Mia Goth’s 2023 criticism of the Academy Awards for consistently overlooking the horror genre has made headlines. The thing is, she makes a valid point, one that is very hard to disagree with. The proof is evident throughout the history of the Oscars, where horror films have scored few nominations and even fewer wins. To date, only The Silence of the Lambs has won Best Picture, and 1973’s The Exorcist was the first horror film to even be nominated for Best Picture – 45 years into the institution. This year is no different, with Godzilla: Minus One the only horror film up for a nomination, for Best Visual Effects. Overall, there have only been six horror films to be nominated for Best Picture consideration. For years, horror films have fostered award-worthy depth and talent that have been passed over, but these may be the most egregious snubs of them all.

1 'Evil Dead Rise'

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

In many ways, the horror genre is a victim of its own success when it comes to the Best Makeup and Hairstyling category. Even the worst horror film can bring the most nightmarish visions to life at the hands of the makeup artist, which makes Evil Dead Rise a rarity among its kin. Not only does the film make every open wound and dripping perforation ultrarealistic, it brings Ellie's (Alyssa Sutherland) transformation into a grotesque Deadite to life — er, death. The pacing of the transformation is perfect, with the cosmetics wisely keeping Ellie recognizable, the human behind the gore, even as she goes full-Deadite. The effects honor the Evil Dead films before it, yet still create something new to build off of.

WATCH ON MAX

2 'The Babadook' (2014)

Essie Davis for Best Actress

In Jennifer Kent's The Babadook, Essie Davis plays Amelia, a widow who has been raising her six-year-old son Sam (Noah Wiseman) on her own. She is exhausted, still struggling with grief, and isolated. Soon, Sam displays erratic behavior, develops insomnia, and is adamant that an imaginary monster is out to get him. His sleepless nights become her sleepless nights, and after reading a pop-up storybook called Mister Babadook, Sam is convinced that the Babadook is real. And as Amelia finds out, he is. Davis is flat-out amazing in the role, making the character's journey from exhausted single mother, to fearful recluse, to impatient and angry authoritarian, to the murderous intent of the Babadook that comes to possess her believable and grounded. It's a powerhouse performance that deserved to be at least nominated.

WATCH ON PRIME

3 'Hereditary' (2018)

Toni Collette for Best Actress

After the death of her mother, with whom she shared a troubled relationship, Annie (Toni Collette) and her family are haunted by an ominous presence. It's not coincidental: Annie discovers that her mother was the leader of a coven. Now, her family are pawns in an evil plan to summon the demon King Paimon, with her son set apart as the demon's male host. Annie's unbelievable pain and anguish are utterly devastating, and it's a testament to Collette's talent that it doesn't come across as melodramatic. Olivia Colman took home the gong this year, with Collette not even nominated. The Academy had a chance to expand the vision of Best Actress beyond what we usually see but unfortunately did not take it.

Watch on Max

4 'IT' (2017)

Best Adapted Screenplay

Stephen King novel adaptations are largely hit or miss. For every Misery, there's a Maximum Overdrive, so screenplay writers Chase Palmer, Cary Fukunaga, and Gary Dauberman were already in for a challenge before putting pen to paper on 2017's IT. IT came with an additional challenge: the shadow of the successful adaptation as a TV miniseries in 1990, with Tim Curry as the menacing, definitive Pennywise, that came before. So not only did they need to bring the story of the Losers Club and their battle against Pennywise to life, but they needed to set it apart from its previous incarnation. Challenge accepted. The screenplay is a faithful and smart adaptation of King's novel, with the film covering the first chronological half of the book, sans the "Ritual of Chüd" and problematic sex scene. More importantly, how they wrote Pennywise created a separate entity from Curry's portrayal, allowing Bill Skarsgård to make the character his own.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

5 Shaun of the Dead (2004)

Best Original Screenplay

The pair of Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg struck gold with Shaun of the Dead, the British zombie comedy film from 2004. It was wildly successful upon release and consistently places high on lists of the best comedy films and horror films. The way they approached the genre is perfection. The zombies in the film are not played for laughs, for the most part. These zombies are just as dangerous and menacing as any found in George A. Romero's films, and it's a respectful homage to the zombie genre. Where they find the humor is on the outskirts of the zombie apocalypse, with best friends Shaun (Simon Pegg) and Ed (Nick Frost) oblivious to the surrounding horror, more focused on a pint than their direction in life. The screenplay is silly where it can be, horrifying when it needs to be and gives the characters a natural progression from layabouts to heroes.

RENT ON APPLE TV+

6 Us (2019)

Best Picture/Lupita Nyong'o for Best Actress

The topic of this piece could arguably be the works of auteur Jordan Peele alone. Peele's Us is unique, something that stands apart from others in the horror genre. It's the tale of a family of four on vacation, shaken to see a group of four people that look exactly like them. These four haunting doppelgängers get into the house, and only one can talk, but haltingly and with effort: Adelaide's (Lupita Nyong'o) double, known only as Red. Peele had created a whole mythology around the film, including an underworld where there are other doppelgängers who come to the surface and start killing their surface doubles. The film ends with a Shyamalan-esque twist of the world he's created. The success of the film is largely thanks to lead actress Nyong'o, who plays the double role excellently, creating two very different characters, imbuing them with their own traits and purposes.

WATCH ON TUBI

7 American Psycho (2001)

Christian Bale for Best Actor

It's 1987, and Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) is the epitome of the late '80s Wall Street investment banker. Well-groomed and wealthy, but behind the exterior lies a shell of a man. A serial killer. Bale's performance captures the narcissistic yuppie of the era, where prestige, more stuff, and better stuff are the only things that matter. If that's all the role called for, then he's no different from any other power-hungry character. But Bale's Bateman is empty behind the eyes, his perfection and charm merely a mask to hide his homicidal anger at being unable to reach the perks of being at the top, while those he sees as inferior can. Bale makes that switch seamlessly, making his daytime pursuits of the almighty dollar and his nighttime murderous activities at home in the same person. He also understands the satire of the film, and his delivery matches the intention of the scene flawlessly.

RENT ON APPLE TV+

8 The Others (2001)

Best Picture

Grace (Nicole Kidman) has retired to a mansion in 1945, with her photosensitive son and daughter, who are unable to be exposed to daylight without being hurt. Her husband died in the war, so she is left to care for the children on her own. She is strict, enforcing her religious principles and rules upon them. Her servants all recently left, without a word and without collecting their final wages, so when three new servants arrive, she hires them on the spot. Soon, strange things start happening around the house, whispers and banging noises ringing through the air. Her daughter insists that there are intruders in the house, but Grace refuses to believe it. The strange events keep happening with regularity, and Grace is growing increasingly hysterical, losing her sanity more and more. And then... the twist. The Others subverts expectations, delivering a haunted house thriller without once betraying the clever twist, à la The Sixth Sense. Chicago won Best Picture that year, with The Others not even getting a nomination.

Rent on Apple TV

9 Let The Right One In (2008)

Best Picture

The Swedish film centers on 12-year-old Oskar (Kåre Hedebrant), a mild-mannered boy subject to frequent bullying, and Eli (Lina Leandersson), a girl that moves into the apartment next door, who turns out to be a vampire. The film foregoes the usual tropes of vampire films and focuses primarily on the deep friendship that grows between the two. Eli encourages Oskar to stand up for himself, and Oskar protects Eli where he can. That isn't to say there isn't gore and death in the movie - it delivers on that front - it's more that it's borne out of need. It humanizes Eli, not an easy thing to do with a bloodthirsty vampire, but it succeeds. Like The Others above, Let The Right One In defies expectations, while that year's winner, Slumdog Millionaire, has largely left the public's memory.

WATCH ON PRIME

10 Psycho (1960)

Anthony Perkins for Best Actor

Psycho introduces us to Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) and his "mother," who doesn't take kindly to the arrival of Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) at the Bates Motel they own. One wildly violent shower results in Marion's sister Lila (Vera Miles), Marion's lover Sam (John Gavin), and a private investigator (Martin Balsam) showing up to investigate Marion's disappearance. By now, we all know what goes down: Bates has an alternate personality, his mother, due to the immense guilt he felt after murdering his mother and her lover ten years earlier. So, when Norman would become attracted to a woman, "Mother" would take over and kill her. Alfred Hitchcock would earn a nomination for Best Director, as would Leigh for Best Supporting Actress, but the fact that Perkins would be overlooked for Best Actor is questionable (and that's putting it lightly). He nailed Bates' mildness, his horror upon seeing Mother's victims, and his need to cover up the crime. Perkins delivered a Bates that was anxious, wary of Mother getting caught. But one scene alone puts Perkins over the top: that empty, dark stare forward with the horrifying smile as the movie ends. It's iconic, and it only works because of Perkins' performance throughout the picture.

RENT ON GOOGLE PLAY

11 The Shining (1980)

Stanley Kubrick for Best Director

Based on Stephen King's 1977 novel, The Shining sees Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) take on a caretaker position at the Overlook Hotel during its off-season. The historic hotel sits isolated in the Colorado Rockies, so it's just Jack, his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall), and his son Danny (Danny Lloyd), who is gifted with psychic abilities called the "shining." Only they are not alone, and the supernatural forces in the hotel start decaying Jack's sanity to the point of breaking. The film is an undeniable classic of the genre, a movie so impactful that other films still reference it, like the "Easter eggs" in Toy Story to it being used as a plot device in Ready Player One. All credit goes to director Stanley Kubrick, who combined his vision, his perfectionism, and the use of the innovative new Steadicam to create an immersive experience, not just a film.

th

RENT ON APPLE TV+

12 Alien (1979)

Sigourney Weaver for Best Actress

Yes, she did eventually get an Oscar nomination for her performance in the sequel, Aliens, but Sigourney Weaver's first go as Ellen Ripley deserved to not only be nominated but to win. Her Ripley is a strong, female character throughout the film, in a genre that has few of them even to this day. It is her character that tries to do the right thing by not allowing the landing party that's discovered the alien eggs, especially not Kane (John Hurt), who has an unknown creature attached to his face, back onto the ship. Her decision is overridden by Science Officer Ash (Ian Holm), and the consequences are deadly. Weaver owns the screen when she is on it, and the way she showcases Ripley's fear of the creature, her rage at the reveal of the company's orders for Ash to return with the alien (and the reveal he is an android to boot), and her level-headed assessment of her surroundings when she is left to confront the alien on her own make Ripley a science-fiction icon.

RENT ON GOOGLE PLAY

13 Frankenstein (1931)

Best Picture

Universal Pictures' Frankenstein, based on the novel by Mary Shelley, is arguably the best film to rise from Universal's early monster films. Colin Clive plays Henry Frankenstein, who pieces together parts from freshly buried bodies to create a living human, with the aid of his assistant Fritz (Dwight Frye). Henry sends Fritz to steal a brain for his creation, and he comes back with the corrupted brain of a criminal, unknown to Henry. The body he's created is strapped to an operating table and lifted toward the top of the tower, where the electrical equipment attached to the body is empowered by the lightning storm outside. It works: the monster is alive. The performances are great, especially Boris Karloff as the monster. Karloff's monster isn't a one-note beast but has an innocence beneath his grotesque exterior. His actions aren't malicious, and the film is as much a tragedy as it is horror. It's a defining moment in the history of horror, and it's a shame that the Academy never acknowledged it as such.

RENT ON APPLE TV+

14 Jaws (1975)

Steven Spielberg for Best Director

Jaws is but the first Steven Spielberg Oscars snub. In fact, the esteemed director wouldn't even win a Best Director Oscar until 1993's Schindler's List, despite a veritable cornucopia of excellent films over the course of the 18 years in between. The snub for Jaws, though, is particularly egregious. If one assumes that the job of a director is to not only make the film, but guide it through any complications during filming, change on the fly if needed, and be innovative where you can be, then Spielberg should have been a no-brainer for a win, let alone a nomination. The troubled production of the killer shark film is not a secret to anyone, of course, and not only did Spielberg come through to the other side, his decisions during production - using the unseen to ratchet up tension because of the failure of the mechanical sharks and filming on the open sea, for example - ended up turning the film into an indisputable classic.

Rent on Amazon

15 Midsommar (2019)

Best Cinematography

Midsommar is the second film here directed by Ari Aster, proving that his first feature film, the aforementioned Hereditary, wasn't a flash-in-the-pan but the arrival of a new visionary in the horror genre. There are many things about the film that the Oscars overlooked, including Florence Pugh as Best Actress, but the biggest has to be the cinematography by Pawel Pogorzelski. Midsommar is visually stunning, embracing the locale and popping with color. There is no retreating to shadows for the film's darker moments. Everything plays out in the long days of sunlight, and it's a testament to how the partnership between Aster and Pogorzelski can bring the dark into the light and still leave the audience dreading what comes next.

WATCH ON MAX