10 Horror Movie Background Scares That Will Scar You For Life

The unrivalled king of new horror, Ari Aster burst onto the scene in 2018 with his first feature film: Hereditary.

Assembling a killer cast comprised of Toni Collette, Gabriel Byrne, Alex Wolff and newcomer Milly Shapiro, as the Grahams, Aster took the haunted house format and postmodernised it, turning everything we know inside out and layering up psychological traumas in the family's race towards extinction.

Though Charlie's (Shapiro) gruesome decapitation provides the horror around which the rest of the film revolves, it is through miniatures artist Annie (Collette) that the film presents the bulk of its most petrifying moments. While many of these scenes wear their heart on their sleeve – or their forehead on the attic door – there is one moment that offers a deep and unsuspecting chill.

Possessed by the spirit of demon king Paimon, Annie awaits Peter (Wolff) in the corner of their living room ceiling like a spider. The fact that she remains unmoving for the entirety of the shot sequence, which goes from Peter to his perspective, viewing the charred remains of his father, back to Peter in close-up, is all the more frightening. And, much like the kitchen scene in The Strangers, once Peter looks to where she was, she's already gone.

Try getting a good night's sleep after that one.