Spooky season is in full swing, and the best streaming services are adding some solid choices for your next horror movie fix. I took a look at Netflix's October line-up, and three stood out to me as cult classics that everyone should watch. One came out in 2016, so I started to ditch it from the list — until I realized that was 10 years ago, and died a little inside.
Anywho, Netflix just got one of Mike Flanagan's first big hits, "Hush," a fun slasher movie with a stellar turn from Kate Siegel as a deaf final girl. For some campier fun, Tom Hiddleston, Mia Wasikowska, and Jessica Chastain star in "Crimson Peak," a gothic romance that's easy to get swept away in. Or for something faster paced, Edward Norton and Anthony Hopkins play off each other really well in "Red Dragon," the second-best Hannibal movie by a country mile.
Want to know more before dedicating your precious streaming time? I don't blame you. Here's everything to know about why these new horror movies on Netflix deserve your time.
'Hush' (2016)
"Hush" is the movie that made me a Mike Flanagan fan, so you can imagine how insufferably smug I've been since he's blown up with Netflix originals like "The Haunting of Hill House" and "Midnight Mass" and Prime Video's new "Carrie" show. It's a prime example of a simple premise done right: a slasher movie where the main victim (longtime collaborator and Flanagan's IRL wife, Kate Siegel) is deaf and mute, leaving her unable to hear her attacker approaching or call for help.
I worried it might trend toward hokey, but this slick horror thriller wrings a surprising amount of tension out of its lean 81-minute run time. Even while Siegel's character is relentlessly stalked and tormented by a masked killer, she's far from a helpless victim. The setting — a home in the middle of the woods — is also a perfect backdrop for a cozy weekend watch to throw on in the background.
Watch "Hush" on Netflix now
'Crimson Peak' (2015)
"Crimson Peak" is one of several movies on my "peak Tumblr era" rotation. This gothic romance movie starring Tom Hiddleston, Mia Wasikowska, and Jessica Chastain — who's providing some absolute nightmare fuel in "Other Mommy" — comes courtesy of the Oscar-winning filmmaker Guillermo del Toro. Part ghost story and part tragic romance, it takes us back in time to the Victorian era where American heiress Edith (Wasikowska) is visited by her mother's spirit and warned to stay away from "Crimson Peak."
She falls for a seductive British baronet named Sir Thomas Sharpe (Hiddleston), but when she moves to his family's rundown manor in Cumberland, England, she uncovers sinister secrets about her new husband and his weirdly possessive sister, Lady Lucille (Jessica Chastain). The ghostly visions that begin to haunt her new home make more sense the further she digs for the truth.
Watch "Crimson Peak" on Netflix now
'Red Dragon' (2002)
We can all agree that "The Silence of the Lambs" was Anthony Hopkins' best Hannibal appearance, sure. But "Red Dragon" doesn't get enough flowers for coming closest to recapturing the original’s cat-and-mouse tension and twisted brilliance. Based on Harris’ novel of the same name, this prequel steps back to the infamous cannibal's first years in jail after FBI profiler Will Graham (Edward Norton) brought him to justice.
A fresh serial killer on the loose pulls Will out of retirement, and he turns to the good ol' doctor for help, which naturally comes at a price. Quid pro quo and whatnot. If you liked this one, just so you know: The phenomenal "Hannibal" TV show with Mads Mikkelsen is on Netflix too, and it treads a lot of the same territory with some gorey shots that truly have to be seen to be believed.
Watch "Red Dragon" on Netflix now