To help you embrace the Halloween spirit, we thought this was the perfect time to revisit this year’s best horror films – so far. Two more months remain of 2018 and we can already say that we’ve got a lot of pretty good new horror movies to watch on this Halloween.
It seems that the horror genre is going through some kind of rebirth. This decade, each year seemed to bring at least one amazing horror film and, among the other movie genres, horror seems to be evolving the most lately. Films like “The Conjuring,” “It Follows,” “Get Out” or “The Witch” have proven that horror films can be masterpieces if done well, and in 2018 this assumption was proved correct again.
We still have to watch “Suspiria,” “The House That Jack Built,” “The Field Guide to Evil,” and a few other upcoming horror films in order to make a definite list of the best 10 horror movies of 2018, but most of these 10 films below are likely to remain on it.
10. The Devil’s Doorway
It’s 1960 and two Vatican priests are sent to Northern Ireland to investigate a miracle that has taken place at a home for “fallen women,” where one of the Virgin Mary statues has cried blood. However, even stranger events start to happen and soon the two priests find themselves in the middle of demonic incidents.
This found-footage film is a bit of a mixed bag. It features some surprisingly great performances from actors who you’ve probably never heard about, it looks great, and really feels like it was shot in the 1960s. On the other hand, its story seems underdeveloped, the sound design is terrible at times, and most of its scares are too clichéd to really work anymore if you’re familiar with horror movies.
We decided to put this film in last place because we think it had the potential to be much better, but considering its 81 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, we can only suggest you give it a shot and make your own opinion on it.
9. The Night Eats The World
It is not so easy to make a zombie film that doesn’t seem like something you’ve seen before. However, over the last few years, a couple of zombie films such as “Train to Busan” or “The Battery” seemed to revitalize George A. Romero’s favorite genre. “The Night Eats the World” is yet another zombie film that manages to be a little different than you’d expect.
Sam (Anders Danielsen Lie), a young musician living in Paris, comes to his ex-girlfriend’s apartment party in order to retrieve some of his tapes. After an incident, Sam passes out without anyone noticing. Next morning, he finds himself in a different world. Most of the people – including his ex-girlfriend and her guests – have turned into zombies and he is the sole survivor in the building.
What was great about “The Night Eats The World” is how it ditched the whole action element of the zombie genre (there are little to no zombie killings taking place in the whole film) and instead focuses on the main character – who is the only character for most of the film – and on his desperation caused by loneliness.
This film is far from a masterpiece, but it is much better than you’d expect it to be. It has a strong lead performance, some unexpected twists and scenes including a bunch of musical numbers that you’d not expect to see in this kind of film but that work surprisingly well, and is overall a lot of fun for a zombie film where there aren’t many zombie killings going on.
8. The Endless
Directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, the men behind 2012’s highly original horror “Resolution” and 2014’s “Spring,” “The Endless” is a mindfuck of a film and, even if you’ll end up loving it or hating it, you’ll have to recognize that it is like nothing you’ve seen before.
Years after escaping a UFO cult as kids, two brothers return to the place that changed their lives trying to seek answers and to confront the unexplainable phenomenons surrounding it.
“The Endless” is not a film for everyone. As we’ve said before, you might love it or hate it. However, if you are a fan of Lovecraft, “The Twilight Zone,” or if you’re fascinated by the idea of parallel universes and unseen or incomprehensible beings surrounding us, you will most likely love it. If not, chances are you might still find a lot to enjoy about it.
7. Halloween
After lots of not-so-highly-regarded sequels and a remake duology by Rob Zombie, the Halloween franchise is yet again delivering a film that is not being panned by the critics, but is highly regarded as one of the franchise’s best.
The 11th entry in the popular slasher franchise continues the story 40 years after the events from the 1978 original film, disregarding the countless sequels from canon. 2018’s “Halloween” features an amazing performance by Jamie Lee Curtis as an older Laurie Strode, and the return of Nick Castle as Michael Myers. Unlike Curtis, who reprised her role as Laurie Strode in the original 1981 sequel “Halloween II” and in “Halloween H20” (1998) and “Halloween: Resurrection” (2002), Castle has never played the character again after the original film.
Unlike the 1978 original, 2018’s “Halloween” is not an influential horror movie. It will not be talked about years later, there won’t be directors who will cite 2018’s “Halloween” as their influence in making horror movies, and people will most likely forget about it soon enough.
With that being said, by today’s standards, John Carpenter’s “Halloween” doesn’t hold up so well. Despite bringing nothing new to the table, this new “Halloween” is scarier, bloodier, and more effective than the original film. We can only say that for 1978, “Halloween” was a much better film than this one is for 2018, but for 2018, this new one is the film that will scare you more.
6. Unsane
Steven Soderbergh’s latest film stars Claire Foy as a young woman who starts to question her own judgment after she is involuntarily committed to a mental institution.
When it was first announced, “Unsane” aroused interest for the way director Soderbergh decided to shoot the film. “Unsane” was entirely shot using the iPhone 7 Plus, and while this was not really so new (back in 2015, Sean Baker’s comedy-drama “Tangerine” was also shot using iPhone 5s smartphones), it was at least something fresh for the horror genre and it added a little to the sense of realism and the rawness of the film.
For those who thought that this artistic choice was nothing more than a gimmick, “Unsane” proved to be much more than a stylistic experiment. This film was a surprisingly effective thriller that was well-written, featured a great lead performance from Foy, and managed to stay interesting for its whole 98-minute running length.