Like its predecessor, Saw II centers around a serial killer who spends so much time designing complicated torture devices with which to murder his victims that it’s a wonder he ever gets around to the actual killing. This time around, he has filled a booby-trapped house with a group of random people, including the teen

Here’s where Hannibal Lecter officially transforms from pop icon to camp figure. This blatant exercise in Hollywood opportunism – Thomas Harris’ book was already adapted in 1986 as Manhunter – never has a chance thanks to Anthony Hopkins’ self-parodying performance. The only thing left for Hopkins now is to hit dinner theaters reciting the bad

After a boatload of sequels to the 1979 original, there was really no way of wringing more blood out of this horror franchise other than to start back at the beginning with a remake. Ryan Reynolds stifles the wisecracks as the husband and stepfather who succumbs to the demons of his new haunted mansion. The

John Carpenter has described this ghost story as a “little exploitation horror movie,” but even by those standards it’s pretty much a bust. As shipwreck victims from 100 years ago haunt a historic town on the Pacific Ocean, Carpenter’s ensemble cast of random characters – including Jamie Lee Curtis as a drifter, her real-life mother

With the pace and feel of an early-evening shadow creeping across the floor, this 1999 feature from writer-director M. Night Shyamalan announced the emergence of a bracing and assured talent. Haley Joel Osment – whose face has the decaying cuteness of a jack-o’-lantern the day after Halloween – proves riveting as a boy who sees

This import perfectly captures kids at play, as well as something related but darker. Ten-year-old Michele (Giuseppe Cristiano) leads an idyllic life in rural Italy until one day he comes across a covered pit next to an old farmhouse and on further investigation finds … Exactly what, the movie leaves up to you. Such ambiguity

What struck me as a heinous thriller in 1995 now seems – in the wake of a rash of explicit, torture-driven horror flicks – like something that verges on restraint. Then again, maybe this is just a demonstration of how subtle chills are more effective in the end. The details of the serial killer’s crimes

Nearly 14 paragraphs of introductory, explanatory text still couldn’t make sense of this video-game adaptation, which involves ancient civilizations, creatures of darkness, secret government agencies and bizarre experiments on orphans. Oh, and yes, there is a mad scientist. It’s all bad-movie good for a while, then just deadening. With Christian Slater and Stephen Dorff –

New levels of horror lunacy are achieved with this jokey entry in the Child’s Play series about a killer doll. Jennifer Tilly jiggles and squeaks as the doll’s lover – even after she becomes a doll herself – while the gonzo murders pile up (at one point Chucky proposes with a recently dismembered ring finger).