Last Updated on August 3, 2021
So this week I’ll give you a little bit of a window into where I came from. I’m gonna throw out, for good or for bad, the movies that have had the biggest impact on shaping the horror fan I am today.
It’s not a list of fav’s (though some certainly are), and it’s not even a list of movies I recommend (although you could do worse in most cases). It’s just the pics that when I look back I realize that I wouldn’t think about horror the way I do if I hadn’t seen them. So strap in and check out some of the dark corners of my closet.
Then spit bullets on the flicks that made you all into the fine upstanding psychopaths you are today.
1. IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS
This was, is and will likely remain my favorite horror flick of all time. The unrelenting mind-f*cks, the awesomely sick images, and a scenario that is plausible enough to leave you nervous are just some of the reasons to love Carpenter’s most assured and ambitious work. Ole’ John is one of those guys who always swings for the fences, so he hits lots of homers and strikes out just about as often. In this case he knocked the leather right off the ball. Do you read Sutter Cane? You should.
2. ALIEN
My folks actually let me check this out when I was 8, but they wouldn’t watch it with me. So I spent the better part of my first viewing running into their bedroom to make sure they were alright. They kindly said that I could stay with them if the movie was too scary. But no, I just wanted to check on them – a lot. I finally watched Alien all the way through sometime in the intervening decade and came to the same conclusion I hold today. It’s nearly perfect and if you want to know how to make a scary f*cking movie without a lot of fancy camera magic and music cues, study and learn.
3. THE ENTITY
If there’s a movie that makes you feel more nakedly, viscerally vulnerable than this movie I want to see it. I’ve never felt so helpless watching something. Poor Barbara Hershey is getting raped left, right and center by a paranormal force, or forces, and nobody can do a damn thing to help her. It’s relentless, raw, and completely unpredictable. All horror should aspire to this kind of powerful effect. I thought I’d been hardened to any real fright with all the genre I’ve seen, but this proved to me that there’s always a story that can gut you no matter how jaded you become.
4. THE BELIEVERS
Horror can make you scared of shite you don’t even believe in. Get great performances and give it all the feel of a realistic setting, whoo boy look out, all the sudden compacts and Santeria are a big problem. I also discovered with The Believers that as much as it’s fun to watch the pics that everybody loves, it’s even more fun to find a truly outstanding movie that many don’t give a lot of thought to.
5. HELL NIGHT
As a 7 year-old watching a movie I wasn’t supposed to watch when the parents were out, this nasty beast scared me like no other slasher has since. It’s highly derivative and a villain named Andrew doesn’t exactly send chills down the spine, but you always remember that first scare. In fact this movie was a big reason that I had a nightlight in my room until I was in my mid teens. And I’m happy to say that despite multiple flaws, it’s still a pretty solid offering.
6. THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE
I’m not sure why it took me so long to finally see this movie, but when I did catch it my thought afterwards was, well I didn’t really like it very much. I thought the characters were all annoying, the set up took waaaaaay too long, and overall I wasn’t particularly impressed with the intensity. I have found that my opinion about TCM being a mostly boring pic with one outstanding kill (hammer anyone?) is the one stance that leads to more anger from genre fans than any other. Which is fine, ’cause what I quickly realized was this – if you can’t stick to your guns just because the majority thinks you’re wrong then you’re not much of a genre fan at all.
7. GODZILLA VS. MECHAGODZILLA
Monster fighting monster = awesome! I’d seen a few monster mashes before I saw this pic, and I’ve suffered through more bad than good ones since, but anytime you throw two battling terrors together on screen I will be there. Why? Because like a heroin junkie I want to recapture that first epic grin, and it came watching Godzilla get his azz handed to him by Mechagodzilla, before of course ripping the f*ckers head off.
8. THE HAUNTING (1963)
I love the wet red stuff as much as the next crazy person, in fact probably more so. But good horror doesn’t have to rely on it and no movie has shown that to more startling effect in my estimation than this masterwork of terrifying sound design. A lot of the movie plays on strong build up followed by an anticlimax, and the effect is that you spend the whole ride feeling kind of ill and very unsettled. That said, there is one boo scare towards the end (I won’t spoil it) that is the one and only time I have ever dumped an entire drink on the floor as a result of a movie.
9. BEWARE! THE BLOB
This is the type of movie you either love or hate, there’s not much middle ground. But I spent three years after I saw it refusing to sit down without looking to see if there was a blob in my chair, because of one of the early deaths. I still consider it to be good cheesy fun with some surprisingly good effects, but it marked me forever with the lesson that horror can give you some weird real life phobias.
10. LASERBLAST
When it comes to genre flicks, never EVER, trust the box. Back before I learned this important lesson my dad and I took a chance on this promising (we thought) looking little nugget and were treated to the worst movie either of us had ever seen. In fact to this day it remains the benchmark for me. No matter how bad some crappy piece of shite might be, I can always take solace in the fact that it wasn’t as bad as Laserblast.
Follow the JOBLO MOVIE NETWORK
Follow us on YOUTUBE
Follow ARROW IN THE HEAD
Follow AITH on YOUTUBE