10 Horror Movies That Tricked You Into Rooting For The Monster

3. The Fly

The brilliance of David Cronenberg's The Fly lies in how it takes a potentially down-the-line creature feature and imbues it with so much tragedy and sympathy for its doomed protagonist, scientist Seth Brundle (Jeff Goldblum).

Even though Brundle becomes a human-fly monster - or "Brundlefly" - by film's end, he's not quite a conventional villain, having been driven insane by his experiment gone wrong.

And so, while we as viewers certainly don't condone his more violent acts, there's a desperate desire to see him find a way to reverse the horrific situation he's found himself in.

Even though it quickly becomes clear there's no possibility of Seth ever returning to normal, it's devastating seeing him progressively lose his sense of self until he finally begs his pregnant girlfriend Veronica (Geena Davis) to put him out of his misery, which she does.

For a film this fundamentally revolting to tap into such deep emotions and make the audience pray for a Hail Mary solution to Seth's transformation is basically a filmmaking miracle on Cronenberg's part.