Film

The Babadook

A widow and her son are already fraying at the edges of grief when a sinister pop-up book insists a creature called the Babadook is coming for them. It's less a monster movie than a portrait of exhaustion and denial curdling into something monstrous, shot in shadowy, claustrophobic domestic space. For horror fans who want dread with real emotional weight underneath it — patient, upsetting, and quietly devastating rather than jump-scare fast.

TMDb rating6.5

If you liked this

Hereditary2018

Grief as an inheritance you can't refuse, filtered through a family unraveling in real time. Same slow-building dread, same sense that the horror is emotional before it's supernatural.

But It's punishing and bleak, with a tonal swerve partway through that some viewers find alienating rather than terrifying.

Hereditary poster

Relic2020

An Australian chiller about three generations of women and a house that seems to be forgetting itself along with its owner. Dementia as haunted-house metaphor, aching rather than shocking.

But Very slow, very quiet, and more interested in sorrow than scares — patience required.

Relic poster

Under the Shadow2016

A mother and daughter trapped in Tehran during bombing raids while something else stalks their apartment. The domestic-monster template done with real political teeth.

But Farsi-language and unhurried; if you want fast frights this will feel more like a siege drama.

Under the Shadow poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Dick Johnson Is Dead2020

Both are about using invented imagery — a monster, a staged death — to make an unbearable grief small enough to survive. One does it through fear, the other through something closer to love.

A documentary filmmaker stages her father's death over and over — falls, accidents, a mocked-up heaven — as a way of rehearsing for real loss. Funny, tender, and strange.

But It's a documentary, not horror, and its warmth is the opposite of the Babadook's dread — some will find the tonal gap too wide.

Dick Johnson Is Dead poster
More like this (8)

The Orphanage2007

A Spanish ghost story steeped in maternal loss, gorgeously shot and genuinely eerie without leaning on gore. Del Toro produced it and it shows.

But Subtitled and melancholic — the scares are atmospheric, not visceral.

The Orphanage poster

Goodnight Mommy2015no page yet

An Austrian film about twin boys convinced their bandaged mother isn't really their mother. Unsettling, clinical, and builds a similar sense that the home has turned hostile.

But Cold and clammy by design — some find it more distressing than scary, with a twist that divides audiences.

A Tale of Two Sisters2003

Korean horror at its most operatic: grief, family secrets, and a house that seems to remember trauma better than the people in it.

But Structurally tricky and best watched without spoilers — a second viewing rewards more than the first confuses.

A Tale of Two Sisters poster

The Others2001

Nicole Kidman as a mother guarding her photosensitive children in a fog-bound house full of wrong noises. Old-fashioned gothic dread, elegantly constructed.

But Gentle by modern horror standards and its big reveal is now fairly well known.

The Others poster

The Witch2016

A Puritan family isolated on the edge of the woods comes apart from within, paranoia and faith curdling into something monstrous. Same slow dread, different century.

But Archaic dialogue and a glacial pace test some viewers' patience before the payoff.

The Witch poster

We Need to Talk About Kevin2011

Not horror exactly, but Tilda Swinton's portrait of a mother dreading her own child carries the same queasy, guilty dread about maternal ambivalence.

But No supernatural release valve here — it's a drama, and a genuinely harrowing one, with no monster to blame.

We Need to Talk About Kevin poster

Repulsion1965

Same architecture: a mind fraying inside a domestic space until the apartment itself seems to turn hostile. The Babadook modernises this exact idea — isolation made literal — but Polanski got there first, minus the monster costume.

Polanski's black-and-white study of a young woman's mind collapsing inside her own flat, decades before 'trauma horror' had a name. Suffocating, claustrophobic, genuinely disturbing.

But Slow, dialogue-light, and shot in a style that will feel dated to viewers used to modern pacing.

Repulsion poster

Paperhouse1988no page yet

Both hinge on a child's private grief conjuring something that crosses from imagination into reality. Paperhouse plays the same premise as wistful fantasy instead of horror, showing how thin that line really is.

A lonely, feverish English girl draws a house — and a boy — that start bleeding into her waking life. A gentler, fantastical cousin to the Babadook's imagination-made-flesh idea.

But It's a children's fantasy at heart, dreamlike rather than frightening — don't expect anything like real horror.

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