Top Horror Movies Streaming This Week

With only three weeks until the 98th Annual Academy Awards, director Ryan Coogler, his co-producers Zinzi Coogler and Sev Ohanian, and nominees Delroy Lindo, Wunmi Mosaku, and actor Miles Canton attended the Academy's Nominee Luncheon last week. It resulted in a great group photo, and it means that we are that much closer to finding out if Sinners is the next horror film to win at the Oscars.

The film that genuinely became a sensation continues to hold court in the number one spot for the fourth week in a row, and it would be hard not to be proud of this tale of vampires and blues music that resonates so deeply with the audience.

Sinners is now streaming on HBO Max and Prime.

Director Francis Lawrence's masterpiece, The Long Walk, has continued its march back towards number one and risen to the second spot this week. The film had been hovering at number four for a few weeks, but has reversed course with the increased number of viewers watching the movie at home. It is a genuinely disturbing look at an alternate 1970s where the United States lives under a totalitarian, militaristic regime, adapted from Stephen King's series of novels written under the pseudonym Richard Bachman.

King's Bachman books tend to be some of the most brutal and pessimistic of King's work. Of the other three, The Running Man, Roadwork, and Rage, all have a similar outlook of despair. The Running Man is about another dystopian nightmare future, Roadwork is about a man's angry reaction to losing everything when his land is due to be taken by the government through eminent domain, and Rage is about a school shooting. None of them features anything supernatural and are realistic and terrifying scenarios.

The Long Walk is now streaming on Starz.

Do you remember the first time you saw Weapons? We do, and it was a lot of fun and frightening at the same time. Apparently, many other people are enjoying the movie multiple times at home, enough so that it has stayed in the top ten since it was released on streaming back in October. It was October 24, to be exact, which translates as four months on the list.

Amy Madigan also took part in the Academy Awards Nominees Luncheon, which was wonderful, as she was recognized for her work as Aunt Gladys. The entire cast, including Josh Brolin, Julia Garner, Alden Ehrenreich, Austin Abrams, Cary Christopher, Toby Huss, Benedict Wong, worked beautifully as an ensemble, and the popularity of the film and critical response show how much actors and their performances matter in filmmaking.

Weapons is now streaming on HBO Max.

There is a newcomer to this week's list, which is Primitive War, starring Ryan Kwanten, Tricia Helfer, Nick Wechsler, and Jeremy Piven. The movie is based on a novel, called Primitive War, naturally, written by Ethan Pettus. The film was directed by Luke Sparke (Scurry, Devil Beneath) and co-written by Sparke and Pettus.

It concerns soldiers in 1968, during the Vietnam War, who are suddenly attacked by dinosaurs while on a secret rescue mission. For everyone who enjoys some dino-gore and saurians clawing their way back into human society with bloody results, this one will pique your interest. The tagline for the film is, amusingly, “This ain't no walk in the park.”

Primitive War is now streaming on Kanopy and Hoopla.

Speaking of scary movies that have been in the top ten for a long time, 28 Years Later was released to streaming on September 20, meaning that it has perched menacingly on this list for five months so far.  28 Years Later has been called a “distinctly British Horror movie” by none other than Fangoria's Amber T., and it is, but clearly, many people around the world have found things within the film that they can relate to.

Director Danny Boyle's latest film is not just a tale of humans surviving in a United Kingdom that is ruled by the rage-infected; it is also a coming-of-age story for two young boys: Jimmy Crystal and Spike. Both have to contend with the violence and horror of the infected, but they have taken separate paths in this strange new world.

28 Years Later is now streaming on Netflix.

Director Guillermo del Toro's gothic film is a thing of beauty, reinventing the classic tale, written by Mary Shelley two centuries ago, for modern audiences.  When you think about the fact that the story was published in 1818 and was written by the author when she was 18, it was an astonishing achievement of understanding and empathy. It shows humanity at war with itself and its own hubris, and some things never change. We still fear the other.

Guillermo del Toro and Jacob Elordi attended the Academy Awards nominees luncheon, and del Toro, at the urging of fellow nominee Paul Thomas Anderson, stood in the center of the photograph with his arms thrown out to recreate the final image in Stanley Kubrick's film adaptation of The Shining.  It was an amazing horror moment in the heart of Hollywood.

Frankenstein is now streaming on Netflix.

Can a specific day, like a holiday or a day of supernatural dread, affect streaming rates? It would seem so, since Sean S. Cunningham's original slasher Friday the 13th has hit the top ten right in a week after 2026's first Friday the 13th. The movie, starring Betsy Palmer, Adrienne King, Harry Crosby, Laurie Bartram, Mark Nelson, Jeannine Taylor, Robbi Morgan, and Kevin Bacon, was very successful in 1980 and remains one of horror's favorite slasher franchises.

The series is so popular that it has inspired nine sequels, one reboot, and one crossover movie with Jason versus Freddy Krueger. The franchise will continue with a prequel television series that has recently wrapped production, Crystal Lake, starring Linda Cardellini as Pamela Voorhees.

Friday the 13th is now streaming on Kanopy.

For everyone who thought the story of The Grabber and his enemies was over at the end of The Black Phone, well, in a scary movie, death is frequently not the end, especially for a good villain. In making a sequel, the director, Scott Derrickson, and co-writer C. Robert Cargill, went to the source, the author of the original novella, who had just the idea to continue the story in a way that audiences would love.

This newest movie in the series has done well financially and with critics, and Ethan Hawke has said he would be willing to play The Grabber again, as quoted by Entertainment Weekly. The story of Black Phone 2 also revealed information that the audience was not privy to in the first film; where the story could go from here is only restricted by imagination.

Black Phone 2 is now streaming on Peacock.

Maddie Hasson, Alex Roe, Andra Nechita, and Marco Pigossi star in this throwback to the sexy thrillers of the 1990s, directed by Mercedes Bryce Morgan. In it, there is one troubled couple against another on the shores of a lake that has been the dumping ground of a serial killer, according to local legend. Like quite a few other innocent people in scary movies just trying to relax on a trip, they trusted the wrong people.

The twists and turns and the sexual tension in the film, along with the performances, have definitely caught the audience's interest in Bone Lake, and the provocative title lends itself to many a skeletal pun.

Bone Lake is now streaming on Netflix.

You can always count on a clown to leap out from nowhere and scare you, and this week's list is also proof of that.  Director Eli Craig's Clown in a Cornfield has been on the countdown before, but it's been a while since we've seen Frendo pop up on the top ten. Welcome back, Frendo.

Katie Douglas, Aaron Abrams, Carson MacCormac, Kevin Durand, and Will Sasso star in this slasher with a clown who is skilled with multiple weapons. That's a true slasher skill set;  being able to make do with any available weapon.

Clown in a Cornfield is now streaming on Hulu and Shudder.