OMG Horror.com

Since the bulk of horror flicks these days are mired in nothing but gratuitous gore, lame shock-thrills and pathetically impotent storytelling; OMGHorror is proud to compile a litany of the kind of horror film that has been around since Hollywood's golden age; that being the haunted house flick. Instead of the trampled attempt to frighten by graphic onscreen, frankly exploitative violence, we're celebrating the films that leverage simple bone-chilling, hair-raising, straight up heart-stopping horror. Ghosts, spirits, phantoms, apparitions, ghouls, Djinns, demons, Jinnis, chimeras - call them what you will - but here is our list of the all time 20 creepiest haunted house flicks. Enjoy!

#20: Dark Water (2002)

First of all, we couldn't conduct a serious list without recognizing all the great horror work coming out of Asia these days. And although the picking is quite bountiful, we've gone ahead and awarded Hideo Nakata's Dark Water a coveted top spot. Bleak and stylishly dreadful, the film centers on a mother and her six year old daughter who move into a decrepit sublet in an old run down building. Inside the apartment, puzzling pools of liquid begin to permeate nearly every surface of the place, usually corresponding with some strange bout of violence or otherwise distressing phenomenon. Soon a spectral being materializes in the form of a young girl, wan with long jet black hair. She appears randomly, usually in conjunction with one of the leaky puddles of "dark water," and it's up to the mother and daughter to not only work through their own personal issues, but subjugate the sinister presence altogether. The film has a quiet, subdued tone that intensifies the feeling of anxiousness and discomfort. The relationship between the mother and daughter is quite interesting and in some ways, as distressing as the ghost itself. Starring Hitomi Kuroki, Rio Kanno, Mirei Oguchi, Asami Mizukawa and Fumiyo Kohinata.

#19: Mansion of the Doomed (1976)

Also known as House of Blood, Michael Pitaki's offbeat depiction avoids the presence of a ghost altogether. Instead, the film centers on a demented eye surgeon who after his daughter is rendered blind from a car accident, becomes obsessed with restoring her vision. So what does he do? He lures innocents into his giant mansion, savagely carves the eyeballs out of their heads and reinserts them into his daughter's sockets. The process works temporarily and the good Doc descends into a homicidal path of grime and grue, excoriating corneas and irises like they were going out of style. This is a mean, raw piece of visceral work achieved through the power of suggestion and well crafted off-screen violence (they eye topic is so sensitive, we fill it in with our minds). Doc Chaney (nice nod to good ol' Lon) keeps his eyeless victims alive as he truly intends to reinstall their peepers once his daughter's vision is salvaged. It's interesting to see how the Doc is portrayed as a man desperate, doing dastardly deeds simply out of the love for he has for his daughter. Since most of the horror takes place in one mansion, we thought it made a nice, unexpected list addition. The film stars Richard Basehart, Gloria Grahame, Trish Stewart and a young B-master Lance Henriksen.

#18: House (1986)

With all the gravity and candid dread that comprises the better part of our list, we thought it'd be a nice change of pace to add a little levity to the mix. Easily our list's most overt comedic horror blend, Steve Miner's (Friday the 13th II and III) third film House brings the '80s cheese grater to the age old haunted house tale. Troubled Vietnam vet and horror novelist Roger Cobb (William Katt) moves into the house his aunt recently died in as a way to muster inspiration for his newest novel. As soon as he moves in, Cobb is bombarded with a litany of demonic distractions. With a missing son and a divorce on the brink, Cobb confides in his nosy neighbor named Harold (George Wendt) who despite showing up at all the wrong times, has a hard time believing Cobb is actually falling victim to monstrous phantoms that lurk in his closet at night; a channel to another ungodly dimension. One episode of Cobb's has him flashing back to his days in Nam, where visions of his deceased best buddy Big Ben (Night Court's Richard Moll) torments the hell out of him. Or into him! With a funny and frightening script co-written by horror/comedy stalwart Fred Dekker (Night of the Creeps, Monster Squad), costarring Kay Lenz and Mary Stavin, House is at least worth renting, renting with an option to buy.

#17: The Entity (1981)

Although not a haunted house proper, The Entity stands as one of the most foul, truly repulsive ghost stories to ever grace a big screen. Based on a true tale and Frank De Felitta's novel (he also inked the screenplay), the flick revolves around a woman who is repeatedly assaulted and sexually molested by a vicious invisible spirit. It happens everywhere she goes, including her own home. When she confers with a phalanx of different doctors, most agree that the woman is out of her gourd and by and large imagining the attacks. This can be a pretty hard picture to watch at times. The visual representations of the woman being tossed around the room; held and pinned down against her will, essentially being raped by roaming vapor is borderline exploitation sleaze, but it owns a genuine fright factor. To think it actually happened to someone in reality makes it all the more perturbing. In OMGHorror's interview with famed parapsychologist Barry Taff, he confided that The Entity was in fact based on the case he worked on in 1974-75. Since he invested time and effort to inform the writings of De Felitta, Taff was ultimately dissatisfied with the "cheapening" of the material director Sydney J. Furie imbued the film with. Starring Barbara Hershey and Ron Silver.

#16: 13 Ghosts (1960)

With our only repeat director on the list, William Castle shot and released this film in "Illusion O," a process that required viewers to wear special lenses in theaters that were akin and mistaken for 3-D glasses (this process required red coloring, not both red and blue). The glasses were said to allow the viewers to see hovering ghosts onscreen before the characters in the movie were made privy. With a lighter, more exuberant fun-filled approach, this story revolves around a family that inherits a dilapidated house fraught with 13 demonic entities, each with a unique look and grueling method-of-madness. Among them: a blazing skeleton, a headless lion tamer, an axe-wielding executioner, a barbarous Italian chef, etc. With the unabashed B-movie gimmicks and vivid, at times overwrought ambience, Thirteen Ghosts secures a deserved historical place in the pantheon of memorable haunted house flicks (the remake, while a tinge better than the remakes of others on this list, unfortunately does not). Comprising part of Castle's cast are Donald Woods, Rosemary De Camp, Charles Herbert, Jo Morrow and Martin Milner. Nab yourself a DVD quick style; two sets of lenses (red and blue) are said to be included.

#15: The Sentinel (1977)

Penned by Jeffrey Konvitz (Silent Night, Bloody Night), based on his own novel, The Sentinel is about a troubled, twice-suicidal fashion model named Alison Parker (Christina Raines). When she moves out on her own, she lands a reasonably priced posh Brooklyn brownstone. Upon residence, Alison is soon plagued by malicious visions, eerie flashbacks and physical ailments (fainting) that have the model questioning the reality of her own existence. When invited to a party thrown by neighbors in the apartment complex, Alison witnesses how strange and bizarre all of her neighbors act. Upon investigation, her rental agent reveals a shockingly horrific truth about the building she lives in; it's in effect, an active portal to hell. Her neighbors exist as mere minions of underworld murder, desperate to overtake the young woman's soul. With a delectably down beat ending and a dream-team cast including Martin Balsam, Burgess Meredith, Ava Gardener, Eli Wallach, John Carradine, Jerry Orbach, Beverly D'Angelo and a young Christopher Walken, The Sentinel is a solid, creepy, good old fashioned haunted house tale.

#14: Amityville Horror (1979)

Based on a supposed true story and the Jay Anson tome, Director Stuart Rosenberg (Cool Hand Luke, The Pope of Greenwich Village) places his parable of the paranormal in Amityville, New York. When newly weds George (James Brolin) and Kathy Lutz (Margot Kidder) move into an affordable dream home to raise their three children (Kathy's from a prior marriage), the couple soon get a tad more then they bargained for. See, a year prior another family was brutally butchered to death in the same home. The Lutz's consult a priest (Rod Stieger) who blesses the house, but instead of a proper exorcism, a demonic force is uncorked that begins to sadistically taunt and toy with the family. With a scythe-sharp opening, a rather torpid second act and a hate-it-or-love-it conclusion, the film's popularity has said to be attributed to the "true story" selling point and success of the original novel. Yet despite its dreary décor (perhaps in spite of it), the film fuses basic special effects with a serviceable story and decent acting (save for Stieger's laughably smoked ham performance), creating a result that generates a few legitimate nape-tingling moments.

#13: The Devil's Backbone (2001)

Self-described by director Guillermo Del Toro as a "sibling" piece to his 2006 film Pan's Labyrinth, The Devil's Backbone is a high energy, wildly imaginative ghost story that takes place in a 1939 post-Spanish Civil War orphanage. The protagonist, a 10 year old boy named Carlos, becomes panicked and febrile upon the haunting of an apparition called Santi, who warns the boy that many in the institution will soon perish. As the war slowly begins to subsume the orphanage, the abandoned boys must band together to ensure survival. A very nice variation of the ghost theme here, instead of being malevolent and vicious, the ghost is actually a symbiotic vessel of revenge and redemption, as Santi ultimately aides the young boys in the conquest of evil forces. Visually, Del Toro does a magnificent job fusing the historical look of 20th century Spain with futuristic special FX and high-tech action sequences. Starring Eduardo Noriega, Federico Luppi, Junio Valverde, and Fernando Tielve as Carlos, The Devil's Backbone is not only a dark, dusty, kick-ass haunted house spin-off, it's Del Toro's favorite flick of his own, a labor of love that took roughly 16 years (since he wrote it in college) to get produced.

#12: Session 9 (2001)

This just might be my personal favorite on the list (save for maybe Stanley). Writer/director Brad Anderson weaves a deft yarn about an asbestos abatement crew who takes a job in an abandoned mental hospital. As the job gets deeper, a sinister presence is unraveled and a malefic possession of one of the crew members coerces him into committing grotesque murder. And a lot of it! Deliberate pacing, a well crafted story that neither spoon feeds or completely shrouds its plot points, a truly spine-stiffening score, overall great use of sound and voice-over all elevate this flick above your run of the mill haunted horror. The deep focus shots and delicate use of dissolves offer spellbinding, trance like environs that really envelope the viewer. In a CG laden feign-fest world of cinema these days, it's damn refreshing to find a film that relies on good acting and storytelling and never sinks to the low level of simple gross out pay-offs and exorbitant carnage candy. Here we have a low budget, economically firm little horror/mystery flick that all writer/directors should aspire to. Starring Peter Mulligan, David Caruso (I know, but believe me, it's good), Steven Gevedon (co-writer), Josh Lucas, and Brendan Sexton III.

#11: House on Haunted Hill (1959)

Classic horror prodigy Vinnie Price heads the class of talent in William Castle's phantasmagoric House on Haunted Hill. Here, Price plays the cold, chic, calculating millionaire eccentric Fredrick Loren. With a slight thematic deviation, this story sees Loren invite five strangers to his mansion that is allegedly possessed; a perpetual place of murder. Loren offers $10,000 to any survivor who can endure staying in the house overnight without a hitch. When midnight strikes, all doors are locked, all avenues of communication closed for good. As the night presses on, each guest must not only fend for their own survival, but must discern if the jarring activity is a manifestation of physical phenomena or if it is just the sick and twisted doings of Loren himself. With a brisk 75 minute run time and a welcome mien of border line campy humor, the film never fails to entertain at the very least. At the very most, the film's no-nonsense approach and black and white imagery nicely combines a sort of cryptic terror with an eerie elegant grace (not unlike The Haunting - remakes of both to be avoided at all costs!) In addition to Price, the flick features Carolyn Craig, Richard Long, Elisha Cook Jr., Carol Omhart and Julie Mitchum (Robert's sis!)

#10: The Others (2001)

Chilean writer/director Alejandro Amenabar sets his gothic story of the ethereal in mid-WW II New Jersey. As the ultra-pious Grace Stewart (Nicole Kidman) inhabits a Victorian mansion with her two sickly photosensitive children, things appear calm and well. Then three servants show up to help with the children, and slowly a barrage of weird, spooky happenings starts to skew the line between what's real and otherworldly. As Grace waits for the return of her war-torn husband (who she concedes might be dead), an efficiently diagrammed plot chalked full of eerie red herrings and brooding menace culminates in one of the most shockingly snap endings that'll not only make your heart leap a beat, but it'll instantly make you want to go back and if not reassess the picture in your head, flat out re-watch it immediately. The picture is dark, gloomy; an inveterate fog usually clogging the exterior shots, the interiors often lit by candle to mysterious effect (a motivated artistic choice given the children's conditions). All in all, The Others is a very nice re-invention on a seemingly tired sub-genre. Those complimenting Kidman include Alakina Mann, James Bentley, Fionnula Flanagan and Christopher Eccleston.

#9: Burnt Offerings (1976)

Lesser known TV horror director Dan Curtis (Dracula, House of Dark Shadows) brings Oliver Reed and Karen Black together as a starring couple in the iniquitously underrated Burnt Offerings. The two play Ben and Marian Rolf, who with their young son David, accept a summer caretakers opportunity in a deserted gothic residence. With such a low rent price, the Rolf's agree to keep an eye on the 85 year old lady who mysteriously lives upstairs. Awfully strange occurrences ensue and we soon gather the house is able to nurture and renew itself by basically feeding on its inhabitants. It's an unnerving, slow burning story that conjoins impressive acting with the glum and grainy tint that pervaded the look of most '70s horror. The hauntingly simple "Music Box" score by Bob Cobert, the daunting on-edge environment and the fuckin' ruler, violently morose ending that is one of the most memorable you'll see make Burnt Offerings an underappreciated haunted gem that if you haven't watched yet, should instantly leapfrog a few notches on your Netflix queue. The film also features Lee Montgomery, Burgess Meredith, Eileen Heckart, and a small turn by screen legend Bette Davis.

#8: The Uninvited (1944)

Nearly 65 years old and counting, aside from being our most historical entry, The Uninvited holds today as the one of the earliest and most effective attempts at a Hollywood "ghost story." Ray Milland and Ruth Hussey play the Fitzgerald siblings Roderick and Pamela, who while chasing their terrier one day, discover an antiquated cliff-house in a small seaside English town. They purchase the abandoned home and almost instantly mystifying disturbances occur. When Roderick courts Stella, the granddaughter of the house's long time landlord, the startling activity begins to heighten to a point where instead of the siblings, the granddaughter is the target of an evil Jinni that may or may not have a link to her own past. The film is a nice minimal blend of film noir and solemn horror technique, never reliant on cheap thrills or gratuitous shock treatment. This is storytelling at its finest, cinematography by Charles Lang as haunting as the theme itself. Speaking of themes, the wispy score of "Stella by Starlight" by Victor Young projects a weepy and hypnotic lament that only helps drive the story toward a satisfying conclusion. Directed by Lewis Allen, the flick costars Donald Crisp, Cornelia Otis Skinner, Alan Napier and Gail Russell.

#7: The Innocents (1961)

Jack Clayton's The Innocents is far and away the crowning film adaptation of Henry James' timeless thread "The Turn of the Screw" (a tale that's been cinematized adnauseam). Deborah Kerr stars as Miss Giddens, a bright-eyed governess assigned to look after two young siblings at a sprawling British estate. Once witnessing how off-key and suspicious the children act, the more Miss Giddens becomes a victim of her own fear, paralyzed by her own paranoia. As she tries to suss the culprit, she digs into the house's past, excavating ambiguous clues and oddly upsetting truths. Is there an ethereal presence? Is it the damned and doomed conjuring of Gidden's schizophrenic mind? Perhaps the best thing about The Innocents is its unwillingness to sate an audience with clear delineation. It never compromises its mystery, which makes the film all the more affecting. With an average shot length of about nine seconds, the film has a lulled, mesmerizing quality that sort of subliminally seeps into your psyche. It has a real lingering effect, staying with you long after you've seen it. Beautifully photographed by Freddie Francis, a melancholy score by Georges Auric, a smart script co-written by Truman Capote, the flick also features Martin Stephens and Pamela Martin.

#6: The Woman in Black (1989)

An obscure made for TV movie that originally aired on England's ITV network in 1989, The Woman in Black is actually one of the more formidable entries on our list. Based on Susan Hill's novel of the same name, the film focuses on a young solicitor who summoned to attend the funeral of lady in a sleepy coastal market town in the U.K. While squaring all the papers away with the deceased lady's seaside estate, the solicitor is pestered with visions of a ghastly specter; a pale and tragic looking woman dressed in all black. The more the solicitor inquires, the less the townsfolk expound on the history of the deceased old lady and the woman in black. The direction by Herbert Wise is pitch perfect; a lean, spare, simply straight forward ghost story that never tries too much or too little to achieve its effect. The atmosphere is almost dreamlike, the tension mounting and piling to an impending sense of real, terrifying doom. There is one reveal shot in the movie that is argued to be among the very scariest of all time; a heart thumping spine-cringer that'll render any person, squeamish or none, down right apoplectic. The film stars Adrian Rawlins, Bernard Hepton, and Pauline Moran in the titular role.

#5: The Legend of Hell House (1973)

British director John Hough employs the musings of renowned author Richard Matheson (novel and script) for his interpretation of the classic, somewhat underappreciated The Legend of Hell House. When a squad of parapsychologists is summoned for a week to exorcise the grisly Djinn that has killed or left insane any survivors that inhabit the Belasco mansion, all horrifying hell breaks loose. With a small cast and a few creepy set pieces, the film has a cornered, claustrophobic feel that only serves to heighten the suspense and overall disconcertion. The implied, off-screen mayhem and uncanny score are tightly melded with blood-curdling thrills and first rate acting that always keeps the momentum of the film rolling. The subplot pitting science vs. religion is a nice way to ground the film and express different psychologies and motivations each facet has concerning the afterlife. Shot in low budget 1972, the visuals offer that gritty and grueling atmosphere that only compounds the level of unrest. Starring Roddy McDowell, Gayle Hunnicutt, Pamela Franklin and Clive Revill, The Legend of Hell House is a tautly terrifying haunted horror masterwork.

#4: Poltergeist (1982)

Written and produced by the most popular filmmaker there ever was, Steven Spielberg, the direction by Tobe Hooper has been a roiled point of speculation for a long time. It's been said that due to creative differences, Hooper was replaced mid-filming, and the man who would see his E.T. hit theaters only a week after Poltergeist was supposedly manning the reins to this one as well (a still non-disclosed fact, though the flick does have a Spielberg feel). When the Freeling family suddenly finds their suburban house disturbed by a supernatural force that seeks daughter Carol Ann as an innocent conduit to the other side of the living, they must band together and do all that's necessary to restore order and rescue their daughter to safety. With impressive FX work, suspenseful pacing, and very believable acting, Poltergeist lives on as one of the most enduring, salient haunted house stories to ever come along. Starring Craig T. Wilson, JoBeth Williams, Beatrice Straight and Heather O'Rourke, the film is an undoubted must-see! (Read up on the Poltergeist curse, where principle cast members mysteriously died subsequent to each films release, as well as inexplicable on-set mishaps that took place). For my money though, you can't top Kane from part 2.

#3: The Changeling (1980)

In Peter Medak's The Changeling, George C. Scott gives a thoroughly convincing, reserved performance as a bereaved music professor who recently lost his wife and daughter to a car accident. After leasing a long since vacant mansion in Seattle, John Russell (Scott) begins to experience legitimate bone-numbing paranormal activity. He hears noises at the same time every morning, finds a bouncing ball that belonged to his daughter come leaping down the stairs, even communicates (via séance) with the ghost of a child who used to live in the mansion decades prior. As he researches the odious history of the building, a shocking and irreparable truth is uncovered that will alter the course of Russell's life forever. Based on a 1960s episode where a house in Denver, Colorado is said to have experienced similar events. Costarring Melvyn Douglas, Trish Van Devere, Jean Marsh, John Colicos, and Barry Morse, The Changeling is easily one of the most effective, moody and ambient haunted house films we've had the good fortune to see. I dare...scratch that, I double-dog-dare any a hardened hardcore gore-hound to watch The Changeling and not have their skin crawl at least once during the course of the film. For real!

#2: The Haunting (1963)

The late Hollywood heavyweight Robert Wise (West Side Story, The Day the Earth Stood Still) helms arguable the scariest less-is-more haunted house flick to ever be conceived. With the simplicity of rattling windows, creaking doors, spinning doorknobs, an abrupt jump here and there, the film is in no way dependent on gaudy special effects or any kind of digital enhancement. Fear is boiled down to its basic form, and the juxtaposition between the banal and the chimerical is so deftly handled that the result is nothing short of breathtaking. Literally! When four guests, including Dr. Markway (Richard Johnson) are invited to the lurid and storied "Hill House" mansion to vet the existence of afterlife apparitions, all kinds of odd fit hits the shan! With the virtual absence of blood or any tangible ghoulish presence, the film is a testament to how a rather tame but succinct story can trigger such an emotional response in the viewer. Still, 45 years later the flick holds up tremendously well, more so than a bulk of the rest of our list. Rounding out the cast are Julie Harris, Claire Bloom and Russ Tamblyn (who claims he had on off-camera incident on the cemetery grounds where the real house exteriors were filmed, saying it was as terrifying as the film itself - DVD commentary).

#1: The Shining (1980)

Well well, the Overlook Hotel! What else can we say, really? The greatly revered Stanley Kubrick adapts Stephen King's novel about the Torrance family, who become winter caretakers for an enormous, entirely isolated hotel in the Colorado Mountains. Hemmed in by a snow storm, writer husband Jack is slowly spirals into madness, while his son Danny's clairvoyant/telepathic ability ("shining") offers harmful visions and frightening glimpses into the hotel's sordid violent past and immediate blood-soaked future. Easily lauded as one of the scariest horror films ever made, the film employs a host of top flight, Oscar caliber talent that would lend credence to the artistic merit of horror films in general (albeit ephemeral). Kubrick's revolutionary visual style, the low angle stedi-cam shots, the terse layering of tension and unease, the harrowing performance of Nicholson (not to mention Shelly Duvall), and the mind-bending conclusion still hold up today (28 years later) as a much deserved seminal genre staple. Aside from Nicholson and Duvall, the flick features Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers, Barry Nelson, Philip Stone and Joe Turkel. The Shining is easily one of the best films ever constructed, horror or no.

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