10. “Hold the Dark”
Director Jeremy Saulnier is no stranger to pushing mental limits and examining what humans are capable of when faced with extreme conditions and often horrific circumstances. The “Blue Ruin” and “Green Room” filmmaker has a habit of forcing his protagonists’ backs against the wall often revealing ugly, scarring results. While “Hold the Dark” cannot be placed in any one specific genre box, there are more than enough horror elements to land it a firm place on this list. There’s no greater fear than losing a child, and Medora Stone’s (Riley Keough) missing son is the driving force… at least for the first section. As the hunter/tracker Russell Core (Jeffrey Wright) unravels the mystery of this small, secluded Alaskan village, he uncovers more than just a missing child case. Underneath the film’s hypnotic hold is a meditation on our primal nature, and how by the end of the day, we’re all animals with the capacity for committing horribly primal acts. In the midst of all that, there’s also a generational tale about the perpetual nature of being stuck in the same place without purpose. “Hold the Dark” is a lot of movie, but as Saulnier has proved time and time again, there’s no seemingly ungainly melange of genres he’s unwilling to explore, and bless him for it. – RO
9. “The Endless”
While it lacks the bigger budget that many of its contemporaries possess, “The Endless” more than makes up for its lack of physical scale or immense VFX with sheer ambition and innovation. Directed by Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson and erring on the side of science-fiction more that strictly horror, “The Endless” draws its scares from the unknown – the unseen – rather than relying on shock value and gore. Focused on a pair of brothers who revisit a UFO death cult they escaped a decade ago following a cryptic video message that compels their return, Moorhead and Benson star in their film, anchoring the already grainy and gritty story with naturalistic performances. The mystique of the world is a draw, but it’s not so much the answers to the questions that offer the greatest intrigue but the journey the two filmmakers take us on to get there. Unpolished and imperfect but overflowing with an abundance of promise that lays further groundwork for exciting new voices, The Endless” is provocative, thrilling, often bleakly comedic and genuinely gripping in its laid bare look at human desperation. – Ally Johnson
8. “Unsane”
If you’re a Dario Argento fan, it’s easy to be giddy about Steven Soderbergh taking the alternate title of “Tenebre” for his latest film, but the giallo influence doesn’t stop there. Shot on the iPhone 7 in just ten days, Soderbergh’s latest operates on the dream logic that many giallo films function on, and while the iPhone aesthetic is a polarizing one, it fits the narrative in regards to how we have eyes on us at all times, and how we are so inundated with videos and images in our pocket on a day-to-day basis that even something like a cry for help that should always be taken seriously could be brushed off as a shrug. “Unsane” depicts gaslighting; one of our scariest modern nightmares, specifically for women, about the manipulation of truth and what people choose to believe. “Believe women” is the phrase that comes to mind throughout the film. It’s a maddening experience, but one that gets at a terrifying truth. All of this with an exceptional lead performance from Claire Foy, who is asked to do a lot here by descending into madness and then using said madness to combat the perpetrator. It’s a thoughtful, twisted, messy ride. – RO
7. “A Quiet Place”
It’s hard to stay silent about how petrifying and unnerving “A Quiet Place” and its premise is. The idea of one loud sound resulting in the demise of you or one of your loved one is enough to make a person scream (see what I did there?). However, at its core, “A Quiet Place” manages to be a successful family drama about the lengths certain parents go to protect their children in times of crisis and in that sense is driven by its selflessness and primal instinct. Most horror films are about the individual escaping a terror at all costs, an almost selfish fear and flight impulse. “A Quiet Place,” a title that already suggests a tranquil home (soon to be torn apart), places the empathy focus and care on keeping the tribe safe. Deftly written, utilizing pitch-perfect Hitchock-ian sense of suspense and tension, director John Krasinski—really upping his craft and ambitions considering his previous two smaller scale indies—creates great conflict and strain through the contradicting methods of survival; stern rigor, rules and continuity (Krasinski) vs. something more meditative and graceful (Emily Blunt). Although the actors don’t speak much dialogue throughout the entire film, adhering to the rules of silence, their expressive performances still speak volumes about personality and character. As a result, the film captures the forgotten art of meaningful acting within the horror genre. These days, horror has becomes known for shock value and relying on innovative concepts. “A Quiet Place” certainly possesses those two elements, but guided by its safeguarding parental lens, Krasinski’s taut, emotional drama is really about the defensive mother bear inside us all (in some cases, still dormant) and that universal fear of the thing you love most, being ripped away from your adoring grasp. – Matthew St.Clair
6. “The Little Stranger”
In a world of extreme horror, sure-thing sequels and jump-scare-filled movies made for teens, a quiet gothic film has almost no chance of making a dent in the box office or cultural consciousness. Perhaps that’s why Focus Features did little promotion and dumped “The Little Stranger” on Labor Day Weekend, notoriously the worst for attendance all year (which is kind of shitty for studio to do to a filmmaker coming off a film with four Oscar nominations including Best Picture and a win for Best Actress, but we suppose that’s someone else’s grudge to hold). But the few who did see Oscar nominee Lenny Abrahamson’s first film post-”Room” were rewarded with a rich, subtle film that doesn’t neatly fit into a marketing box. Domhnall Gleeson stars as a doctor in post-war England who finds a once-majestic estate falling into ruin. Ruth Wilson, Charlotte Rampling and Will Poulter play the mansion’s residents who are haunted – possibly literally – by a tragedy in their family’s past. Adapted from Sarah Waters’ novel, “The Little Stranger” has the feel of a classic you’d have been assigned in an English class; it’s elegant, stately and full of underlying themes deserving of time and dissection. Its sense of unease doesn’t just lie in the threat of spirits; instead, it’s the shifting power structure in 1940s England unsettling both its characters and its audience. – KM