Mike Flanagan’s favourite horror movies of all time
In late 2023, Mike Flanagan—one of modern cinema’s preeminent masters of horror—embraced his inner cinephile and joined Letterboxd. Naturally, one of the first things the Midnight Mass creator did was post a list of his favourite horror movies, and it was a sight to behold. Instead of simply spotlighting a handful of classics everyone knows about and calling it a day, Flanagan posted an epic list of films from the entire history of cinema. Hell, the list is still growing to this very day, and it features some very recent classics in the making.
Before getting to Flanagan’s list, though, it’s worth analysing what the man loves so much about the horror genre. After all, before he was helming movies like Doctor Sleep and Oculus and hit shows like The Haunting of Hill House, he was simply a fan like anyone else.
During a Netflix & Chill video interview with fellow horror supremo Guillermo Del Toro, Flanagan revealed that horror actually helped him grow as a person. He explained: “One of the things that I realised gradually, the more I expose myself to horror, to horror literature, and to the television and movies, was that in the time it took me to get through a scary page or a scary chapter or scary scene, I was getting a little braver in these small, controllable increments.”
Flanagan continued: “I started to think the reason I love horror is because, as a kid who was scared, I learned how to be braver. I had these little bursts of exercise in courage, and it started to make me look at the world a little different. Because if I could carry myself through whatever courage I had to summon to make it to the end of it—if I could carry just a fraction of that out into my real life, then this genre has actually helped me grow.”
This was a typically thoughtful response from a filmmaker known for the emotional depth of his work rather than simply how much blood and guts he can throw at the screen. Indeed, that sensibility very much seemed to carry over into the horror movies he included in his list of favourites because there were very few gorefests to be found.
Like any horror fan worth their salt, Flanagan included a healthy selection of the established genre titans in his list: The Exorcist, Halloween, The Thing, A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Shining, Carrie, Jaws, The Omen, The Blair Witch Project, and Poltergeist. But he also included a ton of lesser-known modern efforts, such as Lake Mungo, The Blackcoat’s Daughter, Saint Maud, and The Ritual.
Flanagan’s love for foreign horror cinema shone through with picks like A Tale of Two Sisters, Martyrs, Train to Busan, Ju-on: The Grudge, and Let the Right One In. He also showed some love for a smattering of classic comedy horrors like An American Werewolf in London and Evil Dead 2.
As for what Flanagan left off his list, there are two classics whose absences are conspicuous. In fact, they haven’t even been added to the list – which the director describes as “ever-evolving” – at a later date. The two forgotten giants of the genre? The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Alien.
