It’s spooky time on Amazon Prime.
Things are about to get freaky. Freakier than the sorry state of social media. Freakier than Earth’s record high temperatures. Honestly, things are SO freaky these days that I find myself turning to horror in order to establish some NORMALCY. Zombies eating people? That’s just what zombies do. Restless ghosts haunting the living? All par for the course. But whatever is going on with the world right now? This is NOT normal. If I were a ghost, I would be scared to return to this mortal plane. Y’all can keep it. I’m good.
If you’re looking for some great horror movies to watch to escape the horrors of daily life on this hell planet, streaming is your friend. Keep reading for the best horror movies you can watch on Amazon Prime right now.
Train to Busan
One of the finest zombie flicks of the 21st Century, Yeon Sang-ho’s Train to Busan is a landmark film that helped remind audiences that K-horror is a force to be reckoned with. The plot is basically Snakes on a Plane, ,except with Zombies on a Train. Unlike Snakes on a Plane, this film is actually scary. Actor Gong Yoo plays Seok-woo, a young father on a train trip with his young daughter when the zombie outbreak begins, and he and a handful of other brave passengers work together to save themselves from hungry zombies and desperate humans.
Shaun of the Dead
Shaun of the Dead is the first installment in Edgar Wright’s Cornetto trilogy, which includes Hot Fuzz and The World’s End. While the other two films are good and middling respectively, Shaun of the Dead may be the best the series has to offer. The film centers around directionless electronics salesman Shaun (Simon Pegg) and his somehow more directionless friend Ed (Nick Frost) as they try to survive a zombie apocalypse with their loved ones. It turns out that impending doom at the hands of flesh-eating horrors might just be the kick in the pants Shaun needs to get things back on track.
Nope
Jordan Peele’s Nope is an extraterrestrial horror-drama-western that was polarizing to audiences, but anyone who doesn’t like it can stay on the South Pole where they belong. We here at the North Pole LOVE this movie. It has one of the best-designed movie monsters in recent memory; taking inspiration from anime, firsthand UFO accounts, and biblically accurate depictions of angels. As with Get Out and Us, Nope has thematic heft: Peele’s examination of spectacle is also a tongue-in-cheek exploration of the universality of racism, as even aliens from beyond the stars make a Black family their target.
Suspiria
Director Luca Guadagnino’s modern remake of Dario Argento’s classic Italian horror film Suspiria has no right being so good. How can you do the 1977 film any better? With modern special effects and editing techniques! The film centers around a young woman (Dakota Johnson) who has been accepted into a prestigious dance academy in Berlin. Hooray for her! Congratulations are in order! Or they would be, if the dance academy wasn’t run by a coven of witches lorded over by Tilda Swinton (who also plays three different roles). Suspiria is a telling parable of the often abusive practices employed by art school faculty against their students in the name of achieving artistic greatness.
REC
Short for “Record,” Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza’s REC is a found-footage horror film that rivals all-time genre greats like The Blair Witch Project. Set in Barcelona, the film follows late night reporter Angela (Manuela Velasco) and her cameraman Pablo (Ferran Terraza) as they join a group of firefighters in answering a distress call at an apartment building. Once inside, they find that the inhabitants of the apartment building have developed a penchant for acting wild and biting people in the neck. They should just leave! Well, they would, if public health services didn’t seal all the doors and windows in order to stop the mysterious infection from spreading.
Hellraiser
Hellraiser was directed by Clive Barker, who adapted the screenplay from his own novella, The Hellbound Heart. Get you a man who can do both. The film is about a hedonist name Frank Cotton who purchases a mysterious puzzle box while sojourning in Morocco. When he opens the box, the hellish humanoid Pinhead (Doug Bradley) appears from a parallel dimension and subjects Frank to extreme sadomasochism, which ends up tearing him apart. Some time later, a new family moves into Frank’s old house and accidentally resurrects him, inspiring the ghoulish hedonist to attempt to feast on their flesh in order to restore his withered physical form.
Jacob’s Ladder
Jacob’s Ladder was panned by critics when it first came out, but Adrian Lyne’s film is now regarded as a horror masterpiece. The title is inspired by a passage from the Bible in which the prophet Jacob sees angels traveling between heaven and Earth on a celestial ladder. The film centers around Vietnam veteran Jacob (Tim Robbins), who returns home from the war only find that the home he once knew is … wrong, somehow. Did that homeless guy have a tentacle spouting from under his clothes? Did that woman just turn into an eldritch demon for a split second? WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?
The Neon Demon
You either hate Nicolas Winding Refn’s films or you make them your entire personality, there is no in-between. The Neon Demon is another polarizing little number, this time following 16-year-old aspiring model Jesse (Elle Fanning) who moves to Los Angeles to pursue her blossoming career. She befriends older models in the scene (played by Jena Malone, Bella Heathcote, and Abbey Lee), who become jealous of her youth and beauty. Like really jealous. Murderously jealous. But hey, that’s just LA, right?
We Need To Talk About Kevin
Directed by Lynne Ramsay, We Need To Talk About Kevin centers on former travel writer Eva and her relationship to her son, Kevin. There’s something … off about Kevin. (Is it because he’s played by Ezra Miller? Probably.) Kevin is not like other little boys his age. While most boys just want to eat dirt and play with water guns, Kevin wants to murder little animals and manipulate people. Eva (Tilda Swinton) struggles with the fact that her son is growing up into a vicious little sociopath, but he’s still her son. How can she help him? How can she love him? How can she fix him? This movie is the reason why I’m not having kids.
Night of the Living Dead
Night of The Living Dead is a must-watch for horror movie fans, especially lovers of films of the zombie persuasion. George A. Romero’s landmark horror film seared the concept of zombies into the braaaains of pop culture, and inspired countless other films that pay homage to this original. There would be no Train to Busan, no 28 Days Later, and certainly no 11 seasons of The Walking Dead. Hell, The Last of Us would cease to exist as well. The cultural impact of this film is staggering. If you haven’t seen it, are you even a horror fan?
(featured image: Universal Pictures / Next Entertainment World / Amazon Studios)
