Editorials
Five Horror Movies Inspired by Fairy Tales to Stream This Week
Arriving this Friday on Shudder to test your stomach is The Ugly Stepsister, the feature directorial debut by Emilie Blichfeldt. The Ugly Stepsister retells the classic fairy tale of Cinderella from the perspective of her stepsister, Elvira (Lea Myren), who subjects herself to a variety of barbaric beauty procedures in the pursuit of a happy ever after (our review).
It’s a fairy tale with a gruesome body horror twist. This week’s streaming picks highlight other fairy tale-inspired horror movies, whether they’re direct adaptations or loosely based on them. All blend horror and fantasy to deliver cautionary bedtime tales of the bloody variety.
Here’s where you can stream these fairy tale inspired horror movies this week.
For more Stay Home, Watch Horror picks, click here.
Absentia – Hoopla, Prime Video
When creating his eerie supernatural tale, writer/director Mike Flanagan drew inspiration from a few urban myths about tunnels and trolls, and that also includes the Norwegian fairy tale Three Billy Goats Gruff. So much that it directly factors into the plot. Flanagan mainstay Katie Parker stars as Callie, a recovering addict who comes to stay with her pregnant sister, Tricia (Courtney Bell). Tricia’s finally ready to accept that her missing husband is dead, but then Callie encounters a strange man in an empty tunnel, shocked that she can see him. It’s the beginning of a series of strange events stemming from the tunnel, including a supernatural bargain Callie unwittingly strikes. Leave it to Flanagan to use urban legends and fairy tales as a haunting and unsettling exploration of grief.
Fragile – Fandango at Home, Fawesome, Hoopla, Prime Video, Roku Channel
Before Jaume Balagueró teamed up with Paco Plaza to unleash one of the most terrifying movies of the decade, [REC], he proved an aptitude for delivering chills with this underseen haunted hospital fairy tale. Calista Flockhart stars as Amy, a nurse brought on to the night shift in the children’s ward at an old hospital in the process of closing. Amy has her demons to battle, but her new gig comes with a malevolent ghost. Fragile is creepy and atmospheric with effective scares, but even better is that Balagueró gives this ghost story an emotional center loosely inspired by Sleeping Beauty.
Gretel & Hansel – MGM+, Pluto TV, Roku Channel
Before The Monkey and Longlegs, filmmaker Oz Perkins reconfigured the classic Grimm fairy tale for a moodier horror story that favors style over a more conventional, straightforward narrative. Think unparalleled production design with impressive sound design and score to match, but with its story told in an unconventional and sometimes muddied way. Sophia Lillis stars as Gretel, the elder sister tasked with protecting her brother from Alice Krige‘s mesmerizing Witch. It’s a coming-of-rage sort of fairy tale.
The Pied Piper – Fandor, Fawesome, Kanopy, Midnight Pulp, Tubi
It’s not just the swift runtime, clocking in at under an hour, that sets this adaptation of a classic fairy tale apart. It’s also in the stunning stop-motion animation. Director Jiří Barta’s 1986 Czech adaptation of Pied Piper of Hamelin introduces a corrupt village consumed by greed and pettiness. When rats inundate them, they turn to a mysterious stranger who offers to lead the rats out of the town for a price. Barta’s hand-crafted feature draws from German expressionism, lending a harsh, gloomy style that suits the horror of this fairy tale well. As for the horror, it’s both grotesque and existential.
Tale of Tales – Kanopy, Paramount+, Shudder
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; but not always the most obvious ones. With three stories about obsession, all taking place in one kingdom, this fairytale isn’t afraid of gruesome bloodshed. With 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 talents like Salma Hayek, John C. Reilly, and Vincent Cassel.
From child-eating witches to village-burning dragons, fairy tales have always had a foot in the horror genre. That’s why it makes sense that, for every The Hobbit and The Chronicles of Narnia, there are also darker and more adult-oriented stories about magical worlds inhabited by ravenous monsters and cruel villains.
Funnily enough, these sinister tales were precisely the ones that I gravitated towards back when I was a kid, and I was reminded of this while watching Netflix’s recently released I Am Frankelda, Mexico’s first ever feature-length stop-motion animation and one hell of an entertaining parable about the intersection between fiction and reality.
In honor of this special kind of horror-adjacent fairy tale, today I’d like to share this list recommending six Dark Fantasy films that horror fans might enjoy.
For the purposes of this list, we’ll be defining Dark Fantasy as fantastical stories that don’t shy away from the more macabre elements that fuel classic fairy tales. That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own grim favorites if you think we missed a particularly thrilling one.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
6. Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013)
I’m fascinated by bizarre attempts at blockbuster filmmaking – especially when the resulting movies are somehow still fun despite their corporate-mandated origins. Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters is precisely one of these strangely compelling studio projects, as this surprisingly successful action-thriller boasts a lot of heart (and tongue-in-cheek humor) for a CGI-heavy creature feature.
Directed by Dead Snow’s Tommy Wirkola, Witch Hunters re-frames the classic fairy tale as an origin story for a duo of badass monster-slayers. Of course, it’s the flick’s anachronistic aesthetic and overall visual flair that make it stand out from other action-horror endeavors from around the same time.
5. The Wolf House (2018)
Made in the tradition of faux cursed films in the same vein as Antrum: The Deadliest Film Ever Made, the eerie backstory to 2018’s Chilean animated flick The Wolf House (La Casa Lobo in the original Spanish) already makes it a nightmarish experience before the flick even really begins.
After all, the movie is presented to us as a faux propaganda film produced by the leader of a death cult (heavily inspired by the real life Colonia Dignidad), with this hybrid animated feature using complex movie magic to simulate a single uninterrupted shot as it tells the story of a lazy young girl who runs away from an isolated colony and encounters a creepy old house in the woods.
4. The Brothers Grimm (2005)
Out of all the Monty Python alumni, Terry Gilliam has had the most interesting career outside of the original comedy group. From fascinating canceled projects (such as his scrapped adaptation of Watchmen) to dystopian parodies that feel more relevant by the minute (1985’s Brazil), even his “lesser” films are still intriguing in their own way.
2005’s The Brothers Grimm is one such project, with this peculiar movie attempting to combine the comedian-turned-filmmaker’s unique visual style with a more blockbuster-oriented plot reimagining the titular brothers as con-artists rather than mere writers. The end result isn’t exactly a masterpiece, but it’s still a legitimately fun ride with plenty of memorable monsters and wonderful performances by both the late, great Heath Ledger and Matt Damon.
3. Dante’s Inferno: An Animated Epic (2010)
2010’s Dante’s Inferno game may have a reputation as something of an unapologetic God of War clone, but I’d argue that the now-obscure game was aesthetically unique enough to deserve a bigger fanbase. However, while the title remains trapped on the seventh console generation, its highly underrated anime adaptation is a lot easier to get a hold of!
Animated by 6 different studios in order to make the 9 circles of hell feel unique from each other, this may not be a completely faithful adaptation of Dante Alighieri’s poem, but it’s still one heck of a great (not to mention gory) time that I’d highly recommend to fans of Netflix’s take on Castlevania.
2. Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009)
My personal favorite entry in the Underworld franchise, Rise of the Lycans, is a highly ambitious prequel that actually works better if you haven’t had the story spoiled to you by the previous Underworld films.
While the rest of the series features plenty of urban fantasy elements as the movies combine machine guns and modern environments with gothic storytelling, Patrick Tatopoulos’ prequel fully embraces its fantastical origins and tells a classic tale about a doomed romance between a werewolf and a vampire amid a medieval uprising.
And the best part is that we get a lot more Michael Sheen as the fan-favorite Lucian.
1. Solomon Kane (2011)
One of my personal favorite movies on this list, MJ Basset’s criminally underseen adaptation of Robert E. Howard’s other iconic warrior is thoroughly steeped in horror ambience and features plenty of memorable monsters. However, it’s also a classic origin story for a swashbuckling hero that wouldn’t feel out of place in a tabletop RPG.
While I’ve already written about how the film deftly combines both horror and fantasy elements without breaking the bank, I’ll never pass up an opportunity to recommend the bizarre movie where James Purefoy expertly plays a puritan John Wick.
It’s just too bad that we never got the other films in this intended trilogy.
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