Here are my top ten Halloween films of all time. These are the kinds of movies you can watch to relive your childhood, or if you’re babysitting on Halloween.
DISCLAIMER: This article contains spoilers and does not rank the films in any particular order.
1. Halloweentown / Halloweentown High
I absolutely love these Disney movies. Every Halloween weekend, I would sit on my bed and watch these two films while snuggled in blankets with some popcorn and hot chocolate. Halloweentown is about a girl who finds out that she’s a witch and decides to save a town of supernatural beings. In Halloweentown High, the same girl joins forces with her grandmother to protect a group of students from the legendary Knights of the Iron Dagger. These may not be the most normal movies you watched as a kid, but you loved them because…
2. Scream
If you haven’t seen Scream, then you didn’t do your childhood right. This was the exception to horror films because it was more of a murder mystery thriller than anything, so your parents would actually let you watch it without worrying that you’d have nightmares. The film starts within the little town of Woodsboro, where a killer has clearly seen one too many scary movies. In the midst of this, nobody is safe as the psychopath stalks victims, taunts them with scary movie trivia questions, then rips them to bloody shreds whether they got the answer right or wrong. You may not have had nightmares, but you probably had trust issues after watching this because the killer could be anybody…
3. Hocus Pocus
After moving to Salem, Max Dennison explores an abandoned house with his sister, Dani, and their new friend, Allison. The house is known to be the property of a previous witch coven of evil sisters. The women aren’t just a superstitious story; they are real. With the help of a magical cat, the kids must steal the witches’ book of spells to stop them from becoming immortal. The symbolism in this movie is ridiculous. These women basically just don’t want to become old hags. They want to stay young and beautiful forever, but I think hope is already gone for 2 out of 3 of the witches…
4. Carrie (1976 & 2013)
This movie is a perfect example of why you shouldn’t bully people. It is an adaptation of the Stephen King horror novel, in which Carrie White is taunted by classmates at school and abused by her mother at home. When strange occurrences start happening around Carrie, she realizes that she has psychic powers. Carrie gets invited to the prom by the most popular guy in school, Tommy Ross, so she tries to let her guard down but the night ends with a dark, violent twist when she is embarrassed as Prom Queen…
5. The Nightmare Before Christmas
The film follows the misadventures of Jack Skellington, the beloved pumpkin king, who has become bored with frightening people in the “real world.” When Jack accidentally stumbles upon Christmastown, which is full of bright colors and warm spirits, he plots to bring Christmas under his control by kidnapping Santa Claus and taking over the role.
6. The Craft
After transferring to a Los Angeles high school, Sarah finds that her telekinetic gift appeals to a group of three wannabe witches, who happen to be seeking a fourth member for their rituals. Bonnie, Rochelle, and Nancy all have troubled backgrounds like Sarah, so when they combine their powers to do a spell that causes a student to lose her hair, the girls grow power-mad and suffer the dangerous consequences.
7. Beetlejuice
This wacky film is about a couple who dies in a car accident and their spirits become stuck haunting their former country home. When the Deetz family buys the home, the ghostly couple tries, and fails, to scare the family away. Their efforts attract Beetlejuice, a rambunctious spirit whose “help” quickly becomes dangerous for everyone.
Oh, yeah – be careful not to say “Beetlejuice” out loud, or you’ll attract him, too.
8. Anything Addams
The Addams Family is a group of fictional characters created by American cartoonist Charles Addams. The Addams Family characters traditionally include Gomez, Morticia, Uncle Fester, Lurch, Grandmama, Wednesday, Pugsley, and Thing. The Addams are a satirical inversion of the ideal American family: an eccentric, wealthy clan who embrace the universal power of death, and are either unaware or don’t care that other people find them bizarre. They originally appeared as an unrelated group of 150 single-panel cartoons, about half of which were originally published in The New Yorker from 1938-1988. The Addams have been adapted into multiple formats, including a TV series (both live and animated), films, video games, and a musical.
Plus, we all know Morticia and Gomez are the sexiest and most elegant couple of all time!
9. Casper
Casper is a kind ghost who peacefully haunts a mansion in Maine. When specialist James Harvey arrives to communicate with Casper and his uncles, he brings along his teenage daughter, Kat. Casper falls in love with Kat, but their budding relationship is complicated…
10. Warm Bodies
A terrible plague has left the planet’s population divided between zombies and humans. An unusual zombie named R sees his walking-dead brethren attacking a living woman and rescues her. The woman, Julie, sees that R is different from the other zombies, and the pair begin an unusual relationship. As their bond grows, R becomes more and more human and they find out that the cure to being a zombie is love.
