Editorials
10 Twisted Fairy Tale Films That Bring the Horror!
Folklore and fairy tales have been around for centuries, long before the written word, and they were often quite brutal and bloody. Moral tales full of fairies, goblins, mermaids, dragons, and various other magical creatures that featured cannibalism, murder, and dismemberment to keep children in line. Sounds like horror, right? When fairy tales lean hard into their horror roots, that’s when the real magic happens. Here are 10 great horror films that blend the two together to unleash fairy tale carnage:
The Hallow
With The Nun arriving in theaters, now is the perfect time to catch up with director Corin Hardy’s feature debut. This dark fairytale is part creature feature, part body horror, and all Irish folktale as it follows a British plant conservationist and his family as they discover the hard way what it means to ignore warning signs and invade the territory of fairies, banshees, and changelings. Forget Tinker Bell, these fairies are truer to their origins; monstrous, mean, and deadly.
Snow White: A Tale of Terror
This horror twist on a fairy tale classic declares itself far removed from its Disney counterpart straight away, with Snow White’s father brutally performing a cesarean section on his dying wife to save his child. The film also imbues its wicked stepmother, Claudia (Sigourney Weaver), with a lot more sympathy as she tries again and again to bond with her stepdaughter to no avail. Also starring Sam Neill and Monica Keena, this take on Snow White is steeped in blood, sex, death, and Satanic ritual.
The Lure
The original Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, The Little Mermaid, wasn’t quite the uplifting story it’s been made out to be in recent decades, and Agnieszka Smoczynska’s feature debut sticks true to the origin story while setting it in a 1980s Polish cabaret. Mermaid sisters Golden and Silver come to shore and fall right in with a nightclub’s house band. One falls in love, the other lusts for human flesh, but both become rising stars. It’s a genre-bender unafraid to get weird, bloody, or tragic.
Little Otik
Based on a Czech fairy tale that tells of a couple so desperate for a child to the point where the husband carves one out of a log that sort of resembles a baby. The log baby comes to life, much to the joy of the erstwhile parents, but it happens to have an insatiable appetite. Otik is strange yet sort of cute, until it starts eating. When food doesn’t satisfy, it turns to hair, then animals, and then people. A wooden monster baby with a never-ending lust for gluttony means this won’t possibly end well.
The Company of Wolves
What if the story of Little Red Riding Hood didn’t have a wolf, but werewolves? Then you have Neil Jordan’s dreamlike Gothic horror fantasy film The Company of Wolves. A sort of anthology that weaves in Little Red Riding Hood among other werewolf centered fables, it’s hinged together by Sarah Patterson’s Rosaleen, a young girl maturing into womanhood. Angela Lansbury plays her grandmother. Remember, beware men whose eyebrows meet.
Freeway
While The Company of Wolves opted for a lush fairytale aesthetic, Freeway gives Little Red Riding Hood a modern twist. Reese Witherspoon plays Vanessa, a teen on the run after her mom and stepfather are arrested on prostitution and drug charges. On the way to her grandmother’s house, she crosses paths with the film’s version of the Big Bad Wolf; serial killer Bob Wolverton (Kiefer Sutherland). An over the top satire, this version of the fairytale isn’t traditional horror but it is horrific. As if serial killing isn’t bad enough, Bob is a violent child pedophile.
Pan’s Labyrinth
It’s difficult to discuss dark fantasy horror films without mention of Guillermo del Toro’s Oscar winning Pan’s Labyrinth. Influenced by fairy tales, his childhood experiences, and lucid dreaming, del Toro crafted a fairy tale story of his own. Set in post-Spanish Civil War in 1944, young Ofelia and her sickly, pregnant mother move in with her new stepfather, the cruel Captain Vidal. Ofelia may or may not be the resurrected Princess Moana of the underworld, tasked with quests by the Faun to acquire immortality and entrance to her kingdom. Ofelia’s tasks mean encounters with child-eating Pale Man, but it’s not as brutal or as scary as the real world.
Good Manners
This horror fairytale just recently came off the festival circuit and entered limited theatrical release this summer but keep an eye out for this touching tale that’s as sweet as it is tragic. Told in two parts, it follows Clara, a nurse hired by the wealthy Ana as a nurse for her unborn child. The women, both lonely, form a strong bond, but Ana’s pregnancy is not quite human, and their lives are irrevocably altered on a fateful night. A modern-day fairytale that retains that sense of whimsy and parable leanings, Good Manners features one of my favorite horror subject matters. I won’t spoil it, though, as this one is best discovered going in blind.
November
An Estonian dark fairy tale story set in the 19th century, this stunning black and white film is a pagan folktale full of werewolves, ghosts, witches, magical beings called Kratts, and Satan, all while the plague looms near. Grounding the story of magic is peasant girl Liina, who longs for village boy Hans. But Hans only has eyes for an aristocrat’s daughter. There’s humor to balance the darkness of the 19th-century village, and the deep dive into Estonian folklore feels simultaneously magical and nightmarish. It’s also a bit disorienting with an untraditional narrative style, so this one will only be for fans of surreal slow burn stories. It’s currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Tale of Tales
Based on a collection of stories by Italian poet Giambattista Basile, Pentamerone, this dark horror fantasy film is an anthology that delves into the earliest versions of well-known fairytales. Three stories about obsession, all taking place in one kingdom, this fairytale isn’t afraid of gruesome bloodshed. Monstrous fleas, aquatic dragons, ogres, witches, and a vain king who prefers to flay the skin of his victims, this is not a bedtime story for kids. It also boasts a large ensemble cast of recognizable talent like Salma Hayek, John C. Reilly, and Vincent Cassel.
It’s been 75 years since The Thing From Another World first warned us to “watch the skies”, and filmgoers have done just that by showing up to multiple instances of extraterrestrial contact on the big screen. This makes sense, as a recent CBS news poll estimated that 63% of Americans believe in intelligent life on other planets, and the ongoing disclosure movement aims to raise that number with each passing day.
With Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day leaving many genre fans hungry for more alien footage (preferably of the spooky variety), today I’d like to share a list recommending six underrated alien invasion thrillers for your viewing pleasure. After all, regardless of whether or not you believe that we’re alone in the universe, it can be fun to dream about the worst-case scenario if our cosmic neighbors ever decide to visit.
For the purposes of this list, we’ll be focusing on lesser-known invasion stories rather than the popular extraterrestrials of franchises like Alien and Close Encounters of the Third (or even Fourth) Kind. That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own alien favorites if you think we missed a particularly thrilling movie.
While it won’t be featured in this article, I’d highly recommend checking out Dean Alioto’s UFO Abduction/The McPherson Tape if you’re up for some ufology-inspired found footage thrills.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
6. The Arrival (1996)
Not to be confused with Denis Villeneuve’s Academy Award-winning Amy Adams vehicle about learning to communicate peacefully with extraterrestrial life, David Twohy’s The Arrival is a much more straightforward (but no less entertaining) genre romp where Charlie Sheen faces a global conspiracy involving hostile alien invaders.
It’s not exactly up there with Close Encounters or even Independence Day, but Twohy’s conspiratorial thriller plays out like an exceptionally fun episode of The X-Files that I’d recommend to sci-fi/horror fans who don’t mind a little bit of wonky CGI and 90s excess alongside their alien thrills.
5. Extraterrestrial (2014)
The Vicious Brothers made a name for themselves with the success of 2011’s Grave Encounters, but that was far from the Canadian duo’s only collaboration. And while it’s not exactly a fan favorite, I always point out 2014’s Extraterrestrial as one of their most underrated projects simply because I agree with the filmmakers’ opinion that there aren’t enough ‘cool alien abduction movies’ out there.
Admittedly, the majority of the picture functions like a run-of-the-mill creature feature with paper-thin characters and familiar horror tropes, but I’d argue that the cosmically-terrifying final act elevates the experience to new and memorable heights. The movie also boasts great performances by both Michael Ironside and Emily Perkins – a combination that more than makes up for the occasionally janky CGI.
4. Alien Raiders (2008)
Director Ben Rock has gone on record lamenting how his John-Carpenter-inspired creature feature was forcefully renamed from Supermarket to the painfully obvious Alien Raiders (a change which likely resulted in many potential viewers skipping out on the experience), but the new title doesn’t change the fact that this single-location thriller is something of a hidden gem.
Taking place entirely within a supermarket, Alien Raiders tells the story of an ensemble of customers and employees who are taken hostage by a group of armed men looking for something far more dangerous than an easy payout. I won’t get into details in order to avoid spoiling the experience, but I’d highly recommend this criminally underseen flick to fans of John Carpenter and the Resident Evil games.
3. Phoenix Forgotten (2017)
You’d think that a Ridley-Scott-produced retelling of one of the most infamous real-life UFO sightings of all time would have a bigger following, but I rarely see Justin Barber’s Found Footage period piece brought up during discussions about extraterrestrial-focused horror movies.
This is a huge shame, as Phoenix Forgotten is just as spooky as it is convincing, with this well-researched dive into the Phoenix Lights incident benefiting from surprisingly believable special effects as well as an appropriately horrific finale.
2. Communion (1989)
I wouldn’t blame you for disregarding Whitley Strieber’s controversial book about his alleged close encounter as sensationalist slop, but I’d argue that Phillipe Mora’s 1989 adaptation of these events is much better than the source material. After all, the movie works as a standalone piece of speculative fiction while also benefiting from an incredible performance by the one and only Christopher Walken!
Mora’s take on Communion may not be particularly scary, but the film is still an unforgettable character study regardless of whether or not the abduction really happened. Not only that, but the flick also paved the way for plenty of future sci-fi stories where the extraterrestrial invaders aren’t as evil as they initially appear.
1. Altered (2006)
Originally envisioned as a Sam Raimi-style horror-comedy titled Probed, Eduardo Sánchez (of The Blair Witch Project fame) eventually realized that it would be much more interesting to turn the film into a serious exploration of the emotional aftermath of a traumatic abduction incident.
That’s how we got Altered, a clever inversion of the standard abduction narrative that follows a group of troubled friends as they capture and experiment on an alien in order to enact revenge for their own abduction years prior.
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