Highest-Rated Movies about 'Retro Horror'

Donnie Darko (2001), American Psycho (2000), Grindhouse (2007), The Conjuring (2013), The Conjuring 2 (2016), It (2017), Doctor Sleep (2019), Planet Terror (2007) ... Let's take a look at the ranked list of the best Retro Horror movies.

#1. Donnie Darko (2001)

Storyline: Donnie Darko doesn't get along too well with his family, his teachers, and his classmates; but he does manage to find a sympathetic friend in Gretchen, who agrees to date him. He has a compassionate psychiatrist, who discovers hypnosis is the means to unlock hidden secrets. His other companion may not be a true ally. Donnie has a friend named Frank, a large bunny which only Donnie can see. When an engine falls off a plane and destroys his bedroom, Donnie is not there. Both the event, and Donnie's escape, seem to have been caused by supernatural events. Donnie's mental illness, if such it is, may never allow him to find out for sure.

Plot Keywords: surrealism, parallel universe, time travel, masturbation, schizophrenia, psychology, child pornography ...

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#2. American Psycho (2000)

Storyline: Patrick Bateman is handsome, well educated and intelligent. He is twenty-seven and living his own American dream. He works by day on Wall Street, earning a fortune to complement the one he was born with. At night he descends into madness, as he experiments with fear and violence.

Plot Keywords: narcissism, materialism, serial murder, 1980s, violence, business card, chainsaw ...

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#3. Grindhouse (2007)

Storyline: A double-bill of thrillers that recall both filmmakers' favorite exploitation films. "Grindhouse" (a downtown movie theater in disrepair since its glory days as a movie palace known for "grinding out" non-stop double-bill programs of B-movies) is presented as one full-length feature comprised of two individual films helmed separately by each director. "Death Proof," is a rip-roaring slasher flick where the killer pursues his victims with a car rather than a knife, while "Planet Terror" shows us a view of the world in the midst of a zombie outbreak. The films are joined together by clever faux trailers that recall the '50s exploitation drive-in classics.

Plot Keywords: car chase, castration, child with gun, decapitation, dismemberment, exotic dancer, head blown off ...

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#4. The Conjuring (2013)

Storyline: In 1971, Carolyn and Roger Perron move their family into a dilapidated Rhode Island farm house and soon strange things start happening around it with escalating nightmarish terror. In desperation, Carolyn contacts the noted paranormal investigators, Ed and Lorraine Warren, to examine the house. What the Warrens discover is a whole area steeped in a satanic haunting that is now targeting the Perron family wherever they go. To stop this evil, the Warrens will have to call upon all their skills and spiritual strength to defeat this spectral menace at its source that threatens to destroy everyone involved.

Plot Keywords: ghost, exorcism, haunted house, based on true story, supernatural power, paranormal investigation, possession ...

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#5. The Conjuring 2 (2016)

Storyline: In 1977, paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren travel to London, England, where single mother Peggy Hodgson believes that something evil is in her home. When Peggy's youngest daughter starts showing signs of demonic possession, Ed and Lorraine attempt to help the besieged girl, only to find themselves targeted by the malicious spirits.

Plot Keywords: haunted house, second part, sequel, based on true story, nun, fear, child in peril ...

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#7. Doctor Sleep (2019)

Storyline: On highways across America, a tribe of people called The True Knot travel in search of sustenance. They look harmless-mostly old, lots of polyester, and married to their RVs. But as Dan Torrance knows, and tween Abra Stone learns, The True Knot are quasi-immortal, living off the "steam" that children with the "shining" produce when they are slowly tortured to death. Haunted by the inhabitants of the Overlook Hotel where he spent one horrific childhood year, Dan has been drifting for decades, desperate to shed his father's legacy of despair, alcoholism, and violence. Finally, he settles in a New Hampshire town, an AA community that sustains him, and a job at a nursing home where his remnant "shining" power provides the crucial final comfort to the dying. Aided by a prescient cat, he becomes "Doctor Sleep." Then Dan meets the evanescent Abra Stone, and it is her spectacular gift, the brightest shining ever seen, that reignites Dan's own demons and summons him to a battle for Abra's soul and survival.—Stephen King

Plot Keywords: based on the works of stephen king, based on novel, hat, vampire, sequel, twist ending, supernatural power ...

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#8. Planet Terror (2007)

Storyline: After an experimental bio-nerve gas is accidentally released at a remote U.S. military base in Texas, those exposed to the gas turn into flesh-eating, mutating zombies out to kill. An assortment of various people who include stripper Cherry, her shady mechanic ex-boyfriend Wray, a strong-willed doctor, the local sheriff, and an assortment of various people must join forces to survive the night as the so-called "sickos" threaten to take over the whole town and the world.

Plot Keywords: go go dancer, zombie, exploitation film, stripper, texas, lesbian, flesh eating zombie ...

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#9. Death Proof (2007)

Storyline: In Austin, Texas, the girlfriends Julia, Arlene and Shanna meet in a bar to drink, smoke and make out with their boyfriends before traveling alone to Lake LBJ to spend the weekend together. They meet the former Hollywood stuntman Mike, who takes Pam out in his "death-proof" stunt car. Fourteen months later, Mike turns up in Lebanon, Tennessee and chase Abernathy, Zoë and Kim, but these girls are tough and decide to pay-back the attack.

Plot Keywords: camera shot of a woman's bare feet, psychopath, hot pants, foot fetish, lap dance, multiple perspectives, redneck ...

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#10. Summer of 84 (2018)

Storyline: After suspecting that their police officer neighbor is a serial killer, a group of teenage friends spend their summer spying on him and gathering evidence, but as they get closer to discovering the truth, things get dangerous.

Plot Keywords: retro horror, invitation, matronizing, character's point of view camera shot, evidence, garage, digging ...

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#11. Christine (1983)

Storyline: In 1957, in Detroit, a red Plymouth Fury is built and is the cause of two accidents, one of them fatal, still in the assembly line. Twenty-one years later, the outcast and bullied nerd Arnold "Arnie" Cunningham is getting a ride with his best and only friend Dennis Guilder and he sees the wrecked car for sale in a garden. Arnie immediately falls in love with the car. The car was given the name Christine by its first owner. He brings the car to a repair shop of the despicable Will Darnell and works hard to restore the classic car. While he works in the restoration, he changes his personality to a cocky teenager and he dates the most beautiful girl in the high-school, Leigh Cabot. Soon Arnie becomes selfish and jealous of the supernatural Christine that kills everyone that is a threat to them.

Plot Keywords: friendship, year 1978, year 1957, villain, death of friend, automobile, obsession ...

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#12. The Guest (2014)

Storyline: A soldier introduces himself to the Peterson family, claiming to be a friend of their son who died in action. After the young man is welcomed into their home, a series of accidental deaths seem to be connected to his presence.

Plot Keywords: psychopath, ex soldier, waitress, drug dealer, experiment gone wrong, bar fight, bar ...

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#13. Turbo Kid (2015)

Storyline: In a post-apocalyptic future, THE KID, a young solitary scavenger obsessed with comic books must face his fears and become a reluctant hero when he meets a mysterious girl named APPLE. Despite their efforts to keep to themselves, ZEUS, the sadistic and self-proclaimed leader of the Wasteland, plagues THE KID and APPLE. Armed with little more than blind faith and an ancient turbocharged weapon, THE KID learns of justice and friendship and embarks on an incredible journey to rid the Wasteland of evil and save the girl of his dreams.

Plot Keywords: wasteland, robot, riding a bicycle, unicorn, torture, damsel in distress, superhero ...

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#14. The Final Girls (2015)

Storyline: When Max (Taissa Farmiga) and her friends reluctantly attend a tribute screening of an infamous '80s slasher film that starred Max's late mother (Malin Akerman), they are accidentally sucked into the silver screen. They soon realize they are trapped inside the cult classic movie and must team up with the fictional and ill-fated "Camp Bloodbath" counselors, including Max's mom as the shy scream queen, to battle the film's machete-wielding, masked killer. With the body count rising in scene after iconic scene, who will be THE FINAL GIRLS left standing and live to escape this film?

Plot Keywords: film within a film, slasher, white panties, teenage girl, killer, year 1957, woman in a shower ...

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#15. Halloween (2018)

Storyline: Jamie Lee Curtis returns to her iconic role as Laurie Strode, who comes to her final confrontation with Michael Myers (Nick Castle and James Jude Courtney), the masked figure who has haunted her since she narrowly escaped his killing spree on Halloween night four decades ago.

Plot Keywords: masked murderer, serial murder, masked villain, gore, violence, slasher killer, trick or treating ...

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