10 Most Horrifying Urban Nightmare Movies
Sometimes nothing is more scary than the horror that lurks at your doorstep.
In recent years, horror movies have the potential to be quite extravagant. Murdering ghosts, biblical demons and psychopathic masterminds whose traps defy the very nature of logic and reason are just some of the most recent horror sensations that helped define the genre in the 21st century. There's a recent trend in horror to which everything has to be supernatural, but sometimes the most terrifying of horrors can be those closer to home.
There's nothing scarier than a horror movie that reflects real life terror. Foregoing all the glitz and glamour of demons, hell and underground bunkers some movies decide that an all too relatable urban setting can become the perfect catalyst for terror, and rightly so. As a result there have been many urban horror movies that are far more scary than their overly supernatural cousins.
What follows is ten examples of where reality can be far scarier than exaggerated fiction, where the horror on your doorstep is far more terrifying than that of ancient castles or abandoned tombs.
10. Visiting Hours
Starring William Shatner and Michael Ironside in prominent roles, Visiting Hours is a Canadian slasher film that really deserves a second look because of the themes it addresses which were different amongst other slasher films at the time: themes of feminism, misogyny, and stalking.
Like many slasher films made in the early 1980s, Ironside’s villainous Colt Hawkins is nothing more than a psychopath with a bloodthirst. However, the inclusion of Hawkins’ misogynistic beliefs and intense stalking tactics draw frightening parallels to modern day news stories of psychopaths and stalkers who have shocked the world.
Scenes demonstrating how far he’ll go to pursue Deborah, the film’s feminist protagonist, are terrifying to witness because of the realism; Hawkins smashing his forearm onto a rack of bottles to cut himself open in order to pursue Deborah at hospital is a memorable example.
Although Visiting Hours may not be the best horror film to come from Canada, the characters and plot themes elevate it above other slasher films of 1982, making it still very relevant today. It may have been banned in 1984, but it's one of those banned films that has more content than what’s offered at face value. Nonetheless it certainly demonstrates a frightening reality that nobody should ever go through.