There are not many activities that can compare to the experience of cooking some popcorn, turning off the lights, and allowing a movie to thoroughly terrify you. However, because there are so many different streaming sites available, it can be difficult to determine which one offers the greatest horror content.
You will be relieved to know that HBO Max offers a vast library of terrifying films for your perusal. They have you covered with everything from the classics to the most recent releases.
You can choose whether you want your shocks to be accompanied by a dash of humour, action, or surrealism, or none of the above, thanks to the range of stories that are offered. The following is a selection of the excellent horror titles that are currently available on HBO Max.
You still haven’t located what you’re looking for, have you? Instead, read our selection of the finest horror movies available on Netflix and Hulu, or check out some of the best thrillers and dramas currently airing on HBO.
10. Se7en (1995)
The 1995 American neo-noir psychological criminal thriller film Seven (stylized as SE7EN) was directed by David Fincher and written by Andrew Kevin Walker. The film was released in the United States. It features well-known actors such as John C. McGinley, Gwyneth Paltrow, Morgan Freeman, and Brad Pitt.
David Mills, played by Pitt, is a detective who teams up with William Somerset, played by Freeman, in an effort to apprehend a serial killer who patterns his killings after the seven deadly sins. The film follows the story of their investigation.
The time that Walker spent in New York City attempting to establish himself as a writer served as a significant source of inspiration for the screenplay. The majority of the filming took place in Los Angeles, with the final scene being shot in the area close to Lancaster, California. The production cost for the movie was $33 million.
Seven, which was distributed by New Line Cinema and released on September 22, 1995, ended up being the seventh-highest earning film of the year with nearly $327 million earned all over the world. It was favourably acclaimed by the media and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Film Editing, but it lost out to Apollo 13 in that category.
9. The Conjuring (2013)
The Conjuring is a supernatural horror movie that was released in the United States in 2013 and was directed by James Wan. The screenplay for the movie was written by Chad Hayes and Carey W. Hayes. This movie kicks off the Conjuring Universe film franchise and is the first of its kind.
Both Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga feature in the role of Ed and Lorraine Warren, who are known for their work as paranormal investigators and authors involved with notable cases of haunting. Their supposedly accurate accounts served as the impetus for the creation of the Amityville Horror narrative and film franchise.
The Perron family, who lived in a farmhouse in Rhode Island in 1971, was having an increasingly difficult time due to the strange occurrences that were taking place in their home. The Warren family decided to help them.
Reports confirmed Wan as the director of a film entitled The Warren Files, which was later retitled The Conjuring. The film centres on the alleged real-life exploits of Ed and Lorraine Warren, a married couple who investigated paranormal events. The development of the film began in January 2012, and the title of the film was initially The Warren Files.
Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga reprised their roles as Ed and Lorraine in the director’s latest film, which was the second time the two had worked together. The filming of the sequences began in February 2012 in Wilmington, North Carolina, and they were shot in the order that they occurred in the story.
On July 19, 2013, Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema distributed copies of The Conjuring across North America, including in the United States and Canada.
8. Antlers (2021)
Antlers is a supernatural horror movie from 2021 that stars Keri Russell, Jesse Plemons, Jeremy T. Thomas, Graham Greene, Scott Haze, Rory Cochrane, and Amy Madigan. The movie is directed by Scott Cooper.
The short story “The Quiet Boy,” which was written by Antosca and first appeared in Guernica magazine in January 2019, was used as the basis for the screenplay, which was written by C. Henry Chaisson, Nick Antosca, and Cooper. In the movie, a teacher thinks that one of her students is having problems at home, but she doesn’t know that the student is hiding a dangerous thing in his house.
Cooper was hired to direct the project in July 2018, and the cast joined the following month. In October and November 2018, the movie was shot in British Columbia. Antlers had its world premiere at Beyond Fest on October 11, 2021.
It was released in theatres in the United States by Searchlight Pictures on October 29, 2021, after being pushed back twice from April 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Critics gave the movie mixed reviews. They liked the cinematography, acting, and scary parts, but they didn’t like how the themes weren’t developed enough in the screenplay.
7. Annabelle (2014)
Annabelle is a supernatural horror movie from the U.S. that came out in 2014. It was directed by John R. Leonetti, written by Gary Dauberman, and made by Peter Safran and James Wan. It takes place before The Conjuring, which came out in 2013, and is the second movie in the Conjuring Universe series.
The movie was based on a story that Ed and Lorraine Warren told about a doll named Annabelle. Annabelle Wallis, Ward Horton, and Alfre Woodard all have roles in the movie. Shortly after The Conjuring came out, a spin-off movie was announced that would tell the story of where the Annabelle doll came from.
This was mostly because The Conjuring did well at the box office and people liked how the doll was portrayed. In January 2014, the main filming began in Los Angeles. Annabelle had its first showing at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles on September 29, 2014. On October 3, 2014, Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema put it out in theatres across the United States.
6. Freaky (2020)
Freaky is an American slasher comedy coming out in 2020. It is directed by Christopher Landon and written by Michael Kennedy and Landon. Vince Vaughn, Kathryn Newton, Katie Finneran, Celeste O’Connor, and Alan Ruck are among the actors in the film.
In a twist on Freaky Friday, the movie is about a teenage girl who switches bodies by accident with a middle-aged serial killer. Blumhouse Productions is the name of the company that Jason Blum works for as a producer.
Freaky had its world premiere at Beyond Fest on October 8, 2020. It came out in theatres in the US on November 13, 2020, and in other countries on July 2, 2021. Critics liked the movie and praised Vaughn and Newton’s acting, as well as the way it mixed horror and comedy.
5. Malignant (2021)
Malignant is an American horror movie that will come out in 2021. It will be directed by James Wan, and it will be based on a story by Wan, Ingrid Bisu, and James Wan. In the movie, Annabelle Wallis plays a woman who starts to see people being killed in her dreams, only to find out that it’s really happening.
Maddie Hasson, George Young, Michele Briana White, and Jacqueline McKenzie also star. Warner Bros. Pictures put Malignant in theatres in the United States on September 10, 2021. You could also stream it on HBO Max. The movie made $34 million on a budget of $40 million and got mostly good reviews from critics.
4. The Shining (1980)
The Shining is a horror movie from 1980 that was written by Stanley Kubrick and Diane Johnson. Kubrick also produced and directed the movie. The movie is based on Stephen King’s 1977 book of the same name. Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Scatman Crothers, and Danny Lloyd are among the actors who play key roles.
The main character of the movie is Jack Torrance (Nicholson), an aspiring writer and recovering alcoholic who takes a job as the off-season caretaker of the remote historic Overlook Hotel in the Colorado Rockies with his wife, Wendy Torrance (Duvall), and their young son, Danny Torrance (Lloyd).
Danny has something called “shining,” which is a psychic ability. After a winter storm traps the Torrances in their house, Jack loses his mind because of the supernatural forces that live in the hotel.
3. Friday the 13th (2009)
Friday the 13th is an American horror movie from 2009 that was directed by Marcus Nispel and written by Damian Shannon, Mark Swift, and Mark Wheaton. It is the twelfth movie in the Friday the 13th series, which has been going on since 1980.
Nispel also directed the remake of Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre in 2003, while Shannon and Swift wrote the screenplay for the 2003 crossover Freddy vs. Jason. The movie was made by Platinum Dunes and Crystal Lake Entertainment.
New Line Cinema and Paramount Pictures were in charge of putting it in theatres. It stars Jared Padalecki, Danielle Panabaker, Aaron Yoo, Amanda Righetti, Travis Van Winkle, and Derek Mears. It’s about Clay Miller (Padalecki), who is looking for his missing sister Whitney (Righetti), who was taken by Jason Voorhees (Mears) while they were camping in the woods at Crystal Lake.
2. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992)
The 1992 psychological horror movie Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me was written and directed by David Lynch and Robert Engels. It is a prequel to the TV show Twin Peaks, which ran from 1990 to 1991 and was made by Mark Frost and David Lynch, who were also the show’s executive producers.
It’s about the investigation into the murder of Teresa Banks (Pamela Gidley) and the last seven days of the life of popular high school student Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) in the made-up town of Twin Peaks, Washington. The series was a strange mix of detective fiction, horror, the supernatural, weird humour, and soap opera tropes.
The film, on the other hand, is much darker and less funny.
1. The Brood (1979)
The Brood is a Canadian psychological body horror movie from 1979 that stars Oliver Reed, Samantha Eggar, and Art Hindle. It was written and directed by David Cronenberg. In the story, a man and his mentally ill ex-wife are locked up by a psychiatrist who is known for his controversial ways of treating patients.
The main story is set against a background of brutal murders that haven’t been solved. Cronenberg came up with the idea for the screenplay after his own nasty divorce. He wanted it to be a meditation on a broken relationship between a husband and wife who have a child together. He cast Eggar and Hindle as characters who are similar to himself and his ex-wife.
He would later say that, even though it had some science fiction elements, it was his only film that he thought was almost like a “classic horror film.” The main filming for The Brood took place in Toronto at the end of 1978. It cost $1.5 million to make. Howard Shore wrote the score for the movie, which was his first time doing so.
Summary
You will be relieved to know that HBO Max offers a vast library of terrifying films for your perusal. They have you covered with everything from the classics to the most recent releases. Instead, read our selection of the finest horror movies available on Netflix and Hulu, or check out some of the best thrillers and dramas currently airing on HBO.