The 10 Scariest Horror Movies Ever – Rotten Tomatoes

If you were poking around RT a week and a half or so ago, you might have come across a little poll we were taking on the site to try and determine the Scariest Movie Ever. Based on other lists and suggestions from the RT staff, we pulled together 40 of the scariest movies ever made and asked you to vote for the one that terrified you the most. As it happens, a British broadband service comparison website decided to conduct a science experiment to determine the same thing, and their results were surprising, to say the least. Did Rotten Tomatoes readers agree with the findings? Read on to find out what our fans determined were the 10 Scariest Horror Movies Ever.

You may not agreethatThe Exorcist is the scariest movie ever, but it probably alsoisnt much of a surprise to see it at the top of our list with a whopping 19% of all the votes cast. William Friedkins adaptation of the eponymous novel about a demon-possessed child and the attempts to banish said demon became the highest-grossing R-rated horror film ever and the first to be nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars (it earned nine other nominations and took home two trophies). But outside of its critical and commercial bona fides, the film is well-known for the mass hysteria it inspired across the country, from protests over its controversialsubject matter to widespread reports of nausea and fainting in the audience. Its dramatic pacing and somewhat dated effects may seem quaint compared to some contemporary horror, but theres no denying the power the film continues to have over those who see it for the first time.

Writer-director Ari Aster made a huge splash with his feature directorial debut, a dark family drama about the nature of grief couched within a supernatural horror film. Toni Collette earned a spot in the pantheon of great Oscar snubs with her slowly-ratcheted-up-to-11 performance as bedeviled mother Annie, but the movies biggest shock came courtesy of Well, we wont spoil that here. Suffice it to sayHereditary struck such a nerve with moviegoers that it instantly turned Aster into a director to watch and shot up to second place on our list.

James Wan has staked out a place among the modernmasters of horror, directing films likeSaw,Dead Silence,Insidious, and this inspired-by-true-events chiller based on the experiences of real-life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. The Warrens, best known for their work on the strange case that inspired theAmityville Horror movies (which played a part in The Conjuring 2), were portrayed by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga, who grounded the effective jump scares and freak-out moments with a believable world-weariness. Together, Wan and his co-leads found fresh terror in familiar genre tropes, and the end result is a sprawling cinematic universe that only continues to grow.

Literally dozens of Stephen Kings novels and stories have been adapted for the big screen, and several of those films are considered classics today, likeCarrie,Misery, andPet Sematary (and that doesnt even account for non-horror stuff likeThe Shawshank Redemption andStand By Me). But the mother of them all is easily Stanley Kubricks adaptation ofThe Shining. A marvel of set and production design and a genuinely unnerving take on the traditional haunted house story,The Shining features a host of memorable images and an iconic Jack Nicholson performance. The films relatively few jumps scares are still absolutely chilling, but its true power lies in the way it crawls under your skin and makes you experience Jack Torrances slow descent into madness. Its rightfully considered one of the greatest horror films ever made, and it ranked fourth in our poll.

While the top four movies on this list collectively garnered 42% of the total votes counted, they were followed by six films that all earned around 3% of the vote each. In other words, these last six films were separated by no more than 60 votes. The first of them isthis low-budget slasher directed and co-written by Tobe Hooper, very loosely inspired by the crimes of Ed Gein.Texas Chainsaws grimy aesthetic helped lend it an air of authenticity, which made it all the more frightening (This couldactually happen, you guys!), and the massive, menacing presence of Gunnar Hansens Leatherface paved the way for other brutes like Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees. Multiple attempts have been made to breathe new life into the franchise and we have another one on the way but none have equaled the original in sheer, over-the-top, power tool-inspired terror.

Its always a tricky proposition to take something that works well for one culture and try to translate that formula successfully for another, but Gore Verbinski managed that withThe Ring. A remake of Japanese director Hideo Nakatas acclaimed thriller about a cursed videotape,Verbinskis take kept the original films striking visual imagery the ghost of a young girl in a white dress with long black hair covering her face and found that it scared the hell out of audiences no matter where they were from. While the film wasnt as well-regarded as its predecessor, it features a committed performance from a then up-and-coming Naomi Watts, and for many, it served as an introduction to East Asian horror cinema.

Coming in at the seventh spot on our list is the film that introduced the world to all-time scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis and put John Carpenter on the map.Halloween is frequently cited as one of the earliest examples of the slasher genre as we know it today, and while it may not feature the same kind of realistic gore weve come to expect of films in that category, it packs a lot of tension and some inventive thrills in a relatively small-scale package. The films legacy is also fairly untouchable: Michael Myers mask has become the stuff of legend, and the giant, unstoppable killer and the final girl have become ingrained in the horror lexicon. Theres a reason the franchise is still going after more than 40 years.

For those who didnt read the scientific study mentioned at the top, weve finally come to the film it crowned the scariest. Before he joined the MCU with 2016sDoctor Strange, director Scott Derrickson had racked up a few horror films, a couple of which earned cult followings. One of them was this small-scale haunted house/possession story about a true-crime writer (Ethan Hawke) who moves his wife and kids into a house where a family was murdered, only to discover the new place might already have a rather evil tenant. Writer C. Robert Cargill was reportedly inspired to pen the script based on a nightmare he had after watchingThe Ring, and the story does share a minor similarity with that film, what with the creepy snuff film angle. But for many who saw it, the dramatic reveals and creepy set pieces far outweighed any recycled genre tropes that might have been present. Plus, theres at least one report out there that says its the scariest movie ever made, so that must count for something.

James Wan has already shown up higher on the list, but before he and Patrick Wilson madeThe Conjuring, they worked together on this supernatural thriller about a young boy who falls into a coma and begins to channel a malevolent spirit. The bare bones of the story werent the most groundbreaking, but frequent Wan collaborator Leigh Whannell infused it with a compelling enough mythology that it spawned three more installments. Wan also stated thatInsidious was meant to be something of a corrective to the outright violence ofSaw, which compelled him to craft something on a more spiritual level, and the end result is an effective chiller featuring what is frequently regarded one of the best jump scares ever put on screen.

The fear of clowns is a very real thing, even if its become so commonplace to announce it that it feels disingenuous. If you needed any further evidence, we direct you to the box office haul of 2017sIT, based on the Stephen King novel of the same name, which went on to beatThe Exorcists 44-year record as the highest-grossing horror film ever. Oh, and of course, its 10th-place finish on this list.Andy Muschiettis big-budget adaptation drew on nostalgia to tell its story of children scarred by trauma, while Bill Skarsgards take on Pennywise the evil, shapeshifting clown was bizarre and unsettling in all the right ways. Add a healthy dose of jump scares, a handful of impressive set pieces, and some top-notch CGI, and youve got a recipe for a horror film thats both fun and full of scares.

Thumbnail imagebyFilmDistrict courtesy Everett Collection

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The 10 Scariest Horror Movies Ever - Rotten Tomatoes