The Big Picture

• A24's horror films are known for their variety and frequently experimental approach to the genre, exploring themes like family, trauma, and loss.
• The filmmakers behind A24's horror films often challenge the traditional form and offer fresh visions, leaving audiences with exciting new ideas.
• While the brand of A24 may create the misunderstanding that the films are being driven by one force, it is the individual filmmakers themselves who deserve credit for their unique approach.

The indie darling A24 is known for bringing us some of the most critically acclaimed horror films of recent years. Often challenging and experimental, their films are notable for the variety of ways they approach the genre. Reflecting on everything from family, trauma, and loss, to the terrifying beings that can lurk in the recesses of our subconscious, the horror films with the A24 stamp are largely memorable, even if they are often misunderstood. The creative minds behind these films challenge the form and offer fresh new visions that leave us with exciting new ideas bouncing around in our heads as a result. Thus, here is our ranking of A24’s horror films, from worst to best.

26. Tusk

Director: Kevin Smith

The unparalleled worst of all the films on this list, it is hard to even fully consider Kevin Smith’s Tusk a movie. An idea born out of a podcast, that perhaps should have stayed there, it places us with Justin Long’s insufferable Wallace on a journey to Canada. Wallace is an arrogant and generally unlikeable podcaster who is making the trip to interview a strange, reclusive man for his show. When he arrives, he discovers not everything is what it seems, as the man seeks to turn him into a walrus. As Smith himself described it, the film is a “more cuddly version of Human Centipede.”

The most notable aspect of the 2014 film is that it certainly challenges the idea of what can actually count as a film. The whole thing feels like a long punchline that doesn’t have the good sense to end. It is, quite literally, a stoned thought turned into a feature. It is defined by something resembling eccentricity and becomes the most boorish body horror film you’ll ever see. The film gets far too side-tracked, including a prolonged Johnny Depp cameo that just keeps on going until you wish it would all stop. Smith certainly gets points for how he somehow tricked all these people into making it with him, though the end result lands with a dull splash.

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25. Slice

Director: Austin Vesely

In what was just narrowly better than last place, Slice is a film that managed to get a lot of talent involved, though it ended up with almost nothing to show for it. The most goofy of all horror comedies, it is set in a small town where a series of mysterious murders of pizza deliverymen mark the signs of something seriously wrong for the area’s residents. There is an intrepid journalist, some bumbling detectives, and cheesy effects, and it feels like it was trying to be a cult film without ever actually having the good craft to back it up.

Slice never really does anything interesting with the tropes of the genre, more often playing into them as opposed to taking them in a new direction. A stoner comedy without any degree of cleverness, it is about as entertaining as being trapped with a friend who got high and rambled about his idea for a script. Such stoner comedies can and have been great, though they were actually funny. Slice, however, is almost entirely unfunny with hardly a laugh to be found anywhere. There might be a few jokes here or there that land out of sheer volume, though it never really makes any impression before you get hit with a deluge of bits that are met with silence. Horror and comedy can go together — see 2021's hilarious Werewolves Within — though Slice would have been better off if it was left on the cutting room floor.

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24. Life After Beth

Director: Jeff Baena

Speaking of other horror comedies, the charming but meandering Life After Beth is one that has a lot of good within it, even as it ranks so low on this list. It follows Dane DeHaan as Zach, who is struggling with the accidental death of his girlfriend. The titular Beth, played by an outstanding Aubrey Plaza, then returns from beyond the grave and re-enters Zach’s life. The troubled lovers will have to work through their fraught relationship and figure out what is going on with her. It is that dynamic that is the core of the film and is equal parts funny as it is engaging. It holds a sweet spot in my heart, though that can’t overcome the rest of what drags it all down to an early grave.

Life After Beth is still by no means terrible, as the performances of the entire cast are universally solid. In particular, Molly Shannon and John C. Reilly as Beth’s parents hit all the right comedic notes. It gets very dark, though not in a way that feels out of place. It should have worked far better, though it just becomes far too repetitive and disjointed. Plaza is a good actor to build a film around as she has been absolutely stellar in subsequent films like Ingrid Goes West, but this film begins to lose steam and can’t regain it. What would have worked as a great sketch or short film gets stretched until it almost breaks.

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23. The Monster

Director: Bryan Bertino

A straightforward and typical monster flick with a title that tells you most of what you need to know, The Monster is a road trip interrupted when a mother hits an animal on the road while driving with her daughter. Before this, mother Kathy (Zoe Kazan) and daughter Lizzy (Ella Ballentine) already have a strained relationship. Much of this stems from Kathy’s alcoholism, which Lizzy bears the brunt of, often having to be the adult in the relationship and take care of the parental figure who is supposed to be there for her. That will all come into focus when they remain stranded on the road awaiting help as some sort of beast lurks in the forest. Together, the duo will have to find a way to work together and survive the threat facing them.

Writer and director Bryan Bertino has made some interesting work, with 2020's The Dark and the Wicked being particularly praiseworthy, though that excellence never quite materializes here. Everything plays out about as you would expect, with some added degree of emotional growth conveyed through flashback. It just lacks a deeper impact, both in its scares and its story. The Monster is completely uninterested in going down any new paths, instead becoming increasingly predictable and even leaning into moments that fully lose themselves in cliché. It is aggressively simple in its execution. Simple isn’t bad, but it certainly isn’t going to blow anyone away.

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22. The Hole in the Ground

Director: Lee Cronin

An entry that fully leans into the "creepy as hell kid" vein of horror, Lee Cronin's The Hole in the Ground is about that and so much more. It follows single mother Sarah (Seána Kerslake) who lives with her son Chris (James Quinn Markey) in the rural Irish countryside. One night, Chris disappears behind their home and comes back behaving rather differently. This leads Sarah to believe he may be an impostor and that it is somehow all tied to the titular hole that is in the forest near their home. It soon becomes a psychological nightmare where Sarah begins to notice Chris doing very un-childlike things, though she struggles to trust herself in what she is seeing.

To its credit, The Hole in the Ground does a competent enough job of messing with some of your expectations and has many strikingly horrifying visuals that carry the film through a largely unoriginal story. It never loses your attention as you get drawn deeper in, though you come out the other side feeling like it just missed out on all it could have been. The parental fears of losing your child or, perhaps worse, not being able to recognize them anymore is a story full of potential — potential that, regrettably, never gets realized. There is a good final note that it all ends on, though the journey in which you get there is where it falls into its own narrative pit of playing it safe.

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21. In Fabric

Director: Peter Strickland

A film that had so much going for it that it breaks my heart to put it this low, In Fabric tells the story of a killer (in both appearance and in nature) dress. The first part of the film follows a brilliant Marianne Jean-Baptiste as Sheila, a divorcee who stumbles upon a dress that will alter the course of her life. The blood-red gown begins to haunt her and even destroys her washing machine. The film is silly yet hypnotic, making you wonder both at the dress and its witchy properties as well as what will happen with Sheila. She is an interesting character who should have remained the focus of the entire film, and it is to its detriment that they shifted her off-center.

Inexplicably, In Fabric takes a hard turn and removes Sheila from the majority of the story. Instead, we are plopped into a new situation with new characters who come across the dress. While some interesting threads remain, this decision entirely abandons the most compelling part of the story and suffers dearly for it. The remainder of the film feels like a retread of everything that was already seen, going back through the discovery of the dress and its properties. The ending does prove to be appropriately over the top and redeems it slightly, though not nearly enough. It is a huge narrative misstep as it tears the audience away from the far better character it was building and dumps you with others who just can’t compare.

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20. Climax

Director: Gaspar Noé

A hallucinatory drug trip of a film, Climax is a horror film that could only be made by the auteur director Gaspar Noé. It is more restrained and straightforward than some of his prior films, like the expansive masterpiece Enter the Void, though it still contains the director’s indelible stamp of surrealness. It focuses on an ensemble cast of a dance troupe who are drugged and begin to descend into madness that will leave them uncertain of what is real. It is a technical marvel with many extended shots of both dancing and violence (sometimes where they are occurring at the same time). These scenes are impossible to look away from, even if you may want to, as it boggles the mind to comprehend how it all came together and where it is all going next. It always keeps you on your toes, shifting from comedy to horror in the blink of an eye. It is truly a spectacle.

There is some degree where the story and the acting leave much to be desired. Much of this is forgivable as many of the cast were selected for their dancing prowess as opposed to their acting. However, in moments where acting is required, it falls flat. Sofia Boutella as Selva is an exception, though no one else can match the levels of genuine terror she creates as she begins to lose her mind. The story itself feels like a secondary aspect, leaving a regrettably empty and exhausted feeling at the core of it by the time it all ends. Climax is by no means a bad movie, though it just can’t quite hold a candle to what is to come on this list.

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19. Enemy

Director: Denis Villeneuve

Before you even say it, yes, Enemy is not entirely a horror film in the conventional sense. Most would describe it as more of a psychological thriller, though that ends up leaving out a lot of the more horrifying aspects, especially its visuals. Loosely based on the novel The Double by Jose Saramago, Enemy has Jake Gyllenhaal pulling double duty as two men who look the exact same, though are opposite sides of the same coin. When one discovers the existence of the other, their worlds begin to blur as their lives become intertwined. It is quite unsettling with many sequences that alarm and intrigue in equal measure, throwing the audience off balance at nearly every chance it gets.

The film is less one to be taken literally, in that there aren’t two identical men walking around at the same time. It is more about how they express different sides of who this person is. There is the creepy use of spider imagery, including a particularly unnerving moment where a woman has the head of an arachnid, that makes your skin begin to crawl. These images are what draw from horror cinema even as it is much more about the internal horrors of what one man is capable of. The outside terrors are manifestations of his inner turmoil. Once you begin to pick up on what is happening, it is all rather blunt, while still being a flawed yet intriguing look at the psyche.

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18. Saint Maud

Director: Rose Glass

A film that deserved a far better release than it got, Saint Maud marks the point where this list starts to get really good. An incredible feature debut from writer-director Rose Glass, it's a film about faith and loneliness that proves to be a brutally painful study of its central character. It stars a convincing Morfydd Clark as Maud, a nurse who is caring for Jennifer Ehle’s ailing Amanda. Maud believes that she is being directed by her faith and begins to drift increasingly into deeper levels of delusion that stem from that. It is a nightmarish descent that comes from both a deeply felt performance as well as many expertly captured sequences that make the most of haunting visuals. It is truly unsettling, cutting right to your very soul with each scene.

Saint Maud is all centered around pain, both physical and spiritual, that deepens the dread the longer it goes on. It isn’t a long film, though at some moments it feels like an eternity. This is not a critique but a compliment, as the ability to make time feel like it is weighing upon you while watching a person in such agony is a true achievement. Every injury Maud inflicts on herself as she spirals out of control just twists the knife further and further until you almost can’t take it anymore. The final moments drive this all the way home, creating one of the most impactful final frames of any film on this list. It is an image that will remain forever seared in your mind.

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17. Lamb

Director: Valdimar Jóhannsson

Lamb is a story of family and loss that plays out in the most terrifying place in the world: rural Iceland. Actually, it is quite a beautiful, though painfully remote, location, where isolation is precisely the point. The movie follows a farming couple who have lost a child and are now living a life devoid of any joy as they struggle in silence with their grief. That is until they discover an unexpected gift that brings new life to the farm. Initially a joyous moment for the couple, they remain blissfully unaware of a looming presence that is circling their home. It is seeking to take back something, revealing that the gift may actually be a curse in disguise.

Oddly enough, Lamb has a lot of elements that are darkly funny, even approaching some degree of surreal silliness, which may catch some viewers off guard. However, the film plays it almost entirely straight and explores how the whole point is that the couple is willing to accept something so absurd as a way to heal. In particular, Noomi Rapace as the mother instills her character with a quiet grace that masks a deeper sadness which can quickly shift into violence. It plays out against a beautifully shot setting that is expertly juxtaposed against the dark forces at play. The final moments ram the point home with a painful yet fitting conclusion that leaves little hope in the bleak, bleak world the film fully inhabits.

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16. Bodies Bodies Bodies

Director: Halina Reijn

Next is the chaotic yet clever Bodies Bodies Bodies. It is a modern horror whodunit whose gags, both big and small, are intertwined with the terror that takes hold of its characters. Set in a swanky mansion as a hurricane descends on the area, it follows seven “friends” who decide to play a game under cover of darkness. This competition is a riff on the game Werewolf, where someone is the murderer and everyone else has to figure out who they are before it's too late. However, the night will take a dark turn when someone actually ends up brutally killed.

A darkly playful tale of paranoia and distrust, Bodies Bodies Bodies is a film all about the chaos the characters create when they go at each other’s throats. This is both physical and verbal, as glorious insults turn into physical confrontations, with everyone wondering who exactly is behind the increasing body count. All the characters feel distinct, yet the performances become universally unhinged as fear begins to consume all of them. While the movie does drag at times, the conclusion is a glorious punchline that ties everything together as perfectly as can be.

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15. Men

Director: Alex Garland

Alex Garland’s Men is by no means his best work, though it still proves to be something quite extraordinary with a conclusion that is unlike anything you’ve ever seen. The story follows a typically outstanding Jessie Buckley as Harper, who is taking a solo vacation to the quiet of the English countryside. She hopes the trip will provide healing after her life was recently thrown into turmoil following a traumatic loss. Upon arriving, she meets an awkward yet creepy landlord named Geoffrey, who is the first of many characters played by a menacing Rory Kinnear. As Harper settles in, she soon discovers that the peaceful time she hoped to have for herself is doomed to chaos as the men of the town all begin to descend on her.

There is a lot about the film that is evocative and unsettling which can’t be discussed without tipping off what it all ends up being a front for. With that in mind, it is both sinister and spectacular when left subtle. Even when it ends up being quite blunt, spelling things out far more than it should have, there is still an unshakeable impact left by Garland’s command of finding beauty in brutality as he makes the jump into body horror. Both central performances further elevate the material, speaking volumes even when they say very little. Men is a film that sees the director shift away from science fiction to settle into more explicit horror, creating an experience defined by striking visuals and an unending sense of dread.

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14. Green Room

Director: Jeremy Saulnier

The most brutal and gory of the films on this list, Green Room creates horror from the terrors of real-life white supremacy that befall an unsuspecting punk-rock band. Starring the late Anton Yelchin in a nuanced performance as Pat, he must face Patrick Stewart in rare form as the cruel white supremacist leader, Darcy. When Pat’s struggling band takes a gig in Oregon without knowing who it will be for, they find themselves trapped inside the green room with a group of modern-day Nazis outside seeking to kill them. With nowhere to turn, they will have to fight and scramble to get out alive. It is a gritty, realistic take that is incredibly gruesome.

Yet, that is precisely what makes Green Room such a memorable piece of work. There is so much death and violence that feels terrifyingly real, and the predicament and way that it plays out is intentionally uncinematic. There is no catharsis or emotional triumph, and the life-or-death fight the characters find themselves in is a hell without any redemption to be found. The pain of every loss is felt with a soul-crushing intensity as it hammers home the reality of what is being faced. Green Room is an unrelenting masterpiece that, even with the small victories found in the end, makes it clear there is no happiness to be felt here. There is only death and violence, a grim reflection of our world with the all-too-human monsters within it.

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13. Talk to Me

Directors: Danny and Michael Philippou

The newest film on this list made a splash when it premiered back at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. Talk to Me is the first feature from YouTubers turned directors Danny and Michael Philippou, and is one of the most interesting movies in recent years. Starring a spectacular Sophie Wilde in what is also her feature film debut, Talk to Me centers on the troubled Mia who is haunted by a devastating loss. When she gets the chance to commune with the world beyond via a dangerous party game involving holding an embalmed hand and surrendering your body to a spirit, she's drawn to the potential that she may hear from her departed loved one.

What ensures that Talk to Me works is the thrill that comes from peering into the great beyond and discovering that something is peering back. It is also a film that will have you pondering deeper questions about life and death, as well as more gruesome ones like "How on Earth is his head still attached?!"

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12. The Blackcoat’s Daughter

Director: Oz Perkins

With yet another bleak entry on this list, this one may be the most underseen and underrated of recent horror flicks. A stunning directorial debut from writer-director Oz Perkins, The Blackcoat’s Daughter is a film built almost entirely on atmosphere. The less you know about it, the better. The basic story is that there are two students, played by Lucy Boynton and upcoming Scream Queen Kiernan Shipka, who find themselves left behind at a prep school over the break. Seemingly disconnected from that, a mysterious woman (Emma Roberts) is making her way on a journey through the winter. That all sounds very vague, though trust me when I say this film is truly something special.

From the creeping score that hits every note perfectly to the sense of dread that the film continuously builds, everything in The Blackcoat's Daughter works together to create maximum impact. It is a slow burn containing a raging fire at its core that, much like the furnace seen throughout the film, is just waiting to set the world alight. It's a movie that more people should have seen, as it regrettably, never really took hold, but it's worth taking a chance on even if you aren’t entirely sure where it's going. The ending, in particular, ties it all together nicely, offering up a final scene that reveals the tragic sense of disconnection and loss that the film is centrally about. A hidden horror gem, The Blackcoat's Daughter deserves far more attention than it got.

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11. High Life

Director: Claire Denis

Another entry that some may object to being considered a horror, High Life is a blend of science fiction and horror from one of the most exciting directors of our time, Claire Denis. A reflective yet still deeply terrifying look at space travel, the film has an absolutely stacked cast of Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, André 3000, and Mia Goth. The characters all find themselves on an interstellar journey as part of an experiment to see whether life can be born in the most inhospitable conditions of space. The experiment itself is deeply unethical and goes to some truly depressing places, crafting an experience that is wholly one of a kind — one scene portrays a black hole that tears open your mind in a moment of glorious yet terrifying annihilation.

High Life's depiction of space is all its own, frequently playing by its own rules while also showing moments of the awesome power that can be found in the darkest reaches of our galaxy. When I first saw it in a theater, there was a moment where several people walked out, though that just reaffirmed how it challenged the form in the best way possible. A beautiful balancing act of a film, High Life also has a beating heart at the center of it, proving to be a story of father and daughter that is as sentimental as it is sad.

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10. Hereditary

Director: Ari Aster

Before you pull out your pitchforks that Hereditary is ranked outside the top five on this list, please know that it could have easily been much farther up. The feature debut that made writer-director Ari Aster one everyone wanted to see more from, the film is a haunting tale that flips the script on many common conventions of the genre. It stars a terrific Toni Collette as Annie Graham, the matriarch of a family grieving a tragic loss. It is a deadly and dire look at how familial trauma plays out in painstaking detail. There is horror to be found in every corner of the Graham family home as it becomes increasingly clear that they are doomed to suffer for the rest of time.

If you consider yourself someone who admires horror, then you’ve likely already seen Hereditary. However, for the sake of those who haven’t, suffice to say the ending takes rather unexpected turns that may catch some off guard. It still all works as a cohesive whole, especially when the precise visuals are so haunting in how they resemble the models that Annie creates in the spirals of her grief. The score by Colin Stetson, with the ending use of 'Reborn' in particular, perfectly compliments the artistry on display amidst the tragedy. It is a hard watch, with moments of unimaginable pain, though it all makes for a powerful piece of work.

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9. Beau Is Afraid

Director: Ari Aster

A film that is almost certain to be one of the most divisive on this list is Beau Is Afraid. Another work by Aster, this is one of those films that is equal parts unhinged as it is oddly compelling. From the very beginning all the way to its revealing end where everyone is put on trial, Beau Is Afraid is a work of existential horror that is not as conventionally scary, as it always prioritizes being darkly comedic. In this regard, it is more similar to Aster’s shorts than his other features and may prove a bit of a hard pill for many to swallow. However, for those willing to go along with it, there is something both silly and sinister that the director manages to tap into.

Following the journey of the troubled Beau (Joaquin Phoenix) as he tries to go home and see his departed mother one last time, Beau Is Afraid places us completely in his shoes as everything seems to go wrong. Whether it's when his keys are stolen as he tries to go to the airport or when he is hit by a food truck, the blows just keep raining down on Aster’s poor protagonist. The film explores fears of family and the future, and, when all is revealed, the constantly watching audience themselves. As Beau tries to find a better story for himself, the repeated denial of any sort of catharsis in favor of delving further into chaos is what makes this movie a standout that is truly all its own.

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8. It Comes at Night

Director: Trey Edward Shults

It Comes at Night is a great film done dirty by a misleading marketing campaign. Even while the title itself may have been somewhat of a misdirect — though it makes sense when read as being about paranoia — the trailer was the nail in the coffin. People went in expecting a monster movie when it most certainly is not. Instead, It Comes at Night is a much more interesting look at how fear and isolation can drive people to commit monstrous acts. Writer-director Trey Edward Shults was coming off the micro-budget family drama, Krisha, with something utterly unexpected yet completely fascinating, and the result is a tension-filled study of humanity when pushed to the absolute breaking point.

What pushes all the characters to the edge is fear of each other and, in the world of the film, the disease they may carry. All the people in this world are traumatized, and that informs their every action. It Comes at Night is pitch black tonally and visually, often relying on the darkness of the scene to increase the suspicion of what is happening. By the time the tragic conclusion plays out, your emotions are almost completely fried. There is one final scream that still echoes around inside my head because of the sheer agony it conveys — when I saw it in theaters, someone broke into uncontrollable sobbing. The movie completely wears you down to the bone with the final scene alone and is a masterful, bleak portrait of our worst selves.

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7. The Killing of a Sacred Deer

Director: Yorgos Lanthimos

The most genuinely funny film on this list (even set against the ones that bill themselves as horror-comedies), The Killing of a Sacred Deer is writer-director Yorgos Lanthimos creating some of his best work. Intentionally awkward yet no less alarming, the film finds a tonal groove that elicits humor and fear in equal measure. The story centers around Colin Farrell’s Steven, a seemingly kind father who is caring for Barry Keoghan’s Martin. Martin’s father died and Steven has stepped in to offer support, even though he may be somewhat culpable as the doctor who was tasked with operating on Martin's dad. Martin begins to torment Steven's family, leaving Steven’s wife Anna (Nicole Kidman) wondering why her children Kim (Raffey Cassidy) and Bob (Sunny Suljic) must suffer as well.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer is a revenge tale that features Lanthimos’ distinct vision for storytelling that always just feels a little bit off. This unique feeling manifests in everything from a strange spaghetti-eating scene, to when Steven attempts to get clarity on which one of his children he should allow to die. Much of the dialogue feels stilted, yet not in a solely monotone way — the conversations just always feel like it is a group of aliens discussing what it is like being a human. This is not a criticism, but a compliment, as it leaves you always wondering what on Earth a character will do based on the bizarre things they say. Drawing inspiration from Greek tragedies, the movie ends with a sacrifice that is done in a darkly absurd, yet no less impactful way. Keoghan's performance as Martin makes the film worth seeing all on its own, as he captures the obsession and sadness of a boy who has lost his father and is seeking justice. With many beautifully framed shots, even occasionally from directly above, The Killing of a Sacred Deer conveys a feeling that we are casual observers of a runaway train that is doomed to crash.

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