#5 – A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

This was the birth of one of the best horror movie villains of all time. Sure the seven sequels may have diluted the original impact but go back and watch the original with an open mind and you’ll find a very effective piece of horror movie history and the best of the ‘slasher movies’. The premise was as trippy as it was imaginative – a killer who only exists in the dream world, which means you can’t kill him in real life. So just don’t fall asleep, right? Not so much. The Nightmare series solidified creator Wes Craven as a horror movie legend and made Freddy Krueger an icon.

#4 – The Descent (2005)

For reasons that still confuse me I have found myself defending this movie more times than I can count. It follows the simple concept that all classic horror movies possess – it plays on our worst and most basic fears; being lost, being in the dark, being chased, and being trapped in close quarters. By the time the actual threat of the movie is revealed it doesn’t even matter because the tension built slowly and with such perfect timing that the scares were already there. Finish it off with an ending more hopeless than The Mist and more chilling than Carrie, and I maintain the same thing I’ve said since the first time I saw it – The Descent is the best horror movie in the last twenty years. Period.

#3 – The Exorcist (1973)

The Exorcist represented a shift in the paradigm of horror into the mainstream. One of the most financially successful horror films of all time,  it was also nominated for ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture. The mix of the supernatural and religious elements made this film scarier on a much deeper level than most films of its time. And at the heart of it all is a child involved in some of the most memorable and troubling scenes that weren’t fit for actors four times her age. Urban legends of the film and its shoot being cursed only added to the allure long after its place in horror movie history was secured.

#2 – The Shining (1980)

The Shining is a prime example of atmosphere over shock. A family of three gets snowed in at a ‘vacant’ Colorado hotel for the winter. It sets the stage well but the minimal number of characters forces the story to rely on itself to succeed. What makes this movie so scary is directly tied to its minimalist approach. Watching a man slowly lose his grasp on reality as he descends into the dark corners of his drunken, troubled mind is something that is entirely plausible in the real world. Watching Jack Nicholson do that at his most manic is terrifying. It’s a shame director Stanley Kubrick didn’t make more than one full-on horror movie; his vision is so perfect for it. I suppose if there was only going to be one, then this is the one I want to watch over and over.

#1 – The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

Picture this. I’m 7 or 8 years old. Mom and dad rent movies on a Saturday afternoon, as we did most weekends. We watch a couple as a family but there is one they keep on top of the TV, held back to watch “after me and my little brother go to bed”. We don’t know what it is but we beg to be allowed to watch it with them and being told we can’t only makes us want to more. But they hold their ground. So my brother and I hatch a plan to pretend we are sleeping and we sneak out shortly after the movie starts, hide behind the couch out of sight and watch this movie without them knowing we are there. We only get through about a quarter of it before we realize the magnitude of the mistake we have made. But since we are too scared to sneak back in to our room – it’s dark and we can still hear the movie – we are forced into the prison of hiding and only listening to the movie we are now too scared to lay eyes on. This only makes matters worse. We caught hell for it once they “found” us, and I still maintain to this day they knew we were there and wanted to teach us a lesson but I didn’t sleep right for weeks and I’ve never been more scared of a movie in my life. Well played Mom. Point taken.