The October Horror Movie Challenge

We’ve made it to the end of another October, and, just as importantly, another October Horror Movie Challenge. Fundamentally, the challenge is only an excuse to watch as many horror films as possible. Personally, I approach it by posting daily reviews of films I hadn’t seen before, but it’s great just to chat to people who have only managed to watch a handful.

I also took part in 2013, 2014, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023. You can find my reviews from these years on this site.

As much fun as watching all these films has been, talking about them is even better. If you fancy joining the conversation, I would love to hear from you. The main hub of discussion is our Discord server, where we have a channel dedicated to the October Horror Movie Challenge. Alternatively, you can contact me on Bluesky, Reddit, or by chanting into that cracked mirror you found at the antique shop.

The Good

I watched a fair few good films this year, and even more that were at least decent. This would normally be a cause for celebration, but I have once again found myself struggling to pick just three of them. It’s also making it tricky to choose the worst films, but more on that later.

In any other year, We’re All Going to the World’s Fair would have made the top three of either good or weird films. It’s not a perfect film by any means, and I can understand how it might frustrate viewers looking for more substance, but I was captivated by its dreamlike atmosphere and hidden depths.

When Evil Lurks was a very near miss. This Argentinian oddity felt like a downbeat, apocalyptic take on The Evil Dead. And speaking of oddities, Oddity was also marvellous, and certainly the creepiest film I saw this month.

In a Violent Nature

You may never have asked it, but In a Violent Nature answers the question “What if you made a Friday the 13th sequel as an art house film?” It takes us on a slow walk through the woods, filled with dread, and punctuated by the occasional bout of bloody violence. This is horror film making stripped back to its bare essentials, and there is simply nothing else like it.

Speak No Evil

What starts out as an uncomfortable tale of a Danish couple visiting some new acquaintances in the Netherlands for a weekend break slowly escalates into one of the purest nightmares I have seen. The first hour of the film will have you squirming in your seat as the Dutch hosts slowly break every social convention that binds us. And then it gets worse. Speak No Evil genuinely shocked me, and it is a rare film that can manage that.

I Saw the TV Glow

I suspect this will be the most divisive of my selections. So much of your reaction to I Saw the TV Glow will come down to who you are. If you have ever questioned your sexuality or gender identity, especially if you’ve spent time in the closet, this film will hurt you. Otherwise, you may just end up scratching your head. On the surface, this is a tale of two friends and their unreliable memories of a TV programme they watched in their teens. But on an allegorical level, it is a brutal examination of what it means to deny who you really are. A wonderful film, but one that left me shaken.

The Bad

It may seem perverse, but I do try to pick at least a few films every year that I suspect will be terrible. At least part of that is because I’m hoping to be pleasantly surprised by them. But, frankly, it can be refreshing to tear into a truly awful film when writing all these reviews.

There were two films I picked for these reasons, but which turned out to be better than I’d anticipated. The Innsmouth School For Girls may be a zero-budget amateur affair with awful acting and painfully cheap effects, but there’s a charm to it that largely won me over. And I fully expected to hate Terrifier, and was weirdly disappointed when I found it merely average.

Even the films I’ve selected for my worst three aren’t all bad. Well, except for Seven Deaths in the Cats Eyes. Fuck that film.

Tales That Witness Madness

Honestly, Tales That Witness Madness is merely disappointing. It apes the format of the classic Amicus portmanteau horror films of the ’60s and ’70s, but suffers from a paucity of ideas. The cast is excellent, and there are some entertaining moments, but the short tales that make up this film are generally weak and obvious. Only Joan Collins’s battle with a seductive tree provides any real excitement.

Torso

Again, Torso is only on this list because I didn’t manage to pick enough truly terrible films. Even so, this is a frustrating giallo that only really comes to life in its final act. Until then, it just feels like a half-connected series of misogynistic murders, punctuated by unnecessary lectures on art history. The setting and costumes are glamorous, but there simply isn’t enough substance to keep the first hour interesting.

Seven Deaths in the Cats Eyes

Another ’70s Italian giallo, but one with a Gothic flavour. This one does deserve to be called bad, and maybe to be beaten with sticks. For all its attempts at creating atmosphere, it’s mostly just a bunch of aristocrats moping around a Scottish castle and occasionally being strangled. It tries to be a mystery, a horror film, and a family drama, and fails at all three. Not even the lurking orangutan can save this one.

The Weird

Maybe it’s because I have seen so many horror films over the years, but the weird ones tend to stick in my mind more than the good ones. On the whole, I’d rather see something that leaves me wondering what the fuck I just watched than a well-made, safer film. Happily, I found a good crop of weirdos this year.

Titane came close to the top three. Its tale of murder, gender-bending identity theft, and automotive body horror was certainly unique. While Stopmotion may tell a familiar story of an artist’s descent into madness, the way it uses frankly grotesque stop-motion animation transforms it into something strange and sinister. And The Coffee Table presents a mix of black comedy, brutal shocks, and eccentric characters that make it difficult to even pin down its genre.

Dr Caligari

This is what you get when the team behind the cult science fiction erotic film Café Flesh go on to make something even stranger but less pornographic. Dr Caligari is a loose sequel to The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, but one rooted in the counter-culture weirdness of 1980s America. Every scene has something utterly bizarre happening, and the production design is simply psychotic. I might argue that Dr Caligari is a pretentious mess, but I don’t want to.

Eight Eyes

Eight Eyes could just as easily gone into the top three list. Its cocktail of retro grime and psychedelia is absolutely to my taste, and it’s a rare film that makes me think of both The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Videodrome in the same scene. The first hour is a relatively straightforward story of an American couple in Serbia who befriend the wrong local, almost paralleling the social awkwardness of Speak No Evil, but then it takes a sharp left turn into bizarroland. There is something unclean about the final act, and I love that.

Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky

The barebones plot of a martial artist incarcerated in a sinister private prison where he is forced to fight for his life is purely a framework on which to hang some of the strangest action scenes I’ve seen. This film is a riot of gore, leaping from one improbable confrontation to the next, resolving them all through the twin powers of imagination and extreme violence. It’s rare to see a film that has so little regard for the audience’s suspension of disbelief, and I admire its sheer bloody audacity.

2024’s Selections

If you’d like a recap of the full list, it went something like this:

We’re All Going to the World’s Fair (USA, 2021)
Tales That Witness Madness (UK, 1973)
When Evil Lurks (Argentina, 2023)
Under Paris (France, 2024)
In a Violent Nature (Canada, 2024)
Torso (Italy, 1973)
Titane (France, 2021)
Rorschach (USA, 2015)
The Coffee Table (Spain, 2024)
Dr Caligari (USA, 1989)
Bit (USA, 2020)
The Guard From Underground (Japan, 1992)
Oddity (Ireland, 2024)
Speak No Evil (Denmark/Netherlands, 2022)
Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (USA, 1982)
Grave Torture (Indonesia, 2024)
Bedlam (USA, 1946)
The Innsmouth School For Girls (USA, 2023)
Daddy’s Head (UK, 2024)
All You Need Is Death (Ireland, 2024)
Eight Eyes (USA/Serbia, 2021)
Poor Things (Ireland/UK/USA, 2023)
Seven Deaths in the Cat’s Eye (Italy, 1973)
Longlegs (USA, 2024)
Night of Fear (Australia, 1973)
Stopmotion (UK, 2024)
Terrifier (USA, 2016)
Azrael (USA, 2024)
Faust (Germany, 1926)
Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky (Hong Kong, 1991)
I Saw the TV Glow (USA, 2024)

A Final Note

If you have been enticed here by these posts, please do look around at some of our other film reviews. We also have a podcast, called The Good Friends of Jackson Elias, which occasionally covers horror films. If this appeals, you might want to check out some of the following episodes.