Eight Overlooked Indie Horror Films to Watch All Year Round

These indie movies know how to pack big scares on small budgets

Another Halloween has come and gone, and while the festivities may be over, the desire to be scared is as evergreen as the trees already replacing pumpkins.

Horror is a very peculiar genre — it can be difficult to find a movie that will fully deliver the chills, screams, and sleepless nights we crave at our most masochistic. Hollywood horror offerings are often carbon copies of one another and trying to select something to watch that’s worth your time can be a real source of fatigue.

Enter the indie horror film. Free from the constraints of big Hollywood studios, indie horror films largely have free reign to break all the rules. In a genre where things are inherently out of the ordinary, these are the films where things really get crazy.

Indie horror doesn’t always rely on gore or jump scares the way many major studio releases do. Their typically-lower budgets demand directors to get creative, and not being able to tell what will happen next is half of the fun.

But of course not every indie horror film is good. Sometimes they’re even so bad they’re good. The following films have something different: palpable suspense, arthouse horror, so-weird-they’re-terrifying screenplays, and bold scares.

Kiss of the Damned (2012)

Kiss of the Damned is a sexy vampire flick reminiscent of 1970’s b-movie horror films. Directed by a member of one of Hollywood’s great dynasties, Xan Cassavetes, the film is one of the more mainstream selections on this list.

Milo Ventimiglia stars as Paolo, a screenwriter who meets and falls in love with Djuna, a beautiful woman he soon finds out is a vampire. Djuna is part of a community of vampires that live on the blood of animals and not humans. However, when Djuna’s reckless, human-killing sister arrives she throws a wrench into the couple’s happy life, threatening to expose Djuna’s identity.

The Eyes of My Mother (2016)

The first five minutes of The Eyes of My Mother unfold faster and more unexpectedly than most horror films do in their entire runtime. It’s a prologue to the strange odyssey that unfolds throughout the rest of the film.

This is one horror movie that is best to go into completely blind. Filmed entirely in black-and-white, the film uses its gorgeously horrific shots to leave the viewer feeling haunted by this strange, nightmarish tale long after the credits have ended.

Knife + Heart (2018)

Bursting with lush colors and a brilliant score composed by electronic group M83, Knife+Heart is a sort-of-slasher film close to being the modern, French version of Italian thrillers. The film follows a French gay porn producer in the late 1970s as she tries to investigate who keeps murdering the actors in her films and why.

What she discovers leads her on an emotional odyssey inside of herself and her work. Knife+Heart features some of the most striking cinematography of the decade, but this is not an indie horror film that relies solely on its beauty to affect the viewer. The writing, acting, score, and photography all work together to make Knife+Heart one of the most memorable and worthwhile films on this list.

Absentia (2011)

Before Mike Flanagan directed Doctor Sleep, the brand new sequel to The Shining, he directed a string of low-to-moderately budgeted horror films of varying quality. The earliest of those (and arguably the best) is Absentia, a Kickstarter-funded of tale of two sisters, Tricia and Callie, who come together after a period of estrangement to file a death certificate for Tricia’s husband who has been missing for seven years. When Callie is drawn to a tunnel near Tricia’s house, she realizes it may be connected to a string of mysterious and possibly supernatural disappearances in the area.

The film proves that what you don’t see can be far scarier than what you do. Absentia is the kind of film to watch with all the lights off, just be sure you can quickly turn them back on once the movie ends.

The House of the Devil (2009)

Would any list of indie movies be complete without genre-darling Greta Gerwig? She may just be a supporting character here, but it’s always nice to see a familiar face for some relief when things get tense. And in The House of the Devil things definitely get tense.

Part babysitter-home-invasion film, part sacrificial-possession film, the movie plays out as a fun yet unexpectedly creepy homage to 80s horror. Waiting for a pizza delivery has never been this suspenseful.

Starry Eyes (2014)

If House of The Devil sounds interesting but you prefer your horror with a little bit more of a message, look towards Starry Eyes. A slow burn about a young woman who moves to Hollywood with dreams of being an actress. When she discovers that the secrets behind fame and fortune may be a little more nefarious than one would imagine, she enters into a life-changing deal to nab herself a spot among the Hollywood elite.

The Blackcoat’s Daughter (2015)

As far as indie studios go, A24 has become so popular among film fans that some might argue it’s one of the most mainstream indie studios out there. They have been distributing some incredible horror films over the past few years such as It Follows, The Witch, and Green Room.

However, those films have all been talked about incessantly and if you’re a horror fan you’ve likely already seen one of them. The Blackcoat’s Daughter seems to be one of A24’s most overlooked releases and it’s hard to understand why.

Starring Kiernan Shipka (The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) and Emma Roberts (American Horror Story), the film follows two young women who are isolated at their boarding school in the dead of winter while one of them is pursued by an entity for an unknown reason. The cold, dark atmosphere chills the viewer to the bone until they’re frozen in suspense. It may be an accessible entry to this list, but it’s certainly worth checking out even just to rate it amongst A24’s other horror offerings.

The Mothman Curse (2014)

Admittedly, this is a bit of a wildcard. The Mothman Curse makes very little narrative sense, but sometimes not knowing what you just watched when the credits roll can make for a great and memorable experience. Unfortunately, the film has little ties to the legend of the infamous cryptid Mothman — a half-moth, half-man creature whose origin has only been explored in one forgettable Hollywood film — but what it lacks in ties to that fabled creature, it makes up for in sheer ballsy weirdness.

It’s shot like a student film and scenes are converted into a strange, black-and-white/night vision combo, making it feel exactly like a monochromatic fever dream. The film follows two women who are interrupted by a sinister, shadowy presence while cataloging a film museum. Soon after, the being makes its way into their dreams until it permeates their consciousness. If you’re looking for something more narratively sound, choose anything else on this list. But if you’re looking to scream a couple of times while being surprised, unnerved, and possibly maddened, then The Mothman Curse should be your pick.

[Originally published by Taste on November 8, 2019]