☠Scary movies I find actually scary☠
by Celestron1980 | created - 03 Jan 2016 | updated - 04 Jan 2019 | PublicNot many scary movies live up to their promise when it comes to scare their audience. I prefer general creepiness, un-easiness and atmosphere to unmotivated jumpscares.
While gathering titles for my list, I realised that movies with antagonists disguised as humans scare the hell out of me.
In no particular order;
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- Movies or TV
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1. One Dark Night (1982)
PG | 89 min | Horror
As part of an initiation into a club called the Sisters, a young girl must spend the night in a mausoleum.
Directors: Tom McLoughlin, Michael Schroeder | Stars: Meg Tilly, Melissa Newman, Robin Evans, Leslie Speights
Votes: 3,756
2. The Boy (2016)
PG-13 | 97 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
An American nanny is shocked that her new English family's boy is actually a life-sized doll. After she violates a list of strict rules, disturbing events make her believe that the doll is really alive.
Director: William Brent Bell | Stars: Lauren Cohan, Rupert Evans, James Russell, Jim Norton
Votes: 101,892 | Gross: $35.82M
3. We Are Still Here (I) (2015)
Not Rated | 84 min | Horror, Mystery
In the cold, wintery fields of New England, a lonely old house wakes up every thirty years - and demands a sacrifice.
Director: Ted Geoghegan | Stars: Andrew Sensenig, Barbara Crampton, Larry Fessenden, Lisa Marie
Votes: 19,925
My favorite 2015 horror movie. Huge surprise for me.
4. The Visit (I) (2015)
PG-13 | 94 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Two siblings become increasingly frightened by their grandparents' disturbing behavior while visiting them on vacation.
Director: M. Night Shyamalan | Stars: Olivia DeJonge, Ed Oxenbould, Deanna Dunagan, Peter McRobbie
Votes: 151,607 | Gross: $65.21M
I had given up on Shyamalan's work since quite a while and approached this one with very low expectations.
I surprisingly enjoyed it a lot. A real creepfest.
5. Rituals (1977)
R | 100 min | Adventure, Horror, Thriller
Five doctors on a wilderness outing are stalked by disfigured, crazed killers.
Director: Peter Carter | Stars: Hal Holbrook, Lawrence Dane, Robin Gammell, Ken James
Votes: 3,071
6. Black Christmas (1974)
R | 98 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
During their Christmas break, a group of sorority girls are stalked by a stranger.
Director: Bob Clark | Stars: Olivia Hussey, Keir Dullea, Margot Kidder, John Saxon
Votes: 48,380 | Gross: $4.05M
The one that started it all.
7. Sinister (I) (2012)
R | 110 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
A controversial true-crime writer finds a box of Super 8 home movies in his new home, revealing that the murder case he is currently researching could be the work of an unknown serial killer whose legacy dates back to the 1960s.
Director: Scott Derrickson | Stars: Ethan Hawke, Juliet Rylance, James Ransone, Fred Thompson
Votes: 280,454 | Gross: $48.09M
8. Unfriended (2014)
R | 83 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
A group of online chatroom friends find themselves haunted by a mysterious, supernatural force using the account of their dead friend.
Director: Levan Gabriadze | Stars: Heather Sossaman, Matthew Bohrer, Courtney Halverson, Shelley Hennig
Votes: 81,479 | Gross: $32.48M
Unique and fine tuned.
9. Ghost Story (1981)
R | 110 min | Drama, Horror, Thriller
Two generations of men find themselves haunted by the presence of a spectral woman. When the son of one of the elderly men returns to his hometown after his brother's mysterious death, they attempt to unravel her story.
Director: John Irvin | Stars: Craig Wasson, Alice Krige, Fred Astaire, John Houseman
Votes: 9,881 | Gross: $23.37M
10. In the Mouth of Madness (1994)
R | 95 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
An insurance investigator begins discovering that the impact a horror writer's books have on his fans is more than inspirational.
Director: John Carpenter | Stars: Sam Neill, Jürgen Prochnow, Julie Carmen, David Warner
Votes: 79,388 | Gross: $8.95M
11. It Follows (2014)
R | 100 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
A young woman is followed by an unknown supernatural force after a sexual encounter.
Director: David Robert Mitchell | Stars: Maika Monroe, Keir Gilchrist, Olivia Luccardi, Lili Sepe
Votes: 269,219 | Gross: $14.67M
12. Frozen (I) (2010)
R | 93 min | Adventure, Thriller
Three skiers stranded on a chairlift are forced to make life-or-death choices, which prove more perilous than staying put and freezing to death.
Director: Adam Green | Stars: Shawn Ashmore, Emma Bell, Kevin Zegers, Ed Ackerman
Votes: 80,777 | Gross: $0.24M
13. Invaders from Mars (1986)
PG | 100 min | Horror, Sci-Fi
A boy tries to stop aliens who have taken over his town and are attempting to brainwash its inhabitants.
Director: Tobe Hooper | Stars: Karen Black, Hunter Carson, Timothy Bottoms, Laraine Newman
Votes: 10,594 | Gross: $4.88M
14. Curtains (1983)
R | 89 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Six young actresses auditioning for a movie role at a remote mansion are targeted by a mysterious masked murderer.
Director: Richard Ciupka | Stars: John Vernon, Samantha Eggar, Linda Thorson, Anne Ditchburn
Votes: 5,740
15. The Blob (1988)
R | 95 min | Horror, Sci-Fi, Thriller
A deadly entity from space crash-lands near a small town and begins consuming everyone in its path. Panic ensues as shady government scientists try to contain the horrific creature.
Director: Chuck Russell | Stars: Shawnee Smith, Kevin Dillon, Donovan Leitch Jr., Jeffrey DeMunn
Votes: 43,552 | Gross: $8.25M
16. The Fog (1980)
R | 89 min | Horror, Thriller
An unearthly fog rolls into a small coastal town exactly 100 years after a ship mysteriously sank in its waters.
Director: John Carpenter | Stars: Adrienne Barbeau, Jamie Lee Curtis, Janet Leigh, John Houseman
Votes: 83,050 | Gross: $21.38M
17. Alien Abduction (2014)
Not Rated | 85 min | Horror, Sci-Fi, Thriller
A vacationing family encounters an alien threat in this thriller based on the real-life Brown Mountain Lights phenomenon in North Carolina.
Director: Matty Beckerman | Stars: Katherine Sigismund, Corey Eid, Riley Polanski, Jillian Clare
Votes: 8,857
18. Sleep Tight (2011)
Not Rated | 102 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
Cesar, a miserable man who works as an apartment concierge, takes a special interest in an attractive woman who lives there. He goes to great lengths to trouble her.
Director: Jaume Balagueró | Stars: Luis Tosar, Marta Etura, Alberto San Juan, Petra Martínez
Votes: 46,714
19. Patrick: Evil Awakens (2013)
Not Rated | 96 min | Horror
At a private clinic, a young nurse soon discovers that one of the comatose patients is quite sinister.
Director: Mark Hartley | Stars: Sharni Vinson, Rachel Griffiths, Charles Dance, Peta Sergeant
Votes: 4,191
20. I, Madman (1989)
R | 89 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
A bookshop clerk and wannabe actress starts seeing the disfigured killer from her 1950s pulp novels come to life and start killing people around her. She tries to convince her cop boyfriend, but to no avail.
Director: Tibor Takács | Stars: Jenny Wright, Clayton Rohner, Randall William Cook, Stephanie Hodge
Votes: 3,732 | Gross: $0.15M
21. Among the Living (2014)
Not Rated | 90 min | Horror, Thriller
Three kids skip school in order to explore an abandoned film studio lot where they catch site of a woman being dragged across the lot by a masked man.
Directors: Alexandre Bustillo, Julien Maury | Stars: Anne Marivin, Théo Fernandez, Francis Renaud, Zacharie Chasseriaud
Votes: 2,551
22. Absentia (I) (2011)
R | 87 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
A woman and her sister begin to link a mysterious tunnel to a series of disappearances, including that of her own husband.
Director: Mike Flanagan | Stars: Katie Parker, Courtney Bell, Dave Levine, Justin Gordon
Votes: 20,086
Very singular movie. Very "wtf"?? and atmospheric.
23. V/H/S (2012)
R | 116 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
When a group of misfits are hired by an unknown third party to burglarize a desolate house and acquire a rare VHS tape, they discover more found footage than they bargained for.
Directors: Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, David Bruckner, Tyler Gillett, Justin Martinez, Glenn McQuaid, Radio Silence, Joe Swanberg, Chad Villella, Ti West, Adam Wingard | Stars: Calvin Lee Reeder, Lane Hughes, Adam Wingard, Hannah Fierman
Votes: 68,397 | Gross: $0.10M
24. V/H/S/2 (2013)
R | 96 min | Horror, Thriller
Searching for a missing student, two private investigators break into his house and find collection of VHS tapes. Viewing the horrific contents of each cassette, they realize there may be dark motives behind the student's disappearance.
Directors: Simon Barrett, Jason Eisener, Gareth Evans, Gregg Hale, Eduardo Sánchez, Timo Tjahjanto, Adam Wingard | Stars: Lawrence Michael Levine, Kelsy Abbott, Adam Wingard, Hannah Hughes
Votes: 44,011 | Gross: $0.02M
25. V/H/S Viral (2014)
R | 81 min | Adventure, Crime, Horror
A Los Angeles police chase sends a fame-obsessed man on a wild ride to save his girlfriend from a cybernetic terror.
Directors: Justin Benson, Gregg Bishop, Todd Lincoln, Aaron Moorhead, Marcel Sarmiento, Nacho Vigalondo | Stars: Patrick Lawrie, Emilia Ares, Celia K. Milius, Steve Berens
Votes: 19,231 | Gross: $0.00M
26. eXistenZ (1999)
R | 97 min | Horror, Mystery, Sci-Fi
A game designer on the run from assassins must play her latest virtual reality creation with a marketing trainee to determine if the game has been damaged.
Director: David Cronenberg | Stars: Jude Law, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Ian Holm, Willem Dafoe
Votes: 107,257 | Gross: $2.84M
Freakish from start to finish.
27. The Skeleton Key (2005)
PG-13 | 104 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
A hospice nurse working at a spooky New Orleans plantation home finds herself entangled in a mystery involving the house's dark past.
Director: Iain Softley | Stars: Kate Hudson, Peter Sarsgaard, Joy Bryant, Gena Rowlands
Votes: 123,051 | Gross: $47.81M
28. As Above, So Below (2014)
R | 93 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
When a team of explorers venture into the catacombs that lie beneath the streets of Paris, they uncover the dark secret that lies within this city of the dead.
Director: John Erick Dowdle | Stars: Perdita Weeks, Ben Feldman, Edwin Hodge, François Civil
Votes: 111,926 | Gross: $21.20M
29. Cemetery of Terror (1985)
R | 88 min | Horror, Thriller
On Halloween, a group of medical students steal the corpse a serial killer from a morgue and raise him from the dead, inadvertently putting themselves and a group of young neighborhood children in danger.
Director: Rubén Galindo Jr. | Stars: Hugo Stiglitz, Usi Velasco, Erika Buenfil, Edna Bolkan
Votes: 1,364
From the moment the dead rises until the end...
30. Case 39 (2009)
R | 109 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
A social worker fights to save a girl from her abusive parents, only to discover that the situation is more dangerous than she ever expected.
Director: Christian Alvart | Stars: Renée Zellweger, Ian McShane, Jodelle Ferland, Bradley Cooper
Votes: 93,371 | Gross: $13.25M
31. Troll Hunter (2010)
PG-13 | 103 min | Drama, Fantasy, Thriller
A group of students investigates a series of mysterious bear killings, but learns that there are much more dangerous things going on. They start to follow a mysterious hunter, learning that he is actually a troll hunter.
Director: André Øvredal | Stars: Otto Jespersen, Robert Stoltenberg, Knut Nærum, Glenn Erland Tosterud
Votes: 79,587 | Gross: $0.25M
A very welcome twist on the found footage genre. Many incredible, intense and frightning moments.
32. Grandmother's House (1988)
R | 90 min | Horror, Thriller
After the death of their beloved father, two teens go to their grandmother's house in California and begin to suspect their grandparents of murder.
Director: Peter Rader | Stars: Eric Foster, Kim Valentine, Len Lesser, Ida Lee
Votes: 2,305
33. Dreamcatcher (2003)
R | 134 min | Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi
Friends on a camping trip discover that the town they're vacationing in is being plagued in an unusual fashion by parasitic aliens from outer space.
Director: Lawrence Kasdan | Stars: Morgan Freeman, Thomas Jane, Jason Lee, Damian Lewis
Votes: 96,488 | Gross: $33.72M
34. Atrocious (2010)
R | 79 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Two teenage siblings endure a terrifying experience while investigating a rural legend near their family's vacation home.
Director: Fernando Barreda Luna | Stars: Cristian Valencia, Clara Moraleda, Chus Pereiro, Sergi Martin
Votes: 5,247
35. The Blair Witch Project (1999)
R | 81 min | Horror, Mystery
Three film students vanish after traveling into a Maryland forest to film a documentary on the local Blair Witch legend, leaving only their footage behind.
Directors: Daniel Myrick, Eduardo Sánchez | Stars: Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, Joshua Leonard, Bob Griffin
Votes: 285,781 | Gross: $140.54M
36. The Abandoned (2006)
R | 99 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
An adopted woman returns to her home country and the family home that she never knew and must face the mystery that lies there.
Director: Nacho Cerdá | Stars: Anastasia Hille, Karel Roden, Valentin Goshev, Valentin Ganev
Votes: 13,304 | Gross: $1.26M
37. The Thing (1982)
R | 109 min | Horror, Mystery, Sci-Fi
A research team in Antarctica is hunted by a shape-shifting alien that assumes the appearance of its victims.
Director: John Carpenter | Stars: Kurt Russell, Wilford Brimley, Keith David, Richard Masur
Votes: 467,023 | Gross: $13.78M
38. Grave Encounters (2011)
Not Rated | 92 min | Horror, Mystery
For their ghost hunting reality show, a production crew locks themselves inside an abandoned mental hospital that's supposedly haunted - and it might prove to be all too true.
Directors: Colin Minihan, Stuart Ortiz, The Vicious Brothers | Stars: Benjamin Wilkinson, Sean Rogerson, Ashleigh Gryzko, Merwin Mondesir
Votes: 64,048
39. Grave Encounters 2 (2012)
Not Rated | 98 min | Horror, Mystery
A film student who is obsessed with the movie Grave Encounters sets out with his friends to visit the psychiatric hospital depicted in the original film.
Director: John Poliquin | Stars: Richard Harmon, Shawn C. Phillips, Jennica Fulton, Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman
Votes: 27,385
40. The Void (I) (2016)
Not Rated | 90 min | Horror, Mystery, Sci-Fi
Shortly after delivering a patient to an understaffed hospital, a police officer experiences strange and violent occurrences seemingly linked to a group of mysterious hooded figures.
Directors: Jeremy Gillespie, Steven Kostanski | Stars: Aaron Poole, Kenneth Welsh, Ellen Wong, Kathleen Munroe
Votes: 41,710 | Gross: $0.15M
41. Phoenix Forgotten (2017)
PG-13 | 87 min | Horror, Mystery, Sci-Fi
Two decades after three teenagers disappeared in the wake of mysterious lights appearing above Phoenix, Arizona, unseen footage from that night has been discovered, chronicling the final hours of their fateful expedition.
Director: Justin Barber | Stars: Florence Hartigan, Luke Spencer Roberts, Chelsea Lopez, Justin Matthews
Votes: 7,007 | Gross: $3.60M
42. Body Snatchers (1993)
R | 87 min | Horror, Sci-Fi
A teenage girl and her father discover alien clones are replacing humans on a remote U.S. military base in Alabama.
Director: Abel Ferrara | Stars: Gabrielle Anwar, Meg Tilly, Terry Kinney, Reilly Murphy
Votes: 21,264 | Gross: $0.43M
43. Ravenous (2017)
TV-MA | 104 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
In the aftermath of an infectious outbreak, inhabitants of a village in rural Quebec find themselves confronting an invasion of ravenous zombie-like beings.
Director: Robin Aubert | Stars: Marc-André Grondin, Monia Chokri, Charlotte St-Martin, Micheline Lanctôt
Votes: 10,181
44. Making Contact (1985)
PG | 98 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
Believing to be able to communicate with his deceased father, a young boy develops psychic powers where he uses them to try to stop supernatural forces threatening his family and friends, especially a possessed ventriloquist dummy.
Director: Roland Emmerich | Stars: Joshua Morrell, Eva Kryll, Tammy Shields, Jan Zierold
Votes: 1,779
45. Hereditary (2018)
R | 127 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
A grieving family is haunted by tragic and disturbing occurrences.
Director: Ari Aster | Stars: Toni Collette, Milly Shapiro, Gabriel Byrne, Alex Wolff
Votes: 378,611 | Gross: $44.07M
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