A Sampling of Jon’s Favorite Horror Movies
Horror movies. Why do I love them? Am I a sicko? No doubt, but there must be more to it than that. Admittedly, horror movies can have a salacious element. Girls often lose their tops (and/or, bottoms) and both sexes often encounter violence in conjunction with the commission of some feral sexual impropriety, but that stuff usually happens in the sub-genre of “slashers” and I’m not really into slashers. A clique of obnoxious teenagers getting hacked to death? Please pass me the axe! I’m not a big fan of jump scare horror, in general.
What I do enjoy is ominous, brooding horror centered around psychological, pagan, borderline supernatural or apocalyptic themes. Enjoy? Is that the best word to use in that sentence? Because that does indeed sound a little sick. How about “fascinate?” Horror, done well in those veins, fascinates me. (That doesn’t sound much better, does it … 🤪)
I could recommend a long list of unsettling, thought-provoking, mesmerizing, mind-bending, or otherwise superior-in-one-aspect-or-another, horror movies, but I will limit it to 10 selections. These are not necessarily my 10 all-time favorites and they’re in no particlular order, but they do represent a wide range of sub-genres. It's fair to say that the horror genre has undergone a bit of a renaissance in terms of both quality and quantity since around the turn of the 21st century, and the list reflects that.
2008
The Swedish original, although the American remake is not bad, either. A story about the transition to young adolescence, touching on themes like bullying, friendship, loyalty and dismemberment. Good human interest stuff.
2017
The most psychedelic selection on the list. It’s pretty hallucinatory from start to finish. Parts of it are quite brutal. The opening credits with the character played by Nicholas Cage felling a tree against the backdrop of a cloud-covered Pacific Northwestern forest while King Crimson's Starless and Bible Black plays over the scene is amazing.
2020
Another story set in a forest. There is a family. There is a wolf. There are hunters. There is prey. An aside: I think I picked up on an important plot point in this movie that I've never seen mentioned in a review.
2011
Two friends, former special forces soldiers who now kill for hire — one of whom is in a bad place, emotionally — are paid to exterminate some nasty people. Then things start to get weird.
1999
A man desires to data a special lady. Their relationship gets off on the wrong foot.
2019
Graduate students are introduced to a community of Scandanavian neo pagans and decide to study their ways. There might be a good thesis in this ... The pagans have other ideas. Cue the festivities!
1961
A quiet but affecting ghost story about the persistence and manifestation of evil. Even as a young adult, it made me a little afraid of the dark. There are a few other movies with this title including a fine, but unrelated Swedish horror from 2021, but what I'm referring to here is the 1961 production directed by Jack Clayton
2014
Small clues here and there hint that this film’s story may play out is some alternate reality just a bit askew from our own. Wherever it is, the characters in this world are pursued by a malevolent and determined force that’s fixated on a particular act.
2015
A soft-spoken audio engineer travels to Italy to produce the soundtrack for an Giallo horror. This is not a typical motion picture for him. As work progresses, the man’s emotional state, shall we say, deteriorates. I have a keen interest in audio production, so that part of the movie facinated me. YMMV.
2008
I had to include at least one “found footage” horror. I am a sucker for them. I watch even the bad ones. This is a remake of the Spanish found footage film, [REC]. Typically reviewed less kindly than the Spanish original, in my opinion Quaratine is superior.