Streaming horror on the Criterion Channel? It's more likely than you think! The Criterion Collection has a lot of rare and interesting horror films on its streaming service, The Criterion Channel. They have no less than five different scary movie collections currently available, four of which have been on the service since October. One new collection, Godzilla: The Showa-Era Films, 1954–1975, is new. One of the collections, Art House Horror, has thirty different films for you to watch and enjoy. Many of the films come with the extras that come with Criterion blu rays, like David Cronenberg's Videodrome Bootleg Video: Transmissions from Videodrome, which includes the footage shot and excerpted in the film as the horror-filled broadcasts from Videodrome itself. Many have interviews with directors, film experts, and fans who love that particular film.
'90s Horror
This a sampling of the '90s horror films that defined the genre, some by auteurs like Francis Ford Coppola and Abel Ferrara, others by genre stalwarts like Frank Henenlotter and John Carpenter, others by filmmakers who didn't normally work in the genre but made stellar scary movies like Ernest Dickerson and Antonia Bird.
Def by Temptation 1990 James Bond III
The Exorcist III (1990) William Peter Blatty
Frankenhooker (1990) Frank Henenlotter
Body Parts (1991) Eric Red
The Rapture (1991) Michael Tolkin
Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) Francis Ford Coppola Leaving December 31
Dust Devil (1992) Richard Stanley
Body Snatchers (1993) Abel Ferrara Leaving December 31
When a Stranger Calls Back (1993) Fred Walton
In the Mouth of Madness (1995) John Carpenter Leaving December 31
The Addiction (1995) Abel Ferrara
Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight (1995) Ernest Dickerson
Event Horizon (1997) Paul W. S. Anderson
Ravenous (1999) Antonia Bird
Art-House Horror
Artful horror that will play with your mind, like House, Arrebato, and Spirits of the Dead. Some movies in this collection are art films that were wildly successful, like George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead. All these films will find terrors in you that may have never been discovered.
Häxan (1922) Benjamin Christensen
Vampyr (1932) Carl Theodor Dreyer
Eyes without a Face (1960) Georges Franju
Jigoku (1960) Nobuo Nakagawa
Carnival of Souls (1962) Herk Harvey
Onibaba (1964 ) Kaneto Shindo
The Face of Another (1966) Hiroshi Teshigahara
Hour of the Wolf (1968) Ingmar Bergman
Kuroneko (1968) Kaneto Shindo
Night of the Living Dead (1968) George A. Romero
Spirits of the Dead (1968) Federico Fellini, Louis Malle, and Roger Vadim
Flesh for Frankenstein (1973) Paul Morrissey
Sisters (1973) Brian de Palma
Blood for Dracula (1974) Paul Morrissey
Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) Peter Weir
Eraserhead (1977) David Lynch
House (1977) Nobuhiko Obayashi
The Shout (1978) Jerzy Skolimowski
Arrebato (1979) Ivan Zulueta
The Brood (1979) David Cronenberg
Wolf’s Hole (1987) Věra Chytilová
The Vanishing (1988) George Sluizer
Cronos (1993) Guillermo Del Toro
Cure (1997) Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Donnie Darko (2001) Richard Kelly
Trouble Every Day (2001) Claire Denis
Antichrist (2009) Lars von Trier
The Lure (2015) Agnieszka Smoczyńska
Suicide by Sunlight (2019) Nikyatu Jusu
Directed by Brian De Palma
The Phantom of the Paradise (1974) Leaving December 31
Directed By David Cronenberg
Some of the works of the Canadian master of body horror that are harder to find are on the Criterion Channel, but some will be gone soon.
Stereo (1969)
Crimes of the Future (1970)
The Brood (1979)
Scanners (1981)
Videodrome (1983) Leaving December 31
eXistenZ (1999) Leaving December 31
Godzilla: The Showa-Era Films, 1954–1975
If you loved Godzilla Minus One and are interested in more films about that thunderous lizard, Criterion has a collection here for you.
Godzilla (1954) Ishiro Honda
Godzilla Raids Again (1955) Motoyoshi Oda
Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964) Ishiro Honda
Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964) Ishiro Honda
Invasion of Astro- Monster (1965) Ishiro Honda
Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966) Jun Fukuda
Son of Godzilla (1967) Jun Fukuda
Destroy All Monsters (1968) Ishiro Honda
All Monsters Attack (1969) Ishiro Honda
Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1971) Yoshimitsu Banno
Godzilla vs. Gigan (1972) Jun Fukuda
Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973) Jun Fukuda
Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla (1974) Jun Fukuda
Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975) Ishiro Honda
High School Horror
Some of the best and most interesting scary movies about high school are from the '70s, '80s, '90s, and the 2000s.
Massacre at Central High (1976) Rene Daalder
Prom Night (1980) Paul Lynch
The Slumber Party Massacre (1982) Amy Holden Jones
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992 ) David Lynch
Ginger Snaps (2000) John Fawcett
Donnie Darko (2001) Richard Kelly
Pre-code Horror
These are some of the greatest films made before Hollywood enacted the Hayes Code, which made films much more tame. These have more of the violence, sexuality, and all of the oomph that films after 1934 lacked.
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) Rouben Mamoulian
Svengali (1931) Archie Mayo
Freaks (1932) Tod Browning
Island of Lost Souls (1932) Erle C. Kenton
The Most Dangerous Game (1932) Ernest B. Schoedsack and Irving Pichel
Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932) Robert Florey
The Old Dark House (1932 ) James Whale
Thirteen Women (1932) George Archainbaud
Murders in the Zoo A. (1933) Edward Sutherland
Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) Michael Curtiz
The Black Cat (1934) Edgar G. Ulmer
The Raven (1935) Lew Landers
Horror Shorts
The Alphabet (1968) David Lynch
Geometria (1987) Guillermo Del Toro
Swallowed (2016) Lily Baldwin
The Beaning (2017) Sean McCoy
Hair Wolf (2018) Mariama Diallo
The Devil's Harmony (2019) Dylan Holmes Williams
The Fall (2019) Jonathan Glazer
White Echo (2019) Chloë Sevigny
