Horror

Nothing is quite as scary as puberty in this exuberant feminist pre-teen body horror from first time Malaysian director Amanda Nell Eu.

Christopher Lee and Edward Woodward star in the folk horror classic about a policemen investigating an island given over to paganism.

Like Ghostwatch reimagined as a cheesy 1970s chat show, this deviously clever found-footage horror has scares to spare.

A mysterious nurse becomes dangerously obsessed with saving the soul of her dying patient in director Rose Glass’ divine debut.

If you only see one Iranian vampire western this year, make sure it’s this one. A female vampire stalks a ghost town in Ana Lily Amirpour’s arresting debut.

Bringing a whole new meaning to the term ‘period film’, Andrew Cumming’s Palaeolithic horror movie is a true original.

A video nasties film censor becomes absorbed in her work in Prano Bailey-Bond's brilliantly adventurous first feature.

A young woman undergoes a disturbing transformation in Ruth Paxton’s extraordinary psychological horror tale.

A dying vampire swears vengeance on the townsfolk who killed him. The promise seems to have been realized when, years later, plague arrives.

In the near future, a cool and ruthless assassin who uses other people’s bodies to carry out execution-style killings comes unstuck when her latest vehicle resists.

Babak Anvari’s Tehran-set ghost story has been acclaimed as a modern horror masterpiece.

David Lowery's haunting exploration of love and loss, with Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck is a high-point of recent independent American cinema.

Ken Russell’s bold account of religious hysteria, political persecution and the corrupt marriage of church and state.

Based on a true story, Chris Crow’s atmospheric chamber piece follows the dark and dire fortunes of two men trapped on a lighthouse for months on end.

The greatest zombie-biker, toad-worshipping-Satanists horror in British cinema is an undisputed cult classic brimming with exciting action and fantastical mayhem.

Jack Nicholson revels in his terrifying performance as Jack Torrance, the would-be writer who becomes the minotaur trapped in Kubrick’s supernatural maze.

An author becomes convinced he's unearthed a feline conspiracy to control mankind.

Angela Carter and Neil Jordan's magical, radical take on Little Red Riding Hood.

The lockdown horror sensation from British director Rob Savage follows six friends who disturb a malevolent spirit during a Zoom séance.

The wealthy elite feed off the lower classes in a deliciously twisted Brazilian social satire that’s definitely not for the squeamish.

Landmark film from 'zombie godfather' Romero, whose makeshift heroes fight for their lives against a new and terrifying enemy.

Three generations of women are plagued by a supernatural presence in one of the year’s most terrifying films.

Bill Nighy plays the arch detective investigating a series of grisly murders around the music halls of Victorian London, in this pungent Gothic mystery.

A punk band becomes besieged in the backstage hideaway of a hideous neo-Nazi club, in this gloriously tense shocker from the director of Blue Ruin.

A gripping real-life story of a Mafia kidnapping in Italy is enthrallingly re-imagined as supernatural fantasy by the directors of the acclaimed Salvo.

Philip Ridley’s stunning comeback film charts a lonely photographer’s battles with demons amid a haunting East London.

Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton star as ageless, blood-drinking lovers in Jim Jarmusch’s clever, funny and sexy vampire tale.

An American tourist in Italy falls for a stunning local woman with a dangerous secret, in this startling horror-romance.

Cannes’ Grand Jury Prize was awarded to this unnerving drama about a man who claims to be able to kill people with a ‘terror shout’ learned from an Aboriginal shaman.

A father-son love triangle unleashes the unstoppable urges of the Greasy Strangler, in this gloriously deranged hybrid of gross-out comedy and gonzo horror.

A young woman tries to escape her sadistic kidnappers, in this bold and brutal Australian thriller.

Another giallo-inspired exercise in operatic violence from Belgian duo Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani, directors of the acclaimed Amer.

Milo isn't your usual introverted, strange teenager; he also believes he's a vampire. Michael O'Shea's dark drama presents a transgressive twist on the teen vampire tale.

An electrifying story of demonic possession.

Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan star as a pair of New Orleans paramedics who encounter a series of bizarre deaths linked to a new designer drug with otherworldly effects.

A tense and terrifying motorway thriller about a man whose girlfriend is kidnapped by a malevolent trucker, directed by former Radio 1 DJ Mark Tonderai.

Ben Wheatley’s ultra-violent second feature, invoking both The Wicker Man and Apocalypse Now.

One man’s love for his designer jacket escalates to dangerous heights in what might just be the strangest serial killer film ever made.

In Gareth Bryn’s subtle and haunting story of ghosts and lost souls, two young lovers are rescued by a mysterious figure in the Welsh mountains.

Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley are scientists who create an animal-human hybrid that develops at an alarming rate and soon grows out of control.

A night in a gay sauna turns into a fight for survival. Two men must over-come prejudice and join forces in taking down a horde of towel-wearing zombies.

An alien Scarlett Johansson prowls the streets of Glasgow in Jonathan Glazer’s astonishing, mind-bending mixture of existential sci-fi and inner-city realism.

Being scared has never been this much fun, as Martin Freeman, Andy Nyman and Paul Whitehouse bring the chilling London stage play to the screen.

"Can you spy him deep within? Little Possum. Black as sin." The reliably deranged Sean Harris is plagued by an evil puppet in this dark, brooding fable from Matthew Holness.

Elliot Page stars in this inventive and surprising post-zombie film from Ireland, in which the rehabilitated undead are transitioned back into society.

Michele Soavi’s compelling concoction of anarchic Evil Dead-style horror-comedy, tragic romance and gore.

A group of guests assembled at a country house swap uncanny and supernatural stories in this classic Ealing chiller from 1945.

A madman harbours murderous thoughts about an old relative with an evil eye in this chilling Edgar Allan Poe adaptation

An ageing countess finds that if she bathes in the blood of virgins her youth is restored.

In Edwardian London, a series of gruesome murders match those of the Whitechapel Ripper, revealing an unlikely suspect.

The occupants of an old house are menaced by a dead - and very angry - Egyptologist.

Boris Karloff stars as Dr. Laurence, a scientist who has devised a way to put one person’s mind into another’s body.

Vampires rampage around Hampstead in a strange, bloody cult horror by low-budget sex-gore auteur Andy Milligan.

Chilling vampire horror from Hammer in which a pair of innocent twins come under the influence of the evil Count Karnstein.