Despite all this year’s challenges, 2021 has seen some absolutely amazing additions to the horror canon. From hilarious horror-comedies to terrifying creature features to complex musings on faith, mortality, and our place in the Universe, here are the year’s 10 best.
It’s been a difficult year for films as some frankly incredible cinematic entries complete for attention between a vast array of streaming services and theaters beset by waves of closures and viral variants. At the same time, challenging times are often great inspirations for horror. It should thus be no surprise that the year has also seen some truly incredible additions to the horror canon, movies which experiment, shock, and successfully pull at our heart strings. Films with something to say. Stunning antagonists, rich struggles, and incredible monsters—all the things that make horror great. Here are ten of the year’s best horror films. 10. In The Earth (dir. Ben Wheatley) In The Earth takes place in the context of a world beset by a massive pandemic. Two researchers set off to a research site deep in the Arborial Forest, before finding their camp ransacked. They find evident help from a local man living off the grid, and eventually discover that something woefully wrong happened during the former research expedition, and its all connected to a stone at the forest’s center that has something oddly mystical about it. Joel Fry and Ellora Torchia deliver excellent performances in a film with a larger than life premise and some high concept horror vibes. At times you feel the limits of budget and the real life pandemic they shot within, but Wheatley gets credit here for largely pulling off a high concept horror entry under unenviable conditions. 9. Antlers (dir. Scott Cooper) Julia Meadows (a wonderful Keri Russell) returns to the small town of Cispus Falls, Oregon, settling in as a local teacher and living with her brother Paul (Jesse Plemons, also great). The pair survived a terrible childhood until Julia left, so her return is both welcome and bittersweet. Her childhood has made her particularly attuned to signs of abuse, however, so when young Lucas Weaver (a wonderful Jeremy T. Thomas) begins to show the signs, she takes notice. Complicating situations is the fact that he’s begun to draw monsters, and no one has seen his father in some time. Antlers boasts impressive cinematography and one of the absolutely best creature designs in recent years, alongside some impressive central performances. It muddies some of its most interesting themes, but altogether Antlers is still an impressive horror entry altogether. 8. Gaia (dir. Jaco Bouwer) Gabi (a charismatic Monique Rockman) and Winston (Anthony Oseyemi) both work for South Africa’s forestry service, travelling along a river deep into the heart of the Tsitsikamma forest. Gabi walks off path to retrieve a drone, soon finding herself under attack by two men, a survivalist and his young son, whose mysterious faith puts them in a deep and odd relationship with a force in the woods. They’re all at threat by a menace of a very different stripe, something that could change our very relationship with nature. Gaia boasts strong performances, a massive menace with a big impact, and incredible tension throughout. The realization of the threat in question, namely its effects on human bodies, is one of the most haunting images of the year in ANY horror entry. 7. Candyman (dir. Nia DaCosta) Anthony McCoy (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) lives with his art gallery partner Brianna Cartwright (Teyonah Parris) in Chicago.
