10 Hidden Gem Horror Monster Movies
Those oft-overlooked classic creature features that deserve their time in the spotlight.
The humble monster movie has served up some all-time great horror pictures over the decades. From the Universal features of the 1930s, to King Kong, to Cat People, to Godzilla, to Jaws, to Alien, to An American Werewolf in London, to Jurassic Park, to A Quiet Place and so many more, when done well, there's nothing more impressive than a classic monster movie.
Of course, not every great monster film receives the accolades and mainstream attention of those aforementioned creature features. Like so many other murky corners of cinema, there are so many hidden gems on this front; hidden gems that rank up as some of the very best that this subgenre has to offer.
Thankfully, this list is here to shine a spotlight on some of those films that have, for whatever reason, not reached a wider audience. Sometimes, that may have been due to poor marketing, others it may be down to simply getting lost in the shuffle, or then there are those that simply were never afforded a proper chance to receive a wider release.
With that in mind, then, here are ten under-the-radar horror monster movies that absolutely deserve some time in the sun.
10. Black Water
From writer/directors David Nerlich and Andrew Traucki - more on him later - 2007's Black Water is an utterly brutal, basic-but-brilliant crocodile-driven feature.
Loosely based on a real tragedy, the general premise of Black Water finds lovebirds Grace and Adam, and Grace's sister Lee, embarking on a fishing trip in a mangrove swamp. When their tour guide suggests they go a little further afield once the fishes aren't biting, that's where things take a literal turn for the worse as a saltwater croc capsizes their boat.
After that tour guide is devoured by this toothy menace, our core three are caught between a rock and a hard place; either take short-term solace up a tree, or swim out to their upturned boat and make a break for safety. To compound this predicament, nobody else is aware that they've even taken this trip, daylight is slipping away, and this crocodile is very much in its natural habitat... and is very much hungry for more human flesh.
Black Water is a film that plays with your expectations, that masterfully uses the one sole location where so much of the feature takes place, that takes an extremely serious approach to its subject, and that could well be the greatest croc feature in the history of that particular subgenre.