It's not just that Oddity is scary – it's how many different ways that the film finds to terrify you that's most impressive. The tension begins with a knock at the door. A young woman awaiting her husband's return is greeted by a strange man who has come to warn her that she is not alone. He's a patient of her husband's, he says, and while he may have been stalking her, he now only has her safety in mind.
Early on, Longlegs feels like it will coast along as a riff on Silence of the Lambs. In it, a young detective pursues a serial killer in a case that slowly starts consuming her life. But while it starts more eerie than scary, Nicolas Cage's unforgettable turn as the titular killer brings the film to another level, delivering goosebumps in the truckload, and adding an unexpected supernatural element as well.
Horror comedies have been around since the early days of film, but in almost every case, the moment humour is introduced, the horror dissipates entirely. Barbarian, the directorial debut of former sketch comedian Zach Cregger, somehow manages both.
When global lockdowns began during the pandemic in 2020, people worldwide pledged that they would use that time to create their masterpiece. Director Rob Savage may have been the first person to achieve that goal.
In it, a seemingly normal elderly couple are mourning the loss of their grandson. But while they may be easygoing in their demeanour, they secretly worship darker forces, determined to find a vessel that could bring their beloved progeny back from the dead. And while it could easily have veered into familiar and gory territory, the film has a restrained take that allows an unsettling feeling to take hold instead.
Nope, Jordan Peele's third film, is perhaps both his best and most perplexing. It's about many things: aliens, paranoia, grief, poverty, all wrapped in the general anxiety in modern-day America. But most importantly, this is about the human obsession with spectacle and the subsequent exploitation of it for monetary gain. It's even a commentary on the history of cinema, and how everything can be sacrificed for the sake of that one perfect shot.
Sometimes you never know where the best horror talent will get their start. In 2022, a giggling pair of YouTuber twin brothers from Australia named Danny and Michael Philippou somehow gave the world one of the scariest films in recent memory.
Starring David Dastmalchian, Late Night with the Devil shows the downfall of a late-night talk show host whose ratings drop so he must resort to cheap tactics such as a Halloween episode in which he hosts a cast of guests that attempt to communicate with the dead.
2Directed by David Prior, a regular collaborator of filmmaker David Fincher, The Empty Man is unlike any other horror movie in recent years. It dances between genres and explores familiar themes – spooky cults, disappearances, murder and supernatural beings – but it does it all with a singular vibe that hooks it all together. Something feels off from the start, and that unease doesn't dissipate until the twist ending.
The 2024 remake of Speak No Evil starring James McAvoy received rave reviews upon release, but it doesn’t hold a candle to the Danish original from 2022. Some films are scary because of a lurking unknown force of evil like a ghost or monster, others are scary because of the prospect of being the victim of a serial killer.