Every month, our contributors will be putting together a list of ten films on certain topics. Each month will be different and will feature an alphabetical list our selections, commentary from each of us on our picks and an itemized list showing what we each selected.

Each year, we celebrate All Hollow’s Eve, an ancient festival celebrating the end of the harvest and the march of the departed to the afterlife. Reviled in some circles and revered in many others, Halloween as it is now called is now little more than a holiday designed to send kids door-to-door in costumes to beg for sugary treats. It’s also the season where horror films and frightening features delight and thrill movie audiences around the world.

In celebration of this October 31, we have put together a list of our favorite horror films. We left the definition loose so our contributors could put together their best lists. They did not disappoint. Everything from slasher flicks to classic horror to thrillers to supernatural dramas to haunted house films to suspense dramas, our contributors have created an eclectic list that highlights some of the best films the genre (and similar genres) have to offer.

Only one film appeared on all four lists and, unsurprisingly, it’s from the Master of Suspense himself, Alfred Hitchcock, whose legendary Psycho redefined many generations of horror films. Of the directors on this list, only two found two spots on the list: John Carpenter (Halloween and The Thing) and Wes Craven (A Nightmare on Elm Street and The Last House on the Left). Here is what we had to say:

Alien

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Ridley Scott) In an era of slasher pics, Alien took horror to a new realm, a futuristic universe where spacefaring laborers are trapped on board a space vessel with a deadly alien lifeform. Ridley Scott’s claustrophobic horror thriller draws the audience in with a tense, frightening drama that made a star out of Sigourney Weaver and is the best film ever made in its subgenre.

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – Not only was the monster scary, but I saw this with someone that told me he was a grabber. As scenes got tense, I watched him grab his hands together, then his knees, then the armrests. I would prepare myself to be grabbed next, but then it would calm down until it started all over again. I don’t know if the movie or waiting to be grabbed by someone was the scarier part. Watched on the big screen, it was absolutely frightening at the time.

An American Werewolf in London

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. John Landis) This showed what amazing makeup can do for a movie, as the transformations of the werewolf were intense. This was probably the movie most responsible for there being an Oscar now awarded for makeup and hairstyling.

The Babadook

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. Jennifer Kent) Essie Davis, who is all sophistication and charm as the self-assured 1920s private detective in the excellent Australian series Miss Fisher’s Mysteries, is anything but as the frightened mother in this 2014 film whose fears for the wellbeing of her young son are exacerbated by memories of the violent accident that killed her husband. The boy’s fears of a monster hiding in the closet are slowly visited upon the mother when she brings a seemingly innocent book into the house. Davis and young Noah Wiseman deliver two of the best performances in a horror film ever, one of the few directed by a woman, the amazing Jennifer Kent.

Carrie

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. Brian De Palma) Fine acting by Sissy Spacek and Piper Laurie turned this bloodbath into something more. The final image is striking, but those two actresses richly deserved their Oscar nominations, in a genre that the Academy rarely will honor. It was the first adaptation of a Stephen King novel on film or television, and may still be the best one.

Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Rouben Mamoulian) Although there were three prominent black-and-white versions of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel, it’s Rouben Mamoulian’s 1931 version that best represents the story. Fredric March rightly won the Oscar for Best Picture (in a tie with Wallace Beery for The Champ) for his brilliant performance as the scientist whose transition from mild-mannered human to psychotic monster was head-and-shoulders above the work of his compatriots. The film sits as not only one of the finest examples of the genre, but of film itself.

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – The first sound version of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel in 1931 is still far and away the best. Director Rouben Mamoulian had already received acclaim for expanding the scope of talkies with his breathtaking location filming of 1929’s Applause atop New York City skyscrapers and bridges and cinematographer Karl Struss was co-recipient of the first Oscar in his field for 1927’s Sunrise. Together they created one of the most visually exciting films in any genre, let alone sci-fi/horror. The performances of Fredric March as the good doctor/fiend and Miriam Hopkins as the prostitute he stalks, are two of the best of their era. March’s on-camera transformations from handsome Jekyll to hideous Hyde still make audiences wonder how they did it.

Ex Machina

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. Alex Garland) This modern take on Frankenstein goes against the grain of most recent sci-fi/horror films in that it is an absolutely gorgeous film to look at. Acting chameleon Oscar Isaac delivers another fine performance in this terrific 2015 film as the deceptively mad scientist whose manipulation of his man-made creature (robot Alicia Vikander) elicits the sympathy of his hand-picked dupe (Dohmnall Gleeson). Vikander and Gleeson are Isaac’s acting equals here with all three of them delivering realistic performances not often found in modern horror films. This is one that I’m actually interested in seeing a sequel to.

The Exorcist

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. William Friedkin) William Peter Blatty adapted his own frightening novel for the screen, winning a 1973 Oscar in the process. Ellen Burstyn as the movie-star mother, Jason Miller as the guilt-ridden younger priest, Max von Sydow as the wise older priest and experienced exorcist, Linda Blair as the possessed girl, and Mercedes McCambridge as the voice of the devil all contribute to making William Friedkin’s film the scariest ever made even without the cut scenes that were restored for the film’s 2000 re-release. That version, however, with the backwards head walk down the stairs and the extended ending, is the one to watch to get the full effect of the horror.

Commentary By Tripp Burton – I almost didn’t put The Exorcist on this list. As I winnowed the list down, there were films I think are a lot better that I had in contention. Then I remembered the first time I watched it: I was 16, in my parent’s basement in an empty house watching with a lone friend, and it was the most terrifying thing I had ever seen. We screamed and flinched throughout the film, and when it was over, I turned to him and said “you’re not leaving here until someone else gets here, right?” His response: “yep, and you’re walking me to my car.” The Exorcist has to go on this list because it might be the most cripplingly frightening mainstream film ever made. The images that have become so familiar to us — the pea soup, the rotating head, the thumping bed — are familiar because they are so effective. I’m too young to have experienced The Exorcist in real time, with the fainting audience members and the crowds flocking to church, but that night in high school taught me the power of William Friedkin’s film.

Frankenstein / The Bride of Frankenstein

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. James Whale) French-born director Robert Florey conceived, wrote the treatment, designed the German Expressionistic sets and cast Bela Lugosi to star in the 1931 film version of Mary Shelley’s early 19th Century novel, which had been performed on stage for more than a century. Producer Carl Laemle Jr. balked at Lugosi’s makeup and Lugosi himself objected to the character’s lack of dialogue so out went Florey and Lugosi and in came James Whale and Boris Karloff who went from character actor to world-famous star the moment the film was released. Lugosi’s makeup was designed to interact with his bone structure so that his facial movements projected insights into the character that might otherwise not have come to the fore. The follow-up film, which took three-and-a-half years to produce, was one of the few sequels that was even better than the original thanks to Whale’s trademark infusion of comedy into terrifying situations, the sly casting of Elsa Lanchester as both Mary Shelley and the monster’s intended bride, wonderful set pieces such as the monster’s genteel visit with the hermit, and Karloff’s wonderful performance.

Commentary By Tripp Burton – Easily the best of all of the Universal monster movies from the 1930s and 1940s, and perhaps still the best monster movies period, Frankenstein and The Bride of Frankenstein have to be taken together as a whole to completely grasp their greatness. I couldn’t put one on the list without the other. Frankenstein is the tighter film, but The Bride of Frankenstein does what any great sequel does: it expands its universe while deepening its characters. The way that Karloff lets the monster slowly become the most human character in the film, as curious and vulnerable as he is strong and threatening, ultimately makes him a scarier creation than Universal’s Dracula or Wolfman. The films go full circle, starting with the monster and the little girl by the lake, where the monster’s desire to do good leads him to do the worst thing imaginable, and ending with the monster destroying and killing not out of anger or his animal nature, but out of the pain of lost love. That might be the most human kind of horror imaginable.

Friday the 13th

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Sean S. Cunningham) While the slasher subgenre has been mocked and this franchise has been ridiculed for its rampant gore and cheesiness, the original Friday the 13th was an amazing example of how the genre could be manipulated and twisted with a story that is surprisingly astute and fascinating. It also contains one of the most unexpected twists in cinema. It may not be a great film in its construction or execution, but for the genre, it is one of my favorite examples of the period.

Halloween

Commentary By Tripp Burton – (dir. John Carpenter) If there ever was a film that invented an entire genre, John Carpenter’s 1978 independent breakthrough film certainly is that. Nearly every trope of the slasher film, probably the most popular type of horror film of the past 30 years, was pioneered in this film: the virginal female lead, the indestructible killer, the wise elder trying to stop things before it is too late, the eerie music, the teenage victims, the running and hiding the audience knows will be pointless, and even the pop-back-to-life scare at the end. The only thing it doesn’t have is a lot of blood or gore. The truth, though, is that no matter how many people have copied Halloween, no one has yet topped Halloween. It remains as chilling as it was when it first came out, with the scares still landing perfectly and the tropes feeling as fresh as if they had never been copied. That is probably due to the fact that Carpenter made the film on a shoestring budget (it remains one of the most profitable indie films of all time), and had to rely on a looming steadycam and mood music rather than easily dated special effects or gigantic set pieces. Sometimes, all you need is a creepy killer, a house and a simple score (by John Carpenter himself) to scare the pants off of an audience.

Horror of Dracula

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. Terence Fisher) I had read the novel, seen the stage-bound 1931 Bela Lugosi version of Dracula, and the not-very-scary 1957 Hammer Film version of The Curse of Frankenstein, so I wasn’t expecting anything too horrific from Hammer’s 1958 version of Dracula, called Horror of Dracula in the U.S. Boy was I wrong! It was absolutely terrifying, with one shock after another, so much so that fourteen-year-old me kept the lights on at night all summer after seeing it. I didn’t turn them off until I turned fifteen in September!

Housebound

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. Gerard Johnstone) This 2014 New Zealand film restored my love of horror films absent for so long thanks to the long, dreary procession of splatter films and the like. It is a murder mystery, a family drama and a comedy, as well as a superbly made horror film with a simple premise. A young woman is sentenced by the courts for a minor infraction to probation at the home she grew up in where something very odd is going on. For starters, there’s something in the walls, but it’s not what you think.

The Innocents

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Jack Clayton) Deborah Kerr’s performance as a young governess haunted by ghostly children in a dark house with a mysterious past is a miraculous feat of tension and fear. Kerr enlivens a film that is already built on a sturdy foundation of craft and art. This chilling movie is a model of the haunted house subgenre that deserves more recognition by modern audiences.

The Invisible Man

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. James Whale) James Whale was already renowned as a consummate director of serious films (1930’s Journey’s End, 1931’s Waterloo Bridge) as well as the most successful sci-fi/horror film yet made (1931’s Frankenstein), but his greatest gift was his penchant for mischievous comedy which he injected into the most unlikely of circumstances. The first evidence of this was 1932’s alternately hilarious and scary The Old Dark House. His 1933 film of H.G. Wells’ The Invisible Man ups the ante by turning the comedy up several notches. The success of the film owes as much to Una O’Connor and other actors’ reactions as it does to to Claude Rains’ superb portrayal of the man who is mostly unseen behind bandages and dark glasses for the bulk of the film.

The Last House on the Left

Commentary By Tripp Burton – (dir. Wes Craven) Wes Craven was probably the biggest name in horror films for the last 4 or 5 decades. He made a lot of important, influential and freaky films, but none of them is quite as unsettling as The Last House on the Left. Craven’s low-budget debut, loosely stealing the plot of Bergman’s The Virgin Spring, holds nothing back in terms of terror, graphic imagery or boundary breaking. It is as raw of a horror film as has ever been made, and remains cringe-worthy today. Unlike the rewatchability of many horror films, where revisiting your favorite scares can invite you to watch it over and over again, once is enough for The Last House on the Left. It is brutal and takes you as deep down a dark hole as any other film has, but in the end it is a brilliant example of what happens when a filmmaker focuses purely on the horrors of humanity and what we are truly capable of doing to others.

The Night of the Hunter

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Charles Laughton) Not technically a horror film, there’s something terrifying about the searing tension and haunting drama that makes up Charles Laughton’s only directorial effort. Starring a brilliant Robert Mitchum as a religious fanatic who marries a widow attempting to locate the stolen stash her late husband has hidden, Night of the Hunter also features a perfectly frightened performance by Shelley Winters. The film evokes countless tropes used in modern horror films whether it’s considered such or not.

Night of the Living Dead / Dawn of the Dead / Day of the Dead

Commentary By Tripp Burton – (dir. George Romero) In coming up with this list, I had a hard time separating out George Romero’s original zombie trilogy and decided that they all had to be considered together. There is no narrative link between them, and each film feels drastically different from the others, but Romero’s great achievement is best understood when you look at the trilogy as a whole. Like all great horror films, Romero’s interest lies less in gore and monsters but in the world that is feeding them. As he moves his zombie apocalypse from the Cold War to Reagan America, Romero uses the zombies as a window into racism, consumerism, the military industrial complex and the true depths of our own human nature. All three films are individually original, suspenseful and fascinating, but taken as a whole, they are sharp, terrifying satires on the America of George Romero.

A Nightmare on Elm Street

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Wes Craven) Slasher films hadn’t evolved much in the decade since their popularity exploded, leaving a four-year period of similar films and sequels that didn’t capture the imagination. Wes Craven, who got his start in the genre in the 1970s took an idea of a dream killer and turned it into one of the most inventive and original horror films of all-time. As young people are slaughtered by an unidentified killer, Craven upends horror conventions and creates frights unparalleled in the medium with seemingly simple cringing sound effects, chilling music and deft editing and effects.

Nosferatu

Commentary By Tripp Burton – (dir. F.W. Murnau) F.W. Murnau’s silent vampire classic was one of the earliest monster movies, and remarkably enough it remains one of the creepiest. This mostly has to do with Max Schreck’s titular creature, who slithers around the screen so convincingly that you have to wonder if he is even human at all (in fact, the 2001 film Shadow of a Vampire purported that he wasn’t). Murnau also does a lot of heavy lifting here, though, and the way that he frames the film and builds suspense is masterful. The Dracula legend has been filmed hundreds of times since, and there are grander, funnier and sexier versions of this story on film, but this original still remains the most unsettling of them all.

Poltergeist

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Tobe Hooper) There are plenty of rumors that Steven Spielberg helmed this 1980s horror masterpiece, but the credit is given to Tobe Hooper. However, many of Spielberg’s stylistic elements are present in this terrifying piece about a family haunted by a phantom hidden deep within the closet of their newly purchased home. One of the decade’s best horror entries, Poltergeist is such an inventive and fascinating film that if it was indeed Hooper who directed the film, he should have been able to accomplish so much more. As with many horror films, the musical score by Jerry Goldsmith is absolutely superb.

Psycho

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Alfred Hitchcock) Produced the same year as the other progenitor of the slasher genre, Psycho is significantly better known than Peeping Tom (which wasn’t released in the United States until 1962) and for good reason. This iconic film gave suspense maestro Alfred Hitchcock one of his greatest successes. Establishing everything that made the slasher genre possible, Hitchcock’s familiarity with tension, balance and terror enabled the film to surpass its contemporaries at a time when horror was struggling to find new life. Hitchcock gave it that and so much more.

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – Alfred Hitchcock was the master of all media in 1960. He was the host of a top-rated TV mystery and suspense series. He was the publisher of a mystery suspense anthology magazine. His last two theatrical films, Vertigo and North by Northwest, had been two of his best, so when Paramount released Psycho with the admonition that no one would be seated after the start of the film, audiences lined up around blocks in theatres all over the world prior to the film’s start time. Anticipation for seeing the film for the first time has never wavered, which is well earned by such elements as the shocking demise of a principal character halfway into the film, scenes of genuine horror, and the masterful performances of a very strong cast led by Anthony Perkins and Janet Leigh.

Commentary By Tripp Burton – So much has been written about Alfred Hitchcock’s seminal horror film Psycho that it is hard to find something to say that doesn’t sound worn out or derivative. It only speaks to the brilliance of the film, though, that it has been covered so thoroughly. The way Hitchcock and screenwriter Joseph Stefano consistently reroute the viewer through the maze of Norman Bates’ world–from killing of his heroine too early to drawing out suspense and then paying it off with red herrings to the final reveal of the truth behind Norman Bates’ mother–is a masterful job of screen manipulation. Over half a century later, the film still frightens and surprises viewers, and the film almost gets creepier and edgier each year. No one has ever been able to do quite the same thing on film, and Psycho will remain a seminal horror film for generations to come.

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – One of the oldies, but still a very effective film, with the acting, Bernard Herrmann’s memorable score, and specific scenes all being part of our collective consciousness. Showers, mothers and taxidermy haven’t been the same since. The studio probably did not want Alfred Hitchcock to direct this, but it is arguably his best known film now.

Rosemary’s Baby

Commentary By Peter J. Patrick – (dir. Roman Polanski) Having read Ira Levin’s novel, I was fascinated by how close Roman Polanski’s 1968 film of Rosemary’s Baby followed the text even to the location filming in New York’s legendary apartment building turned co-op, the Dakota. More psychological than truly horrifying, it is nevertheless terrifying and remains so, especially for women going through their first pregnancy. Mia Farrow has always been a good actress, but she’s never had another part that perfectly fit her the way this one does. Supporting players John Cassavetes, Oscar winner Ruth Gordon, Sidney Blackmer, Ralph Bellamy and Maurice Evans are also superbly cast.

Commentary By Tripp Burton – When winnowing down films for this list, I was shocked at the number of Roman Polanski films I could have put on here. I gave serious consideration to Repulsion, The Tenant and even Polanski’s film version of Macbeth. If one of his films had to be on this list, though, it is certainly Rosemary’s Baby. Polanski’s tale of devil worship works not only because Polanski creates such an effective mood of paranoia and anxiety, but because everyone in the film commits to the realism and honesty of the situation. This means that Polanski doesn’t have to show anything more than his actors’ faces, and he lets his wonderful cast do all of the heavy lifting. What comes out of this is one of the most moody, creepy portraits of horror in cinema.

Shaun of the Dead

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. Edgar Wright) An ordinary bloke dealing with his own problems and a wicked hangover does not at first realize that the zombie apocalypse has started. He may never rise to the role of a true hero, but a great sense of humor pervades the film and keeps it from ever getting too creepy even as the body count rises.

The Shining

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Stanley Kubrick) There wasn’t a genre that director Stanley Kubrick hadn’t infused with his literate brand of film brilliance. The story of an alcoholic and his family trapped in a remote snow-bound hotel is one of the most mesmerising films in Kubrick’s repertoire, a visually resplendant picture that oozes style. Jack Nicholson and Shelly Duvall deliver iconic performances in a film that may not be classically scary, but is certainly anything but calming.

The Silence of the Lambs

Commentary By Tripp Burton – (dir. Jonathan Demme) Jonathan Demme’s Best Picture winning exploration of evil might not look like a traditional horror film on the surface, but it remains one of the most ominous examples of psychological horror on film. Some of the larger set pieces are more suspenseful than horrific (the basement chase in particular), but the way that Demme chooses to frame everything in the film creates the mood of a horror film throughout: Hannibal Lecter is treated as a monster, images such as the disemboweled security guard are horrific, and a macabre feeling of death permeates every moment. Even the way Demme uses his trademark “talk to the camera face on” technique makes you feel like these characters are burrowing into your soul. It is a creepy film with an almost Grand Guignol quality, and it is almost certainly one of the most horrifying films around.

The Sixth Sense

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. M. Night Shyamalan) Everyone knows the big reveal at the end by now, but a terrific sense of unease pervades the entire film. Strongly cast and directed, it holds up surprisingly well, even if its writer/director has not fared that well since.

Suspiria

Commentary By Wesley Lovell – (dir. Dario Argento) Apart from John Carpenter and Wes Craven, there are few directors so in tune with a genre that their every work is a challenge to the status quo. Dario Argento has been directing horror flicks in his native Italy for the better part of five decades. Suspiria represents his high water mark, a stylish, horrifying look into a ballet academy where a young newcomer discovers a sinister threat behind a series of vicious murders. It may not be the most familiar or accessible film, but it deserves to be seen by anyone intersted in the medium.

The Thing

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. John Carpenter) A lonely Antarctic research station proves an effective and claustrophobic setting for this creepy and gory film. Trapped down there for the winter, the researchers get more paranoid and frightened as time passes and more of them are killed. Gory but good.

The Vanishing

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. George Sluizer) Perhaps more eerie than most horror films, this Dutch film about the disappearance of a woman at a roadside petrol station gradually gets tenser and tenser. Cutting between her obsessed lover and the kidnapper, it builds to a truly terrifying ending. It is a frightening film, not gory but deeply disturbing.

Westworld

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. Michael Crichton) Not the first movie to show that adding artificial intelligence to robots can have bad repercussions for the human race, but it fits into an effective niche that runs from at least 2001: A Space Odyssey through Terminator to this year’s Ex Machina. Starting with a malfunctioning rattlesnake, it gets progressively creepier.

The Wicker Man

Commentary By Tripp Burton – (dir. Robin Hardy) Much has been discussed about the ending of The Wicker Man, and it certainly is one of the most squirm-inducing climaxes in cinema. Everything leading up to the ending, though, is just as powerfully horrific. As Sergeant Howie and the audience together begin to understand the hidden darkness in this bright seaside village, the imagery of the film becomes nightmare-inducing: the medieval costuming, the maypole dance, the icy visit to Lord Summerisle’s house, and the haunting Willow’s Dance. By the time we get to the end, we know that almost anything can happen in The Wicker Man, and the final battle between warring religions remains one of the darkest endings to a horror movie anywhere.

Zombieland

Commentary By Thomas LaTourrette – (dir. Ruben Fleischer) Buoyed by strong performances throughout and a great sense of humor, this is a really enjoyable film to watch. It is not always horrifying, but it can have you on the edge of your seat before the next laugh eases the tension.