The Horror franchise has always been one of the toughest and hardest genres to get into for many of Hollywood’s greatest of Directors. As the generation changes and shakes hands with a new range of audience, the Horror genre keeps adapting. Gone are the days where blood & gore and Jump Scares used to do the trick. Now, a good Horror movie needs to have a good premise and backstory along with character depth and the horror element. These 21st Century Horror masterpieces have managed to crack the code and now sit atop the mountain as the greatest 21st Century horror movies to be ever created. 17 Greatest 21st Century Horror Movies that will make you shit your pants!
1. The Conjuring
The Conjuring tells the story of paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. They have been asked to investigate supernatural occurring plaguing a small family in a backwater town. It is later revealed that the house the family currently reside at was actually the home of a witch who sacrificed her life to the Devil and now haunts the house as a paranormal entity.
2. Don’t Breathe
Don’t Breathe took the blind man hunting people down a dark alley kind of storyline to the next level. When a group of teenagers break into the house of a blind guy looking for riches and treasures to loot, they are in for one hell of a surprise after they find out that the guy is actually trained to fight in the dark and he is keeping a girl captive in the basement, torturing her. The movie involves the teenagers trying to find a way out as the lights are shut down by the Blind person, who now knows that there are people in the house.
3. Hereditary
Hereditary is one of the best Horror movies to ever exist. Period. Sometimes the best movies come out of a rather simple story arc. The plot is very ordinary – a single mother is trying to make ends meet when she realizes her child is being stalked by a dark presence. Hereditary is not about jump scares. The ghost will not always suddenly come out of the shadows. What it will do is it will wait for the perfect moment to come out of the background, slowly and steadily creeping into the horizon as the characters would stay oblivious as to what is going on. You would be screaming at the top of your lungs for them to look back but the evil entity will still get its guy.
4. Get Out
5. Grave Encounters
It was made in a shoestring budget. Nobody though that an Italian production house could make such a well-crafted plotline. Grave Encounters is a found footage horror movie where a group of horror adventurists looking for a venue to shoot for their next episode of their horror reality TV Show find out that the abandoned mental hospital they are currently at is not that abandoned at all.
6. Saw
The Saw series of movies have gained widespread global acclaim for the blood and gore tactics they employ in their movies. The movie that started the movement was Saw. The story is about a psychopathic serial killer called Jigsaw who intends to use booby trapped mechanical devices that are designed to kill people to teach society what it means to be human.
7. REC
REC is another found footage horror tale. The story follows a television reporter and a cameraman following a group of people into the depths of a mysterious apartment building. When the doors are locked from the outside, the group finds itself trapped within as a malevolent entity takes hold of everyone.
8. It
It is the remake of a classic 1990’s production. No one thought (besides DC comics) that a clown could be this scary. A group of children, calling themselves the Losers’ Club, find out that their small town is plagued by a case of missing children. Their investigation leads them to a nameless entity that is devouring children by feeding on their greatest fears.
9. Insidious
Insidious was planned to be a two-part storyline since the events of the first movie could not be explained in full detail and required another movie to provide them with some form of closure. In the world of Insidious, there exists a place between Life and the Afterlife called the Further. A kid who can travel between the realm of life and the Further is haunted by an evil entity that wants to get into the plane of reality. All hell breaks loose when the demonic force almost succeeds in doing so.
10. Us
Us is yet another movie that gives us a riveting social narrative. Jordan Peel, who also directed the new Twilight Zone Episodes, was inspired by one such episode to create Us. The story of us is a young African-American family being stalked by evil doppelgangers.
11. The Endless
The Endless is a movie that was not supposed to make such a huge splash. But it did. And it did it with style and panache. The Endless is the sequel to another well-received movie called Resolution. The Endless is about two brothers who are coming back to the cult they ran out of. After coming back they realize that an unexplainable entity is controlling the very fabric of time and space in that camp.
12. A Quiet Place
One of the most intense horror movies to have been ever made, A Quiet Place has a star studded cast. But the true star in the movie was the monsters who hunted down people using sounds. A Quiet Place showed a world where humans stopped talking because of the monsters that took over the world hunted their prey by tracking their noses and how one family is trying to cope with their new reality.
13. The Descent
The Descent is probably one of the most underrated horror movies. The movie had a terrific story line but the people did not receive it well. When a team of cave explorers undertake an expedition into a deep cavern of mines, they are trapped in there all the while being pursued by a sentient species of predators that reside within the mines. The ending will leave you in dire straits.
14. The Devil’s Backbone
The Devil’s Backbone came all the way back in 2001. It was Director Guillermo del Toro’s greatest work up until that time. A Spanish boy who was recently orphaned during the Spanish Civil War visits an orphanage. When he realizes a ghost is haunting him, he follows the ghost around in turn to reveal dark secrets regarding the Orphanage he currently resides in.
15. It Comes at Night
The World is dead. Humanity is on the verge of extinction. A strange disease has destroyed civilization. Two families now share a home and have somehow managed to survive by warding off the virus from entering their residence. But time and resources are running short. There is also the possibility of an intruder already in the house.
16. Drag me to Hell
A sanctions officer rejects the application of a lease for a house. The owner of the house curses her for not driving her out of her own home. Drag me to Hell then reveals that the protagonist of the story now has to battle unseen forces that are hell-bent on literally dragging the woman to the depths of purgatory.
17. Annabelle
Evil Doll and Bad Spirits are a dangerous combination. Annabelle was a spin-off production to the hit Conjuring franchise but it still stood out on its own as a good horror movie. Annabelle will give you the creeps at night if you decide to watch it alone. Fair Warning: Do not dare do that!!!
