Best Horror Movie of the '70s

So scary mom wouldn't let me see it in the theater. While dad and older brother saw it, me, mom and little brother went to see Every Which Way But Loose 😭

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rangerm2@reddit

Life would be a little more dull without "Right turn, Clyde"

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monsterlynn@reddit

Is Jaws really Horror, though? I always felt it was more action-suspense. It does have a higher gore factor than a lot of those kinds of movies for the 1970s, but I don't think that makes it horror.

The Wicker Man is my favorite '70s horror.

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CynfullyDelicious@reddit

Have you seen Midsommar? First time I saw it, my mind immediately went to the Wicker Man.

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Aircooled2088@reddit

I remember watching Jaws at my grandparents house on Prism…

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dugs-special-mission@reddit

Just watched it last night. Amazing and holds up well.

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Healthy-Grape-777@reddit

That was such a good movie. I still imitate that scream at the end.

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BuckyD1000@reddit

My favorite '70s horror movies in no particular order:

The Exorcist

Suspiria

Alien

Halloween

Carrie

Texas Chainsaw Massacre

Magic

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BuckyD1000@reddit

It's a really good movie. My wife is freaked out by the trailer to this very day.

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Comedywriter1@reddit

The dog shoving the guy off the cliff is one of my favourite scenes ever. 😂👍

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diecastbeatdown@reddit

Michael Berryman.. always picture him in Weird Science...

"I'd hate to lose my teaching job."

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Frankenstein: The True Story (1973) My babysitter let me watch this. It was part 1. My mom let me watch part 2. I was 6. I rewatched it as an adult, and it was still eerie and suspenseful. My favorite part was watching a hand and forearm crawling across the floor of the doctor's lab.

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SnuffShock@reddit

Dawn of the Dead

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Comedywriter1@reddit

Agree. Still love this film.

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PrettylightedUMphrek@reddit

That remake freaks me the fuck out

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really4got@reddit

I can never really decide if I like the original or the remake of this better.

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SnuffShock@reddit

Somehow the remake feels way more dated than the OG.

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3Bucksm0m@reddit

Halloween. I still watch this one annually 🔪

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Comedywriter1@reddit

So good!

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u0088782@reddit

Halloween was filmed at my elementary school in Alhambra, CA, and I was also told that the condo we lived in was built over one of the abandoned houses that was used during filming. That was extra creepy when you're a kid...

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ZebraBorgata@reddit

My answer exactly!

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Wonderful-Creme-3939@reddit

Suspira, the soundtrack alone gives me chills.

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b-a-n-n-e-r_m-a-n@reddit

The first horror movie that I saw as a kid was The Omen (1976). Really wish I didn’t still have that logged as a core memory 😂

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No-Win-2741@reddit

Great movie! The decapitation scene? Shoot that just about did me in the first time I saw it.

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shuzan7@reddit

Same!!!

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Expensive-Signal8623@reddit

I love The Omen. Think Alien is better, but I love The Omen.

The Omen II is good too. Omen III is okay, Sam Neill is good

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Edward_the_Dog@reddit

Because of that movie, every time I see a group of crows hanging out, it freaks me out.

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wellbloom@reddit

OMG! When the mother ironed her baby!

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ArcaneElement@reddit

The Amityville Horror

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cockblockedbydestiny@reddit

This one doesn't really hold up at all as an adult, but holy crap as a child that was the scariest thing I'd seen for a long time afterward.

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Advanced_Nose_7738@reddit

First scary movie I saw. The scene where some hysterical lady started busting the basement wall apart, found some kind of red cellar and screamed something about it being a passage to hell scared the shit out of me.

As an adult, it's a shitty movie.

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mike___mc@reddit

The Exorcist. Even the TV version made me piss my pants.

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Couldwouldshould@reddit

The remastered version is incredible

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No-Win-2741@reddit

The spider scene where she comes down the stairs? Nightmare fuel!

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No-Win-2741@reddit

Check out the director's cut where she walks downstairs like a spider, bent over backwards. Nightmare fuel!

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MaximumJones@reddit

gif

Not even debatable.

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Defiant-Win-7859@reddit

I want to see this so badly but I don’t know if I’d ever sleep again

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Dg0327@reddit

No other even comes close!

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CitizenChatt@reddit

Yeah, we ain't doing this one

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trUth_b0mbs@reddit

I'm almost 50 and this movie STILL scares the crap out of me.

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CynfullyDelicious@reddit

The Exorcist, followed closely by A Clockwork Orange and Jaws, and Carrie.

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ElteeRyan@reddit

The Exorcist for sure. I was way too young to be watching that shit.

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ekeller50@reddit

Same. Same. First movie to ever give me waking dreams. I swear I saw ghosts.

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hermitzen@reddit

Yup. To this day I can't watch it alone.

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Advanced_Nose_7738@reddit

Halloween. I was 9 and it was on TV and remember that we weren't allowed to go trick or treating that year because of the Tylenol murders going on. 1982.

That scene where the two started making out on the couch in the living room in the dark and the camera slowly rolls back and shows Michael's shoulder as he watches....

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DerDoobs@reddit

Still have not rewatched.

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scdmf88888@reddit

I am so glad that someone else knows about this movie. I feel like I am the only one. Super scary movie.

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DerDoobs@reddit

IIRC they actually made sequels. shudders

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scdmf88888@reddit

I knew they made a second one but I didn’t watch it. I recently found out they had made a third one.

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Natural_King2704@reddit

Prime Cut

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Mountain_Exchange768@reddit

The Changeling

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tripletdad0603@reddit

I love The Changeling! When the ball comes bouncing down the stairs I got chills.

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Mountain_Exchange768@reddit

I just love the movie - have seems it dozens of times and I still flinch during some scenes, lol

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Undersolo@reddit

Alien. I was 5 when it came out, and about 8 or 9 when I saw it. The perfect sci-fi haunted house in space movie (also, great poster and tag line)!

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Expensive-Signal8623@reddit

It's really an Agatha Christie movie in space (Ten Little Indians)

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ewok_lover_64@reddit

Susperia. Rosemary's Baby. The Last House on the Left. The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane. Burnt Offerings . Don't Be Afraid of the Dark

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TalFidelis@reddit

Don’t be afraid of the dark - that movie more than any other got to me as a kid. Sure Jaws had some moments but I didn’t have nightmares. Those homunculi haunted me for a year.

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ewok_lover_64@reddit

I watched that by myself when it first aired in 1973. After that, I was hooked on horror

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LatkaGravas@reddit

Rosemary's Baby

1968

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whatcouchsaid@reddit

Honorable mention, but not released in the 70s: The Shining (1980) which fully feels like a 70s movie

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Expert_Habit9520@reddit

Agreed that year 1980 still had a 70s vibe to it. I think 1982/1983 is where the 1980s sort of broke away from the ‘70s and became a completely different decade socially and culturally.

So count me in as far as allowing “The Shining” to be in consideration. 😀

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Expensive-Signal8623@reddit

Come play with us, Danny

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Defiant-Win-7859@reddit

I tried to watch it last Halloween but I was so disturbed I couldn’t finish

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whatcouchsaid@reddit

It’s unsettling. I saw it when I was 5ish. When people question what’s wrong with me I blame that

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Defiant-Win-7859@reddit

😂😂😂😂

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Ironmike11B@reddit

I'm going with the Carter administration.

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tripletdad0603@reddit

Phantasm

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Defiant-Win-7859@reddit

I watch it every Fourth of July! I got the 50th anniversary Blu-ray and everything. It’s the only horror movie I’ve ever seen (I’ve never watched the sequels), but I’d classify it more as a psychological thriller tbh.

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BranderChatfield@reddit (OP)

Believe you me, don't bother watching the sequels, other than for mere comedy.

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Brevemike@reddit

Cabaret - still gives me screaming nightmares

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Healthy-Grape-777@reddit

Halloween

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MrsDonaldDraper@reddit

Dawn of the Dead

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Igmu_TL@reddit

Faces of Death -1978

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ViolentFlames13@reddit

Texas Chainsaw Massacre

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obijuanmartinez@reddit

The Wicker Man!!!

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Dry_Tourist_1232@reddit

Toss-up between Halloween and Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Honorable mention goes to the much lesser known Tourist Trap.

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SnuffShock@reddit

Tourist Trap is wild.

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Dry_Tourist_1232@reddit

I watched it any time it was on cable.

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SnuffShock@reddit

They sorta remade it during the early ‘00s, except that they called it House of Wax. It was scripted as a Tourist Trap reboot but something fell thru in the licensing so they changed the name. If you watch the 2005 House of Wax it is pretty clearly a Tourist Trap rip-off. It’s not nearly as good, tho.

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Ornery_File_3031@reddit

Omen and Salem’s Lot (which was actually a tv movie over two nights I think)

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Agreeable_Initial667@reddit

My Bloody Valentine. The original.

Harry Warden still lives in my nightmares.

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SnuffShock@reddit

The best thing the early 2000s horror remake cycle did was get us an uncut version of My Bloody Valentine. I always loved the version I knew from my vhs but the uncut version is waaaayy nastier.

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Agreeable_Initial667@reddit

I don't know why but my favorite was when he put that girl/guy in the dryer spin cycle in the laundromat (We were all about laundromats back in those times).

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JhazaBoo@reddit

Jaws.

We had a dog named Peanut when I was little and my whole family was watching Jaws on tv one night. Peanut ran and hid under the tv when the shark came too close to her liking.

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Big-Sheepherder-6134@reddit

Halloween. Saw first saw it Halloween night 1980 at home. Well actually the last half hour of it. Then we saw the Amityville Horror immediately afterwards. I don’t understand why my parents let us watch them. Even though the two movies scared the crap out me (I couldn’t sleep that night and had to keep a light on), it started my semi-obsession with those slasher movies of the 70’s and 80’s. We had uncut movies after 7:00pm every night with a service called ONTV and they regularly showed all those recently released horror movies. I remember when the ONTV guide would come and I would read all the different movie descriptions. I would immediately pick out the horror ones and was ready to watch. Halloween was the best of them all and remains a favorite. On the other hand I never thought the Exorcist was that scary. A demon possessing a girl? Fiction. Boring. A guy in a mask walking around a regular neighborhood? Could be outside right now!

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Safe_Move7021@reddit

The Exorcist, hands down

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pocket_wookie@reddit

Salem’s lot was one for me

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yearsofpractice@reddit

Oh man. 70s horrors. So good. Honestly, my favourite is the OG Wicker Man.

The best is probably Alien. Or The Shining (released 1980 so I’m allowing it). But The Wicker Man is my absolute favourite. Absolute madness

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Extra-Walk-5513@reddit

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, hands down.

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ChessieChesapeake@reddit

Trilogy of Terror, specifically story #3 with the Zuni doll.

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Powerful_Audience208@reddit

Yes!! That stupid doll scared the crap out of me.

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Jolly_Security_4771@reddit

Don't Look Now. It still scares the piss out of me

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Whipstich-Pepperpot@reddit

Bad Ronald (1974), as seen on The Late Late Show, circa 1980.

Any weird beam of light with no obvious source has forever made me creeped out.

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aasyam65@reddit

Carrie

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marshallkrich@reddit

Texas Chainsaw Massacre 1974

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Pooks23@reddit

The Legend of Hell House!!!!!! Amazing soundtrack, too. 1973 (same year I was born)

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PrettylightedUMphrek@reddit

The most freakiest and fucked up old horror movie to me is the last house on the left its watching an old snuff film

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Pendleton9@reddit

Horror Express

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GooseNYC@reddit

Halloween

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HHSquad@reddit

The Exorcist without question. Still the king of Horror movies. And anytime I hear Tubular Bells, it haunts me right back to this classic

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SignificantTransient@reddit

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curiousLouise2001@reddit

I had to google what year The Shining came out-1980 so it doesn’t make the cut 😅😅

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Expert_Habit9520@reddit

I have to be honest, I am not convinced I ever watched Jaws 100% of the way through as I barely remember much of it. Stuff like “The Exorcist” and “The Amityville Horror” I watched multiple times over the years.

Favorite is “The Exorcist”. My guilty pleasure horror movies that aren’t that great but they have a certain charm to them are “Race With The Devil” and “Brotherhood of Satan”.

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Repulsive-Tea6974@reddit

Alien.

I just can’t get over that you just now saw Jaws for the first time.

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