For Halloween, or any time of the year, it’s important to know where to conveniently access quality horror movies. If you have Amazon Prime, you’ve got a virtual library of scary horror movies at your fingertips. We’ve rounded up the best of them!
For this list, everything that’s scary is fair game. We’ve included titles released as recently as this year–and there are influential silents from the early days of cinema, too.
In no particular order (they’ve all earned a solid recommendation at least) here are the 20 best and most frightening horror movies you can stream right now on Amazon’s Prime Video.
1. Carrie (1976)
A mesmerizing masterpiece and one of the most iconic genre pictures ever, Brian De Palma‘s vibrantly stylish adaptation of Stephen King‘s first novel is just as effective now as it was four decades ago. Sissy Spacek stars as a barbarically bullied high school student who unleashes telekinetic fire and fury upon her classmates.
For its first hour, Carrie is a deliriously entertaining, star-studded tragicomedy. Then [spoiler alert] the prom scene bloodbath hits; in 2018 it will still make your blood run cold. Carrie has been remade numerous times (even the sequel, 1999’s The Rage, was essentially a remake) and none of the other versions are much good at all. Notably, other Carrie‘s really stumble by showing the girl enjoying, relishing her bloody vengeance. The way Spacek plays it—the meek Carrie snaps under the cruelty and humiliation, losing control of her powers—is so much more frightening, disturbing and even moving. Spacek and Piper Laurie, who plays Carrie’s violently fanatical mother, were both nominated for Oscars, an unprecedented feat for a horror movie.
2. The Blair Witch Project (1999)
Before the parodies and long before the found footage genre lost its novelty, Eduardo Sánchez and Daniel Myrick‘s micro-budgeted The Blair Witch Project, an innovative work of wondrous and horrid imagination, was one of the most frightening motion pictures of all time.
A lot of horror pictures have created some terrifying visuals before, sure (we’ll cover German Expressionism later in this list), but no scene in a movie will ever be as scary as what we can create in our heads with our imaginations. The Blair Witch Project knows that, and it preys on that.
Turn off the lights. Turn off your phone. Immerse yourself in this movie. By the end of it, you’ll just want to cover yourself with a blanket, perhaps paralyzed with fear. It’s the kind of scary that stays with you for days, maybe forever.
Both Blair Witch sequels: 2000’s Book of Shadows and 2016’s Blair Witch, are hilarious, unfortunately.
Related: The Best Movies Set Each of the 50 States
3. Night of the Living Dead (1968)
Directed, photographed, edited and co-written by George A. Romero, then a kid in his mid-20s, this minimalist frightfest about a siege of zombies in Western Pennsylvania pushed the limits of explicit gore. What’s more, it played around the U.S. as a kiddie matinee when it first came out because the modern rating system hadn’t yet been put into place.
Renowned today for its social commentary as well as its ability to scare the living daylights out of people, this was the top-grossing film in Europe in 1969, and it earned nearly 300 times its budget during its initial release.
In 1999, the Library of Congress selected Night of the Living Dead for preservation in the National Film Registry for being “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant,” and in 2001 the American Film Institute named it one of the most heart-pounding movies ever made.
The graphic violence and the utterly depressing, nihilistic ending are still shocking after 50 years. To be fair, Romero one-upped himself a decade later: 1978’s Dawn of the Dead remains, to this day, the best zombie film ever made.
Related: How Watching Movies in a Cemetery Became a Los Angeles Must
4. Nosferatu (1922)
German Expressionism rejected objective reality, using heightened, distorted images to convey powerful emotions. F.W. Murnau‘s unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker‘s Dracula (the first screen adaptation of the novel) is one of the key films of this movement. Nosferatu won’t make you jump like so many modern horror films, but its grotesque beauty will haunt you in ways few other works of art can.
Nosferatu wasn’t released in the United States until 1929, seven years after its German release. It was remade, beautifully, by Werner Herzog in 1979. Another remake reuniting The VVitch‘s Robert Eggers and Anya Taylor-Joy has been rumored for a few years. That sounds like horror heaven.
5. Frailty (2001)
The most underrated picture on this list, Bill Paxton‘s directorial debut is an exquisitely written, shot and performed psychological thriller. Paxton stars as widowed blue-collar worker whose two young sons are witness to his gruesome serial slayings, which he says an angel of God commands him to commit. Frailty co-stars Matthew McConaughey and Powers Boothe. If you’ve never seen it, now’s your chance.
Frailty received generally positive reviews upon release, and some critics (rightly) pointed out that the film is very special. Roger Ebert said: “Frailty is an extraordinary work, concealing in its depths not only unexpected story turns but also implications, hidden at first, that make it even deeper and more sad.”
Related: Bill Paxton’s Greatest Roles of All Time
6. mother! (2017)
Darren Aronofsky‘s slow-burn freakout features Jennifer Lawrence walking around in a big farmhouse for two hours, and it’s a metaphor for Mother Earth and the Book of Genesis. This was the most divisive movie of 2017, which is saying something: mother! received mostly positive reviews, it tanked at the box office, some critics called it a masterpiece, mostly everyone agreed it’s deeply disturbing–but A.O. Scott of The New York Times called it “a hoot!”
mother! is not as profound as it thinks it is, but Aronofsky can stage escalating set pieces better than just about anyone working today, and you simply must hand it to him–few contemporary auteurs if any can get that kind of all-over-the-map public response from a single flick.
Related: Why Mother! Failed at the Box Office
7. It Comes At Night (2017)
Hollywood wunderkind Trey Edward Shults‘ follow-up to his knockout debut Krisha received high praise from critics but didn’t fare as well with audiences, doing only so-so at the box office. This is mostly because of the pic’s misguided marketing.
Starring the ever-reliable Joel Edgerton, Carmen Ejogo and Riley Keough, It Comes at Night is an unnervingly quiet, contained and claustrophobic drama about an escalating war of fear and suspicions between two families stranded together in a cabin after an outbreak has ravaged the world. So of course some audiences were let down when the trailers clearly promoted a jump-scares-heavy rollercoaster in the vein of The Nun and The Conjuring about a monster in the woods (or something like that).
It’s important to go into It Comes at Night with some idea of what to expect: this isn’t horror that goes boo! a lot; Shults is far more concerned with exploring the horrors of the human heart and mind.
Related: Read Parade‘s Review of It Comes At Night
8. Unsane (2018)
A characteristically dynamite Claire Foy is the main draw in Steven Soderbergh‘s nasty, artful psycho-thriller about a woman eluding a crazed stalker as she is confined to a mental institution–though the cinematography (Unsane was shot entirely on an iPhone 7 Plus) is expertly unnerving. Unsane offers requisite genre thrills, but there’s a little more to it than that. Critics were mixed-to-positive upon release, but like many of Soderbergh’s movies, it’s likely that time will be very good to this one.
9. Green Room (2016)
Gifted genre auteur Jeremy Saulnier‘s follow-up to critical darling Blue Ruin stars a top-form Patrick Stewart as a neo-Nazi who starts killing young members of a punk band after they witness a murder. This isn’t spooky boo! horror; this is masterfully staged, tension-soaked graphic violence that would make you turn away in disgust if it weren’t so enthralling and well-acted.
Related: Read Parade‘s Review of Green Room
10. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
The quintessential work of German Expressionism, Robert Wiene‘s indispensable The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari tells the story of a crazed, murderous hypnotist. Though this is the topic of some debate, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is sometimes credited as the very first horror feature. Its influence is seen in films like The Babadook, Batman Returns and pretty much everything Guillermo del Toro has ever made. Nearly an entire century later, we’ve yet to see a horror movie with richer atmosphere. The handmade, in-camera visuals are still jaw-hit-the-floor stunning, not to mention haunting.
11. Paranormal Activity (2009)
By the time we got to The Ghost Dimension, the Paranormal Activity series was about as scary as a peanut butter sandwich–but the patient, well-crafted original holds up fairly well. Co-produced, written, directed, photographed and edited by Oren Peli, the found-footage supernatural thriller about a young couple documenting strange occurrences in their home is the most profitable film ever made based on return-on-investment. It cost $15,000 to produce and grossed $193 million worldwide.
The borderline-goofy theatrical ending is nowhere near as frightening as the one that played in festivals before the film’s wide release. Seek out the alternate cut (it’s on the Blu-Ray) for a less conventional, far more unsettling experience.
Related: Micah Sloat Discusses the Alternate Endings Moviegoers Didn’t Get to See
12. House on Haunted Hill (1959)
If you’re not a hardcore horror fan, and you’d like to be festive but you don’t want to have trouble sleeping for weeks, William Castle‘s charming, campy and only slightly creepy classic is the way to go. Vincent Price stars as an eccentric millionaire who invites five guests to spend the night in a spooky house for a $100,000 prize.
House on Haunted Hill was remade in 1999 as a dumbed-down, charm-free and Vincent Price-less hard R. The less said about that one the better!
13. 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)
On top of being a just a straight-up terrific actor who should be in more movies, Mary Elizabeth Winstead is something of a genre movie queen. She elevated the gory guilty pleasure Final Destination 3 as well as the misguided remake of The Thing, she was every fanboy’s dream girl in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, and she was the only part of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter anyone remembers (seriously– how did a movie with that title not end up memorable?!). Well, in 10 Cloverfield Lane she’s just riveting in a sweaty-palmed cat-and-mouse game in an underground bunker, opposite a seriously threatening John Goodman.
Hollywood’s Boy Wonder Damien Chazelle co-wrote this clever, airtight screenplay not long before he became the youngest-ever recipient of the Oscar for Best Director. 10 Cloverfield is so suspenseful and so good at what it sets out to do it’s likely you’ll stress-eat all of your popcorn. It takes a major turn in its last fifteen minutes that probably wouldn’t work if we weren’t so invested in Winstead.
Parade‘s Review: There’s Big Trouble Above and Below in 10 Cloverfield Lane
14. Jaws (1975)
The inaugural summer blockbuster and the first movie ever to gross $100 million, this is the film that started it all for director Steven Spielberg. In 2001, the American Film Institute named Jaws the second most thrilling film ever made, behind only Alfred Hitchcock‘s Psycho. A masterpiece of suspense, Jaws won three Oscars and was nominated for Best Picture, though Spielberg shockingly wasn’t nominated for Best Director. Adjusted for inflation, its U.S. box office haul is a jaws-dropping $1.14 billion.
Related: The 42 Greatest Summer Blockbusters of All Time
15. Jacob’s Ladder (1990)
Not many horror movies are as deeply, spiritually affecting as Adrian Lyne‘s surrealist thriller about a trauma-stricken Vietnam War vet (Tim Robbins) desperately trying to piece together his memories.
Not all critics were kind to Jacob’s Ladder in 1990, but it’s held in high esteem today. It’s proved quite influential, largely the basis for the popular Silent Hill video game series, and you’ll see touches from it all over American Horror Story, even in other big-screen classics like The Sixth Sense.
Roger Ebert gave the film a highly positive review at the time, saying it left him “reeling with turmoil and confusion, with feelings of sadness and despair,” calling it a “thoroughly painful and depressing experience — but, it must be said, one that has been powerfully written, directed and acted.”
A remake starring Michael Ealy and Jesse Williams is slated for a February 1, 2019, release.
16. American Psycho (2000)
More incisive and freaky than spooky or chilling, this darkly satiric adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis‘ 1991 novel was in development hell for nearly a decade. Christian Bale had his heart set on the role of narcissistic Wall Street homicidal maniac Patrick Bateman, but Lionsgate wanted Leonardo DiCaprio.
David Cronenberg, Oliver Stone, Martin Scorsese and Danny Boyle were all in the running to direct at some point, but Mary Harron was the right choice. She milked the material for maximum black humor, and she insisted on Bale, who is perfect in the lead role. Now widely considered one of our most prominent method actors, Bale spoke in an American accent throughout filming. When he spoke in his native Welsh accent at the wrap party, everyone thought he was prepping for a different role.
Another touch Harron brought to the film, and one of several reasons this movie is appreciated by women as well as men, is the way she flips the male gaze, even as she explores a male-centric narrative. It’s no secret that many horror films throughout history have been problematic in their objectification of women. In American Psycho, Bale’s Patrick Bateman is obsessed with his looks—often onscreen in some state of undress—and Harron’s camera makes the most of this.
17. Girl with All the Gifts (2017)
Gemma Arterton and Glenn Close star in M.R. Carey‘s adaptation of his own sci-fi zombie novel set in a dystopian future where a fungal infection has wiped out most of humanity. This British pic bears a lot of similarities to 28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later. It’s not nearly as substantial or terrifying as those classics, but it’s tense and thoughtful enough to stand on its own, and young lead Sennia Nenua gives a striking performance.
18. The Monster (2016)
Strong turns from Zoe Kazan and Ella Ballentine drive this efficient, occasionally gripping small-scale thriller about a mother and daughter who take on–you guessed it– a monster, on a dark night in the woods. This was writer/director Bryan Bertino‘s follow-up to 2008’s The Strangers and 2014’s Mockingbird.
19. Bone Tomahawk (2015)
It’s actually rather surprising that this critically well-received horror Western (yes, a horror Western) didn’t find more of an audience when it was released. Kurt Russell, Patrick Wilson, Matthew Fox and Richard Jenkins star. It’s best to go into this one knowing as little as possible. Just be warned: this is one of the most shockingly, graphically violent films with big movie stars released in the past decade.
20. The Monster Squad (1987)
Let’s top off this list with a fun one. Over three decades before they teamed up for the nostalgia-heavy, fairly entertaining and undeniably disappointing The Predator, Fred Dekker and Shane Black helmed this PG-13, mostly kid-friendly fantasy adventure about five boys who find themselves facing off against the Universal Monsters. Though it’s definitely not on the same level in terms of quality, the mildly scary Monster Squad has a tone similar to that of Gremlins.
Related: We Ranked All Six Predator Movies, Including The Predator
What are you watching this Halloween season? What’s the scariest movie you’ve ever seen? Sound off in the comments!
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