20 Horror Movies That Weren't What Anyone Expected

Osgood Perkins loves to toy with audiences and what they think they're getting out of a horror film, and this was first evidenced in his terrific 2015 debut The Blackcoat's Daughter.

With the spooky setup of two young girls (Kiernan Shipka and Lucy Boynton) stranded at an all-girls boarding school during Christmas break, on the surface this seems to be a pretty standard fare Catholic conspiracy story.

But oh, that's just not the case at all.

Perkins' twisty narrative intentionally withholds information from the viewer regarding its three central characters - the third played by Emma Roberts - in turn offering up a surreal meditation on identity clearly influenced by the works of David Lynch.

It's easy to see why the marketing focused on the elemental bones of its premise rather than Perkins' weirder creative inclinations, but all the way to the end this is far more of a quiet, dread-soaked outing than the more conventional supernatural horror film most were led to expect.