It’s Halloween month - Friday the 13th, to be more specific - which means a litany of stories across platforms is vying for your eyeballs, warm veins and the back of the seat to launch you from in shock or fear. If not for the American festival, a lot of horror movies, or the genre itself might have found it difficult to sustain over the years. Good cinema sells by itself, but at times (as was evidenced by the ‘Barbenheimer’ phenomenon earlier this year), a festive event-like push doesn’t hurt. That said, most Halloween releases are notoriously poor and just cash-grab sprints towards filling obligatory blanks. Anyway, they are here which means you’ll probably be seeking spooks on your streaming device or in the theatre. Here is a list of everything you must watch, could watch and that which you must avoid.
Must-See
No One Will Save You
Home invasion thrillers are a dime a dozen, but what Brian Duffield’s recently released film does is give it the imaginative push of science-fiction. Moreover, it is a silent film, i.e., there’s no dialogue. An anxiety-ridden Kaitlyn Dever must fight an alien invasion all by herself, without having the outlet of a dialogue or a scream. It’s immersive because it transpires under the pressure of overbearing lid. It’s probably one of the better genre films of the summer. Scream and you’re done!
Streaming on Disney+Hotstar
The Fall Of The House of Usher
Mike Flanagan - who gave streaming, possibly, it’s most rousing window into serialized, long-form scares with The Haunting of Hill House - signs off with a show that pretty much establishes his legend. Flanagan’s latest pays ode to the stories of Edgar Allen Poe, in a tale of misery and grief that rips apart the notion of redemption. Over eight episodes, it tells the story of the nasty Usher family and how, all of its young heirs die within the space of weeks. It’s grim, precise, literary and horrifying in affectingly turbulent ways.
Streaming on Netflix
Talk to Me
Directed by debutant twins (the Philippou brothers), this Australian film that released in theatres a couple of months ago is easily the finest in a year that has otherwise been a genre let-down. A bunch of teenagers discover the ability to summon spirits, using a decayed hand. The thrill of which is biting and fascinating at first, until the story becomes a terrifying ordeal in confronting violent histories and secrets. It’s not out on streaming yet, but it won’t be long before it is. Don’t miss it for the world.
Could Watch
Totally Killer
Amazon PrimeVideo’s spoof of the slasher genre is a fun, at times gory, coming-of-age tale. Jamie (Kiernan Shipka) accidentally travels back in time, after the “Sweet Sixteen Killer” returns to kill her mom as one last victim of a killing spree that began 35 years ago. Full of meta jokes, witty observations about adolescence, woke-ism and a general sense of giddiness about the past, Totally Killer is more enjoyable than it is scary. It is the most fun you will have watching a sort-of horror film this year.
Streaming on PrimeVideo
Goosebumps
There probably isn’t a better motley gang of misfits dealing with something supernatural than Stephen King’s IT (and the films it has inspired), but RL Stine’s famous young adult novels are somewhat rechristened by Disney in a series that is expectedly perky, and just about spooky enough to keep you going. Thankfully, the kids that shoulder the story are all likeable, espousing a certain small-town chemistry that doesn’t feel gummily Disney-ish.
Streaming on Disney+Hotstar
A Haunting in Venice
Another recent theatrical release that, though an investigative thriller, conjures a firm sense of the supernatural. Not everyone is a fan of Kenneth Brannagh’s inarticulate Poirot, but his latest directorial might just be the most un-Christie mystery you have ever seen. It’s discomforting, adequately squeezed by a Venice on the edge and for once, the tricks, the stilted camera angles convey an uneasy sense of dread. It’s not out on streaming yet but should be soon. Watch out for it.
Avoid
The Nun 2
Still in theatres and somewhat lapped by the masses, The Conjuring franchise, the numbers notwithstanding, is on its last legs. Not only is The Nun 2 boring, uninspiring and unintentionally funny, it practically undermines the horror genre by denuding it of the very essence of human behaviour and emotion. It’s just jump scares and parlour tricks, one after the other cosplaying with your patience. Watch it if you want to instantly forget it.
Playing in select theatres
Haunted Mansion
You’d think a cast that features Owen Wilson, Dan Levy, Jared Leto, Rosario Dawson, etc., can at least be corny fun, if not slimy and spooky. Disney’s Haunted Mansion, instead, is a tedious infrastructural post-mortem that evidences the studio’s might in pulling together a starry cast, affording them all the expensive tools they could want and still producing something that looks like a mix of folksy anxieties of the pre-pubescent variety. You get who the audience is, but even they would demand better.
Streaming on Disney+Hotstar
The Exorcist: Believer
Who’d have thought that the first horror film to ever be nominated for an Oscar, would be rebooted by a seemingly dependable director (David Gordon Green) to ecstatically offensive results. Even in iMax, the biggest screen conceivable, inside the loudest arenas built by humanity, The Exorcist:Believer is a dour mess. Compared to the ingenuity, the visual eeriness of the original (in the year that William Friedkin died no less), it’s an abomination that no true horror fan should let pass.
Playing in select theatres
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