Halloween is here again and in-between putting on your costume and eating candy, you may want to sit down and watch a scary movie or TV show!
“You don’t believe in the Boogeyman? You should.”
Release Oct 19, 2018Runtime 1h 46mBudget $10M
Moviefone has assembled a list of the 35 scariest movies and TV shows ever made to help you celebrate All Hallows’ Eve!
Let’s begin!
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In 2047, a group of astronauts are sent to investigate and salvage the starship ‘Event Horizon’ which disappeared mysteriously 7 years before on its maiden voyage. With its return, the crew of the ‘Lewis and Clark’ discovers the real truth behind the disappearance of the ‘Event Horizon’ – and something even more terrifying.
To secure their fortune — and future — two ruthless siblings build a family dynasty that begins to crumble when their heirs mysteriously die, one by one.
One night per year, the government sanctions a 12-hour period in which citizens can commit any crime they wish — including murder — without fear of punishment or imprisonment. Leo (Frank Grillo), a sergeant who lost his son, plans a vigilante mission of revenge during the mayhem. However, instead of a death-dealing avenger, he becomes the unexpected protector of four innocent strangers who desperately need his help if they are to survive the night.
Five years after surviving Art the Clown’s (David Howard Thorton) Halloween massacre, Sienna (Lauren LaVera) and Jonathan (Elliott Fullam) are still struggling to rebuild their shattered lives. As the holiday season approaches, they try to embrace the Christmas spirit and leave the horrors of the past behind. But just when they think they’re safe, Art returns, determined to turn their holiday cheer into a new nightmare. The festive season quickly unravels as Art unleashes his twisted brand of terror, proving that no holiday is safe.
Set in 1982 in the suburb of Blackeberg, Stockholm, twelve-year-old Oskar (Kåre Hedebrant) is a lonely outsider, bullied at school by his classmates; at home, Oskar dreams of revenge against a trio of bullies. He befriends his twelve-year-old, next-door neighbor Eli (Lina Leandersson), who only appears at night in the snow-covered playground outside their building.
“Eli is 12 years old. She’s been 12 for over 200 years, and she just moved in next door.”
Release Oct 24, 2008Runtime 1h 55mBudget $4M
Twenty-eight days after a killer virus was accidentally unleashed from a British research facility, a small group of London survivors are caught in a desperate struggle to protect themselves from the infected. Carried by animals and humans, the virus turns those it infects into homicidal maniacs — and it’s absolutely impossible to contain.
29. ‘Saw‘ (2004)
Obsessed with teaching his victims the value of life, a deranged, sadistic serial killer abducts the morally wayward. Once captured, they must face impossible choices in a horrific game of survival. The victims must fight to win their lives back, or die trying…
A “contemporary prequel” to the 1960 film ‘Psycho’, depicting the life of Norman Bates (Freddie Highmore) and his mother Norma (Vera Farmiga) prior to the events portrayed in Hitchcock’s film, albeit in a different fictional town and in a modern setting. The series begins after the death of Norma’s husband, when she purchases a motel located in a coastal Oregon town so she and Norman can start a new life.
In October of 1994 three student filmmakers disappeared in the woods near Burkittsville, Maryland, while shooting a documentary. A year later their footage was found.
When twin brothers (Theo James) find a mysterious wind-up monkey, a series of outrageous deaths tear their family apart. Twenty-five years later, the monkey begins a new killing spree forcing the estranged brothers to confront the cursed toy.
25. ‘Scream‘ (1996)
A killer known as Ghostface begins killing off teenagers, and as the body count begins rising, one girl (Neve Campbell) and her friends find themselves contemplating the ‘rules’ of horror films as they try to survive a real-life one.
“Someone has taken their love of scary movies one step too far. Solving this mystery is going to be murder.”
Release Dec 20, 1996Runtime 1h 52mBudget $14M
Several friends travel to Sweden to study as anthropologists a summer festival that is held every ninety years in the remote hometown of one of them. What begins as a dream vacation in a place where the sun never sets, gradually turns into a dark nightmare as the mysterious inhabitants invite them to participate in their disturbing festive activities.
23. ‘From‘ (2022 – 2026)
Unravel the mystery of a nightmarish town in middle America that traps all those who enter. As the unwilling residents fight to keep a sense of normalcy and search for a way out, they must also survive the threats of the surrounding forest – including the terrifying creatures that come out when the sun goes down.
Immediately after their miscarriage, the US diplomat Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck) adopts the newborn Damien (Harvey Stephens) without the knowledge of his wife (Lee Remick). Yet what he doesn’t know is that their new son is the son of the devil.
“You have been warned. If something frightening happens to you today, think about it. It may be The Omen.”
Release Jun 25, 1976Runtime 1h 51mBudget $2.8M
Finney Blake (Mason Thames), a shy but clever 13-year-old boy, is abducted by a sadistic killer (Ethan Hawke) and trapped in a soundproof basement where screaming is of little use. When a disconnected phone on the wall begins to ring, Finney discovers that he can hear the voices of the killer’s previous victims. And they are dead set on making sure that what happened to them doesn’t happen to Finney.
20. ‘M3GAN‘ (2023)
A brilliant toy company roboticist (Allison Williams) uses artificial intelligence to develop M3GAN, a life-like doll programmed to emotionally bond with her newly orphaned niece (Violet McGraw). But when the doll’s programming works too well, she becomes overprotective of her new friend with terrifying results.
Flashing between past and present, a fractured family confronts haunting memories of their old home and the terrifying events that drove them from it.
Paranormal investigators Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) work to help a family terrorized by a dark presence in their farmhouse. Forced to confront a powerful entity, the Warrens find themselves caught in the most terrifying case of their lives.
“Based on the true case files of the Warrens.”
Release Jul 19, 2013Runtime 1h 52mBudget $13M
Steve Freeling (Craig T. Nelson) lives with his wife, Diane (JoBeth Williams), and their three children, Dana (Dominique Dunne), Robbie (Oliver Robins), and Carol Anne (Heather O’Rourke), in Southern California where he sells houses for the company that built the neighborhood. It starts with just a few odd occurrences, such as broken dishes and furniture moving around by itself. However, when he realizes that something truly evil haunts his home, Steve calls in a team of parapsychologists led by Dr. Lesh to help before it’s too late.
When Ellen, the matriarch of the Graham family, passes away, her daughter’s family begins to unravel cryptic and increasingly terrifying secrets about their ancestry.
Two young missionaries (Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East) are forced to prove their faith when they knock on the wrong door and are greeted by a diabolical Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), becoming ensnared in his deadly game of cat-and-mouse.
Camp counselors are stalked and murdered by an unknown assailant while trying to reopen a summer camp that was the site of a child’s drowning.
“They were warned…They are doomed…And on Friday the 13th, nothing will save them.”
Release May 9, 1980Runtime 1h 35mBudget $550,000
An anthology horror drama series centering on different characters and locations, including a house with a murderous past, an asylum, a witch coven, a freak show, a hotel, a farmhouse in Roanoke, a cult, the apocalypse and a summer camp.
A fading celebrity (Demi Moore) decides to use a black market drug, a cell-replicating substance that temporarily creates a younger, better version of herself (Margaret Qualley).
“Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself?”
Release Sep 20, 2024Runtime 2h 21mBudget $17.5M
A young couple, Rosemary (Mia Farrow) and Guy (John Cassavetes), moves into an infamous New York apartment building, known by frightening legends and mysterious events, with the purpose of starting a family.
In pursuit of a serial killer, an FBI agent (Maika Monroe) uncovers a series of occult clues that she must solve to end his terrifying killing spree.
9. ‘Alien‘ (1979)
During its return to the earth, commercial spaceship Nostromo intercepts a distress signal from a distant planet. When a three-member team of the crew discovers a chamber containing thousands of eggs on the planet, a creature inside one of the eggs attacks an explorer. The entire crew is unaware of the impending nightmare set to descend upon them when the alien parasite planted inside its unfortunate host is birthed.
Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) is a top student at the FBI’s training academy. Jack Crawford (Scott Glenn) wants Clarice to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), a brilliant psychiatrist who is also a violent psychopath, serving life behind bars for various acts of murder and cannibalism. Crawford believes that Lecter may have insight into a case and that Starling, as an attractive young woman, may be just the bait to draw him out.
“To enter the mind of a killer she must challenge the mind of a madman.”
Release Feb 14, 1991Runtime 1h 59mBudget $19M
Members of an American scientific research outpost in Antarctica find themselves battling a parasitic alien organism capable of perfectly imitating its victims. They soon discover that this task will be harder than they thought, as they don’t know which members of the team have already been assimilated and their paranoia threatens to tear them apart.
Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) accepts a caretaker job at the Overlook Hotel, where he, along with his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and their son Danny (Danny Lloyd), must live isolated from the rest of the world for the winter. But they aren’t prepared for the madness that lurks within.
After her father’s sudden, untimely death thrusts her into the unforgiving ecosystem of public high school, Carrie (Summer H. Howell) is forced to navigate a viral bullying scandal that tears through her community, the relentless pressure and casual cruelty of the social‑media age, and the awakening of mysterious telekinetic powers that rise alongside her adolescence.
Teenagers in a small town are dropping like flies, apparently in the grip of mass hysteria causing their suicides. A cop’s daughter, Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp), traces the cause to child molester Fred Krueger (Robert Englund), who was burned alive by angry parents many years before. Krueger has now come back in the dreams of his killers’ children, claiming their lives as his revenge. Nancy and her boyfriend, Glen (Johnny Depp), must devise a plan to lure the monster out of the realm of nightmares and into the real world…
“If Nancy doesn’t wake up screaming, she won’t wake up at all.”
Release Nov 16, 1984Runtime 1h 31mBudget $1.8M
When Sally (Marilyn Burns) hears that her grandfather’s grave may have been vandalized, she and her paraplegic brother, Franklin (Paul A. Partain), set out with their friends to investigate. After a detour to their family’s old farmhouse, they discover a group of crazed, murderous outcasts living next door. As the group is attacked one by one by the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen), who wears a mask of human skin, the survivors must do everything they can to escape.
12-year-old Regan MacNeil (Linda Blair) begins to adapt an explicit new personality as strange events befall the local area of Georgetown. Her mother (Ellen Burstyn) becomes torn between science and superstition in a desperate bid to save her daughter, and ultimately turns to her last hope: Father Damien Karras (Jason Miller), a troubled priest who is struggling with his own faith.
“Something almost beyond comprehension is happening to a girl on this street, in this house…And a man has been sent for as a last resort. This man is The Exorcist.”
Release Dec 26, 1973Runtime 2h 2mBudget $11M
Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween Night 1963, Michael Myers escapes from a mental hospital and returns to the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois to kill again.
