What sends shivers down your spine
I love a good horror movie, and 2025 gave us some really good horror films in “Bring Her Back” and “Weapons.” I want to put “Sinners” in there, but I feel that the film may use the conventions of horror—plus, it’s a film that’s much bigger in scope than what the genre of horror provides.
But 2025 is also a scary time: genocide, threats of war and of civil war, mass shootings in the United States, the mental health crisis, and the environmental crisis. The list goes on, really. How can a horror film scare us when the real world can sometimes be scarier than what’s on the cinema screen?
Talking with Richard Somes the other week about horror films got me thinking: What if I ask other horror film directors about their thoughts on the genre, and give a list of five horror films that are best suited for these times? Lucky for me, the Philippines has some of the best horror filmmakers out there today.
Derick Cabrido
Known works: “Clarita,” “Mallari,” and “Untold”
Five scary movies for 2025
1. “P77” (2025)
2. “Hereditary” (2018)
3. “The Devil’s Advocate” (1997)
4. “Insidious” (2010)
5. “The Autopsy of Jane Doe” (2016)
What makes a film scary?
When something feels normal but not quite. Smiles that last too long, birds humming… it triggers a primal unease.
And also, the scariest films aren’t about monsters—they’re about human vulnerability, grief, trauma, guilt, and repression. These are emotional doorways horror uses to slip into our psyche. The Babadook isn’t about a pop-up book demon. It’s about unresolved grief.
Why is horror so popular?
I think because horror movies scratch an itch that other genres tiptoe around—it lets us safely confront the things we’re most afraid of. Death, darkness, the unknown, guilt, punishment, loss of control—horror doesn’t run from those. It invites them in for dinner and asks them to stay the night.
Horror gives you a way to process anxiety without having to talk about it. Watching a character survive (or not survive) the worst imaginable situation lets you symbolically face your own hidden fears.
Kenneth Dagatan
Known works: “In My Mother’s Skin,” “Sanctissima,” and “Bloody Crayons” (screenwriter)
Five scary movies for 2025
1. “Martyrs” (2008)
2. “Cure” (1997)
3. “The Wailing” (2016)
4. “The Devil’s Backbone” (2001)
5. “Violator” (2014, Dodo Dayao)
What makes a film scary?
A film is scary when it captures the fears of our time but does it with restraint, allowing the audience to feel rather than be told.
Why is horror so popular?
Horror gives us a safe space to confront death and fear. Inside the cinema, we can face what terrifies us and survive it.
Dodo Dayao
Known works: “Violator,” “Midnight in a Perfect World”, and “Kampon” (screenwriter)
Five scary movies for 2025
“Baskin” (2015)
“Begotten” (1989)
“Cure” (1997, Kiyoshi Kurosawa)
Speak No Evil (2022): The nihilistic Danish original by Christian Tafdrup and NOT the wimpy American remake
“Spoorloos” (1988)
What makes a film scary?
I hate it when mainstream horror over-explains itself. A chink in the armor of the threat emboldens you, and the best horror operates on loss of control, mistrust of safe spaces, on displacement and disruption—on not knowing. Restoration is the least of its priorities. Which is to say, the best horror defeats the audience. It’s way more nuanced than that, but that’s always been the point, I think.
Why is horror such a popular genre?
Horror, even the bleakest ones, provide a catharsis juicier than the catharsis of tearjerkers because it’s a fear we’re temporarily exorcising, and we are all right now more afraid than we’re aware or care to admit. This is why I love watching James Wan films in the cinema.
Carlo Ledesma
Known works: “The Tunnel,” “Sunod,” and “Outside”
Five scary movies for 2025
“The Thing” (1982)
“Unknown Number: The High School Catfish” (2025)
“The Day After” (19930
“Elephant” (2023
“Hereditary” (2018)
What makes a film scary?
When it leaves an indelible impression as soon as the film ends, but slowly creeps back into your head as soon as you’re back home and the lights go out. The films that scare me are the ones that say less and make me imagine more.
Why is horror so popular?
Horror will continue to be loved because it is necessary. We need to feel uncomfortable, to feel confronted. If we can’t look fear in the eye in real life, then we are destined to fail. Horror gives us a safe space to confront those fears.
Jerrold Tarog
Known works: “Bliss,” Shake Rattle & Roll XV: “Ulam,” and “Shake Rattle & Roll: “Extreme Mukbang”
Five scary movies for 2025
“The Witch” (2015)
“Woman In the Dunes” (1964)
“Hereditary” (2018)
“Saw The Devil” (2010)
“Green Room” (2015)
What makes a film scary?
For me, it’s the ability to invoke anxiety and dread. Jump scares are fleeting. Gore is spectacle. The supernatural has its limited appeal to a skeptic like me. So I prefer the feels—ideally sustained throughout the film —building up into a crescendo of the inevitable.
Why is horror so popular?
I think it is comparable to people loving roller coaster rides. It’s the stimulation, the novelty of diving into the unknown. Or it’s about wading into familiar tropes in the hopes of being surprised. Studies have been done about this. Personally, I just like being enveloped in thematic darkness from time to time.
Mikhail Red
Known works: “Eerie,” “Block Z,” “Deleter,” and “Nokturno”
Five scary horror films for 2025
“Lake Mungo” (2008)
“Ringu” (1998)
“The Exorcist” (1973)
“Event Horizon” (1997)
“Pulse (Kairo)” (2001)
What makes a film scary?
Film is scary when it weaponizes your imagination against you and makes you anticipate the worst. Also, after watching, it stays with you subconsciously; it lingers and disturbs you, and you connect certain situations or environments, or feelings with the memory of the film. You are not just scared but also scarred.
I also think there are good horror films (thematically rich, well-crafted, layered, original in narrative, etc.) that are not necessarily scary and actual scary horror films. Of course, they can be both good and scary. The ones in my list I consider both good and scary.
