melanie Griffith, Linda Blair and Farrah Fawcett.
A group of kids travel to a cabin in the woods are besieged by demons in the original, shoestring horror classic The Evil Dead. Sam Raimi’s film was made with almost no money, out in the middle of nowhere, in conditions that punished the cast and crew, but the stress is all there on the screen, and from that exasperation came ingenuity.
The Evil Dead may be cheap but it’s a kitchen sink horror movie, with every idea Sam Raimi could concoct fully realized on camera. Unspeakable acts of violence, camera angles that should have been impossible under those circumstances, and a story that defies conventions and simply rips the characters to shreds. There’s a reason why Stephen King called this movie “the most ferociously original horror film of 1982.” There was nothing else like it, and it’s still devilishly distinctive today.
- Originally titled “Book of the Dead”. The title was changed because producers feared young audiences wouldn’t watch films about books.
- The incantation includes “Sam and Rob, Das ist Hikers Dan dee Roadsa,” describing cameos by Raimi and producer Rob Tapert as hitchhikers.
- Joel Coen, of The Coen Brothers, was an assistant editor, in one of his first industry jobs.
Between the timeless Frankenstein (1931) and Bride of Frankenstein (1935), this second sequel often gets lost in the shuffle. However, many of the portrayals of Frankenstein’s monster and the seedy assistant Igor (Ygor in this film) since have been inspired by elements of Son of Frankenstein, most notably Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein (1974), which utilizes the same basic plot and even gets memorable gags from the wooden-armed Inspector Krogh of this film. Giants of the horror genre Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi, alongside Basil Rathbone as the titular son of the monster’s creator, give solid performances throughout, with Lugosi’s hunched-from-hanging Ygor permanently adhering himself to the Frankenstein mythology thanks to a conniving and vengeful spin. The mood of Son is far less heady and philosophical than the first film, centering mostly on the young doctor’s attempts to reverse the damage done by his father to this small town (renamed, what else, Frankenstein, for this film). Karloff’s monster is mute here, unlike in Bride, which removes some of the empathy of the character and makes him a truly frightening presence whose relatively small amount of screen time only enhances the fear and suspense over when he’ll appear next.
The film takes itself a little more seriously than its immediate predecessor, Bride, with director Lee making efforts to avoid the camp while ramping up the drama of the storyline with all its revenge and atonement. The kitschy lab equipment and dramatic shadows make the Frankenstein castle extra spooky, the perfect stage for Lugosi to creep around behind Karloff’s towering monster.
- Son is Karloff's final turn as the monster in a film, though he’d later appear as a different character in House of Frankenstein (1944).
- The hunchbacked assistant in the first film is actually named Fritz, and no such character named Ygor appears in Mary Shelley’s novel.
- Karloff’s only child, Sara, was born during filming. The actor reportedly rushed to the hospital in full makeup for his daughter’s birth.
Philip Kaufman’s remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is so smart, so expansive, and so full of squishy effects that some might argue that it’s even better than the original (which is also one of the best horror movies of all time).
But regardless of your preference, it’s hard to argue that Kaufman’s update isn’t a vicious horror thriller. Donald Sutherland begins to suspect that the people around him have been replaced by alien life forms, and as he discovers the truth, he also discovers that he may be too late, and the world may have already been conquered.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers builds to a finale that makes good on every unthinkable promise the original movie made, from unexpectedly chilling imagery (that dog, shudder) to a quietly chilling sequence of absolute uncertainty. This movie’s despair is cruel and inescapable.
- Kevin McCarthy and Don Siegel, the star and director of the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers, both have cameos.
- The only film score ever composed by celebrated jazz musician - and psychiatrist - Denny Zeitlin.
- The Grateful Dead frontman Jerry Garcia recorded the banjo music for one scene.
A demon is following you, walking slowly in your direction, and if it ever catches you, you will die a horrifying fate. The only way to get rid of it is to have sex, which passes the curse on to your partner.
Either of those ideas would have been enough for a conventional horror film, but David Robert Michell combines sexually transmitted infection phobias and the fear of constantly being followed to incredible effect. The widescreen photographic gives the intimate story a sense of sweeping thematic scope but also forces the audience to constantly search the screen for signs of the follower in the background.
It Follows is a masterful example of style and substance giving birth to something that feels new. And their unfamiliar offspring is wholly horrifying.
- Inspired by a recurring nightmare director David Robert Michell had as a child.
- David Robert Michell asked Disasterpeace to compose the score because he liked their work on the video game Fez.
- Maika Monroe’s character’s name, “Jay”, is short for “Jamie”, named after Halloween star Jamie Lee Curtis.
There is no shortage of killer doll movies, but Child’s Play remains the standard by which they are judged. It is the story of a mother who goes to great lengths to get her child the doll he wants for his birthday, only to discover it’s the gift that keeps on giving… stab wounds.
The audience knows, right away, that Chucky is a killer doll but the story sticks with the adults anyway, as we wait for them to catch up to what we and our child protagonist already knew. The suspense is unforgiving because it keeps the horrifying puppet creation off the camera for much of the film, so when the damned Goody Guy doll does move, it feels all the more unnatural and wicked.
Great premise, great visual effects. And that battery scene is one of the cleverest reveals in horror movie history. Child’s Play was disturbing then, and it’s still creepy as hell now.
- Chucky’s real name, Charles Lee Ray, stems from real-life killers Charles Manson, Lee Harvey Oswald and James Earl Ray.
- The original title was Batteries Not Included. By the time Child’s Play was made that was already taken by another, family-friendly movie.
- Many of the ideas cut out of the original screenplay - like the death of a teacher and a toy factory climax - were used in Child’s Play 2.
It has been said that The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari may be the first true “horror movie,” and if so, the genre started out on a high note. The hallucinogenic tale of a hypnotist who sends a sleepwalker on a mission of death is a nightmare come to life in eldritch angles and impossible shadows, a vision of madness more explicit than any that came before it… and most that came in its wake.
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is one of those films whose influence is so pervasive that watching it today, it may be difficult to fully appreciate just how remarkable and unusual it would have been when it was first released. The rules it broke, bent and changed would never be quite the same afterwards, and completely screwing with the audience’s heads - visually, psychologically and narratively - was suddenly on the table forever.
- Considered to have the first “twist ending” in movie history.
- The dreamlike sets were constructed out of paper.
- Robert Wiene acquired the rights in 1934, intending to remake the film with sound. This version was never produced.
If only it had been given a different title, this excellent roller coaster ride of an action-horror film might not have had to struggle for a while under the enormous shadow of its legendary predecessor. But struggle it did, and it’s a shame, since it’s a propulsive and yet contemplative 21st century take on zombies that’s worth multiple trips back to the mall. From pulse-pounding action sequences to some lovely character touches and one of the most wistfully melancholy conclusions of any zombie film, this is a sort-of remake that has definitely aged well.
- Cameos from the original film include cast members Ken Foree, Scott Reiniger and Tom Savini.
- The department store in the mall called Gaylen Ross is a reference to the 1978 film’s lead actress.
- A car commercial that Snyder shot before this movie can be glimpsed at one point.
This film progresses in three distinct, parallel ways: First, the action keeps rising from the ground floor of a sealed apartment building to its tiny attic. Two, the characters find themselves in smaller and more claustrophobic spaces. Three, the light keeps going down until everything is not only dark but lit only by night vision. Oh, and did I mention there are demonic zombies? A modern masterpiece of horror storytelling with a relentless structure that demands attention throughout, this Spanish production also brilliantly blends two conceptions of the zombie into a creature that is equal parts science fiction and supernatural. Watch this one. In the dark. Alone. With headphones on.
- The film spawned several sequels, as well as the usual pale imitation of a shot-for-shot American remake and its own sequel.
- The title is the abbreviation of a video camera’s "record." Remember video cameras?
- The cast was not told what was going to happen to their characters, which helped to heighten the tension of their performances.
The Descent is one of the scariest movies ever made, long before the monsters show up. Neil Marshall’s thriller tells the story of six women who venture deep into an uncharted cave and become trapped. With no way out, they have to venture deeper and deeper, hoping to chance upon an outlet, and the inky darkness and oppressive claustrophobia is enough to give anyone a panic attack.
But of course, there’s more to The Descent than that. There is desperation and betrayal and an outside force that pushes all of these spelunkers to the brink. And thanks to a remarkable cast and a script that treats them all like real people, regardless of their bizarre circumstances, it’s as riveting a survival tale as any yet told.
- The design of the monsters was inspired by F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu.
- None of the filming took place inside an actual cave. The sets were created on a soundstage.
- The last minute of the film was cut from the American theatrical release, to make it end on a more positive note.
Paranormal Activity’s smallness makes every little scare seem enormous. It’s the intimate little story of Katie and Micah, a young couple who are haunted by a demon that has followed Katie since childhood, and how that evil gets stronger when Micah fails to take her trauma seriously.
That simple and relatable tale of a relationship undone by simple callousness is illustrated with horror so subtle that it’s practically subtext. Lingering images make the audience squirm, waiting for the impossible to happen, and little changes in behavior take on ominous significance when you know that genuine evil is afoot.
Paranormal Activity spawned a legion of “found footage” imitators, but the format was never what made Oren Peli’s film so scary. The gimmick only amplified the believability of an already realistic supernatural tale. Everything about the production makes it easy to believe that Paranormal Activity is possible. And that’s scary.
- Made over $193,000,000 at the box office. The production costs were only $15,000.
- Filmed in 2006, not released until 2009.
- Steven Spielberg returned his Paranormal Activity screener to the office in a garbage bag. He thought it was haunted.
Guillermo Del Toro’s macabre little fantasy about a grandfather who becomes an immortal bloodsucker bears many of the filmmaker’s trademarks: gruesome makeup effects, a fascination with mythology and - most importantly - a lot of love.
Federico Luppi plays an elderly antique dealer who discovers, quite by accident, a clockwork device that grants eternal life and eternal thirst. But although he’s driven to lick blood off the floors of bathrooms, he’s also fighting with every fiber of himself to remain a good man. Del Toro’s story takes him to heroic heights and horrifying lows, but we get the impression that the filmmaker believes in his tormented hero.
Lots of horror movies try to make you understand the monster, but few can make you care as deeply about them as Cronos.
- Guillermo Del Toro’s directorial debut.
- Universal Pictures wanted to remake the film. Guillermo Del Toro rejected the offer.
- Ron Perlman took a salary cut to help produce the movie, and has worked with Del Toro many times since.
Stephen King’s frightening novel about a novelist trapped in a house with his “number one fan” is a masterpiece of claustrophobic horror. James Caan plays Paul Sheldon, whose car wipes out in a snowstorm, and finds himself bedridden with Annie Wilkes, played by Kathy Bates, who REALLY loves his work, and who takes advantage of his infirmity to force him to write his latest novel to her disturbing specifications.
Annie Wilkes is the ultimate example of fandom gone awry, her possessiveness of the stories she loves giving her license to abuse the author - literally, and violently - for not making her happy. And Rob Reiner’s deftly told story gives Bates and Caan all the room they need to explore that toxic relationship between an artist and their audience, and to let it devolve, organically, to horrifying behavior.
- Kathy Bates won an Oscar for Best Actress, making Misery the only movie based on a Stephen King novel to win an Academy Award (so far).
- Actors who turned down the role of Paul include: Jack Nicholson, Harrison Ford, Denzel Washington, Bruce Willis… and many more.
- Rob Reiner has a cameo in the film as a helicopter pilot.
Christopher Walken is perfect in this Stephen King adaptation as a man who loses everything, but gains psychic powers in exchange. (How can a character with such dumb-looking hair be so cool?) Director David Cronenberg really goes there, bringing the tragedy of Walken’s character to bear on first a murder mystery, and then a potentially more devastating and sweeping mass murder via Martin Sheen as a delusional presidential hopeful. "The missiles are flying.” Hallelujah indeed.
There are so many other elements that just come together to make this a great film. Like the flashback sequence on the gazebo. Or the question the film poses to the viewer about murdering Hitler as a child. And, of course, the love story at the center of it all. Sad and chilling.
- Cronenberg reportedly fired blanks from a .357 Magnum to achieve the realistic-looking flinches when Walken's premonitions strike.
- The first King work set in the fictional town of Castle Rock. Others include Cujo, Stand by Me and the upcoming eponymous TV show.
- The story was also adapted into a TV series starring Anthony Michael Hall and Nicole de Boer which ran from 2002 to 2007.
American audiences are more familiar with the remake, Gore Verbinski’s The Ring, but Hideo Nakata’s version has a spectral allure all its own. A reporter discovers a videotape with shocking imagery and a curse upon it, damning the viewer to die one week after viewing it. To save her life, and eventually the life of her child, she has to discover the source of the spirit photography and - hopefully - put a vengeful spirit to rest.
The bizarre imagery we associate with The Ring emerges more unexpectedly from Ringu, which manages to evoke a creepy atmosphere without constantly calling attention to itself. It’s a mystery that happens to be horrifying, a tale of abuse and murder that comes out in most unexpected ways, that earns its shocker moments more than most films of its kind.
- The second adaptation of the novel. The first, a TV movie called Ring: Kanzenban, was released in 1995.
- Became the highest grossing horror film in Japan upon its release in 1998.
- Hideo Nakata directed both the Japanese sequel Ring 2, and the American sequel to the remake, Ring Two.
This film was an almost instant classic upon its release, helped along by horror fanboy and auteur Guillermo del Toro, who served as executive producer. It avoids cheap scares with nods to the gothic, even while not submitting fully to its tropes. The story keeps you guessing, as Aurelia unravels the tragic history of her home (once the orphanage where she lived as a girl) while searching for her missing adopted son Simón, and the motifs of childhood disease, disfigurement, and death give the film slightly more staying power than your average haunted house story. Plus, the inventive hide-and-seek game, taught to Simón by creepy orphaned ghost kids (shudder), gives viewers just the right amount of “I know what’s about to happen but I still can’t look away” fright.
Spare, carefully-deployed moments of shock and violence help keep the film textually interesting, and the twist about Simón’s whereabouts is both satisfying and brutal.
- The film received a 10-minute standing ovation after it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival.
- Geraldine Chaplin, who plays the medium Aurora, is the daughter of Charlie Chaplin.
- To prepare for her role as Aurelia, Belen Rueda studied the films Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and The Innocents (1961).
It’s almost impossible to talk about Takashi Miike’s Audition without ruining it. In fact, you should probably stop reading right now and just watch it. But since you’re still here, let’s talk about Miike’s pulverizing misdirect of a movie. Audition starts out like a romantic comedy, about a single man who holds an audition for a new girlfriend, only to find himself attracted to a young woman with… let’s just say “serious issues,” and let that hang there.
Audition lures you into a false sense of security, then throws you off a ledge and rips out the safety net. To call it “shocking” is to do a serious disservice to the word. It’s a vicious punchline, preceded by an even crueler joke, and there’s nothing else quite like it.
- Eli Roth called Audition “a huge influence” on his horror movie Hostel, which features a cameo by Takashi Miike… as himself.
- Miike reportedly wanted to end the film at the beginning of the final, horrifying scene, but was convinced to show it all by a producer.
- Spoiler Alert: The vomit was real.
It’s easy, but not altogether inaccurate, to say The Omen was just the latest in a long line of hot button Catholic horror thrillers, the progeny of Rosemary’s Baby and The Exorcist. And while Richard Donner’s film isn’t as subtle or as insightful as Polanski or Friedkin’s classics, its forthright approach to the story of the Antichrist is thrilling and satisfying.
Gregory Peck, the altruistic dad from To Kill a Mockingbird, plays smartly against type, as a single father who gradually realizes that his own son may be the living embodiment of evil. Does he have what it takes to end the nightmare? Or will his love prove too strong?
Suspenseful, unthinkable questions, brought to life by a crowd-pleasing filmmaker and a bombastically frightening score by the great Jerry Goldsmith. Horror movies don’t need much more than that.
- The original title was “The Antichrist”, which was later changed to “The Birthmark”, and then finally changed to The Omen.
- Jerry Goldsmith won his only Academy Award - out of 18 nominations - for his score to The Omen.
- Earned a "cursed" rep after the production endured unexpected disasters (like a hotel bombing and two airplanes struck by lightning).
Videodrome isn’t just a horror movie: it’s a fever dream brought on by late night study sessions with too much caffeine and too many media studies textbooks. James Woods stars as the head of a sleazy television station, on the hunt for the next tawdry attention-getter, when he stumbles across a pirated signal for “Videodrome,” depicting an all-too realistic torture. No plot. No themes. Just snuff.
In David Cronenberg’s world, ideas become flesh and flesh becomes new ideas, as exposure to sadism influences the grey matter of every viewer. Familiar notions about using fictional violence as a form of catharsis are challenged and gutted, and the worst case scenario of our continued obsession with multimedia turns out to only be the starting point for something even worse.
- The character of Brian O’Blivion was inspired by media studies guru Marshall McLuhan, who taught David Cronenberg in college.
- The tapes in Videodrome are in the Betamax format, because VHS tapes were too large to work in a key visual effects scene.
- Andy Warhol declared Videodrome “A Clockwork Orange of the 1980s”.
There are lots of horror anthologies in the world (those films that serve as a delivery mechanism for many, shorter, scary films). Few are as good, or as influential, as Dead of Night.
The set-up is simple: a man arrives at a country cottage and believes he has seen everyone there before, in a dream. So they try to assuage his rattled nerves by telling them spooky stories that inspired them all to believe in the supernatural. Some of them are silly, but most are sincere and ethereal, and the segment starring Michael Redgrave as a ventriloquist who believes his doll is real - a trope that would become more popular later - features one of the legendary actor’s finest performances.
And yet the conclusion of Dead of Night (which I couldn’t possibly ruin here) may be the film’s crowning achievement, bringing every disparate story crashing together in a singular vision of horror.
- The only horror movie produced by Ealing Studios, which was more famous for classic comedies like The Ladykillers.
- Two installments - the golfing story and the Christmas story - were cut from the original American release.
- The film’s story inspired astronomers to develop an alternative to the Big Bang theory, called The Steady State theory.
Guillermo Del Toro is considered a horror filmmaker, and that makes sense. He’s made a lot of horror movies. But a film like Pan’s Labyrinth offers another perspective, seems to reveal that he’s weaving fairy tales first and foremost, and that they only just happen to be horrifying.
A young girl named Ofelia moves in with her new stepfather, an abusive fascist whose torments cause her to escape to fantasy realms… which may be even more horrifying than her new reality. She encounters giant toads, faceless monsters guarding tables of plentiful food, and an eldritch faun who offers her immortality, but at what cost?
The demonic slant Guillermo Del Toro gives to childhood yearnings play like a warped Grimm’s fairy tale, and The Brothers Grimm were pretty warped to begin with. That gives Pan’s Labyrinth a timeless, universal quality that extends beyond the concept of a genre, and into the primordial parts of the human mind.
- Guillermo Del Toro gave up his salary to contribute more money to the ambitious production.
- Del Toro wrote the English subtitles for Pan’s Labyrinth himself after being disappointed in the translations of his earlier films.
- Winner of three Academy Awards, but lost Best Foreign Language Film to the German drama The Lives of Others.
While there are some that would still insist that the original 2008 Swedish film – itself an adaptation of the novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist – is superior, this atmospheric American-British remake produced under the revived Hammer banner managed the impossible: to deliver on the tragic emotion and dark horror of the original while adding its own distinctive touches to one of the unlikeliest love stories in cinema.
The melancholy fills every frame as we follow the strange path that the often-bullied Owen and his new protector Abby take after meeting in the snow, even while the movie adapts classic vampire mythology to a more modern setting.
- There are references to Now and Later candy, a real product, that suggest some thematic meaning here.
- Reeves was asked to change the ages of the main characters, but he disagreed and kept them the same as in the earlier version.
- A prequel four-issue comic book called Let Me In: Crossroads was also released by Hammer Films and Dark Horse Comics.
The Spanish Civil War provides an unsettling backdrop for more than one of Guillermo Del Toro’s movies. In The Devil’s Backbone, it’s responsible for killing young Carlos’s father, and stranding him at an orphanage with an unexploded bomb in the courtyard and a ghost with blood floating from his wounds, promising that “many of you will die.”
The Devil’s Backbone is a children’s story, packed with kids who dare each other to overcome their fears, even as they are all endangered by the coming war and the violent urges of someone in their midst. Guillermo Del Toro has an exquisite sympathy for all of these children, even the dead ones, and even the ones who grew up to be monsters. It’s that sensitivity that makes The Devil’s Backbone more than just another spooky story. It’s also a supernatural drama of the highest order.
- Partly inspired by del Toro’s relationship with his uncle, who died and allegedly returned as a ghost.
- Del Toro considers this film the “brother” of Pan’s Labyrinth.
- When released by the Criterion Collection, the number on the spine of the Blu-ray was “666.”
The horror movie genre was still in its infancy when James Whale got to it, but you’d never know it by watching his films. Frankenstein is a bravura example of gothic showpersonship, full of lightning and castles and obsession and sadness. It shoves more movie into 71 minutes than many two hour-plus summer blockbusters can manage.
And although Frankenstein takes great liberties with Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s novel, it set the visual standard by which mad science, grave robbing, and the living dead are still measured. This is a world of godlike men and eerily human monsters, anchored by a legendary performance from Boris Karloff as a beast that touches our hearts even as it churns our stomachs.
- Karloff was a mostly unknown actor at the time, and was credited only as “?” in the opening credits to preserve the mystery.
- Bela Lugosi turned down the role of the Frankenstein Monster, but eventually played him in 1943’s Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man.
- Dr. Frankenstein’s line, “At last I know what it’s like to be God!” was removed from re-releases. It was finally restored for home video.
Few horror movies capture the strength and vulnerability of children as honestly, or as lyrically, as Charles Laughton’s The Night of the Hunter. The film is about a young boy and a young girl who get a new father, Harry Powell, a preacher played by Robert Mitchum (in the performance of his career). Harry has very particular ideas about sex, and violence, and his new children have something he wants, and he’ll do anything to get it.
The Night of the Hunter plays out like a demonic picture book, full of big images and exaggerated ideas. It’s told from the perspective of children who are living out their greatest fears, who cannot imagine waking up, but fight on anyway. And although the nobility of the childlike spirit is celebrated, the takeaway one can’t help but put in your pocket is that the world really is as big and scary as they say it is. Harry Powell is one of cinema’s greatest villains, a despicable hypocrite with silky words and bloody hands. The movie that keeps him imprisoned is terrifying to visit. And one of the best horror movies ever.
- This is the only film directed by renowned actor Laughton.
- Spike Lee borrowed Robert Mitchum’s speech about “love and hate” for his acclaimed 1989 drama Do the Right Thing.
- The film was remade in 1991 as a TV movie starring Richard Chamberlain as Harry Powell.
Jennifer Kent's debut feature is an elegant, psychologically-dense horror film which taps into various traditions without ever feeling the slightest bit derivative. It's an instant classic.
Like all great psychological horror, it begins with a tragedy. Amelia's husband died while driving her to the hospital to give birth to Sam, their only child. Ever since that day, Amelia has raised Sam alone and never celebrated his birthday. The film spends time establishing this complex domestic situation and the fractured relationship between mother and child. Even seven years later, it's painfully clear that Amelia hasn't successfully grieved and moved on with her life. But what's more unsettling is her relationship with Sam. While she takes him to school, reads him bedtime stories, and cooks him nutritious dinners, she secretly can't stand him. She pulls away, when she should be pulling him close. And it's into this troubled home that The Babadook worms his way.
What follows isn't a monster movie nor a slasher film; things don't frequently jump out of the shadows. The threat is much less tangible - it's ambitious, pervasive, and in the final analysis, much more terrifying. Things go bump in the mind. This is a brilliantly made, elegant horror film, with real psychological depth. It's also a celebration of a school of horror that's been dormant for much too long. This is modern psychological horror at its most rich, macabre, and moving.
- The Babadook itself was created via in-camera trickery, inspired by the silent films of Georges Méliès and others.
- Exorcist director William Friedkin said The Babadook was one of the scariest horror films he’s ever seen.
- Kent owns the rights to The Babadook. She told IGN that she has no plans for a sequel. Sorry fans!
Teaching the American movie-making machine a thing or two about how to make a blockbuster action epic with heart, filled with charismatic and compelling characters, nail-biting tension, and stunning set pieces, this apocalyptic zombie ride reinvigorated the genre with its central father-daughter story and inventive take on the by-now familiar zombie rules. Setting most of the action on the titular vehicle makes for a tightly-contained and roller-coaster-like ride of a story that unfolds over two hours with little chance of you catching your breath.
- You can learn more about the outbreak in the film’s animated prequel, Seoul Station.
- The film premiered at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival.
- Shaun of the Dead filmmaker Edgar Wright hailed the film as the best zombie movie he’d seen in “forever.”
Few horror movies elicit as extreme a physical reaction quite like 2008’s Martyrs. This low-budget French-language film is smart, bleak, and absolutely unforgettable for those willing to stomach its brutal imagery. Divided into two distinct parts, the first half is a suburban poltergeist thriller that delves into the subconscious and past trauma of our heroine. The way she’s stalked around the home is utterly chilling. But Martyrs makes its turn, the film transforms into a bizarre religious gore-fest that draws a link between spiritual enlightenment and utterly brutal physical and emotional torture. It’s tough to keep your eyes set on the horrifying images that unfold on-screen, but for those willing to dive into its heady themes, it’s even harder to look away.
- The director was inspired by 2005's Hostel.
- American remake was released in 2015.
- The director went on to helm 2012's The Tall Man starring Jessica Biel.
Carol is a wallflower in Roman Polanski’s Repulsion, a quiet girl who seems repulsed (if you will) by anybody other than her sister. So when her sister leaves on vacation, and Carol is left home all alone, she retreats. And retreats further. And further, until her apartment is her own mind, full of anxieties and traumas and clutching arms.
Few films capture a descent into madness as vividly as Repulsion. Catherine Deneuve is an inherently sympathetic performer, so no matter how extreme her introversion becomes, we never lose our connection with her plight. The way her world gradually warps to match her haunted perceptions feels disturbingly natural, as though the film is nurturing psychological horror in a greenhouse, and inviting the audience to watch it grow.
- This is the first part of Polanski’s “Apartment Trilogy,” which also includes Rosemary’s Baby (1968) and The Tenant (1976).
- The director has a cameo in the movie, dressed as a woman.
- This is Polanski’s first English-language movie.
Adrian Lyne’s tormented drama stars Tim Robbins as a Vietnam veteran tortured by violent memories of the war, and memories of a family long lost. And by visions of men with no faces, and of his girlfriend impaled. Is he losing his mind? Was he the victim of chemical warfare?
Whatever the answers, Jacob’s Ladder viscerally depicts a man’s life being ripped away. His sanity is shattered, his connections to other people irreparably frayed. Lyne, who typically specializes in images of slick erotic pleasure, proves that he’s brilliant at bringing the exact opposite to life: the slimy streets, the abandoned tunnels, the rickety gurneys of Jacob’s life are repellant, but immersive. You can’t escape Jacob’s Ladder. The only way out is upward.
- The story and style of Jacob’s Ladder were a major influence on the Silent Hill video games.
- All of the film’s visual effects were recorded in camera, without post-production assistance.
- Lyne gave up soon-to-be bomb Bonfire of the Vanities for this film. (His first choice for Jacob was Tom Hanks.)
Clive Barker’s Hellraiser is one of the most memorable horror films of the past several decades - not simply because of its nameless, aesthetically dynamic villain (later to be named Pinhead by fans), but also because of its ruthlessly bleak and gut-wrenchingly horrific view of the human condition. The film, like its literary namesake The Hellbound Heart, is about lust - for power, for pleasure, for life and love - and the terrible, blood-soaked price that the human heart will pay to fulfill its desires.
The set-up is soap-opera simple: Julia's married to Larry, but once had a tryst with his brother Frank. Kirsty is Larry's daughter and Frank once lusted for Kirsty. Frank, who we spied purchasing the puzzlebox at the film's opening, solves the riddle and is sent into the hellish company of Pinhead and his demonic Cenobites. Now Frank's back (only without his flesh) in a conspiracy with Julia to hijack Larry's skin. And it's up to Kirsty to keep all Hell from breaking loose.
For what is essentially - at its rawest roots - a haunted house film, there's a philosophy to Hellraiser uncommon in lesser horror films. It aspires to be more than a man in a mask and a few screaming teenagers. It is a film about pleasures and how obsessively we seek them; about how the price tag for what we want - openly or secretly - too often says simply, "Hell."
- The film originally earned an X rating from the MPAA.
- There have been nine films in the series to date, with a tenth currently awaiting release.
- Doug Bradley played Pinhead in the first eight films but reportedly did not participate in the ninth film due to its rushed production.
Writer-director Jordan Peele's film combines classic genre tropes with issues of racism to create something fresh and dynamic, and deeply unsettling. When African-American Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) heads to the countryside to meet the family of his white girlfriend Rose (Allison Williams), he quickly realizes that something is amiss in this too disarming household. Yeah, Dad (a creepy Bradley Whitford) would’ve voted for Obama a third time if he could, but Mom (Catherine Keener, also creepy) is surely up to no good with her hypnotherapy. And why do the household help - both people of color - seem like they’re straight out of Invasion of the Body Snatchers?
What follows is an often tense, sometimes funny, but ultimately gripping tale that poses some uncomfortable questions throughout while keeping the audience on their edge of their seat. Peele's main gig may be as a comedian, but we need more movies like this from him STAT.
- Peele cited Night of the Living Dead, the first horror film with a black lead, as inspiration.
- Peele is the first African-American writer-director to earn over $100 million for a film debut.
- Filming took place over a mere 28 days.
Both director Wes Craven and writer Kevin Williamson had plenty of success in their career, but Scream remains a big highlight for both men. Williamson's script managed to deftly be so many things - it was a sly meta/self-parody about the horror genre that didn't cross the line into goofiness while also playing as a successful whodunit and, most importantly, an effective horror film in and of itself.
Finally a group of horror movie characters made it clear that, yes, they'd seen all the same movies we had, and were aware of the rules and clichés that come with the genre. But no one was more knowledgeable than the killer (or is that killers?) who toyed with the victims by asking them horror movie trivia that plenty of us in the audience could have fun playing along with.
But when the killer actually showed himself, it was terrifying, with several extremely well-executed suspense scenes by Craven, which proved again just how good he was with this sort of material. A movie that set out to simultaneously make the audience laugh, cheer and, yes, scream, Scream deserves a lot of credit for pulling off all these elements so well.
- Scream was originally called Scary Movie when Williamson was developing it.
- Sony Pictures filed a lawsuit against the producers claiming that the title infringed on their 1995 film Screamers' copyright.
- Drew Barrymore was originally cast in the lead role before other commitments forced her to take a smaller part.
Count Orlock is moving to Germany, and he’s bringing pestilence and shadows with him. F.W. Murnau’s shameless rip-off of Bram Stoker’s Dracula does away with the sensuality that many associate with the undead monster, revealing the vampire to be a sad and rat-like creature, tormented by isolation and completely wrong for the modern world.
Murnau seems to have a queasy fixation on Orlock and his eery appetites, and his movie paints them out with thick shadows and grotesque imagery. Max Schreck’s performance as the Count is so bizarre and hypnotic that, years later, he stills ranks as one of the most iconic horror monsters. Indeed, the horror genre is still using the language that Murnau helped invent with Nosferatu, and his film feels as deliriously creepy today as it ever did.
- Murnau changed the ending so it was different from Dracula to avoid being sued by Bram Stoker’s estate.
- The estate sued anyway, and the court ordered all copies of the film to be destroyed. Only a few survived.
- This is the first film to show vampires being killed by sunlight, popularizing this now common part of the monster’s mythology.
Some high concepts tower over all the others. Drew Goddard’s The Cabin in the Woods, co-written by Joss Whedon, is the story of a group of college kids who travel to a, yes, cabin in the woods and get besieged by what you might call a “Zombie Redneck Torture Family.” But it is also the story of two white collar office drones who watch the slaughter in real time, and make damn well sure it hits every cliché imaginable. And somehow it all makes sense.
The Cabin in the Woods works as a formulaic horror movie - the cast is great, the jokes are witty and the violence is spectacular - but Goddard’s film also hacks and slashes at the horror genre itself. The Hollywood machine that cranks out familiar tropes and the audiences that get off on them each get impaled with biting commentary and subversive twists on familiar ideas. Horror comedies don’t get much smarter. Or funnier. Or more gleefully destructive.
- This was filmed in 2009, but delayed to convert the film to 3D, and then delayed again due to MGM’s financial woes.
- Goddard and Whedon wrote the screenplay in just three days.
- Marty’s bong, which converts to a travel mug, cost $5,000 to make.
The movie that gave birth to the whole "horror movie as faux-documentary" - AKA found footage - and that inspired such films as Paranormal Activity and its ilk, The Blair Witch Project is quite an effective scare fest in retrospect.
Some of its then-inspired choices in the realm of "is it or isn't real" seem dated and obvious now given the fact that nowadays the internet seemingly sets out to reveal spoilers that surround projects like this. (Also, we know it's all fiction at this point.) But Blair Witch came out in 1999, when the internet was in its infancy and could be used as a tool to successfully convince audiences that maybe the story of a three-person documentary crew going snipe hunting for what turns out to be pure evil is in fact real.
Blame the gift/curse of the shaky-cam on this movie, but give it credit for delivering scares in such a way that changed the way we like to be scared... and that changed the way Hollywood goes about making the things that scare us.
- The film cost $60,000 to make and has grossed over $248 million to date theatrically.
- To increase tension and encourage conflict among actors, the directors gave them less and less food each day.
- The tent-shaking scene wasn't scripted — that was the director actually terrorizing the actors as they slept.
A family that’s too religious even for Puritan, colonial America strikes out on their own at the start of Robert Eggers’ absorbing historical horror tale. So when tragedy strikes there is nowhere to turn but inward, and the guilt, hypocrisy and paranoia build up inside a father, a mother, their children and - yes - even their goat.
Eventually those feelings will explode, but until then we are completely absorbed by Eggers’ exemplary period detail, distinctive colonial language and keen observations about early religious fervor. Whatever doubts you may have about whether The VVitch is about an actual witch, salient points are being made about living as though religion is literal, and evil is more than just a concept. The VVitch is a disturbing horror movie. It’s an insightful drama. It’s a damning indictment. It’s one of the most ambitious horror movies of the century, and it all takes place on a tiny little farm.
- This was shot using mostly natural/available light.
- The goat, Black Phillip, head butted co-star Ralph Ineson two weeks into filming, injuring his ribs.
- The film was endorsed by The Satanic Temple.
All of today's mega-popular vampire franchises owe a debt of gratitude to Count Dracula. And as much as Bram Stoker's original novel helped popularize the vampire story, it was Universal's 1931 adaptation that cemented the image of Dracula in the minds of most moviegoers.
Dracula condenses and combines many of the main characters from the novel, opening with the poor Mr. Renfield's arrival in Transylvania. After falling victim to Dracula's influence, the pair head to London so Dracula can feast on the city's inhabitants. Only the courageous Dr. Seward, his ally Professor Van Helsing, and their friends can prevent Dracula from slaughtering innocents and making the fair Mina his newest bride.
Dracula isn't the scariest film by modern standards. What it does have is plenty of atmosphere and a very memorable take on the lead villain. This adaptation diverged from the source by making Dracula a handsome, charismatic figure, and Bela Lugosi captured the imaginations of millions with his performance as Dracula. For better or worse, it was a role that would follow him for the rest of his life. And it remains the definitive portrayal of this classic villain for many.
- A Spanish-language version of the film was shot on the same sets at night while Browning shot his version during the day.
- The first sequel to the film, Dracula's Daughter, features a brief glimpse of a wax bust of Lugosi in Dracula's coffin.
- Lugosi would not play Drcaula again until the final Universal Monsters horror film, 1948's Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.
The zombie genre is bigger than ever now, and you have 28 Days Later to thank for it. The genre was practically dead by the time Danny Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland gave zombies a much needed shot of adrenaline with this film. Literally, this movie is pumped up on adrenaline. The zombies - er, sorry, “infected” - sprint through the movie, spawning endless debates about whether “fast zombies” are scarier than “slow zombies”. As if that’s the important thing.
What mattered most is that 28 Days Later was more than a visceral horror experience. A great cast and a smart script treated the concept with sincerity and severity, and Boyle’s digital cinematography gave the film an immediacy that hadn’t been matched at that time. If zombies - sigh, “infected” - did take over the Earth, this is surely what it would look and feel like. And it would be terrifying.
- Ewan McGregor was Boyle’s first choice to play Jim (followed by Ryan Gosling).
- James McAvoy auditioned for a role as a zombie, and did a backflip for Boyle. He didn’t get the part.
- An alternate, more depressing ending was filmed, and eventually included as an Easter egg in some theatrical releases.
David Cronenberg's very R-rated, very intense and very excellent remake of The Fly puts Jeff Goldblum in the role of Seth Brundle, a scientist who invents telepods meant to change the world. Instead, they change him into a man-fly monster when a fly accidentally gets trapped in one of the machines as Seth teleports from one pod to the other.
The script, performances and Howard Shore's tremendous score work together to create a horror opera, one full of dark twists and practical creature effects scares. Once all the gore and vomiting-on-food-to-eat-it settles, we realize we've just watched a tragedy about a scientist who accounted for everything save nature finding a way to remind man not to play God. (Kind of fitting that Goldblum learned this lesson here and again in Jurassic Park, no?)
- Goldblum and his costar Geena Davis would marry a year after The Fly was released. (They later divorced.)
- More recently, Cronenberg wrote a script he called "not exactly a sequel" but "more a meditation on fly-ness." The project stalled, however.
- The Fly was made into an opera in 2008.
It rarely hurts to merge horror with a tinge of comedy, and John Landis' An American Werewolf in London is one of the finer examples of that combination. It's also one of several iconic werewolf movies that hit theaters in 1981. Of the trio, American Werewolf remains the most popular and well-loved.
The film follows two backpackers traveling the English countryside. When only one survives an attack by a vicious wolf, he becomes convinced he's been infected by the werewolf's curse. And it wouldn't be much of a werewolf movie if he turned out to be wrong.
An American Werewolf in London stood out at the time thanks to its amazing makeup and special effects work; never before had the werewolf transformation seemed so convincing. The humor didn't hurt either, particularly with the brilliantly demented nightmare sequences. But American Werewolf was ultimately a tragic horror film, and one certainly deserving of remembrance today.
- The Academy Award for Best Make-Up wasn't added until 1981, the year this movie came out — and it was the first film to earn it.
- Director John Landis was reportedly shocked by how gory his own film was when viewing an HD transfer in the mid-2000s.
- The caged wolves scene was filmed in one take because actor David Naughton refused to get back into the cage a second time.
Can you believe that there's a movie on our list that got its title from a Morrissey song? This most unusual of love stories is a Swedish film which hit it big internationally with its tale of a 12-year-old boy and his centuries-old vampire... who looks like a 12-year-old girl (but most certainly isn't).
Whether or not Oskar and Eli's relationship is an equal partnership, or Oskar is doomed to become the vampire's next Hakan (the old and ill-fated human who takes care of Eli early in the film) isn't clear. But it's an engrossing story from start to finish.
Though chock-full of bloody good horror moments, director Tomas Alfredson's film works so well because it is acutely interested in its two lead characters: Oskar, the boy who is bullied at school and finds a protector in his new, nocturnal neighbor; and Eli, a beautiful little cherub who's actually not even a girl and certainly not a cherub. Weird, right? But so good.
- The word "vampire" is only spoken once in the entire movie.
- Both the writer and director have said they aren't big fans of vampires.
- Almost every scene in the film features the color red or reddish orange in some way.
Dario Argento’s 1977 masterpiece Suspiria is one of the finest examples of Giallo horror films ever made. Part psychological thriller, part slasher, and part mystery, it’s every bit as beautiful and terrifying now as it was 40 years ago. Putting together the puzzle-pieces of the increasingly-supernatural murders at a prestigious German dance academy makes for one of the most unique and visceral horror experiences around. Argento crafted countless unforgettable images through the use of brilliant lighting, unnerving camera angles, and buckets of the brightest blood imaginable. All of this is paired with a uniquely-wonderful soundtrack by German prog-rock band Goblin, whose incredible score makes this descent into hell one we’ll gladly repeat again and again.
- Director Dario Argento would blast the creepy soundtrack to unsettle actors into giving a more authentically disturbed performance.
- In the original script, the ballet school was for girls under 12, but producer Salvatore Argento objected due to the film's violence.
- Dario Argento changed the age limit to 20, but didn't alter the script in any way, which explains the childlike qualities of the characters.
George Romero practically created the zombie movie genre single-handedly in 1968 with Night of the Living Dead. Ten years later he refined the formula with Dawn of the Dead. Far bigger, gorier, and funnier than its predecessor, Dawn of the Dead remains Romero's definitive work.
Whereas Night featured a small cast of survivors holed up in a remote farm house, Dawn opens with a glimpse of a major metropolitan area falling to chaos during the zombie outbreak. It isn't long before our four heroes are forced to leave town and barricade themselves inside a shopping mall. But as it turns out, the undead hordes still retain enough of their old selves to feel the need to shop and consume.
The true brilliance of Dawn is how it combined straight-up zombie carnage with a healthy dose of satire and social commentary. At the end of the day, are modern Americans really so different from the shambling undead? They crave warm flesh; we crave iPhones.
- Make-up for zombie actors could total up to three hours.
- The zombies had gray skin because Night of the Living Dead was in black and white.
- Actress Gaylen Ross refused to scream, because she believed her character Fran was too strong to show fear that way.
By 1984 the slasher movie had been done to death (excuse the pun). Just how many masked killers could you see before fatigue set in? But Wes Craven had a brilliant twist on these types of films. First, he created a killer, Freddy Krueger, who instantly stood out from the rest of the pack. His face was burned beyond recognition, but Freddy wore no mask and didn't stay silent.
In fact, he had plenty of cruel taunts for his victims. More importantly, his domain was the dream world, where he could stalk and terrorize without any rules to bind him - if you ran away from him, he could just as easily be waiting for you as you approached. There was nowhere to hide from Freddy because we all have to sleep sometime, right?
Featuring a more relatable group of young characters than most slasher films, A Nightmare on Elm Street made a huge impact upon its release, thanks to its excellent conceit and amazing villain, and Craven's talent at building tension and delivering the goods in his murder scenes. And with Freddy, Craven gave us one of the most popular, durable and recognizable movie characters of all time.
- The film ended up requiring over 500 gallons of fake blood.
- Actor Robert Englund, who plays Freddy Krueger, cut himself the first time he put on the glove.
- No one ever says the words "Elm Street" in the movie.
After Poltergeist, all of a sudden quaint cookie-cutter houses everywhere became haunted death-traps, ravaged by violent Native American ghosts who aren't too pleased about their current state of "unrest."
Director Tobe Hooper and producer Steven Spielberg created a veritable masterwork that took the ghost story out of ancient castles and haunted mansions and shoved it, without apology, into the happy suburban track home.
Almost every single part of this movie is so full of devastating win - from Carol Ann's warbled white-noise voice to freakin' angry trees that bust through your window to grab you - that one is almost able to forgive the less-than-warranted sequels. This house may now be "clean," but your pants are going to need changing.
- While Hooper is the credited director, producer Steven Spielberg has been referred to by many who worked on it as its "de facto" director.
- "The Poltergeist Curse" has long haunted the film's legacy, with two of its young stars dying not long after its release.
- Real skeletons were used for filming at some point in the Poltergeist franchise's history, though it's unclear on which film.
An alien with the ability to take the form of any life that it absorbs infiltrates an Antarctic research base, and soon the 12-man team is up to their eyeballs in slaughter, suspicion and paranoia. John Carpenter's film has itself planted on either side of the horror and sci-fi movie lines.
The Thing plays fair within both genres, but leans more toward horror. The movie takes its time setting up the rules of the creature living amongst our heroes, while more importantly establishing each character - from Windows to MacReady to MacReady's beard - as people we actually worry about. Such attention to character and pacing feels like a lost art at times in the current genre climate.
The practical special effects hold up better than you'd think (save for the stop-motion Blairmonster), and Kurt Russell gives one of his best performances as team leader MacReady. Any self-respecting movie fan should have this in their library.
- Based on John W. Campbell, Jr.'s novella Who Goes There?
- The 1951 film The Thing from Another World was also based on that work, although it dropped the alien's shapeshifting abilities.
- The film opened at number eight at the box office with a poor showing of $3.1 million. Many have blamed its competition, E.T., for this.
Like your films bleak, bloody and full of brutality? Tobe Hooper's gruesome 1974 indie flick took the nefarious inbred mountain folk that we all cringed at in 1972's Deliverance and turned them into an aggressively insane backwoods clan of cannibals. Take a van full of "young adults" on their way to, let’s say, smoke weed and hang out at a cemetery, and let them run out of gas in the wrong part of Texas. Then throw in the skin-suited Leatherface and some meat-hooks and you've got yourself a film that barely found a distributor because of its extreme levels of graphic violence.
Psycho might have been the first "slasher" film per se, but Chainsaw simultaneously elevated and de-elevated the genre with its disturbing levels of sadism. One could also say that the film acted as a precursor to both the "slasher" and "torture porn" genres.
- Leatherface and some plot points in the film were partially inspired by infamous murderer Ed Gein.
- Hooper came up with the chainsaw idea while in the hardware department of a store when he was considering how best to get through the crowd.
- Reports vary on the film's exact budget, which was between $93,000 and $300,000. It would eventually make $30 million theatrically.
Get over Mia Farrow's bad haircut and watch this movie. You'll be surprised how much this unsettling creepshow from 1968 gets away with for, you know, being in 1968. Roman Polanski's most "conventional" film outside of Chinatown is one of his best, telling the slow-burn story of a young New York couple who move into an apartment building... which happens to be home to several Satan worshipers who want to use Rosemary's spawn as a means for Mr. Devil McBrimstone to visit to our mortal realm.
Farrow is perfect in the role of Rosemary; as she slowly unravels, the more she discovers what shady cult dealings are happening all around her. The entire world seems to be conspiring against the most innocent of people here, as the Devil watches from the wings and Rosemary breaks down.
Polanski's "less is more" approach to delivering chills further supports the storytelling rule that the more kept off screen, the more the audience has to imagine, and hence, the scarier.
- Actress Mia Farrow really ate raw liver for a scene.
- The scene where Rosemary walks through oncoming traffic was also real — Polanksi reportedly told her "nobody will hit a pregnant woman."
- Rosemary's Baby, Repulsion, and The Tenant are all part of a loose trilogy exploring the horror of city living.
In 1968, director George Romero took the frightening idea of "zombification," which up until that point had been relegated to creepy voodoo tales and extra-dimensional Lovecraft-ian lore, and created a terrifying new genre of horror: the zombie apocalypse film. "They're coming to get you Barbara" became the first official "I'll be back" of horror, as poor Judith O'Dea has to flee a cemetery because the dead have inexplicably come back to life and started walking the Earth in search of human flesh.
Hitchcock discovered, with 1963's The Birds, that the sheer terror of "not knowing" the reasons behind the sweeping global outbreak of evil can be the most horrifying part of the entire story. The "Zombocalypse" genre is so enduring that it's still going strong today (hello, Walking Dead fans...). Sure, some films have made their zombies run fast and tried to explain the whole dead-alive deal with a virus, and that's all fine. But nothing will ever beat the basics.
With this one film, Romero was able to tap into everything we're afraid of: death, desecration of the flesh, cannibalism, brainwashing, disease and hopelessness. There's also a stinging underlying social message about racism, media and paranoia where viewers got to learn that they could be just as dangerous and cruel as the mindless hordes of undead they were hiding from.
- The creatures in the film are referred to as "ghouls," but never as zombies.
- Romero has acknowledged that the film was directly influenced by Richard Matheson's novel I Am Legend.
- In addition to Romero's Dead sequels, co-writer John Russo launched an alternate sequel series starting with The Return of the Living Dead.
Though more of a "remix" than a sequel, Evil Dead II improves on its predecessor in almost every way. More gore, more comedy, more, more, more... Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell (and Ash!) returned to the woods after six years for Evil Dead II, which leans into the gruesome excess of the first but ups the ante to a ridiculous degree (this was the one where an eyeball flies into a person’s open mouth). Though Evil Dead II didn't invent splat-stick, it sure did perfect it, and went on to influence countless other comedy gross-outs. Groovy.
- Raimi and producer Rob Tapert decided to make a sequel to the first Evil Dead only after their troubled film Crimewave flopped.
- Originally, the film was to have sent Ash back to the Middle Ages.
- Budget constraints, however, meant that story wouldn't be fleshed out until the third film.
Using a serial-killer cannibal with a doctorate to help catch another serial killer is as bare bones as you can get with this Best Picture Oscar winner. But the movie is much more than that. It's the scariest film ever made built around psychology and deduction, with both used as crime-solving tools and murder weapons. Yes, blame this movie all you want for your friend's bad Hannibal Lecter impersonation that never seems to get better, but it gave us one of the screen's all-time iconic villains and Anthony Hopkins the role of his career.
Jodie Foster is also exceptional as FBI Agent Clarice Starling, on the trail of Buffalo "It Puts The Lotion in the Basket" Bill. Director Jonathan Demme is effortless and relentless with his tension here, succeeding where Ridley Scott failed in his 2001 sequel, Hannibal, by keeping Lecter more of a believable monster and less of a monstrous caricature.
This is 1991's best film, according to the Academy, and it's worthy of multiple viewings. We suggest watching it with some fava beans and a nice chianti.
- Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster are only in four scenes together.
- Hopkins studied case files for serial killers and attended real court hearings for murderers in preparation for his role.
- The iconic "Hello, Clarice" is a misquote. The real line is "Good evening, Clarice" — however "Hello, Clarice" is spoken in the sequel.
The scariest movie (maybe even the best one?) Spielberg's ever made, Jaws is equal parts monster movie and character piece, centered on an island called Amity that's preyed upon by something that leaves teeth the size of shot glasses in the hulls of boats and turns their owners into decapitated flotsam. The late Roy Scheider gives a career-defining performance as Chief Brody, the local sheriff with a fear of water who is put in charge of taking down the murder fish.
Joining him on the Orca for the hunt are Richard Dreyfuss' Hooper and Robert "Find 'im for three, catch 'im and kill 'im for 10" Shaw as Quint, the number one cause of death for just about any marine life.
But you already know that. You should have seen this movie at least 10 times by now, thanks to cable and VHS and DVD and Blu-ray and streaming. You've probably contemplated making John Williams' theme your ring tone. This film is made out of the type of movie magic that warrants lots of praise using words like "perfect" and "instant classic."
- Jaws was Hollywood's first summer blockbuster; it was the first film ever to earn $100 million within the first 60 days of its release.
- Three notoriously unreliable mechanical sharks, all nicknamed "Bruce" after director Steven Spielberg's lawyer, were used.
- The island of Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts was used as the shooting location of Amity island.
Alien movies are generally thought of as being planted in the science fiction realm. However, with the original at least, Alien was as much a horror film as a sci-fi one. With a small cast being hunted by a lone, terrifying creature, Alien was a long way removed from the Star Wars and Star Treks of Hollywood.
Alien is set several centuries in the future when humanity has ventured into the stars. The crew of the mining vessel Nostromo become unwitting hosts to a bloodthirsty alien lifeform, and one by one they fall to an enemy that hides in the shadows and springs from above. Only Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) is savvy enough to survive the alien's onslaught. Too bad for her it was only the first round.
Alien doesn't resemble many sci-fi movies of the time. Artist H.R. Giger designed a world full of twisted tubes, cold hallways, and pervasive darkness. Before Alien, pop culture never warned us how dark, dirty and scary the cold depths of space were. Director Ridley Scott adopted a "less is more" approach that later sequels sadly abandoned; modern directors can cram all the Aliens and Engineers they want into their films, but none can match the sheer claustrophobic terror generated in the original film.
- The dead facehugger's internal organs were created using a sheep kidney, shellfish, and oysters.
- The Xenomorph only has four minutes of screentime.
- The Alien was given acid blood when nobody could think of a reason why the Nostromo crew wouldn't just shoot it dead.
Certainly there were those of us on the IGN staff who argued that this James Whale classic should've been higher on our list - perhaps even number one. But compromise being what it is, Whale, Colin Clive, Boris Karloff and the rest have had to settle for fifth place.
The film is the apex of the Universal cycle of classic monster pictures in terms of quality. Rather than simply regurgitating a cheap variation on the first Frankenstein (which is basically what many of the Universal sequels would go on to do), Whale opted to, ahem, flesh out the story and characters of the original (which he also directed). Karloff, in his second turn as the Monster, granted his most famous creation the gift of speech here, and of friendship, and even love. Also, of humor -- Bride of Frankenstein is a comedy as much as it is a horror film.
Brimming with wonderful side characters (oh, Doctor Pretorius, how we miss you) and often unsettling imagery (Jesus H. Christ, did they just crucify the Monster?), the film is over 80 years old and we're still talking about it - and loving it. To paraphrase Doctor Pretorius, "It is our only weakness."
- Universal started to consider a sequel as early as the first film's preview screenings in 1931.
- But since Dr. Frankenstein died in that original cut, a happy ending had to be tacked on so that Clive could return for a sequel.
- Karloff didn't like the Monster's newfound ability to speak in Bride. No worries; the character would revert to being mute in the next film.
Psycho can be seen as the film that birthed the slasher genre and Texas Chain Saw Massacre was an integral step in its progress, making things more visceral. But it was Halloween that truly defined this subgenre in horror, inspiring a million sequels, rip-offs, imitations and homages. Take an instantly identifiable holiday, add in a chillingly silent, unstoppable masked killer and a feisty, resourceful heroine and you have Halloween... and of course all the films that came after it.
But John Carpenter brought a sense of tension and suspense few others could match in a slasher film, as we watched Michael Myers stalk Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) from afar, before going on his inevitable killing spree.
Michael himself is an excellent villain, wearing a blank, emotionless mask that perfectly captured the black soul of someone who simply killed and killed, and seemingly couldn't be stopped, no matter what you did to him. It's no wonder Michael became a horror icon and that fans rebelled when he didn't appear in Halloween III. After all, Michael Myers and Halloween - both the film and the actual holiday - are now forever intertwined.
- Halloween grossed $47 million at the box office — the modern day equivalent of $150 million.
- Its massive success, combined with its meager $300,00 budget, makes it one of the most successful indie films in history.
- The mask Michael Meyers wears is a slightly modified Captain Kirk mask spraypainted white.
Psycho is both one of the greatest thrillers of all time and one of the greatest entries in Alfred Hitchcock's legendary resume. A true master of suspense and tension, Hitchcock crafted a memorable horror experience with a limited cast and even more limited budget. Like so many great horror movies, Psycho's scares far exceed its scale.
Psycho is the story of crazy old Norman Bates and his even crazier mother. When a young woman on the run from the law arrives at the remote Bates Motel, she falls victim to a knife-wielding killer. Several more victims are claimed before the killer is brought to justice and the true secret of the Bates family stands revealed.
The content of Psycho isn't as shocking as it was way back in 1960. After all, girls get stabbed in the shower all the time in modern horror cinema. However, it's a testament to Hitchcock's skill as a director that Psycho remains a tense and nerve-wracking experience. The killing of Janet Leigh's character and the accompanying Bernard Herrmann musical key is one of the most iconic scenes in Hollywood history.
Psycho is such a classic of the genre that it inspired a shot-for-shot remake in 1998. It's also had sequels and a TV show based on the tale.
- Alfred Hitchcock loved Bernard Herrmann's score so much he doubled his salary, citing that 1/3 of Psycho's effect was thanks to the music.
- One shot in the infamous shower scene uses a custom-made shower head with a 6 foot diameter so the water would spray around the camera lens.
- Hitchcock's personal earnings for the film exceeded $15 million, which is worth $120 million today, adjusted for inflation.
"Tubular Bells" is the scariest music arrangement ever made. We hear it and we're the scaredy cat equivalent of Pavlov's Dog - the Satan bells ring, and we tense up, scream and get all incontinent. More than once. And then cry ourselves to sleep with one eye open.
The movie's premise - a little girl possessed by a demon - is scary enough as words on paper. But what director William Friedkin does with it, aside from prove that he has a seriously strong (or frightfully off) constitution for this sort of stuff, is treat the extraordinary of it all as if it were really happening next door to us.
The scares come from a place based in Faith, where Heaven and hell are as real as your beliefs in them care to be. Faith, for all the documentation on the subject, is tethered to the intangible; it's not something science can define or strategize. The demon that comes from The Exorcist's interpretation of that idea is something more powerful than a Freddy or a Jason. Something that can't be shot or stabbed or detonated.
Before it can be attacked, let alone defeated, it has to be first believed in - as terrible and soul-threatening as this may be to the young priest and old priest charged with delivering the climatic exorcism. Fathers Karras and Merrin spend the third act of the movie fighting back the Devil for control of young Regan's soul. And in doing so, Karras, a man of wavering faith throughout most of the movie, finally believes in the only true good he knows by sacrificing himself to save that little girl.
Film-school analyze this movie more if you want. Bottom line: It is the best horror movie about the consequences of belief ever made. It is the reason why so many exorcism movies still flood the marketplace.
- Max von Sydow was only 44 when he made The Exorcist. Artist Dick Smith applied extensive makeup to make him appear significantly older.
- Oscar-winner Mercedes McCambridge (All the King's Men, Giant) provided the voice of the demon. She was not initially credited for it.
- Peter Blatty's original novel was inspired by an actual 1949 case of demonic possession and exorcism.
Stanley Kubrick's movie adaptation of The Shining is almost certainly the most popular Stephen King film. The project was an unusually commercially-focused one for Kubrick, but the same stylistic elements that defined his earlier films were on full display, and the film remains a haunting and unsettling chronicle of a family man's psychological breakdown.
Jack Nicholson plays Jack Torrance in this adaptation. Torrance is a struggling writer who accepts a job as winter caretaker for the Overlook Hotel in the Colorado Mountains. The knowledge that the previous caretaker had gone insane and murdered his family fails to scare Jack away. but when both Jack and his psychically attuned son begin communing with the many spirits haunting the Overlook, things quickly take a turn for the worse. Deadly hedge mazes, elevators full of blood and the terrifying Room 237 are only some of the horrors that await viewers.
Aside from being a genuinely scary film, The Shining has left its mark on modern pop culture. Who doesn't recognize the image of Nicholson poking his head through a doorway and shouting "Here's Johnny!"? The Shining also served as fodder for one of the best "Treehouse of Horror" segments in the history of The Simpsons.
The film is required viewing for any horror aficionado - just don't expect to sleep easily that night - and our pick for the best horror movie ever made.
- The iconic “Here’s Johnny!” scene took three days to film and involved 60 doors.
- Child actor Danny Lloyd thought he was shooting a drama rather than a horror, and wasn’t shown an uncut version of the film until he was 17.
- The MPAA banned blood in "all audience" trailers — to convince them to use the infamous elevator scene, Kubrick claimed it was rusty water.
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