While the horror genre has traditionally been intended for a more mature audience, numerous ‘gateway’ movies are targeted towards younger viewers and have a lower MPAA rating. Goosebumps is a great example, as are Coraline, The Corpse Bride, and the TV show Wednesday. However, young people will find a way to watch content that’s not suitable for their age range, regardless of the censors.
Horror movies are designed to terrify, disgust, and thrill audiences in equal measure, and there’s no fun in sticking to PG-13 horror movies forever. As such, it’s no surprise that millennials have been brought up on more extreme films from the genre. Some of the best gateway horror movies may have been R-rated upon release, but would likely get a lower rating in some cases now. However, that’s not to say they’re appropriate for fans who experienced them way too young.
10 Arachnophobia
Directed By Frank Marshall (1990)
Arachnophobia (1990) is a horror-comedy directed by Frank Marshall. The film follows a small-town doctor, played by Jeff Daniels, who discovers a deadly new species of spider that unleashes terror on the community. John Goodman co-stars as an eccentric exterminator brought in to combat the arachnid menace. The film combines elements of suspense and humor to depict the struggle against an unexpected and lethal infestation.
- Director
- Frank Marshall
- Release Date
- July 20, 1990
- Writers
- Don Jakoby , Al Williams , Wesley Strick
- Cast
- Jeff Daniels , Harley Jane Kozak , John Goodman , Julian Sands , Stuart Pankin , Brian McNamara
- Runtime
- 109 minutes
Many of the very best horror movies prey on the most simple phobias people have, and Arachnophobia plays into this perfectly. Despite being a PG-13 movie, it features scenes that younger millennials would have been freaked out by, even if they weren’t scared of spiders. Producer Steven Spielberg’s movies always tested the boundaries of the censors, and the announcement of a remake proves Jeff Daniels’ Arachnophobia has become a cult classic.
The production design is superb, and the mix of fake, real, and mechanical spiders works incredibly well in the movie. Anyone with even the mildest fear of spiders would have felt uncomfortable in a packed cinema watching Arachnophobia, but several scenes tested the censors. A shower scene has a hint of naked breasts, plus there’s some blood, rotting corpses, and many intense spider attacks.
9 Critters 2: The Main Course
Directed By Mick Garris (1988)
Critters 2, released in 1988, is the sequel to the original sci-fi horror film. Set in Grover’s Bend, the story unfolds as critter eggs, mistaken for Easter eggs, hatch and unleash chaos in the small town. The plot follows the local residents’ struggle against the ravenous creatures.
- Director
- Mick Garris
- Release Date
- April 29, 1988
- Cast
- Liane Curtis , Scott Grimes , Barry Corbin , Don Keith Opper , Lin Shaye , Eddie Deezen , Terrence Mann , Roxanne Kernohan , Sam Anderson , Douglas Rowe , Frank Birney , Cynthia Garris , Herta Ware , Tom Hodges , Lindsay Parker , David Ursin
- Runtime
- 86 minutes
- Character(s)
- Megan Morgan , Brad Brown , Harv , Charlie McFadden , Sally , Hungry Heifer Manager , Ug , Lee , Mr. Morgan , Quigley , Reverend Fisher , Zanti , Nana , Wesley , Cindy , Sheriff Corwin
When the wonderfully festive Gremlins wowed audiences with its puppetry madness in 1984, its massive success inspired a slew of creature features. One of those movies was the fun and well-received Critters in 1986. It featured nasty creatures Critters featured the Krites, who terrorize a small Midwest family. However, it’s the 1988 sequel, Critters 2: The Main Course, that was too inappropriate for millennials for several reasons.
Critters 2 The Main Course is one of the best gateway horror movies, but some of its scenes are definitely not suitable for younger millennials. When the shape-shifting bounty hunters arrive, one of them transforms into a fully naked Playboy model and even has the centerfold magazine staple attached to her abdomen. The film is also surprisingly gory for a PG-13 release, with the furry, malevolent monsters taking fleshy chunks out of people in several scenes.
8 Final Destination
Directed By James Wong (2000)
- Director
- James Wong
- Release Date
- March 17, 2000
- Cast
- Devon Sawa , Ali Larter , Kerr Smith , Kristen Cloke , Daniel Roebuck , Roger Guenveur Smith
- Runtime
- 98 minutes
Final Destination was the starting point for one of the most inventive franchises in horror and brought terror to a whole generation of millennials. The series has managed to scare people away from tanning beds, elevators, bridges, plus many other scenarios where death awaits its next victim. The first movie features a terrifying scene in which one of the main protagonists, Devon, has a premonition that the plane they’re on will explode.
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When they’re kicked off the flight, the plane explodes, and vengeful death comes looking for them. What makes the movie so terrifying for younger viewers, is the lingering fear that you can never cheat death.
The final death scene in the first movie is one of the most disturbing in the entire franchise, as one character has her throat slit by exploding glass, is stabbed in the chest, and is then finished off by her entire house exploding.
While the Final Destination series may contain some ridiculous deaths, they are still ridiculously gory. The final death scene in the first movie is one of the most disturbing in the entire franchise, as one character has her throat slit by exploding glass, is stabbed in the chest, and is then finished off by her entire house exploding.
7 The Descent
Directed By Neil Marshall (2005)
The Descent is a horror film that follows a group of thrill-seeking friends who find themselves fractured after one of them loses their husband and daughter in a car accident. Attempting to rejuvenate her friend Sarah and bring her back to the group, Juno convinces her to follow her and their friends to a mysterious cave system they find in the mountains. However, when they find themselves traped with no way out, she reveals she took them to an uncharted region with no chance of rescue, hoping to give them the adventure of the life time. Angry, fearful, and low on supplies, the group travels further into the caves only to discover they’re not alone.
- Director
- Neil Marshall
- Release Date
- August 4, 2006
- Writers
- Neil Marshall
- Cast
- Shauna Macdonald , Saskia Mulder , Alex Reid , Natalie Mendoza , MyAnna Buring , Nora-Jane Noone
- Runtime
- 99 minutes
One of the first scenes in Neil Marshall’s expertly crafted horror movie, The Descent, gives a brutal indication that the film is going to be a very uncomfortable experience. A shocking moment, set in a moving car, shows a man suddenly being impaled by copper pipes from an unexpected collision. It’s a great early jump scare and proves that The Descent is one of the best horror movies from the 2000s, and is not for the faint of heart.
Once the main plot kicks into gear and the group of women begin their caving expedition, the excessive, gory action also rears its ugly head in the form of some horrific cave dwellers.
Marshall proved with Dog Soldiers in 2002 that he was capable of gory set-pieces. There’s equally disturbing action in The Descent; bones are broken and protruded from limbs, flesh is torn apart by the terrifying antagonists, and blood is spilled regularly, proving that younger millennials should not have been watching this.
6 The Blair Witch Project
Directed By Daniel Myrick & Eduardo Sanchez (1999)
The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 horror film that follows three film students who venture into the Black Hills near Burkittsville, Maryland. As they document their search for the Blair Witch legend, strange and unsettling events unfold. Presented as found footage, the film is directed by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, and it pioneered the found footage genre in mainstream cinema.
- Director
- Eduardo Sánchez , Daniel Myrick
- Release Date
- July 30, 1999
- Writers
- Daniel Myrick , Eduardo Sánchez
- Cast
- Joshua Leonard , Michael C. Williams , Heather Donahue
- Runtime
- 81 minutes
Looking back on The Blair Witch Project, it isn’t a scary movie overall, but it deserves its status as one of the era’s most iconic movies, and is too much for younger audiences for several reasons. The Blair Witch Project had a genius marketing campaign, and media reports at the time of release claimed that cinema-goers were getting sick in theaters from the intense horror in the movie. It was more likely to be the film’s handheld camerawork.
However, the premise of the film in which three students disappear in the woods with only footage from their camcorder left behind, is incredibly disturbing. Thanks to the clever marketing campaign, and the sensationalist reporting of the movie in the media, some audiences believed the found footage was real. When the chilling final scene appears, showing one of the main characters standing in a corner, possessed by an unknown force, the terror would have been too much for impressionable minds.
5 Child’s Play
Directed By Tom Holland (1988)
Child’s Play is a horror-slasher film by director Tom Holland and marked the beginning of the Chucky character from writer Don Mancini, a modern horror icon. When serial killer Charles Lee Ray is slain after a detective catches him, he transfers his soul before he dies into a Good Guy doll, which ends up in the hands of six-year-old Andy Barclay. Naming himself Chucky, the doll begins a killing spree, which leads those around Alex to suspect him as the killer – and his mother is the only one who believes him.
- Release Date
- November 9, 1988
- Cast
- Catherine Hicks , Chris Sarandon , Brad Dourif , Alex Vincent , Dinah Manoff , Tommy Swerdlow , Jack Colvin , Raymond Oliver
- Runtime
- 87 Minutes
The possessed doll sub-genre is one of the most incredibly successful, and popular, with horror fans around the globe. With M3GAN spinoff SOULM8TE expanding its cast, plus M3GAN 2.0 in the works, the demonic doll movie is going nowhere fast. The horror genre had previously featured numerous slasher villains, so when Chucky was unveiled in 1988’s Child’s Play, he joined the likes of Freddy Krueger and Michael Myers in horror iconography.
The movie follows a six-year-old boy who is given a much sought-after doll for his birthday. Unfortunately, the toy had recently been possessed by the consciousness of a dying serial killer and subsequently embarks on a gleeful murder spree. The movie is too intense for younger viewers due to the deaths being sadistic rather than overly bloody. A man is tortured by Chucky and has his limbs broken before bleeding out and dying. The electric shock machine sequence would also be too intense for some.
4 The Ring
Directed By Gore Verbinski (2002)
An American remake of the original Japanese supernatural horror film, Ring, The Ring follows a journalist who discovers she has seven days to live after watching a cursed videotape. Attending the funeral of a girl who dies under mysterious circumstances, the victim’s mother asks Seattle journalist Rachel to investigate the death. After learning about the urban legend behind the video tape the girl watched, Rachel views the tape in the hopes of finding a lead – only to find herself succumbing to the same curse.
- Director
- Gore Verbinski
- Release Date
- October 18, 2002
- Writers
- Ehren Kruger
- Cast
- Martin Henderson , Naomi Watts , Amber Tamblyn , David Dorfman , Brian Cox
- Runtime
- 115 minutes
The late 1990s and early 2000s saw the emergence of some wildly demented horror movies from Japan. One of them, 1998’s superbly creepy psychological horror, Ringu proved to be so popular that a remake with Naomi Watts was quickly put into development, and brought terror to cinemas in 2002. It’s a horror movie with so much iconography to work with thanks to its superior original, but would still have scared the life out of millennials nonetheless.
Verbinski’s excellent remake inspired many other productions, based on some of the growing J-horror films, to be green-lit. It also showcases some genuinely terrifying sequences. The first kill in the movie is edited in an effective, creepy way, and while the numerous jump scares don’t all land, the monstrous antagonist, Samara, would have been too scary for younger horror fans to handle. The Ring‘s ending has a deeper meaning and is also one of the best horror movie scares of the time.
3 Saw
Directed By James Wan (2004)
Saw II is the follow-up to James Wan and Leigh Whannell’s 2004 body horror film, Saw. In the sequel, a group of ex-convicts are kidnapped by Jigsaw and must work together to find an antidote to a toxin that is scheduled to kill them all in two hours. Darren Lynn Bousman took over directing duties for Saw II after Wan directed the original.
- Director
- darren lynn bousman , Franky G , Glenn Plummer , Beverley Mitchell , Dina Meyer , Emmanuelle Vaugier , Erik Knudsen , Shawnee Smith , Tobin Bell
- Writers
- darren lynn bousman , Leigh Whannell
- Cast
- Donnie Wahlberg
- Runtime
- 93 Minutes
The early 2000s were a great time to be a horror fan, and the era delivered many iconic horror movies. However, the lasting legacy of the all-time classic, Saw, is one of the best examples of how to create a franchise and scare unwitting millennials at the same time. With Jigsaw confirmed to return to screens in Saw XI, it looks like the gory trap-filled series isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
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Movies like Saw were on the rise in the 2000s, and millennials were subjected to numerous horror films based around the theme of torture and mutilation.Saw upped the ante when it came to grisly, disturbing death scenes, and also brought iconic imagery like Billy the Puppet to the forefront of pop culture. It’s the macabre traps in Saw, however, that would have terrorized millennials who were able to watch the movie.
2 The Shining
Directed By Stanley Kubrick (1980)
Making The Shining is a documentary directed and edited by Vivian Kubrick. Released in 1980, it provides a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the production process of Stanley Kubrick’s iconic horror film The Shining, showcasing the intricacies and challenges faced during its creation.
- Director
- Vivian Kubrick
- Release Date
- October 4, 1980
- Cast
- Jack Nicholson , Vivian Kubrick , Terry Needham , Stanley Kubrick , Danny Lloyd , Scatman Crothers , Shelley Duvall , Gert Kubrick , Brian W. Cook , Leon Vitali , Michael Stevenson
- Runtime
- 35 minutes
- Character(s)
- Self
Despite being released long before the millennium, Stanley Kubrick’s incredibly haunting, and disturbing film, The Shining, is so ingrained in pop culture that its appeal has spanned decades. Based on the 1977 book by horror legend Stephen King, the film focuses on the sinister presence in The Overlook Hotel, where caretaker Jack Nicholson slowly loses his mind. It’s not a movie for the faint of heart, especially if you’re an impressionable millennial.
As Jack becomes increasingly unhinged, the various themes, and bloody imagery, in the movie begin to appear in all of their gloriously grotesque nature. The movie is a psychological thriller, and while it’s not overly gory or blood-soaked, apart from the famous lift scene, it still manages to be disturbing in its own right. The reappearing dead twins are incredibly creepy, the psychological abuse that Jack’s wife Wendy suffers is horrific, and the overbearing tension of the finale is too upsetting for younger viewers.
1 A Nightmare On Elm Street
Directed By Wes Craven (1984)
A Nightmare on Elm Street, released in 1984, explores the terror faced by a group of teenagers haunted in their dreams by Fred Krueger, a vengeful spirit. As they confront a series of mysterious deaths, Nancy Thompson uncovers the truth about Krueger’s dark past and seeks to stop him.
- Release Date
- November 9, 1984
- Cast
- Heather Langenkamp , John Saxon , Ronee Blakley , Amanda Wyss , Jsu Garcia , Johnny Depp , Robert Englund , Charles Fleischer , Joseph Whipp , Lin Shaye , Joe Unger , Mimi Craven , Jack Shea , Ed Call , Sandy Lipton , David Andrews , Jeff Levine , Donna Woodrum , Shashawnee Hall , Carol Pritikin , Brian Reise , Ash Adams , Don Hannah , Leslie Hoffman , Paul Grenier
There’s one movie that, despite being released long before the millennium, is guaranteed to scare the life out of millennials should they have witnessed its macabre bloodshed; 1984’s A Nightmare on Elm St. The movie unleashed one of the horror genre’s best, and most disturbing villains in Freddy Krueger; a janitor with horrific injuries, who terrorizes, and kills, teenagers in their sleep.
The first movie became a hugely popular franchise, albeit with diminishing returns, but with A Nightmare on Elm St‘s Robert Englund suggesting the villain could return, a whole new generation of horror fans may be haunted by Krueger’s serial killer. What makes the first movie so disturbing is the gleeful nature of how Krueger dispatches his victims in their sleep. Johnny Depp’s character Glen is murdered in a gloriously bloody scene, but most haunting is Tina’s wild, cruel demise.
