20 Best Horror Movies Since 2000
10. Under The Skin
Jonathan Glazer's Under The Skin could well appear on a list of the best art house movies of the new millennium, which on the surface appears to be more of a distanced, ephemeral science fiction film than an out-and-out horror movie designed to shock audiences.
Despite its genre-defying approach to cinema, Under The Skin features some of the most chilling imagery committed to cinema in the last few decades. It follows the experiences of a mysterious alien (played by Scarlett Johannson), who prowls the streets of Scotland in a beat up van looking for fresh victims to lure back to a void, sucking them into a cosmos-inspired abyss.
Johansson was secretly filmed trying to converse with members of the public for some of the scenes, lending Under The Skin an avante garde feel at odds with her superstar nature. Glazer's direction is impeccable, not least in his visualisation of the strange void and in the closing sequences where Johansson's alien finally sheds its human skin. It's very rare for horror to approach the level of pure art, but Under The Skin accomplishes this with effortless ease.