Do you’re feeling that? That chill within the air, that tingling sensation in the back of your neck? It may possibly solely imply one factor. That’s proper: Halloween season is as soon as once more upon us!
Right here at Polygon, we love horror. We cowl all of it 12 months spherical, whether or not it’s rating the scariest new releases of the 12 months or curating lists of the spookiest horror films to look at on Netflix.
We particularly love Halloween, although, a vacation devoted to all issues scary and spooky. Which is why, yearly for the previous 4 years, Polygon has put collectively a Halloween countdown calendar, choosing 31 of our employees’s high horror-themed or Halloween-adjacent picks throughout films, TV, and on-line movies all through the month of October, all obtainable to look at at house. It’s been a lot enjoyable, in actual fact, we’re doing it once more — with an all new batch of movies, exhibits, and movies to select from.
Every single day for the month of October, we’ll add a brand new suggestion to this countdown and inform you the place you possibly can watch it. So curl up on the sofa, dim the lights, and seize some popcorn for a spine-tingling marathon of Halloween-adjacent delights.
Picture: Anchor Bay Leisure
The place to look at: Accessible to stream on Plex and Pluto TV with advertisements and to lease on Amazon
Kicking off the Halloween horror film season is a fragile artwork. Only a few days into the official begin of fall, it’s vital to choose precisely the best film to subtly shift that chill within the air from cozy to spooky as gently as you possibly can. With that in thoughts, we’re easing into Halloween this 12 months with Dario Argento’s Phenomena, an ideal mix of spooky, campy, and bleak that units that stage excellent for the frights to come back.
Phenomena takes place in a distant city in Switzerland at a boarding faculty the place Jennifer Corvino (Jennifer Connelly), the daughter of a well-known American actor, is the most recent scholar. The one drawback is there’s additionally a serial killer rampaging by means of the city, and when Jennifer witnesses one of many murders, her life is abruptly in grave hazard. The excellent news is she has an inexplicable telekinetic energy over bugs to assist preserve her alive.
And whereas the film isn’t fairly as foolish because the premise would indicate, it’s among the many most weird and enjoyable of the various sleazy slashers of the Eighties. However what really elevates it to a particular place is that it’s one of many uncommon horror films the place the supernatural is seemingly wholly on the aspect of excellent. It’s uncommon {that a} film lets us unambiguously root for the magical energy at its heart, giving the entire thing the unusual, otherworldly feeling of a very grotesque fairytale.
All of this makes for a tremendously entertaining and odd thriller film, and a good way to start a month filled with horror films. —Austen Goslin
Picture: Sony Photos Residence Leisure
The place to look at: Shudder, AMC Plus
Anthony Waller’s 1995 horror thriller is a premise straight out of a waking nightmare. Billy Hughes (Marina Zudina), a mute particular results make-up artist, is in Moscow figuring out of a dilapidated film studio on a low-budget slasher. After returning to the constructing after hours to choose up an vital piece of kit, Billy unintentionally locks herself inside with no method of getting in contact with both her sister Karen or her sister’s boyfriend Andy. Issues rapidly go from dangerous to worse when she secretly stumbles upon the filming of a snuff movie perpetrated by a pair of Russian gangsters. When the gangsters suspect that another person is contained in the studio, Billy should discover a technique to escape undetected earlier than her personal life is put into hazard.
Mute Witness is a terrific cat-and-mouse homicide thriller filled with teeth-clenchingly tense sequences and a compelling lead efficiency courtesy of Marina Zudina. The primary hour of the movie is expertly paced and edited, ingratiating the viewer throughout the format of the studio earlier than transitioning right into a mad-dash climax that’s breathtaking and terrifying to behold. If that isn’t sufficient to pique your curiosity, the movie touts a short but memorable cameo look by Sir Alec Guinness (Star Wars, Lawrence of Arabia) in one in every of his last on-screen performances. —Toussaint Egan
Picture: Warner Residence Video
The place to look at: Accessible to lease on Amazon and Apple
For those who ever get uninterested in the identical outdated restaurant cuisines, the reply is usually to search for a fusion restaurant that mixes a few your favorites, taking spices and strategies from completely different cultures and mashing them up into one thing new. The identical goes for horror films: For those who’re bored of the standard executions of all of the acquainted tropes, a style mashup like 1998’s Fallen could also be one of the simplest ways to search out some new taste in acquainted concepts.
In Fallen’s case, director Gregory Hoblit and screenwriter Nicholas Kazan put the serial-killer procedural thriller and the possession horror story in a blender and use concepts and strategies from each to boost the drama. Hoblit is a police-show vet (Hill Avenue Blues, NYPD Blue, LA Regulation, um, Cop Rock) who retains the motion grounded and gritty, even because the supernatural edge pushes the story removed from the style’s regular beat.
Denzel Washington stars murder detective John Hobbes, with John Goodman as his companion Jonesy. The 2 males (working below a sinister lieutenant performed by Donald Sutherland) lately cracked a homicide case that despatched a serial killer (Elias Koteas) to the gasoline chamber. After his demise, although, the killings begin once more, and Hobbes and Jonesy begin working a brand new case that appears to be the outdated case. Horror vets will know the place that is going lengthy earlier than they do, however Hoblit ramps up the eerie pressure as Hobbes’ life begins to unravel.
A variety of horror includes folks encountering the supernatural for the primary time and fumbling for a response that can allow them to survive, however the stakes at all times appear larger when the protagonist is in legislation enforcement and in idea has to comply with procedures, obey guidelines, and presume innocence. (See additionally: The Hidden, Angel Coronary heart, Longlegs, and many others.) Washington makes for a terrific rule-following cop who’s caught in a terrifying state of affairs the place not one of the guidelines he’s discovered can presumably apply. The result’s a solidly creepy film with simply the slightest tinge of understanding camp. —Tasha Robinson
Picture: Scream Manufacturing unit
The place to look at: Prime Video, Peacock, Shudder
Creature characteristic administrators usually cite Jaws as inspiration for holding again on full monster carnage till the top — the much less you present, the scarier it’s. Screw off! If a film guarantees an enormous mutant alligator terrorizing the town, then we greatest see an enormous mutant alligator terrorizing that metropolis, and infrequently!
Excellent news: Alligator is strictly that, with the added bonus of nice performances, a depraved humorousness, and a contact of social commentary.
Robert Forster (Jackie Brown, Breaking Unhealthy) stars as detective David Madison, a cop with a status for doing good whereas dropping his companions within the warmth of motion. When phrase of a killer alligator prowling the sewers reaches the floor, Det. Madison springs into motion with a Dr. Marisa Kendall (Robin Riker), a herpetologist whose no-bullshit strategy to amphibian analysis paves the way in which for a traditional zinger-filled romance. Solely the legendary John Sayles might squeeze a throwback screwball romance right into a killer alligator film and nonetheless discover room to stay to the bumbling paperwork.
Very similar to Jaws, Sayles and director Lewis Teague interrogate the failed establishments that permit a 36-foot hyper-metabolic alligator to run rampant in Chicago — not solely can the cops not get their shit collectively, however the alligator is simply dino-like after consuming a biotech firm’s discarded animal carcasses, all radiated with development formulation. In contrast to Jaws, Teague places his big alligator puppet to good use, snapping its jaws on numerous victims, from alleycats to random youngsters in a pool. Blood splatters, Chicagoans run for expensive life, Det. Madison complains about his receding hairline, and by the top, issues go growth. Alligator isn’t tremendous scary, however it’s a raucous good time, a minimize above most monster B-movies of any period. —Matt Patches
