Horror movies have enjoyed a real renaissance in recent years. From the launch of new franchises like Terrifier and X to the rise of new horror auteurs like Jordan Peele, Ari Aster, Coralie Fargeat and Julia Ducournau, there's been plenty for fans of all things spooky to sink their teeth into in recent years.
Even with that in mind, 2024 has been a bigger year than most. From quirky indie releases through studios like A24 and Black Bear to stellar franchise revivals after decades in the wilderness, it seems we've not had a month where the horror fan can't pop to a local cinema and catch a brilliant new release. That in mind, we've assembled ten films that highlight just how brilliant 2024 has been horror - and note, we say "highlight" and not "the ten best horrors of 2024" because frankly there's been far too many to condense down to just ten. Don't see your favourite on the list? Let us know what we're missing.
Terrifier 3 (Damien Leone)
Let's start with the biggie. Direcor Damien Leone has been toying with the sadistic killer Art The Clown since 2008, when the character popped up in the short The 9th Circle. Finally given his own star vehicle in 2016's Terrifier, the franchise swiftly hacked its place to horror fans' hearts with its mix of brutal violence, splat-happy special effects and a sense of genuine creepiness bolstered around the performance of David Howard Thornton (Art).
With each movie getting a bigger budget and better effects, it was an easy guess that Terrifier 3 would up the stakes considerably given the success of its predecessor. What nobody could have expected was that the film would go on to top the box office and pull in enough to become the highest grossing unrated movie of all time. Retaining the immense gore and brutality that has become the series' calling card, Terifier 3 exceeds all expectations and makes the most of its move from Halloween-set mayhem to Christmas, the added supernatural elements that crept in from the second installment opening a whole new dimension of horror for fans to enjoy.
Alien: Romulus (Fede Álvarez)
Making new movies within beloved franchises is always a tricky proposition in horror. While we've had some impressive reboots and sequels in recent years (Halloween springs to mind), there are just as many soulless cash-grabs that seem designed purely to milk the wallets of those who love the originals by chucking a few nostalgic elements and callbacks in and calling it a day (2022's Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Exorcist: Believer). Not so with Fede Álvarez's Alien entry.
Having already proved his chops at rebooting classic horrors with 2013's impressive Evil Dead, Álvarez's take on the Alien universe managed to march things back from the quasi-religious arcs original director Ridley Scott had indulged with Prometheus and Alien: Covenant to give us something pure, simple and spine-tingling: a bunch of miners trapped on a ship with vicious Xenomorphs and face-huggers hiding in every shadow. A return to practical effects lent the film's villains a tangibility that made them feel truly formidable in ways they haven't since Aliens and while it might've clobbered fans around the head a little too hard with nostalgia at times, some incredible set pieces (including the use of zero gravity) made it feel truly memorable in its own right.
Longlegs (Osgood Perkins)
Nicholas Cage has been staging his own one-man horror renaissance for a while now, utilising his OTT acting style in the likes of Mandy, The Colour Out Of Space and Renfield (with varying degrees of success). He's seldom been creepier or more unsettling than in Longlegs, however, Osgood Perkins' indie release toeing the line between straight-horror and crime thriller in ways that bring to mind similar crossover classics like Seven and The Silence Of The Lambs.
Chuck in some supernatural skullduggery and some Satanic imagery and Longlegs clearly alligns itself more with the realms of pure horror, its 101-minute runtime packed with twists and turns that'll have you on edge throughout.
Blink Twice (Zoë Kravitz)
Again playing in the liminal space between horror and thriller, Zoë Kravitz's directorial debut played with sinister undertones when a seemingly idyllic getaway on a private island with a bunch of billionaires gives way to something much more sinister. Although it doesn't have the supernatural edge that Longlegs does, Blink Twice nonetheless leans hard on classic horror sensibilities of movies like Repulsion and Don't Look Now where reality isn't all it seems.
Bolstered around a brilliant cast including Naomi Ackie, Alia Shawkat, Channing Tatum, Haley Joel Osment and Kravitz herself, Blink Twice shows horrors can be perpetrated in even the most idyllic settings and that the genre isn't beholden to stereotypes when it comes to setting and story.
The Substance (Coralie Fargeat)
Much like heavy metal, "horror" is a broad church with many subgenres sheltering beneath its banner. While slashers and supernatural horror might make up the broadest selection, body horror has always had its devotees and while David Cronenburg might have been its biggest name director in the 80s, Coralie Fargeat has staked her claim on malleable flesh and stomach-churning effects with The Substance.
With big-name stars like Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley and Dennis Quaid in its cast it was obvious that The Substance was going to have more, erm, substance than your usual splat-happy flick, but Fargeat's greatest genius is in just how nauseating she makes even the mundane feel (you'll never look at a plate of shrimp the same). Following the tale of fading star Elizabeth Sparkle as she turns 50 and is shut out from Hollywood, the film's almost-sci-fi premise ("what if you could create a new, better you?") is turned into a kind of modern day fable that marks this out as a classic. The final half hour or the film is so unhinged it makes even the most violent and gory horror look tame by comparison, so this one should be on any self-respecting horror fans' list.
Late Night With The Devil (Colin & Cameron Cairnes)
Alright, so this technically premiered in 2023, but with its release into cinemas and streaming this year we're still claiming it. And rightly so, because Late Night With The Devil is a brilliantly spooky movie that shows you don't need to go back to colonial times to create an effective period horror.
Centred around David Dastmalchian's Jack Delroy, a late night TV host in a desperate bid for ratings after his show paused production following a family tragedy, Late Night With The Devil plays with the found-footage format with an extra helping of Satanic, supernatural menace. The film's 70s setting seeps into more than just its narrative; the way the story unfolds and builds to a big crescendo of horror set pieces is straight from the book of Halloween, directors Colin & Cameron Cairnes forging a brilliantly gripping narrative that have you scanning the screen for clues and hints throughout its 95-minute runtime.
Maxxxine (Ti West)
Ti West's X series has always been a horror franchise with a twist, each installment interconnected via overlapping characters and narratives but set in vastly different time periods and given wildly different aesthetics to match. From the 70s backwoods slasher of X, to Pearl's classical Hollywood setting (inspired by the likes of The Wizard Of Oz and Mary Poppins), the franchise has always more ambition than your average hack-and-slash feature, so even as it dives headlong into the glitz, glamour and sleaze of the 80s for third installment Maxxxine, it should've been obvious something special was afoot.
Sure enough, West has lots of fun picking up with surviving character Maxine Minx - franchise star Mia Goth - clawing her way to stardom in 80s Hollywood against the backdrop of the Night Stalker killings plaguing Los Angeles. There's plenty of hack-and-slash violence that will be familiar to fans of the preceding films, but Goth also proves her credentials as a modern day scream queen by completely dominating the movie, creating a horror icon that could easily hold her own against fan favourites like Laurie Strode or Nancy Thompson.
The First Omen (Arkasha Stevenson)
To have not one, but two incredibly solid horror franchise reboots in a year feels almost unheard of by this point. Yet somehow Arkasha Stevenson's directorial debut managed to capture both the ethereal dread surrounding the original Omen movie whilst offering a 2024-friendly update to its motifs and set pieces that seriously got under the skin.
Released into cinemas around the same time as Immaculate - another sinister Church/nun-set horror well worth an explore - The First Omen brought the franchise back to life with a sense of flair, set pieces ranging from the steady build of terror in a darkned room to all-out body horror gruesomeness. While it perhaps leant a little too hard on callbacks (yep, another one), Stevenson's Omen entry felt like a breath of fresh air against the increasingly fetid and listless pacing of modern church-set horrors.
Lisa Frankenstein (Zelda Williams)
Like we said further up, horror is a broad church. And while the likes of Beetlejuice and Ghostbusters blurred the boundaries between horror and black comedy in the 80s, we'd say if you want a strong fix of oddball horror comedy you could do a lot worse than Lisa Frankenstein.
Another directorial debut - this time from Zelda Williams - Lisa Frankenstein was written by acclaimed screenwriter Diablo Cody (Juno, Jennifer's Body) and offers a Heathers-like twist on the Frankenstein tale as misunderstood teen Lisa (Kathryn Newton) befirends a reanimated Victorian corpse (Cole Sprouse). It's a fun and quirky movie that plays with a Tim Burton like "sunny happy suburbia vs goth" clash-of-cultures, its witty dialogue and weird sensibilities suggesting it may yet turn out to be a cult classic in years to come.
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I Saw The TV Glow (Jane Schoenbrun)
A24's status as esteemed studio of quirky, mind-warping movies remains firmly in tact judging by Jane Schoenbrun's I Saw The TV Glow. A psychological horror starring Justice Smith and Brigette Lundy-Paine, its story follows two teens who become obssessed by a cult horror TV show titled The Pink Opaque (a show clearly styled on the likes of Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Eerie, Indiana).
It's a slow burner in the truest sense of the word with the horror more incidental than overt, but it plays with its characterisations brilliantly. With in-film band performances it feels like a celebration of 90s TV/music crossovers (hello again, Buffy) with the likes of Phoebe Bridgers and King Woman popping up, as well as Fred Durst appearing as a character in-film. Heavy with subtext, I Saw The TV Glow is the kind of movie that demands heavy re-watches to catch every detail.
