Editorials
Stay Home, Watch Horror: 5 Haunted Horror Movies to Stream This Week
The haunted house is a staple of horror for a good reason. Not much is more inherently terrifying than spaces meant to provide security, comfort, or healing being invaded by an unseen, malevolent presence. The often mysterious and intangible nature of the supernatural means fighting them off isn’t as clear cut as staking a vampire in the heart or shooting a werewolf with a silver bullet. Supposing they can be fought at all. Sometimes the only thing the haunted can do is flee. As Shudder’s Host recently demonstrated, leaving isn’t always an option.
This week’s streaming picks belong to haunted habitations. If you need a chill in the peak summer heat, a familiar comfort watch, or something a little under the radar, these five haunted horror movies offer something for all tastes. As always, they’re all available to stream now.
The Awakening – Kanopy, Shudder
Set in 1921, Rebecca Hall stars as paranormal debunker Florence Cathcart. She accepts an invitation from war vet Robert Mallory (Dominic West) to stay at the boarding school where he teaches, to determine if the place is indeed haunted. The more she encounters strange phenomena, the more her skepticism gets shaken. The realization that the hauntings exist comes with frightening reveals about Florence’s past. The Awakening bears a stronger resemblance to The Devil’s Backbone than The Others, in terms of period supernatural movies. There are genuine paranormal frights, but there’s more than meets the eye to this spectral tale.
Fragile – Prime Video, Vudu
Two years before [Rec] made international waves, Jauma Balagueró co-wrote and directed a small Spanish-British chiller set in a closing hospital. Calista Flockhart stars as Amy Nicholls, a new nurse that takes over the night shift at the children’s ward in a hospital scheduled to close. It’s mostly abandoned, and the patients that are left are stuck in a holding pattern until nearby hospitals free up space. That’s bad news for Amy and her young patients, who are tormented and attacked by a ghostly presence that doesn’t want them to leave. There’s an underlying fairy-tale sweetness to this ghost story, mainly as Amy bonds with young orphan Maggie, but Balagueró also brings the scares.
Insidious – Netflix
Before The Conjuring, James Wan helmed this Leigh Whannell-scripted haunted house story that introduced the unnerving world of “The Further.” The Lambert family has barely moved into their new home when tragedy strikes. Their son Dalton suffers a fright induced fall, and soon after slips into a coma. Shortly after, their home becomes inundated with unnerving paranormal activity. They call in paranormal experts to help save their son. Instead of the traditional haunted house, it’s a person that’s haunted here, and the introduction of astral projection gives a refreshing twist to the subgenre. It’s not just the mythos and creepy look of The Further’s inhabitants that make Insidious so memorable, but plucky heroine Elise Rainier (Lin Shaye).
Paranormal Activity 3 – Hulu, Prime Video
This prequel easily marks a series high point in the Paranormal Activity franchise. Set in 1988, the film follows Katie and Kristi when they were children. When their mother’s boyfriend Dennis notices a strange anomaly on a tape he attempted to make, he decides to rig the house with cameras. Of course, the paranormal activity ramps up at a steady pace, until it explodes in haunting violence. Paranormal Activity 3 chronicles the origins of the sisters’ bond with the demonic Tobi, and the series’ third outing still manages to create innovative new scares. Like the oscillating camera, creating one of most goosebumps-inducing scares of the franchise. Tobi’s mythology and his connection to the girls are expanded in thrilling ways, and it’s refreshing that Dennis marks the first male protagonist of the series to be a genuinely nice guy. I’m looking at you, Micah and Daniel.
We Are Still Here – Prime Video
Following the death of their only son, Anne (Barbara Crampton) and Paul Sacchetti (Andrew Sensenig) decide to move to snowy, rural New England. Paul is hoping the change will shake Anne from her deep depression. Instead, Anne becomes convinced Bobby’s spirit inhabits the house. The truth is far more horrific; the house is cursed to awaken every thirty years and demand a sacrifice. Set in 1979, writer/director Ted Geoghegan creates a massive love letter to Lucio Fulci’s House by the Cemetery that permeates just about every detail of this moody haunter. Right down the insanely bloody finish. If standard haunted house movies aren’t for you, try this on for size. For puzzle solvers and Easter egg hunters, read through the house’s history in the end credits.
Editorials
‘Immaculate’ – A Companion Watch Guide to the Religious Horror Movie and Its Cinematic Influences
The religious horror movie Immaculate, starring Sydney Sweeney and directed by Michael Mohan, wears its horror influences on its sleeves. NEON’s new horror movie is now available on Digital and PVOD, making it easier to catch up with the buzzy title. If you’ve already seen Immaculate, this companion watch guide highlights horror movies to pair with it.
Sweeney stars in Immaculate as Cecilia, a woman of devout faith who is offered a fulfilling new role at an illustrious Italian convent. Cecilia’s warm welcome to the picture-perfect Italian countryside gets derailed soon enough when she discovers she’s become pregnant and realizes the convent harbors disturbing secrets.
From Will Bates’ gothic score to the filming locations and even shot compositions, Immaculate owes a lot to its cinematic influences. Mohan pulls from more than just religious horror, though. While Immaculate pays tribute to the classics, the horror movie surprises for the way it leans so heavily into Italian horror and New French Extremity. Let’s dig into many of the film’s most prominent horror influences with a companion watch guide.
Warning: Immaculate spoilers ahead.
Rosemary’s Baby
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The mother of all pregnancy horror movies introduces Rosemary Woodhouse (Mia Farrow), an eager-to-please housewife who’s supportive of her husband, Guy, and thrilled he landed them a spot in the coveted Bramford apartment building. Guy proposes a romantic evening, which gives way to a hallucinogenic nightmare scenario that leaves Rosemary confused and pregnant. Rosemary’s suspicions and paranoia mount as she’s gaslit by everyone around her, all attempting to distract her from her deeply abnormal pregnancy. While Cecilia follows a similar emotional journey to Rosemary, from the confusion over her baby’s conception to being gaslit by those who claim to have her best interests in mind, Immaculate inverts the iconic final frame of Rosemary’s Baby to great effect.
The Exorcist
William Friedkin’s horror classic shook audiences to their core upon release in the ’70s, largely for its shocking imagery. A grim battle over faith is waged between demon Pazuzu and priests Damien Karras (Jason Miller) and Lankester Merrin (Max von Sydow). The battleground happens to be a 12-year-old, Regan MacNeil (Linda Blair), whose possessed form commits blasphemy often, including violently masturbating with a crucifix. Yet Friedkin captures the horrifying events with stunning cinematography; the emotional complexity and shot composition lend elegance to a film that counterbalances the horror. That balance between transgressive imagery and artful form permeates Immaculate as well.
Suspiria
Jessica Harper stars as Suzy Bannion, an American newcomer at a prestigious dance academy in Germany who uncovers a supernatural conspiracy amid a series of grisly murders. It’s a dance academy so disciplined in its art form that its students and faculty live their full time, spending nearly every waking hour there, including built-in meals and scheduled bedtimes. Like Suzy Bannion, Cecilia is a novitiate committed to learning her chosen trade, so much so that she travels to a foreign country to continue her training. Also, like Suzy, Cecilia quickly realizes the pristine façade of her new setting belies sinister secrets that mean her harm.
What Have You Done to Solange?
This 1972 Italian horror film follows a college professor who gets embroiled in a bizarre series of murders when his mistress, a student, witnesses one taking place. The professor starts his own investigation to discover what happened to the young woman, Solange. Sex, murder, and religion course through this Giallo’s veins, which features I Spit on Your Grave’s Camille Keaton as Solange. Immaculate director Michael Mohan revealed to The Wrap that he emulated director Massimo Dallamano’s techniques, particularly in a key scene that sees Cecilia alone in a crowded room of male superiors, all interrogating her on her immaculate status.
The Red Queen Kills Seven Times
In this Giallo, two sisters inherit their family’s castle that’s also cursed. When a dark-haired, red-robed woman begins killing people around them, the sisters begin to wonder if the castle’s mysterious curse has resurfaced. Director Emilio Miraglia infuses his Giallo with vibrant style, with the titular Red Queen instantly eye-catching in design. While the killer’s design and use of red no doubt played an influential role in some of Immaculate’s nightmare imagery, its biggest inspiration in Mohan’s film is its score. Immaculate pays tribute to The Red Queen Kills Seven Times through specific music cues.
The Vanishing
Rex’s life is irrevocably changed when the love of his life is abducted from a rest stop. Three years later, he begins receiving letters from his girlfriend’s abductor. Director George Sluizer infuses his simple premise with bone-chilling dread and psychological terror as the kidnapper toys with Red. It builds to a harrowing finale you won’t forget; and neither did Mohan, who cited The Vanishing as an influence on Immaculate. Likely for its surprise closing moments, but mostly for the way Sluizer filmed from inside a coffin.
The Other Hell
This nunsploitation film begins where Immaculate ends: in the catacombs of a convent that leads to an underground laboratory. The Other Hell sees a priest investigating the seemingly paranormal activity surrounding the convent as possessed nuns get violent toward others. But is this a case of the Devil or simply nuns run amok? Immaculate opts to ground its horrors in reality, where The Other Hell leans into the supernatural, but the surprise lab setting beneath the holy grounds evokes the same sense of blasphemous shock.
Inside
During Immaculate‘s freakout climax, Cecilia sets the underground lab on fire with Father Sal Tedeschi (Álvaro Morte) locked inside. He manages to escape, though badly burned, and chases Cecilia through the catacombs. When Father Tedeschi catches Cecilia, he attempts to cut her baby out of her womb, and the stark imagery instantly calls Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury’s seminal French horror movie to mind. Like Tedeschi, Inside’s La Femme (Béatrice Dalle) will stop at nothing to get the baby, badly burned and all.
Burial Ground
At first glance, this Italian zombie movie bears little resemblance to Immaculate. The plot sees an eclectic group forced to band together against a wave of undead, offering no shortage of zombie gore and wild character quirks. What connects them is the setting; both employed the Villa Parisi as a filming location. The Villa Parisi happens to be a prominent filming spot for Italian horror; also pair the new horror movie with Mario Bava’s A Bay of Blood or Blood for Dracula for additional boundary-pushing horror titles shot at the Villa Parisi.
The Devils
The Devils was always intended to be incendiary. Horror, at its most depraved and sadistic, tends to make casual viewers uncomfortable. Ken Russell’s 1971 epic takes it to a whole new squeamish level with its nightmarish visuals steeped in some historical accuracy. There are the horror classics, like The Exorcist, and there are definitive transgressive horror cult classics. The Devils falls squarely in the latter, and Russell’s fearlessness in exploring taboos and wielding unholy imagery inspired Mohan’s approach to the escalating horror in Immaculate.
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