Tyrone’s favourite horror films

HALLOWEEN is a big time of the year for horror movie buffs and enthusiasts.

For cinema fans there is nothing better than watching a midnight horror film and staying up past the witching hour on Halloween night.

We asked our readers on social media what some of the most frightening horror movies and film scenes of all time are.

Ray Smithson suggested Salem’s Lot, the 1979 adaptation of the Stephen king novel, which has a terrifying scene with a child vampire floating eerily at the window of their next victim.

Another popular suggestion was the original Friday the 13th, the story of a lake shore holiday park and the untimely suspicious deaths of its holidaymakers.

The original film can be strange on first viewing as the flagship villain of the series ‘Jason’ and
his even more famous hockey mask and chef’s knife do not appear in this 1980 legendary genre piece.

Dracula was a popular choice. Amazingly, the novel by Irish-born author Bram Stoker has had over 200 screen adaptations.

Perhaps the most famous one is  the 1931 original, where Bela Lugosi played the titular role. Lugosi reprised his role years later and actually took to the stage in the North gracing the stage of Belfast’s Grand Opera House.

Accounts from the time say that Lugosi terrified the audience inside the theatre.

Paul McBrayne chose another horror classic – 1979’s Amityville Horror, which starred James Brolin who plays a father of a family moving into a new house which is haunted by an evil spirit which slowly drives him to madness.

A remake of the film was made and released in 2005 starring Deadpool actor Ryan Reynolds to much less acclaim than its more star-studded predecessor.

Poltergeist 2 was another choice. It may not be as famous as the first film in the series but anyone who has stayed up late at night and saw the famous part of the film with the creepy old preacher will tell you it has the same fright factor as the first film.

The film with the biggest connection to Halloween is the film that has the holiday’s name.

John Carpenter’s 1978 classic Halloween has a star making performance from the ultimate ‘scream queen’ Jamie Lee Curtis. Michael Myers, the ultimate slasher film antagonist, goes on a murderous rampage through the fictional town of Haddonfield.