The 10 Best Horror Movies Of 2023, Ranked

Horror remains as vital as ever. While other films flounder at the box office, horror almost always reigns supreme. Audiences simply cannot get enough. We inherently love to be scared; to be disturbed; to be frightened. To sit in the dark and let something scary take hold of us. The horror films of 2023 were an eclectic bunch — weird, wonderful, both fresh and familiar. Slasher throwbacks, modernist takes on classic tropes, and bold new voices in the genre all presented themselves to us, giving us the creeps in the process. 

As is always the case when making a list like this, it's important to recognize the titles that didn't make the cut. So while we're proud of our ranked list of the top 10 horror movies of 2023, we also want to highlight several titles not on the list — "Knock at the Cabin," "The Sacrifice Game," "Haunted Mansion," "The Conference," "The Outwaters," "The Passenger," "V/H/S/85," "Huesera: The Bone Woman," "It's A Wonderful Knife," "Dark Harvest," and "M3GAN," just to name a few. These horror films might not be in our top 10, but that doesn't mean fans of the genre should skip them. In fact, we urge you to see as many horror movies as you possibly can. It's good for you.

I am not the biggest Eli Roth fan, and there are a lot of ways "Thanksgiving" — his feature-length adaptation of a fake trailer originally made for the double-feature "Grindhouse" — could have gone wrong. But Roth's modern slasher ends up being a heck of a lot of fun. To be clear: the script is a little wobbly, the characters are thinly sketched, and you can figure out who the killer is pretty quickly. But none of that ends up hampering the film because it's so much fun. Remember when horror movies were fun? I do! And I miss that. Don't get me wrong — I can get down with modern bleak horror and its use of trauma as a catalyst. But it's also a treat to have an old-school slasher back in theaters again.

Rather than return to the grindhouse aesthetic of the trailer, Roth's film feels more like a throwback to the '90s slasher boom ushered in by "Scream." A year after a Black Friday massacre at a Walmart-like superstore, a killer in a pilgrim outfit is stalking the residents of a small town on Thanksgiving. This enables Roth to get creative with a whole buffet of gory, inventive kills, many of which use old-fashioned practical effects. The filmmaker isn't trying to break new ground here; instead, he's delivering a series of thrills and kills that are bound to appeal to even the most jaded of horror fans. Bring on that sequel. (Chris Evangelista)

Brandon Cronenberg makes movies that make you feel awful. Nasty, violent, ugly films. The type of films that have you questioning why you're watching them in the first place. None of that may sound very appealing to you, but me? I'm all-in on Cronenberg's nihilistic madness. While not as good as his horrifying "Possessor," Cronenberg's latest, the gonzo nightmare "Infinity Pool," packs one hell of a punch. In "Infinity Pool," Alexander Skarsgård is a struggling writer (is there any other kind?) on vacation with his wife (Cleopatra Coleman) in the (fictional) country of Li Tolqa. There, the married couple meets another couple, played by Jalil Lespert and modern scream queen Mia Goth. 

After an accident lands Skarsgård's character in legal trouble, he's presented with an utterly bonkers escape hatch: he can pay a huge fee to have himself cloned, and then his clone can be punished in his place. This opens the door to a world of strange, vile, increasingly violent situations as Skarsgård's character becomes more and more deranged and damaged by the experience, egged on by Goth, turning in a performance so unhinged that it's legitimately scary. I can't wait to see what f***ed-up s**t Brandon Cronenberg cooks up next. (Chris Evangelista)

Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" has served as the catalyst for many a tale of terror, and the latest film to draw on her classic story about reanimating the dead is Laura Moss' wonderfully macabre "Birth/Rebirth." Both disturbing and darkly funny, "Birth/Rebirth" boasts a killer performance from Marin Ireland (Ireland had a hell of a year; she delivers another great performance in the film "Eileen"). Ireland is Rose, a pathologist who has been conducting experiments to bring back the dead. When a 6-year-old named Lila (A.J. Lister) dies, Rose sees the perfect specimen for her experiments. 

But Lila's mother, a nurse named Celie (Judy Reyes), soon learns that her dead daughter is alive again — sort of. From here, the film becomes a kind of odd-couple dark comedy, with Rose and Celie both operating out of Rose's home to help Lila get back on her feet. As you might imagine, things don't go according to plan. To say any more would spoil the fun, as part of the power of "Birth/Rebirth" is not knowing exactly where all of this is leading. I went into the film completely cold at Sundance and ended up blown away in the process — that was back in January 2023, and I haven't stopped thinking about the film all year. (Chris Evangelista)

Arguably the most polarizing horror film of 2023, Kyle Edward Ball's "Skinamarink" is also one of the scariest ... if you give yourself over to it, that is. Shot in his childhood home, "Skinamarink" is a micro-budget analog horror film about two children creeping around their house in the middle of the night only to find the doors and windows have disappeared, their parents are nowhere to be found, and the only source of lighting is an old tube TV playing public domain cartoons on repeat. "Skinamarink" operates less like a narrative film and more like an immersive experience, regressing the viewer back into childhood and forcing them to remember what it felt like when the furniture felt too big, the darkness seemed darker than humanly possible, and every unseen sound carried a threatening aura.

A viral sensation that quickly became the world-of-mouth hit of the year, "Skinamarink" is only effective if the viewer is willing to let the film work its magic. There are shots of walls in the dark that don't move for minutes on end, an act of psychological warfare on Ball's part that triggers the audience's mind to start playing tricks. Half of the terror is questioning if there's something hidden in the darkness that we can just barely make out, or if this is a result of our own fear trying to make sense of what's before us. Is there something in this house, or are the senses going into overdrive and imagining something that isn't there? Watch and see for yourself. (BJ Colangelo)

In Toho's hands, Godzilla can be more than smashy and loud. Takashi Yamazaki's "Godzilla Minus One" is as much about a tumultuous era in Japanese history as it is about a reptilian kaiju decimating cities. Tokyo is already rubble in the wake of World War II before Godzilla even whips his tail into rows of skyscrapers. Yamazaki uses Godzilla as a metaphor, not just a scaly monster, which realizes the full potential of the iconic creature's presentation. You get all the underfoot chaos present in American adaptations that value action over all else, but also thoughtful storytelling bursting with nationalistic commentaries built on the values of communal strength.

Yamazaki impresses as "Godzilla Minus One" doesn't crumble under the story's ambitions nor undersell the visual splendor of Godzilla's might. Destruction sequences feature a ferocious Godzilla laying waste to metropolitan hubs, whether stomping around or blasting his atomic breath, with kudos paid to Yamazaki's visual effects team. Then there's the vocal post-war response to Japan's government failings, led by a lead character who suffers from tremendous guilt as a surviving kamikaze pilot. You get scenes where Godzilla hurls battleships like bathtub toys and thoughtful scripting about the courage it takes to fight back when you're already in the suck. "Godzilla Minus One" is a conflicted and contemplative kaiju take, which makes it one of the year's best films. (Matt Donato)