How scary are M3GAN, Knock at the Cabin, Skinamarink, Infinity Pool, and the other best horror movies of 2023? We’ve taken the best horror movies of 2023 so far and ranked them by scariness.
Horror’s already looking great in 2023. There are established masters doing some of their best work in years, undeniable new talents making waves with their first or second big features, and old franchises breaking records at the box office. And it’s still only March.
With so many good horror movies out in just a few months, it’s already time to start listing the best of the best, and giving options for everyone from the scaredy-cats to the horror-curious to the freaks (in a good way) who can’t get enough fright and gore. No matter what you like, there’s probably already a 2023 horror movie for you, and to help you find it, we put together a list of the year’s best horror so far, ranked by how likely they are to give you a chill — and what kind of chill that might be.
Because everyone deserves the exact fright they want, we’ve ordered them based on scariness. Scariness isn’t an easy thing to define, so we’ve divided the topic up into two categories: terror, which could be anything from creepiness to something genuinely frightful, and gore, which is just about how bloody a movie ends up getting. Each category gets a rating out of five, then we add the two numbers to reach a (more or less) scientific scariness score.
So for everyone looking for a good scare, here are the best horror movies of 2023 (so far), ranked from least to most scary. And for a broader look at the year in movies, here’s our list of the best movies of 2023 so far.M3GAN
Run time: 1h 42m
Director: Gerard Johnstone
Cast: Allison Williams, Violet McGraw, Ronny Chieng
A horror comedy with an emphasis on comedy, M3GAN is easily one of the most fun and least scary movies on this list. It’s also one of the best. The story follows a career-obsessed toy engineer named Gemma who has been tasked with taking care of her recently orphaned niece, Cady. Instead of actually doing anything, Gemma builds a robot to parent Cady, and things quickly go off the rails. Murder and mayhem ensue, but thanks to the movie’s constant barrage of jokes and its PG-13 rating, it stays fun and creepy without ever actually getting too far outside the comfort zone of just about any moviegoer. —Austen GoslinHow scary is M3GAN?
Terror: 1/5
Gore: 2/5
Total scariness score: 3/10
M3GAN is available to stream on Peacock. It is also available for digital rental or purchase on Amazon, Apple TV, Google Play, and Vudu.Sick
Run time: 1h 23m
Director: John Hyams
Cast: Gideon Adlon, Bethlehem Million, Dylan Sprayberry
John Hyams is one of my favorite directors working today, so it’s no surprise that his COVID-19 slasher Sick worked well for me despite many of the COVID elements of the movie not landing. A modern master of tension, pacing, and brutal action scenes, it all comes together in a slick 80-minute package, following two college students who travel to a cabin in the woods at the start of the COVID outbreak, and encounter an unexpected guest.
More tense than scary, there is nonetheless some gore in this one, including some broken bones and a few spurts of blood. —Pete VolkHow scary is Sick?
Terror: 2/5
Gore: 3/5
Total scariness score: 5/10
Sick is available to stream on Peacock.Infinity Pool
Run time: 1h 57m
Director: Brandon Cronenberg
Cast: Alexander Skarsgård, Mia Goth, Cleopatra Coleman
Brandon Cronenberg’s third feature is a dystopian vision of the world as nothing more than a playground for the uber-wealthy (yes, even more than it already is). The movie is set at a resort where the wealthy go to get away in a country where all of its strict laws can be bent, broken, or otherwise twisted if you’ve got the money. There’s cloning, murder parties, drug-fueled orgies, and Alexander Skarsgård on a leash, so basically everything you need for a good tropical vacation, or a good trippy horror movie that asks a lot of questions about how you know you’re really you or if you’ve been replaced by something lesser.
