It's October, and we're just a few weeks away from Halloween, so you're probably looking for something scary to watch. Netflix offers up a plethora of fantastic horror movies both classic and new, from The Shining to The Babadook, but the service offers up some great hidden gems as well. Here are some movies you might have scrolled passed that you should give a shot.
Hush (2016)
The cover art for Hush does not do it justice one bit. You've probably passed this one by a few times, thinking it looks like your typical home invasion story. If so, you're wrong. Hush follows a deaf woman who is stalked by a masked killer outside of her secluded home. The soundtrack and score play heavily into the feeling and tone of the film, and it's a nice spin on a tale we've seen many times.
Housebound (2014)
Blurring the lines between horror and comedy is the Australian movie Housebound. A woman returns to her childhood home after being put on house arrest, but something suspicious is going on in the house. Is it haunted or does she have an overactive imagination? Housebound is a weird movie, in the best way possible. It hits comedic beats better than many other comedies, but the movie still delivers some good horror. Australians create magic when they make scary movies.
The Host (2006)
Korea's The Host is a wonderful reimagining of the giant monster subgenre of horror films. A horrific beast emerges from Seoul's Han river and starts attacking people. A family comes together in order to rescue a loved one who has been taken by the monster. It's a horror movie with a great heart to it, and one of the best giant monster movies of the past 20 years.
The Wailing (2016)
Korea likes to make horror films that are a bit more complex and cross over into other genres, like The Host. In The Wailing, a diseased stranger comes to a village and the sickness starts spreading, which leads to a bunch of murders. While this is a horror film, it's also a mystery which follows two police officers' investigation of this disease. It may not be the film you're expecting, but it gives viewers a different perspective on horror.
REC 4: Apocalypse (2014)
You're more than likely familiar with the found footage movie Quarantine, which is the American remake of the first REC film. Manuela Velasco returns as Angela, the ill-fated reporter from REC and its sequel. This time, she's stuck on a freight ship in the middle of the ocean, and the virus she's dealt with before is back. REC 4 isn't the strongest in the series, but it is a nice way to wrap up Angela's story. There is a sense of claustrophobia along with the terror of seeing zombie-like creatures chasing down the cast, so the horror comes from multiple levels.
It Follows (2014)
One of the best horror films of 2014 was It Follows, which was an hour and 40 minute movie promoting abstinence. The movie follows a young woman who becomes stalked by a malevolent being, which moves at a slow walking pace, but will kill the person it's following if it reaches them. The only way to get rid of it is to have sex with someone else, but if the person you passed it onto dies, the being comes back after you. Aside from scaring the audience into not having sex, the movie plays into paranoia exceptionally well, and at no point in time do the characters ever truly feel safe.
Clown (2014)
Do you suffer from coulrophobia, the fear of clowns? Well, Clown isn't for you then. The 2014 film follows a father who finds an old clown costume, which he wears to perform at his son's birthday. However, the costume is cursed, and he actually becomes a demonic clown that eats children. On paper, this sounds like a dumb movie, but it's actually pretty fun as it creates a really cool fictional lore for the dark history of clowns.
The Pact (2012)
This is another horror movie where the Netflix image doesn't do it justice. The Pact follows a young woman who returns to her childhood home after the death of her mother. She has her sister come visit her, but soon after, the sister disappears. She finds something weird is going on in the home. There is a lot more to the film than the synopsis lets on, as it contains a slew of twists and turns before the credits roll. It does have a bit of a slow start, but the overall payoff is well worth it.
Train to Busan (2016)
We've already brought up Korean horror a few times, but without a doubt, Train to Busan is one of the country's most important exports. Not only that, but it's also one of the best zombie films in the entire genre. The film follows a man and his daughter, who are on a train to--you guessed it--Busan; however, there's a zombie outbreak, which quickly infects the passengers. What makes this such an amazing film is that it's incredibly intense, as it's just as much of an action or disaster film as it is about zombies. You will not be disappointed with this one.
Under the Shadow (2016)
Taking place in Tehran during the Iraq/Iran war in the 1980s, Under the Shadow follows a woman whose husband is called away to war, so she must care for her daughter, while bombs drop on the city. While this is all happening, a Djinn haunts their home, and the two cannot leave. This movie is a slow burn, building tension instead of focusing on jump scares. What's really interesting is the way it includes Middle Eastern lore as the backbone of the movie. Under the Shadow feels new and familiar at the same time.
The Hallow (2015)
The Hallow does a fine job at mixing a few familiar tropes within the world of horror and creating something wildly entertaining. Without giving too much away, the movie follows a family who has moved into a remote cabin in the woods. Locals warn the family about an area called "The Hallow," which contains fairies and baby stealers. As you can guess, things go pretty downhill for the family once they learn this, with their windows being broken and more. On the surface, this seems like a typical horror movie on Netflix, but what separates it is the growing tension, how the film incorporates legends and lore, and some great shocking moments.
Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994)
If you're interested in watching any of the Nightmare on Elm Street movies, you should watch the first one and then Wes Craven's New Nightmare. It follows actress Heather Langenkamp, a decade after she starred in the original Nightmare on Elm Street. She's being terrorized over the phone by someone that sounds like Freddy Krueger, and things get even stranger when she learns director Wes Craven is planning another Nightmare film. The story for New Nightmare is a home run, as it's the scariest version of Freddy yet, even though it's not technically Krueger, just a demon using his form. Aside from the nostalgia factor, you should watch this as it's simply a great horror film.
VHS 2 (2013)
Finally, there's VHS 2, the follow-up to the 2012 horror anthology. This time, there's a more cohesive story connecting everything, as a two private detectives searching for a missing girl find a collection of VHS tapes in a house they broke into. The contents of the tapes are bizarre, gruesome, and haunting. Each story in VHS 2 offers up something unique and horrifying, from ghosts to cults to zombies to alien abductions. Out of the three VHS films, this is the strongest in terms of storytelling and overall production.
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