The 1970s and 1980s were the slasher era of horror. The 2000s saw the emergence of found footage. And the 2010s are the generation of Arthouse Horror. Filmmakers like Ari Aster, Robert Eggers, and Jordan Peele have delivered a new style; showing audiences that horror movies can be more than a guy in a mask slaying college coeds with a knife.
Arthouse Horror has intricate scripts, relying on sharp cinematography and great acting to tell the story. Weird, pretentious, long – Arthouse horror has some excellent flicks to check out – if you want your scares done in style. And not all of them come from the modern era.
10 – The Lighthouse (2019)
This one is the king of weird. Robert Eggers sophomore film is stylistically beautiful, set at a remote lighthouse in the 1890s. It’s based off an unfinished story by the legendary Edgar Allen Poe – unfinished because he died whilst writing it. Cinephiles will devour its presentation but the bizarre arthouse choices will keep most traditional moviegoers from enjoying it.
9 – Eraserhead (1977)
Before Ari Aster, before Robert Eggers – we had David Lynch. The twisted mind behind Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive began his career with the cryptic film Eraserhead. Set in a post apocalyptical world, nothing normal happens. Weird scenes. A girl coming out of the radiator to sing. An alien baby. Eraserhead is guaranteed to give you nightmares after watching, and you won’t even know why.
8 – Midsommar (2019)
Ari Aster’s sophomore flick gets more stylized, and more insane than his debut. Midsommar follows a group of college aged friends on a trip to a remote village in Sweden. There’s a festival, there’s the cloud of hallucinogenic drugs, and there’s horror – all in broad daylight. It’s unusual for horror and it works.
7 – The VVitch (2015)
Robert Eggers debut film. Like The Lighthouse, The Witch is another film steeped in a great atmosphere. It’s Puritan times. A family, expelled from their village, attempts to survive on the outskirts of a brooding forest. It’s a slow burn, and the accents are tough to digest, but it will leave you with chills.
6 – The Babadook (2014)
Aussies know horror (see Lake Mungo review) and The Babadook is downright terrifying, despite the annoying kid. Filmmaker Jennifer Kent delivers a tale of grief and the aftermath of trauma. Essie Davis shines in the lead role. Its really scary and really unsettling.
5 – Hereditary (2018)
Ari Aster’s debut film is a straight up horror movie. There are some head scratching moments, and some parts that cross my personal threshold of grossness. But the scares are outstanding – one of which is in my all time faves list. Hereditary covers horror themes of haunting and possession, and does so in a cinematically appealing way.
4 – The House on Pine Street (2015)
This is a lesser known film that I love. It’s a haunted house story with much deeper roots. Not as outlandish with style as some of the others, most casual movie fans will be able to enjoy this. A young couple relocates to a quaint suburban house. She’s pregnant, and pines for her old life. No jump scares here – the terror is earned.
3 – It Follows (2014)
One of the earlier entries into the Arthouse Horror subgenre, filmmaker David Robert Mitchell includes subtle misdirection to keep the viewer off balance. An ambiguous entity takes the form of anyone, and follows you slowly. And continually. If it gets you, you die. It could be the most terrifying premise in history.
2 – Psycho (1960)
Before Ari Aster, Robert Eggers, Jordan Peele, Jennifer Kent, David Robert Mitchell etc. there was Alfred Hitchcock. The famed director helmed over 40 films, and Psycho was his first horror picture. It spawned the infamous shower scene, and made the name Norman Bates iconic. Hitchcock was quite experimental with his filming, and keen-eyed observers will relish how the director set the framework for horror that is still replicated decades later.
1 – The Shining (1980)
This is the epitome of balance. Stanley Kubric takes the Stephen King novel, adds great acting from Jack Nicholson, and warps it with his own twisted style to make one of the best horror films of all time. It’s unsettling, its tense, its downright scary. And that’s just the endless supply of analysis videos one can get lost in viewing. The movie is great, and holds up to this day. The twins, the bathtub, Here’s Johnny! Some of the scariest moments in the history of film are here.
