There are countless niches within the horror movie genre, and while some of us love all of them, many movie lovers have a penchant for one over the other β or a specific type of horror film that really gets them spooked. Ghost movies, in particular, can be especially chilling. The reality is, many people believe ghosts exist (and even frequent the human realm), so when we watch movies about ghosts and hauntings, it often instills real fear β even if just for a short while. We're talking the kind of unsettling fear that induces nightmares.
Weird stuff that can't be easily explained happens in the real world all the time β babies and pets staring at the corners of rooms, indoor temperatures suddenly shifting, strange noises waking us up at night, things randomly falling off shelves β so when we see these things being attributed to paranormal beings in the movies, it strikes a chord. Regardless of whether it's a docu-style flick about a haunting, or a completely dramatized period piece centered on the supernatural, movies about ghosts are straight-up chilling.
Sometimes, we kind of believe the eerie events we're watching could possibly happen in real life.
That's exactly why these 17 terrifying ghost movies keep us up at night. Check them out.
'Session 9'
The 2001 film Session 9 follows a group of workers hired to clean asbestos out of an abandoned mental hospital for a hefty payout. Some of the crew are at odds with one another for personal reasons, which builds some serious tension on the work site. When one of the workers wanders off and starts playing tapes of one of the hospital's former patients, unsettling occurrences begin to plague them.
'The Blair Witch Project'
The Blair Witch Project shook the film world when it came out in 1999. It was one of the first found-footage-style horror movies ever made, and that perspective alone was enough to creep viewers out. It's about a group of students who venture into some woods in Maryland to film a documentary about a local witch legend, but find themselves being terrorized by dark forces. Blair Witch is definitely a good reminder to stay out of the woods after dark!
'The Woman in Black'
Starring Daniel Radcliffe, The Woman in Black follows a despondent young lawyer who travels to a remote village in England on business and soon realizes the manor belonging to his client is being haunted by the ghost of a scorned woman. The ghost, though, isn't content with just terrorizing the residents of the home; she seeks to exact her revenge on the entire town. The film is dark and suspenseful, through and through.
'What Lies Beneath'
In this spooky ghost film, starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Harrison Ford, a recently retired woman β who sent her only child off to college β finds herself often alone at her lakefront home in Vermont, while her husband is off at work as a university research scientist. Soon, her isolation begins to take a toll, and she becomes suspicious that her home is actually haunted. She grows increasingly scared and paranoid, but despite the odd occurrences she claims are happening, her husband thinks she's simply losing her sanity.
'Insidious'
Insidious is the film that sparked an entire franchise based on the real-life cases of paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren … and it is quite chilling to watch. It's about a couple who wakes to find their young son in a coma, only doctors can't figure out why or how it happened. With little hope of him awakening, they return home with him, but soon his mother begins to sense strange presences in their home. Desperate to figure out what's going on and save her son, she enlists the help of a paranormal investigator, who surprisingly worked with her husband when he was a child. The investigator reveals that the boy is astral projecting and is not in a coma, but has become trapped in an alternate realm β unwittingly letting spirits and demons into the human realm.
'Oculus'
Oculus is about siblings who watched their father kill their mother at home when they were children. The brother spent years in a mental hospital for killing the father in the aftermath, but when he's released, his sister convinces him that he'll be exonerated if they can prove that an ancient mirror that stood in their childhood home was at the root of their tragic childhood experience. It's such a weird story, but spooky enough to make viewers avoid mirrors for a while.
'The Uninvited'
In The Uninvited, a young woman spends some time in a mental hospital after a suicide attempt. Upon returning home, things aren't any better. In fact, a sinister force seems to be at work. Her father has remarried, and her new stepmother β who just so happens to be her mother's former nurse β gives her all the wrong feelings. She starts having visions of her dead mother, and becomes convinced that her stepmother killed her.
Yikes!
'The Sixth Sense'
The Sixth Sense was pretty much the movie of the year when it came out in 1999. It's about a young boy who now famously "sees dead people," as in lots and lots of ghosts. A renowned child psychologist, who recently learned he failed a former patient with a similar affliction, is recruited to help. The film is utterly chilling and gives the sense that spirits are lurking in every corner.
'Paranormal Activity'
Paranormal Activity is another found-footage film that spawned an entire franchise. Some of the films are admittedly a bit silly, but the original is flat-out frightening. It follows a couple who moves into a new home and find themselves witnessing odd and unexplainable disturbances that become increasingly threatening. They set up a night-vision camera in the hopes of capturing what's terrorizing them at night, and end up chronicling some terrifying phenomena.
'The Orphanage'
The Orphanage is an excellent film about a woman who moves her children into her childhood home. The house was once an orphanage for handicapped children, and she decides that she will reopen it to care for children herself. All the while, her young son has started talking to mysterious new friends that no one else can see. She brushes him off … until he disappears and she ends up contacting a paranormal investigator, who helps her understand that the orphanage has been haunted.
'Poltergeist'
Despite the often laughable visual effects β though excellent for their time β Poltergeist is the ultimate ghost movie. It's about a family who moves into a new construction home and eventually realizes there are supernatural forces at work. When their youngest child is abducted during an intense paranormal event, they reach out to ghost hunters who help them come to the realization that hundreds of lost souls are inhabiting their home and have lured their daughter into their realm.
Spoo-KY!
'The Nun'
The Nun β another tale from the files of Ed and Lorraine Warren β is what nightmares are made of. In it, the Vatican sends a jaded priest with a troubled past, and a nun in training to a remote area of Romania to investigate the death of a young nun. They're met with an evil force that ends up being the ghost of a malevolent nun, intent on terrorizing the convent.
'Ghost Ship'
Ghost Ship may be one of the most glamourous ghost movies out there, but that doesn't mean it's lacking in the scare department. This edge-of-the-seat horror flick brings suspense, quite a bit of gore, and some of the most mind-bending ghost encounters imaginable. Just imagine being trapped in the middle of the ocean on a cruise ship haunted by dozens of the departed!
'Winchester'
Starring the indomitable Helen Mirren, it's hard not to be spooked by Winchester. Not only does the film's cast deliver on the intensity, but the movie is about arguably the most haunted house in the world. It's based on actual events surrounding the eccentric Winchester firearms heiress, who, while living at her isolated mansion in California, became convinced that she was being haunted by the ghosts of people who had been killed by the Winchester repeating rifle. Talk about guilt!
'Velvet Buzzsaw'
While Jake Gyllenhaal's Velvet Buzzsaw's genre is a bit hard to define (it's pretty comical), it is undoubtedly disturbing. The seemingly inexplicable events that occur in the film had viewers talking for weeks after the film premiered on Netflix. It follows a group of people connected to the elite art world who are being targeted by a supernatural being intent on punishing them for their greed.
'The Invisible'
The Invisible is somewhat of a lesser known film, starring Justin Chatwin and Marcia Gay Harden, in which a teenage boy whose viciously attacked after being mistaken for someone else. He wakes up in a sewer the day after the attack only to discover that no one can see him. He's dead, but hasn't crossed over, and has no way to escape the never-ending cycle he's stuck in. It's disturbing β precisely because we have no way of knowing if we could end up just like Nick one day.
'Mama'
When a man suffers a mental breakdown and kills his wife, their two daughters are discovered living alone in the woods years later. The traumatized girls are adopted by their uncle and his new wife, who soon realize that something similar has followed the children into their new home. A spirit they call "mama" refuses to release its hold on the girls so they can resume a normal life.
