Fright Fest Favourites

Yesterday Lauren, my friend at work, and I were talking about scary movies, which got me to thinking about what some of my favourite fright fest films are.  And as it is Friday 13^th it seems an appropriate day to write a post about some of the scariest and most sweaty palm making horror films I’ve seen.

Horror is one of my favourite film genres (there is obviously some psychological reason why we get pleasure from scaring ourselves witless) and I’m usually quite good at watching them through without breaking out in a nervous sweat.  However, there are a few films that I find myself reaching for a cushion to hide behind - because obviously if something were to be ‘coming to get me’ a cushion would be my best protection!

I do enjoy (and I use the term ‘enjoy’ lightly) the gruesome and sadistic films like Saw, Hostel and The Hills Have Eyes and the old classics are great too - think Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween, The Exorcist. I am partial to a bit of Japanese horror (I went through of phase or ordering lots of the Japanese originals on Amazon) – The Ring, Dark Water.  They are usually quite psychological and have a tendency to feature freaky Japanese children who do weird things (freaky children are generally just scary).

Probably most of my scare sessions involve either teen American slasher flicks – Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, thriller horrors (the sort that you believe have the potential to actually happen in real life), such as Paranormal Activity,  or based on ‘true events’ type frighteners like  Wolf Creek and Adrift.  
  
Five Fright Fest Films:  
  
Last House on the Left – sort of a remake of the 60/70’s version, although not half as violent and sadistic as the originals, it still has a few scenes that are quite disturbing but the storyline is great and it is full of ‘will she won’t she’ type tension and suspense 

The Strangers – this has a lot of the things that scare me the most – strange noises from outside, looking out of windows at night, house in the middle of nowhere, creaks and jumps and provokes the ‘it could actually happen’ thought 

 The Grudge - the original Japanese version is much more freaky than the US remake with Sarah Michelle Geller but both are good cover-your-eyes watches 

The Blair Witch Project – genius when it first came out (even if the shakey handcam style made me feel slightly motion sick), mostly due to the great PR and marketing campaign surrounding it

Paranormal Activity 2 – better than the 1^st I think with lots of sitting on the edge of your seat waiting for ‘something’ pop out and make you jump moments

These are just a selection of my favourites and even though we probably spend most of the time being too scared to leave the lounge, shouting ‘you fool’ or ‘why did you do that?’ at the characters who have either opted to grab the worst weapon ever or have decided to leave the safety of the group and wander off into the dark woods on their own to ‘explore’ I am sure that jumpy, gruesome horror films will stay a regular feature in our house.  

I’m looking forward to seeing the new Scream 4 and also Insidious soon too!

Anyone got any good recommendations of horror films I could scare myself senseless with??? Post them below so I can add them to my LOVEFiLM list!  

Horror DVD