31 Horror Films To Watch This October

It’s hard to believe that movies like The Tingler (1959), Blood Feast (1963) and Suspiria (1977) didn’t get a late-October release, but at the time Halloween was seen as a lull period between summer and Christmas. All of that changed when, on 31 October 1978, John Carpenter’s Halloween had its US premiere.

Not only had no previous picture made use of the title, but enterprising filmmakers had failed to seize upon the season for a gimmick release strategy. Originally conceived as The Babysitter Murders, Halloween owes some of its success to producer Irwin Yablans, who set out to do just that.

Set in Haddonfield, one of those Illinois towns where the cars bear California plates and palm trees are visible in the background, Carpenter’s movie uses the date as an excuse for lots of horror movie atmospherics, most of which hadn’t been seen in a while. The closest comparison was Bob Clark’s Black Christmas (1974), which also uses a holiday as the backdrop for a story about a barely-seen killer.

Shot for $325,000, Halloween became one of the most profitable independent films of all time and was re-released in 1979 and 1980 before the sequel, imaginatively titled Halloween II, arrived in cinemas on October 30 1981, firmly establishing the date as the release period for horror pictures.

2015 brings us Crimson Peak and Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension, or if you prefer, here are 31 good, bad and so-bad-they’re-good films you can view at home. 

Norway’s answer to the 80s slasher movies, Cold Prey follows five snowboarders who take refuge in an abandoned hotel when one of them (Rolf Kristian Larsen – a dead ringer for Shaggy from Scooby Doo) breaks his ankle on the slopes. What they don’t know (but quickly realize) is that the place closed in 1975 when the owner’s son disappeared, and faster than you can say “Mrs Voorhees’ boy”, they’re being chased through the snow by a pickaxe-wielding psycho.

So far so traditional, but what separates the movie from the pack is….okay, it doesn’t offer anything new but director Roar Uthaug strings the he’s-right-behind-you suspense scenes together better than his 80s counterparts, it’s slickly shot and there’s in-jokes for fans of The Shining.

Audiences responded favourably, so two years later, Final Girl Jannicke (Ingrid Bolso Berdal, Chernobyl Diaries) returned in Cold Prey: Resurrection, which in the tradition of Halloween II (1981) offers more of the same, only set in a hospital.