50 Unmissable Horror Movies
16. Kwaidan (1964)
Kwaidan is a Japanese anthology horror film based on Lafcadio Hearn’s collections of Japanese folk tales. The film comprises four stories, each exploring themes of the supernatural. In ‘The Black Hair’, a samurai regrets abandoning his wife and soon faces retribution for his impure actions. ‘The Woman of the Snow’ tells of a man who encounters a deadly snow spirit. ‘Hoichi the Earless’ follows a blind musician summoned by ghostly warriors. Finally, the shortest story, ‘In a Cup of Tea’, centres on a man haunted by visions of a mysterious face.
Directed by Masaki Kobayashi, the mastermind behind Harakiri and The Human Condition trilogy, Kwaidan is a brilliant insight into cultural folklore. The filmmakers are unconcerned with jump scares, so each segment offers up something hauntingly beautiful – the cinematography and set design being the best examples of that, each truly bringing these ancient stories to life.
Kwaidan was acclaimed upon release, even despite one of the segments being cut in the original US release. It won the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, the second time Kobayashi won this prize following Harakiri, and was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards in 1966. GT
17. Onibaba (1964)
The inner workings of the human mind are always ripe for artistic exploration, and when you want to craft a horror film, there’s no better place. In Japan in 1964, a demon mask in a period thriller becomes one of the most recognisable images in an entire genre. Medieval Japan plays host to a story of two women killing passing soldiers en-route to and from a civil war, in order to steal their possessions. After one of them steals a demonic mask from a samurai, she uses it to try and dissuade her companion from a love affair, with horrific consequences.
Taking a number of ancient folk tales and Buddhist myths as its inspiration, Onibaba paints a bleak, almost post-apocalyptic tale of despair and pressure on the fringes of Kyoto before its fall as the country’s capital. Shot in gorgeous monochrome, it took the filmmakers three months in the reeds and marshes to get what they wanted, building temporary accommodation in the middle of nowhere to live on site.
Thankfully, all the efforts of the cast and crew paid off. It is a bleak film that creeps up on you, and when the demonic mask reaches the heights of its power, it brings us some of the most iconic imagery ever put to screen. Director Alexandre Aja (Crawl) has stated in interviews that Onibaba was an influence on his 2024 release Never Let Go, proving that even six decades on, a Japanese historical ambiguous horror film still has the power to disturb and influence. KJ
18. Night of the Living Dead (1968)
The idea of the zombie comes from voodoo traditions. Originating on the continent of Africa, the idea was taken to the sugar plantations of the Caribbean, prominently Haiti, and then popularised in the West from there. Voodoo has therefore played a prominent role in the history of the zombie feature, being the predominant portrayal of the idea for decades up to and including Hammer’s Plague of the Zombies in 1966. Then, George A. Romero changed everything.
It’s impossible to completely appreciate how much Night of the Living Dead (1968) completely changed an entire branch of popular culture. Perhaps not since 1943’s Frankenstein vs The Wolf Man, which introduced werewolves changing with the full moon, had a single film rewired the entire global mythology of a centuries-old superstition. Drawing upon the aforementioned Hammer film, along with Richard Matheson’s vampire plague novel “I Am Legend”, Romero took the shambling hoards and threw off the shackles of voodoo magic. In their place came the cannibalistic corpses we now understand zombies to be.
It’s a radical change for a radical film filled with paranoia and fighting between terrified humans. It’s a film of both extraordinary horror and surprising tenderness. The black and white photography (used to save money) gives everything the feeling of a newsreel showing the horror unfolding before our eyes. Added to the lack of correct copyright to the film, allowing countless other movies to use it in the background of their own, Night’s influence managed to spread almost without notice. Now it’s impossible to think of zombies as being under the control of a voodoo master – now they’re the hungry undead wanting to eat your flesh and brains. It’s Romero’s film we have to thank for that.
Recommended for you: Romero’s ‘Dead’ Movies Ranked
19. Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Our collective assumption of Satanism is that it is horrific and abnormal, so naturally we assume that it needs to be practiced in an out-of-the-way place. The novels by Dennis Wheatley, such as “The Devil Rides Out”, “To The Devil A Daughter”, and “The Satanist”, reinforce this logic by being largely set in remote country estates or other locations with fenced-off grounds. In Rosemary’s Baby, satanism is being practiced in a New York apartment block.
Rosemary’s Baby tells of young Rosemary (Mia Farrow), trying for a child with her husband, Guy (John Cassavetes), who has a terrifying dream of being attacked by a demon with glowing eyes. As strange things continue to happen around the apartment, she begins to suspect that her friendly elderly neighbours, Roman (Sidney Blackmer) and Minnie (Ruth Gordon, who won an Oscar for this role), are not who they appear to be.
The first of the unofficial unholy trinity of Satanism films (also including The Exorcist and The Omen), Rosemary’s Baby is incredibly personal and invasive. It is conspiratorial and dirty and bleak in so many ways, with every vestige of an individual invaded and defiled. It’s not just the assault, but the betrayal of those we love, those we respect, the idea of safety within the home and the wider community. Much like Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Rosemary’s Baby shows us that underneath everyone is someone who may use us for their own personal ends.
Many horror films base themselves on the degradation of the human being to a mere tool or instrument to be used for the gain of others, often through the most violent means possible. Rosemary’s Baby highlights how fellow human beings really do not about us. KJ
20. The Exorcist (1973)
In 1971, Ouija Boards were normal. They were made for getting in touch with one’s self, to use the internal influences of the subconscious to reveal things not present in the front of the mind. That it might be used to get in touch with something else was a ridiculous notion. William Peter Blatty set the idea askew in 1971 with the publication of his novel, “The Exorcist”. When it was adapted in 1973 by The French Connection director William Friedkin, within days the Ouija Board changed its use. Now it was used by small children to accidentally bring ancient Mesopotamian demons into New York houses, and have them work their satanic evil out in the face of priests doing combat against them for the souls of the innocent and the pride of the Catholic Church.
An impeccable blend of the sacred and the profane, The Exorcist is the ultimate tale of the forces of good vs the forces of evil. The language is abhorrent, the makeup and prosthetics magical in the most awful way, the four main performances of Linda Blair, Max von Sydow, Ellen Burstyn, and Jacob Miller, are some of the best of their careers, and the direction keeps it tight and personal, weaving in subliminal flashes of the demonic to make it a truly harrowing experience filled with projectile vomiting, chilling levitation, and blasphemous uses of crucifixes that had never been thought of before. The incorporation of Mike Oldfield’s “Tubular Bells” gave the film, and its subsequent franchise, one of the most recognisable scores in history, even to people who have never seen the film.
The Exorcist was an instant success. People were reported to have fainted and vomited in the theatres. Picket lines were started. The film was censored and only released in full in many countries only decades later. It was the highest-grossing horror film of all time, and would keep that record until the release of It: Chapter One in 2017, nearly 45 years later. It was nominated for ten Academy Awards, winning Best Adapted Screenplay and Sound, and being the first of only six horror films in history to be nominated for Best Picture. Fifty years on, with five sequels and other adapted media under its belt, any possession film is still automatically compared side-by-side with The Exorcist. None have matched it.
Recommended for you: The Exorcist Movies Ranked
Nice work everyone. Next year: 50 MORE unmissable horror films.
What a list, truly something for every horror movie lovers’ taste!