Back In The Day: The 10 Best Horror Movies From The 80s

Ahh, the ’80s. What a decade. Mullets were cool, yo-yos were a thing, shoulder pads made even the most beautiful girl look peculiarly repellent, and half the globe strutted their stuff with a ghetto-blaster on their shoulder and a Game Boy in their back pocket. Happy days. The ’80s were bodacious, and would probably be the first place most folks visit when time travel finally gets invented (come on, Doc!). But it wasn’t solely a decade of dodgy fashion sense, incredible music and the mass market explosion of video games — it was arguably the creative zenith of modern horror movies, too; a perfect storm of enhanced special visual effects, cheap production costs, great box office numbers, and a swelling matinee culture’s ravenous appetite for more, more, more. So, we’ve decided to do what we did recently for ’90s horror flicks, but instead re-focus on the ’80s. It’s time for WGTC to wrestle the age old question: What were the best horror movies from the ’80s? Before we get to the list, we’d like to touch on a few honourable mentions that didn’t quite make the final cut: The Lost Boys and Gremlins are charming, quintessential, more family-orientated horror-comedy entries into the genre; John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness and George Romero’s Day of the Dead are smart, creepy cult-classic gems, and An American Werewolf In London and The Blob blend body horror with a dash of cheesy black humour to captivatingly great effect. Also, James Cameron’s incredible sci-fi sequel Aliens is an absolute masterpiece, but leans a little too heavily into the action to warrant an entry on this horror-focused list. And finally, Child’s Play kept us up for nights on end, but it sadly doesn’t quite stand as tall with more modern, mature eyes. So, come join us as we take a trip down memory lane to the excessive and extraordinary heights of the ’80s. Just, like, don’t forget to bring a Rubick’s Cube and your most gnarly, totally radical headband for the ride, yeah… 10) The Return Of The Living Dead (1985) Another day, another government germ warfare project gone awry. Alien scribe Dan O’Bannon made his directorial debut with this cult horror-comedy that embraced the schlock whilst preserving the shock. While trying to impress newbie employee Freddy, the medical warehouse foreman Frank accidentally releases a deadly toxin from within military experimental drums hidden inside the building’s basement, which renders the pair unconscious. Upon awakening, the duo quickly realize that the secretive fumes they've unleashed harbour the power to re-animate the bodies of dead corpses. Oops. Replete with a tongue-in-cheek self-referential sense of humour, a strikingly brash punk-rock attitude and some terrific practical visual effects, too, The Return of The Living Dead is an absolute classic that helped fuel our rapidly growing fascination with the ol’ walking dead. Interestingly, it was also the first flick to introduce the well-known concept of zombies wanting to eat our yummy human brains. Mmmm, tasty. 9) Friday The 13th (1980) Kicking off one of the longest running horror film series to ever grace the big screen is this blood-soaked shocker from director Sean S. Cunningham. Spurred by the success of John Carpenter’s 1978 slasher masterpiece Halloween, Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. aimed to capitalize on the new, burgeoning low-budget slasher subgenre. Their decision paid dividends, as the Friday The 13th series would go on to become a multi-million dollar media franchise that would span across twelve movies, a TV show and two video games (we’re sure we haven’t seen the last from this iconic madman, either). Though Jason Voorhees’ legendary hockey mask doesn’t make an appearance until the third installment, the original Friday The 13th will be forever burned into our memories as the gory introduction to one of cinema’s most fierce and unrelenting teen-slasher villains. 8) Hellraiser (1987) We can’t think of many baddies that look as aesthetically terrifying as Pinhead and his ramshackle gang of cenobites (these guys would be a shoo-in for a best dressed award at any Halloween costume competition!). From the creative mind of visionary British horror author Clive Barker - in his directorial debut, no less - comes Hellraiser; a dark and twisted journey that delves into themes of obsession, despair, betrayal and the blurred lines between pleasure and pain. Barker’s hellish opus focuses on a mysterious Pandora’s box that opens up a portal to the labyrinthian dreamscapes of the underworld, and releases a myriad of disturbing creatures that terrorize whomever's unlucky enough to open it. With some hauntingly pitch-dark imagery and a choice assortment of excellently delivered dialogue - who can forget: “We’ll tear your soul aparrrrt!”? - Hellraiser stands out as one of the finest British horror flicks to come out from the ’80s. 7) Re-Animator (1985) Loosely based on H.P. Lovecraft’s episodic novella series Herbert West—Re-animator, first-time director Stuart Gordon’s gore-tastic splatterfest is a fun, campy, no holds barred descent into should-I-laugh-or-should-I-vomit territory? (chances are, you’ll probably do both). Mad scientist Herbert West has concocted a mysterious serum that can bring dead tissue back to life. Following the death of his professor (in a super gruesome opening scene that sets the tone for the entire flick), West travels to the USA to continue his research. The real twist is that West isn’t the true villain of the movie, but instead acts as more of a likeable anti-hero. Pepper in some grisly practical effects that never let up, a playful Psycho inspired score and a wealth of surprisingly smart writing that fuses together ideas from Frankenstein with other old-school, lo-fi horror films like the 1960’s The Hypnotic Eye, and add in some terrifically memorable performances from bonkers genius West (Jeffrey Combs) and all out evil professor Dr. Carl Hill (David Gale), and you’re left with a movie that frequently runs the gamut between laugh-out-loud hilarity as well as delivering some hardcore gross-out moments that’ll have you reaching for a sick-bag. Re-Animator is a ground-breaking and marvelously memorable horror flick that deserves your undivided attention. The squeamish need not apply… 6) The Evil Dead (1981) Sam Raimi’s debut full-length horror film is an imaginative, low-budget showpiece that centres around demonic possession within the isolated forests of rural Tennessee. Five university students make an unplanned stopover at a remote, abandoned cabin and discover an ancient tome dubbed the “Book of the Dead.” Inadvertently, our gang of adventurers (led by the wonderfully over-the-top Bruce Campbell) release a fiendish demon that is hellbent on possessing the living and spilling as much blood as humanly demonly possible. Though the movie was shot on a shoestring budget, the film would go on to become a multi-sequel media franchise, similar to Friday The 13th. Its writer-director would also move on to direct the Spider-Man trilogy with Tobey Maguire in 2002, and craft the spectacularly brilliant Drag Me To Hell in 2009. Back in the ’80s, The Evil Dead didn’t so much as push the gore envelope, but instead ripped the darned thing up, covered it in crimson corn syrup and blasted it through a 12-gauge boomstick. It’s a deliciously nasty horror cult-classic that’ll give any teen horror-junkie a dose of jumpy jolts, creepy look-away-from-the-screen scares, and a few laughs to boot. 5) Poltergeist (1982) It’s rare to find an example of horror with as much heart as Tobe Hooper’s Poltergeist, a feature some believe was actually directed by Steven Spielberg. Interestingly, the King of Entertainment had a clause in his contract for E.T. the Extra Terrestrial which stopped him from directing another movie while shooting his short-legged alien flick. Thus, Spielberg took on a role as a producer for Poltergeist, though apparently spent much of his time on-set in more of a directorial capacity. Still, one truth we know for certain is that the film was an incredibly important movie for the genre, not only for picking up Academy Award nominations (it lost out to Spielberg’s own loveable alien blockbuster movie that year), but in how it managed to get an entirely new audience into the horror genre (it’s one of the only PG rated horror flicks that have gone on to become a critical and commercial success). Focusing on a family’s home haunted by a myriad of resentful phantasms and ghastly apparitions, Poltergeist may not be the scariest movie on this list, but it’s, arguably, one of the most culturally significant. 4) The Fly (1986) David Cronenberg’s remake of the 1958 classic is a deft balance of mad scientist gothic chills and jaw-droppingly gruesome body horror, with a surprisingly touching love story mixed in for good measure. Self-involved scientist Seth Brundle (played superbly by the charismatic Jeff Goldblum) invents a “telepod” that can teleport matter from one pod to another instantaneously. Unfortunately, during a live specimen test - where Brundle himself steps up to the task - the experiment goes horribly awry as the procedure suffers from a literal fly in the ointment. Before the teleportation process begins, an unsuspecting bluebottle fly crawls into the teleporter and winds up fusing the two of them together. At first, Brundle seems perfectly fine, however, it soon becomes clear that his genetic makeup has been altered and intermixed with that of a common housefly. Yikes. This is a true horror classic that smuggles in a poignant, heartbreaking romance between its pulsating and disturbing horrific imagery that really helps elevate it beyond its source material and fellow genre kinship. 3) A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984) Another exquisite gem that helped to propel the teen-slasher subgenre forward was Wes Craven’s dream-shattering monster myth which focused on a knife-handed serial killer who preyed on the young adolescents within the titular street of a town named Madstop. The twist, however, is that Freddy Krueger (played by the creepy Robert Englund) isn’t a mere human being, but is a ghost-like entity that stalks the dreams of his victims, where he kills them in bloody and gruesome fashion. Not only did the movie catapult the late and great Wes Craven (AKA the Master of Horror) into the limelight, but it was also the breakout hit for the now famous Johnny Depp (who played central character Glen Lantz) and was also the beginning of another truly iconic villain who would go on to grace our screens in a further eight films, whilst spawning an assortment of comics, video games, books and even a TV show. Blimey. Whatever you do… DON’T… FALL… ASLEEP… 2) The Shining (1980) Legendary director Stanley Kubrick had just come off something of a box office and critical flop with his 1975 aristocratic period drama Barry Lyndon. In light of this, he set out to craft a motion picture that was not only a commercial success, but was also artistically fulfilling, too, by adapting and putting his own unique spin on Stephen King’s bestselling horror novel. With such a notoriously fraught production and with King declaring the film as a “misogynistic” misinterpretation of the source material, it’s truly amazing that The Shining has not only endured and weathered the storm, but has gone on to become an outright masterpiece in the horror genre. It’s a deeply disturbing piece of psychological terror that revels in its allegorical open-endedness; it’s filled to the brim with artful, poetic symbolism and its cold, stark portrayal of a mind unravelling in a haunted, isolated hotel in the midst of winter is eerily unsettling stuff. Add to this a phenomenal turn from a barmy Jack Nicholson (who ad-libbed a lot of his iconic lines), some of the most memorable and phenomenal cinematography in the genre, a skillfully crafted score that resounds with ominous dread, and imagery that will linger with you long after the credits have rolled, and you’re left with a show-stopping masterpiece that helped to cement Kubrick’s stellar reputation as one of the finest auteurs in Hollywood. 1) The Thing (1982) John Carpenter’s remake of Howard Hawks’ 1951 sci-fi classic is, in our eyes, the best horror movie to come out of the ’80s. It’s an arresting, uncomfortable feature that marries balls-to-the-wall paranoia with an unforgettable, palpable dread that veritably oozes atmosphere and style. Set entirely in an isolated research station in Antarctica, a group of scientists uncover a space craft that crash-landed into the nearby ice 100,000 years ago. The group unwittingly release a hostile alien organism that can re-create its hosts with 100% authenticity. Kurt Russel’s MacReady shines brightly as the cocky, amiable helicopter pilot, while the ensemble cast that surrounds him are fascinating characters played with understated brilliance, nuance and depth. Elsewhere, Carpenter’s trademark synth soundtrack fires on all cylinders and is an absolute doozy, too. It’s a rare example of a director building upon and improving its preceding inspiration; Carpenter’s vision sticks closely to the original John W. Campbell Jr.’s novella Who Goes There? that both of the films are based upon, and deftly crafts a gripping, claustrophobic thrill-ride filled with chin-stroking intrigue and outrageously gruesome visuals. Rob Bottin’s practical special effects, meanwhile, are nothing short of masterful, and have aged gracefully — we rarely get visual effects like this anymore, which is a mighty shame. The thing is, The Thing is an utterly haunting visual and aural nightmare that’ll stick with you long after the curtains have closed. For our money, it’s one of the greatest horror films ever made and is, arguably, John Carpenter’s magnum opus within a body of work that is second to none. And that was all without mentioning that unforgettable scene where that head-thing sprouts legs. *shudders*