The FrightenersMovies like The Frighteners
- Key Features:
- Exorcism, Ghosts, Supernatural, Serial killer, Small town, FBI, Dark humor, Romance, Gothic horror, Mystery, Special effects, Deception, Violence-moderate
- Tone:
- humorous, suspense-driven, whimsical
- Target Audience:
- Horror comedy fans, Supernatural thriller enthusiasts, Fans of dark humor, Viewers who enjoy quirky stories
- Emotional Arc:
- Amusement → Fear → Resolution
The Frighteners

Once an architect, Frank Bannister now passes himself off as an exorcist of evil spirits. To bolster his facade, he claims his "special" gift is the result of a car accident that killed his wife. But what he does not count on is more people dying in the small town where he lives. As he tries to piece together the supernatural mystery of these killings, he falls in love with the wife of one of the victims and deals with a crazy FBI agent.
The Frighteners
A newly dead New England couple seeks help from a deranged demon exorcist to scare an affluent New York family out of their home.

An awkward, unemployed man who can talk to the dead teams up with a rebellious bartender to find the vengeful ghost that's been terrorizing their town.

Bertram Pincus, a cranky, people-hating Manhattan dentist, develops the unwelcome ability to see dead people. Really annoying dead people. Even worse, they all want something from him, particularly Frank Herlihy, a smooth-talking ghost, who pesters him into a romantic scheme involving his widow Gwen. They are soon entangled in a hilarious predicament between the now and the hereafter!

An exorcism comedy which follows the Order of Hellbound Saints (Brooklyn Parish), a highly secretive and profoundly blasphemous men of God, as they battle demonic forces too terrible to be cast out by traditional Vatican-approved methods.

A teenager suspects his new neighbour is a vampire. Unable to convince anyone, he tries to enlist the help of a self-proclaimed vampire hunter and magician.

A large spider from the jungles of South America is accidentally transported in a crate with a dead body to America where it mates with a local spider. Soon after, the residents of a small California town disappear as the result of spider bites from the deadly spider offspring. It's up to a couple of doctors with the help of an insect exterminator to annihilate these eight legged freaks.

After years of performing “exorcisms” and taking believers’ money, Reverend Marcus travels to rural Louisiana with a film crew so he can dispel what he believes is the myth of demonic possession. The dynamic reverend is certain that this will be another routine “exorcism” on a disturbed religious fanatic but instead comes upon the blood-soaked farm of the Sweetzer family and a true evil he would have never thought imaginable.

Dane ‘Marbles’ Marbeck can see ghosts, thanks to a homemade drug: his late father’s neurological medication mixed with marijuana. Officer Jayson Tagg, a wannabe super-cop on the trail of a serial killer, ends up murdered. So when Marbles’ mum plans to sell the family farm, and the only way of buying the house off her is taking the money offered by Tagg in exchange for his help, Marbles accepts. The unlikely duo of stoner medium and ghost cop struggle to reconcile their differences while they navigate their way through ghouls, perverts, a mysterious hooded figure, and an unexpected shot at love. It becomes clear the only way Marbles and Tagg will solve the case with their souls intact is to confront their deepest regrets and overcome their prejudices.

A reality TV director copes with a spoiled celebutante and a show gone haywire when a masked killer starts bumping off the crew in this slasher-movie satire.

On his way to be executed, the vehicle containing notorious serial killer Jack Frost collides with a hazardous chemical truck, turning him into a snow covered mutant and unleashing him on the unsuspecting town of Snomonton.

Chad Buckley is super crazy about horror movies, but also very lonely. He mostly spends his days in his small movie shop having wild discussions with his only returning customer, Sam.

When secretive new neighbors move in next door, suburbanite Ray Peterson and his friends let their paranoia get the best of them as they start to suspect the newcomers of evildoings and commence an investigation. But it's hardly how Ray, who much prefers drinking beer, reading his newspaper and watching a ball game on the tube expected to spend his vacation.

In the peaceful Colorado town of Snowfield, something evil has wiped out the community. And now, it's up to a group of people to stop it, or at least get out of Snowfield alive.

After losing their academic posts at a prestigious university, a team of parapsychologists goes into business as proton-pack-toting "ghostbusters" who exterminate ghouls, hobgoblins and supernatural pests of all stripes. An ad campaign pays off when a knockout cellist hires the squad to purge her swanky digs of demons that appear to be living in her refrigerator.

Malcolm and Kisha move into their dream home, but soon learn a demon also resides there. When Kisha becomes possessed, Malcolm - determined to keep his sex life on track - turns to a priest, a psychic, and a team of ghost-busters for help in this spoof of all the "found-footage/documentary style" films released in recent years.

After she and her husband move into a haunted house, a woman gives birth to a demonic infant that wreaks havoc.

A family moves to a small California town where they plan on starting a new life running a long-abandoned funeral home. The locals fear the place, suspected to be on haunted ground.

A medical school dropout loses his fiancée in a tragic lawnmower incident and decides to bring her back to life. Unfortunately, he was only able to save her head, so he goes to the red light district in the city and lures prostitutes into a hotel room so he can collect body parts to reassemble her.

Four interwoven stories that occur on Halloween: an everyday high school principal has a secret life as a serial killer; a college virgin might have just met the one guy for her; a group of teenagers pull a mean prank, and a bitter old recluse receives an uninvited guest.

A former mental patient's repressed anger reaches the boiling point, leading him to embark on a mission of revenge against the thugs who once subjected him to severe physical and mental trauma.

A familiar-looking group of teenagers find themselves being stalked by a more-than-vaguely recognizable masked killer! As the victims begin to pile up and the laughs pile on, none of your favorite scary movies escape the razor-sharp satire of this outrageously funny parody!

Terror grips a small mountain town as bodies are discovered after each full moon. Losing sleep, raising a teenage daughter, and caring for his ailing father, officer Marshall struggles to remind himself there's no such thing as werewolves.

In the sleepy town of Centerville, the lives of a number of interconnected characters are disrupted by the undead.

An undertaker who hasn't had any 'customers' in a long time is forced to pay one year's back-rent. To get money he starts to kill people, which brings absurd results.

Charley Brewster, a high school student, accidentally discovers the true and creepy nature of Jerry Dandrige, his dashing and enigmatic new neighbor; but no one seems willing to believe him.

It's been some time since Father Jebedaiah Mayii exorcised the Devil from little Nancy Aglet, who is now grown up with a husband and two children of her own. But the prince of darkness wants to go a second round and has returned to repossess her! With Father Mayii unwilling to help, Father Luke Brophy tries his best to help Nancy, even when TV's Ernest Weller plans to air the exorcism live on TV.

A local TV personality leads a team of supernatural investigators, including an exorcist, into the darkest corners of a supposedly haunted house.

Detective Roger Mortis is killed in action while investigating a string of mysterious robberies: until he's brought back from the dead with a chemical company's secret re-animation technology. Now he has twelve hours to solve the case of his own death before he dies: And stays dead.

A horror movie/buddy comedy about Joey and his undead friend Bart who comes back from the dead as a revenant: an articulate zombie that needs to drink blood to arrest the decomposition of his body.

In small-town Texas, affable and popular mortician Bernie Tiede strikes up a friendship with Marjorie Nugent, a wealthy widow well known for her sour attitude. When she becomes controlling and abusive, Bernie goes to great lengths to remove himself from her grasp.

Luther Heggs, a typesetter for the town newspaper, pitches an idea for a story about a local haunted house where a famous murder/suicide occurred 20 years earlier. After the editor assigns Luther to spend one night alone in the mansion, Heggs has a number of supernatural encounters and writes a front page story that makes him a hometown hero...until the nephew of the deceased sues him for libel.

A year after the murder of her mother, a teenage girl is terrorized by a masked killer who targets her and her friends by using scary movies as part of a deadly game.

Cemetery watchman, Francesco Dellamorte, is tasked with dispatching the recently deceased when they rise from their graves.

Infected by a virus, a mild mannered HR manager attempts to fulfill his overwhelming desire for brains, all while trying to keep it together so as not to incur the wrath of his bridezilla-to-be.

The trouble with Harry is that he’s dead. In a quiet Vermont village, a corpse creates unexpected chaos as several townspeople each believe they may be to blame.

A group of three youtubers who call themselves experts in supernatural beings decide to win public recognition once and for all. For this they plot a plan to capture a being known to all. It is the spirit of a light-haired woman who died in an unknown way and who haunts the bathrooms of schools across the country: the blonde in the bathroom.

Six friends on a road trip stop for the night at a bed and breakfast in the sleepy town of Lovelock. After a night that leaves both the inn's owner and chef dead, the gang finds themselves under suspicion by the local sheriff. But that's only the beginning as nearly all of the town's quirky residents become possessed by an evil spirit and pin down the friends inside the B&B.

In the third installment of the Scary Movie franchise, news anchorwoman Cindy Campbell has to investigate mysterious crop circles and killing video tapes, and help the President stop an alien invasion in the process.

A low-budget film crew working in New York City find themselves being preyed upon by a sexually conflicted serial killer.

Radio personalities Larry Abbot and Vickie Pearle are stars of a mystery show. Since they announced their engagement, Larry has been plagued by speech problems and, seeking out an unconventional cure, he returns to his boyhood home, a mansion in the countryside, bringing Vickie along. Larry reunites with numerous family members, but discovers that there are sinister things afoot within the walls of the creepy estate.

Home with their newly-formed family, happy parents Dan and Jody are haunted by sinister, paranormal activities. Determined to expel the insidious force, they install security cameras and discover their family is being stalked by an evil dead demon.

In Los Angeles, on Halloween night, a hitman tries to transport a corpse in plain sight, but people he stumbles upon on the street, believing that his sophisticated appearance is a magnificent disguise, constantly stand in his way to congratulate him.

Paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren take on one last terrifying case involving mysterious entities they must confront.

A popular prank TV show, Scare Campaign, has been entertaining audiences for the last 5 years with its mix of old school scares and hidden camera fun. But as we enter a new age of online TV, the producers find themselves up against a new hard edged web series that makes their show look decidedly quaint. It's time to up the ante, but will the team go too far this time, and are they about to prank the wrong guy?

About to be electrocuted for a catalog of heinous crimes, the unrepentant Horace Pinker transforms into a terrifying energy source. Only young athlete Jonathan Parker, with an uncanny connection to him through bizarre dreams, can fight the powerful demon.

Just after a bad breakup, Charlie MacKenzie falls for lovely butcher Harriet Michaels and introduces her to his parents. But, as voracious consumers of sensational tabloids, his parents soon come to suspect that Harriet is actually a notorious serial killer -- "Mrs. X" -- wanted in connection with a string of bizarre honeymoon killings. Thinking his parents foolish, Charlie proposes to Harriet. But while on his honeymoon with her, he begins to fear they were right.

A schoolteacher moves into her deceased aunt’s house in a small Californian town, and is harassed by unfriendly locals and a mysterious hearse.

A horror anthology containing three stories: a female college student working a graveyard shift is terrorized by a serial killer; a hair transplant goes horribly wrong; and a baseball player loses an eye and gets a new one from a recently executed murderer.

After witnessing a bizarre, traumatic incident involving a patient, Dr. Rose Cotter starts experiencing frightening occurrences that she can't explain.

After a series of gory murders commited by mobs of townspeople against visiting tourists, the corpses appear to be coming back to life and living normally as locals in the small town.

A team of reality TV paranormal investigators go to Mexico's most haunted house in the pursuit of better ratings. However, when the true dark secrets of the mansion begin to reveal themselves, the hapless team quickly discover that this house is no hoax. With zero genuine ghost-hunting experience, they have to figure out how to stop the ghosts and escape the house with their lives.

After exorcising the demons of his ex, Malcolm starts afresh with his new girlfriend and her two children. After moving into their dream home, Malcolm is once again plagued by bizarre paranormal events.

Shaun lives a supremely uneventful life, which revolves around his girlfriend, his mother, and, above all, his local pub. This gentle routine is threatened when the dead return to life and make strenuous attempts to snack on ordinary Londoners.

A small town is taken over by an alien plague, turning residents into zombies and all forms of mutant monsters.

Mystery Inc. has cracked the case to top all cases! They’ve tracked down Coco Diablo, the head of a notorious costume crime syndicate. With Coco and her kitty in prison, Mystery Inc. thinks that they can finally enjoy a break. Wrong! Suddenly, menacing doppelgänger ghosts of the Scooby crew and favorite classic foes show up in Coolsville to threaten Halloween. Now it’s up to the meddling kids to unmask the latest scoundrel and save Halloween!

A woman and her son enlist a motley crew of so-called spiritual experts to help rid their home of supernatural squatters.

When Kylie Bucknell is sentenced to home detention, she's forced to come to terms with her unsociable behaviour, her blabbering mother and a hostile spirit who seems less than happy about the new living arrangement.

Anton is a cheerful but exceedingly non-ambitious 17-year-old stoner who lives to stay buzzed, watch TV, and moon over Molly, the beautiful girl who lives next door. However, it turns out that the old cliché about idle hands being the devil's playground has a kernel of truth after all.

Dexter and Royce, two stoners in the small town of Weedsville, attempt to cover up the overdose of Royce's girlfriend Matilda. What leads from an old drive-in being perfect place to ditch her turns into the accidental discovery of a Satanic cult, who brings Mattie back from the dead after their ritual is botched. Along with the two's dealer Omar on their tail, how will these buddies and their slightly-off lady-on-board deal with the dangers of drug debt and demon-worshipping magic?

After receiving an exotic small animal as a Christmas gift, a young man inadvertently breaks three important rules concerning his new pet, which unleashes a horde of malevolently mischievous creatures on a small town.

A newlywed sheriff tries to stop a shambling monster that has emerged from a spaceship to eat people.

In the phantasmagorical town of Raven's End, a misguided young girl takes refuge in a decrepit old mortuary. The eccentric undertaker chronicles the strange history of the town through a series of twisted tales, each more terrifying than the last, but the young girl's world is unhinged when she discovers that the final story... is her own.

The two tradesmen Ib and Edward are tired of their lifeless marriages and dream of living the good life from the stash of money they've earned moonlighting for years. After a huge fight with their wives the two men get drunk and hire a Russian contract killer to do a hit on their spouses. But they have badly underestimated their wives, and this becomes the start of an absurd journey where Ib and Edward to their own horror end at the top of a kill list.

Cindy finds out the house she lives in is haunted by a little boy and goes on a quest to find out who killed him and why. Also, Alien "Tr-iPods" are invading the world and she has to uncover the secret in order to stop them.

Seven black friends go away for the weekend, only to find themselves trapped in a cabin with a killer who has a vendetta. They must pit their street smarts and knowledge of horror movies against the murderer to stay alive.

As a child Jack Brooks witnessed the brutal murder of his family. Now a young man he struggles with a pestering girlfriend, therapy sessions that resolve nothing, and night classes that barely hold his interest. After unleashing an ancient curse, Jack's Professor undergoes a transformation into something not-quite- human, and Jack is forced to confront some old demons... along with a few new ones.

The Freelings' suburban home becomes the center of paranormal activity that opens a portal to the 'other side'. With help, they must cross over to get their daughter back.

When partygoers at a deserted funeral home decide to have a séance on Halloween night, they awaken something evil with a thirst for blood.

A ragtag group of gunslingers try to make their way in a post-apocalyptic world. The twist to this world is that it’s just not barren and dangerous, it’s also filled with flesh-eating zombies. The gunslingers will find themselves stranded in a town and forced to make a choice on either to save the citizens of the town or save themselves.

Val McKee and Earl Bassett are in a fight for their lives when they discover that their desolate town has been infested with gigantic, man-eating creatures that live below the ground.

Two roommates deathly afraid of ghosts both fall in love with a girl who believes their home is haunted.

Madea and the gang encounter monsters, goblins and boogeymen at a haunted campground.

Professor Philip Goodman devotes his life to exposing phony psychics and fraudulent supernatural shenanigans. His skepticism soon gets put to the test when he receives news of three chilling and inexplicable cases -- disturbing visions in an abandoned asylum, a car accident deep in the woods and the spirit of an unborn child. Even scarier -- each of the macabre stories seems to have a sinister connection to the professor's own life.

Horror junkie Joe Foster gets to live out his ultimate scary movie fantasy courtesy of Fear Inc., a company that specializes in giving you the fright of your life. But as lines blur between what is and is not part of the game, Joe's dream come true begins to look more like a nightmare.

Billy, once the coolest kid in high school, comes back to his hometown 15 years later to find he’s no longer cool and the girl he still has feelings for now dates the former class outcast. Billy becomes obsessed with proving the outcast is a murderer.

Con man Ray Elliot decides to leave crime behind to start a company that sells fake alibis to clients who have been unfaithful to their significant others. It seems that the streetwise Ray has found his calling, until he unexpectedly becomes a murder suspect in a case involving one of his most influential customers. Now, as the police and an assassin called "The Mormon" track Ray, he and his attractive assistant, Lola, must clear their own names.

A Halloween-hating dad reluctantly teams up with his teenage daughter when an evil spirit wreaks havoc by making their town's decorations come to life.

Jamie returns to his hometown in search of answers to his wife's murder, which occurred after receiving a weird package containing a ventriloquist dummy named Billy, which may be linked to the legend of ventriloquist Mary Shaw. Destined to find out the truth, Jamie goes to the town of Raven's Fair, where Shaw used to perform and is buried. But Jamie is in for more than he expected.

As bodies begin dropping around the Hollywood set of STAB 3, the third film based on the gruesome Woodsboro killings, Sidney and other survivors are once again terrorized by another Ghostface killer.

Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween Night 1963, Michael Myers escapes from a mental hospital and returns to the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois to kill again.

While a group of young actors rehearse a new musical about a mass murderer, a notorious psychopath escapes from a nearby insane asylum.

Elliot Hopper, a widower with three children, is working on a business deal to get his family out of financial straits when he is suddenly killed in a taxi accident. With the aid of a paranormal researcher, Elliott attempts to complete the deal from the beyond, ensuring his family will be taken care of.

Six scientists arrive at the creepy Headstone Manor to investigate a strange phenomena which was the site of a mysterious massacre years earlier where 18 guests were killed in one night. It turns out that the house is the place of a satanic cult lead by a sinister monk who plans to kill the scientists who are inhabiting this house of Satan.

A mystical, ancient dagger causes a notorious serial killer to magically switch bodies with a 17-year-old girl.

A pathologist experiments with a deaf-mute woman who is unable to scream to prove that humans die of fright due to an organism he names The Tingler that lives within each person on the spinal cord and is suppressed only when people scream when scared.

A second-class horror movie has to be shown at Cannes Film Festival, but, before each screening, the projectionist is killed by a mysterious fellow, with hammer and sickle, just as it happens in the film to be shown.

Twenty-five years after a streak of brutal murders shocked the quiet town of Woodsboro, a new killer has donned the Ghostface mask and begins targeting a group of teenagers to resurrect secrets from the town’s deadly past.

Christmas is supposed to be a time of joy, peace and goodwill. But for some folks in the small town of Bailey Downs, it turns into something much less festive.

A mentally ill man in a small Texas town goes on a killing rampage and is fatally wounded by police. When doctors use an experimental serum to bring him back to life, the killer develops superhuman strength and the town sheriff must pursue him.

While the original parodied slasher flicks like Scream, Keenen Ivory Wayans's sequel to Scary Movie takes comedic aim at haunted house movies. A group of students visit a mansion called "Hell House," and murderous high jinks ensue.

A hapless hunchback who only yearns for love, finds himself in the middle of a murderous feud between the Pope and the King of France when each orders the hunchback to kill the other.

A spoof on many horror movie series. Ending his shift at the video rental, Stan's picked up by his BFF and 2 cute girls, all going to a Halloween party. Will they even get there?

Boyfriends Josh and Rohan plan a weekend getaway to introduce their parents, only to discover that their rental is home to a 400-year-old poltergeist.

On the fifteenth anniversary of the exorcism that claimed Father Damien Karras' life, Police Lieutenant Kinderman's world is once again shattered when a boy is found decapitated and savagely crucified.

After his fiancée, Kate, dies in an accident on their wedding day, veterinarian Henry grows depressed. To help him move on, his sister has him visit psychic Ashley and gives her Kate's diary. Ashley uses the journal's details to convincingly deliver the fake message that Kate wants Henry to move on. However, Kate's ghost is watching over Ashley and Henry. Furious when they fall for each other, she vows to sabotage their relationship.

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.

Two priests, one in crisis with his faith and the other confronting a turbulent past, must overcome their differences to perform a risky exorcism.

Madea winds up in the middle of mayhem when she spends a hilarious, haunted Halloween fending off killers, paranormal poltergeists, ghosts, ghouls, and zombies while keeping a watchful eye on a group of misbehaving teens.

