BEST HORROR MOVIES
 
  I have not seen every horror movie ever made, so there are going to be some exclusions that I must apologize for. I do not know what those exclusions are, since I can only tell you about those horror movies I have actually watched. There are thousands of different horror movies and due to the large amount, it is too broad a category to signify with one list. Thus, it is necessary to subcategorize the genre known as horror. These subcategories are my opinions, based on what I have seen. Someone else would likely make different subcategories, or make none at all.

    These are my subcategories of horror movies, along with my top picks:

    * REALISTIC

          A realistic horror movie is based on events that happened sometime in the past or could happen right now. It does not invoke any monsters, aliens, ghosts, dinosaurs, or zombies for scaring crowds. However, it can use viruses - because viruses are real.
          Top Pick: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
          Other significant releases : Silence of the Lambs, The Last House on the Left, The Hills Have Eyes (1977), 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later, Hostel, Hostel II, Devil's Rejects, Audition, Blue Sunshine

    * SUPERNATURAL

          A supernatural horror movie uses ghosts, demons, bogeymen, trolls, gods, etc. This type of movie can also rely heavily upon possession. Vampires seem to be a main theme in this category, however. And Asian horror heavily invokes this genre.
          Top Pick: Hellraiser (1987)
          Other Significant Releases: The Exorcist, The Shining, Amityville Horror II, Hellraiser II, A Tale of Two Sisters, The Ring, Mirrors, Whispering Corridors, The Eye, Uzumaki (Spiral), Demon Knight, Phantasm II, An American Werewolf in London

    * ZOMBIE

          I would guess there are more than 50 different zombie movies, so this is complicated enough to deserve its own subcategory. A zombie is not a cannibal nor a virus infected person. If zombies were cannibals then they would eat each other and if they were infected with a virus, then they would be alive. A zombie is a dead human that eats living humans.
          Top Pick: Dawn of the Dead (1978)
          Other Significant Releases: Return of the Living Dead, Day of the Dead, Dawn of the Dead (2004)

    * EXTRATERRESTRIAL

          This type of horror movie involves something that did not originate on the Earth or takes place on an environment that is not the Earth. Supernatural environments do not qualify as extraterrestrial, although they are technically so.
           Top Pick: Alien (1979)
           Other Significant Releases: The Thing, Aliens, Predator, Predator 2, Sunshine, Event Horizon, Alien 3, Alien 4, Alien vs. Predator 2

    * ZOOLOGIC

          A horror movie based on zoology, or the study of animals, is one that exaggerates or offers variations on, the reality of animals. Dinosaurs are a main theme in this category. Bear in mind that humans are also animals, and so variations on humans qualify.
          Top Pick: The Descent (2005)
          Other Significant Releases: Jurassic Park, Jaws, The Host, Kingdom of the Spiders

    * SLASHER

          This type of movie shows a lot of people being killed in various ways, by some sort of stalking human or supernatural human. These are not realistic because the antagonist often displays superhuman strength or healing abilities.
          Top Pick: Halloween (2007)
          Other Significant Releases: Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th

    * OTHER

          I'm not sure how to classify some movies, so they are just 'other'.
          Top Pick: The Stuff (1985)
          Other Significant Releases: Can't think of any.
         
          Some notes about what I have typed:

    * 28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later are often erroneously labeled as "zombie" movies. I must point out that the people are infected with a virus, which is similar to rabies. Also, they are not dead. Those movies are realistic.
    * The creatures in The Descent were possible variations on humans, so I could technically move that to the Realistic subcategory. Their existence could come about by species cleavage, which is explained by phylogenetic systematics.
    * A vampire is not a possible variation on a human, so all vampire movies are supernatural.
    * The Host used a fish, heavily mutated, by chemicals.

Hurray for Audition and Tale of Two Sisters!!!

I need to see 28 days/weeks later sometime.

Ramza

PET SEMETARY (1989)

CARRIE (1976 version)

THE STEPFORD WIVES (1975 version)

CUJO (1983)

ARACHNOPHOBIA (1990)

CHILD'S PLAY (1988)

DEAD SILENCE (2007)

SUDDENLY, LAST SUMMER (1959)

1408 was pretty good too

I love horror movies
Problem is, most are horrible (no pun intended
Anyway, here are the ones I really enjoyed (that I can think off at the moment):

A Tale of Two Sisters
Alien (a classic! far better than most any alien film I can think of)
An American Werewolf in London
Army of Darkness (hilarious and awesome
Brazil (hard to classify this movie, not really horror, but has some horror feel to it, definitely brilliant for sure)!
Escape from New York (Carpenter at his best)!
The Exorcist (in my opinion this is THE greatest horror film ever made, and nothing tops it! Make sure you see the "uncut" version on a big screen... definitely frightening for sure!)
Halloween (the original slasher is still the best... love the autumnal feel and serenity of small-town America!)
Ghost Story (not as good as the beautiful film Haunted, but quite entertaining)
Haunted (if you haven't seen this, you must! it's the best ghost story I've ever seen! If you enjoyed A Tale of Two Sisters, I can't imagine how you won't enjoy this great "horror" film)!
In the Mouth of Madness (could have been a classic, but instead ends up as the best Lovecraft inspired movie ever)
Jaws (a cultural phenomenon, although the guy who wrote the book said afterward he should not have written it because it gave sharks a bad name... I wouldn't classify this movie as horror, although I can see why you do)
Nightmare on Elm Street (clever and fun, this movie was really well done, the sequels however suck)!
The Mummy (not the original with Boris, but the new one, was a great film! too bad the sequel was terrible)
The Ring (still need to see Ringu)
The Shining (good stuff)
The Thing (a good John Carpenter flick, still awesome even to this day)!
Starship Troopers (well, not sure how your weird classification scheme works... I wouldn't call this, nor Alien a horror film to be honest, rather sci-fi, but the former was great, and this one was really fun, although dumb in many ways)

hmmm, might think of more later on!
I tend to like movies which are more about the atmosphere than anything else. "Horror" movies like the Host bore me, and 1408 was just horrendous! Definitely, we should keep this list going, since I'm always up for a new horror movie (even though chances are that afterward I'll say it sucked

cheers,

-avatar!

BTW, would you consider anything by Ingmar Bergman "horror"? What about The Seventh Seal? By the way, you do know that all your "real" films never happened? The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is entirely fictitious, although it was loosely inspired by Ed Gein.

edit: Also, I'm sure Arachnophobia has a special place in Jodo's heart!

I'm too much of a wuss to watch anything with serial killers or zoimbies or anything, but weird non-anthropomorphic monsters are fine for some reason.

As for a favorite? Gremlins 2, if it counts. If it doesn't, I'm gonna have to go with Gremlins 2.

That is probably my all time favorite sci-fi/horror movie.

HO-LEE F*** that movie scared the crap out of me.  Saw it like 4 times ;P

My top 10:

1)   Jurassic Park
2)   Jurassic Park
3)   Jurassic Park
4)   Jurassic Park
5)   Jurassic Park
6)   Jurassic Park
7)   Event Horizon
8)   Jurassic Park
9)   Jurassic Park
10) Jurassic Park

heh...
http://xkcd.com/87/

edit: I thought Event Horizon was kinda cool too. Would have made a good video game!

Here we go!!  Cool thread!

Ok, lots of good movies listed Jodo - and very good to see 'The Descent' listed in  there.  What a great 'thriller-horror'.  This was a good one to watch with the g/f.  LOL on the Stuff?!!?  Hahaha, I have to watch that, I remember watching it as a kid.  I read that it had an underlying 'anti-smoking' (or antii-drug) message

Of course Nightmare of Elm Street 1 was pretty good.  Scream 1 was good too.  There's definitely a few Wes Craven (even that guy's name is scary) movies that deserve mentioning, but I have to look them up.

Here's some additional movies to put other there, not sure where they rate, in order, but here's what I got.

The Gate (1987)- (Featuring little Steven Dorff of Blade fame), pretty scary and bordered of humorous at times.  The scene where he see's his mom and dad come back, only it's not really them.  Or the family portrait that was the family, murdered.  And who can ever forget the mini-troll things.

The Prince of Darkness (1987)- One of John Carpenter's scarier movies, if you can get passed the severe 80's cheese look of all the actors. Some interesting concepts - What if Jesus was an alien sent to 'warn' us from a great evil?  The other side of mirrors....  Donals Pleseance and two of the better chinese characters from Big Trouble in Little china (can't think of their names), are in this one.  Zombies too.

They Live (1986)- I love this movie - The classic quote of 'I have come to chew bubblegum and kick ass...and I'm all out of bubble gum' featured in Duke Nuke'em came from here.   Roddy Piper puts the sunglasses on and sees what's 'really' going on in the world.

The Sentinel (1976) - This one was pretty good actually, though you have to get passed the 70's look.  I caught this by accident on a late night cable channel flip.  A young model in New York moves into an apartment that she gets at a great price, or so she thinks, but soon learns a gate / portal to hell exists in the building and is being guarded by an old priest.  Prince Humperdink from Princess Bride is in this one.  The girl that played the model would definitely be on my list.

Phantasm 1 (1978) - This one I don't know if it's still scary, the sequals became quite comedic (Reggie!) but no one can forget the Tall Man or the flying metallic balls that drilled into people's skulls.

I'll see if I can think of any others

BTW - Did anyone see Mirrors with Keifer Sutherland?  An R-Rated Horror movie that looks good, could it be?!?

No takers for Manos: The Hands of Fate?

I haven't seen it (despite trying to get Keifer to go with me this weekend), but the reviews over at Rotten Tomatoes don't seem very favorable.

This thread was actually inspired by my viewing of Mirrors. I already commented about it in the FILMS 2008 thread. For further information, it reminded me of The Ring and a Twilight Zone episode. Most of the reviews are unfavorable and that is typical of really good movies that only a handful of people understood. Not much thought is required to grasp what's going on, but you do have to pay attention. I saw a lot of people viewing their cellphones in the theater and I'm not sure why they paid for a movie if they intended to not watch it. Anyway, I would recommend reading what the idiots have to say at IMDB (they are always an entertaining bunch, and according to them, every movie is somehow the worst movie ever made) and go watch the movie. It is clear that the bad reviews were written by people with either low intelligence or low attention spans.

The only Bergman movie I've seen is The Seventh Seal and it did not seem like horror although it did take place during the plague and had a few disturbing scenes. It was definitely more philosophical than scary.

   I know the realistic films never happened, but they were either based on events that did happen or could happen. There was no chainsaw massacre in Texas, but that Gein fellow did wear a mask of skin. The reason why it's realistic, more so than the connection with Ed Gein, is that some guy could very well grab a chainsaw and decide to massacre some people. It is not impossible. Gosh, just read this:

   http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/ … anada.bus/

The Howling (1981) - Both this film and American Werewolf in London were released in 1981.  Personally, I have to give the edge to Howling.  It has a fair share of comedy (though I think a lot of it was unintentional), but there are a couple scary scenes.  It also has the best damn werewolf transformation I've seen in any kind of movie.  American Werewolf also has a good transformation scene, but that film fell out of my favor because it was too gory for my tastes, and I hated the ending. 

Bad Moon (1996) - Well... I'm still not sure why Mariel Hemingway took the lead role in this film.  And the werewolf isn't really at the center of the story; he's more of a co-star.  The werewolf looks good (I can't remember if it had a transformation scene or not), but there's not much else here.  Still, if you want another werewolf movie, then you'll lose only 80 minutes of your life watching this one.

The Wolf Man (1941) - Black & white, and a classic.  That is all.

The Monster Squad (1987) - One of my favorite films of all time.  It's another film that's not scary, and it's definitely more of an action/comedy thing.  But hey, you get Dracula, Sea Monster, Mummy, Frankenstein, and Wolf Man in one film, all put together in an 80s-movie package.  And I really liked the performances of Dracula and Wolf Man.

Haha...I hear you on IMDB...Gotta love the petty debates that go on here, and Youtube.

Thanks for your take on Mirrors, I definitely want to see it now.

Here's another classic horror movie

The Fly 1986 - Incredible transformation, very gross, but I tell you, very well done.  Goldblume does an amazing job as Brundle Fly

Another 2 for the realistic category:
Wolf Creek and The Blair Witch Project

I've always thought that BWP requires someone put themselves in the same situation to really enjoy/understand. I wouldn't want to be lost out in the middle of the woods during the night with shit like that going on...

I don't really like horror movies, but I do enjoy good psychological thrillers that border the horror genre like the Saw series (I, great, II good, III bad, IV good), Cube (1 amazing, 2 not so much, 3 ... lol STV), Hellraiser.  I prefer the standard psychological thriller movies like Memento, Se7en, The Game, The Fountain, stuff like that.  Horror movies are just usually too borderline over-the-top or just underbudgeted to be produced well (hello, Rob Zombie House of a Thousand Corpses?)

The Blair Witch Project - I was one of the few idiots (or the only one) who thought this really happened. It scared me shitless. I watched it for the first time on cable on Halloween night during a thunderstorm, so that helped with the scaring. It's still a trip to watch, especially the last scene.

The Entity - Creepiest movie about ghost rape, ever. If there's one that's creepier, I don't want to know about it. That pounding music that plays during each encounter is almost scarier than the entity itself.

The Car - My favorite movie about a demon-possessed vehicle. After seeing No Country for Old Men, I've been dreaming of a remake in which Josh Brolin reprises the lead role originally played by his father and, if they're still together, his wife Diane Lane plays his wife in the movie. It would also be directed by the Coen bros. and it would be a bloodbath of human roadkill.

2007's BLACK HOUSE (Geomeun jip) is a really good korean horror film along the lines of Miike's Audition. it builds little by little and then explodes at the end. plenty of wincing to be enjoyed by everyone...  netflix has it,

Mirrors is a remake of 2003's Korean movie Into the Mirror, although it looks like they americanized it into more of a gore movie (not AL) and threw in some boobs. Netflix doesnt have this one, we just downloaded a fansub.

the Host was about as scary as ghostbusters... i was expecting everyone to break out in song at any moment ...

Blair Witch was very well done. I think a lot of people thought it really happened. However, I can't seem to bring myself to watch it again (not scared, just boring the 2nd time around). They need to make a good video game along those lines...

cheers,

-avatar!

Man, I just caught that one on one of the Encore channels last weekend (about half way through) and my mind was blown.  Great concept, didn't know there was more than one.

I think the original The Omen and Rosemary's Baby take the top spots for me.  Don't know if I should be excited or horrified at the prospect of a Michael Bay produced remake of the latter.

Also, where's the love for Hitchcock?  Psycho, Rear Window, Rope, Frenzy.... all classics that scared the living doo-doo out of me when I was a kid.

I love Hitchcock! My fav is Vertigo, although I personally wouldn't classify Hitchcock as horror (I view his work as mystery). On the other hand, two exceptions have to be Psycho and The Birds which are great horror films. (Wasn't Psycho considered the greatest horror movie by the American Film Institute or something like that?)

Also, what about A Clockwork Orange?

cheers,

-avatar!

They really need to make a horror-film centered around Track 2 of the original SILENT HILL soundtrack..

..Once you hear this track you turn into a ravaged, murdering psychopath focused only on KILL KILL KILL..

..and f--- that THE HAPPENING (2008) flick!

Children Kill..

It means Rosemary will explode. Micheal Bay demands that all childbirth be AWESOME.

I've never seen any of the films you mentioned. I remember my parents talking about Hitchcock, especially The Birds.

That movie is not scary; it's ultra violent, like Robocop. Of course, the violence might be scary to some people. Another good early Malcom McDowell film is If...., from 1968.

  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063850/

Not _really_ horror but the best thriller, by far, I watched this year is Chugyeogja (english title: Chaser - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1190539/ )
It does contain horror/gore elements but that's not the meat of the movie (...).
No silly revengeful or supernatural entity in there, just human psychology.
By all means give it an evening if you can.
Korean flicks: awesome alternative to hollywood dumbed-down crap even a chicken with an IQ of 16 couldn't stand.
Later,

Alcahest

Although I'm a huge horror-lover, I stayed out of this thread simply because there's just too many films to mention. Personally, horror movies never really frighten me, but I do enjoy them still for their dark settings and campy silliness. I just thought about this, though:

I definitely think avatar! brings up an interesting point here. Ingmar Bergman's movies are most often not considered conventional "horror", but still I'd say that they are way more disturbing than most horror movies. Its a different type of horror: an exposition to and contemplation on your own mortality, that frankly makes you realize that most horror movies where you have some guy in a hockey-mask going around chopping up people or some supernatural shit going on are just plain silly and childish (although these silly movies also have a lot of charm). I guess different people find different subjects "scary" or "disturbing". The Seventh Seal definitely disturbed the hell out of me more profoundly than any horror movie I've seen (since I'm a philosophical person and thus very open to/able to identify with it's particular kind of dread). But other people might be able to relate to and prefer to be frightened by stuff like this instead, if that's their cup of tea.

On the subject of the more "existential dread"-side of horror (as opposed to the serial killer/zombie/alien/possession/etc. sides), I've always found dystopian tales very disturbing, you know like 1984, Brave New World, and the like. Definitely scarier than some dumb monster running around. And while we're on the topic of different and atypical horror, how about the surreal stuff? I've always found David Lynch's work full of disturbing scenes: Twin Peaks, Fire Walk With Me, Blue Velvet, Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive, and Inland Empire definitely have their share of nightmare moments, many of them far more earthshattering than the cheap jabs of the "slasher"-films. Again, a different type of horror. Not to mention the TV news, that stuff really turns my stomach so much that I purposely avoid it for the sake of my own mental well-being.... Oops, getting somewhat off-track here.

Anyway, what I bumped the thread for (if anyone cares) is that I suddenly remembered the mention of Ingmar Bergman in here, and the discussion about whether or not to classify him as "horror". It turns out Bergman actually made one conventional horror movie apart from his existential stuff: Hour of the Wolf. Its quite good with a very well-crafted chilly atmosphere, about a painter who thinks he sees demons. Gets quite unsettling and freaky towards the end (in the "psychological horror"-way).

Also, Michael Bay remaking Rosemary's Baby is just about the most pathetic thing I've ever heard. That guy isn't even on the same planet as Roman Polanski.

And while we're on the "also" note: remakes of classic horror movies practically always suck, don't they?

I definitely wouldn't call Hour of the Wolf conventional horror. Again, it's about a man fighting his own daemons. Just like all Bergman films, it's psychological and deep.

As for Michael Bay, has he done anything good?? I wonder how many explosions there will be in the RB remake? Yeah, chances are good, that it's going to suck. There's only one remake that I can think of that was actually as good or even better than the original. That is:

The Mummy

then of course, it was followed by an absolutely terrible sequel (which I saw ONLY because I had a free ticket, and it totally wasn't worth the time)! I guess there's also a horrible third Mummy movie, which apparently has nothing to do with any mummy.

cheers,

-avatar!

That depends on what you mean by "conventional", of course. It has Bergman's existentialist touches, but its definitely a horror movie, as there are demons (actual demons, as in supernatural creatures) and impossible, supernatural scenarios. Its the only Bergman movie I've seen that has supernatural motifs, which is probably why its known as his only horror movie. The Seventh Seal featured Death personified of course, but he was more metaphorical than "real".