Lisa Frankenstein recently arrived in theaters, giving us all a fresh dose of leg warmers and hair spray and reminding everyone that, while ’90s nostalgia is hot, ’80s nostalgia isn’t over yet. Zelda Williams’s film clearly delights in all the trappings of 1980s pop culture and teenage life, and if the movie hits you just right, it’ll have you craving more ’80s horror vibes when you get home.
So, we’re here to help. From killer businessmen in power suits to high-concept slashers that feel like ’80s movies even when they’re not, here are 15 great horror movies that’ll take you back to the era of hair metal and hanging at the mall.
American Psycho (2000)
Full of outstanding ’80s production design, great soundtrack choices, and spot-on costumes, American Psycho is a gleeful, relentless send-up of 1980s excess with a sense of humor as black as the fabric on Christian Bale’s power suits. The story of a young businessman (Bale) who moonlights as a serial killer and builds his own movie-worthy myth in his mind, it’s not a movie that necessarily looks on the ’80s favorably. But for all its ruthless dissection of the era, Mary Harron’s masterpiece also never fails to get the details right, which just makes the cuts that much deeper. And, hey, Jared Leto gets ax murdered in this one!
The House of the Devil (2009)
A lot of movies capture an ’80s vibe by pouring on the MTV-inspired fashion and New Wave soundtracks, but The House of the Devil is something different. A Satanic Panic–infused nightmare from director Ti West, driven by the expressive eyes of lead actress Jocelin Donahue, it’s a movie that expertly captures that particular latchkey-kid dread that comes with discovering something’s not quite right about the neighborhood. It’s an ode to the quiet side of the ’80s where dark things live. And if that doesn’t do it for you, you can always watch for a scene-stealing Greta Gerwig appearance.
WNUF Halloween Special (2013)
A lot of the movies on this list aren’t literally set in the ’80s, or they spend more time on plot than they do on establishing that ’80s vibe. But if you want a pure, uncut shot of ’80s nostalgia straight into your veins? WNUF Halloween Special’s got you. Masterminded by director Chris LaMartina, it’s designed down to the last detail to play like a local-news Halloween special you recorded with your VCR while you were out trick-or-treating, complete with faux commercials that simultaneously evoke a certain menace while adding tremendous authenticity. The plot follows a local news crew as they investigate a house reputed to be haunted, but you might have to watch more than once to get all of the details. The first time you see it, you’ll be too busy wondering if you stumbled on something that really was ripped off an old basement tape.
The Final Girls (2015)
A modern horror film with a high-concept hook that turns it into a period movie sounds a little complicated, but nothing about The Final Girls feels hard to watch. Starring Taissa Farmiga as the daughter of a famous scream queen (Malin Akerman) who’s magically transported into one of her mother’s slasher movies, it’s so self-assured in pursuing its premise that it never loses its audience, building layers of fun and incisive trope dissection while also telling a very satisfying mother-daughter story along the way. If you love Farmiga as a horror star, it’s essential viewing.
Dude Bro Party Massacre III (2015)
Some movies on this list are loving attempts to re-create a certain ’80s horror-cinema moment. Others are shameless send-ups of tropes that filled the movies of that moment. Dude Bro Party Massacre III is both. Framed as a lost cult classic just being rediscovered, it’s a film that revels in poking fun at a certain kind of ’80s slasher while also delivering the goods. Anyone who has ever spent a weekend ripping through a stack of VHS slashers will recognize the perspective here and just how well the film pulls it off. Plus, it’s one of the few movies where you can watch someone throw a circular-saw blade like it’s a ninja star, so that’s fun.
The Lure (2015)
American horror movies aren’t the only ’80s throwbacks in town. Agnieszka Smoczyńska’s hypnotic The Lure, about a pair of mermaids who enter the human world and work as a nightclub act, simultaneously feels like the darkest music video you’ve ever seen and an indulgent trip through ’80s Euro-horror wonders. Throats are ripped, songs are sung, and by the time it’s over, you’re simply not the same. Put this one on if you’re looking for another side of the ’80s — or if you just enjoy a good musical number.
The Babysitter (2017)
Modern-horror luminary Brian Duffield (Spontaneous, No One Will Save You) didn’t set The Babysitter in the 1980s, but that doesn’t stop the film from evoking some of the best doses of horror fun the decade had to offer. The film follows an adolescent boy (Judah Lewis) who’s basically in love with his cool, gorgeous babysitter (Samara Weaving), until he accidentally finds out she’s a member of a demonic cult. Funny, self-aware, and full of awesome horror reveals and playful winks at the genre’s many conventions, it’s the kind of film you’ll wish you could have gotten on VHS at the video store back in 1988.
Happy Death Day (2017)
Once the slasher market took off in the 1980s, certain key elements emerged, and it became very clear very quickly that horror filmmakers loved to set their killer movies on college campuses. The college slasher is a staple of the decade thanks to films like Final Exam and The House on Sorority Row, and while it’s not an ’80s film itself, Happy Death Day calls those movies to mind quite well, with a twist. Yes, you’ll get your scheming sorority sisters and your biting college-age putdowns, but this tale of a young woman (Jessica Rothe) who’s caught in a time loop pitting her against the same killer again and again is also something more — a coming-of-age story worthy of the ’80s best teen tearjerkers.
Summer of ’84 (2018)
One great side effect of Stranger Things’ success is the resurgence of films about neighborhood kids trying to piece together dread-inducing mysteries, often in a retro setting. Summer of ’84 is, as the name suggests, exactly that kind of movie, following a group of kids who think the nice guy across the street (expertly played by Rich Sommer) might be the serial killer who’s been abducting local kids for years. If you ever spent a summer riding around on bikes with your friends, building legends out of quiet suburban streets and maybe hiding from that one particular neighbor who’s a little too creepy, this is the movie for you.
Mandy (2018)
The films of Panos Cosmatos exist in their own warped version of time, so much so that they might not even take place in this universe. That means that Mandy, while set in 1983, doesn’t necessarily follow the same path as other ’80s-set films, but it’s better for it. The story of a vengeance-mad logger (Nicolas Cage) who sets out to get the cult that killed his beloved (Andrea Riseborough), it’s drenched in hallucinatory colors and sounds that’ll take you back to the days when you used to get high and sit between two speakers to get the full effect of the album you just bought.
It (2017) and It Chapter Two (2019)
It’s not every day you get to watch a group of kids mop up a room full of blood while a Cure song is playing, but that’s the kind of ’80s movie experience you get from watching Andy Muschietti’s two-part adaptation of Stephen King’s epic killer-clown novel. The childhood chapters of the novel take place in the 1950s, but Muschietti & Co. wisely moved things up 30 years, and it was more than a cosmetic choice. The 1980s setting offers plenty of great style points (and New Kids on the Block jokes), yes, but it also adds a layer of true-crime dread to the whole thing, placing the kids at the center of fear in the decade when everyone was seemingly out to get them.
Psycho Goreman (2020)
Ask horror fans what they love about ’80s movies and before too long the words practical effects will come out. It’s just how we’re wired. We like to see the latex and the goop and the fake intestines fly, and Psycho Goreman is here to give us all that and more. The story of two siblings (Nita-Josee Hanna and Owen Myre) who accidentally resurrect an ancient, murderous alien overlord, it’s an absolutely wild ride that feels like the kind of thing you’d pass around on tape to your friends, making sure everyone had the chance to see the madness. It’s not set in the ’80s, but it has a vibe so strong you’ll start playing air guitar without realizing it.
Freaky (2020)
Another entry on this list that isn’t set in the ’80s, and even delights in depicting certain Gen-Z personalities, Freaky nevertheless feels like a welcome throwback to the kind of conceptual slashers that were everywhere in the decade when the subgenre took off. As the title suggests, it’s a Freaky Friday–style body swap that puts a teenage girl (Kathryn Newton) in the body of a masked slasher (Vince Vaughn), and vice versa. That’s fun enough on its own, but it’s what the film does next, from shop-class murders to unlikely romances, that makes it a winning blend of John Hughes and John Carpenter, perfect for ’80s movie fans who’ve already exhausted the films released in that decade.
The Fear Street Trilogy (2021)
Technically, Netflix’s Fear Street trilogy of films, adapted from R.L. Stine’s beloved YA books, takes place everywhere but the ’80s. We get an installment in the ’90s, an installment in the ’70s, and even an installment in the 17th century. But despite the quibbles over the nature of linear time, everything about Leigh Janiak’s films sends them back to the heyday of 1980s slashers, when everyone was looking for the right high concept to place a masked killer into. The difference? Janiak gives us not one, but three high concepts wrapped into one grand story, and it’s a joy to behold. Put some Jiffy Pop on the stove and start streaming.
V/H/S/85 (2023)
The V/H/S horror anthologies always felt made for the ’80s, so much so that it’s a little weird the franchise took this long to make its way to a purely ’80s-set installment. Once it got there, though, it delivered. Wrapped in a frame story that plays like a late-night ’80s news special, the segments in this film cover everything from a kid who has prophetic dreams of murders to a synth-driven piece of performance art about virtual reality to, of course, a segment that reveals cults of mass murderers really do walk among us. It’s got everything but the VCR.
Related
- The 30 Best Horror Movies on Shudder
- Every Slasher Released in 1981, Ranked
Matthew Jackson , 2024-02-15 16:13:14
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