How would you organize a major horror movie list? (UPDATE end of page 1)

Where would you put Animals like Jaws or Back Country?

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Where would you put Animals like Jaws or Back Country?

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Monsters, but if you want a natural monster section that's reasonable.

I don't mind adding more specific subgenres, if y'all think that's the best path. I'm a big fan of specific organization, so you'll find no fight/ego from me.

On Evolution of Horror their current style/theme is "Nature Fights Back", which kind of covers the same ground.

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For reference: Official SPOOKY SEASON Horror Movie Discussion/Recs Thread from this past Halloween.

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In that thread

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Motherfricker I just started drafting a thread about this by genre

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Which category for August Underground type horror films?

This works

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In that thread

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I know. That’s why I posted it: for reference.

What about breaking up Ghosts/Paranormal/Haunted Houses into Fixed Location (like a haunted mansion) and Variable (wherever)?

HORROR GENRES

Psychological

Psychological horror focuses on mental and emotional states.. They range from internal topics like phobias and madness, all the way to home invasion. This is a “low distraction, must focus” style, so the viewer can fully buy into the output.

Madness:Your protagonist is either going to lose its mind or will be terrorized by someone losing their mind.

Survival :Typically in a home,alone, or a small group. The distinction between the survival and the Killer genres is the focus being on the stalking of the protagonist(s) more than any direct threat/kill. The killer is often masked and not revealed until the climax (if revealed at all).

Body Horror: Synonymous with David Cronenberg, this genre focuses on violation of the human body. Mutation, transformation, destruction, and/or degeneration of the body are common. Body horror focuses on the internal impacts of the violation, while the viral subgenre focuses on the outward threats by the infection.

Isolation: The protagonist is alone in a terrible situation and the cost to survive will be great. Typically set in a natural setting.

Killers

The killer genre focuses on a human(ish) killer and human victims. This genre has the largest gap in quality. Some of the most iconic and best horror movies of all time are in this genre, as well as most of the worst horror movies of all time. Slashers exploded in the 80s with VCRs, which led to an insane demand for constant content, which explains this gap. By the 90s, this had become more refined until Scream went meta on the genre and it never really returned to its roots outside of some nice entries.

Slashers: There is a maniac on the loose and it is killing people. The focus is often on the creativity in how your victims (often teenagers) can be killed. Another common meme is multiple sequels for the successful first entry.

Crime-Thriller : There is a fine line when a crime thriller becomes a horror movie, and noo ne is particularly good at defining this line. There will be an investigation (typically police) of killings which may lead to questions of supernatural causes. Serial killers are typical. Unlike other movies in the genre, the focus is on the investigation, and often the horror emerges from the toll of the investigation (overlapping with psychological horror).

Backwoods: A subgenre of the slasher film but set in remote, wooded areas, triggering our fears of isolated and downtrodden rural populations.

Science Fiction

Sci-fi horror may be the most fruitful genre of horror following the 80s slasher era. The vast canvas that sci-fi permits allows venturing into all sorts of other genres, with no real limits on what threats/terrors can be created. Some of the most celebrated horror movies of all time fall in this genre.

Space Horror: Your typical horror movie, but in space. The blend typically involves aliens, isolation, and psychological horror. Your setting will be in a spaceship or a planet that is not Earth.

Infections: The threat is a pathogen. The effects vary, from full on zombie-style takeover to a malevolent outside force controlling or replacing humanity. Let the great 28 days later debate begin.

Aliens (and invasions): Aliens on earth, whether it be a small incident or with a full-scale invasion as the threat. Will often involve survival, action, and monster tropes.

Monsters

A completely traditional genre that is self-explanatory. Humans are threatened by non-humans. Those non-humans range from normal animals to undead creatures to 400-foot tall mutations that can destroy a city.

Vampires: Vampire-based horror is one of the oldest and expansive genres in horror. Undead creatures who rely on the life force of normal humans to survive. The rules change with each work, but sunlight is typically a threat.

Werewolves: Lycanthropy is a horror that has existed since at least Ancient Greece, however the number of quality movies is relatively sparse compared to other monster subgenres.

Zombies: Until Night of the Living Dead, zombie films were typically constrained to a Caribbean setting and voodoo being applied on unsuspecting victims. After NOTLD, the genre changed to unstoppable hoards of the undead, in various iterations.

Giants/Kaiju : Godzilla. King Kong. Big monsters. Don’t complicate things.

Animals/Nature: Lions, tigers, and bears…and sharks, birds, frogs, sloths…The threats in these movies must be real animals and they must be attacking humans.

Atmospheric

Atmospheric horror would be a subgenre of psychological horror, if not for the vast sub-content within the genre. The setting is paramount, as well as the hidden malevolence (which is often not revealed until the climax). In these movies, the danger is real and external, while in psychological horror, that horror is more internal to the character.

Gothic : The gothic genre is very difficult to define in words, because so much of the style involves heavy reliance on a specific atmosphere. Traditional gothic content will be set in the 18th or 19th century at European estates or castles, with on loss, grief, repression, revenge, and decay (social and personal) driving the story.

Folk Horror: The focus of folk horror is the clash of old society and modernity. A modern-urban protagonist enters a society that has been left alone and allowed to practice the old ways. Unlike the occult, the ancient religions are pagan and not specifically evil, like the occult genre.

Cosmic Horror: You are an insignificant speck within the cosmos that cannot comprehend what terror is being revealed. The genre popularized by H.P. Lovecraft requires real internalization, which blends with psychological horror. Can be found relying on sci-fi, fantasy, occult, or monster tropes.

Post-Apocalyptic : The world is over, now what? This genre is typically a crossover with sci-fi and survival.


Supernatural/Paranormal

This genre stands in stark contrast to the Killer genre. The horror in this genre is not human and is outside of human control, often with characters entering into realms and gaining knowledge that they should not dabble in.

Possession: Unlike the infection subgenre, the possessing agent here is supernatural (typically demons or ghosts). The central conflict here is the possession itself (in contrast to the occult/demonic subgenre, which may have that as a climactic threat).

Ghosts and Haunted Houses: Like with the giant monster subgenre, don’t complicate things. There will be an actual house and there will be actual ghosts/spiritual entities haunting that house.

Witchcraft and Witches: The witch subgenre typically involves a female practitioner of some form of magic. You’ll find spells, curses, brooms, and black cats. Due to the history of Puritans in America, the mythology of witches is its own subgenre outside of the occult/supernatural that it overlaps with.

Occult and Demons: Black magic. Cults. Satanism. Will have lots of overlap with other supernatural subgenres, as well as monster and psychological genres.

Dark Fantasy: A subgenre of fantasy that blends horror elements with fantasy tropes. Typically the scares aren’t extreme, and this can be a gateway subgenre for younger children to start to understand horror.

Rough draft of page 1. I haven't really done any editing and this was my first draft

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The aim of this project is to create a reference point for horror movies for this board. I am going to try to sort horror movies into two different listings. The first will be by genre and the second will be by style. The point of this list/project is to be able to update over time. I plan on dedicating a page to each genre and each style. Hopefully that gives plenty of characters to keep this updated in the future. If I get froggy I may include links to previous threads on here discussing each movie.

Genres organization becomes problematic because so many horror movies are multi-genre, especially when science fiction is involved. I am curating the list (and can edit the list in the future based on commentary) so I’m picking the genre and subgenre I feel most represents the movie. I plan on giving mini-reviews of some of the listed movies, and I hope to include other possible genres into which the movie could fall. I obviously can’t do this for every movie (I haven’t even seen all of the movies on this list). Each genre will get a MISC/Potpourri grouping for movies that are too unique to fit in one specific subgenre.

The second listing will be by horror style. Style is more focused on how the story is presented which permits lots of genre-mixing. For instance, genres found in Giallo range from standard crime thrillers all the way to extreme supernatural (Suspiria). Found footage basically can apply across the board as well. In addition to the presentation style, there may be a certain style for an era (like Millennial horror).

Lastly, I will do my best to put movies into genres that do not spoil any climactic reveals, so if you see a movie with a spoilerific resolution in a genre that you wouldn’t initially associate with it, that’s why. When commenting/discussing, please be mindful of spoilers and give clear spoiler warning when anywhere close to discussing them.