Best Horror Film...

CallaghanFilms

CallaghanFilms

Veteran
The Top Ten Horror
Films Of All Time...​

Granted, other threads have covered the "Scariest" or "Most Disturbing" films. This is something else altogether...
This is a list of the best-made overall classics that happen to fall under the Horror umbrella.

Now, what is horror? As always, opinions will vary...and this is no doubt especially true for this particular genre (which is so near and dear to so many dvxusers' hearts.) For myself, it is easier to say what isn't horror. Is Alien? Yes. However, I would personally not consider Aliens to be so (I see it as more Sci-Fi.) I also would not label The Silence of the Lambs with a horror post-it (even though some do just that), but rather with a thriller one.

Anyway, on with the lists...


The Callaghan Top Ten:

#1 Psycho (1960)
psycho4.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0054215/

#2 The Shining (1980)
17.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0081505/

#3 Jaws (1975)
jaws_chum.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0073195/

#4 Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
02b_bride_of_frankenstein.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0026138/

#5 Alien (1979)
20050331alien.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0078748/​
 
#6 The Birds (1963)
birds.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0056869/

#7 Halloween (1978)
Halloween_JamieLeeCurtis.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0077651/

#8 Rosemary's Baby (1968)
001649_44.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0063522/

#9 Misery (1990)
misery2.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0100157/

#10 The Omen (1976)
omen4.jpg

http://imdb.com/title/tt0075005/​


Honorable Mentions

-Dracula (1931)
http://imdb.com/title/tt0021814/

-Poltergeist (1982)
http://imdb.com/title/tt0084516/

-The Exorcist (1973)
http://imdb.com/title/tt0070047/

-The Thing (1982)
http://imdb.com/title/tt0084787/

-The Village of the Damned (1960)
http://imdb.com/title/tt0054443/
 
Excellent! Thanks for posting this thread, Callaghan! This will help give some insight to what different people consider horror (re: HorrorFest)

Here's my list:

01. Halloween
02. Angel Heart
03. The Shining
04. Psycho
05. Shadow of the Vampire
06. Devil's Advocate
07. The Hunger
08. Rosemary's Baby
09. The Exorcist
10. Bram Stoker's Dracula

Honorable Mention:
Frailty
Carrie
Alien
Poltergeist
 
Very hard to choose a top ten but I'll try.....

1. Suspiria
2. The Brood
3. The Exorcist
4. Halloween
5. Black Christmas
6. Night of the living dead
7. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
8. Alien
8. Carrie
9. Psycho
10. The Stepfather
11. The Thing
 
I was waiting to see what you and The Machinist would come up with. :)

Hey! Where's Hudson's list? And TheYankee's? And Horse...an horror aficionado like you surely has a list we need to see...:beer:
 
Last edited:
Halloween 1/2
Texas Chainsaw Massacre
The Sixth Sense
Nightmare on elm street
The Thing
Psycho
The Shining
The exorcist
 
There have been some very good lists, so far. I'll put a stop to that.:Drogar-BigGrin(DBG)

In no particular order:

John Carpenter's The Thing - Okay, maybe there's some order to this. Not only do I think this may be the best horror movie ever made, I think this is the best movie I've ever seen. Period.

Halloween - The best and classic example of my favorite horror subgenre - the slasher flick. This movie has inspired me more than any other.

Black Christmas - Fantastic pre-Halloween slasher that's drenched in dread and suspense. If you haven't seen it, you should be ordering it right now.

Now the Argento flicks:

Deep Red - Argento's giallo masterpiece makes my list for several reasons. Argento weaves a great murder mystery that keeps you guessing throughout, but completely makes sense when all is revealed. His visual style is unmatched in terms of interesting camera movement and unusual shot selection.

Suspiria - Very surreal and creepy. Brutal, yet beautiful.

Other suff:

The Changeling - The best ghost story I've ever seen. Hands down. George C. Scott is perfect in this.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - While this doesn't stack up to some of the others on this list from a technical standpoint, it makes up for that in raw power.

Bride of Frankenstein - This made every other movie made in the 1930s look like a crappy play in comparison. This helped establish what a movie should look like.

Evil Dead - Wonderfully creepy and fun flick made on a shoestring budget by a bunch of kids. How cool is that? Raimi's extremely unconventional camera work is worth the purchase price by itself.

Psycho - Hitch. Enough said.

Didn't quite make the cut:

Day of the Dead - Romero at his finest. Bleak and hopeless, the way a zombie movie should be.

Exorcist III - "Wait, you mean the original, right?" No, I don't. Don't get me wrong, I like the original. I just can't watch it very often because it's sooo boring for the majority of the movie. For me, nothing can top the interaction between George C. Scott and Brad Dourif in part III. If you haven't watched it, do it. Now.
 
HorseFilms said:
Deep Red - Argento's giallo masterpiece makes my list for several reasons. Argento weaves a great murder mystery that keeps you guessing throughout, but completely makes sense when all is revealed. His visual style is unmatched in terms of interesting camera movement and unusual shot selection.
Click to expand...

Deep Red was my favorite from my younger days...until I tried watching it again recently.

I find myself tapping my foot, waiting for the bathtub and elevator.

Hopefully, those scenes are actually in the flick, and not in some other movie. I still haven't reached them in this one.

Myabe I was more forgiving when I was 18.

But I ain't gonna give up. Sooner or later the DVD will play to the end.
 
GenJerDan said:
Deep Red was my favorite from my younger days...until I tried watching it again recently.

I find myself tapping my foot, waiting for the bathtub and elevator.

Hopefully, those scenes are actually in the flick, and not in some other movie. I still haven't reached them in this one.

Myabe I was more forgiving when I was 18.

But I ain't gonna give up. Sooner or later the DVD will play to the end.
Click to expand...

Do you have the uncut DVD that Anchor Bay released? If not, you're probably missing 20-30 minutes of the movie. The cut version (released as Deep Red: The Hatchet Murders) makes absolutely zero sense and is pretty much unwatchable.
 
I got it in the "Chiller" 50-film set for cheap. Horrible transfer, of course.

But I don't think it's the cut version....loooooooong. Longer than I remember it being it the theater, actually, but that might just be memory.

(To hint at where I am in watching it: the last thing I remember is the arm-wrestling. Or was it Hemmings going to his friend's apartment? Whichever came last.)
 
Top Ten Horror Films Of All Time


1.John Carpenter's The Thing- It just had the absolute most amazing ending of any film, it left you wanting so much more but also being so satisfied with not having anymore.

2.George A. Romero's Night Of The Living Dead- Its an original, its a classic, it made zombies.

3.Sam Raimi's Evil Dead- It is what kicked Bruce Campbell's career into action and it was the directorial debut of a man who now directs Spiderman (which had the best opening of all time.)

4.Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds- It honest to god made me afraid OF BIRDS!!!

5.Ridley Scott's Alien- Ridley Scott is just an amazing director period. His films are real, and spooky. If Alien didn't scare you then you must have a chemical imbalance. Also, if you think Segourney Weaver is attractive, you may also have a chemical imbalance.

6.John Carpenter's Halloween- It's John Carpenter's only Halloween film and it is superb. It introduces a character that has now been PLAYED OUT and it starred a hermafrodite who everyone thought was sexy.

7.House On Haunter Hill (original)- Vincent Price as an excentric millionaire, his wife is a *****, he invites plenty of people to a house for seemingly no reason and soon the sreepy stuff happends.

8.David Fincher's SE7EN- Its got a young Brad Pitt, its got a young...er Morgan Freeman, and it's one of the eeriest roles for Kevin Spacey to play. A Perfect puzzle film that ends with a twist.

9.Johnathan Lynn's Clue- Now, i know, this is very debatable as a horror film but still, these people made a film based off of a board game and the movie was....... GREAT! Again, very debatable!

10.Mary Harron's American Psycho- This is another one that is debatable as a horror film but if there is a scene with a nude man holding a chainsaw covered in blood and chasing a woman down an empty hallway then its a horror film. But your opinions may vary.

Top 5 Worst Horror Films Of All Time

1.Michael Rae's Laserblast- I watched it, and afterwards i took a few hours to question why i got into film. I realized, it was to infiltrate and kill people who make films like this.

2.John Carpenter's The Fog- This is just a horrible film, the problem is solved yet the pirates in the fog still kill everyone in the town... retarded.

3.Lucio Fulci's Zombi- This is just a badddd, baaadddddddddd zombie movie of which there has been many.

4.Mitsiko Titowaki's Battle Royale II- While Battle Royale was an amazing movie the sequel was a terrible waste of japanese film:(

5.Francis Ford Coppola's The Terror- This is a black and white film starring Jack Nicholson and Boris Karloff which is a very strange pair but sadly it is a horrible film and although it has 2 of the best actors of all time and one of the most dedicated directors it still found a way to fail.

Special mentions for worst horror films of all time is:

ANYTHING UWE BOLL TOUCHES!!!!!!!
 
HorseFilms said:
There have been some very good lists, so far. I'll put a stop to that.:Drogar-BigGrin(DBG)
Click to expand...

Nice list, Horse. There're a couple on the list I haven't seen. Looks like I'll have to head to the video store...:beer:
 
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