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Halloween poster

Movies that feel likeHalloween (1978)

Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween Night 1963, Michael Myers escapes from a mental hospital and returns to the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois to kill again.

If you loved Halloween, the closest films we have are The Fog (1980), The Omen (1976) and Thesis (1996). All three share Halloween's dread and unsettling feel, which is what we rank on before quality.

Seen the big three already? The under-the-radar pick below is What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962).

🍅 97% Rotten Tomatoes★ 7.7 IMDb ↗TMDB ↗dir. John Carpenterdreadunsettlingtense
11 of 12 streaming nowNetflix · Amazon Prime Video · Paramount Plus Premium

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If Halloween hit the spot, these will too

Looking for the series itself? Also in this series: Halloween (2018) · Halloween Kills (2021)

The Fog poster
The Fog
1980 · dir. John Carpenter
🍅 77%★ 6.8horrorPrime VideoPeacock

Carpenter's own slow-building dread descending on another small town

The difference: A supernatural ghost-ship menace, not one masked human predator

Strange things begin to occur as a tiny California coastal town prepares to commemorate its centenary. Inanimate objects spring eerily to life; Rev. Malone stumbles upon a dark secret about the town's founding; radio announcer Stevie witnesses a mystical fire; and hitchhiker Elizabeth discovers the mutilated corpse of a fisherman. Then a mysterious iridescent fog descends upon the village, and more people start to die.

The Omen poster
The Omen
1976 · dir. Richard Donner
🍅 76%★ 7.5horror · thrillerPeacock

A quietly mounting sense that evil has already arrived and can't be stopped

The difference: A supernatural antichrist conspiracy, not a masked stalker in the suburbs

Immediately after their miscarriage, the US diplomat Robert Thorn adopts the newborn Damien without the knowledge of his wife. Yet what he doesn’t know is that their new son is the son of the devil.

Thesis poster
Thesis
1996 · dir. Alejandro Amenábar
🍅 86%★ 7.4horror · thriller

A methodical serial-killer thriller that trusts patience over cheap shocks

The difference: A film-school investigation plot, not a masked figure stalking teens

While working on a thesis about audiovisual violence, film student Ángela finds a snuff video where a girl is tortured until death. Soon she discovers that she was a former student in her university, and that the authors of the video are not very far either.

The Birds poster
The Birds
1963 · dir. Alfred Hitchcock
🍅 95%★ 7.6horror · thrillerPeacock

An ordinary town suddenly besieged by an unexplainable, relentless threat

The difference: Nature-gone-wrong horror, not a human killer stalking one victim

Thousands of birds flock into a seaside town and terrorize the residents in a series of deadly attacks.

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? poster
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?
1962 · dir. Robert Aldrich
🍅 91%★ 8horror · thriller

Dread-soaked where it counts, unsettling underneath

A former vaudeville child star viciously torments her paraplegic sister in their decaying Hollywood mansion.

Nightwatch poster
Nightwatch
1994 · dir. Ole Bornedal
🍅 63%★ 7.1horror · thriller

Horror built on tension, twice over

The difference: The critics' underdog of the pair

Martin, a law student, takes up a job as a nightwatchman at a mortuary to fund his studies. But the mortuary harbours a dark secret, and he has to find the truth before he is implicated in a serial murder case.

Silent Night, Deadly Night poster
Silent Night, Deadly Night
1984 · dir. Charles E. Sellier Jr.
🍅 55%★ 5.8thriller · horrorPrime Video

A holiday setting turned into the backdrop for a relentless killer's return

The difference: A cheaper, gorier slasher riff with none of Carpenter's restraint

After a man dressed as Santa Claus brutally murders Billy Chapman's parents, little Billy then endures the cruelty of a sadistic nun at his orphanage. Years later, when adult Billy has to fill in for an absent in-store Santa, his childhood trauma brings him to the breaking point.

Jaws 2 poster
Jaws 2
1978 · dir. Jeannot Szwarc
🍅 56%★ 5.8horror · thrillerNetflixStarz

An unstoppable predator returning to terrorize a town that thought it was safe

The difference: An open-water shark sequel, not a masked killer stalking suburban streets

Police chief Brody must protect the citizens of Amity after a second monstrous shark begins terrorizing the waters.

Candyman poster
Candyman
1992 · dir. Bernard Rose
🍅 79%★ 6.8drama · horror · thrillerPrime VideoPeacock

An urban legend proving disturbingly real to the person who doubts it

The difference: A hook-handed myth investigation, weightier and more melancholy in tone

The Candyman, a murderous soul with a hook for a hand, is accidentally summoned to reality by a skeptic grad student researching the monster's myth.

Ring poster
Ring
1998 · dir. Hideo Nakata
🍅 98%★ 7.2horror · thriller

A creeping supernatural dread that spreads once you've simply seen it

The difference: A cursed-videotape mystery, not a flesh-and-blood killer on the loose

A mysterious video has been linked to a number of deaths, and when an inquisitive journalist finds the tape and views it herself, she sets in motion a chain of events that puts her own life in danger.

Drag Me to Hell poster
Drag Me to Hell
2009 · dir. Sam Raimi
🍅 92%★ 6.6horror · thrillerParamount+Peacock

An ordinary person marked by something evil that refuses to let go

The difference: A supernatural curse comedy-horror, campier than Carpenter's dead-serious dread

After denying a woman the extension she needs to keep her home, loan officer Christine Brown sees her once-promising life take a startling turn for the worse. Christine is convinced she's been cursed by a Gypsy, but her boyfriend is skeptical. Her only hope seems to lie in a psychic who claims he can help her lift the curse and keep her soul from being dragged straight to hell.

Insidious: Chapter 2 poster
Insidious: Chapter 2
2013 · dir. James Wan
🍅 38%★ 6.6horror · thriller

The same two preoccupations: halloween, and family

The difference: Made in the 2010s, in a different era of the craft

The haunted Lambert family seeks to uncover the mysterious childhood secret that has left them dangerously connected to the spirit world.

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The best-reviewed films that share Halloween’s defining feeling.