Orlando (1992)
Tilda Swinton plays a gender-changing immortal in Sally Potter’s eccentric adaptation of a Virginia Woolf novel
Orphan (2009)
Another variant on the evil child film featuring a maliciously psychopathic Isabelle Fuhrman
Orphan: First Kill (2022)
I was fairly ho-hum about the first Orphan but this is a sequel that entirely surprises you
Orphans and Angels (2003)
New Zealand made film about a woman who falls under the influence of a sinister stranger who plies her with drugs
Orphee (1950)
Jean Cocteau’s beautiful modernisation of the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice updated to post-War France
Osiris (2025)
Soldiers in the middle of a warzone are abducted by aliens and wake up aboard an alien facility. An interesting set up that dissolves into massive amounts of artillery fire and action
Osmosis Jones (2001)
The Farrelly Brothers make a part-animated, part-live action film that is set inside slob Bill Murray’s body where the cells and body functions are all talking characters
Otesanek (2000)
Hilarious Jan Svankmajer film about a mother who decides to treat a log as a child. Full of blackly funny humour before transforming into a macabre monster movie
OtherLife (2017)
Australian SF film about the development of a set of eyedrops that allow the recipient to experience a set of preprogrammed virtual memories. The film does nothing with the idea beyond rehashing Total Recall-like reality games
Otis (2008)
Film about a big overweight psycho who abducts girls and makes them enact a fantasy of being a cheerleader. Produced by one of the directors of The Blair Witch Project
Otto; or, Up With Dead People (2008)
Bruce LaBruce made the world’s first gay pornographic zombie film with L.A. Zombie. This was an earlier trial run, less a porn film and more down around the level of a student art film
Ouija (2014)
Blumhouse horror film based around the Parker Brothers boardgame. Modern multiplex horror films don’t come more generic than this. On the other hand, you cannot deny that debuting director Stiles White creates some occasionally quite spooky moments, it’s just that the rest of the show comes entirely by the numbers
Ouija Shark (2020)
Another in the spate of deliberately ridiculous killer shark films concerning a ghost shark that emerges from an ouija board
Ouija Shark 2 (2022)
A sequel to the Gonzo Killer Shark film Ouija Shark, this goes even crazier
Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016)
Blumhouse’s Ouija didn’t get many good reviews but they proceeded with a prequel here. This is automatically the better film from the outset by employing Mike Flanagan, behind amazing works like Absentia, Hush and The Haunting of Hill House, as director, even if it comes out as one of Flanagan’s lesser works
Ouija: Summoning (2015)
A bafflingly incoherent effort – quite what it is about I am at a loss to explain. The sole distinction it has that it was repackaged from its anonymous original title to market it on the tail of Blumhouse’s Ouija: Origin of Evil despite the fact an ouija board only briefly features at the start
Our Man Flint (1966)
One of the more amusing of the numerous James Bond copies of the 1960s featuring James Coburn as agent Derek Flint, this plants tongue in cheek and cheerfully spoofs the whole spy fad
Out of Darkness (2022)
A film that follows a group of cavepeople who set out on a journey to find a new land to only to be hunted by mysterious unknown, possibly supernatural threat
Out of the Blue (2006)
Film based on a true-life shooting spree in the tiny nowhere New Zealand town of Aramoana
Out of the Body (1989)
A cheapie from cult Ozploitation director Brian Trenchard-Smith about a man having clairvoyant visions of an astral killer
Outback Vampires (1987)
One of the most head-scratchingly bizarre efforts among the great Ozploitation fad – a comedy about vampires in an Australian Outback town
Outbreak (1995)
Spectacular big-budget, all-star film about a plague outbreak on US soil – one that was loosely inspired by the Ebola outbreak
Outcast (2010)
Absolutely fascinating Irish-Scottish film about people hunting each other with arcane sorceries on a rundown Edinburgh council estate … Compulsively fascinating in its often enigmatic approach, while depicting magic on screen in a way unlike anything we have seen before
Outer Touch (1979)
Bizarre attempt to mix the 1970s SF film with the British sex comedy as a group of people are abducted by three alien women who are ignorant about sex
Outland (1981)
The film‘s Space Western idea aside – the plot is High Noon transplanted into orbit – this is a solid and well-made science-fiction film with Sean Connery as a long marshal on Jupiter’s moon Io
Outlander (2008)
Retelling of the epic legend of Beowulf in SF terms where Grendel becomes an alien monster
Outlaw (2007)
British vigilante film that strains at issues of social relevance but only ends up parroting Death Wish cliches
Outpost (2007)
Above average revival of the Nazi zombie concept in a film that has spawned two sequels. The plot of soldiers venturing into an old bunker is conducted with tight, lean suspense and some undeniably gory dispatches
Outpost III: Rise of the Spetsnaz (2013)
Outpost was a modestly effective Nazi zombie film. This was the second of two sequels, a prequel that goes back to depict the original Nazi experiments
Outpost: Black Sun (2012)
Outpost was a solid and reasonably effective rehashing of the Nazi zombie theme; this was the first of two sequels. The first had a formula that seems difficult to mess up but this does – it’s over half the film before we get zombies after which we get Just the Same As Before and little more
Outside Ozona (1998)
Thriller following several different people as they drive towards the title Texas town, while a serial killer calls into an all-night radio talkback
Outside Satan (2011)
In the vein of Pasolini’s Teorema, French director Bruno Dumont makes a film about an ambiguous visitor who may be capable of miracles. Slow, very opaque but eventually rewarding
Outside the Wire (2021)
There have been some impressive works about A.I. in the last few years. This plays out as Ex Machina by way of Training Day and is only notable in its ridiculous implausibility
Over Her Dead Body (2008)
Unfunny comedy in which Eva Longoria dies and returns as a ghost to make life miserable for fiance Paul Rudd as he becomes involved with another woman
Over the Hedge (2006)
Likeable DreamWorks animated film filled with much slapstick energy about a group of talking animals that venture into a housing estate in search of food
Over Your Dead Body (2014)
The most sustained film Takashi Miike has made in some time. In this case, he adapts Yotsuya Kaidan, the most famous of all Japanese ghost stories, which has been filmed multiple times, but rather than offer a straight telling also adds a layer where the story comes to replay itself among the actors in the play
Overlord (2018)
J.J. Abrams’ produced film about soldiers encountering Nazi mad science experiments during WWII. Despite a decent budget thrown at it, this was a box-office failure. It may be that in a genre where we have gravitated to films about Nazi zombies and Nazi moonbases, this was just too tame
Ow (2014)
This begins fantastically well – the appearance of a mysterious alien object that paralyses everybody who looks upon it – only to take a major nosedive in its second act where we promptly realise that the filmmakers didn’t have a clue where to take the story after that
Oxygen (1999)
An abduction thriller that draws much influence from The Silence of the Lambs with Adrien Brody as a smooth criminal genius manipulating his interrogator
Oxygen (2021)
Imprisonment thriller where Melanie Laurent wakes up trapped inside a cryogenic capsule, this expands out to become an excellent SF film
Oz: The Great and Powerful (2013)
Sam Raimi’s prequel to The Wizard of Oz is now; the story of how a conman fools an entire land rather than of an innocent girl just trying to find her way home. The reconceptualisation of Oz comes with a colourful sweep
Ozark Sharks (2016)
A surprisingly amiable entry in the gonzo killer shark genre from director Misty Talley who seems to be making this her own genre niche
Oƨombie (2012)
This surely takes the cake amid the fad for wacky zombie films in which Osama bin Laden is resurrected as a zombie. Imagine a mash-up between Zero Dark Thirty and a zombie film
The Objective (2008)
The co-director of The Blair Witch Project makes a film about soldiers lost in the desert encountering mysterious lights in the sky. Essentially Blair Witch but with lost soldiers facing UFO phenomena
The Oblong Box (1969)
One of the films seeking to exploit the fad for Edgar Allan Poe adaptations started by Roger Corman in the 1960s. This has nothing to do with the Poe story and mostly shuffles around the familiar elements of the cycle
The Occupant (2020)
Spain’s Pastor Brothers have been rising genre name in the last few years. This is a psycho film concerning an unemployed man forced out of his apartment who returns to manipulate the life of the new tenant
The Occupant (2025)
A woman survives a helicopter crash and must make a harsh wilderness trek through the Caucasus Mountains before discovering that the helpful voice on the other end of the radio may be something not human
The OctoGames (2022)
The South Korean tv series Squid Games with people forced to play deadly versions of children’s games was a surprise international hit on Netflix. This is the low-budget horror copycat
The Odd Life of Timothy Green (2012)
On one level, this sets out to be a warm-hearted fantasy about the appearance of a magic child to a childless couple. On another possibly unintentional level, it is a rather unlikeable film about how two parents continually force a child to conform to the social expectations of those around them
The Offering (1995)
Obscure, little seen but beautifully made Magical Realism film set amongst witches and romantic rivalry in Mexico
The Offering (2016)
Singaporean film that offers an assemblage of cliches elements from various horror films in a mishmash of hauntings, possession, occult happenings and ominous Biblical portents that make little sense in terms of explanatory rationale
The Offering (2022)
Undeniably reminiscent of the standout The Vigil, a horror film set around an Orthodox Jewish funeral home that creates great uncanny mood
The Old Dark House (1932)
A classic Old Dark House thriller from director James Whale, a droll comedy of wonderfully stylised Gothic mood and featuring a near-perfectly cast line-up of eccentrics creeping about
The Old Dark House (1963)
The oddest collaborations of its era – between Hammer Films and William Castle renowned for his sensationalist gimmicks, who conduct a remake of James Whale’s droll horror comedy. Alas, Castle only turns out a broad farce
The Old Guard (2020)
Huge Netflix hit adapted from a comic-book about a team of immortal mercenaries
The Old Guard 2 (2025)
The Old Guard about a team of immortal mercenaries was a hit when it was released a few years ago. Now most of the principals reunite for a sequel
The Omega Code (1999)
The Omen and imitators had been exploiting Biblical End Times prophecies for years but this is one that approaches it from a Christian perspective. The film also started a wave of serious faith-based films that employed name actors in order to carry them to crossover audiences
The Omega Man (1971)
The second film version of I Am Legend, this rewrites the book’s vampires as mutants and abandons its mood of paranoia for a fantasy of hippie utopia and Charlton Heston in square-jawed action hero mode
The Omen (1976)
This is where all the cliches of Devil Children began. A big hit among the 1970s occult boom, this is essentially Sunday tabloid Christianity – a lurid, doom-filled take on Book of Revelation End Times prophecies that moves with a slick polish and a series of schlocky deaths every few minutes
The Omen (2006)
The classic 1976 Anti-Christ film is given the remake treatment. The production look slick but quickly disappears into forgettability
The One (2001)
Promising idea of an alternate world-hopping film from James Wong, this spends too much time copying moves from The Matrix and lets most of its possibilities pass by
The One Game (1988)
Mind-twisting mini-series where videogame designer Stephen Dillane is wound into a series of reality and illusion games
The One I Love (2014)
Going by the title you could easily dismiss this as an indie relationship drama (as I initially did) but what we instead get is a fascinatingly cryptic doppelganger film where a couple go on a retreat only to encounter idealised versions of themselves who seem intent on stealing their lives
The Oracle (1953)
British quota quickie, a comedy about a man who discovers an oracle in a well that gives him tips on horse races
The Oracle (1985)
From cult director Roberta Findlay, this is a film about a haunted ouija board. What is going on doesn’t make a lot of sense but Findlay serves up a series of bizarre deaths that prove entertainingly absurd
The Ordeal (2004)
A Belgian-made venture into Backwoods Brutality territory that keeps heading into stranger and more disturbing places until it almost seems to be taking place on another planet altogether
The Order of the Black Eagle (1987)
A low-budget spy/action film with entertainingly bizarre elements including a cryogenically frozen Hitler and the hero going into action accompanied by a baboon
The Orphan Killer (2011)
Modern-day run through of the slasher film with the heroine pursued through a school by an axe-wielding maniac. This leaps into the basics with a real brutality and wades in buckets of gore
The Orphanage (2007)
A Spanish ghost story that effectively eschews modern jumpshock tactics in favour of subtle old-fashioned scares
The Other (1972)
Classic horror film about good and evil twins that creates a good deal of sinister effect and arrives at a much imitated twist
The Other Me (2000)
Disney Channel film about a cloned kid. The result indifferently slung together and the basic premise dealt with in a hardly serious way
The Other Side of the Door (2016)
From Johannes Roberts, the director of 47 Meters Down and other works, an undeniably spooky variant on Pet Sematary set in Mumbai as a mother unwittingly resurrects her late son’s spirit
The Other Side of the Mirror (2016)
This sets out to offer a dark take on Alice in Wonderland but leaves you scratching you head. At most the Wonderland characters take a lot of drugs, along with a haphazard mix of scenes from the book cheaply shot
The Others (2001)
Alejandro Amenabar directed ghost story made not longer after The Sixth Sense that works with nicely subtle effect and arrives at an unexpected twist ending that turn the standard haunted house tale on its head
The Ouija Exorcism (2015)
Another title jumping on the fad for ouija board films we’ve had since Blumhouse’s Ouija series, this concerning an ouija board that has a malevolent spirit trapped inside it. Routine tension by the numbers – possessed people with glowing eyes are just not that scary
The Outsider (1996)
Low-budget film that steals the premise of Westworld in the story of an amusement park that recreates the world of 1940s film noir with androids, which proceed to go amok
The Outwaters (2022)
An ultra cryptic Found Footage film about mysterious happenings in the desert
The Owl Service (1969-70)
A British children’s tv mini-series about a mysterious dinner service that presages the playing out of a Welsh myth, this is seen as one of the original influences on the Folk Horror genre
The Owners (2020)
Maisie Williams and an aging Sylvester McCoy in a film about house burglars who break in to a home to discover sinister things afoot
The Oxbow Cure (2013)
Canadian film about a woman alone in a cabin that has a set-up that seems to be heading in the direction of an effective horror film about cabin fever and/or paranoia – only for things to then get completely baffling as to what is happening