its october and the only horror movies i've watched are scream 1-3. they are ok for what they are (deconstruction of horror tropes via murder mystery), but i need something spicier. something existentially horrifying, not just a wrinkly monster chase or a crazy guy hacking up white girls. something that follows you out of the movie and changes how you think about the world for a few days before you're normal again. stuff that pulls at the threads of your understanding of reality. a lot of so called psychological thrillers do this but thats not specifically what i'm looking for as much as existential terror.
since i created this post i'll start with suggestions of my own
1 - SKINAMARINK
watch this without any research or info going in. all i will say is that there is limited dialogue and the amount of times you see a face or character asymptotically approaches zero. watch while stoned for maximum effect.
2 - They Look Like People
psychological thriller, avoiding spoilers but i'll say that it mayyybe leans into some problematic ableist tropes relating to mental health common to the horror genre. i have a friend that loves this movie and relates to it strongly for mental health reasons though so i might be over- or under- analyzing.
3 - The Lighthouse
monochrome period piece. 2 boys 1 lighthouse. you can probably predict how this goes but the execution is so worth it, the actors are amazing and the cinematography is excellent.
thats pretty much all i got, i haven't seen that many movies.
Definitely check out The Witch (2015) if you haven't already, it's from the same director as The Lighthouse.
Candyman (1992) is one of the greatest gothic horror films of all time IMO. The premise makes it sound like a cheesy slasher movie but it's actually quite beautiful and profound.
I'd also recommend the original Hellraiser (1987) and Possession (1981). Really I could go on, but I'll keep the list short.
Candyman is a great horror flick. I was about 13-14 when it came out. I got dropped off at the local cinema to meet a friend to go watch it since his brother worked the ticket booth and we could get in that way. The Candyman scared me, and Virginia Madsen made me feel some sort of way. Good tines.
Idk if the VVitch caused any existential fear but it was so atmospheric and the landscapes so similar to the local forests that it had me a feeling little anxious in the woods for a few days after.
spoiler
which is impressive in retrospect since the movie doesn't really have a spooky monster or malevolent being that'll 'jump out and get you', for me it just strongly associated that winter season dreary grey pine forest vibe with creeping dread
Skinamarink was awful. Don't fall for this, people. They're trying to trick us into watching bad YouTube ARGs stretched out to feature length.
Skinamarink was unlike any feature-length film I’ve seen, but not exactly in a good way. Like I kind of enjoyed it, but I hesitate to recommend it to anyone unless they’re into ‘challenging’ kinds of movies. I don’t really have any desire to watch it again.
It did have the side effect of this video being made so it’s not all bad https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qQ1NDTHA85I&pp=ygUZc2tpbmFtYXJpbmsgZGVsZXRlZCBzY2VuZQ%3D%3D
I watched with a friend and we ended up watching it at 1.5 speed just so it could end faster
The film felt wrong like staring at a single, unmoving object for an hour, yes.
Of the bat I should say say my tastes are for the more surreal, psychological and Lovecraftian/Cosmic horror stuff.
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Possession - Zulawski. Massive content warning: extreme and disturbing violence. There is psychological and sexual violence in this film. That being said it's one of my top movie experiences of all time. I definitely don't recommend this if you struggle at all with those things in horror (or horror in general). If you are fine with this in art then best going in as blind as possible. Also very arthouse.
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On the Silver Globe - also by Zulawski. You wouldn't know this has horror elements until you watch it. Alot of people wouldn't call it horror but I think the horrific aspects struck me very strongly when I saw it recently. Again massive content warning as it is quite disturbing. Very surreal and difficult to follow (partly because the full version is not available as it was destroyed by the Polish government at the time).
Other Zulawski films with horror elements: Third Part of the Night, Devil. His films tend to be very surreal, with the emphasis on psychological and Lovecraftian or cosmic horror, expressed through more immediate, concrete, domestic or historical events.
- Twin Peaks - S1, S2, Fire Walk With Me, S3. A Masterpiece. Especially the ending of S2, FWWM and all of S3. David Lynch.
- Mulholland Drive, Lost Highway, Eraserhead, Blue Velvet. All classics with dream-logic surrealism and Lovecraftian horror elements. All by Lynch.
For some weird British horror by Ken Russell (I can still scarcely believe that a straight man made these films), which also have some comedic elements:
- Gothic - hysterically camp psychological horror
- The Devils - hail Satan
- Lair of the White Worm - surreal comedic folk horror. Has a young Hugh Grant. Also I don't care what you're sexuality is but no way it couldn't be affected by Amanda Donohoe in this.
Related to that is another Polish classic: Mother Joan of the Angels. This is actually about the same series of events as the Russell's The Devils, but set in the aftermath of the event depicted in that film. That being said the films are also very different in tone. The Poles in general are excellent at horror for some reason.
Also there are honestly also a bunch of American horror classics:
- Alien - gets more terrifying to me the older I get.
- The Thing
- Nightmare on Elm street - I was pleasantly surprised by this once. Expected it to be trash.
- Rosemary's Baby - by Polanski, just so you know. Hail Satan.
- The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - I also also surprised by this. Also thought it would be garbage.
- Reanimator
- Carrie
- Beyond
- Prince of Darkness
- In the Mouth of Madness
- Dawn of the Dead
- Day of the Dead
- Psycho
- The Birds
- The Fly
- Videodrome
- Alice in Wonderland - yes the Disney one. This scared the bejeezus out of me as a child. There's also a classic Soviet-Ukrainian version you can find on Dailymotion in two parts.
- The Love Witch - more a modern satire and homage than actual horror but worth the watch.
An interesting recent guy is obviously Robert Eggers, whose been revitalizing Folk Horror:
- The Witch
- The Lighthouse
The Brits are also low-key very good at Folk Horror:
- Blood on Satan's Claw
- Witchfinder General
- The Wicker Man
- A Field in England
- Enys Men
- Penda's Fen
- Werewolf in London
Another British classic:
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Peeping Tom
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Mystic's in Bali for interesting non-Western stuff.
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Viy for Russian folk horror.
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A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night
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Let the Right one In
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Jonathan - a German Vampire film that makes clear the class-warfare angle on Vampires.
Also recomment Dario Argento. Suspiria is legit a classic. Just don't think too hard about the plots. Also Lucio Fulci. See City of the Living Dead and The Beyond. Very gory.
Another very weird and gory one in the same ballpark at Fulci is the cult classic Messiah of Evil.
Also worth saying that some old classics like Nosferatu (1922) and The Cabinet of Dr Caligari are still worth a watch, especially if you're interested in the evolution of cinema as an artform and aesthetic language. Still trippy.
The Herzog Nosferatu is also a classic imo. The Hammer Dracula films with Christopher Lee are very silly but I like them. Coppolo's Dracula is an underrated classic and I'm tired of pretending otherwise.
There's also several Japanese horror classics (obvs):
- Cure
- Pulse (Kairo) - both these are are Kiyoshi Kurosawa
- Ringu
- Onibaba
- Keroneko
- Jigoku
- Hausu - this is so batshit insane it's unbelievable.
- Kwaidan
- Horrors of Malformed Men - literally some of the craziest shit I've seen.
- Pandemonium
- Angel's Egg
- Perfect Blue: content warning sexual violence.
- Vampire Hunter D
- Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust
- Genocyber - content warning this is super gory.
- NInja Scroll: content warning sexual violence.
- Devilman: The Birth
- Devilman: Demon Bird Sirène
Lair of the White Worm also has a young Peter Capaldi in it, which rules. I love him.
Also you reminded me I've seen Horrors of Malformed Men before and blocked out the memories. What a fucking weird movie.
Holy shit ofc how did I forget Capaldi. Legendary.
Yh when i watched Horrors of Malformed Men I was three joints in and that was too much honestly. Really next level. Like it just gets more and more insane.
If you liked that you might also like Dogura Magura by Toshio Matsumoto. Also disturbing. Same guy who did Funeral Parade of Roses (masterpiece imo).
Ive been going through Yoshihige Yoshida's stuff over the last year as well as he's quick become one of my fav directors.
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I am surprised no one mentioned my all time favorite: The Fly by David Cronenberg with Jeff Goldblum.
Most horror movies present you with an external threat. The good protagonist is threatened by external forces like zombies, murderers, psychopaths etc. The Fly is different in that there isn't really a bad guy. You identify with the monster just as much as with their victim.
For me that makes a much more powerful horror experience, because in my day to day life I don't have any meaningful external threats. Sure, there are thieves, murderers, angry mobs etc. in our world, but it's not like I woke up hoping that today I wouldn't meet one of them.
But this fear of losing control over yourself, lashing out at your children, saying something wrong at work or losing control in a very different way like finding out you have a tumor that has been growing inside of you for a long time - those threats are much more real to me.
I’d recommend
- REC
- The Babadook
- Saint Maud
- Barbarian
- The Descent
- The Changling (1981)
- The Platform
- You’re Next
Also what other people posted
The Changling (1981)
I didn't care for that one myself I felt the protagonist was only tangentially involved in the plot
Aww that’s unfortunate but I can understand. I felt like it was not actually a horror movie but rather a political thriller. The score is amazing in it
I just found it frustrating how much more engaging the film would have been if
spoiler
the protagonist was the changeling which would have made him more involved in the story
also the university having a psychic research department was lame as it makes having ghosts like having termites or mould in the house, a pain in the ass recognised thing that can happen in old houses
The original Night of the Living Dead does so much with its limited resources, actors, and locations. I just rewatched it because of the recent Movie Mindset episode about it, and it's still a gut punch of a movie. There's a reason it's the granddaddy of the zombie genre.
Your namesake, Dumplings, was fun iirc. Lady makes age defying dumplings, hijinks ensue
my name is a reference for the peak genre of posting/alienating everyone around you (thus achieving the coveted status of 'non-posting'), but i'll check it outSame director made Imprint. Now that is a fucked up movie
Annihilation, Event Horizon, Color out of Space, and on a lighter note: Glorious
My impression of horror as a genre is basically that the point is "here's some bad stuff happening to some people. Sure does get the blood pumping to imagine it could happen to you!" Which is why I never watch horror because that just isn't interesting or enjoyable for me at all. I like seeing good things happen to nice people who then live nice lives, as a general rule.
Am I missing something about horror or is that basically it?
I've enjoyed a little bit of horror, like certain Junji Ito works which seem less like "here's some bad stuff happening to people" and more like "here's some wacky shit happening to people and it's unclear whether it could even be defined as good or bad all things considered" but even most of his are still "wow, this person's life really sucks, wanna see it get even worse?"
Seeing good things happening to nice people never lets them show off what they're really made of. Its easy to be nice when nothing bad is happening to you. Its much harder when your world is falling apart. Also, I like monsters
it's hard to define what does it for me, 99% of the time it doesn't scare me, sometimes it's unsettling, but most of the time it's just a movie that has darker-than-usual themes and subject matter that rides or dies on the same hills of any other genre. impress me with clever craft & interesting ideas, give me insurgent political ideas under the thinnest of pretenses. make me laugh.
"horror" gets to be a very diverse and creative genre because it is not for children, but generally not taken seriously either, so they're allowed to be very left wing---as all biblically accurate zombie films are
In the most mainstream, I think that both Ari Aster and Jordan Peele are challenging the ruts the genre has gotten itself in to. Midsommar effected me for days.
A while back, I ran across Hagazussa. Its a difficult watch (content warning for extreme sexual violence and infanticide), but it also has that quality of reality unbound. Its slow, atmospheric, and terrible.
I loved Midsommar and just saw Hereditary and thought it was fantastic although a little scattered. Midsommar predicts the liberal obsession with Nazis in Ukraine IMO.
Beau is Afraid is also either a comedy or horror movie depending on who's watching it
Stalker may fit. It's not a scary movie, but I think it could be considered existential horror - though not quite in a tragic or hopeless sense.
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I rewatched The Descent last night. It's very creepy and claustrophic.
A caving expedition goes horribly wrong, as the explorers become trapped and ultimately pursued by a strange breed of predators.
To create the mood - there must have been some CGI and at times they surely were filming on sets but the direction, photography, and set design worked in concert. I really felt like I was underground with them.
