A horror film has certain safety measures. You can turn it off, change the channel, or cover your eyes. In any movie, you have the ability to just stop watching. After all, none of it is real. But what happens when the horrific events on the screen can’t be turned off or changed? What happens when a film is frightening because it is real, because its horror is the kind that exists beyond the confines of the movie screen? This is the kind of horror that horror documentaries deliver.
The horror genre is enjoying a boom right now. There’s no denying it. But the recent surge of horrific content is not limited to the fictional. Documentary filmmakers are cashing in on their viewers’ attraction to the macabre. Any good documentary seeks to expose a new truth, understanding, or perspective. This work of uncovering becomes terrifying when we realize that what’s been documented is the inescapable horrors of reality, the things we can’t un-see, and the moments we can’t avoid. What follows are five horror documentaries that feel like fictional horror films. Their discoveries leave you wondering what’s worse, fact or fiction?
- Cropsey (2009)
If there is one film that started the recent upsurge in horror documentaries, it is Cropsey. Joshua Zeman and Barbara Brancaccio begin their film by trying to explain the urban legend of Cropsey, a local boogeyman that spawns from the abandoned mental institutions that dot the landscape of Staten Island, NY. Throughout the film, we are challenged to follow as Zeman and Brancaccio continue to uncover some truly unsettling information about a man who could be the source behind the Cropsey myth and the horrendous crimes that he may have committed against Staten Island children. While it is far from the best documentary on this list, Cropsey showcases the ground of abandoned mental institutions, provides an intriguing and horrifying murder mystery, and manages to heighten the tension enough to have you checking the locks on your doors before heading to sleep. The glaring success of this film is its exposure of a real-life boogeyman who is more than ready to pull you into the woods and make you disappear.
Cropsey is streaming on Amazon Prime.
2. Killer Legends (2014)
Killer Legends is the spiritual sequel to Cropsey and the better half of Joshua Zeman’s horrific documentary duo. Instead of dealing with a particular urban legend, Zeman chooses to take on some of the most prevalent myths that have haunted B-movies and fireside story circles. “The Hook,” “The Babysitter and the Mysterious Phone Call,” and “The Killer Clown.” We learn that each of these myths are grounded in horrific historical circumstances. Yes, you are going to see John Wayne Gacy and you are definitely going to see clips of about five movies dealing with lonely, scared babysitters in horror films. But learning the historical significance of the most popular urban legends is worth sitting through some of the documentary’s weaker moments. The one outlier and true standout is the myth of “The Candyman.” If you are like me, you believed that Clive Barker created The Candyman in his short story collection, Books of Blood. And, like me, you would be dead wrong. Despite Barker’s short story and the 1992 film, The Candyman has much more sinister origins. Are they worse than Tony Todd and his signature hook hand? That is to be determined…
Killer Legends is streaming on Netflix.
- Room 237 (2012)
Okay, enough with the urban legends and spooky stories. Let’s talk about true terror, the idea that everything around you is a lie, entrenched in a conspiracy theory, and covered by an enigma. Room 237, directed by Rodney Ascher, takes up the ways in which Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980) explores the limitations of our accepted reality. This is a film about the various interpretations of a particular movie. But it is radical in its approach and begs the viewer to second-guess the truths that they held to be self-evident. Theories about a Minotaur, the moon landing, and the genocide of Native Americans are going to come up. Never heard of these theories? You better prepare yourself, because they are rather compelling. All of these paranoid-but-still-plausible explanations run as voiceover while The Shining plays in the background. As a fan of conspiracy theories and a slightly paranoid doomsday prepper, Room 237 and its radical theories keep me up at night and questioning the nature of truth. Even if you aren’t sensitive to radical interpretations, the constant background images of The Shining are enough to spark fear in you.
Room 237 is available to stream on Amazon (and it’s also out on Blu-ray).
- Rats (2016)
Stephen King once wrote, “I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I’ll go for the gross-out. I’m not proud.” I’m going directly for the gross-out and I’m very proud. Rats is directed by Morgan Spurlock and it is his best work since Super Size Me (2004), which is a horror film in and of itself. Rats is about rats and it does not spare the viewer any of the disgusting circumstances that have invited infestations of the rodent menace (wait till you see what’s really under the streets of New York). They are under the streets, they are in the vents, they are in the walls, and they will swim up the sewer pipes and into your toilet. Worst of all, we’ve over-poisoned them and now we can no longer control the population. Go ahead, put down traps. You’ll soon learn that they are too smart to be killed. If their squeals, skittering feet, and omnipresence wasn’t enough, Spurlock invites us to watch as researchers pull the creatures apart, revealing the numerous diseases they carry. If you are not already squirming, you will be when you get to see an undulating botfly larva pulled from under the skin of a dead rat. Maybe don’t eat before watching this one.
Rats is streaming on Netflix.
- Haunters: The Art of the Scare (2017)
I’m not sure if this film is a horrific documentary as much as it is a documentary about horror. Either way, it is too fun to pass up. Haunters, directed by Jon Schnitzer, is a filmic history of the contemporary haunted house attraction. It goes through how the first haunted houses were created and how they have evolved to this day. Interestingly, it documents the lives of people who are obsessed with the practice of scaring people. From backyard-haunted mazes to theme parks to over-extreme immersion experiences, the film centers the lives of this passionate niche group and shows how the inventors of the scariest attractions conceive, create, and implement their ideas. It is also very plain in exposing the conditions of extreme scare experiences like “McKamey Manor” and “Blackout.” These attractions go far beyond the traditional haunted house and use prolonged immersion and physical and mental torture to evoke fear in their participants. While it dabbles in the extreme, Haunters is its most genuine when dealing with veteran haunters who love the opportunity to build the maze, wear the mask, and, well, scare people. By the end, you will be craving Halloween, masks, candy, and a few jump scares.
Haunters is streaming on Netflix.
If these films aren’t enough, I’ve compiled an honorable mention list for your viewing pleasure.
Honorable Mentions:
- The Nightmare (2015)
- My Amityville Horror (2012)
- The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst (2015)
- The Mothman of Point Pleasant (2017)
- A Haunting in Connecticut (2002)
Ethan Robles is a M.A. student at Lehigh University who studies the horror genre in fiction and film. He also has worked in the digital humanities. Outside of academia, he is a creative writer and higher education consultant.
