Random Most Underrated Horror Films Of Last 10 Years (12 items)

• 

  (#3) Absentia

  • Doug Jones, Ian Gregory, Justin Gordon, Katie Parker, Brian Normoyle, Courtney Bell, Damon Pfaff, Scott Graham, Camron Robertson, Connie Ventress, Morgan Peter Brown, Dave Levine, Brandon Valley Jones, James Flanagan, Erin Cipolletti, Joseph Mendoza, Mark Dumonski

  Director Mike Flanagan has made quite a career for himself by directing Netflix's mini-series version of The Haunting of Hill House, not to mention Stephen King adaptations Gerald's Game and Doctor Sleep. But one of his earliest horror film entries still remains under-seen, in spite of being part of what started his career in the industry.

  The film follows Tricia and her sister, Callie. Tricia's husband has been missing for seven years, and she and her sister gradually begin to suspect his disappearance, along with those of many other people in the area, has something to do with a tunnel in front of her house. Just as Tricia is having her husband declared passed in absentia, he abruptly shows back up, bloody and barefoot, and surprised that anyone else can see him.

  Of course, things only get freakier from there, as Flanagan showcases some of the skills that have made him a major name in the horror field in the years since.
• 

  (#10) Resolution

  • Sarah Oliver, Zahn McClarnon, Bill Oberst Jr., Kurt David Anderson, Aaron Moorhead, Peter Cilella, Thor Wixom, Melissa E. Low, Emily Montague, Michael Felker, David Clarke Lawson Jr., Dan Martinez, Catherine Burns, Justin Benson, Bob Low, Vinny Curran, Carmel Benson, Skyler Meacham, Shiblon Wixon, Josh Higgins, Glen Roberts

  Writing/directing duo Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead have been generating growing buzz in indie horror circles with the release of films like The Endless, but one of their best (and most under-seen) efforts remains their 2012 debut Resolution.

  The film concerns two friends, one of them (Michael) a successful graphic designer with a pregnant wife, the other (Chris) a user who has moved into a remote shack and seems to have become increasingly delusional. Michael decides to stage an intervention, but things begin to turn strange when the two men start finding seemingly impossible photographs and film footage of them. A mind-bending trip into the truly weird that is also a tale of the bonds of friendship, Resolution is a testament to what you can do with a fairly meager budget and some big ideas.
• 

  (#2) American Mary

  • Katharine Isabelle, Antonio Cupo, Paul Anthony, David Lovgren, Jen Soska, John Emmet Tracy, Julia Maxwell, Sean Amsing, Tristan Risk, Clay St. Thomas, Sylvia Soska, Nelson Wong, Twan Holliday, Paula Lindberg, Travis Watters

  Sister act directing duo Jen and Sylvia Soska, who have recently remade David Cronenberg's Rabid, first exploded onto the genre scene with their 2012 black comedy horror film American Mary. Though it immediately earned them a name in extreme horror circles, American Mary still remains under-seen by the wider horror world. In it, Katharine Isabelle (of the Ginger Snaps series) plays a medical student who, in desperate need of funds, finds herself drawn into the world of extreme body modification.

  Unfortunately, she is also the victim of a terrible assault from the doctors and mentors who are in charge of her residency, which leads her to a grisly revenge and into a cat-and-mouse game with the police. With a 60% at Rotten Tomatoes, the Critics Consensus says American Mary "utilizes pitch-black humor and striking visuals to deliver gory, freaky thrills for body-horror enthusiasts."
• 

  (#5) Triangle

  • Melissa George, Michael Dorman, Rachael Carpani, Henry Nixon, Emma Lung, Liam Hemsworth

  Most of Christopher Smith's films have been appreciated by horror aficionados while sailing under the radar of less dedicated fans. None of them deserves a reappraisal more than 2009's Triangle.

  Sure, on the surface it looks and sounds like a typical slasher flick with a nautical twist: A group of friends take refuge on an abandoned cruise ship after a yachting accident, only to find themselves stalked by a masked slayer. But there's much more going on in Triangle than meets the eye, and to delve into its twists and turns would be to dig into the territory of spoilers better discovered for yourself.

  For fans of Netflix's In the Tall Grass - and those who thought that film had some fun ideas but lacked a little in execution - give Triangle a look. You won't regret it.
• 

  (#1) Grave Encounters

  • Alex Sander, Merwin Mondesir, Mackenzie Gray, Juan Riedinger, Fred Keating, Sean Rogerson, Luis Javier, Shawn MacDonald, Michele Cummins, John Sampson, Ben Wilkinson, Ashleigh Gryzko, Max Train, Arthur Corber, Ryan Da Silva, Eva Gifford, Kristina Brown, Gisli Johanneson, Blair Brownlee, Alex Timmer, Warren Cwele, Dana Keller, Robert Wellman, Cliff Rogers, Greg Stubbard, Jacquelin Wood, Brenda Anderson, Michael Mahoney, Kate Roumieu, Bob Rathie, Jon Malmberg, Josh Holmes, Martha Eason, Matt Diamond

  Found-footage horror movies and ghost movies have both been extremely popular over the course of the last decade - but they also both get kind of a bad rap among horror connoisseurs as being samey films made to appeal to the least-common denominator. At a glance, Grave Encounters looks like it'll be exactly that - a found-footage dark ride about the crew of a ghost hunting reality show who explore an abandoned mental hospital with a dark history, where they'll encounter plenty of kohl-eyed figures.

  And, certainly, it has plenty of that to offer. But Grave Encounters also does things that most of its siblings don't dare, such as messing with time and space in ways that are genuinely disconcerting and reminiscent of more typically thoughtful fare like Picnic at Hanging Rock or the book House of Leaves.
• 

  (#6) Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale

  • Tommi Korpela, Per Christian Ellefsen, Jorma Tommila, Risto Salmi, Peeter Jakobi, Rauno Juvonen, Jonathan Hutchings, Sigmund Bøe, Onni Tommila, Nils M. Iselvmo, Olav Pedersen, Nils Nymo, Ilmari Järvenpää, Jens Sivertsen, Steinar Skogstad

  Before the Krampus craze had really taken hold, there was the bizarre Finnish horror film Rare Exports. Think of it as an Amblin Entertainment flick with the darkest possible sense of humor, as a child and his dad try to bail out their bankrupt business slaughtering reindeer by... exporting Santas?

  It seems that a British research team has dug something massive out of the ice. At the same time, local children and items have begun to go missing. When Pietari, a young local boy, and his father inadvertantly capture a naked old man that they think might be Santa Claus, things take a turn for the very weird. Prepare yourself for lots of unclothed old men, lots of weird hijinks, and some titanic revelations about the true nature of Santa Claus in this irreverent, dark horror comedy from 2010.

New Random Displays    Display All By Ranking