This blog entry is dedicated to what I consider to be an official version of my Top 10 Favorite Horror Films of All-Time. Aside from some different choices, this year, I also decided to cite reasons for each ranking. I know I have said it before (click here and here), but it bears repeating – all lists (including my own) are subjective. Nevertheless, please be kind to number 7 on this list because that one means a lot to me 🙂 Anyway, Happy Halloween to all of my dear readers 🙂 Now, without further ado, I present to you all:

-My Top 10 Favorite Horror Films of All-Time-

10.) Vampyr (1932)
Dir: Carl Theodor Dreyer
Country: Germany/France
Color: Black and White
Danish director Carl Theodor Dreyer’s only true horror film was implicitly unfairly viewed by critics as one of his lesser works during it’s initial theatrical release in 1932. Fast-forwarding 91 years later in 2023, many critics now consider Vampyr to be (in the words of former Village Voice critic J. Hoberman) Dreyer’s most radical film. Given everything that came before and after in Dreyer’s oeuvre, Hoberman’s view can not be stated any better. Intentionally emphasizing atmosphere and imagery over plot, as a foreign horror film, Vampyr may be the closest one that purely resembles a nightmare.

Since I could not find a youtube video link to an official theatrical trailer, click here to view a 90th anniversary trailer

Click here to view a youtube video link of British film critic Mark Kermode’s commentary of it as one of BFI Player picks

Click here to watch the film on youtube

9.) The Shining (1980)
Dir: Stanley Kubrick
Country: United States/United Kingdom
Color: Color
Author Stephen King may have been greatly disappointed over director Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of his 1977 bestselling novel, but this has not prevented The Shining from eventually becoming (and deservedly so) a quintessential example of cinematic horror. Along with other Kubrick films, The Shining has only improved with time. Not unlike Carl Theodor Dreyer’s Vampyr, The Shining remains the only horror film within Kubrick’s oeuvre. Similar to the former, The Shining resembles the work of an idiosyncratic filmmaker. On the one hand, we get now iconic scares ranging from the blood gushing elevator to images of hacked up twins to the image of it’s lead actor Jack Nicholson exclaiming (through ad-libbing) Here’s Johnny!. As in all (or most) of Kubrick’s films since 1957’s Paths of Glory, The Shining has been open to all sorts of interpretations and neither one would be wrong.

Click here to view the film’s original theatrical trailer

8.) Nosferatu (1922)
Dir: F.W. Murnau
Country: Germany
Color: Black and White
German director F.W. Murnau’s unauthorized silent adaptation of author Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula also happens to be my personal favorite version of the source material. Whereas other versions romanticized the aforementioned title character, Nosferatu depicts the vampire (named Count Orlok in this film) as a truly hideous monster in every single way imaginable. All of his mannerisms are expressed perfectly by it’s lead actor Max Schreck. As a masterpiece of both German Expressionism and cinematic horror, Nosferatu is driven less by scares and more by it’s eerie atmosphere.

Since I can’t find an official theatrical trailer for it, click here to view this youtube video link of it’s 100 Anniversary trailer

Click here to watch the film on youtube

7.) Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992)
Dir: David Lynch
Country: United States/France
Color: Color
Critically savaged upon it’s initial theatrical release back in 1992, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me has since been reassessed as not only a misunderstood masterpiece, but also as one of director David Lynch’s major masterworks. As for myself, I will go one step further by citing Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me as the number one greatest American horror film of the 1990’s. A prequel to both the original series (1990-91) and 2017’s The Return, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me centers on the sad last days of Laura Palmer – acted with gusto by the immensely beautiful and talented Sheryl Lee. Aided by composer Angelo Badalamenti’s haunting music score, the result is every bit as surreal and nightmarish as it is ultimately tragic. British film critic/novelist Kim Newman once stated that the film’s many moments of horror demonstrate just how tidy, conventional and domesticated the generic horror movie of the 1980’s and 1990’s has become. I could not have stated it any better.

Click here to view the film’s original theatrical trailer

Click here to listen to the soundtrack

Click here to watch author Scott Ryan’s introduction to the film at Chicago’s Music Box Theatre from last year

Click here, here, here, here and here to watch a Q&A with actress Sheryl Lee and actor Dana Ashbrook from a 2021 showing of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me at Chicago’s Music Box Theatre

6.) Let the Right One In (2008)
Dir: Tomas Alfredson
Country: Sweden
Color: Color
Even If he is destined to never make another great film, Swedish director Tomas Alfredson can at least be proud of this one. With all due respect to Nosferatu and Vampyr, Let the Right One In stands as my number one favorite horror film ever made to center on a vampire. Let the Right One In breaks with convention by exploring it’s surface themes relating to boy/girl bonding, revenge and social rejection with truly insightful results. If there is another horror film out there that has already achieved this, I have yet to see it.

Click here to view the film’s original theatrical trailer

5.) The Babadook (2014)
Dir: Jennifer Kent
Country: Australia
Color: Color
Regardless of whether The Babadook continues to stand for myself as the number one greatest horror film of the 21st century is another question. The one thing I can guarantee is that The Babadook will always remain my personal favorite one of the 2010’s. On a whole, the title monster serves as a metaphor for both parenting and grief. The result is all the scarier once you realize how close it hits to home.

Click here to view the film’s original theatrical trailer

4.) Dead of Night (1945)
Dir: Alberto Cavalcanti, Charles Crichton, Basil Dearden and Robert Hamer
Country: United Kingdom
Color: Black and White
Noted for being Ealing Studios only foray into the genre (at least based on my knowledge), Dead of Night also served (debatably barring 1924’s Waxworks) as the granddaddy of all horror anthology films. While all subsequent portmanteau horror films can be described as perfect to an extent, for me, Dead of Night is the only one where that aforementioned word can be applied without reservation. Sandwiched between it’s prologue and epilogue are five stories that form a cohesive whole. Though I love them all for different reasons, my personal favorite segment would have to be director Alberto Cavalcanti’s The Ventriloquist Dummy. If that one is not the creepiest of the bunch, then it certainly comes close.

Though I can’t find a trailer for it online, the film is probably available on DVD/Blu-Ray

Click here to view a 2014 retrospective documentary on it entitled Remembering Dead of Night

3.) Diabolique (1955)
Dir: Henri-Georges Clouzot
Country: France
Color: Black and White
Though Alfred Hitchcock is often credited for initially redefining Cold War era cinematic horror with Psycho, the aforementioned genre was actually first redefined five years earlier in 1955 by French director Henri-Georges Clouzot with Diabolique. As the film’s plot unfolds, Clouzot wastes no time in elevating the tension to completely unbearable heights and effortlessly keeps it going throughout. Culminating in one of the most shocking twist endings ever conceived, Diabolique is a horror thriller that will ultimately make one’s heart stop.

Click here to view the film’s original theatrical trailer

Click here to view Alex Cox’s Moviedrome intro to the film

2.) Eyes Without a Face (1960)
Dir: Georges Franju
Country: France/Italy
Color: Black and White
Gruesome on the surface, but lyrical in the center, Eyes Without a Face is often implicitly cited (and rightfully so) as what a horror film would look like helmed by poet Jean Cocteau. In contrast to the morbid, yet tragic story is the strangely beautiful atmosphere, which (subtly or otherwise) resembles that of a fairy tale.

Click here to view what may or may not be the film’s French trailer

Click here to view British film critic Mark Kermode’s commentary of it as one of his BFI Player picks

Click here to view Kermode’s Kermode Uncut commentary on it

Click here to view Mark Kermode’s Cult Film Corner commentary on it

1.) Don’t Look Now (1973)
Dir: Nicolas Roeg
Country: United Kingdom/Italy
Color: Color
Now often hailed as one of (If not) the most influential horror films ever made, Don’t Look Now also happens to be my number one favorite horror film of all-time. Reportedly cited by Nicolas Roeg (the British director himself) as his exercise in film grammar, as a horror thriller, Don’t Look Now stands out as quite possibly the most beautiful marriage between form and content. Accompanied by composer Pino Donaggio’s emotionally powerful music score, Roeg’s trademark unconventional editing style and it’s fittingly bleak, yet strangely lovely atmosphere, Don’t Look Now explores a tragedy’s impact on a married couple through the power of visual storytelling. Along with it’s explicit controversial sex scene, Don’t Look Now is noted for featuring (like Diabolique before it) the scariest ending ever conceived in the history of cinematic horror.

Click here to view the film’s original theatrical trailer

Click here to view the film’s 2019 4K Restoration trailer

Click here to view British film critic Mark Kermode’s 2008 Culture Show interview with director Nicolas Roeg

Click here to view Kermode’s review of the 2019 4K Restoration of the film

Click here to view Irish documentarian Mark Cousins 2001 Scene By Scene interview with actor Donald Sutherland on the film

Click here to view Mark Cousins Moviedrome intro to the film

Click here to view Danish-Norwegian filmmaker Joachim Trier commentary on the film

Click here to listen to the soundtrack

Let me conclude this blog entry with a two questions for my dear readers below

What are your top 10 favorite horror films of all-time?

What video links in my blog entry interested you the most?