15 Best 2016 Horrors To Watch This Halloween
2. Lights Out
The Film
A (somewhat controversial) nightmarish look at manifested mental illness as a family are tormented by the ghost of their mother's weird childhood friend who attacks in the dark.
Why Watch It?
Well, it's actually pretty scary, which goes a long way.
It's a particularly silly movie when you start trying to pull the plot apart, but it actually works because it hits several key horror hallmarks: it's about the dark, it has a creepy monster, it has a family in peril... All keys to making compelling horror movies even when some of the other component parts are a little broken.
Lights Out works in a similar way to the Slender Man craze and It Follows: the idea of something unseen getting gradually closer and more threatening. And by mostly keeping the "monster" out of the light, they managed to keep some mystery around her, following the same successful notes as the likes of Alien.
And for all the complaints about the portrayal of mental illness, the central conceit that the "monster" is tied very much to Sophie's mental state is actually very smart. People are too easily triggered.