The Devil’s Tomb (2009)
Jason Connery directs a film that draws upon the basics of The Keep about soldiers venturing into a tomb in Iraq where they awaken a great evil housed there
Devil’s Triangle (2021)
An adventure potboiler from The Asylum about the crew of a plane who pass through the Bermuda Triangle to end up in Atlantis just as the Atlanteans prepare to declare war on the surface world
The Devil’s Wedding Night (1973)
One of the numerous European erotic vampire films made during the early 70s. This came out not long after The Exorcist and so the vampire countess is accompanied by a coven of Devil worshippers
Devil’s Workshop (2022)
This comes with an intriguing premise in which a struggling actor consults a demonologist to prepare for a role and agrees to spend a weekend with her during which she decides to exorcise him
The Devout (2015)
The bizarre story of a man who believes his young daughter is the reincarnation of a NASA astronaut. The film makes great claim that it is based on a true story but fails to make a compelling argument for its case
The Diabolical (2015)
This gives all appearance to being another copy of Insidious – a ghost story with an evil-sounding adjective for a title. The film settles in in predictable ways; then throws the ghost story angle on its head with a surprise SF twist
Diabolik Chi Sei? (2023)
The third of the new series of films based on the cult Italian comic-book about a masked super-thief. This entry goes back to offer us a Diabolik origin story
The Diamonds of Metro Valley (2010)
Crime film that takes place amid cardboard sets and toy robots. A puzzlingly surreal effort that seems more suited to an MTV clip for an indie band than a full-length film
Dick Barton Strikes Back (1949)
From the early days of Hammer Films, one of several films based on Dick Barton, a popular radio hero. A progenitor of the spy movie with the title hero trying to prevent foreign agents unleashing a deadly sonic ray
Dick Tracy (1990)
The Warren Beatty directed and starring adaptation of the popular newspaper comic-strip detective proved a flop. Beatty creates a highly stylised world and peoples it with an all-star cast but fails to invest the world with any depth
Die (2010)
A blatant copy of Saw, albeit without the Torture Porn sadism, with people imprisoned in a cellar forced to kill one another. An oddly unconvincing film that fails to generate any tension or even conviction
Die, Monster, Die! (1965)
Adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s The Color Out of Space, directed by Roger Corman’s production designer Daniel Haller that draws on the look and mood of Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe films
Die Screaming Marianne (1971)
Pete Walker was one of the most underrated directors of the 1970s Anglo-horror wave. This was his first film. Compared to Walker’s later works, this is more a psycho-thriller that sits on the borderline of being horror
Digby, The Biggest Dog in the World (1973)
British children’s film in which a dog is made giant sized after being fed a growth formula by scientist Spike Milligan. Amiable but nothing great
Digging Up the Marrow (2014)
Adam Green, director of the Hatchet films, makes a Found Footage film about the search for an underground world of monsters. The monsters, when seen, are quite imaginative
Digital Man (1995)
Fairly average 90s SF/action video release about soldiers hunting an amok military android before realising the androids have also infiltrated their troupe
The Dinner Party (2020)
A young couple are invited to a posh dinner party, only to find that sinister and deadly things lurk not far beneath the niceties before things get really strange. A directorial outing for actor Miles Doleac
The Dinosaur and the Missing Link: A Prehistoric Tragedy (1915)
The very first film from stop-motion animator Willis O’Brien, the creator of King Kong. A rather slight piece about the comic shenanigans among a group of cave people but it was the first film to ever depict a dinosaur on screen.
Dinosaur Hotel (2021)
A head-scratching oddity from the people behind Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey with people enter in a reality tv show where they are hunted by dinosaurs within the confines of a hotel
Dinoshark (2010)
One of the earliest entries in the gonzo killer shark fad, predating Sharknado even. This comes produced by Roger Corman and concerns a prehistoric shark that is revived
Dinotopia (2002)
A TV mini-series based on the popular illustrated books by James Gurney about the discovery of a lost land where dinosaurs have evolved into their own civilisation
Diplomatic Siege (1999)
One of the numerous action films to use a variant on the Die Hard scenario (with an added nuclear threat). For once, this has an okay script and a sense of humour but is killed by a fatal miscasting of its two leads
Discontinued (2022)
We’ve all heard the theory that we might be living in The Matrix. This asks the question of what happens when it is announced that the simulation is being shut down
The Discovery (2017)
Robert Redford plays a scientist who finds proof of the existence of the afterlife only to then face a worldwide rash of suicides. From the director of the fascinatingly weird The One I Love
Disenchanted (2022)
Enchanted in which Amy Adams played an animated fairytale princess entering the real world was a reasonable hit. This is the long-planned sequel that reunites the principals but feels like a joke that belabours in the retelling
Disquiet (2023)
Jonathan Rhys Meyers wakes up in a hospital as strange hallucinatory and nightmarish things start to happen. The fact that this is a deathdream film becomes very obvious
Ditch Day Massacre (2016)
Passable low-budget slasher film that looks as though it is was shot in the director’s home. Somehow the title, which refers to a day when a group of teens decide to ditch school, fails to stand among the great holiday-titled slashers
The Djinn (2021)
Horror film in which a young mute boy discovers a book that contains a spell that offers one’s greatest wish, only for he to summon a djinn
DNA (1997)
Another variant on Alien – a monster movie with Mark Dacascos as a doctor facing a genetically engineered insect monster in the jungles of Borneo
DNA (2004)
Forensic thriller in which Tom Conti is a CSI who discovers evidence that he might have conducted a series of killings while in a fugue state
Doctor Dolittle (1967)
This gets the nonsensical absurdity of the original Doctor Dolittle stories far more than the Eddie Murphy version. On the other hand, this was the era of Mary Poppins and this is made as a lumbering musical
Doctor K (1999)
South Korean film about a doctor with shamanistic powers, this starts out seeming to be a horror film before becoming something different altogether
Doctor Sleep (2002)
Here Nick Willing makes an initially promising film but this becomes a disjointed muddle involving hypnotism, serial killers and occult conspiracy. Not to be confused with the Stephen King adapted film
Doctor Strange (2007)
One among a handful of animated films based on Marvel Comics properties, this conducts a passable telling of the origin story of the Sorcerer Supreme
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
Doctor Strange was one of the better MCU films. Here Sam Raimi takes over in the director’s chair. This readily delves into multiverse themes but requires a major crash course in a plethora of Marvel tv series to follow
Dogs (1977)
Another in the 1970s fad for Animals Attack films. This features David McCallum facing off against hordes of dogs that turn on humanity with killing intent
Doin’ Time on Planet Earth (1988)
A peculiarity from Cannon Films that was a flop, a comedy in which a weird teenager believes he is an alien and suddenly attracts the attention of a bunch of UFO cultists
Dollman Vs. the Demonic Toys (1993)
Full Moon production that offers the novelty of bringing together their Dollman and Demonic Toys franchises, although nearly a third of the film is comprised of recycled footage from said films
Dolls (1987)
Following his success with Re-Animator, Stuart Gordon went on to make this film about a dollmaker and his malevolent dolls. The doll effects are eniably effective but the film’s appeal to a child-like fairytale morality is uneven
Dolly Dearest (1991)
A copycat possessed doll film that came out in the aftermath of the Child’s Play films. A routine effort about an evil spirit uncovered in a Mexican mine that inhabits a child’s doll.
Dominique (1978)
A creaky old-fashioned psycho-thriller – one that draws heavily on Les Diaboliques and a contrived plot to drive somebody crazy – that came out the same year as Halloween and feels a whole world apart
Donnie Darko (2001)
A thoroughly overrated cult classic. A baffling mixture of precognition, time travel, sinister talking bunnies and 1980s satire. What this doesn’t do is ever fall together into a coherent explanation about what is going on
Donovan’s Echo (2011)
Film about clairvoyance and predestination that owes much to Don’t Look Now. Unfortunately, this reduces everything to the prosaic level of a tv movie thriller
Don’t Answer the Phone! (1980)
Fairly average 1980s slasher film – the first on the theme of a killer calling into a radio talkback host. This delves with enthusiasm into voyeurism, while Nicholas Worth has clear fun as the psycho of the show
Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark (2011)
Guillermo Del Toro produced cinematic remake of a 1970s tv movie, this creates a good deal of creepy mood and atmosphere with Katie Holmes as a mother who finds goblins in the cellar, but never pushes any of it in a way that jolts audiences in their seats
Don’t Breathe (2016)
This, which is sort of The People Under the Stairs by way of Wait Until Dark, was greeted with terms like ‘an instant classic’. It is a well-oiled machine that produces some undeniable jumps but little remains in memory after it is over
Don’t Go in the House (1979)
A film from the slasher era – the scenes of the psycho of the show incinerating victims with a flamethrower were the cause of censorship controversy. Less a slasher film and more a psycho film, this pushes into some disturbing headspace
Don’t Knock Twice (2016)
Welsh director Caradog James impressed with his previous film The Machine. Here he makes a horror film concerning an urban legend about an old crone haunting those who disturb her, but fails to do anything notable
Don’t Open Till Christmas (1984)
The 1980s slasher fad brought a number of ventures into the Christmas slasher film, which has grown into its own genre niche since then. This is one British entry in the genre about a killer targeting people dressed as Santa
Don’t Worry Darling (2022)
Actress Olivia Wilde creates a variant on The Stepford Wives set in an idyllic 1950s town where the women seem to be prisoners. Wilde is making a feminist parable but the plausibility of her SF scenario falls apart
Doom: Annihilation (2019)
This was the second film based based on the Doom game and actually does a far better job of getting the essence of the game and paying fanservice to its elements than the earlier 2005 film did
Doomsday Man (1998)
Thriller with Esai Morales as a virologist called out of retirement to track down his brother James Marshall who has gone rogue and stolen vials of a deadly bacteriological agent
Door to the Other Side (2016)
Haunted house story that is not substantially different from the 7000 on this site. This has some novel twists in that it focuses on an old man afraid to go out of doors who appears to open up a supernatural doorway as he sleeps
Doppelganger (1969)
Gerry Anderson was best known for his puppet tv shows. This was his first film with live actors based around the absurd notion of a space expedition to a planet on the far side of the sun that is a mirror opposite of the Earth
The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982)
Entry from the 1980s heyday of slasher film made by students at the UCLA film program with a killer stalking the dorm. Featuring an unknown Daphne Zuniga as one victim
The Double (2013)
Socially inept Jesse Eisenberg encounters a charming doppelganger that takes over his life. Richard Ayoade adapts a Dostoevsky novella but for some reason transplants it into a blackly comic dystopia
Doug’s 1st Movie (1999)
Film spinoff of a popular children’s animated tv series Doug about a kid and his observations on life. The film’s story has the title character befriending a local lake monster
Down a Dark Hall (2018)
Rodrigo Cortes, who made the fine Buried, directs a Young Adult horror, which is produced by no less than Twilight author Stephenie Meyer, concerning supernatural happenings at a girl’s boarding school.
Down to Earth (1947)
This was a semi-sequel to Here Comes Mr Jordan featuring Rita Hayworth as the goddess Terpsichore descended to Earth to inspire a Broadway producer
Down to Earth (2001)
Remake of Heaven Can Wait/Here Comes Mr Jordan as a vehicle for comedian Chris Rock where the heavenly body mix-up now becomes about a black man ending up in a white man’s body
Dr. Caligari (1989)
The original The Cabinet of Dr Caligari is a classic of silent German Expressionist cinema; this loose remake feels like Eraserhead reconceived with absurd Day-Glo disco decor
Dr. Dolittle 2 (2001)
A sequel to the Eddie Murphy Dr Dolittle remake. This is still an insult to the original stories but under director Steve Carr at least proves a more amiable comedy than the first film did
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1913)
The fourth film version of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde starring King Baggot in the title roles. This is very faithful to the story, even if it reads as largely unremarkable today
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1941)
Version of the Jekyll/Hyde story starring Spencer Tracy and with Ingrid Bergman as the dancehall girl he liaises with. This has been made in the vogue for Freudian psychology so the transformation is tricked out with dubious symbolism
Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde (2008)
Modernised version of the Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde story starring Dougary Scott. The principal novelty here is that the bulk of the story takes place in a courtroom as Hyde is placed on trial for murder
Dr. Jekyll and Ms. Hyde (1995)
Another variation on the Dr Jekyll and Hyde becomes a woman theme. This version is played as a modern comedy wherein Tim Daly turns into Sean Young who plays to bitchy excess
Dr Jekyll’s Dungeon of Death (1979)
Not a Jekyll and Hyde film but instead about Jekyll’s grandson who conducts a series of experiments in harnessing aggression. An almost sordid exploitation film
Dr Petiot (1990)
French film about true-life serial killer Marcel Petiot, a respectable doctor who operated a lifeline for Jewish refugees during WWII only to kill them
Dr Terror’s House of Horrors (1965)
The first of Amicus’s horror anthologies. The stories are rehashes of five popular horror tropes, all united by Peter Cushing as the title doctor telling the fortunes of five passengers on a train carriage
Dracula (1931)
The classic adaptation of the Bram Stoker novel that made Bela Lugosi into a horror icon and created the image of the vampire in dinner-suit and with East European accent. For all its stature, it is a dull and talky film and Lugosi is overwrought
Dracula (1974)
TV movie version of Bram Stoker’s book that was released to theatres in some places. Richard Matheson’s script brings back many aspects of the book that are dropped by other productions but the film suffers the fatal miscasting of Jack Palance in the title role
Dracula (1980)
Not an adaptation of Bram Stoker but an anime based on the Marvel comic-book Tomb of Dracula (the same title that gave birth to Blade)
Dracula (2002)
This conducts the interesting idea of updating Bram Stoker’s book to the present day with Patrick Bergin as Dracula. Ultimately, this suffers from low tv movie horizons
Dracula (2006)
BBC costume drama version of the Bram Stoker novel, which offers the most radical take on the story of any version made to date, substantially wrenching around many of the familiar characters
Dracula: A Love Tale (2025)
Luc Besson makes a return with an adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. The surprise about this is that he fairly much uncreditedly remakes Francis Ford Coppola’s version of the story
Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972)
For their seventh Dracula films, Hammer introduced Dracula to the present-day. The result was a wild mishmash where Christopher Lee plays second fiddle to Hammer’s belated attempts to jump aboard the Swinging 60s youth scene
Dracula Exotica (1980)
The inevitable adult version of Count Dracula. Beyond the obvious, this is halfway watchable, having a sense of humour and even a story, which plays out as a straight version of Love at First Bite
Dracula, Father and Son (1976)
Almost certainly this is the one Christopher Lee Dracula film you will never have heard about. This was a French comedy made not long after Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein, spoofing the Dracula film
Dracula II: Ascension (2003)
The first of two sequels to Dracula 2000. This is based around the idea of trying to scientifically examine a vampire’s body, sort of a vampire film by way of CSI
Dracula III: Legacy (2005)
The second of two video-released sequels to Dracula 2000, this takes place with more of an action emphasis and features vampire hunters tracking Dracula across rebel-torn future Europe
Dracula Rising (1992)
The 1990s brought us the darkly romantic vampire spearheaded by Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula. This was a Roger Corman produced bandwagon jumper on the trend
Dracula: The Dark Prince (2013)
A medium-budget Dracula film that draws much on its cinematic predecessors and comes filled with Underworld-like brooding Gothic poses. Plus the oddity of a blonde Dracula
Dracula: The Original Living Vampire (2022)
The Asylum conduct their own version of Bram Stoker’s Dracula and this becomes one of the most radical screen adaptations of the story to date, swapping genders of characters
Drag Me to Hell (2009)
Sam Raimi chose to follow up his hugely successful Spider-Man trilogy with this incredibly silly film about Gypsy curses. Raimi piles on ridiculous shock effects that become so over-the-top that the film ends up somewhere in orbit
Dragon Soldiers (2020)
Low-budget film directed by a former soldier about a troupe of mercenaries sent into the woods to round up vagrants who find they are fighting against a dragon
Dragonfly (2002)
Kevin Costner believes his late wife is trying to communicate with him. Comedy director Tom Shadyac makes his first serious film but it is so respectable and with all the horror element bled out of it as to be dull
Dragonheart 3: The Sorcerer’s Curse (2015)
Sequel to a largely forgotten fantasy series. While never transcending formula, this fares somewhat better than the previous sequel largely because CGI effects have advanced since the original
Dragonheart: Battle for the Heartfire (2017)
The fourth film in the Dragonheart franchise. Is there truly anybody out there who was begging for this? Cheaply made in Romania where it seems to be straining to drag the original premise out for another film
DragonHeart: Vengeance (2020)
Quite why the largely forgotten DragonHeart has produced four sequels is beyond me. Where does such a loyal fanbase come from that they keep churning out more of these films?
Dragonwasps (2012)
Typical Syfy Channel creature film with people encountering giant fire-breathing genetically-engineered wasps in the jungles of Belize
Dream a Little Dream (1989)
One of the forgotten entries in the mid-1980s spate of bodyswap comedies where elderly Jason Robards finds himself in teenager Corey Feldman’s body. This suffers from a very confused script
Dream Demon (1988)
Jemma Redgrave is a socialite who is plagued by nightmares that take over her life. A British attempt to copy A Nightmare on Elm Street that collapses into a muddle of symbolism and reality-blurring dreams
Dream One (1984)
Head-scratchingly odd fantasy film produced by John Boorman and family where a young boy is transported to a world where he mingles with characters from fiction
Dreamcatcher (2003)
Lawrence Kasdan directs an adaptation of the Stephen King novel about a group of men on a weekend get together in the woods who find themselves in the midst of an alien invasion
Dreamland (2019)
Bruce McDonald, who directed the standout Pontypool, makes a crime film where Stephen McHattie plays both a hitman and a heroin-addicted trumpet player. For head-scratching reasons, the film also includes a vampire
Dreamscape (1984)
The original version of Inception almost, featuring psychics entering into people’s dreams and then attempts to dream assassinate the US President. Despite much promise, the idea is prosaic in its handling
Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas (2009)
Film based on real-life serial killer Henry Lee Lucas and his exaggerated claims to have killed hundreds of victims. Starring Antonio Sabato, Jr in the title role
The Driver (2019)
Zombie action film that features Mark Dacascos driving through the post-apocalyptic landscape in a luxury car looking for a home for his daughter
D-Tox (2002)
Thriller where Sylvester Stallone is a detective who goes into alcoholic rehab after his wife is killed by a serial killer only to realise that the killer is posing as one of the attendees
Dual (2022)
Film in which a dying Karen Gillan has a clone made of herself only to make an unexpected recovery and be forced into a televised duel to death with the clone for ownership of her life