Top 12 Horror Films of the '90s

In light of the brief discussion from a previous post about horror in the '80s compared to the '90s and spurred on by comments from another post, I had to look deeper into horror films of the '90s to get a larger sense of the quality. Verdict: what a terrible decade for horror. My initial list of just "good" horror films came to about eighteen and I whittled it down to twelve that I would consider great. It's not even like every year is represented. From '96 to '99, horror was essentially a dead genre. Some things that surprised me or are at least of note:

-- Wes Craven had a pretty solid output through the decade. It's a shame that he's fallen apart in the aughts.

-- There were a ton of shitty remakes and sequels made in the decade. That's still the case now, but at least more people are able to make their own movies even if they're low-budget and direct-to-DVD (and generally not good).

-- With one or two exceptions, my list of films is dominated by well-established genre directors, either of the time or today.

The list is in no order except by release year. As always, if I miss any, let me know!

1990

Gremlins 2: The New Batch -- Joe Dante

Everything is amped up in this sequel. I can see why some wouldn't like it because it's totally different from the original. It's as close to a live action cartoon as one is likely to see and the gremlins are the main attraction. They run amok in a skyscraper that houses seemingly everything imaginable. It's pure, unadulterated chaos that Dante has complete control over. I almost can't believe Gremlins 2 ever got made. It's totally meta (Leonard Maltin is attacked while reviewing the first film) and ridiculous and I love every second of it.

Tremors -- Ron Underwood

My dad is the biggest fan of this series I've ever met. I can't remember if I showed it to him or we rented it together, but he owns all four movies plus the TV series. I'm nowhere near his level of fandom, but the first Tremors is definitely worth it. Horror comedy is tough to pull off, especially when it's basically a special effects heavy monster movie in which realism is key to the success of the movie. Tremors gets great performances from Fred Ward and Kevin Bacon and their chemistry is so good that it's sad Bacon didn't come back at least for the second one. One would be remiss if Michael Gross isn't mentioned as he carries much of the remaining series. It's amazing how far away from Family Ties he is as gun nut Burt Gummer.

1992

Dead/Alive (aka Braindead)

For the longest time, this was the only movie I would never force anyone to watch. Generally, I'd invite friends over to watch a certain horror movie or series of movies whether they are fans of the genre or not. They don't mind much because it's in a group and spirits are high. But Dead/Alive was a no go. It's incredibly gross and weird and I didn't think the novices would be able to take it. After seeing it playing on a TV in a bar recently, I've changed my mind. Everyone has to see it. In fact, it's impossible to look away from Dead/Alive. It's over-the-top and hilarious with great gore and puppeteering. I dare you to watch this movie and figure out how Peter Jackson went from this to being trusted with one of the biggest motion picture franchises ever (AND shooting all three of those movies back to back to back). It boggles the mind.

1993

Army of Darkness -- Sam Raimi

I almost eliminated this from my list because I don't believe it's nearly as good as Evil Dead I or II and I've seen it so many times (and so many versions of it) that I feel like it's losing its luster (kind of like The Big Lebowski). However, it's brought me so much joy and I still find myself watching it even though I think I don't need to anymore. Great one-liners, tons of awesome gags, and it's nice to see so many old school effects even if many of them are terrible. The shoot may have been horrible, but it doesn't show on screen. As amazing as Bruce Campbell is in the first two, watching him in this is like watching an entirely different actor. The man commands the screen. It's like we watched him grow up and learn how to act through each film in the trilogy.

Cronos -- Guillermo del Toro

This has been covered in much more detail.

1994

In the Mouth of Madness -- John Carpenter

The first time I watched In the Mouth of Madness, I didn't care much for it. I mean, I liked it enough to buy the DVD for $5, but it didn't impress me like The Thing did. However, it won out on the voting amongst friends for a movie to watch and I was blown away. I'm not sure what I missed out on the first time, but it's creepy and sinister and Sam Neill owns the screen. It's Carpenter's homage to the Lovecraft-ian world (the title is taken from two Lovecraft stories) and it packs an amazing, apocalyptic punch. And just to show that I'm not alone, a coworker went through the exact same experience as me. The movie is practically begging to be rewatched.

Wes Craven's New Nightmare -- Wes Craven

Before Craven would get really meta on us with Scream, he towed the water with New Nightmare. Freddy got a new look and lost the elaborate set pieces and quippiness that took over the series in the years since A Nightmare on Elm Street. There's a fair amount of bad acting as studio execs play themselves, but it's nice to see Heather Langenkamp back as well as Robert Englund out of the make-up. Much like In the Mouth of Madness, I only realized how good this film was upon rewatching it, which really makes me insecure about my opinions of things. Those who know me know that I'm not known for an unwillingness to share opinions, so this is potentially earth-shattering for me.

1996

The Frighteners -- Peter Jackson

I'll always associate The Frighteners with Christmas because I saw it for the first time at a Christmas party I had with my friends. We rented it and though I probably a little young (I was terrified of utility knives for a while after), I still loved it. There were funny ghosts and Michael J. Fox was in it! What's not to like? Jeffrey Combs gives what might be his most unhinged performance in a career full of them. What's notable about this film on this list is that it's the first to feature CG heavily. It's almost amazing how great the movie looks given the year it was made (Toy Story was only released the year before) and it still holds up admirably. Given the leaps in technology that Weta had to make to get this movie made, you can draw a straight line from The Frighteners to Lord of the Rings. Also, it's kind of cute the way Jackson tried to pass off the New Zealand locations for an American city.

Scream -- Wes Craven

While Scream may be responsible for 90% of the bad horror films that came out in the five to ten years after it, there's no denying it's a great movie. The characters are well-developed, the script is solid and self-referential, the cast is perfect, and the killer is terrifying. The Ghostface mask was responsible for many sleepless nights for me and even though Scream scared the bejesus out of me (I was in seventh grade when it came out and I couldn't believe that a classmate of mine wanted to see it in theaters, I still read the script to the sequel before it's release (the only movie script I ever read until I had to read one for my screenwriting class) and I saw Scream 2 on opening night. Now that my knowledge of the genre is so much greater than it was at the time, it's fun to go back and watch the various references/homages I didn't get (truth be told, I like the whole series and though I haven't seen 4, I expect to like it too).

1999

Lake Placid -- Steve Miner

Once again, covered ground.

Sleepy Hollow -- Tim Burton

For sheer joy, Sleepy Hollow ranks as one of my favorite movies ever. It's rare to have a movie live up to one's expectations so fully, but I was running along with the horseman in the theater. I couldn't help it. My legs were moving on their own accord. Once again, I saw this relatively early in my horror education so I didn't realize the importance of Christopher Lee or Michael Gough to the genre. I don't mind the changes from the original story since Johnny Depp keeps the spirit of Ichabod alive and well in his squeamishness (and doesn't Burton gleefully bloody Depp at every turn?). Sleepy Hollow may be the last truly great Tim Burton movie (how sad that the '90s signaled the end of quality output from so many good directors [yes, I know Burton is making tons of money for Disney, but the movies suck]).

Bug in the Machine: Cronos

There's so much I like about Guillermo del Toro, his aesthetic, his use of practical effects (when he can), his continual casting of Ron Perlman, yet I don't really love his films. Pan's Labyrinth was awesome, but I don't care much for superhero movies. Hellboy I and II and Blade II are fine for what they are, but I can't view them as anything more than good. Even though I'm not a huge fan of his work, I'm excited that he gets to work because he creates some pretty amazing worlds.

Aside from The Devil's Backbone, Cronos may be de Toro's most restrained movie, which makes sense as it's his first feature. It's about an antiques dealer who finds a mechanism in one of his pieces and, upon activating it, is revitalized. Oh, it also gives him a powerful urge to drink blood. Meanwhile, a rich dying man has been looking for this item for years because he believes it will give him eternal life and keeps sending Ron Perlman to collect it from the antiques dealer. It's a variation on vampire lore which means I've front-loaded October with alternative takes on vampires, thus far.



Del Toro's got a great eye for set design and staging. The warehouse home of the sick man, de la Guardia (Claudio Brook), is sterile and eerie with tiny statues wrapped in plastic hanging from the ceiling and a museum of body parts removed from his person. On the other hand, the antiques dealer, Jesus Gris (Frederico Luppi), eventually moves to a shack on the roof of his house and the setting there is almost magical with shafts of light beaming down through holes in the ceiling. This instinct for creating memorable locations and sets is part of what makes del Toro's films so enthralling to look at.

These old men fighting over the mysterious mechanism each have a protector of sorts. De la Guardia has his nephew, Angel (Perlman) who goes out into the world and does the dirty business and Jesus has his innocent granddaughter who has a mysterious understand of the dangers her grandfather is getting into and a high tolerance for the insanely creepy. There's a lot of importance in character names: Angel de la Guardia means "guardian angel" and Jesus Gris means "gray Jesus." I really want to attach significance to the granddaughter's name, Aurora and I don't think it's a struggle. The rooftop shack fills with shafts of light from the sky and she is seen wearing a red and green jacket later in the film both of which make reference to aurora borealis. She is literally the light in the sky in Cronos.

It was very strange when I realized that Jesus was going to be the main character. I'm not used to movies that feature older people as the protagonists, let alone horror movies. It makes the events of the film that much more believable. Instead of some young person who just wants to live forever, it's a man approaching his last days. He has a happy life and is the guardian of his young grandchild. It's not much of a leap to see why he'd want to prolong his life. The same is true for the dying antagonist. It's a smart decision in a smart movie.

Cronos shot up to probably my second favorite del Toro movie with ease (behind Pan's Labyinth). I'd been contemplating buying the Criterion Blu Ray any time there is a 50% off sale, but balked. I made a huge mistake.

Stray observations I couldn't work in above
-- Ron Perlman likes to hitch himself to talented foreign filmmakers early. He's in this and Jean-Pierre Jeunet's The City of Lost Children. Both del Toro and Jeunet have worked with him multiple times.
-- The backwards funeral suit Jesus wears throughout the end of the film is a welcome bit of humor during some dark scenes. For some reason, it reminded me of the walking headless corpse in Re-Animator.
-- The funeral director and his view of himself as an artist struck me as an homage to Dead and Buried. I think this supports that theory:


And now... a rant.

I watched Cronos on Netflix Instead View right after watching a hitch-free episode of Twin Peaks on the same. However, whereas Twin Peaks was smooth as sil, Cronos had a consistently jerky image. Not enough to really hurt the viewing experience, but enough to be noticeable and annoying. Meanwhile, the sound was perfect. This leads me to believe that there is something wrong with the file Netflix uploaded to their servers (or however they get stuff on Instant View).

It's not enough that Netflix only has a small portion of their movies on Instant View. Or that movies are routinely being picked up and dropped from the roster. Or that some of the foreign movies are only available in dubbed format. But we also have to deal with glitchy Instant View titles? How can a company justify jacking up their prices or splitting streaming and DVD-by-mail when there are still so many issues with one of the options? Unless Netflix can offer nearly flawless playback and give the customer (nearly) everything they want from streaming (more selection, the option for subtitles both to avoid dubbing and for the hearing impaired, quality image, etc), they should never have even thought about charging people for Instant View.