Horror movies are often at their best when they’re simple popcorn films that can be thrown on without too much prior thought, robust and easy to enjoy as top-notch “brain-off” entertainment. A good “popcorn movie” refers to a film that doesn’t ask much of its viewer while being wildly entertaining. This is a stride that many horror films are able to hit effortlessly, with so many of the genre’s greatest hits relying on fantastical premises, bombastic performances, and audacious special effects.
That’s not to say all horror films are shallow, as plenty of philosophical scary movies can call into question societal values or ponder themes with deep implications in ways no other genre can. But for every genuinely groundbreakingly profound horror movie, there are a litany of delightfully gory and over-the-top popcorn flicks that simply deliver on a good time. Casting aside required knowledge of previous films, complex symbolism to dissect, or realism that’s taken a touch too far, horror movies can be wickedly fun.
10
Jaws
The first blockbuster
Arguably the first popcorn movie to strike it big at the box office, Jaws is the archetype that completely changed how the film industry worked from the ground up. A young, hungry Spielberg helms the story of a simple tourist town which has its busy season interrupted by a string of gruesome attacks by a man-eating great white shark. With the economic pressures of the town on the line, the police chief, a marine biologist, and a grizzled veteran sailor team up to hunt the bloodthirsty aquatic beast.
It’s no wonder that the film inspired a whole litany of sequels and a smattering of Jaws rip-off movies.
Because of its historical significance, Jaws has been dissected for all sorts of deeper themes and double meanings, from Herman Melville’s Moby Dick to the Watergate scandal. But in essence, Jaws is simply a rip-roaring good time, from the iconic theme song to the classic lines to the thrashing splendor of Bruce the shark himself. It’s no wonder that the film inspired a whole litany of sequels and a smattering of Jaws rip-off movies.
9
The Cabin In The Woods
A celebration of horror in general
The Cabin in the Woods
7/10
- Release Date
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April 13, 2012
- Runtime
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95 minutes
- Director
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Drew Goddard
For those that are dedicated fans of horror as a whole, The Cabin in the Woods is a brilliant distillation of all there is to love about the genre. The story begins as many horror films do, with a quintet of college kids eager to release their pent-up energy on a vacation to a creepy cabin isolated in a spooky forest. They’re soon attacked by a family of redneck torture zombies, but the carnage is all being meticulously directed by a white-collar organization dedicated to orchestrating horror movie tropes to appease ancient eldritch gods.
The Cabin in the Woods is genuinely funny, lined with a sparkling cast of character actors including a pre-MCU fame Chris Hemsworth. The film lovingly pokes fun at common horror movie clichés like dumb characters and creepy figures that warn the protagonists to turn back while effectively incorporating every film in the genre ever made into a singular universe of terror. Culminating in one of the most spectacular final acts in any movie ever, The Cabin in the Woods is a finely-tuned homage to an entire art style.
8
The Blob (1988)
An underrated horror remake
The Blob
- Release Date
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August 5, 1988
- Runtime
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95 Minutes
- Director
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Chuck Russell
One of the greatest science fiction horror movies of all time is the original The Blob made in 1958, which chronicles the tale of an alien organism that comes to Earth and feeds on humans. The 1988 remake, piloted by Chuck Russell, is one of the greatest but also one of the most critically underappreciated horror remakes ever. This time around, the Blob itself is actually the result of a military experiment, grown inside a satellite before crashing down to the planet to reign terror on a small town.
The special effects of 1988’s The Blob are a true marvel, as the acidic amorphous fiend oozes its way through a chunk of the population, leaving only skeletons in its wake.
The film has a great sense of increasing spectacle as the Blob grows bigger and bigger in size, culminating in an absurd action setpiece that includes one of the greatest movie flamethrower scenes conceived. Equal parts creature feature and disaster flick, The Blob is positively dripping in unabashed horror fun.
7
Braindead (a.k.a. Dead Alive)
Sickeningly fun brain-off entertainment
Dead Alive
- Release Date
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August 13, 1992
- Runtime
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104 Minutes
Most people know Peter Jackson from his wonderfully iconic adaptations of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings books, earning him international fame. But before he was lavishly constructing fully-realized fantasy worlds, he was flaying the flesh from his victims’ bones in delightfully horrific movies like Braindead, also known as Dead Alive in North America. The film takes viewers through a mutant zombie outbreak in New Zealand, which is desperately attempted to be curbed by a nebbish mama’s boy.
Fittingly enough considering its title, the film is a reckless indulgence of wanton blood and guts. Known as one of the goriest mainstream movies ever made, Braindead is a no-holds-barred display of Peter Jackson’s talent with practical effects. With absurd ideas like zombie monkey-rat hybrids and zombies that can sexually reproduce to make zombie babies, Braindead is a cult classic that works better the more one’s own brain is turned off while watching it.
6
An American Werewolf In London
Funny, scary, sexy and hairy
Bringing the concept of a wolf man back to the pop culture zeitgeist in full swing for the first time since Universal’s The Wolf Man, An American Werewolf in London is the definition of a great popcorn horror movie. The film centers on a pair of American backpackers in England, one of whom is bitten by a ravenous werewolf, thereby passing the curse on to him. Sure enough, on the next full moon, the hapless David becomes a bloodthirsty beast that wreaks havoc on the most populated centers of London.
With such a simple and well-worn idea, An American Werewolf in London does a great job digging up every conceivable corner of its premise as its titular fanged creature of folklore carves a bloody path through a modern metropolis. The film was among the first to introduce genuine comedy into a typical horror formula, achieving great success in doing so despite contemporaneous doubts. Easily one of the greatest werewolf movies ever made, if not the singular best, An American Werewolf in London is sure to get the blood pumping.
5
Re-Animator
A unique take on H.P. Lovecraft
When it comes to Lovecraftian horror, images of incomprehensible cosmic horrors or fish-themed monstrosities might be the first thing to come to mind. But Re-Animator provides a starkly unique and surprisingly easy-to-enjoy adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s work. Loosely based on the short story Herbert West-Reanimator, the film tells the macabre tale of an up-and-coming doctor whose life is thrown into chaos when he becomes roommates with Herbert West, a mad scientist obsessed with reviving the dead via a special glowing green serum.
From the aggressively green glow of the serum to the unique setting of a medical institution of learning.
Re-Animator is chilling and gruesome in ways that only a low-budget mid 80s horror movie can be, making some of the best use of a severed head ever seen in cinema. Jeffrey Combs is phenomenal as the deranged Herbert West, whose relentless fixation of playing god and earnest belief in his own superiority is simply the perfect archetypal modern necromancer. From the aggressively green glow of the serum to the unique setting of a medical institution of learning, Re-Animator presents gore utilized in almost slapstick levels of physical humor.
4
Evil Dead II
Blood-coated popcorn splendor
Evil Dead II
9/10
- Release Date
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March 13, 1987
- Runtime
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84 minutes
- Director
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Sam Raimi
For the most part, picking the middle of a franchise for a fun movie to simply throw on and have a good time with isn’t the best idea, with convoluted, serialized plotlines getting in the way of the amusement. That isn’t the case for Evil Dead II, which reboots the Evil Dead series by retelling the first film’s events despite the numbered title. In an attempt to spend some time with his girlfriend Linda, Michigan hardhead Ash Williams is thrown into a fight for survival when the couple accidentally resurrect the sinister Deadites via the Necronomicon.
Evil Dead II is Sam Raimi at his goriest, funniest, and scariest best. Bruce Campbell’s square-jawed and dim-witted Ash is the perfect goofball protagonist to stick into such a sick and twisted world, succumbing to madness as he endures the carnival of horrors unfolding all around him. From the creative camera angles from the roaring Deadite’s point of view to the bonkers finale with a gnarled creature battle, Evil Dead II might be the zenith of popcorn horror movie making.
3
Trick ‘R Treat
The perfect holiday horror movie
Trick ‘r Treat
- Release Date
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November 27, 2015
- Runtime
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1hr 22
- Director
-
Michael Dougherty
-
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Quinn Lord
Sam / Peeping Tommy
Horror anthology movies have an almost unfair advantage when it comes to excelling as popcorn fare. Enter Trick ‘R Treat, directed by Michael Dougherty of Godzilla: King of the Monsters and Krampus fame. The film weaves through five tales all set on Halloween night in a small Ohio town in which the holiday is taken deathly seriously. Serving as connective tissue is the big-headed Sam Hain, named after Halloween’s original name as a pagan holiday, Samhain, a murderous toddler who punishes those eschewing Halloween traditions.
Despite being very much a frightening horror movie, Trick ‘R Treat is a cozy holiday classic worth returning to every year. Unlike many anthology films, there truly isn’t a weak link in any of the stories, from the coven of werewolf women to the unassuming dad moonlighting as a serial child murderer. Sam himself deserves a place in the Mount Rushmore of iconic masked slasher villains, rounding out a delightful candle-lit scary movie sweeter than Halloween candy.
2
V/H/S 2
V/H/S/2
- Release Date
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June 6, 2013
- Runtime
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92 Minutes
- Director
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Simon Barrett, Adam Wingard, Eduardo Sánchez, Gregg Hale, Timo Tjahjanto, Gareth Evans, Jason Eisener
Truthfully, the entire V/H/S series is a stellar pillar of popcorn horror movies as a whole, and it’s difficult to recommend only a single entry in the franchise for those eager to absorb cheap and entertaining scary stories. Each movie is a collection of vignettes presented as actual video tapes (or otherwise lost media) that have been dusted off and refurbished, knitting together a creative stream of frights, blood, and deviancy. If the series had to have a single winner to represent its popcorn movie tendencies, it has to be V/H/S 2.
Still one of the strongest entries in the V/H/S series, V/H/S 2 plays with all sorts of sources of footage, from zombies wearing GoPros to bionic eyes to dog-collar cams scampering through alien abductions. With series-standout titles like Safe Haven, V/H/S 2 knows where to hit hard and leave things off before shifting gears into a new genre of horror altogether. For as wide a net as the film is able to cast, it’s an impressive staple of horror movie mastery.
1
Killer Klowns From Outer Space
Nightmarish good fun
Any horror movie that has its own theme song is a guaranteed popcorn movie classic, and the band The Dickies can attest to the quality of Killer Klowns from Outer Space. True to its title, the film follows the alien invasion of a small town orchestrated by a circus full of monstrous clown-like creatures that weaponize a variety of carnival-themed gadgets. It’s up to an odd love triangle of kids to stop the carnage before the clowns can cocoon the entire town’s population in cotton candy for easy consumption.
The grotesque designs of the clowns themselves are the true star of the show here, sure to trigger coulrophobia in even the most cool-headed audiences. The film’s scrappy budget and late-80s sensibilities drown the entire thing in an eerie fever-dream tone that’s hard to find anywhere else, but the good fun of the creative kills and absurd circus creations is impossible to deny. Genuinely funny and surprisingly disturbing, Killer Klowns from Outer Space might not be the deepest horror movie, but it’s one of the few to have villains that literally wield popcorn as a weapon.
