It has been another year of great genre films. Watch the rocking chair whilst I pontificate, but I can remember many years of eking out a list of ten films, most of which were forgettable, but, hey, a list was needed! The past several years have seen a resurgence in thoughtful, frightening films. My list has become a struggle to decide between those movies that fly a bit under the radar and those that are universally loved, and it is an embarrassment of riches. But enough jawing about the great state of horror in 2018. Let’s get to listing!

10) A Quiet Place

I like monster movies. I like movies where a small group of people struggle to survive against seemingly impossible odds in an effort to rebuild some kind of civilization. I also like things that are kinda dumb, but entertaining. These are the reasons for A Quiet Place showing up on my list. While there are several moments following the viewing (and some during) where you find yourself asking the “Why don’t they…” questions, and the answers can be particularly unsatisfying, but the strength of John Krasinski’s horror hit is in the excellent pacing and fascinating world created within the film. Emily Blunt is, as usual, quite good and it starts with a nasty bit of business that is never matched in the later film. Still, this was one I enjoyed going back to as pure popcorn entertainment.

9) Terrified

Writer-director Demian Rugna’s throw-it-all-at-the-wall approach to making Terrfied could have resulted in a jumbled mess, and I would argue that it doesn’t quite add up to the sum of its parts. Still… The scene with the woman in the shower. And the boy at the table. And hiding from the thing in the wardrobe. These were all exceptional moments in this foreign treat, and I don’t know that any film on this list is more horror than Terrified. I am genuinely excited about the Guillermo del Toro-produced remake if only to potentially iron out some narrative snags while keeping the creepy intact. Here’s hoping!

8) Annihilation

Alex Garland’s follow-up to Ex Machina is just as dense and captivating as his take on AI residing in a too-human body. This time around, he’s sending a group of women led by Jennifer Jason Leigh into a mysterious field that is slowly growing in size and from which no team has ever returned. While this one may lean more heavily into science fiction territory, there is no denying the body horror elements within Annihilation. Natalie Portman is efficient as the wife of a recently-returned soldier who can’t quite make sense of what happened to him within the haze of this mysterious zone. It’s a mind-bending and surreal film that ends in a place that can be open to wildly different interpretations. Also, that bear…

7) Satan’s Slaves

Another gift from Shudder, Satan’s Slaves borrows heavily from a lot of modern chillers, notably the James Wan-style classic haunted house stories. Unlike Wan’s work, however, Satan’s Slaves possesses a nastiness that Wan only occasionally indulges in. The result is a twisting and spooky story about Faustian bargains and the cost of fame. From the chilling imagery of the dying mother to a certain scene involving a bus, this is one that I found truly wonderful from its first frame to its last.

6) Cam

I can’t quite say the same of the final entry on our bottom five of this illustrious list. I have my issues with Cam, but I have also obsessed over the meaning of the conclusion. This peek into the world of cam girls and their fans is alternately fascinating and head-scratching, and I still do not entirely know what to make of the ending. And yet, I have a hard time not considering this one of the best films of the year for its portrayal of the complicated issues around women’s sexuality in the age of internet fame. Are the women in control of their own sexuality, or are they a willing product, posed for the pleasure of the viewers? Or maybe something else entirely? All I know for sure is that I have had more and more enjoyable conversations over this movie than almost any other on the list.

5) Ravenous (Les Affames)

I am hard-pressed to find a zombie film that can make me sit up and take notice, but Ravenous adds just enough to the typical zombie outbreak story to make something unusual and wonderful. Yes, the infected still want to munch on the uninfected, but they also have their own sort of primal civilization. The monoliths of commercialism rise high among the ruins in this film, which also features an intriguing take on the downer endings often encountered in this type of film. Report back once you’ve seen it and we’ll talk about what that ending means.

4) Revenge

Did I mention what a strong service Shudder has become? They also provided me with my fourth-favorite film of the year, a bloody bit of moviemaking called Revenge. As the title suggests, this is a rape-revenge film, the kind of movie that was relegated to drive-ins on the back end of a distasteful double feature. Coralie Fargeat takes the helm and guides what could be a simple exploitation flick into the realm of art-house feminist explosive, turning the tale of Matilda Lutz’s assault and subsequent path to justice into something not quite supernatural, but maybe? The assault scene is uncomfortable but not exploitative (a careful balance), and the subsequent action seems to have been directed with the words “More blood!” as the common refrain. The final fifteen minutes are a blood-soaked masterpiece of tension and dark comedy.

3) The Endless

No other movie on this list made me come out of my chair with a standing ovation like The Endless. There is a moment of such joy for me in this one that it will go down as one of the most satisfying cinematic surprises of my life. In addition to that one sweet reveal, The Endless matches the successes of Resolution and Spring in grounding itself in characters and allowing the fantastical happenings unfold like a magic trick in slow motion. You know something incredible is about to happen, you just don’t know what. When the secrets of The Endless are laid bare, it is no less satisfying. A wonderfully convoluted mythology awaits you with this one. Don’t rush it. Let it happen.

2) Hereditary

The movie that again raised the insufferable question of what is or is not horror is my number two. First, it is most certainly a horror film. Second, I actually thing the horror film part of Hereditary is the least interesting. Sure, there are some great visuals in the last act, but it’s really the first hour and change of this movie that blew my back in my chair. From Toni Collette’s painfully raw performance and the numbed shock of Alex Wolff as her son to the stunning turn in the now-infamous car scene… it lingers. This movie gets in your craw and stays there, forcing you to examine the familial dynamics of the movie in increasingly disturbing ways. On the one hand, it’s a modern take on Rosemary’s Baby. On the other, it’s one of the most visceral family dramas I’ve ever seen. The combination is frequently breathtaking and a movie that will live on in the pantheon of new classics of the genre.

1) Mandy

Here we are. The thing I saw this year that affected me the most. Mandy is a Heavy Metal comic with a score by Yes and cinematography from one of those sleep experiment patients. It’s a blend of Creepshow lighting and the plotting of an LSD-rattled opera composer just wrapping his eightieth viewing of Hellraiser. It’s a Goblin score applied to an art film designed to test the limits of human consciousness.

If you had told me at the beginning of this year that my favorite movie would be a Nicholas Cage movie from the director of Beyond the Black Rainbow, I would have rolled my eyes so hard they would have come around again. But that’s just what happened. this movie exists as a marvel, an unflinching artistic vision. Mandy is exactly what it’s supposed to be, as if birthed whole-cloth from Panos Cosmatos’s brain instead of a movie requiring a cast and crew. It’s hard to imagine what the set was like, how it all came together, and yet somehow it did and we are all the better for sharing the world with something like Mandy. Nothing else came close this year as a singular vision for what a movie should be, and what it might be capable of. If someone tells me they couldn’t enjoy a viewing of Mandy, I immediately understand. It is art and, like all art, it will dismay some and reward others. All I know is that I love this movie and it reveals more of itself with each viewing. I am always pleased to find a movie that not only makes a yearly list exciting, it will follow me the rest of my days. Whenever someone says, “What should I watch tonight?” I will ask, “Have you seen Mandy?” My god, it’s full of stars…

Some honorable mentions before we wrap it up:

The Haunting of Hill House

As good as horror was on the big screen this year, television more than matched pace. Mike Flanagan’s The Haunting of Hill House is 9 1/2 hours of perfection followed by 30 minutes of saccharine resolution. Who cares? This was a phenomenon. Even non-horror fans jumped on this train and we’re scared witless for their efforts. And make no mistake, this was a scary show. Dare you to watch the whole thing alone in the dark. I’ll wait…

The Terror

Another television offering, this is as close to The Thing‘s atmosphere of desolation and doom as we are likely to get. A period piece, a naval story, and a supernatural fable about human failing, The Terror landed early in the year and hung with me as one of the finest examples of horror television I have ever seen. Jared Harris is terrific and the final two episodes are harrowing and gruesome. Amazing.

And that’s my best of 2018. What did you think? Drop me a line here or come say hi on the Legion Facebook group!