‘Tis the season for all streaming platforms to embrace horror on a massive scale, making the options endless for your Halloween watchlists. We’re breaking down this month’s streaming highlights by platform. While Prime Video may not deck the halls for horror’s sacred holiday like Hulu, it does bring some notable gems worth checking out this Halloween.
Here are eight newly added horror movies you won’t want to miss on Prime Video in October 2023.
Bubba Ho-Tep
Don Coscarelli takes a creative approach to addressing the sluggish nature of standard ancient mummies; he unleashes the monster upon a pool of potential victims too feeble to outrun it. Bruce Campbell stars as an aged man claiming to be the still-living Elvis Presley. When a reanimated mummy in cowboy gear starts feeding off the residents in Presley’s nursing home, he teams up with John F. “Jack” Kennedy, who uses a wheelchair, to stop it. Coscarelli injects plenty of laughs, but for Shady Rest Retirement Home residents, this mummy represents a massive threat. The filmmaker uses a silly concept to weave a poignant and thrilling tale, breathing new life into the undead archetype.
Crawl
Crawl functions as a lean, mean thriller, delivering white-knuckle intensity and Alexandre Aja’s trademark brand of brutal suspense. Kaya Scodelario stars as Haley, a young woman who heads into a hurricane to retrieve her father, Dave (Barry Pepper). She barely has enough time to find him injured in the crawlspace underneath his house before the alligators trap them in place, and the hurricane’s rising floodwaters cause time to be of the essence. It’s a survival thriller heavy on intense action sequences, grounded by the affecting bond between a father and daughter.
Disturbing Behavior
Proving that it’s best to let teens work through the inner turmoil of transitioning into adulthood, Disturbing Behavior demonstrates how horrifically awry it can get when adults attempt to modify unruly teen behavior. High school psychologist Dr. Edgar Caldicott orchestrates a unique program that reprograms its “Blue Ribbon” students, reshaping them into model citizens. The only problem is that it makes them dangerously aggressive at best and violently murderous at worst. The soundtrack and supporting performances by Nick Stahl and William Sadler make this a winsome entry in ‘90s teen horror.
Godzilla vs. Kong
Adam Wingard’s MonsterVerse heavyweight event pits Godzilla against King Kong in a dazzling Kaiju spectacle prone to going long on its human storylines. The rapid pacing makes it all fly by, and the visuals easily make this the best-looking entry yet in the MonsterVerse. Considering a sequel is in the works and the Apple TV+ series “Monarch: Legacy of Monsters” is on the near horizon, now feels like a great time to revisit Godzilla vs. Kong.
Mean Creek
Conceived in the mid-90s, writer/director Jacob Aarons Estes’ Mean Creek shares a common D.N.A. with grim coming-of-age horror like Super Dark Times. More of a psychological thriller than horror, the narrative also centers on a teen gathering gone horribly awry and the subsequent way the teens cope with that event. For Marty, he already has skeletons in his closet thanks to his father’s suicide. It’s also Marty’s short-fused temperament that pushes a prank gone wrong into absolute pitch-black darkness, making for a bleak thriller that earns the “mean” in its title.
Totally Killer
Nahnatchka Khan (Always Be My Maybe, Young Rock, Don Wong) directs this brand new slasher described as Back to the Future meets The Final Girls. Kiernan Shipka stars as the teen who finds herself trapped in the ‘80s with the teen version of her mother and the masked killer who murdered her. It’s a totally ‘80s vibe that leans into the crueler aspects of high school but with a whole lot of humor (our review).
Renfield – October 10
Director Chris McKay (The Tomorrow War) and writer Ryan Ridley (“Rick and Morty”) bring Universal Monsters characters Dracula (Nicolas Cage) and Renfield (Nicholas Hoult) into the modern world for a horror-comedy about a toxic relationship between a megalomaniac and his bug-eating servant. McKay unleashes the gore and laughs in spades in his tribute to these classic characters.
Studio 666 – October 25
Rock & Roll Hall of Famers Foo Fighters use horror as a vehicle for a charming movie about their band. Trying to inspire creativity for the Foo Fighters’ tenth album instead winds up summoning demons from Hell in this one, offering up an entertaining and bloody horror-comedy that serves as a band spotlight first and foremost. The excessive gore and band personalities delight, even when its simple plot is prone to meandering. Look for cameos by Jenna Ortega and horror master John Carpenter, who also provides the opening theme music.
