My Halloween watchlist for the last two weeks of October moves from gentle to full throttle: Sleepy Hollow and Hocus Pocus to start, Trick 'r Treat and The Others through the middle, then The Blair Witch Project, Hush and Scream for the last nights before the thirty first. It happened last year that I reached this point having watched exactly one horror film all month, so this time there is an actual list, not a ranked chart or countdown, just what is queued on my sofa in the order my nerves can cope with.
What are the best gentle Halloween films to start with?
The first few nights of the run in are for films that are more atmosphere than terror. Something with a proper story, a good coat, maybe a joke or two, so I do not end up lying awake convinced the wardrobe has opinions about me. Sleepy Hollow is my usual opener. It is moody without being cruel about it, and it gives me an excuse to light a candle and pretend my flat has a fog machine.
After that I tend to slide into something like Hocus Pocus, which barely counts as horror and I do not care. Some nights you want to be unsettled. Other nights you want witches who are mostly just very tired mothers with a grudge. Both are valid uses of an evening.
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The middle stretch, where it gets properly spooky
By the second week I am ready for something with actual teeth. Trick 'r Treat is a habit at this point, partly because it is basically five short stories stitched together, so if one segment gets a bit much I know relief is only ten minutes away. Ginger Snaps goes on the list too, mostly because it treats being a teenage girl as its own kind of horror film, which feels accurate.
This is also the stretch where I finally admit I need proper supplies rather than whatever half a biscuit I find down the side of the sofa. A decent throw over my knees makes an enormous difference to how brave I feel, because apparently my courage lives somewhere around my ankles. I have been eyeing up an oversized fleece throw blanket for exactly this reason, since the one I currently own has a hole in it that lets all the warmth escape like it is fleeing the scene of a crime.
The Others earns its spot here as well. It is the sort of film where nothing especially violent happens and yet I still end up checking that all the doors are shut before bed, which is either a sign of a well made film or a sign that I am far too suggestible for this hobby.
What are the scariest films to watch right before Halloween?
By the time Halloween itself is within touching distance, gentle is out the window. This is when The Blair Witch Project comes back into rotation, mostly because handheld footage and a woman crying in a tent still gets me every time, no matter how many times I have seen it. Hush goes on straight after, because a thriller where the main character cannot hear the intruder in her own house is exactly the kind of thing that makes me check the locks twice before I sit back down.
I usually close the fortnight with Scream, partly out of tradition and partly because I need one film in the list that lets me shout answers at the screen. There is something about a slasher with a sense of humour that feels like the right note to end on, rather than going to bed on something so bleak I lie there analysing every creak the flat makes.
How do you watch horror films without getting too scared?
One film a night, never two, because a double bill just means I am tired and jumpy at the same time, which is a genuinely terrible combination. Lights low but not off, because full darkness is for people braver than me. And something warm in my hands throughout, whether that is tea, coffee, or whatever I can find that will not spill when I inevitably flinch.
If you are planning your own run in to Halloween, that is my list, in my order, built entirely around what I can handle on a work night. Pick your own pace. Just do not, like me last year, leave it all until the thirty first and try to cram a month of spooky season into a single evening. It does not work, and you will fall asleep during the good bit.
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