50 Best Horror Films of the 1980s
by capkronos | created - 07 May 2012 | updated - 10 Sep 2016 | PublicI might get some flack for leaving off some pretty famous genre films, but these are the 50 that I've enjoyed the most thus far, ranked in order of preference.
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1. Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986)
Unrated | 83 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
Arriving in Chicago, Henry moves in with ex-con acquaintance Otis and starts schooling him in the ways of the serial killer.
Director: John McNaughton | Stars: Michael Rooker, Tracy Arnold, Tom Towles, Mary Demas
Votes: 40,482 | Gross: $0.61M
2. Phenomena (1985)
R | 116 min | Crime, Horror, Mystery
A young girl who has an amazing ability to communicate with insects is transferred to an exclusive Swiss boarding school, where her unusual capability might help solve a string of murders.
Director: Dario Argento | Stars: Jennifer Connelly, Donald Pleasence, Daria Nicolodi, Dalila Di Lazzaro
Votes: 30,079
3. Cannibal Holocaust (1980)
Unrated | 95 min | Adventure, Horror
During a rescue mission into the Amazon rainforest, a professor stumbles across lost film shot by a missing documentary crew.
Director: Ruggero Deodato | Stars: Robert Kerman, Francesca Ciardi, Perry Pirkanen, Luca Barbareschi
Votes: 61,186
4. Brain Damage (1988)
R | 84 min | Comedy, Horror
One morning, a young man wakes to find that a small, disgusting creature has attached itself to the base of his brain stem. The creature gives him a euphoric state of happiness but demands human victims in return.
Director: Frank Henenlotter | Stars: Rick Hearst, Gordon MacDonald, Jennifer Lowry, Theo Barnes
Votes: 13,180
5. Angst (I) (1983)
Not Rated | 87 min | Drama, Horror, Thriller
A troubled man gets released from prison and starts taking out his sadistic fantasies on an unsuspecting family living in a secluded house.
Director: Gerald Kargl | Stars: Erwin Leder, Robert Hunger-Bühler, Silvia Ryder, Karin Springer
Votes: 13,484
6. The Return of the Living Dead (1985)
R | 91 min | Comedy, Horror, Sci-Fi
When two bumbling employees at a medical supply warehouse accidentally release a deadly gas into the air, the vapors cause the dead to rise again as zombies.
Director: Dan O'Bannon | Stars: Clu Gulager, James Karen, Don Calfa, Thom Mathews
Votes: 68,954 | Gross: $14.24M
7. Litan (1982)
88 min | Fantasy, Horror, Thriller
Nora and Jock arrive in the strange village of Litan during the Festival of the Dead.
Director: Jean-Pierre Mocky | Stars: Marie-José Nat, Jean-Pierre Mocky, Nino Ferrer, Marisa Muxen
Votes: 476
8. Bewitched (1981)
101 min | Crime, Horror, Thriller
While possessed by an evil spirit, a man murders his daughter. A police detective investigating the case also becomes possessed. A good monk helps fight the evil spirit.
Director: Chih-Hung Kuei | Stars: Fei Ai, Melvin Wong, Fanny Fen-Ni, Lily Chan
Votes: 550
aka: Bewitched
9. The Company of Wolves (1984)
R | 95 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
A teenage girl in a country manor falls asleep while reading a magazine, and has a disturbing dream involving wolves prowling the woods below her bedroom window.
Director: Neil Jordan | Stars: Sarah Patterson, Angela Lansbury, David Warner, Graham Crowden
Votes: 18,424 | Gross: $4.39M
10. The Evil Dead (1981)
NC-17 | 85 min | Horror
Five friends travel to a cabin in the woods, where they unknowingly release flesh-possessing demons.
Director: Sam Raimi | Stars: Bruce Campbell, Ellen Sandweiss, Richard DeManincor, Betsy Baker
Votes: 232,513 | Gross: $2.40M
11. The 4th Man (1983)
Unrated | 102 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
A man who has been having visions of an impending danger begins an affair with a woman who may lead him to his doom.
Director: Paul Verhoeven | Stars: Jeroen Krabbé, Renée Soutendijk, Thom Hoffman, Dolf de Vries
Votes: 8,550
12. Sommarens tolv månader (1988 TV Movie)
130 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
Two construction workers are offered an unusual contract. Great pay, but they don't know where they're going or what they are supposed to build. They are brought to a place with 12 months of summer.
Director: Richard Hobert | Stars: Hans Mosesson, Bergljót Arnadóttir, Victoria Möllerström-Hjelm, Göran Stangertz
Votes: 235
aka: The Twelve Months of the Summer
13. Basket Case (1982)
Not Rated | 91 min | Comedy, Horror
A young man carrying a big basket that contains his extremely deformed, formerly conjoined twin brother seeks vengeance on the doctors who separated them against their will.
Director: Frank Henenlotter | Stars: Kevin VanHentenryck, Terri Susan Smith, Beverly Bonner, Robert Vogel
Votes: 21,723
14. Dance of the Damned (1989)
R | 82 min | Drama, Horror, Romance
A vampire follows his instincts to a strip joint where he focuses in on one of the performers. He picks her for his meal because she is contemplating suicide, but he wants to share her life... See full summary »
Director: Katt Shea | Stars: Starr Andreeff, Cyril O'Reilly, Debbie Nassar, Maria Ford
Votes: 562
15. Night of the Demons (1988)
R | 90 min | Comedy, Fantasy, Horror
Ten teenagers party at an abandoned funeral parlor on Halloween night. When an evil force awakens, demonic spirits keep them from leaving and turn their gathering into a living Hell.
Director: Kevin Tenney | Stars: Cathy Podewell, Alvin Alexis, Hal Havins, Allison Barron
Votes: 19,156 | Gross: $3.11M
16. Ms .45 (1981)
R | 80 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
A timid and mute seamstress goes insane after being attacked and raped twice in one day, in which she takes to the streets of New York City after dark and randomly shoots men with a .45 caliber pistol.
Director: Abel Ferrara | Stars: Zoë Lund, Bogey, Albert Sinkys, Darlene Stuto
Votes: 12,573
17. Psycho II (1983)
R | 113 min | Crime, Horror, Mystery
After twenty-two years of psychiatric care, Norman Bates attempts to return to a life of solitude, but the specters of his crimes - and his mother - continue to haunt him.
Director: Richard Franklin | Stars: Anthony Perkins, Vera Miles, Meg Tilly, Robert Loggia
Votes: 31,096 | Gross: $34.73M
18. The Changeling (1980)
R | 107 min | Horror, Mystery
After the death of his wife and daughter in a car crash, a music professor staying at a long-vacant Seattle mansion is dragged into a decades-old mystery by an inexplicable presence in the mansion's attic.
Director: Peter Medak | Stars: George C. Scott, Trish Van Devere, Melvyn Douglas, Jean Marsh
Votes: 40,047
19. Baxter (1989)
R | 82 min | Comedy, Drama, Horror
A white bull terrier named Baxter is given to an elderly woman by her daughter. As time passes, the dog develops aggressive and murderous behavior in order to be adopted by another family.
Director: Jérôme Boivin | Stars: Lise Delamare, Jean Mercure, Jacques Spiesser, Catherine Ferran
Votes: 2,748
20. Christmas Evil (1980)
R | 100 min | Horror, Thriller
A toy factory worker, mentally scarred as a child upon learning Santa Claus is not real, suffers a nervous breakdown after being belittled at work, and embarks on a Yuletide killing spree.
Director: Lewis Jackson | Stars: Brandon Maggart, Jeffrey DeMunn, Dianne Hull, Andy Fenwick
Votes: 8,575
21. Reflections (1987)
102 min | Drama, Horror, Romance
Piano teacher is deeply traumatised by the events of his childhood, as well as by political oppression in his youth. Decades later, all those traumas lead to carnage.
Director: Goran Markovic | Stars: Mustafa Nadarevic, Anica Dobra, Milorad Mandic-Manda, Bogdan Diklic
Votes: 1,319
22. Opera (1987)
R | 107 min | Crime, Horror, Mystery
A young opera singer is stalked by a deranged fan bent on killing the people associated with her to claim her for himself.
Director: Dario Argento | Stars: Cristina Marsillach, Ian Charleson, Urbano Barberini, Daria Nicolodi
Votes: 19,506
23. Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (1981)
R | 96 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
An orphaned teenager finds himself being dominated by his aunt who's hell-bent on keeping him with her...at all costs.
Director: William Asher | Stars: Jimmy McNichol, Susan Tyrrell, Bo Svenson, Marcia Lewis
Votes: 4,849
24. In a Glass Cage (1986)
Unrated | 110 min | Drama, Horror
A former Nazi child-killer is confined in an iron lung inside an old mansion after a suicide attempt. His wife hires him a full-time carer, a mysterious young man who is driven slowly mad by the old man's disturbing past.
Director: Agustí Villaronga | Stars: Günter Meisner, David Sust, Marisa Paredes, Gisèle Echevarría
Votes: 5,049
25. Wolf's Hole (1987)
92 min | Adventure, Drama, Horror
A group of teenagers are mysteriously invited to a skiing workshop in the mountains. There are eleven of them, but the camp supervisors insist that there should be only ten, and that one of them is an intruder.
Director: Vera Chytilová | Stars: Miroslav Machácek, Tomás Palatý, Stepánka Cervenková, Jan Bidlas
Votes: 714
aka: Wolf's Lair
26. Man Behind the Sun (1988)
Not Rated | 105 min | Drama, History, Horror
Japanese troops round up Chinese and Russian prisoners of war and take them to unit 731, where they're horribly tortured and experimented on to test new biological weapons.
Director: Tun-Fei Mou | Stars: Gang Wang, Dai Yao Wu, Runshen Wang, Zhe Quan
Votes: 7,287
27. Gremlins (1984)
PG | 106 min | Comedy, Fantasy, Horror
A young man inadvertently breaks three important rules concerning his new pet and unleashes a horde of malevolently mischievous monsters on a small town.
Director: Joe Dante | Stars: Zach Galligan, Phoebe Cates, Hoyt Axton, John Louie
Votes: 247,962 | Gross: $148.17M
28. The Boxer's Omen (1983)
Not Rated | 99 min | Horror
While in Thailand to avenge his brother who was crippled in a fight with a corrupt Thai boxer, a man gets caught up in a web of fate, Buddhism and black magic.
Director: Chih-Hung Kuei | Stars: Phillip Ko, Shao-Yen Lin, Kar-Man Wai, Lung-Wei Wang
Votes: 1,943
aka: The Boxer's Omen
29. The Shining (1980)
R | 146 min | Drama, Horror
A family heads to an isolated hotel for the winter where a sinister presence influences the father into violence, while his psychic son sees horrific forebodings from both past and future.
Director: Stanley Kubrick | Stars: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers
Votes: 1,107,555 | Gross: $44.02M
30. Beetlejuice (1988)
PG | 92 min | Comedy, Fantasy
The spirits of a deceased couple are harassed by an unbearable family that has moved into their home, and hire a malicious spirit to drive them out.
Director: Tim Burton | Stars: Alec Baldwin, Geena Davis, Michael Keaton, Annie McEnroe
Votes: 340,384 | Gross: $73.71M
31. Aliens (1986)
R | 137 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
Decades after surviving the Nostromo incident, Ellen Ripley is sent out to re-establish contact with a terraforming colony but finds herself battling the Alien Queen and her offspring.
Director: James Cameron | Stars: Sigourney Weaver, Michael Biehn, Carrie Henn, Paul Reiser
Votes: 763,594 | Gross: $85.16M
32. Mr. Vampire (1985)
PG-13 | 96 min | Action, Comedy, Fantasy
The planned reburial of a town elder goes awry as the corpse resurrects into a hopping, bloodthirsty vampire, targeting everyone responsible for digging the grave. A Taoist Priest and his two disciples attempt to stop the terror.
Director: Ricky Lau | Stars: Ching-Ying Lam, Siu-Ho Chin, Ricky Hui, Moon Lee
Votes: 4,634
33. Deadly Games (1989)
Not Rated | 92 min | Action, Horror, Thriller
On Christmas Eve, a resourceful young boy has to defend himself and his grandfather from a killer dressed as Santa Claus.
Director: René Manzor | Stars: Brigitte Fossey, Louis Ducreux, Patrick Floersheim, Alain Lalanne
Votes: 2,785
34. Little Shop of Horrors (1986)
PG-13 | 94 min | Comedy, Horror, Musical
A nerdy florist finds his chance for success and romance with the help of a giant man-eating plant who demands to be fed.
Director: Frank Oz | Stars: Rick Moranis, Ellen Greene, Vincent Gardenia, Levi Stubbs
Votes: 86,447 | Gross: $38.75M
35. Guinea Pig 5: Mermaid in the Manhole (1988 Video)
63 min | Horror
An artist rescues a mermaid in a sewer who develops bleeding sores all over her body, paints a portrait with her oozes and eventually disjoints her.
Director: Hideshi Hino | Stars: Shigeru Saiki, Mari Somei, Masami Hisamoto, Gô Rijû
Votes: 2,513
Guinea Pig: Mermaid in a Manhole
36. Pin (1988)
R | 103 min | Horror, Thriller
Isolated by his strange parents, Leon finds solace in an imaginary friend, which happens to be an anatomy doll from his father's doctor office. Unfortunately, the doll begins to take over Leon's life, and his sister's life as well.
Director: Sandor Stern | Stars: David Hewlett, Cynthia Preston, Terry O'Quinn, Bronwen Mantel
Votes: 5,299
37. The Howling (1981)
R | 91 min | Horror
After a bizarre and near deadly encounter with a serial killer, a television newswoman is sent to a remote mountain resort whose residents may not be what they seem.
Director: Joe Dante | Stars: Dee Wallace, Patrick Macnee, Dennis Dugan, Christopher Stone
Votes: 40,231 | Gross: $17.99M
38. The Night of the Hunted (1980)
Not Rated | 92 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
Futuristic asylum residents in a skyscraper suffer insanity, amnesia. Blank-eyed inmates roam halls of "Black Tower" as tension escalates and bodies pile up.
Director: Jean Rollin | Stars: Brigitte Lahaie, Alain Duclos, Dominique Journet, Bernard Papineau
Votes: 2,096
39. Deranged (1987)
R | 83 min | Horror
A woman kills a burglar in self-defense. The experience so unnerves her she begins to imagine that everyone is trying to harm her and begins to kill anybody who comes near her.
Director: Chuck Vincent | Stars: Veronica Hart, Jerry Butler, Jennifer Delora, Jamie Gillis
Votes: 507
40. The Toxic Avenger (1984)
R | 82 min | Action, Comedy, Horror
Tromaville has a monstrous new hero. The Toxic Avenger is born when meek mop boy Melvin falls into a vat of toxic waste. Now evildoers will have a lot to lose.
Directors: Michael Herz, Lloyd Kaufman | Stars: Andree Maranda, Mitch Cohen, Jennifer Babtist, Cindy Manion
Votes: 32,193
41. Society (1989)
R | 99 min | Comedy, Horror
An ordinary teenage boy discovers his family is part of a gruesome orgy cult for the social elite.
Director: Brian Yuzna | Stars: Billy Warlock, Concetta D'Agnese, Ben Slack, Evan Richards
Votes: 21,964
42. The Ninth Configuration (1980)
R | 118 min | Comedy, Drama, Horror
An ex-marine psychiatrist attempts to rehabilitate his patients by indulging their fantasies, and seeks to prove the existence of a loving God to one especially troubled inmate.
Director: William Peter Blatty | Stars: Stacy Keach, Scott Wilson, Jason Miller, Ed Flanders
Votes: 8,983
43. Day of the Dead (1985)
Not Rated | 101 min | Horror, Thriller
As the world is overrun by zombies, a group of scientists and military personnel sheltering in an underground bunker in Florida must decide on how they should deal with the undead horde.
Director: George A. Romero | Stars: Lori Cardille, Terry Alexander, Joseph Pilato, Jarlath Conroy
Votes: 74,407 | Gross: $5.80M
44. Lady Terminator (1989)
Unrated | 82 min | Action, Drama, Fantasy
The spirit of an ancient evil queen possesses the body of a young anthropological student, who then goes on a murderous rampage.
Director: H. Tjut Djalil | Stars: Barbara Anne Constable, Christopher J. Hart, Claudia Angelique Rademaker, Joseph P. McGlynn
Votes: 2,019
45. Maniac (1980)
18+ | 87 min | Crime, Drama, Horror
A psychopathic man goes on a killing and mutilation spree in New York City.
Director: William Lustig | Stars: Joe Spinell, Caroline Munro, Abigail Clayton, Kelly Piper
Votes: 20,237
46. Videodrome (1983)
R | 87 min | Horror, Sci-Fi, Thriller
A programmer at a Toronto TV station that specializes in adult entertainment searches for the producers of a dangerous and bizarre broadcast.
Director: David Cronenberg | Stars: James Woods, Debbie Harry, Sonja Smits, Peter Dvorsky
Votes: 103,076 | Gross: $2.12M
47. Hellraiser (1987)
R | 94 min | Horror, Thriller
A woman discovers the newly resurrected, partially formed, body of her brother-in-law and lover. She starts killing for him to revitalize his body and escape the demonic beings that are pursuing him after he escaped their underworld.
Director: Clive Barker | Stars: Andrew Robinson, Clare Higgins, Ashley Laurence, Sean Chapman
Votes: 140,622 | Gross: $14.56M
48. I, Madman (1989)
R | 89 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
A bookshop clerk and wannabe actress starts seeing the disfigured killer from her 1950s pulp novels come to life and start killing people around her. She tries to convince her cop boyfriend, but to no avail.
Director: Tibor Takács | Stars: Jenny Wright, Clayton Rohner, Randall William Cook, Stephanie Hodge
Votes: 3,733 | Gross: $0.15M
49. Cemetery of Terror (1985)
R | 88 min | Horror, Thriller
On Halloween, a group of medical students steal the corpse a serial killer from a morgue and raise him from the dead, inadvertently putting themselves and a group of young neighborhood children in danger.
Director: Rubén Galindo Jr. | Stars: Hugo Stiglitz, Usi Velasco, Erika Buenfil, Edna Bolkan
Votes: 1,365
50. Fright Night (1985)
R | 106 min | Horror
"Fright Night" sees a teenager believing that the newcomer in his neighborhood is a vampire. He turns to an actor in a television hosted horror movie show for help to deal with the undead.
Director: Tom Holland | Stars: Chris Sarandon, William Ragsdale, Amanda Bearse, Roddy McDowall
Votes: 78,698 | Gross: $24.92M
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