10 Best Recent Guilty Pleasure Horror Movies You Probably Missed

7. The Pale Blue Eye

Based on the novel by Louis Bayard, The Pale Blue Eye was director Scott Cooper’s 2023 follow-up to the massively popular Antlers. 

Was it as good? Well, no, but that was always going to be a tall order. 

Christian Bale stars as a run-down detective who is hired to investigate a mysterious death at the United States Military Academy. Since this is a historical fiction story, he gets some help from a young Edgar Allen Poe, played by Harry Potter and Queen’s Gambit star Harry Melling. 

The Pale Blue Eye is a fun, moody mystery featuring the guy who played Dudley Dursley pretending to be Edgar Allen Poe. It leans into its historical concept nicely whilst also introducing elements of the supernatural as the story progresses. 

It’s not groundbreaking or anything and some will see it as a step down for Cooper after the startling originality of his previous work, but as a piece of escapism set in a world full of characters you’ll recognise, The Pale Blue Eye is fun for all the family. 

Ok, it’s not - it’s actually quite disturbing in places - but you get the idea.