14 Unconventional Horror Valentine’s Day Movies

Hey, we said unconventional! Jörg Buttgereit's 1987 controversial German horror NEKRomantik follows a young couple with a very specific shared special interest that you can probably guess by the film's not-so-subtle title.

Easily one of the most controversial horror movies of all time, NEKRomantik is still banned in Iceland, Malaysia, Singapore and more to this day (for reasons you can probably guess) and serves as a rite of passage watch for anyone wanting to dip their toes into extreme horror.

If you're sick and tired of sappy romcoms and classic love stories, NEKRomantik is an ideal date movie for testing whether or not your potential partner is on your wavelength. Because ithe wise words of Fango contributor Melissa Kay, what is necrophilia if not love persevering?

Shin'ya Tsukamoto's grinding industrial freakshow Tetsuo: The Iron Man is a chief example of Japan's cyberpunk horror genre, but it's also weirdly romantic. The 1989 monochrome nightmare, which was influenced by Davids Lynch and Cronenberg, follows a salaryman who wakes up one morning to find himself sprouting inorganic material from his skin, and plagued by increasingly disturbing visions involving sex, death and a whole lot of metal.

Tetsuo is an assault on all the sense, but among the constant clanging, yelling and screeching is a story of two misfits finding love by embracing their unique fetishes and fusing together, quite literally, in eternal bliss.

If you and your loved prefer junkyards to fancy restaurants and drills to dancing, Tetsuo makes for a perfect Valentine's Day watch.

If The Creep Tapes showed us anything, it's that Mark Duplass' Peachfuzz is a complicated fella with, err, an interesting attachment style, shall we say. But it's in 2017's Creep 2 that Peachfuzz almost, almost, has something resembling a normal romance. In Patrick Brice's Creep sequel, the wolf-mask psychopath meets his match in Sara (Desiree Akhavan), an aspiring filmmaker who agrees to shoot a documentary on Peachfuzz and his many crimes.

We can't for a moment condone any of Peachfuzz's tactics in declaring his love for Sara (especially the Romeo and Juliet-inspired violent showdown in the woods), but we can't deny that there's a charm to our favorite socially-awkward serial killer that makes Creep 2 perhaps one of the sickest and twisted love stories in horror history.

Will Peachfuzz finally find love in the upcoming third season of The Creep Tapes? We'll hopefully find out sometime this year on Shudder!

Another vampire love story not to be missed this Valentine's Day is Bill Gunn's 1973 beautifully surrealist horror Ganja & Hess. Starring cinematic legend Duane Jones (Night of the Living Dead) and the stunning Marlene Clark (Black Mamba), Ganja & Hess is not just a horror-romance for the ages, it's also a profoundly important piece of Black genre cinema that has rightfully been reappraised in recent years.

Clark and Jones star as the titular pair, who are both drawn into the seductive pull of vampirism as their own intimate, erotic and dreamy love story blossoms. This being a horror film however, things quickly go sideways.

As always, in Ganja & Hess the metaphor of vampirism is so much more than it is simply a tale of bloodsuckers, with its themes of “assimilation, white cultural imperialism and the hypocrisies of organized religion”, as critic Scott Foundas put it, paving the way for other Black vampire movies including Ryan Coogler's Oscar-nominated and record-breaking hit Sinners. With this in mind, Ganja & Hess is also a perfect watch to add to your Black History Month horror watchlists.

South Korean auteur Park Chan-wook has a few unconventional love stories in his filmography (I'm a Cyborg, But That's OK, The Handmaiden, Oldboy, if you're feeling brave), but the vampire horror Thirst stands out as his one of his most tragically romantic.

Starring Song Kang-ho (Parasite) and Kim Ok-vin (The Villainess), Thirst follows Sang-hyun, a Catholic priest who accidentally ends up infected with a virus that causes him to turn into a vampire. While he grapples with both his faith and new urges, Sang-hyun also finds himself enamoured with Tae-ju, the wife of his childhood friend, causing more moral quandary in this holy man's once simple life.

Those who like their romance bloody and bruised will find a lot to love in Thirst, and given that we're in something of a monster movie renaissance, it's about time Park's underrated horror masterpiece had a reappraisal.

Ever been so hot for a partner that you still breathlessly obsess over them even after they're turned into a skinless, bloody entity by extra-dimensional kink demons summoned by a magic puzzle box? Yeah, Hellraiser sets a high bar for romantic gestures, and frankly a candlelit dinner isn't going to cut it after watching Julia go to the ends of the earth and back to resurrect her one true love.

Clive Barker's 1987 horror classic is the perfect Valentine's Day watch for both couples and singles alike; for the former, it's a romantic reminder that love doesn't end when life does, and for the latter, it's proof that you're better off alone. At least then you won't have to deal with Pinhead and his crew barging in and doing all sorts of unspeakable, agonizing, torturous things to you.

Unless you're into that of course. Hey, we don't kink-shame here.

Aside from vampirism, there is perhaps no more potent metaphor for all-consuming love than cannibalism. Luca Guadagnino's Bones and All, his second foray into the horror genre following 2018's Suspiria remake, demonstrates this perfectly with its core relationship between Maren (Taylor Russell) and Lee (Timothée Chalamet), two ‘eaters' looking to lead a normal life despite their insatiable appetites for human flesh.

What makes Bones and All such a perfect Valentine's Day watch for those who like their romance more unconventional is how, among the blood and viscera of their existence, Maren and Lee are just two misfit, lonely lost souls who happen to find true love with each other. Something all of us, cannibal or not, are looking for.

As its title suggests, Bones and All is about loving someone completely, not in spite of, but in celebration of, their darkest and scariest parts.

Scream queen Melissa Barrera put a bloody spin on fairytale classic Beauty and the Beast with her role in the 2024 romantic horror Your Monster. In Caroline Lindy's feature debut, Barrera plays a soft-spoken actor who is dumped by her longtime boyfriend while recovering from surgery. To add insult to injury, she discovers her ex is staging a musical that she helped him develop.

But out of these gut-wrenching life changes emerges a – quite literal – monster (Tommy Dewey) with whom she finds a connection, encouraging Laura to follow her dreams, open her heart and fall in love with her inner rage.

Your Monster not only established Barrera as a major player in horror even outside of the slasher genre, it's the perfect unconventional love story to watch this Valentine's Day, especially if you're reeling from a breakup with a selfish ex.

David Bowie, Susan Sarandon AND Catherine Deneuve in a bisexual erotic vampire horror that's as stylish as it is sexy?? Of course The Hunger is one of our top picks for an unconventional Valentine's Day movie marathon. Duh. In Tony Scott's directorial debut, bloodsucking couple Miriam and John (Deneuve and Bowie) enlist the help of a gerontologist, Sarah (Sarandon), when John suddenly begins to rapidly age, despite his vampiric condition.

As vampires are wont to do, a love triangle quickly sparks between the three of them, which further escalates when John's body begins to disintegrate and Sarah is turned. It's a classic horror love story, meaning the morals are questionable and the sensuality is steamy. Perfect Valentine's Day viewing.

Oh, and if the above wasn't enough to convince you, maybe the incredible Bauhaus-soundtracked opening sequence will.

Noticing a theme running through this list? Yep, vampirism and Valentine's Day go hand in hand. After all, what's more romantic than literally sucking the life-force from your lover? In Ariane Louis-Seize‘s adorable 2022 comedy-horror Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person however, it's a little less cut and dry than that, as the titular vamp Sasha (Sara Montpetit), for ethical reasons, refrains from chowing down on human prey, much to the annoyance of her bloodsucking family.

Her morals are challenged however when she meets Paul (Félix-Antoine Bénard), the eponymous suicidal person, and the pair quickly figure out a solution that could solve both their problems.

Both warmhearted and full-blooded, Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person is a winning mix of horror, humor, romance, and a different point of view on creatures of the night. Get it on your Valentine's watchlist quick sharp.

Ann Hui's Visible Secret is a dreamy, quirky love story that fits nicely into the long-established Listen To Women When They Tell You You're Haunted canon of movies. The 2001 Hong Kong horror-comedy follows Peter (Eason Chan), a young hairdresser who falls in love with the beautiful June (Shu Qi), a nurse who insists she can see ghosts through her spiritually active third eye.

Of course, Peter doesn't believe her at first, but soon changes his tune when he also starts witnessing restless spirits wreaking havoc in the world of the living.

Visible Secret makes the perfect Valentine's Day watch for any couple who have decided to stick together through even the toughest of times. Although hopefully with far fewer decapitated ghosts.

In Lars Von Trier's Antichrist, a happy couple head into the woods for a romantic, incredibly normal weekend getaway. They leave feeling refreshed, relaxed, and more in love than ever before!

Nah, we're just kidding obviously, but Antichrist does make for excellent Valentine's Day viewing if you want to give love the middle finger. As He and She, Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg give two of the most intense performances in all of horror history, rivalling Sam Neill and Isabelle Adjani in Possession as the cinematic pair most direly in need of couple's therapy.

Fair warning though, Antichrist is probably not the movie you want to put on for a romantic evening in if you and your partner are, shall we say, going through it. Or who knows, maybe it'll help!

Nothing beats a holiday themed slasher, and while Christmas pretty much has a monopoly on the market still, Valentine's Day has a solid canon that has a relatively recent all-timer entry in Josh Ruben's Heart Eyes.

What makes Heart Eyes such a great Valentine's Day watch is that among the brutality and the bloodshed (of which there is plenty!) is a genuinely touching love story between Olivia Holt's Ally and Mason Gooding's Jay. The pair have a ton of chemistry, making it believable and easy to root for them, especially when they go up against the Heart Eyes Killer.

David Cronenberg's Crash is one for the real freaks (complimentary). The 1996 adaptation of J.G. Ballard's 1973 novel of the same name stars James Spader, Holly Hunter, Elias Koteas, Deborah Kara Unger and Rosanna Arquette as a group of symphorophilics, aka people who erm, get off to scenes of violent disaster, chasing the ultimate erotic high by getting themselves willingly involved in car crashes.

Among Cronenberg's filmography (which includes masterpieces like Scanners, The Brood, The Fly, Crimes of the Future and, most recently, The Shrouds), Crash stands out as an interesting example of the body horror auteur embracing the politics of fetish and sexuality.

Controversial at the time of release, and even more so today in our current sexless media landscape, Crash is a Valentine's Day must-watch or rewatch for those who like to get a little weird with it.