“Gallery of Horror” by Alvaro Tapia is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 These are the OG’s, guys and ghouls. Sorry, gals. Typo.

I don’t know about you, but it seems like every October, I make grandiose plans to engage in several mini-marathons of my favorite horror films in honor of Halloween, and nearly all of them fail to become a reality. But that doesn’t mean it’s not fun to come up with an itinerary! (Author’s note: I searched my vocabulary for several long minutes searching for a more fun word for itinerary, which seems to reduce what should be an enjoyable excursion to a set of responsibilities, but alas, here we are.)

Now, you can find a ton of, “Best Horror Films of All-Time” lists out there, and they will invariably look like this:

The Exorcist

The Shining

The Omen (Lotta “The” movies, no?)

Halloween

Etc., Etc., Etc., Etc., Etc., Etc., Etc., Etc., Etc., Etc.

Look, it’s not that these movies aren’t great, because they are. But everyone knows about these films, even people that don’t like horror films in the first place, and anyone with even so much as a passing interest has checked them out by now.

So with that being said, we’ve (I’ve) decided to put together a list of slightly-lesser known horror films that you can check out this Halloween. Now these aren’t super obscure European art films or anything; they’re all films that you can find on Amazon, or wherever you rent movies these days. (Redbox is cool, but you can never be sure what they’re gonna have as far as old movies; usually pretty slim pickings in that department.) Whether you decide to do a marathon of all ten films back-to-back, or choose to simply watch one or two this weekend, you’re sure to get a kick out of any and all of these selections.

On with the show! (Author’s note: I decided to do these alphabetically, as trying to put one over the other would be an exercise in endless self-debate.)

“The Conjuring” by Maurina Rara is licensed under CC BY 2.0. Really, it’s not the foot hanging from above that’s scary, but rather the severity of the varicose veins on said foot.

The Conjuring

The Conjuring was a movie I had zero interest in. Like, none whatsoever. I’m not at all a James Wan fan, and will punch the face of anyone who tries to defend Saw as a good film (Side note: Cary Elwes delivers one of cinemas all-time worst performances in that film, and it’s not even a fun horrible performance a la Nick Cage.) So imagine my surprise when a mid-year poll of Quentin Tarantino’s favorite films thus far was released (back in 2013), and he happened to include The Conjuring (wanna say it was #9). My rational went something along the lines of, “If it’s good enough for Tarantino, it’s good enough for me,” and despite everything I had anticipated about the movie, it turned out to be a legitimately suspenseful film. Well crafted, and surprisingly effective with the thrills given the fact that there is almost no blood in the film. It’s an old-school tale with an old-school approach, and I would honestly argue that it’s the best haunted-house film of all time.

“RusselsCrazy” by Jessica Ripley is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. Why is the outstretched palm the universally accepted way to approach a crazy man with a gun?

The Crazies (2010 Re-make)

The Crazies is one of those movies that you don’t remember in super-great detail when you leave the theater or turn off the television, but you do remember that you totally dug it and would watch it again. Given that, this is the end of this summary. Oh yeah: Timothy Olyphant is awesome.

“Evil Dead Red Band” by Penquin Longman is licensed under CC BY 2.0. Also, there’s never really a time when you should saw your own face. Especially when your high on PCP.

Evil Dead (2013 Re-make)

So it should be known that I’m a huge Evil Dead fan, and worship all things Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell. Now, I was super hesitant when the film came out, as you never really can be sure what you’re going to get when one of your favorite cinematic properties gets re-made, and I think the best thing they did with this film is acknowledge that it would be impossible to re-create the spirit of the original, and so rather than attempt in vane to do so, they retained all of the classic sequences and tropes of said original, but removed the humor and took a more serious and sinister approach to the story. Now by no means am I saying this makes the re-make better than than the original, as that’s a large part of what gives Evil Dead ’81 its charm. That being said, Evil Dead ’81 doesn’t have blood literally raining from the sky. *cue Slayer*

“1986 Re Sonator” by Ricardo Pablo is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. Also, we thank you, Europe, for your casual attitude towards licensing cinematic photographs and marketing materials.

From Beyond

From Beyond is a film that so few people have seen, and it always leaves the same impression: “What the hell did I just watch? And can we watch it again?” It’s a visceral, bloody, overtly sexual mind-trip of a film. It’s from Stuart Gordon, who is responsible for the incomparable Re-Animator, and it’s similarly over the top in it’s execution. Also like Re-Animator, it stars Jeffrey Combs, who much like Bruce Campbell, finds this rare space between camp and gravitas in which to perform. Throw in parallel dimensions, overstimulated oblongatas, and a crap-ton of pink lighting, and you’ve got a wildly entertaining way to spend 90 minutes.

“Gremlins Singing to Mrs. Deagle” by Mart is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. And fuck Mrs. Deagle. She had it coming.

Gremlins

With all apologies to Die Hard, Gremlins is the greatest live-action Christmas film of all-time, hands down, with a bullet (It would be the best Christmas film of all time period, if not for a certain stop-motion animated Christmas film by Tim Burton.) Gizmo is one of the most loveable of all cinematic creations, as evidenced by his persistence in geek culture over the years, despite only starring in two films collectively totaling 180 minutes. The Gremlins themselves are a perfect mesh of goofy cartoons and sadistic little monsters. It still blows my mind that Steven Spielberg and Chris Columbus, two of the warmest and cuddliest filmmakers this side of Ron Howard (unless of course Ron Howard is directing a children’s movie like The Grinch, in which case he goes as dark as possible; I’m usually one for juxtaposition, but his approaches in this regard often just feel misdirected,) got together and decided that the best way for parents and children to come together was to watch a mother defend herself with a kitchen knife while being attacked from a little green monster that jumps out of a Christmas tree, and to have a Gremlin run over a genial, albeit slightly cranky, neighbor and his wife with their snowplow (We salute you, Mr. Futterman. And your wife too, I suppose.) Either way, if The Nightmare Before Christmas can become a Christmas staple, Gremlins can become a Halloween staple. And it should.

“1.13.12” by Movies in LA is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0. If you look hard enough, you’ll see Shane Black’s first writing credit. I think he was 12.

The Monster Squad

The Monster Squad is a movie very near and dear to my heart. Whereas most of my friends and peers grew up on, and have an incredible emotional attachment to, The Goonies, The Monster Squad was the movie that I adopted featuring a collective group of scrappy young bucks that have to band together in order to fight off a supernatural evil greater than themselves. It’s just that instead of buried treasure and a disfigured man-boy, it’s all of our favorite Universal monsters under one roof, with none other than Dracula himself as headmaster of the night’s events. This movie is a brisk jaunt, and the only complaint is that there isn’t more of it to go around. Oh yeah; watching junior high schoolers smoke and call each other fags is an interesting reminder of what times were like almost 30 years ago, especially given that it was a studio film with Burger King sponsorship.

“1985 Re Animator” by Ricardo Pablo is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. Yep, this is the movie Kevin Spacey talks about in American Beauty where a severed head goes down on a chick. You know you wanna see that.

Re-Animator

So I know I’m kind of double-dipping here with two Stuart Gordon films, and this is probably the highest profile film on this list, but I just couldn’t leave it out. Surprisingly, there are still a large number of people that haven’t seen Re-Animator, and yeah, I get that it’s not exactly for everyone, but you just can’t imagine how hysterical it is to reminisce about the film with others that have seen it. It’s got a bunch of gooey creature effects, and the production value is actually pretty good for a relatively low-budget flick. Plus, you know, severed heads going down on girls and whatnot.

“Carving up the turkey” by Boogeyman13 is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. Leatherface looks cool and all. But it’s all about that one shot.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003 Re-make)

I’ll be honest: as a whole, this film is okay. It was one of the first major re-makes in the early 2000’s, and for better or worse, was an integral part of starting the Hollywood Re-Make Machine. So why include it on this list? For the simple reason that it has one of cinema’s all-time greatest shots. I know, weird right? That a mediocre studio remake would be responsible for one the greatest shots in cinematic history. But it’s true. In this re-make, rather than stab himself to death, the hillbilly shoots himself through the head. The shot starts inside the van at the very front of the cab, tracks backwards showing the screaming teens on either side as it does, then goes dark as the camera tracks through the bullet wound in the hillbilly’s head, with the screaming teens still visible, then goes out through the back of the bullet wound, causing the head to slump forward, at which point the camera continues to track backwards through the bullet hole in the rear windshield, and raises out to the sky as it cranes downwards at the teens exiting the car. Truly, a brilliant shot. Then a bunch of stuff happens that you can probably half-pay attention to while you scroll your timeline on Twitter.

“Trick r Treat Movie Poster” by Rie is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. If I were a midget, I would dress as this guy for Halloween every year.

Trick ‘r Treat

Trick ‘r Treat is kind of like the Aberrant Literature Short Fiction Collection (shameless plug,) in that it’s essentially a collection of unique short stories, but in this case presented in a pseudo-linear fashion, or at least pulling a Tarantino in tying it all together and having multiple stories take place within a specific timeline, all to varying degrees of success. I will say that the actors really give it their all for such a schlocky movie, especially Dylan Baker (but that guy gives every role everything he has, so I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.) The character design is also awesome, as you can see above, plus it’s got Anna Paquin, which is always nice.

“Mad-Max-Fury-Road” by tricks ware is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. He seems tough, but he’s really just looking out for his girls. I have that right, don’t I?

Mad Max: Fury Road

I know, I know, I know, You’re probably thinking, “What the hell, Jason? This is neither a horror movie, nor follows the alphabetical presentation you established.” And you’d be right to do so. It just so happens that I’m obsessed with this film at the moment, and have resolved to find a way to enter it into any and every cinematic conversation I should happen to engage in. Ergo, I am classifying this article as a conversation (one I had with you; it’s been fun) and am with no qualms weaving it into a narrative it has no right being in. Watch it if you haven’t. It’s an incredibly visceral viewing experience, and arguably the greatest action film ever made.

Be sure to follow us on Twitter and like our page on Facebook!