You love a thrill, and a chill, and you spend your fall season curled up on the couch watching horror movies.
You have seen all of the classics. Halloween. Friday the 13th. Walking Dead. And you’ve seen all of the numbered sequels.
Nothing delights you more than a bowl of popcorn, a hot cider drink, your warmest blanket, and two horror movies queued up on the TV. Sure, you like a good jump scare, but you also find yourself drawn to the slow, suspenseful drawn-out terror that only the best directors can deliver.
If that describes you, you might be delighted to learn about these talented directors and the movies that showed their strengths in the horror and suspense genre.
Coralie Fargeat, Revenge
One of the innovations that women directors bring to the horror and suspense genre is to take the idea of the woman as the object of the viewer’s gaze and turn it on its head. In Revenge, which has an impressive 93% Rotten Apples score, Coralie Fargeat does just this.
Trailer: https://www.imdb.com/video/vi3977099289?ref_=tt_pv_vi_aiv_1
When a romantic getaway is joined by two male friends, the figurative escape becomes literal, and Jen finds herself running for her life. Left for dead after being pushed from a cliff, she plots a methodical revenge that is suspenseful and satisfying. And a little bloody.
Karyn Kusama, Jennifer’s Body
In this uneven mashup of comedy flick / high school send up / horror movie, Karyn Kasuma again uses the male gaze against the viewer. Or, more accurately, against the men who gaze at Jennifer.
Sure, at first she seems like every other evil temptress. Her skirts are cut high, her blouse cut low, and she delights in everybody looking at her in the halls of school. She befriends a nice girl, who unwittingly helps her lure curious boys to their death.
When Jennifer goes after her boyfriend, though, she decides enough is enough.
There is enough gore and suspense to gre you through the evening, and even a good jump scare, but the 45% Rotten Tomatoes score suggests you might want to have a back-up film ready, or watch with a bunch of best friends who can enjoy the good with the bad.
Julia Ducournau, Raw
One of the rare horror movies to receive multiple awards from fans and major film festivals, Raw is an unexpectedly shocking and gory horror film.
Beautifully shot, with the heart of a love movie, the suspense and trauma in the movie caused viewers at the Toronto film festival to pass out.
The main character, a staunch vegetarian, is forced to eat meat for the first time. When she does this, she learns that her family has kept an important secret from her.
She can’t get enough raw meat. And you won’t want it to end, either.