The Monkey (2025)
Osgood Perkins adapts a Stephen King story about a toy monkey that causes deaths whenever it is wound, which becomes the opportunity for Perkins to go into full-on Final Destination territory with bizarre deaths
Rich Flu (2024)
This comes with a wonderfully satiric idea of a plague that kills the world’s wealthiest people
Coffin Homes (2021)
From director Fruit Chan, director of the great Dumplings, a film that takes a satiric jab at Hong Kong’s rental shortage crisis and concerns haunted apartments
Darker Than Night (1975)
A Mexican entry in the haunted house genre, featuring a group of girls who inherit a place haunted by an aunt and her black cat. Strikingly rich in terms of set design
Night Has a Thousand Eyes (1948)
A classic work of Film Noir with Edward G. Robinson as a stage mentalist who suddenly finds he can predict the future
Grand Piano (2013)
Essentially a classical music version of Phone Booth with Elijah Wood trapped at a grand piano in front of a concert audience by a sniper. The results prove quite gripping
My Best Friend’s Exorcism (2022)
Possession film that is quite a bit more than the light fluffy Young Adult film the title makes it seem, boosted by a great performance from Amiah Miller
Shin Kamen Rider (2023)
A reboot of the classic Japanese tv series about a superhero who goes into action on a motorcycle using a suit to transform into a grasshopper being
Y2K (2024)
Film that imagines what might have happened if the Y2K Bug had occurred and resulted in a machine revolution
Space Sharks (2024)
Another in the gonzo killer shark film fad viz Sharknado, a bottom of the barrel effort concerning lab sharks returned from a space mission mutated
Ouija Shark 2 (2022)
A sequel to the Gonzo Killer Shark film Ouija Shark, this goes even crazier
Stree (2018)
An Indian horror film about a folk tale of a witch spirit the Stree, this was a popular success that was then built out into an Indian version of The Conjuring Universe
Candy Land (2022)
This conducts a seedily grim depiction of the world of the prostitutes working at a highway truck stop. In the midst of this, they try to deal with a killer eliminating their numbers
Meet Cute (2022)
An extremely clever romantic comedy where Kaley Cuoco repeatedly returns back through time to replay her one perfect day, a date with Pete Davidson
The Lonely Man with the Ghost Machine (2024)
Graham Skipper directs/writes/stars in a film about the last man on Earth trying to bring his wife’s ghost back from the dead
The Electric State (2025)
This is a film that has within its hands the capacity to be the defining film about A.I. and robotics. Adapted from the art of Simon Stålenhag and directed by the Russo Brothers behind the last two Avengers films
Kung Fu Panda 4 (2024)
The fourth entry in DreamWorks popular animated series
Who Invited Them (2022)
A very different type of home invasion film where two mysterious and charming party guests succeed in turning the hosts against each other
The Executioners (2018)
A film where four girls on a weekend getaway undergo a home invasion. It soon becomes apparent that this is a film homaging I Spit on Your Grave
Odysseus and the Isle of the Mists (2008)
Supposedly an adventure based on an untold story from The Odyssey, an entry among the fantasy adventure films made for cable filler in the 2000s
The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters (1954)
The Bowery Boys were a poor man’s Abbott and Costello; here in one of their most entertaining outings they try to compete with Abbott and Costello’s monster bashes
Bug (2006)
One of the last films from William Friedkin, an astonishingly deranged descent into paranoia and madness, featuring an alarming performance from a young, unknown Michael Shannon
Azrael (2024)
A film that takes place with no dialogue set in a post-apocalyptic world where people have forsaken speech as Samara Weaving is pursued by a cult
Year 10 (2024)
Film set in the aftermath of civilisation where people have lost the capacity for speech
My Old Ass (2024)
At first glance, this film about a teenager meeting her future self seems too cute and lightweight, but emerges as something extraordinary
Strange Darling (2023)
An incredibly refreshing and original psycho film, made with a furious energy that is constantly turning everything we think is going on on its head
Antisocial 2 (2015)
Antisocial, a horror film about zombies created by social media, proved a reasonable hit. This is a sequel that skips on a few years after the collapse of civilisation
Two of Us (2020)
Thai-made film that gives off some initial The Quiet Earth vibes as two girls enjoy a private paradise in a holiday resort following the collapse of civilisation
Six: The Mark Unleashed (2004)
Christian work about the Biblical End Times set in a dystopia where everyone is forced to accept the Mark of the Beast. Starring Jeffrey Dean Morgan, no less!
Flesh and Blood: The Hammer Heritage of Horror (1994)
The most exhaustive of the various documentaries about Hammer Films, which covers the history of the studio and was made at a time when most of the principals from Hammer’s heyday were still alive
Discontinued (2022)
We’ve all heard the theory that we might be living in The Matrix. This asks the question of what happens when it is announced that the simulation is being shut down
How It Ends (2021)
A shot during the Covid lockdown film. An amiable comedy set on the last day of the world where Zoe Lister-Jones and her imaginary younger self Cailee Spaeny walk across L.A. to find closure with the people in her life
You Can Call Me Bill (2023)
Alexandre O. Philippe has made a host of documentaries about film and fandom. Here he sits down with a 91-year-old William Shatner who reflects on his life
Better Man (2024)
This comes with a head-scratching premise – a biopic of pop star Robbie Williams but where Robbie is portrayed as a CGI ape. Essentially, the rock star biopic by way of one of the Planet of the Apes reboot films
Presence (2024)
Steven Soderbergh is one of the foremost independent directors in the US. He has dipped into numerous different genres and here takes on the ghost story
Blood Frenzy (1987)
An 80s psycho film where several people go camping in the Mojave Desert on an encounter group but one of their number proves to be a killer
Camp Blood 2 (2000)
The second entry in a surprisingly prolific series of low-budget films – currently running to fifteen films – that homage the 1980s slasher film
She Devil (1957)
1950s mad scientist film where a scientist develops a regeneration serum only to turn Mari Blanchard into a man-eating femme fatale
Penda’s Fen (1974)
Absolutely extraordinary British tv play that was one of the formative works in the development of Folk Horror on screen
Bad CGI Gator (2023)
A deliberately ridiculous Charles Band production where students throwing their laptops into a lake causes an alligator to float through the air and become giant-sized
The Flood (2023)
This is essentially Assault on Precinct 13 with a mix of police and criminals at siege inside a jail but where the attacking street gangs are replaced by alligators. Far better than the B movie you assume
The Inheritance (2024)
A billionaire traps his children in his mansion with him in the belief that something is trying to kill him as it slowly eliminates their numbers
Companion (2025)
A smart and extremely clever variant on Androids/A.I. themes with Sophie Thatcher as a sex android who gains self-awareness and independence. A great script filled with hilarious whiplash twists.
Mufasa: The Lion King (2024)
The Lion King was one of the worst of the live-action Disney remakes. Now comes this prequel
Kids vs Aliens (2022)
The director of Hobo with a Shotgun returns with a film about a group of kids caught up as aliens invade a party
Alien Invasion (2023)
From prolific producer Scott Jeffrey, best known for Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, a low-budget Alien copy, essentially an Alien that takes place in an English country mansion
What Have You Done to Solange? (1972)
One of the standout entries in the giallo film and certainly one of the best plotted of the genre, concerning a series of murders at a Catholic girls school
Trauma (2004)
Colin Firth is released from hospital following the death of his wife but experiences a series of reality-blurring hallucinations
Influencer (2022)
A standout thriller full of sharp whiplash twists that features Cassandra Naud as a murderous psycho who targets social media influencers and then steals their identities
Crimson (2020)
A film based around real-life YouTube influencer Brian ‘Faze Rug’ Awadis as he buys a new mansion only to move in and find his neighbours are an alley of sinister clowns
Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story (2024)
A documentary about the career of Superman star Christopher Reeve and his dealing with life following the accident that left him a quadriplegic
The Gorge (2025)
Scott Derrickson film with a captivatingly original premise – a sniper is assigned to a guardhouse overlooking a gorge filled with mysterious monsters and ends up in a forbidden relationship with his counterpart across the divide
Paddington in Peru (2024)
Third of the Paddington series, this has more of an adventure film feel as it takes Paddington and the Browns to Peru in search of a lost city
Last Journey of Paul W.R. (2020)
French film about Earth endangered by an oncoming moon and how only one man can save the world
Homebodies (1974)
A wonderful little largely unknown film where the seniors in an apartment building due to be demolished group together to take revenge on the real estate developers
Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971)
A film that was the cause of much censorship controversy when it came out where two teenage girls decide to become devil worshippers and engage on a spree of mischief and cruel malicious acts
Robots (2023)
A comedy variant on android/A.I. themes where two people use robot doubles for romantic subterfuge only for the two androids to elope together
T.I.M. (2023)
We have had a spate of films in the last few years about androids and A.I. This has to count as the first film about an android stalker
Mads (2024)
French horror film shot all in a single unbroken take as a deadly infection, possibly a zombie outbreak, spreads all around town
Wolf Man (2025)
After reviving The Invisible Man, James Wan associate Leigh Whannell takes on a reworking of The Wolf Man
A Guide to Dating at the End of the World (2022)
Australian film that is a romantic comedy take on The Quiet Earth, the classic work about three people who awake in an entirely deserted world
The Apocalypse (2007)
One of the bizarre early oddities from The Asylum, a disaster movie about an oncoming asteroid. This also try to jump aboard the mid-2000s fad for Biblical movies where faith elements are combined with the scenario in ways that are bizarre
When a Killer Calls (2006)
One of The Asylum’s first mockbusters, designed to popularise on the remake of When a Stranger Calls
Anthropophagus (1980)
From the notorious 1970s/80s period of Italian cinema, this was listed as one of the notorious Video Nasties. This features a lone cannibal killer amok on a Greek island amid plentiful gore
Highwaymen (2004)
Robert Harmon made the classic The Hitcher, but failed to ever follow up on it. This is the sole work that ever came close – a beautifully tense series of psychological games between Jim Caviezel and a motorised killer on the backroads
Lynch (2007)
A documentary about David Lynch made by one of his assistants during the shooting of Inland Empire
The Deliverance (2024)
Supposedly based on a true story, a possession and exorcism film from filmmaker Lee Daniels about an African-American family undergoing a supernatural assault
Star Trek: Section 31 (2025)
A Star Trek film spun off around Michelle Yeoh and the secret service that appears in the modern revival series
Moana 2 (2024)
Disney make a sequel to Moana, their venture into Pacific Island mythology
Piglady (2023)
A True Crime film where the story of a woman who killed two men and fed their remains to her pigs is essentially turned into a slasher movie
Cabin 28 (2017)
A true crime film based on an unsolved home invasion in California in 1981 that left four for dead. From prolific British director Andrew Jones
The Prophecy: Uprising (2005)
The fourth of The Prophecy films about war between angels, the first to be made without Christopher Walken
Alien Conquest (2021)
The Asylum conduct a modernised remake of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds – for the second time. With resident mad scientist Joe Roche on script, the results are undeniably interesting
Shirley Thompson Versus the Aliens (1972)
One of the other films from Jim Sharman, director of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, a gonzo comedy where alien visitors bring a statue of the Duke of Edinburgh to life
The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024)
A satiric film based on Spike Lee’s idea of the Magical Negro, an African American who exists to deliver wisdom or magical influence to white people. This gets in some deftly amusing punches at US race relations
Nosferatu (2024)
Robert Eggers of The Witch fame conducts a remake of the classic silent Nosferatu that comes drenched in mood and period detail
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (2024)
Third of the Sonic the Hedgehog films and surprisingly far more entertaining than you expect from such a lightweight formulaic film
The Black Demon (2023)
Another killer shark survival piece with a family trapped aboard an abandoned oil rig under attack by a megalodon shark that may be the embodiment of an Aztec god
Shark Killer (2015)
One killer shark film of the 2010s that is not deliberately ridiculous, this concerns the hunt for a shark that has swallowed a valuable diamond
Noroi: The Curse (2005)
A Japanese Found Footage film made not long after The Blair Witch Project with a man investigating various paranormal incidents around Tokyo
Criminally Insane (1975)
From the Films That Could Never Get Made Today file – an exploitation classic about an obese woman who goes on a killing spree. This comes with a level of derangement that leaves you puzzled why this has never become a cult classic
Save the Green Planet (2003)
A bizarre South Korean comedy about a businessman who is imprisoned by a possibly crazed man who insists that he is an alien. Things sit in an absurdly funny ambiguity. Later remade by Yorgos Lanthimos as Bugonia
Night of the Hunted (2023)
From an Alexandre Aja associate, a reasonably tight thriller about a woman taking shelter in a gas station from a psycho sniper outside
Kraven the Hunter (2024)
Another of Sony’s films spun off from Spider-Man supporting characters, where the big game hunter villain is now turned into a superhero
Timestalker (2024)
Actress Alice Lowe directs/stars in a comedy about a woman who pursues the man she is infatuated with as both reincarnate through history
Accidental Exorcist (2016)
A low-budget but nevertheless at times quite funny version of an exorcism film, one that throws out all the tired clichés of the genre
Good Against Evil (1977)
From the great and underrated Paul Wendkos, a 1970s tv movie that taps the deviltry movie fads of the day and becomes a blatant copy of The Exorcist, albeit cleaned up for tv sensibilities
Night Life of the Gods (1935)
A 1930s screwball comedy about the invention of a ray that can petrify people that is then used to bring statues of Greek gods to life
Andromedia (1998)
An early Takashi Miike film where a teenage girl is killed and her personality uploaded to the internet, having been conveniently backed up by her father on three cd roms!
Turok: Son of Stone (2008)
Animated adaption of the comic-book about a Native American warrior stranded in a prehistoric lost world
The Vourdalak (2023)
Adaptation of a classic Aleksei Tolstoy story set in Eastern Europe as a family awaits the return of the patriarch who has been turned into a vampire
Earth Abides (2024)
Earth Abides is a classic novel that fairly much defined the theme of survival in the aftermath of the collapse of civilisation. This is a TV mini-series adaptation of the book but badly fumbles it
George A. Romero’s Resident Evil (2025)
George A. Romero was hired to make the very first Resident Evilfilm but was then abruptly fired and we ended up with films we did. This is a documentary that sets out to find out what happened
Arctic Hollow (2024)
A low-budget film about a venture into the Hollow Earth in search of a missing person and encounters with creatures there. So low budget the underground caves seem shot in a darkened room
The Strangeness (1985)
One of the first women-directed horror films. Also one of the first on the subject of people venturing underground and encountering cave monsters
The Order of the Black Eagle (1987)
A low-budget spy/action film with entertainingly bizarre elements including a cryogenically frozen Hitler and the hero going into action accompanied by a baboon
Santo vs Dr Death (1973)
Another of the films featuring Santo, the Mexican masked wrestler superhero, who here is pitted against a mad scientist operating an artworks theft operation
Weathering With You (2019)
From Makoto Shinkai who made Your Name., a lovely anime about a girl who can control the weather
Lazareth (2024)
Set in a post-pandemic future, this features Ashley Judd and daughters living on their own suddenly forced to welcome a stranger into their house
Wicked: Part 1 (2024)
The first half of a two-part adaptation of the hit Broadway musical that is a prequel to The Wizard of Oz, showing The Wicked Witch’s origin story