My Halloween rewatch pile is always the same: Halloween (1978) and The Shining for proper dread, Rosemary's Baby when I want something slower and quieter, and Hocus Pocus or Practical Magic on the nights I need it gentler. There's a point every September where I stop pretending I'm going to discover something new this year and just admit I'm reaching for the same films again.
I used to feel a bit guilty about it, like I should be working through some ambitious watchlist of things I've never seen. Then I made peace with the fact that a rewatch during spooky season isn't laziness. It's tradition.
Which horror films do I rewatch every Halloween?
Halloween is non negotiable. Not a Halloween film, the original Halloween, the one from 1978. There is something about how patient it is that newer horror rarely bothers with any more. Long stretches where nothing happens except a street looking slightly wrong, and somehow that's scarier than half the jump scares I've sat through since. I've got the Halloween 1978 Blu-ray box set and it comes out of the shelf like clockwork the last week of September.
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The Shining is the other one, and it's less a rewatch and more a yearly reminder that I should never, under any circumstances, agree to look after a large empty building. I always notice something new, a detail in the hotel corridors, a bit of dialogue I'd forgotten, and I always end up slightly convinced my own flat has gone a bit odd for the rest of the evening. Kettle takes three seconds longer to boil than usual and suddenly I'm listing exits.
What's the best horror film to watch when you want to relax?
This is going to sound like a contradiction, watching horror to relax, but hear me out. Rosemary's Baby is slow and quiet and almost entirely about a woman feeling patronised by everyone around her, which, some weeks, is extremely relatable and not even about the supernatural bit. I put it on with a blanket and something warm to drink and it somehow counts as a cosy night even though the ending is horrible. I've got a chunky knit throw blanket that's basically part of the ritual at this point, along with something hot that isn't just tea for once, my hot chocolate gift set gets more use in October than the rest of the year combined.
What are good Halloween films that aren't too scary?
Some nights the actual scary ones are too much, usually the nights I've already had a small disaster of my own, burnt dinner, missed a delivery, that sort of thing, and I don't need my flat feeling haunted on top of it. That's when Hocus Pocus or Practical Magic come out instead. Still witches, still autumn, still the right mood, just with a lot less dread attached. I know some people think they're not "real" horror. I don't care. Spooky season isn't only for the films that leave you checking the wardrobe twice.
Setting the mood properly
None of this works without the room looking right, honestly. I've got warm pumpkin string lights up along the shelf by the time any of this starts, because watching Rosemary's Baby under a normal overhead light just isn't the same experience. Lamp light only, ideally something flickering, and the sofa properly set up before I even choose what's going on.
I'd love to know what's in your own rewatch pile. Is it the classics like mine, or have you got one nobody else seems to pick? And more importantly, gentle night or proper dread, which one are you in the mood for this week?
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