Editorials
‘It Lives Inside’: Five Terrifying Movie Monsters Lurking in the Shadows
Warning: Major spoilers for the following films abound.
Few experiences unite people from all walks of life like a fear of the dark. Often surpassing specific concerns of serial killers, monsters, witches, or demons, what we collectively fear most is that mysterious, dark unknown. Anything and everything could be lurking in the shadows just waiting to pounce. Bishal Dutta’s terrifying new film It Lives Inside follows an ancient evil that hides in dark corners while terrorizing its prey. The film follows a troubled teen named Tamira (Mohana Krishnan) terrorized by a flesh-eating demon known as the Pishacha that feasts on negative energy. This malevolent being soon sets its sights on her best friend Samidha (Megan Suri) and begins a campaign of terror hoping to gorge itself on chaos, destruction, and emotional pain.
One of Dutta’s most frightening scenes takes place in Samidha’s darkened bedroom. Staring at her open closet door, the terrified teen notices a pair of tiny glowing eyes watching her from the shadows. Samidha shines a flashlight into the open doorway, but the light reveals nothing more than her familiar possessions. The second she drops the flashlight’s beam, the glowing eyes return, more malicious than ever.
The terrifying Pishacha is the latest in a long line of creatures and killers hiding under the cover of darkness. But really, in hindsight, the horror genre has practically been built on the stories of beings who use the absence of light to conceal the most unthinkable evil. In light of this week’s greatest scare, Bloody Disgusting is revisiting five films that terrify viewers by challenging them to decide if what we think we’re seeing is actually there. Hopefully we, along with the characters on this list, will find out what’s really lurking in the shadows before it’s too late.
Above, we have an exclusive conversation with filmmaker Bishal Dutta, who shares his favorite horror moments in the dark ahead of It Lives Inside, now playing in theaters nationwide via Neon. Get tickets now!
Gerald’s Game (2017)
The cinematic adaptation of Stephen King’s harrowing novel terrifies on several levels. Jessie (Carla Gugino) Burlingame and her husband Gerald (Bruce Greenwood) have traveled to their luxurious lake house well after the summer season has ended, hoping to kickstart their love life with a bit of kink. However, an innocent game of restraint takes a dreadful turn when Gerald suffers a fatal heart attack while Jessie is tethered to the bed frame.
In addition to the gruesome degloving scene and the ever present threat of starvation, director Mike Flanagan puts Jessie through a harrowing ordeal in which the keys to survival lie in the darkness of her own mind. In the middle of the night, Jessie wakes to see a pale face watching her from the corner. Sporting a ghoulish grin, this man with long, dangling arms stands for hours in the corner of Jessie’s darkened bedroom, watching and enjoying her misery. Lit only by the moon’s rays through the open windows, Jessie has no way to know if the creature she dubs the Moonlight Man (Carel Struycken) is real or simply the grim specter of death watching her final hours.
Lake Mungo (2008)
Following the tragic drowning death of their daughter, Alice (Talia Zucker), the Palmer family begins to notice her faded image in pictures and video footage created after her death. We eventually learn that Alice’s brother Mathew (Martin Sharpe) has been editing the images, hoping to help his parents process their pain. However, closer examination reveals something even more horrific. Lurking within the doctored footage is another hideous face hiding in the shadows. The family’s neighbor can be seen ducking out of view after sneaking into the Palmer house to find video evidence of a sexual assault.
The stunning image of his leering face hiding in the grainy footage is nearly as disturbing as the reason he’s there in the first place. But writer/director Joel Anderson isn’t done haunting us with phantoms. As if conjured by Matthew’s understandable deception, additional footage shows Alice beginning to appear in undoctored photos. A powerful examination of grief and depression, Lake Mungo ends with a haunting credits sequence showing a multitude of happy family photos that all contain her ghostly image, watching from the shadows as life moves on without her.
When a Stranger Calls Back (1993)
We’ve all heard the story of the babysitter and the stranger upstairs. Asking if she’s checked the children, he torments her with repeated calls eventually revealed to be coming from inside the house. Fred Walton’s 1979 film When a Stranger Calls brings this terrifying urban legend to life in one of horror’s most unnerving opening sequences. Fourteen years later, the babysitter returns in When a Stranger Calls Back, another twist on a nightmarish urban legend. Julia (Jill Schoelen) is babysitting when a stranger knocks on the door. Complaining of car trouble, he continues to harass her throughout the evening while the kids sleep upstairs.
With a locked door between them, Julia believes she is safe. However, she begins to fear there may be someone else in the house. It seems this killer has been hiding in the shadows of the darkened living room for hours. A ventriloquist by trade, he’s been throwing his voice to convince Julia that he’s outside the front door, when he’s been just inches away the whole time, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. This slightly ridiculous premise feels like a nightmare come to life as the murderous trickster emerges from the shadows with claw-like hands outstretched.
The Conjuring (2013)
Immediately after moving into a rambling farmhouse, the members of the Perron family begin to hear strange sounds in the night. Middle daughter Christine (Joey King) wakes to find that her covers have been pulled to the floor and there’s an overpowering smell of rotting meat filling the room. Still wiping the sleep out of her eyes, she looks around her darkened bedroom and notices a sinister presence lurking in the corner. As her sister gets up to investigate the door suddenly slams, removing the possibility that it’s just her imagination.
However, this is only a precursor to one of the film’s most famous scenes. After putting her daughters to bed, Carolyn (Lili Taylor) ventures downstairs to investigate a strange sound. She opens the door to the cobwebby cellar and peers down the stairs with only the flame from a match to light her way. As she tries to make sense of the shadows, a pair of ghostly hands appear just behind her ear and clap twice, a sinister mockery of a beloved family game. Once again the door slams locking Carolyn inside the basement, alone in the pitch-black darkness with the house’s evil presence.
Hereditary (2018)
One of the darkest films in recent memory, Ari Aster’s Hereditary is filled with sinister spirits hiding in the shadows. After the horrifying death of his little sister Charlie (Milly Shapiro), Peter (Alex Wolff) awakens to see her standing in the corner of his room. He calls out to Charlie, but before she can answer, her head falls off and rolls toward his bed. A closer look reveals nothing more than a ball rolling across the floor, but this horrific vision mirrors the details of his sister’s horrifying decapitation.
Set in a cold and unsettling house, Aster’s film is filled with hidden horrors including naked cult members hiding in dark corners and visual details that grow more unsettling upon rewatch. However, these nightmares pale in comparison to the scene that kicks off Aster’s shocking climax. As Peter wanders through his suspiciously quiet house, our eyes adjust to take in the dimly lit scene. We eventually notice Peter’s mother Annie (Toni Collette) perched like a waiting spider in the upper corner of his room. When she finally does attack, Peter retreats to the attic where an even more hellish fate awaits.
It Lives Inside hits theaters nationwide on September 22nd. Get tickets now!
If there’s one artistic medium that can perfectly recreate the despair of living through a vivid nightmare, it has to be video games. A simulated world can be just as believable as the developers want it to be, and once you add in the added complexity of actually exploring and participating in spaces and events instead of just observing them as you would in a film, it starts to become clear why so many horror titles add mind-bending meta elements that make you fear the act of playing itself.
For instance, years ago, I remember scoffing at Silent Hill: Shattered Memories due to its initial disclaimer promising that “this game plays you as much as you play it,” only to later go through unexpected heartbreak once the developers used the game’s personalization mechanics to make the ending even more impactful. This is just one example of interactive experiences reaching through the screen in order to affect gamers, and in honor of eerie fourth-wall breaks and haunted game folders everywhere, today I’d like to recommend six other meta horror games liable to melt your brain (but in a good way).
For the purposes of this list, I’ll be defining “meta” as any game that incorporates/addresses the fact that you’re playing a game into the overall narrative. That being said, this is far from a definitive guide to the meta horror genre, so don’t forget to comment below with your own favorites if you think I missed a particularly spooky one.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
6. Bubbaruka!
I was fascinated by virtual pets as a kid. Pokémon Yellow was always my favorite entry in the franchise because you could look behind you and check in on Pikachu, and you’d never find me on the playground without my trusty blue Tamagotchi. That’s why it felt like Benjamin Schade’s Bubbaruka! was made for me, personally.
A survival horror throwback where you explore an unfinished version of a nostalgic virtual pet game that a friend of yours found hidden inside a used laptop, this surprisingly lengthy title will soon have you questioning the limits of virtual life and death. Just remember not to lower your guard just because of the game’s cutesy retro graphics, as Bubbaruka! has a lot more up its lo-fi sleeves than you may initially realize.
5. Inscryption
Roguelike deck-building may no longer be the novel game mechanic that it once was, but when it works, it really works. If there’s one of these randomized titles that still hasn’t been beaten despite years of competitors attempting to one-up its card-based thrills, it’s Daniel Mullins’ infamous Inscryption.
What starts as a supernatural haunted cabin story soon with folk horror aesthetics soon evolves into a mind-bending exploration of the terrors of programming itself, though I won’t get into details as this is one genre narrative that is best experienced firsthand.
While the latter half of the game isn’t quite as mechanically engaging as that memorable first act, Daniel has since updated the title with an infinite tabletop mode so you can continue battling Leshy to your masochistic heart’s content.
4. SIMULACRA
Despite smartphones being such a crucial part of modern-day life, there isn’t a lot of media that explores this virtual aspect of our online selves in any meaningful capacity. That’s why I was originally compelled to try out Kaigan Games OÜ’s SIMULACRA – a mystery game where you find a lost phone and attempt to unravel the secrets of a missing young woman named Anna.
From fully functional apps to authentic-looking Found Footage videos detailing Anna’s life and social group, SIMULACRA will leave you feeling like a reluctant detective that can’t help but get involved in a missing persons case that only gets stranger the more you learn about it.
If you like this one, don’t forget to check out the mechanically superior sequels.
3. A Dark Place
XerStudios’ A Dark Place may be controversial due to its malware-like approach to messing with your computer systems as you play, but I’d argue that this experimental form of interactive art makes the game that much more fascinating – especially since the story behind the title is interesting enough for it to be worth dealing with what some fans jokingly consider to be legitimately cursed game files.
While this 2018 title is best experienced blind, I’m a big fan of how the game uses extremely simple mechanics to tell a complex story that lingers long after you’ve (hopefully) managed to uninstall the curse.
2. MyHouse.wad
Adding MyHouse.wad to this list is kind of a cheat since it’s technically a Doom II mod instead of a standalone release, but there’s no way that we could discuss fourth-wall-breaking meta horror experiences without bringing up the videogame equivalent to Mark Z. Danielewski’s iconic House of Leaves.
I won’t get into details in order to avoid spoilers, but Steve Nelson’s bizarre creation starts out as an architectural tribute to a deceased friend before quickly evolving into a freaky example of liminal horror and the limits of virtual obsession.
If you’ve ever felt like living through a Creepypasta, this is the game/mod for you!
1. Forbidden Solitaire
The most recent release on this list, Grey Alien games and Night Signal Entertainment’s Forbidden Solitaire, may not be a technically complex title, but it’s certainly one of the most entertaining interactive horror romps of the past few years.
This tongue-in-cheek project presents itself as an eerily authentic piece of screenlife horror where you try out a mysterious card game from the ’90s while your sister attempts to warn you about the title’s allegedly “cursed” history. While poking through the protagonist’s desktop screen and receiving fascinating FMV footage from Emily is entertaining enough, using the power of Solitaire to destroy demonic entities is terrifyingly addictive.
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