Film

Crimson Peak

Guillermo del Toro's gothic romance is less a haunted-house scare-fest than a Victorian melodrama drenched in red clay and moth wings. It's gorgeous to look at, deliberately theatrical, and more interested in dread and desire than jump scares. Good for anyone who wants their horror to look like a painting and their romance to have teeth.

TMDb rating3.3

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you love gothic romance where the house is practically a character, with decaying grandeur, candlelit dread and a slow-building sense that something rotten sits under the lace.

Skip it if you want a tight scare-a-minute horror film, since it lingers on atmosphere and costume, and its ghosts arrive more as mood than as jump-scares.

What it asks of you: Settle in for just under two hours of unhurried build-up, where the visuals and performances carry more weight than the plot pacing, and where the dread is steady rather than sudden.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Bram Stoker's Dracula1992

Coppola's operatic, blood-soaked gothic romance shares Crimson Peak's love of decadent costumes, decaying aristocracy, and doomed desire dressed up as horror.

But The performances are as heightened as the sets — some find it gorgeous, others find it a bit much.

Bram Stoker's Dracula poster

Penny Dreadful2014

A lush, brooding Victorian horror series that mashes up gothic literary monsters with the same painterly dread and repressed longing del Toro traffics in.

But Three seasons is a big commitment, and the ending divided fans sharply.

Penny Dreadful poster

Rebecca1940

Hitchcock's classic about a new bride haunted by the memory-soaked house she's married into — the blueprint for every gothic mansion secret since.

But Black and white and restrained by comparison; no blood, all suggestion.

Rebecca poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Crimson Peak

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

House of Usher1960

Same DNA: a sentient dying house, a decaying bloodline, and gothic horror as inherited sin — del Toro is quoting this film directly, decades before he made his own version.

Roger Corman and Vincent Price's Poe adaptation is the direct ancestor of Crimson Peak — a decaying aristocratic house that's practically alive, family rot as literal curse, lurid Technicolor doom.

But Cheap by today's standards, stagey and slow, with the charm of a b-movie rather than a blockbuster.

House of Usher poster
More like this (8)

The Others2001

A meticulously atmospheric haunted-house film that trades gore for dread and a genuinely satisfying late turn.

But Slow-burn pacing; if you know the twist already it loses some bite.

The Others poster

Pan's Labyrinth2006

Del Toro's own fairy-tale horror, showing the same eye for beautiful monstrousness and cruelty dressed in myth.

But Bleaker and more political than Crimson Peak, with a child protagonist facing real-world horrors alongside the fantastical.

Pan's Labyrinth poster

Jane Eyre2011

A moody, atmospheric adaptation with a brooding house, a mysterious secret, and a romance built on withheld information.

But No supernatural element — the dread here is entirely human.

Jane Eyre poster

The Woman in Black2012

English moors, a crumbling estate, and a vengeful ghost — a classic ghost story told with real patience and atmosphere.

But Leans harder into straightforward scares and less into romance or visual excess.

The Woman in Black poster

Sleepy Hollow1999

Tim Burton's gothic mystery-horror shares del Toro's love of stylised color, fog, and a period setting soaked in dread.

But More whimsical and comic than Crimson Peak — this one has a sense of humour about itself.

Sleepy Hollow poster

The Haunting of Hill House2018

A family drama disguised as a haunted-house story, using the house itself as a repository of grief and memory the way Crimson Peak does.

But Modern setting and a sprawling family-ensemble structure feel very different from Crimson Peak's intimate love triangle.

The Haunting of Hill House poster

Kwaidan1965

Del Toro has cited this film's theatrical, hand-built artifice as inspiration — Crimson Peak's stagey, unreal sets are doing the same trick in a different language and century.

A Japanese anthology of ghost stories shot on obviously artificial, painted studio sets — eerie, deliberate, and visually ravishing in a way that makes horror feel like folklore.

But Very slow, very stylised, and subtitled — this rewards patience over scares.

Kwaidan poster

Suspiria1977

Both treat architecture as a monster in its own right, using color and sound rather than jump scares to make a house feel alive — Crimson Peak is the tasteful version of what Argento does with a chainsaw.

Dario Argento's Italian horror turns a building into a malevolent, breathing entity through pure color and sound — the giallo cousin to Crimson Peak's living house.

But Far more violent and abstract, with dream logic instead of plot — this trades romance for pure sensory assault.

Suspiria poster

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Recommended by

The Others, Pan's Labyrinth, The Shape of Water, The Changeling, The Woman in Black, The Innocents, Gaslight, Rebecca, The Haunting of Hill House, The Mummy, The Haunting of Bly Manor, Kwaidan, Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, The Company of Wolves, The Haunting, Annabelle: Creation, Wendy, Penny Dreadful, The Uninvited, Nosferatu, Forever Home, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Rebecca, The Phantom of the Opera, Mirror Mirror, Bride of Frankenstein, Malignant, My Cousin Rachel, Stoker, The Devil's Backbone, The Invitation, Fruits Basket, Beautiful Creatures, Vampire Academy, Dark Shadows, Washington Square, Interview with the Vampire, House, Wuthering Heights, The Curse of the Cat People, Flowers in the Attic, The Duchess, The Little Stranger, Sleepy Hollow, Winter's Tale, The Awakening, A Tale of Two Sisters, Mama, The Skeleton Key, A Haunting in Venice, Colette, Vita & Virginia, Lady Macbeth, The Lure, Vampyr, The Old Dark House, Queen of the Damned, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, Girl with a Pearl Earring, Snow White and the Huntsman, Nosferatu, The Wolfman, From Hell, Tumbbad, Anna and the King, Tipping the Velvet, Affinity, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Shirley, The Night Circus, The Watcher in the Woods, The Phantom of the Opera, Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Miniaturist, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, The Huntsman: Winter's War, Madame Bovary, Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, The Haunted Mansion, Gretel & Hansel, Possession, Thir13en Ghosts, Stonehearst Asylum, Dorian Gray, The Turn of the Screw, Tale of Tales, Hysteria, The Invisible Woman, Marrowbone, The Presence, The Wretched, Martyrs Lane, Ophelia, The Devil's Carnival, The Thirteenth Tale, Gormenghast, Silent Hill: Revelation 3D, The Goblin Market, The Europeans, The Creeping, Northanger Abbey, The Turn of the Screw, The Yellow Wallpaper, Poor Things, The Concubine, Full Circle, Last Night in Soho, Bathory: Countess of Blood, The Secret of Moonacre, The Vampire Lovers, Snow White, Presence of Mind, W.E., The Limehouse Golem, The Raven, The Woman In White, A Place of One's Own, House on Haunted Hill, Sense and Sensibility, Paradise Hills, The Turning, The Tale of the Three Brothers, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Lady J, Hokum, The Lodgers, The Woods, The Banishing, KASANE –Beauty and Fate–, Vidocq, The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, Ebenezer, The Best Offer, Ghost Story, The Reckoning, The Bride, The Adventurer: The Curse of the Midas Box, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2, The Blood Spattered Bride, The Pale Blue Eye, The Yellow Wallpaper, Lady in White