5 Horror Movies That Didn’t Get Enough Love in 2020 (Plus 100 More)
I recently asked social media to share their top three horror movies of 2020. A few people mentioned it was a bad year for film, but I disagree. I stumbled across some of my more recent favorites that year. In fact, I’m still discovering more as they slowly surface after enduring the pandemic hurdles. 2020 was as decent of a year for horror as many of the recent years people keep yelling are great times for the genre. However, I realized I am also part of the problem because I usually only talk about a handful of my favorites. For example, if no one is writing, texting, posting, or yelling about Josh Ruben’s Scare Me, then I have clearly died. I’m also forever trying to force people to watch Chung-Hyun Lee’s The Call. Plus, I constantly fight the urge to squeeze Park Il-hyun’s The Closet into every conversation.
However, there are plenty other 2020 movies that deserve our attention. These titles gave us something to chat about on social media other than how scary the world was. We found internet friends who became our lifelines because we posted about these pandemic babies. Many of these movies kept us sane while we were in lockdown. Most of us started our podcasts, blogs, and so forth, dissecting them, which makes them part of our content creation journeys. However, other films were unceremoniously yeeted onto a streamer at some point and remain unheard of. So, I’m doing my part by giving you five more of my favorite movies from 2020.
Because everyone is different, I’m also including 100 titles that came out that year at the end of this streaming guide. This is 100 of who knows how many, so we all have tons more to watch.
#Alive (dir. Il Cho)
Where You Can Watch: Netflix
An unknown infection spreads through a city, leaving chaos and zombies in its wake. However, one man has remained in his building, plotting his escape and hoping to find help. It will always feel too soon for movies about viruses for those of us who survived 2020. This is why I put this one off until a couple of years ago and was then upset I was late to the party. #Alive manages to capture the feelings of isolation many of us felt during that awful year. It is also fun and features some fantastic performances alongside the zombie activity we showed up for. This film also features Park Shin-hye, who was in The Call. That is another of my favorite Korean genre films to come out of 2020. If you watch only one pandemic movie that landed on Netflix during the pandemic, make it this one.
The Dark and the Wicked (dir. Bryan Bertino)
Where You Can Watch: AMC+ and Shudder
Two adult siblings return to the family farm after they get news that their father is dying. They soon find themselves in a living nightmare as they confront the evil that haunts their family. This is one of the few movies from this decade that unsettles me. So, obviously, it’s one of my favorite 2020 films. It is creepy, dark, and twisted, plus it enjoys toying with the audience. We all love The Strangers, but The Dark and the Wicked might be Bryan Bertino’s scariest movie. It also introduced many of us to powerhouse Marin Ireland (Birth/Rebirth, Eileen).
So, if you want nightmare fuel, this is your girl. It’s easily one of the most frightening films of 2020, if not the decade. It has lived in my top three of that year since the first time it left me shaking on my couch. I still get chills just thinking about it.
Freaky (dir. Christopher Landon)
Where You Can Watch: Prime Video
An unsuspecting teen swaps bodies with a serial killer and discovers she has less than 24 hours to get back into her body before the change becomes permanent. Freaky has weirdly become one of the movies I most associate with the pandemic. Before I knew what it was about or the people involved, I remember seeing pictures of the drive-in World Premiere on social media. I then watched it slowly find its audience when it landed on VOD before it became a must-watch title. This funny, deadly, gender-bending slasher was also Kathryn Newton’s loudest warning that she would be campaigning for horror royalty. The first warning shot was her performance in Paranormal Activity 4, of course. If we were putting together a time capsule of horror movies from 2020, it wouldn’t feel complete without Freaky.
His House (dir. Remi Weekes)
Where You Can Watch: Netflix
A couple who escaped from war-torn South Sudan struggle to adjust to their new life in an English town where a different kind of evil awaits them. I have seen a lot of haunted house movies in my life, but this was the first one that had an actual reason for people to stay. It also helps that the thing that is haunting our leads is part of their story, instead of random poltergeists. This movie is creepy, heartbreaking, stressful, and just damn good. It features some amazing performances from Sope Dirisu and Wunmi Mosaku. Also, Matt Smith has a supporting role if you are a Whovian who likes to be scared. His House is one of the movies battling it out in my top three films of 2020. Truthfully, while I love all three of my faves, this one wins that three-way battle most days.
Spree (dir. Eugene Kotlyarenko)
Where You Can Watch: VOD
A failed influencer desperate for followers sets out on a deadly plan to go viral while driving a rideshare. Joe Keery’s character is awkward, dangerous, and cringey. This movie also reawakens all those fears about getting into strangers’ cars we all forgot about once Uber was invented. This found footage film is a surprisingly fun gem that takes the most unexpected route to its destination. Not only is Spree a good time, but it is also a film that forced me to admit the found footage genre has way more to offer than I previously assumed. While I’m sad I missed this one in 2020, I have fond memories of watching it with friends during a virtual watch party. That makes Spree another title I think of when trying to find one of the few silver linings during that awful year.
Horror Movies That Came Out in 2020
- 1 Dead Dog (dir. Rollyn Stafford)
- 5G Zombies (dir. Dustin Ferguson)
- 7 Sins (Various Directors)
- 8 Graves (dir. Gus Smythe)
- 8ight After (dir. Vincent Rocca)
- 12 Hour Shift (dir. Brea Grant)
- 13 Slays Till X-Mas (Various Directors)
- #Alive (dir. Il Cho)
- A Ghost Waits (dir. Adam Stovall)
- A Quiet Place Part II (dir. John Krasinski )
- Angels Fallen (dir. Ali Zamani)
- All My Friends Are Dead (dir. Cezary Stolecki)
- Alone (dir. Johnny Martin)
- Alone (dir. John Hyams)
- Antebellum (dir. Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz)
- The Babysitter: Killer Queen (dir. McG)
- Bad Hair (dir. Justin Simien)
- The Banishing (dir. Christopher Smith)
- Behind You (dir. Andrew Mecham and Matthew Whedon)
- Black Box (dir. Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour)
- Block Z (dir. Mikhail Red)
- Bloody Hell (dir. Alister Grierson)
- Books of Blood (dir. Brannon Braga)
- Boys from County Hell (dir. Chris Baugh)
- The Bridge Curse (dir. Lester Shih)
- Butchers (dir. Adrian Langley)
- Brahms: The Boy II (dir. William Brent Bell)
- The Call (dir. Chung-Hyun Lee)
- The Call (dir. Timothy Woodward Jr.)
- Caveat (dir. Damian Mc Carthy)
- Children of the Corn (dir. Kurt Wimmer)
- The Closet (dir. Park Il-hyun)
- Come To Daddy (dir. Toby Harvard)
- Corona Zombies (dir. Charles Band)
- The Craft: Legacy (dir. Zoe Lister-Jones)
- A Dark Path (dir. Nicholas Winter)
- The Dark and the Wicked (dir. Bryan Bertino)
- Death of Me (dir. Darren Lynn Bousman )
- Deep Blue Sea 3 (dir. John Pogue)
- The Devil All the Time (dir. Antonio Campos)
- The Empty Man (dir. David Prior)
- Fantasy Island (dir. Jeff Wadlow)
- Freaky (dir. Christopher Landon)
- Friend of the World (dir. Brian Patrick Butler)
- Ghosts of War (dir. Eric Bress)
- Gretel & Hansel (dir. Oz Perkins)
- The Grudge (dir. Nicolas Pesce)
- Hacksaw (dir. Anthony Leone)
- Her Name Was Christa (dir. James L. Edwards)
- His House (dir. Remi Weekes)
- Honeydew (dir. Devereux Milburn)
- Host (dir. Rob Savage)
- Hubie Halloween (dir. Steven Brill)
- The Hunt (dir. Craig Zobel)
- Hunted (dir. Vincent Paronnaud)
- Hunter Hunter (dir. Shawn Linden)
- Intruder (dir. Sohn Won-pyung)
- I’m Thinking of Ending Things (dir. Charlie Kaufman)
- The Invisible Man (dir. Leigh Whannell)
- Kindred (dir. Joe Marcantonio)
- Lingering (dir. Yoon Eunkyoung)
- Mang Kepweng: Ang Lihim ng Bandanang Itim (dir. Topel Lee)
- The New Mutants (dir. Josh Boone)
- The Night House (dir. David Bruckner)
- Nocturne (dir. Zu Quirke)
- The Owners (dir. Julius Berg)
- Peninsula (dir. Yeon Sang-ho)
- Possessor (dir. Brandon Cronenberg)
- Promising Young Woman (dir. Emerald Fennell)
- Psycho Goreman (dir. Steven Kostanski)
- The Reckoning (dir. Neil Marshall)
- Relic (dir. Natalie Erika James)
- The Rental (dir. Dave Franco)
- Rent-A-Pal (dir. Jon Stevenson)
- Run (dir. Aneesh Chaganty)
- Run Sweetheart Run (dir. Shana Feste)
- Scare Me (dir. Mark Stephens)
- Scare Me (dir. Josh Ruben)
- Shadow In The Cloud (dir. Roseanne Liang)
- She Dies Tomorrow (dir. Amy Seimetz)
- Shirley (dir. Josephine Decker)
- Shortcut (dir. Alessio Liguori)
- Slaxx (dir. Elza Kephart)
- Spell (dir. Mark Tonderai)
- Spiral (dir. Kurtis David Harder)
- Spontaneous (dir. Brian Duffield)
- Spree (dir. Eugene Kotlyarenko)
- Sputnik (dir. Egor Abramenko)
- Stay Out of the Attic (dir. Jerren Lauder)
- The Superdeep (dir. Arseny Syuhin)
- Sweet Taste of Souls (dir. Terry Ross)
- The Turning (dir. Floria Sigismondi)
- Uncle Peckerhead (dir. Matthew John Lawrence)
- Underwater (dir. William Eubank)
- Valley of the Dead (dir. Javier Ruiz Caldera and Alberto de Toro)
- Vampires vs. the Bronx (dir. Osmany Rodriguez)
- Violation (dir. Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli)
- Whispering Corridors: The Humming (dir. Mi Young Lee)
- The Wolf of Snow Hollow (dir. Jim Cummings)
- You Should Have Left (dir. David Koepp)
The list is long, but I know there are so many more movies from 2020 that I am missing. Many places I pulled from overlook indie filmmakers while leaving much to be desired regarding international horror. However, this proves we had way more horror movies in 2020 than we may have expected.
I can’t tell you what to do, but I think it would be cool if more of us sought out films from 2020. Whether we overlooked them, they flew under our radar, or we were distracted by the pandemic, so many overlooked titles deserve our attention. It’s also cool to see how some of these filmmakers followed up their COVID babies when they could go outside again.
I know I have some homework to do because I missed some of these films. Valley of the Dead, specifically, sounds like my kind of party. Let me know what titles you are most excited to check out from the 100 movies listed above on Bluesky.
Categorized:Editorials Streaming Guides
