10 Awesome Slasher Films You've Probably Never Seen
7. Black Christmas (1974)
First off, can we spend this entry (and the rest of our lives) pretending that the 2006 remake of Black Christmas with Michelle Trachtenberg never happened? Because that shouldnt have happened. Thanks. The 1974 Black Christmas is the Joan of Arc of slasher films, in that it launched the thousands of imitators to create the slasher genre. Black Christmas wasnt the first slasher (that will come later), but its certainly the most influential. Halloween was originally conceived as a sequel to Black Christmas (with the serial killer evidently being a fan of the holidays), but the film was eventually given to John Carpenter as a stand-alone slasher of its own. Black Christmas also predates the trope that is usually attributed to A Stranger Calls, in which the call is coming from inside the house!, again showing just how innovative and inspirational it was. Set in a sorority house at Christmas time, the girls of the house have been receiving obscene and disturbing phone calls from a man who moans nonsense and threatens to kill them. It doesnt take long for that threat to become reality. Black Christmas is unflinching, especially for a film from the 70s (someone gets stabbed to death with a unicorn ornament, which you dont see everyday), and is also one of the few classic horror films that holds its scariness to the present day.
