2023: a tumultuous, but also exciting year for cinema that saw the bottoms fall out of once unstoppable franchises and the rise of new and old masters. Characterized by surprise blockbusters, stinging excavations of the human condition, and a few bold oddities, this year was a cornucopia of great film. So much so that for the first time ever, I’m expanding the usual top 10 to a top 20.

Director Kevin Greutert returns to the franchise that birthed his feature-length career with Saw X, a precise and brutal high watermark that knows exactly what its audience wants. Top-tier Tobin Bell, top-tier Shawnee Smith, top-tier traps: it’s the best Saw in years and perhaps since the original. Minor spoilers ahead…

My favorite horror movie, 2008’s Australian cult sleeper - Lake Mungo - is celebrating its 15th anniversary this week. Within the walls of a mockumentary, dread and sorrow percolate into a devastating crescendo as the Palmer family grapples with the specter of death, and there’s nothing quite like it. A terrifying haunted house yarn that belies its tragic, shattering underbelly, Lake Mungo is a masterwork of grainy apparitions, mounting unease, and quiet restraint. Minor spoilers ahead…

Every single Evil Dead movie is a bloody, gruesome delight, and now the tradition continues with Lee Cronin’s Evil Dead Rise. A decade after a deadly-serious reboot turned the franchise on its head, this new installment finds a bond between sisters shredded by a disgusting waltz of Deadites, guts, and gore. Alyssa Sutherland brings her A-game as a twisted, cackling fiend: a physical performance for the ages. Minor spoilers ahead…

Crackling with confident, formal prowess and visual electricity, M. Night Shyamalan’s Knock at the Cabin is the director’s best film since 2004’s The Village. A family’s impossible choice framed by ratcheting tension and blistering performances, Shyamalan’s latest nerve-jangler is a chamber piece artfully designed to quicken pulses and break hearts. There isn’t a single wasted shot in Knock at the Cabin’s firecracker, 100-minute runtime: it’s astonishing to watch. Minor spoilers ahead…

Kyle Edward Ball delivers one of the scariest movies of the decade with a lo-fi stunner that reaches into the crevices of vestigial instinct. Uncanny in its ability to bottle the ineffable childhood dread of past-your-bedtime nightmares, Skinamarink mines a whole new mode of horror from its swirling grain, sinister corners, and dark spaces. Minor spoilers ahead…

Happy Halloween! There’s nothing quite like the words “Guillermo del Toro curates an anthology” to stoke a horror fan’s anticipation. Cabinet of Curiosities, del Toro’s attempt to assemble an all-star roster of genre voices, is as consistently wonderful and gruesome as anthologies get. With creeping eldritch terror, nasty alien infestations, and gothic creature features, Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities has remarkably few duds and more than its fair share of bangers. It’s the perfect way to spend your All Hallow’s Eve. Minor spoilers ahead…

Coverage of TIFF’s Midnight Madness begins here! The Golden Age of Hollywood meets the bloody end of a pitchfork, Ti West’s colorful prequel is the perfect companion piece to this year’s X. Expanding Mia Goth’s performance into an unhinged showcase with a jaw-dropping, single-take monologue, Pearl leaves behind the grimy 70s porn slasher for the pastures of a technicolor nightmare. Spoilers for X and minor spoilers for Pearl ahead…

The secrets to Zach Cregger’s Barbarian have been closely guarded since its premiere at San Diego Comic-Con in July, and for good reason: There are some nasty tricks hiding in this basement. Gore-hounds and squirm-fiends with appetites for sick thrills will have a great time with the film’s surprisingly funny descent into madness, but Barbarian’s fizzling atmosphere and payoffs make it this year’s not-quite-Malignant. Minor spoilers ahead…

A sprawling, sci-fi procedural anchored by weighty performances, white-knuckle set pieces, and thunderous soundscapes, Nope is director Jordan Peele’s most mature and layered work, exploring our primordial obsession with spectacle and our desperate need to capture it. A slowly unfolding puzzle box that is as alluring as it is exhilarating, Peele assembles his formidable image-making around what he knows best: terror and wit. Minor spoilers ahead…

Scott Derrickson’s highly anticipated The Black Phone is a fractured, slack exercise in lukewarm horror. Undermining Joe Hill’s short story of the same name with multiple threads that never come together and a villain as thin as he is forgettable, The Black Phone makes weak-willed grasps at the intelligent thriller it could have been. At least Ethan Hawke got paid. Minor spoilers ahead…

Body is reality. Surgery is the new sex. David Cronenberg’s first feature in eight long years acts as a furtive peek into a carefully crafted, crumbling dystopia. In a world where graphic surgeries are the only form of entertainment remaining, Crimes of the Future explores — with a demure thoughtfulness — the complexities of art and performance in an increasingly uninhabitable society. Come for Cronenberg’s body horror resurgent, stay for the perfect weirdo performances from Viggo Mortenson, Lea Seydoux, and Kristen Stewart. Minor spoilers ahead…

Combining familiar, 70s grindhouse terror with modern sensibilities, X is director Ti West’s best film since 2009’s House of the Devil. With bloody slasher mayhem unspooling on a porn set, West’s latest slice of brutality brings the nudity and gore, but underneath its vintage horror pastiche lies a sex-positive, beating heart that examines the cutting power of jealousy and the unforgiving cruelty of time. Mia Goth, Brittany Snow, and Jenna Ortega form a new Scream Queen triumvirate. Minor spoilers ahead…

Rebecca Hall continues her streak of blistering performances in Andrew Semans’ harrowing Sundance psychodrama. A tale about motherhood, hidden pasts, and the limits of control, Resurrection unspools a single mother’s crushing secret in a steely structure that belies its brazen, outrageous horror. Every Sundance has that one Midnight film that lays worms in your brain, and Resurrection is this year’s culprit: a bloody, twisted ride with shocking revelations. Minor spoilers ahead…

Edgar Wright’s decades-long tour of genres makes a no-frills horror pitstop in Last Night in Soho. A collision between past and present painted with the brush of giallo and other era-appropriate terrors, the film is a lush and arresting thriller…until it isn’t. Last Night in Soho soars in its first half with Wright’s signature craftsmanship and a pair of great performances from Thomasin Mackenzie and Anya Taylor-Joy, but its final act is undone by its over-polish, toothlessness, and muddled pastiche. Minor spoilers ahead…

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.

The fourth installment of the found footage anthology series, V/H/S, hits Shudder today. A collection of four short horror vignettes sandwiched within a sinister frame narrative, V/H/S/94 continues the tradition of its predecessors delivering nasty - and uneven - chills. Running the gamut of sewer-dwelling cryptids, haunted wakes, and outrageous mad scientists, there’s a little something for everyone within the creepy walls of V/H/S/94. Minor spoilers ahead…

Another entry in this year’s Midnight Madness slate, Congolese filmmaker Jean Luc Herbulot’s Saloum is a confident genre mashup. Part Spaghetti Western, part crime thriller, part folk horror, the film packs a potent cocktail of tones within its brisk 84-minute runtime. With tinges of Robert Rodriguez and John Carpenter, coupled with a crackling performance from Yann Gael, Saloum is a lean, breakneck journey into the terrifying unknown and the wildest surprise at TIFF this year. Minor spoilers ahead…