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10 Environmentally Eerie Eco-Horrors

Because there’s nothing scarier than the way we’ve messed up the planet.
Eco Horror
By  · Published on October 18th, 2019

5. Prophecy (1979)

Prophecy

She lives. Don’t move. Don’t breathe. There’s nowhere to run. She will find you. Prophecy‘s poster puts it all out there. No escape. You did this to yourself. You’re to blame for your own agonizing death at the claws of one pissed off mutated grizzly. Each kill in an environmental horror movie slashes with an “I Told You So” sound effect. Paper mill waste altered bears just make sense. Of course, if we treat our planet like garbage, she’ll only return the favor. Oh, you don’t feel that way? Huh. Only people with a soul and a brain understand that demon bears are a righteous and natural response to the filth we insist on spewing into our rivers, forests, and oceans? Cool, cool, cool. Keep tossing your plastic straws out your car window, but don’t blame me when the furry goliath that looks like Boo-Boo crossbred with Yogi’s BM rips your bowls out at your next picnic. (Brad Gullickson)


4. Long Weekend (1978)

Long Weekend

The purpose behind the best eco-horror is to remind us that if we keep abusing the planet, it’s going to come back to bite us eventually. That message has never felt more sincere than it does in Long Weekend, an Ozploitation classic about a married couple who go on a vacation and disrespect their natural surroundings. This prompts nature to gets its revenge by making their relaxing getaway a living hell, which results in one of the most claustrophobic, suspenseful, and atmospheric horror experiences out there. This is also one of Quentin Tarantino’s favorite horror movies, for whatever that’s worth to you. (Kieran Fisher)


3. Snowpiercer (2013)

Snowpieercer

If you’re like me and go into Snowpiercer only knowing about Tilda Swinton’s batty, transformational performance, you’re in for a good old-fashioned Cinematic Experience. Korean director Bong Joon-ho’s English-language debut, adapted from a story by Jacques Lob, takes us inside a near-future version of Earth that’s been ice age-d by a failed attempt to reverse the effects of global warming. Naturally, all of the extinction event’s survivors are on a high-speed train whose cars are divided up by social class. The wealthy class cars are home to decadent set design and fancy weirdos, while passengers in the back cars have grit so caked-on you can almost smell it. Dynamic and perpetually surprising, Snowpiercer has an impressively fleshed out mythology for a standalone film. Although it skews toward sci-fi, the Snowpiercer’s horror lies both in the bloody realities of class warfare and the insta-freezing climate that looms just outside the train doors. (Valerie Ettenhofer)


2. The Host (2006)

The Host

Who would have guessed that dumping an ungodly amount of chemicals into a natural body of water could have disastrous consequences on the natural environment and the people that live near it? Apparently, not the American military operating in South Korea. In Bong Joon-ho’s groundbreaking monster film, environmental destruction and American imperialism are both taken to task and through the allegory of a mutated creature lurking under the surface, exposed brilliantly, with no qualms made about indicting those responsible. The Host is an expertly well-executed film that is unnerving in how perfectly it plays with the idea of environmental devastation through a creature attack. It questions how we would respond to this, and, perhaps most frightening of all, presents an understanding of how we’d just learn to live with the fallout. (Anna Swanson)


1. Godzilla (1954)

Godzilla Toho

Japan has experienced the horrors of nuclear devastation more than any country and its people ever should. The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, coupled with the Lucky Dragon 5 fishing boat incident in 1954, left destruction in their wake, which naturally created a feeling of anxiety throughout the nation at the time. Godzilla wasn’t the first monster movie to channel people’s fears pertaining to nuclear annihilation, but it’s the best and most influential of the bunch. The franchise it spawned is kinda silly at times, but Ishiro Honda’s original masterpiece is a bleak, terrifying cautionary tale that reminds us to never forget the victims of those horrible incidents. (Kieran Fisher)

Red Dots

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Based in the Pacific North West, Meg enjoys long scrambles on cliff faces and cozying up with a good piece of 1960s eurotrash. As a senior contributor at FSR, Meg's objective is to spread the good word about the best of sleaze, genre, and practical effects.