With Halloween quickly approaching, many people are looking for a terrifying film to put them in the mood. Horror movies have been around since the creation of film and they blend into all kinds of different subgenres. Here are four of the best horror movies out there.

Alien, a 1979 sci-fi horror film, was directed by Ridley Scott and stars Sigourney Weaver. The story follows the crew of a commercial space ship named the Nostromo. The crew lands on a mysterious planet to investigate a distress signal. However, when they arrive, they don’t find much and quickly get back on their ship and continue their journey. Little do they know that one of the crew members has brought a alien life form back on the ship. What follows is a battle for survival as the alien begins to pick the crew off one by one.

Alien is a fantastic example of how horror movies can work in multiple genres. The sci-fi set up provides great atmosphere for a truly horrifying movie. The effects still hold up to this day and the performances are spot on. It also happens to be jam-packed with iconic moments including the aliens first kill and the climactic final showdown involving a flamethrower.

The Silence Of The Lambs is a 1991 psychological crime thriller directed by Jonathan Demme starring Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins. It opens to high critical acclaim and is one of only three movies to win the “Big Five” at the Oscars. The story follows Foster’s character Clarice, a police detective trying to find a dangerous serial killer called “Buffalo Bill”. In order to try to understand the mind of a serial killer, Clarice talks to a serial killer in captivity named Hannibal Lecter (Hopkins). The result is a truly terrifying look into the mind of a killer.

The Silence Of The Lambs is a near perfect movie and functions very effectively as a horror movie as well. Unlike the rest of the films on this list, the film’s purpose is not be scary, but when dealing with such disturbing subject matter, one would be hard pressed not to feel the hairs on the back of his or her neck beginning to rise.   

Halloween wouldn’t be complete without viewing at least one Stephen King film, and none are better than director Stanley Kubrick’s, The Shining. The Shining was released in 1980 and stars Jack Nicholson. The plot centers around Nicholson’s character Jack Torrance and his family as they watch over a large hotel over the winter months. What starts as a nice escape from everyday life quickly takes a turn for the worse and Torrance begins to lose his mind.

The Shining might be the most terrifying film on this list. Fantastic performances and horrific imagery help set the tone early on. However, as the story continues on the the constant sense of dread is what begins to wear the viewers down. This is no surprise considering many of the lead actors, including Nicholson and Shelly Duvall, who plays Nicholson’s wife, were both mentally exhausted after filming. The Shining manages to be surreal and brutally realistic all at once.

Love him or hate him, director M. Night Shyamalan’s debut feature The Sixth Sense is a masterpiece. The 1999 film stars Bruce Willis and Haley Joel Osment. Willis plays Dr. Malcolm Crowe, a renowned child psychologist who is struggling to help Osment’s character, a young boy, who claims he sees dead people.

If you haven’t seen this classic by now, odds are you’ve been living under a rock. The film features one of the most famous twists in Hollywood history. The film only gets better the more you watch it.  Each time back you will notice a different little detail and the twist and the plot becomes more convincing each time. A thrilling ride from start to finish, The Sixth Sense is a Halloween must.