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What are the best horror movies ever made? Everyone has their own answer, and that extends to various communities of film fans around the world, including the cinephiles who inhabit Letterboxd.
Over the years, the Letterboxd community –- who rate and review movies with a pure and honest eye -– has collectively fallen in love with horror films from around the world. They come from a variety of cinematic eras, cultures, and subgenres, and because Letterboxd users are constantly adding ratings, whether evaluating movies for the first time or revisiting and re-scoring them, the list is always evolving. The site's official list of the top 250 horror films of all time is a monumental snapshot of the genre, but only a handful of movies can compete for the top spot on that list.
So, which are at the top, according to Letterboxd? The list can change in a heartbeat, but as of July 2026, these are the best horror movies ever in the eyes of Letterboxd users, from longtime classics to relative newcomers.
Read more: 10 Most Disturbing Movie Endings Of All Time, Ranked
5. Psycho
Legendary auteur Alfred Hitchcock is better known for suspense and thrills, but he has crossed into all-out terror several times throughout his career, and those instances remain fan-favorites.
At the top of Hitchcock's horror achievements is "Psycho," his 1960 film adaptation of Robert Bloch's novel of the same name, which currently sports a 4.3-star average on Letterboxd. The film tells the story of Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins), a mild-mannered motel manager with a strange relationship with his mother and a problem on his hands, namely that someone keeps murdering his guests. When Marion (Janet Leigh), a woman on the run, goes missing at the motel, her friends and family start investigating, putting Norman in an impossible position that could reveal all of his secrets.
That's slightly oversimplifying the many layers at work in "Psycho," a film about repression, violence, and what we as humans do when cornered. More than six decades after its release the film is still revealing new things to fans. It still ranks among Hitchcock's most revered classics, with many horror fans considering it a progenitor of the modern slasher movie, and of course, it features the most famous sequence in Hitchcock's entire career. All you have to do is say the words "shower scene," and everyone knows what you're talking about. That's the power of "Psycho."
4. The Silence of the Lambs
Though "Manhunter" beat it by several years and remains a beloved film, "The Silence of the Lambs" is the movie that really catapulted Hannibal Lecter into pop culture immortality. Adapted from Thomas Harris' novel of the same name, the film tells the story of FBI trainee Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster), whose efforts to help investigate a serial killer's gruesome crime spree lead her to Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), a cannibal killer tucked away in an asylum. Starling is supposed to simply get his perspective on the killings, but Lecter is quickly fascinated by the young woman, setting off an elaborate game of quid pro quo that sends Clarice off in search of the darkest parts of humanity.
"The Silence of the Lambs" is the second of four Lecter novels written by Harris, and it's by far the most famous. The movie, directed by Jonathan Demme, is a big reason why. The film was a runaway hit in 1991, and became one of the few movies in history to sweep the "Big 5" categories at the Oscars. In 1992 it took best picture, best director for Demme, best actor for Hopkins, best actress for Foster, and best adapted screenplay for writer Ted Tally. Though it's a mystery film at its heart, its imagery and characters made it a masterpiece of terror still beloved by horror fans, as attested by its 4.3 Letterboxd rating average.
3. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me
When his hit mystery series "Twin Peaks" was cancelled after two seasons on ABC, writer/director David Lynch decided he wasn't yet done with this story, and set out to tell part of it on the big screen. The result is "Fire Walk With Me," a disturbing journey that lays out the timeline of the show.
With much of the original cast returning, the film is divided into two major parts. The first follows FBI Agents Gordon Cole (Lynch) and Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) as they investigate the death of Teresa Banks (Pamela Gidley) and the disappearances surrounding it, while the second shows us the last week in the life of Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee), whose murder is the show's central mystery.
While "Twin Peaks" was originally known as a mystery series with lots of soap opera influence and notes of horror scattered throughout, "Fire Walk With Me" pushes the intensity of the horror to levels never seen on the original show. Watching Laura barrel toward her fate, and seeing how it all happened in the days before she washed up on a riverbank wrapped in plastic, still send chills down your spine. A cult classic in its own right, with a stellar 4.3 on Letterboxd to boot, "Fire Walk With Me" is one of the reasons we eventually got Lynch and co-creator Mark Frost's appropriately-titled return to the show "Twin Peaks: The Return."
2. The Thing
John Carpenter has been known for decades as a master of horror, and he's got several genre masterpieces to his name. But even among recognized classics like "Halloween," "The Fog," and "In the Mouth of Madness," one of Carpenter's films is widely hailed as the best sci-fi horror movie of all time. Adapted from Howard Hawks and Christian Nyby's 1951 film "The Thing from Another World," and the John W. Campbell short story which inspired it, "The Thing" is Carpenter at his most visceral.
"The Thing" follows a group of American scientists, cut off from the rest of the world at a remote Antarctic outpost, as they discover a strange alien organism in their midst. It first appears in the body of a dog, but as it spreads, infecting the residents of the outpost, the survivors soon discover that they can't trust anyone.
"The Thing" is an ensemble horror film, led by stars like Kurt Russell and Keith David, but for many horror fans the real star is the makeup effects by the great Rob Bottin, which turned Carpenter's concept into a series of terrifying, shapeshifting monstrosities that stay stuck in your head for days. The idea of something infecting your body is scary enough, but watching what The Thing can do is what really turns this film into the lasting masterpiece that has amassed it a 4.4 rating average on Letterboxd.
1. Perfect Blue
With a 4.4 rating average on the platform, Letterboxd's favorite horror film is an anime, and it's one of the greatest animated films ever to come out of Japan. Directed by Satoshi Kon, "Perfect Blue" is the story of Mima (Junko Iwao), a Japanese pop star who decides to leave the girl group that made her an icon in order to become an actress. It's a risky move, and it gets riskier when Mima must deal with creepy fans and a new website that seems to mimic every part of her private life, right down to an exact replica of her bedroom.
Though at first presenting itself as the story of a creepy stalking fan and the celebrity who must repulse him, "Perfect Blue" digs deeper, as Mima's new acting career and the pressures of her would-be doppelganger's attention shift her state of mind. It begins in subtle ways, but soon becomes a terrifying experience in which Mima no longer understands what's real and what's an invention of her fans. It's a remarkably delicate exercise which delivers truly horrifying imagery and existential dread, and the level of craft on display is second to none. It's one of the best anime works ever created, and indeed, one of the best horror films of all time.
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Read the original article on Looper.
