10 Deep Cut Horror Movies You Can Stream Right Now

MORE HIDDEN HORRORS

It’s that time of year again. With Spooky Season in full swing, I’m once again counting down a collection of under-the-radar horror gems you can stream right now. Scrolling through all your streaming services for the perfect Halloween movie night can be a daunting task, especially if they’re spitting out the same recommendations time and time again. For this list, we’re skipping right past the old favorites, the classics, and the genre mainstays for some deeper cuts - truly scary and unnerving horror movies that just might have escaped your attention, all a click away.

Wisconsin Death Trip (1999)

Starting off the list with the deepest of cuts, Wisconsin Death Trip is a 1999 docudrama - stay with me here - adapted from a book based on a series of black and white photos taken by Charles Van Schaick in the late 19th Century. A catalog of the weird, macabre, and violent, Wisconsin Death Trip is real-life American gothic that snaps a portrait of bleak, rural life in the cursed Black River Falls. Daguerreotypes of corpses, bizarro news clippings, and tales of murder - all real  - feature heavily in this James Marsh (Man on Wire, The Theory of Everything) documentary-style dramatization. Fascinatingly creepy. Watch now on YouTube

Possum (2018)

A sparse, claustrophobic study of a man unraveling, Possum finds a disgraced and emotionally stunted puppeteer, Philip (a fantastically subdued Sean Harris), returning to his childhood home and his abusive uncle. Along for the ride? A horrifying spider-like marionette dubbed “Possum” that Philip keeps inside a duffel bag. Repeated attempts at disposing of the grotesque puppet fail, and it always finds its way back. Oppressive atmosphere and unrelenting dread make Possum a nasty little work, with its fleet 85-minute runtime packed to the brim with harrowing squirminess - a discomfiting ode to low-budget, 70s British horror. Streaming on Tubi

Impetigore (2019)

Indonesian filmmaker Joko Anwar has graced our horror lists before with the terrifying Satan’s Slaves (2017), and now he’s back with the delirious and bloody Impetigore. With a conceit as gruesome as it is fresh, the film centers around a young woman (Tara Basro) who returns to her childhood village to claim her inheritance, but unbeknownst to her, the community has been longing to murder her to end a decades long curse. Sanguine in its brutality and uncompromising in its ruthlessness, Impetigore is horror with some real teeth. Streaming on Shudder

The Empty Man (2020)

One of the most unfairly buried horror films of the last decade, The Empty Man holds the record for fastest ascent to cult classic status. Whether it was COVID, its own distribution woes, or its unappealingly generic title, David Prior’s sprawling cosmic haunter was released with zero fanfare, only to be uncovered gradually by discerning genre enthusiasts. From its 20-minute opening ghost story to its expansive scope of creeping, ontological terror, The Empty Man swings for multiple fences with a confidence you just don’t see anymore. Thought plus concentration plus time equals flesh - The Empty Man is one of the most audacious genre thrillers of the last decade, and perhaps my favorite of this list. Available for rent on Apple TV Plus

Cure (1997)

A string of grisly, seemingly unrelated murders committed by different people mysteriously share the same modus operandi. At the center of these killings? An enigmatic amnesiac (Masato Hagiwara) who has come into contact with each of the alleged killers. Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Cure is the very best of 90s J-Horror, a gripping procedural that paints a haunting portrait of psychopathy and existential dread that builds and builds and builds. One of the most incisive deconstructions of the nature of evil, all culminating in a sublime final act that proves Kurosawa as a master of his craft. Streaming on The Criterion Channel

The Night House (2021)

Another release that came and went this year without much fanfare, David Bruckner’s The Night House is now available for rent. Flipping the script on haunted abodes with chilling efficiency and powered by a singular, searing performance from Rebecca Hall, The Night House explores the spaces between terrifying, grief-fueled dreamscapes. Taking the cheapest and most tired genre convention - the jump scare - and turning it into a powerful metaphor for the seizing unpredictability of grief, the film weaves a harrowing tale that marries potent terror with a powerful performance. One of the best horror surprises of the year. Available for rent on HBO Max

The Dark and the Wicked

Bleak. Bleak. Bleak. Director Bryan Bertino follows up 2008’s The Strangers with a different kind of a home invasion. Centered around a nerve-fraying performance by Marin Ireland, the film is rife with effective scares and blistering violence that become increasingly heavy as a malevolent presence begins dismantling a family from within. Not quite as sharp or taut as The Strangers, but The Dark and the Wicked is an exacting gauntlet of fear that’s got more than its fair share of tricks. Streaming on Shudder

Point of View (2015)

This year, we’re throwing a short film into the mix. Justin Harding’s eight-minute chiller from 2015, which liberally and cleverly borrows the conceit from Doctor Who’s monstrous Weeping Angels, finds a “tired coroner stalked by the living dead - but only when she’s isn’t looking!” One of my favorite horror shorts in recent memory, Point of View is a bite-sized blast of fun, filled with clever editing and some truly gnarly practical effects. Watch now on YouTube

Session 9 (2001)

What can only be described as a cerebral, headier precursor to haunted sanitarium yarn such as Grave Encounters and Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum, 2001’s Session 9 has been described by some as one of the scariest films ever. A story of mounting tension as a crew of asbestos cleaners clear out an abandoned asylum, Session 9 focuses on a series of chilling tapes that slowly uncovers a gruesome crime. A simmering cauldron of psychological horror that eventually boils over with nary a jump scare, it mines maximum creep factor out of rot, decay, and the ghosts of the past. Available for rent on Apple TV and Amazon

One Cut of the Dead (2017)

What’s a Halloween movie night without some horror comedy? Revolving around a hack director’s (Takayuki Hamatsu) low-budget zombie film as it’s invaded by the real undead, One Cut of the Dead has a pretty simple premise; it doesn’t sound like much, but the less you know about it, the better. Brilliantly clever, surprisingly wholesome, and meticulously crafted, One Cut of the Dead is recursive zombie fun that mines new, exciting, and hilarious material out of a tired subgenre. Go into this one blind. Streaming on Shudder