Thread by @NitrateDiva

"Why Wait for October?" Classic Horror Recommendations 🧵

Daily dose commences now with Columbia chiller RETURN OF THE VAMPIRE (1943). Bela Lugosi battles aristocratic scientist Frieda Inescort for the soul of Nina Foch. 🦇🧛🩸

LAKE OF THE DEAD (1958): Cozily dark Norwegian cabin in the woods thriller. Haunting atmosphere: glistening black water dotted with lilies, tangled forests, creaking boards... Although the explanation at the end is a bit much, this creepy vacation is still worth it.

THE UNDYING MONSTER (1942): Manor house whodunit with a werewolf twist. Pleasantly concise at 63 minutes, although I could curl up by the fire and stay a while longer.

Directed by John Brahm, who had a flair for the unhinged, and produced by Bryan Foy, aka the Keeper of the Bs.

EVEN THE WIND IS AFRAID (1968): A gaggle of schoolgirls encounter a specter after their draconian headmistress grounds them over vacation.
Written and directed by Mexican horror master Carlos Enrique Taboada, this ghost story is streaming free on Tubi! bit.ly/3BIMiYB

THE UNKNOWN (1927): Tod Browning's unsettling carnival drama veers into body horror and ghoulish revenge once Lon Chaney's character decides he'd literally give a limb or two for Joan Crawford.

THE DOUBLE DOOR (1934): An iron-willed matriarch will stop at nothing to dispose of her step-brother's radiant new bride in this underseen Gothic melodrama.
(A Google video search should turn it up...)

THE MAGICIAN (1926): A beautiful sculptress falls under the spell of a deranged occultist. Influential chiller directed by Rex Ingram, starring his wife and collaborator Alice Terry. Loosely inspired by Aleister Crowley.
Look out for young Michael Powell's cameo!

THE GORGON (1964): Cushing, Lee, and Barbara Shelley. That would be enough! But the autumnal melancholy, ruined manor, unusual monster, and atmosphere of police state paranoia all make this a uniquely brooding Hammer entry.
Streaming on Tubi: bit.ly/3njgUMi

DEAD OF NIGHT (1945): Much imitated, never equalled anthology of nightmare fuel. A murder mirror, Miles Malleson as the most British incarnation of death imaginable, and the creepiest ventriloquist dummy.
Like, I'll probably have bad dreams just tweeting about it.

THE SEVENTH VICTIM (1943): A movie that looks the devil in the eye at the crossroads of Horror and Noir and sees humanity's own obsessions with death and control.

Just rewatched this and it has lost none of its ability to give me full-body chills!

CARNIVAL OF SINNERS (1943): Spellbinding tale of making a deal with the devil—all the more uneasily authentic as a product of Continental Films, the French movie industry's WWII devil's bargain. Maurice Tourneur (Jacques's dad) recaptures the splendor of his silent masterpieces.

BURN, WITCH, BURN (1962): He's an arrogant, uber-rational professor. She's an open-minded amateur witch. Can their marriage be saved—even after he burns her talismans and leaves them vulnerable to a deadly hex fueled by academic acrimony?

Streaming free on Pluto TV!

THE MEPHISTO WALTZ (1971): In honor of Jacqueline Bisset's birthday, of course I have to put in a good word for this decadent, haunting tale of music, death, jealousy, and occult body/soul transference.

BLOOD AND ROSES (1960): There's something about the so-called spring of your life that is very much like the autumn. Dreams wither. Possibilities fall away like dead leaves. That's the sensual sadness at the heart of Vadim's dreamlike vampire film, inspired by Le Fanu's Carmilla.

DRÁCULA (1931): Universal's Spanish-language DRACULA filmed by night on the same sets as the English version. The result is a longer, more visually daring early talkie horror with standout performances by Lupita Tovar and Pablo Álvarez Rubio. #HispanicHeritageMonth

THE BLOB (1958): Steve McQueen as the intrepid teen hero, darn good special effects, a beautiful color palette, and a sequence structured around a midnight screening of DAUGHTER OF HORROR. What's not to love? A clever, cool, satisfying flick.

NIGHT TIDE (1961): For Curtis Harrington's birthday, I have to recommend his haunting doomed love story between a sweet, lonely sailor (baby Dennis Hopper!) and a gorgeous carnie chick who may or may not be a murderous mermaid. You can practically smell the salt air.

SON OF DRACULA (1943): No, Chaney Jr's not a great Dracula. But the movie belongs to Louise Allbritton as the femme fatale who cozies up to the Count for the dark secret of eternal life.
Robert Siodmak does Southern Gothic on the cusp of his 40s noir run. Streaming free on Tubi!

HORROR AT 37,000 FEET (1973): What if a 70s plane movie engulfed an M.R. James ghost story? We don't have to wonder. We have this made-for-TV gem. (And check out the rest of Jessica's thread too! 👇)

THE UNINVITED (1944): Lovable siblings, a seaside mansion to die for, a fragile beauty, and a spectral menace... all the right elements for one of classic Hollywood's greatest ghost stories. Cozy and chilling in the perfect measure.

THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925): Elevated horror indeed! An opulent, captivatingly macabre adaptation from Universal starring Lon Chaney at his most simultaneously horrifying and heartrending. And that Technicolor Red Death masquerade sequence...

KILL, BABY... KILL! (1966): The title sounds like a slasher, doesn't it? But no. It's a slow-burn ghost story in the Gothic tradition, woven around two formidable women with mystical powers. Graced by one of Bava's best color palettes IMO!