10 Horror Films That Actually Won Oscars

10. An American Werewolf In London

Won: Best Makeup

One of the first films to prove that a horror movie could have a sharp sense of humour and deliver a few shocks, John Landis' An American Werewolf In London works on so many levels that several contemporary critics were wondering if the film had a split personality.

The Chicago Reader called it “a lot of dissociated segments left hanging in midair” while Roger Ebert complained that “Landis never seems sure whether he’s making a comedy or a horror film….the laughs and the blood coexist very uneasily.”

Neither credited Rick Baker with creating some of the best transformation sequences ever put on celluloid, nor did they credit him with making werewolves scary again after all those old Hammer and Universal movies. If the movie has a hero then Baker is it, and his Oscar was richly deserved.