Editorials
11 Great Made for TV Horror Movies You Can Stream Right Now
Before the advent of the digital age in media, made-for-television movies were event TV. They were a smart way to get family and friends to stay home and gather around the television. The ’60s through the early ’90s marked a boom of horror on the small screen, offering memorable -and some forgotten- gems that proved terror didn’t have to have a big Hollywood budget to be effective.
Even with lower budgets and programming limitations, some of the best horror emerged from the small screen. A lack of gore, nudity, and graphic violence won’t hinder a good scare, after all. What’s more, the format would allow filmmakers and storytellers to push the envelope in absolutely gonzo ways to compensate. Meaning that the made-for-TV movie could be downright frightening, but it could also be pure insanity.
These eleven made-for-TV movies run the gamut in horror. Some elicit chills, and some go off the rails into eccentricity. From ghosts to creatures to killers, there’s something for everyone. Best of all, you can stream them now and recreate that event TV nostalgia.
Invitation to Hell – Tubi
Months before Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street released in theaters, his bizarre made-for-TV sci-fi horror movie aired on ABC. Engineer Matt Winslow (Robert Urich) moves with his wife, Patricia (Joanna Cassidy), and children, Chrissy (Soleil Moon Frye) and Robert (Barret Oliver), to a new suburban community. He’s a workaholic so consumed by his job project in creating a thermal space suit that he doesn’t notice that something is quite off about the idyllic community and country club director Jessica Jones (Susan Lucci). The more Jessica woos his family, the stranger things get. Up until the bonkers final act, in which Matt descends into Hell, it’s a mostly standard horror movie with Lucci going full camp as the villainess. Though, that finale in Hell is out there. Invitation to Hell also earned a Primetime Emmy nomination, so 1984 belonged to Craven.
Satan’s School for Girls – Tubi, Prime Video
Following the suicide of her sister, Elizabeth (Pamela Franklin) enrolls in her sister’s school to find out what happened. Her investigation finds her in the crosshairs of a Satanic cult. Director David Lowell Rich built an extensive career directing made-for-TV movies, including The Horror at 37,000 Feet. While this 1973 movie might be dated in many aspects, Rich knew how to create atmosphere, and there are a few genuinely creepy moments. Producer Aaron Spelling (Charlie’s Angels, Melrose Place) produced the made-for-TV remake in 2000, too.
Devil Dog: The Hound of Hell – Tubi
Richard Crenna stars as Mike Barry, the patriarch of a family that just lost their beloved pup. They decide to get a new one, unaware that it’s been bred and used in a Satanic ritual that renders it possessed by evil. That’s right. This cute puppy is a minion of Satan, and it’s looking to wreak demonic mayhem. It’s up to dad to save the day. Luckily, that dad is played by Richard Crenna. While it has a silly title and the low budget shows some seams, Devil Dog offers up some Satanic fun and a few spooky moments. Assault on Precinct 13 and The Car’s Kim Richards also stars as Mike Barry’s daughter.
Trilogy of Terror – Prime Video
Directed by Dan Curtis and starring Karen Black, this anthology horror film is based on short stories by Richard Matheson. It was the film that Black felt led to her being typecast in horror, and it’s easy to understand why. Playing the lead in all three segments, each a different character, Black played a femme fatale, an unhinged woman with split personalities, and most memorably, a woman who finds independence from her overbearing mother thanks to the help of a pint-sized aboriginal warrior. That Zuni fetish doll, with its razor-sharp teeth and little spear, is the stuff of nightmares. Admittedly, the first two segments tend to be forgettable. Still, the strength of “Amelia,” and her fight for her life against one of the scariest dolls in movie history, keep this one forever at the forefront of made-for-television movie memory.
How Awful About Allan – Prime Video
A TV horror movie starring Anthony Perkins doesn’t need much else to pique your curiosity. Perkins stars as the eponymous Allan, a tormented man who has psychosomatic blindness after his father died in a fire he unwittingly caused. Once released from his stay at a mental facility, he moves in with his sister. She’s also taken in a stranger. When Allan begins hearing strange voices and whispers, he’s unsure whether someone is out to get him or if he’s suffered a mental relapse. The Haunting’s Julie Harris stars as his sister, Katherine. This pick is for fans of slow burn psychological horror. It’s much more interested in creating ambiguous atmosphere than scares. Once again, though, Perkins fully commits.
Dead of Night (1977) – Shudder, Prime Video, Tubi
Like Trilogy of Terror, this horror anthology was also helmed by Dan Curtis and scripted by horror author Richard Matheson. It also features three tales of terror; one involving time travel, the second a vampire, and the last a story about a mother that wishes her dead child back to life. The latter of which was updated and reused in Trilogy of Terror II. When it comes to TV horror, it doesn’t get much more reliable than when Curtis is involved, and he knows how to arrange an anthology. Like Trilogy of Terror, he saves the best segment for last. “Bobby” is some creepy stuff.
The Spell – Prime Video
If the ’70s taught us anything, it’s that bullies are best dealt with through telekinesis. Poor 15-year-old Rita is frequently bullied by her schoolmates for being overweight. She discovers she has telekinetic powers and begins to seek vengeance. The Spell aired on NBC in 1977, drawing inevitable comparisons to Carrie, though writer Brian Taggert attempted to develop the project for theatrical release before Brian De Palma’s movie released. Despite the similarities, there are key differences. The biggest of which is that Rita’s mother isn’t a monster like Margaret White. Look for young Helen Hunt playing Rita’s sister.
Summer of Fear – Prime Video
Also known as Stranger in Our House, this is Wes Craven’s more recognizable television movie. That’s probably because it’s based on a novel by famous author Lois Duncan, and stars Linda Blair. Lee Purcell also stars as Julia, a teen taken in by her aunt and uncle after her parents’ death. Her cousin Rachel (Blair) is initially excited to have a girl her age around but quickly becomes suspicious after a string of accidents and unlucky coincidences. Rachel soon discovers Julia might be an evil witch. Evil teen witches make for a fun, somewhat campy movie. There’s no real suspense or scares, but the wacky series of events more than compensates. Also, look for an early performance by Fran Drescher.
When a Stranger Calls Back – Prime Video
One of the earliest examples of a sequel far superior to its predecessor, this under-seen cable movie delivers severe tension starting with one of horror’s best openings of all time. If you haven’t seen the original film, that’s okay; this stands on its own just fine and fills in the necessary blanks. Jill Schoelen (The Stepfather, Cutting Class) stars as this outing’s babysitter, the target of an unseen stranger when left to care for two sleeping kids. While the first film delivered the iconic, “The calls are coming from inside the house” trope, this sequel goes to surprising and unnerving places. Airing on Showtime in 1993, When a Stranger Calls Back offers up one of the most eccentric killers of the decade. And that’s saying a lot.
The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane – Prime Video
On Halloween, teen Rynn Jacobs (Jodie Foster) celebrates her thirteenth birthday alone in her father Lester’s house. It’s clear to everyone that aside from Rynn’s frequent solitude, the 13-year-old is also harboring a dark secret. The landlord and her son, Frank Hallet (Martin Sheen), are determined to find out what it is. Despite the PG rating, this small screen flick is rather mature and provocative. His sexual advances render a psychological cat and mouse chase between the adult Frank and young Rynn all the creepier. A pedophiliac villain would be warped enough, but Rynn has some disturbing skeletons in her closet. That Foster and Sheen play the leads further elevates this unique movie into something memorable. Edit: This one wasn’t actually made for TV, though a less explicit version did air on TV.
Gargoyles – Tubi
Dr. Mercer Boley (Cornel Wilde) and his daughter Diana (Jennifer Salt) are traveling in New Mexico for his work. They come upon a colony of actual living gargoyles, and they’re quite unfriendly. These aren’t the Gothic cathedral variety, but evil, demonic beings of folklore. It’s a creepy monster movie that doesn’t bother with any layered story, just monster-induced chaos. That’s okay! Legendary makeup artist Stan Winston handled the gargoyle makeup, earning him his very first feature film credit. Gargoyles won the 1973 Emmy Award for Outstanding Achievement in Makeup. By today’s standards, Gargoyles may not terrify as effectively as it did when it aired on CBS in 1972, but it left an indelible traumatic mark on the generation that caught it on air.
Due to a complex series of anthropological mishaps, the Wayans Brothers are a huge deal in Brazil. Around these parts, White Chicks is considered a national treasure by a lot of people, so it stands to reason that Brazilian audiences would continue to accompany the Wayans’ comedic output long after North America had stopped taking them seriously as comedic titans.
This is the only reason why I originally watched Michael Tiddes and Marlon Wayans’ 2013 horror spoof A Haunted House – appropriately known as “Paranormal Inactivity” in South America – despite having abandoned this kind of movie shortly after the excellent Scary Movie 3. However, to my complete and utter amazement, I found myself mostly enjoying this unhinged parody of Found Footage films almost as much as the iconic spoofs that spear-headed the genre during the 2000s. And with Paramount having recently announced a reboot of the Scary Movie franchise, I think this is the perfect time to revisit the divisive humor of A Haunted House and maybe figure out why this kind of film hasn’t been popular in a long time.
Before we had memes and internet personalities to make fun of movie tropes for free on the internet, parody movies had been entertaining audiences with meta-humor since the very dawn of cinema. And since the genre attracted large audiences without the need for a serious budget, it made sense for studios to encourage parodies of their own productions – which is precisely what happened with Miramax when they commissioned a parody of the Scream franchise, the original Scary Movie.
The unprecedented success of the spoof (especially overseas) led to a series of sequels, spin-offs and rip-offs that came along throughout the 2000s. While some of these were still quite funny (I have a soft spot for 2008’s Superhero Movie), they ended up flooding the market much like the Guitar Hero games that plagued video game stores during that same timeframe.
You could really confuse someone by editing this scene into Paranormal Activity.
Of course, that didn’t stop Tiddes and Marlon Wayans from wanting to make another spoof meant to lampoon a sub-genre that had been mostly overlooked by the Scary Movie series – namely the second wave of Found Footage films inspired by Paranormal Activity. Wayans actually had an easier time than usual funding the picture due to the project’s Found Footage presentation, with the format allowing for a lower budget without compromising box office appeal.
In the finished film, we’re presented with supposedly real footage recovered from the home of Malcom Johnson (Wayans). The recordings themselves depict a series of unexplainable events that begin to plague his home when Kisha Davis (Essence Atkins) decides to move in, with the couple slowly realizing that the difficulties of a shared life are no match for demonic shenanigans.
In practice, this means that viewers are subjected to a series of familiar scares subverted by wacky hijinks, with the flick featuring everything from a humorous recreation of the iconic fan-camera from Paranormal Activity 3 to bizarre dance numbers replacing Katy’s late-night trances from Oren Peli’s original movie.
Your enjoyment of these antics will obviously depend on how accepting you are of Wayans’ patented brand of crass comedy. From advanced potty humor to some exaggerated racial commentary – including a clever moment where Malcom actually attempts to move out of the titular haunted house because he’s not white enough to deal with the haunting – it’s not all that surprising that the flick wound up with a 10% rating on Rotten Tomatoes despite making a killing at the box office.
However, while this isn’t my preferred kind of humor, I think the inherent limitations of Found Footage ended up curtailing the usual excesses present in this kind of parody, with the filmmakers being forced to focus on character-based comedy and a smaller scale story. This is why I mostly appreciate the love-hate rapport between Kisha and Malcom even if it wouldn’t translate to a healthy relationship in real life.
Of course, the jokes themselves can also be pretty entertaining on their own, with cartoony gags like the ghost getting high with the protagonists (complete with smoke-filled invisible lungs) and a series of silly The Exorcist homages towards the end of the movie. The major issue here is that these legitimately funny and genre-specific jokes are often accompanied by repetitive attempts at low-brow humor that you could find in any other cheap comedy.
Not a good idea.
Not only are some of these painfully drawn out “jokes” incredibly unfunny, but they can also be remarkably offensive in some cases. There are some pretty insensitive allusions to sexual assault here, as well as a collection of secondary characters defined by negative racial stereotypes (even though I chuckled heartily when the Latina maid was revealed to have been faking her poor English the entire time).
Cinephiles often claim that increasingly sloppy writing led to audiences giving up on spoof movies, but the fact is that many of the more beloved examples of the genre contain some of the same issues as later films like A Haunted House – it’s just that we as an audience have (mostly) grown up and are now demanding more from our comedy. However, this isn’t the case everywhere, as – much like the Elves from Lord of the Rings – spoof movies never really died, they simply diminished.
A Haunted House made so much money that they immediately started working on a second one that released the following year (to even worse reviews), and the same team would later collaborate once again on yet another spoof, 50 Shades of Black. This kind of film clearly still exists and still makes a lot of money (especially here in Brazil), they just don’t have the same cultural impact that they used to in a pre-social-media-humor world.
At the end of the day, A Haunted House is no comedic masterpiece, failing to live up to the laugh-out-loud thrills of films like Scary Movie 3, but it’s also not the trainwreck that most critics made it out to be back in 2013. Comedy is extremely subjective, and while the raunchy humor behind this flick definitely isn’t for everyone, I still think that this satirical romp is mostly harmless fun that might entertain Found Footage fans that don’t take themselves too seriously.
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