DOT’s Pre-Halloween Guide to Streaming 2024

July 29, 2024 4:25 PM

A list of horror highlights by streaming service! Each of these services has too many to really cover in total, so I am highlighting just a few favorites for each, largely bypassing the better known stuff (though obviously fellow true believers may have seen most of these even so.)

BY STREAMING SERVICE:

• Tubi
• Netflix
• Max
• Hulu
• Peacock
• Hoopla
• Kanopy
• Shudder
• Amazon Prime
• freevee
• Starz
• Paramount Plus
• Crackle
• Plex
• Pluto
• Screambox

I'll start with Tubi, because they're free in the US (and many other places) and they have a TON.

TUBI

• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• History of the Occult - An odd unheralded gem. Imagine a B&W Argentianian take on All the President's Men, interrupted by Lovecraftian horror.
• 1BR - Excellent, creepy horror film with a fresh premise and style. Recommended to anyone.
• May - Angela Bettis is a creepy marvel in Lucky McKee's odd, feminist take on the slasher.
• Ginger Snaps - Brilliant use of the werewolf trope in a female coming of age story.
• Train to Busan - South Korean film masterfully blends intense fast zombie carnage with a heartfelt father/daughter survival melodrama.
• Lake Mungo - Desperately sad Aussie found footage gem.
• Audition - Prolific Japanese auteur Takashi Miike serves up one of the most intense twists/genre shifts ever.
• Dead End - Ray Wise and family take a "short cut" that gets increasingly surreal. Pitched like a very dark Twilight Zone ep.
• The Endless - Benson & Moorhead (whose work you maybe enjoyed in Loki season 2) spin a complex/sad/horrifying sci-fi yarn.
• Troll Hunter - Norwegian found footage horror flick about trolls has no business landing this squarely. Does not skimp on FX.
• Villains - Bill Skarsgård, Maika Monroe in a loopy horror thriller about a Bonnie & Clyde type couple who take refuge in the wrong house.
• Cemetery Man - Weirdly romantic and absurd horror comedy with Rupert Everett as a lonely cemetery keeper who has to make sure the dead stay down.
• Excision - Sneakily bonkers body horror about a teen who decides to get a headstart on her surgical career.
• Housebound - Hilarious Aussie horror comedy about a young woman trapped on house arrest with her parents... and maybe one other unknown person.
• Tragedy Girls - A hilariously mean and vicious update of Heathers for the influencer era.
• Dead & Buried - Tragically overlooked atmospheric and creepy 80s horror gem from the writing team behind Alien.
• Detention - Positively fucking unhinged horror comedy from Joseph Kahn (most known for directing Taylor Swift videos). Takes wild, weird swings with huge detours into amazing levels of non sequitur.

The problem with Netflix is their originals are so hyped, you mostly know them all, and their non-original catalog keeps getting thinner.

NETFLIX

• Under the Shadow - Both a top-notch fright flick and a fascinating period piece about Iran on the cusp of the revolution.
• He Never Died - Henry Rollins is a morose loner, targeted by hoods, who have made an epic fucking mistake. Darkly funny and cracklingly violent.
• May the Devil Take You - Hyperviolent Indonesian auteur Timo Tjahjanto tackles demonic possession in a small family.
• The Perfection - Creepy thriller about classical musicians from the director of The Matador. Wow, does this take a turn into horror.

There are plenty of famous horror blockbusters on Max, but far fewer deep cuts and hidden gems.

MAX

• Men - Alex Garland (Civil War) delivers a positively bizarre film about toxic masculinity. Rory Kinnear plays... nearly everyone.
• We Are All Going to the World's Fair - The microbudget debut of Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw he TV Glow) is a tragic slow burn about a lonely teen, trying to find herself online through a sinister online game.
• Malignant - James Wan gets fucking weird. Nonsensical but electric.

Hulu has one of the strongest lineups of any streamer for Halloween.

HULU

• Cobweb - Antony Starr and Lizzy Caplan in one of my very favorites of the last year.
• When Evil Lurks - Demián Rugna is the next great horror director. His films make you feel... unsafe.
• Watcher - Chloe Okuno directs Maika Monroe in a tense pseudo-update of Rear Window.
• Titane - Surreal, horny French body horror. Like nothing else.
• Resurrection - Rebecca Hall and Tim Roth in what starts as a stalker thriller then gets more and more surreal.
• In the Earth - Ben Wheatley's hallucinogenic horror about a forest that is more alive than anyone guessed.
• Censor - A woman working as a censor during the UK's "video nasties" era begins to come unglued.
• Off Season - This is all vibes, but what vibes! If you enjoyed Messiah of Evil, make this a priority.
• Piggy - Searing Spanish horror thriller about a bullied overweight girl crossing paths with a killer.
• Tragedy Girls - A hilariously mean and vicious update of Heathers for the influencer era.
• Slash/Back - Four girls in Nunavut have to defend their town from shapeshifting aliens. Good fun alla ound.
• Fresh - Very hard genre shift from romcom to horror maybe 35 minutes in. Wild and jarring.

Peacock is no slouch.

PEACOCK

• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• Train to Busan - South Korean film masterfully blends intense fast zombie carnage with a heartfelt father/daughter survival melodrama.
• Freaky - Basically, this is Freaky Friday the 13th. From the writer/director of Happy Death Day.
• Ginger Snaps - Brilliant use of the werewolf trope in a female coming of age story.
• Dead & Buried - Tragically overlooked atmospheric and creepy 80s horror gem from the writing team behind Alien.
• 1BR - Excellent, creepy horror film with a fresh premise and style. Recommended to anyone.
• Troll Hunter - Norwegian found footage horror flick about trolls has no business landing this squarely. Does not skimp on FX.
• Villains - Bill Skarsgård, Maika Monroe in a loopy horror thriller about a Bonnie & Clyde type couple who take refuge in the wrong house.
• Dog Soldiers - You probably know Neil Marshall's famously perfect cave horror movie The Descent. This is his other gem, about soldiers turned into werewolves.
• Deathgasm - Death metal teens accidentally activate a demon. Hilarious and affectionate parody of metal and demonic horror.
• The Innkeepers - Did you like Ti West's X trilogy? This is an earlier one, a slow burn about two coworkers in a possibly haunted hotel.
• Tragedy Girls - A hilariously mean and vicious update of Heathers for the influencer era.

Check with your public library to see if you have Hoopla. It's free with many public libraries and it's awesome.

HOOPLA

• The Descent - Have you not seen this? RIGHT NOW.
• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• Speak No Evil (2022) - Watch the Danish/Dutch original (still largely in English) before the remake comes out this fall. Will positively fucking ruin your day.
• Under the Shadow - Both a top-notch fright flick and a fascinating period piece about Iran on the cusp of the revolution.
• Ghostwatch - 1992 UK TV film is gradually being acknowledged as legendary. The world's most mundane TV show hosts (played largely by actual UK TV hosts, as themselves) investigate a haunted house for Halloween. Watching this is the horror movie equivalent of being a frog in boiling water.
• History of the Occult - An odd unheralded gem. Imagine a B&W Argentianian take on All the President's Men, interrupted by Lovecraftian horror.
• Satan's Slaves 2: Communion - This is Indonesian pop horror, so it's not trying to come in overly arty or thematic dense. But it's a) expertly done and b) working from a different set of rhythms than Western viewers are accustomed to seeing. As such, it may knock you on your butt.
• Train to Busan - South Korean film masterfully blends intense fast zombie carnage with a heartfelt father/daughter survival melodrama.
• Host - Practically perfect (and short!) found footage horror gem about a seance conducted over Zoom that goes very wrong. Legitimately scary.
• One Cut of the Dead - Japanese film pulls a rug out from under you, transitioning from an odd zombie film to a heartfelt family drama about how a family helped their dad get the film made.
• Censor - A woman working as a censor during the UK's "video nasties" era begins to come unglued.
• The Sadness - Positively vicious zombie movie in which the zombies aren't just flesh eaters, they're cruel sadists. Like Terrifier, this made a lot of people tsk tsk about lines being crossed even as other people saw it as a gleefully transgressive thrill ride.
• The Endless - Benson & Moorhead (whose work you maybe enjoyed in Loki season 2) spin a complex/sad/horrifying sci-fi yarn.
• Terrified - Demián Rugna's first feature is every bit as dark and terrifying as When Evil Lurks.
• Deadstream - Rollicking found footage horror comedy about the worst kind of streaming channel bro trying to salvage his audience with a livestream from a haunted house. Plays like Evil Dead II interrupting a YT stream. Absolutely a blast.
• The Day of the Beast - In an effort to stop the Antichrist from being born in Madrid on Christmas Eve, a priest and a metalhead team up to try to commit enough sins to summon Satan. Wild, funny, dark, and original.
• Housebound - Hilarious Aussie horror comedy about a young woman trapped on house arrest with her parents... and maybe one other unknown person.
• Hellbender - The Adams Family (a real life family of four) made this brilliant microbudget coming of age horror about a mother and daughter at odds as the girl grows into her family inheritance: bloody mystical powers. Really an all-around treat if you like both horror and indie drama.
• Glorious - A man in crisis hits the restroom at a rest stop, but something dark and not of this world is in the next stall. Wild, weird, Lovecraftian glory hole story.
• He Never Died - Henry Rollins is a morose loner, targeted by hoods, who have made an epic fucking mistake. Darkly funny and cracklingly violent.
• Who Invited Them? - A couple splurges on their dream house, but the housewarming party attracts a bizarre couple. Funny, dark thriller.
• Lucky - A surreal, darkly funny and tense exploration of gaslighting and violence against women. HUGE recommend.
• Let Us Prey - Liam Cunningham (Ser Davos from Game of Thrones) and Pollyanna McIntosh star in this tense bloody mix of Assault on Precinct 13 and Prince of Darkness. A particular favorite of mine.
• Off Season - This is all vibes, but what vibes! If you enjoyed Messiah of Evil, make this a priority.
• We Are All Going to the World's Fair - The microbudget debut of Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw he TV Glow) is a tragic slow burn about a lonely teen, trying to find herself online through a sinister online game.
• Piggy - Searing Spanish horror thriller about a bullied overweight girl crossing paths with a killer.
• Slash/Back - Four girls in Nunavut have to defend their town from shapeshifting aliens. Good fun alla ound.
• Troll Hunter - Norwegian found footage horror flick about trolls has no business landing this squarely. Does not skimp on FX.
• Psycho Goreman - Imagine if the teams behind The Toxic Avenger and the original Power Rangers TV series collaborated on a horror comedy.
• Excision - Sneakily bonkers body horror about a teen who decides to get a headstart on her surgical career.
• Deathgasm - Death metal teens accidentally activate a demon. Hilarious and affectionate parody of metal and demonic horror.
• The Innkeepers - Did you like Ti West's X trilogy? This is an earlier one, a slow burn about two coworkers in a possibly haunted hotel.
• Caveat - Damian McCarthy (writer/director of the new film Oddity) made his debut with this creepy yarn about a man hired to "babysit" a mentally ill woman in a remote country home.
• Becky/The Wrath of Becky - This is a perfect double feature. Nazis make the mistake of crossing the world's angriest teenage girl.
• Scare Me - A would-be writer heads to a cabin to write his first book, only to find a woman nearby doing the same is already a hugely successful writer. They have a sort of "story off." Stars Ava Cash (of You're the Worst and The Boys.)

Like Hoopla, Kanopy may be free through your library! Look into it. They also have a deep catalog of cult/international horror hits from the 60s-90s.

KANOPY

• Audition - Prolific Japanese auteur Takashi Miike serves up one of the most intense twists/genre shifts ever.
• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• Suspiria (1977) - Please tell me you have seen this phantasmagoric nightmare of dream logic, wild production design, and intense camera work.
• Titane - Surreal, horny French body horror. Like nothing else.
• In the Earth - Ben Wheatley's hallucinogenic horror about a forest that is more alive than anyone guessed.
• Train to Busan - South Korean film masterfully blends intense fast zombie carnage with a heartfelt father/daughter survival melodrama.
• Green Room - A punk band who unknowingly booked a gig playing for Nazis have to fight to escape with their lives.
• The Blackcoat's Daughter - Intensely atmospheric and sad horror drama from Osgood Perkins (Longlegs).
• Censor - A woman working as a censor during the UK's "video nasties" era begins to come unglued.
• Society - This uneven, occasionally wooden 80s horror flick from the producer of Re-Animator features the most bizarre body horror sequence ever.
• The Endless - Benson & Moorhead (whose work you maybe enjoyed in Loki season 2) spin a complex/sad/horrifying sci-fi yarn.
• The Day of the Beast - In an effort to stop the Antichrist from being born in Madrid on Christmas Eve, a priest and a metalhead team up to try to commit enough sins to summon Satan. Wild, funny, dark, and original.
• Ghost Stories - Generic title masks a sharp adaptation of the acclaimed London stage play. Creepy as hell.
• Berberian Sound Studio - Peter Strickland's period piece about a sound engineer hired to work on a giallo both pays tribute to the genre and mercilessly interrogates its hostility to women.
• Clear Cut - What starts as a Noble White Hero tries to Do Right by Indigenous People drama goes magnificently off the rails into horror and the mystical.
• We Are All Going to the World's Fair - The microbudget debut of Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw he TV Glow) is a tragic slow burn about a lonely teen, trying to find herself online through a sinister online game.
• Villains - Bill Skarsgård, Maika Monroe in a loopy horror thriller about a Bonnie & Clyde type couple who take refuge in the wrong house.
• The Girl with All the Gifts - Thought-provoking and sci-fi-tinged zombie film where the "evolution" into zombies is maybe not so simple.
• The Hole in the Ground - Evil Dead Rise director Lee Cronin's first feature brought horror-strikes-the-heart-of-the-family approach to an A24 palette.
• The Innkeepers - Did you like Ti West's X trilogy? This is an earlier one, a slow burn about two coworkers in a possibly haunted hotel.
• The Lodge - Riley Keough stars as a professor's new paramour, stuck at a winter cabin with his children. The kids decide to take out their frustrations with her by trying to reactivate her trauma from being a cult survivor.

I cannot recommend Shudder strongly enough. Could easily support your entire spooky season viewing.

SHUDDER

• Speak No Evil (2022) - Watch the Danish/Dutch original (still largely in English) before the remake comes out this fall. Will positively fucking ruin your day.
• Kill List - Ben Wheatley's genre-shifting thriller crosses from family drama to crime to folk horror. Traumatizing.
• Resurrection - Rebecca Hall and Tim Roth in what starts as a stalker thriller then gets more and more surreal.
• Ghostwatch - 1992 UK TV film is gradually being acknowledged as legendary. The world's most mundane TV show hosts (played largely by actual UK TV hosts, as themselves) investigate a haunted house for Halloween. Watching this is the horror movie equivalent of being a frog in boiling water.
• A Dark Song - A mother who has lost her son hires an occultist to perform an ancient rite to trap an angel. Like if Ken Loach made a horror film.
• Satan's Slaves and Satan's Slaves 2: Communion - Awesome double feature of top shelf Indonesian horror. Both films are actually frightening.
• When Evil Lurks - Demián Rugna is the next great horror director. His films make you feel... unsafe.
• Watcher - Chloe Okuno directs Maika Monroe in a tense pseudo-update of Rear Window.
• Host - Practically perfect (and short!) found footage horror gem about a seance conducted over Zoom that goes very wrong. Legitimately scary.
• One Cut of the Dead - Japanese film pulls a rug out from under you, transitioning from an odd zombie film to a heartfelt family drama about how a family helped their dad get the film made.
• The Sadness - Positively vicious zombie movie in which the zombies aren't just flesh eaters, they're cruel sadists. Like Terrifier, this made a lot of people uneasy about lines being crossed even as other people saw it as a gleefully transgressive thrill ride.
• The Innocents (2021) - Not to be confused with the classic UK ghost story. Norwegian film in which the children in an apartment complex develop dangerous powers.
• Terrified - Demián Rugna's first feature is every bit as dark and terrifying as When Evil Lurks.
• Deadstream - Rollicking found footage horror comedy about the worst kind of streaming channel bro trying to salvage his audience with a livestream from a haunted house. Plays like Evil Dead II interrupting a YT stream. Absolutely a blast.
• Stop Motion - Unsettling film from this year about a stop motion animator who starts to lose her grip on reality after her mother is struck ill.
• Infested (aka Vermines) - Tense, nail-biting terror about spiders from Sébastien Vanicek, who will be directing the upcoming Evil Dead sequel.
• The Day of the Beast - In an effort to stop the Antichrist from being born in Madrid on Christmas Eve, a priest and a metalhead team up to try to commit enough sins to summon Satan. Wild, funny, dark, and original.
• Ghost Stories - Generic title masks a sharp adaptation of the acclaimed London stage play. Creepy as hell.
• Berberian Sound Studio - Peter Strickland's period piece about a sound engineer hired to work on a giallo both pays tribute to the genre and mercilessly interrogates its hostility to women.
• Dead & Buried - Tragically overlooked atmospheric and creepy 80s horror gem from the writing team behind Alien.
• Hellbender - The Adams Family (a real life family of four) made this brilliant microbudget coming of age horror about a mother and daughter at odds as the girl grows into her family inheritance: bloody mystical powers. Really an all-around treat if you like both horror and indie drama.
• Glorious - A man in crisis hits the restroom at a rest stop, but something dark and not of this world is in the next stall. Wild, weird, Lovecraftian glory hole story.
• Who Invited Them? - A couple splurges on their dream house, but the housewarming party attracts a bizarre couple. Funny, dark thriller.
• Lucky - A surreal, darkly funny and tense exploration of gaslighting and violence against women. HUGE recommend.
• Off Season - This is all vibes, but what vibes! If you enjoyed Messiah of Evil, make this a priority.
• We Are All Going to the World's Fair - The microbudget debut of Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw he TV Glow) is a tragic slow burn about a lonely teen, trying to find herself online through a sinister online game.
• Slash/Back - Four girls in Nunavut have to defend their town from shapeshifting aliens. Good fun alla ound.
• Psycho Goreman - Imagine if the teams behind The Toxic Avenger and the original Power Rangers TV series collaborated on a horror comedy.
• The Innkeepers - Did you like Ti West's X trilogy? This is an earlier one, a slow burn about two coworkers in a possibly haunted hotel.
• Caveat - Damian McCarthy (writer/director of the new film Oddity) made his debut with this creepy yarn about a man hired to "babysit" a mentally ill woman in a remote country home.
• Becky/The Wrath of Becky - This is a perfect double feature. Nazis make the mistake of crossing the world's angriest teenage girl.
• Scare Me - A would-be writer heads to a cabin to write his first book, only to find a woman nearby doing the same is already a hugely successful writer. They have a sort of "story off." Stars Ava Cash (of You're the Worst and The Boys.)
• Clear Cut - What starts as a Noble White Hero tries to Do Right by Indigenous People drama goes magnificently off the rails into horror and the mystical.
• Mute Witness - Long unavailable 90s minor classic about a mute FX tech on a shoot in Russia who ends up on the run after seeing a snuff film being shot.
• The Boy Behind the Door - Tense thriller about two tween boys. When one is targeted by predators, his best friend tries valiantly to save him.
• Late Night with the Devil - Much hyped film from this year stars David Dastmalchian as a Carson-era late night host who invites a possessed girl on his show as a ratings stunt.
• Werewolves Within - Based on the video game. Odd and surprisingly funny. Terrific cast includes Milana Vayntrub and Sam Richardson.
• Psycho Goreman - Imagine if the teams behind The Toxic Avenger and the original Power Rangers TV series collaborated on a horror comedy.
• Villains - Bill Skarsgård, Maika Monroe in a loopy horror thriller about a Bonnie & Clyde type couple who take refuge in the wrong house.
• Dog Soldiers - You probably know Neil Marshall's famously perfect cave horror movie The Descent. This is his other gem, about soldiers turned into werewolves.
• Come True - Very Cronenbergian scifi horror about a sleep study that may be attempting to conjure something otherwordly and horrible.
• Cemetery Man - Weirdly romantic and absurd horror comedy with Rupert Everett as a lonely cemetery keeper who has to make sure the dead stay down.

They've added ads unless you pay more, so I hardly ever go by. But Amazon Prime still has a bunch of stuff.

AMAZON PRIME

• The Descent - Have you not seen this? RIGHT NOW.
• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• History of the Occult - An odd unheralded gem. Imagine a B&W Argentianian take on All the President's Men, interrupted by Lovecraftian horror.
• Orphan: First Kill - An absurd premise tackled with glee and energy. A rip roaring good time.
• Ginger Snaps - Brilliant use of the werewolf trope in a female coming of age story.
• Lake Mungo - Desperately sad Aussie found footage gem.
• Dead & Buried - Tragically overlooked atmospheric and creepy 80s horror gem from the writing team behind Alien.
• 1BR - Excellent, creepy horror film with a fresh premise and style. Recommended to anyone.
• Troll Hunter - Norwegian found footage horror flick about trolls has no business landing this squarely. Does not skimp on FX.
• Dog Soldiers - You probably know Neil Marshall's famously perfect cave horror movie The Descent. This is his other gem, about soldiers turned into werewolves.
• Excision - Sneakily bonkers body horror about a teen who decides to get a headstart on her surgical career.
• Deathgasm - Death metal teens accidentally activate a demon. Hilarious and affectionate parody of metal and demonic horror.
• The Last Exorcism - A conman who made his living faking exorcisms for rubes partners with a film crew to show how his tricks were done. Thing is, the last case he lines up is a girl who really *is* possessed. A very, very rare fresh take on an exorcism movie.

Not sure why freevee remains a separate service, but here is what's on there.

FREEVEE

• The Descent - Have you not seen this? RIGHT NOW.
• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• History of the Occult - An odd unheralded gem. Imagine a B&W Argentianian take on All the President's Men, interrupted by Lovecraftian horror.
• Ginger Snaps - Brilliant use of the werewolf trope in a female coming of age story.
• Lake Mungo - Desperately sad Aussie found footage gem.
• The Day of the Beast - In an effort to stop the Antichrist from being born in Madrid on Christmas Eve, a priest and a metalhead team up to try to commit enough sins to summon Satan. Wild, funny, dark, and original.
• Dead End - Ray Wise and family take a "short cut" that gets increasingly surreal. Pitched like a very dark Twilight Zone ep.
• 1BR - Excellent, creepy horror film with a fresh premise and style. Recommended to anyone.
• Clear Cut - What starts as a Noble White Hero tries to Do Right by Indigenous People drama goes magnificently off the rails into horror and the mystical.

Maybe you have Starz. got that one on here, too.

STARZ

• Malum - One of the most legitimately scary films of the past several years. Light on plot, but dense with vibes, dread, and gore. A bit like a two hour run through a particularly scary horror video game.
• The Blackening - Hilarious riffing on Black folks in horror and the tropes surrounding them.
• The Girl with All the Gifts - Thought-provoking and sci-fi-tinged zombie film where the "evolution" into zombies is maybe not so simple.
• You Won't Be Alone - No idea how this isn't an A24 film. Moody folk horror about a young woman taken by a witch and turned into the same.

Paramount Plus still exists, too.

PARAMOUNT PLUS

• Orphan: First Kill - An absurd premise tackled with glee and energy. A rip roaring good time.
• Significant Other - If you can guess where this is going, let's have a drink together sometime. Because I find liars fascinating.

Crackle is free, at least in the US.

CRACKLE

• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• Ginger Snaps - Brilliant use of the werewolf trope in a female coming of age story.
• Troll Hunter - Norwegian found footage horror flick about trolls has no business landing this squarely. Does not skimp on FX.

Plex is free, too.

PLEX

• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• Oculus - This haunted mirror film with Karen Gillan is still BY FAR the scariest thing Mike Flanagan has ever made.
• A Dark Song - A mother who has lost her son hires an occultist to perform an ancient rite to trap an angel. Like if Ken Loach made a horror film.
• The Endless - Benson & Moorhead (whose work you maybe enjoyed in Loki season 2) spin a complex/sad/horrifying sci-fi yarn.
• Ghost Stories - Generic title masks a sharp adaptation of the acclaimed London stage play. Creepy as hell.
• Housebound - Hilarious Aussie horror comedy about a young woman trapped on house arrest with her parents... and maybe one other unknown person.
• Dead End - Ray Wise and family take a "short cut" that gets increasingly surreal. Pitched like a very dark Twilight Zone ep.
• 1BR - Excellent, creepy horror film with a fresh premise and style. Recommended to anyone.
• Troll Hunter - Norwegian found footage horror flick about trolls has no business landing this squarely. Does not skimp on FX.
• Villains - Bill Skarsgård, Maika Monroe in a loopy horror thriller about a Bonnie & Clyde type couple who take refuge in the wrong house.
• Dog Soldiers - You probably know Neil Marshall's famously perfect cave horror movie The Descent. This is his other gem, about soldiers turned into werewolves.
• Excision - Sneakily bonkers body horror about a teen who decides to get a headstart on her surgical career.
• Deathgasm - Death metal teens accidentally activate a demon. Hilarious and affectionate parody of metal and demonic horror.
• The Innkeepers - Did you like Ti West's X trilogy? This is an earlier one, a slow burn about two coworkers in a possibly haunted hotel.
• Tragedy Girls - A hilariously mean and vicious update of Heathers for the influencer era.
• The Last Exorcism - A conman who made his living faking exorcisms for rubes partners with a film crew to show how his tricks were done. Thing is, the last case he lines up is a girl who really *is* possessed. A very, very rare fresh take on an exorcism movie.

Pluto is also free. This is what they have on demand.

PLUTO TV

• Triangle - This is one of my very favorite movies ever. Don't read a blurb or watch a trailer. Just go in blind.
• Train to Busan - South Korean film masterfully blends intense fast zombie carnage with a heartfelt father/daughter survival melodrama.
• Ginger Snaps - Brilliant use of the werewolf trope in a female coming of age story.
• The Day of the Beast - In an effort to stop the Antichrist from being born in Madrid on Christmas Eve, a priest and a metalhead team up to try to commit enough sins to summon Satan. Wild, funny, dark, and original.
• Housebound - Hilarious Aussie horror comedy about a young woman trapped on house arrest with her parents... and maybe one other unknown person.
• 1BR - Excellent, creepy horror film with a fresh premise and style. Recommended to anyone.
• May - Angela Bettis is a creepy marvel in Lucky McKee's odd, feminist take on the slasher.
• Villains - Bill Skarsgård, Maika Monroe in a loopy horror thriller about a Bonnie & Clyde type couple who take refuge in the wrong house.
• Dog Soldiers - You probably know Neil Marshall's famously perfect cave horror movie The Descent. This is his other gem, about soldiers turned into werewolves.
• Deathgasm - Death metal teens accidentally activate a demon. Hilarious and affectionate parody of metal and demonic horror.
• The Innkeepers - Did you like Ti West's X trilogy? This is an earlier one, a slow burn about two coworkers in a possibly haunted hotel.
• Tragedy Girls - A hilariously mean and vicious update of Heathers for the influencer era.
• Everyone Will Burn - Spanish supernatural horror about a mysterious girl adopted by a local who brings chaos to the town.

Screambox is a less common one, but I'll share a few, in case you're doing a free trial.

SCREAMBOX

• Audition - Prolific Japanese auteur Takashi Miike serves up one of the most intense twists/genre shifts ever.
• History of the Occult - An odd unheralded gem. Imagine a B&W Argentianian take on All the President's Men, interrupted by Lovecraftian horror.
• The Day of the Beast - In an effort to stop the Antichrist from being born in Madrid on Christmas Eve, a priest and a metalhead team up to try to commit enough sins to summon Satan. Wild, funny, dark, and original.
• Housebound - Hilarious Aussie horror comedy about a young woman trapped on house arrest with her parents... and maybe one other unknown person.
Please note: MeFi is a site with many different people, who have among them, many different triggers. I have not provided content warnings for the above. If you have specific concerns though, you can ping me and I will let you know for any particular movie, if the dog dies, if there is SA content, what the gore level is, whether there is anything particularly uncomfortably evocative of current political issues, dated stuff that wouldn't fly in 2024, etc.

posted by DirtyOldTown (13 comments total)

Eh well. Tried to have anchors but they didn't work. Enjoy the list though.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 4:26 PM on July 29

Flagged as fantastic--thanks DirtyOldTown!!
posted by Wobbuffet at 4:45 PM on July 29

FINE I GET IT I'LL WATCH TRIANGLE

(Magnificent work, well done!)
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 6:47 AM on July 30

(Uh, is this the Ringo Lam Triangle or the Melissa George Triangle?)
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 6:53 AM on July 30

Melissa George.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:09 AM on July 30

Incredible list and effort here, flagged as the fantastic post that it is!

Triangle is my go-to recommendation for a film that should have a much bigger following. Highly recommended.

Lots of incredible recommendations here, the mini reviews really help nudge up some films that I've had on my "to watch" list for a while now.

Frustratingly there does not appear to be any legal way to access History of the Occult in the UK. Not available for streaming of even physical purchase.
posted by slimepuppy at 7:20 AM on July 30

Stuff like that, I fix with a VPN.

Speaking of which, anyone who has Netflix and a VPN, set your location as Romania and watch Capra cu trei iezi ("The Goat and Her Three Kids.") It's a Romanian folk horror that feels very much in the vibe of say, The VVItch. Excellent little gem.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:32 AM on July 30 [1 favorite]

Thanks for the advice, I've had mixed success with paid services but looks like Tubi works!
posted by slimepuppy at 7:35 AM on July 30

I have leaned towards movies I would consider showing mixed company. (For instance, Lucky McKee's The Woman is widely available now and amazing, but also tremendously upsetting, so it's not on these lists.)

If you have particular requests (particular subgenres, vibes, etc ) you want recs for, let me know and I will do what I can.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:18 AM on July 30

Outstanding! Thank you so much for this!
posted by rmd1023 at 6:35 AM on August 1

Spitballing to myself: dunno if this would be useful as a wiki page, or with links to JustWatch or Trakt?

But this is intriiiiiguing.
posted by Pronoiac at 8:31 AM on August 1

A Dark Song is something I hoped would turn up on this list. It's not for everyone -- there is some legitimately offputting unpleasantness (putting it mildly) in the interactions between the two main characters that I think will be a dealbreaker for some viewers. But it's a strong rec from me. "Loved" isn't the right word... I found it really moving, in the end.
posted by verbminx at 1:13 AM on August 2 [1 favorite]

Holy [zombie] cow.
posted by ryanshepard at 10:39 AM on August 10