If you\u2019re not a horror fan, it\u2019s hard to explain exactly why horror is so compelling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps it\u2019s the vicarious release of allowing yourself to be scared in a controlled environment, or maybe it\u2019s just the visceral thrills of what you\u2019re seeing on screen, but horror scratches an itch that no other genre can scratch for its fans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2023 has been an excellent year for horror, and while there could still be some terrifying future classics on the way, we feel confident in calling the year\u2019s best horror movies right now. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s take a look at the best horror films of 2023!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Evil Dead Rise<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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Nobody expected the Evil Dead <\/em>franchise to have the staying power it\u2019s had, but the series is still going strong, as this year\u2019s entry Evil Dead Rise <\/em>proves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps wisely, Evil Dead Rise <\/em>does away with the continuity of the somewhat ill-advised 2013 reboot, returning instead to the core series (although you\u2019d be forgiven for thinking this was another reboot).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By moving the action to a claustrophobic apartment block, director Lee Cronin wrings maximum tension out of his movie, bringing Evil Dead <\/em>back to its brutal best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saw X<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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Speaking of franchises nobody expected to get a second wind\u2026Saw X <\/em>is, as you\u2019ve probably guessed, the tenth movie in the long-running Saw <\/em>franchise, and it somehow manages to breathe new life into its series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

John \u201cJigsaw\u201d Kramer is presented with a potential opportunity to cure his terminal cancer, but when that cure turns out to be bogus, he takes his revenge on the fraudsters as only he knows how.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turning the tables in a delightfully interesting way, Saw X <\/em>has proven popular with audiences and critics alike, which is unusual for the crowd-pleasing franchise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talk To Me<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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The premise of teenagers using Ouija boards or similar spiritual conduits to talk to the dead is nothing new, and nor are possession movies, but Talk To Me <\/em>finds new ground to tread.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thanks to its down-to-earth practical effects, Talk To Me <\/em>never feels floaty and weightless in the way that truly bad horror can, and its characters and story are compelling as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s also a thematic underpinning to Talk To Me <\/em>that we don\u2019t want to spoil, but if you\u2019re expecting this to be a straightforward horror movie, you may be surprised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

M3gan<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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Admit it: when you first saw the title of this movie, you read it as \u201cm-three-gan\u201d, didn\u2019t you? We certainly did. At any rate, this is a first-class techno-chiller, and one you\u2019ll love if you\u2019re a fan of both creepy doll horror movies and android stories alike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The titular M3gan is assigned as a companion to Violet McGraw\u2019s Cady, a young girl with tragedy in her past. Cady\u2019s mother is M3Gan\u2019s designer, but she gets much more than she bargains for when M3gan turns out to be less cuddly than she\u2019d hoped.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gerard Johnstone\u2019s movie strikes the perfect balance between silly and scary, making it an ideal Halloween treat for spooky season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enys Men<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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The term \u201celevated horror\u201d is one that\u2019s proven somewhat controversial among critics; some praise it for lifting horror out of its splattery preconceptions, while others suggest that it\u2019s pretentious and insulting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whatever your take on \u201celevated horror\u201d, Enys Men <\/em>isn\u2019t like most other horror movies. It\u2019s more of a symphonic piece than a straightforward story, so letting yourself soak up its atmosphere is paramount for enjoyment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enys Men <\/em>is very much not for everyone, but if you immerse yourself in its tactile world, you\u2019ll find plenty to love about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Huesera: The Bone Woman<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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If you can imagine a mixture of What To Expect When You\u2019re Expecting <\/em>and Rosemary\u2019s Baby<\/em>, with a healthy dash of Cronenberg-style body horror thrown into the mix, then you\u2019re pretty close to Huesera: The Bone Woman<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natalia Soli\u00e1n is Valeria, a woman who becomes pregnant for the first time. She\u2019s overjoyed until she falls afoul of a curse, which threatens to destroy her family and her chances of happiness with her first child.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Obviously, if you\u2019re pregnant yourself or hoping to be in the near future, you may want to avoid this one, but otherwise, settle in for a delightfully chilly Mexican-Peruvian production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Blackening<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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It\u2019s an unfortunately common trope that the Black character in many horror movies is the first one to die, and that, plus many other racist Hollywood tropes, is what\u2019s being skewered by The Blackening<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s a pretty solid pedigree behind The Blackening<\/em>; its creative team includes Barbershop<\/em>\u2019s Tim Story, Harlem<\/em>\u2019s Tracy Oliver, and Brooklyn Nine-Nine<\/em>\u2019s Dewayne Perkins, among others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re in the mood for a laugh-out-loud comedy that has some bite to it thanks to its satirical message, then you could definitely do a lot worse than The Blackening<\/em>, so be sure to add this one to your spooky season watch list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Infinity Pool<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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If you know the movies of Brandon Cronenberg, you\u2019ll know that the apple has very much not fallen far from the tree; like his father, Cronenberg junior makes unflinchingly terrifying and unsettling horror movies, and Infinity Pool <\/em>is no exception.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The movie takes place in a country in which those who have committed crimes can escape consequences by having a clone killed in their place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Alexander Skarsg\u00e5rd\u2019s James Foster accidentally does something horrible, he decides to pay the huge fee required to go through this process, and naturally, things spiral downwards pretty quickly from there.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you\u2019re not a horror fan, it\u2019s hard to explain exactly why horror is so compelling. Perhaps it\u2019s the vicarious release of allowing yourself to be scared in a controlled environment, or maybe it\u2019s just the visceral thrills of what you\u2019re seeing on screen, but horror scratches an itch that no other genre can scratch … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":10180,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"close","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,171],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10168"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10168"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10168\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10181,"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10168\/revisions\/10181"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nerdleaks.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}