Happy Goat Horror

Love horror, but hate being startled by insanely loud orchestra stabs? Then this might be the list for you. Here at Happy Goat Horror, we’re easily startled. After all, we’re goats. We spend half our time perched on inexplicably tiny ledges, to AVOID being startled. We’re big fans of tension, fear, creeping anxiety, an atmospheric build, blood and guts, all that other good stuff. But we’re not partial to being so shocked by what sounds like someone violently throwing their violin out of a moving car, that our souls temporarily leap out of our bodies. We need our souls. We hope to offer them to The Dark Lord one day (he is, after all, the mightiest of all the goats).

In no particular order of preference, here are 10 Horror Movies That Don’t Rely On Jump Scares…

THE INVITATION (2015)

Written by Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi :::::: Directed by Karyn Kusama

Will and his girlfriend attend a dinner party hosted at his old house by his ex-wife and her new husband. It’s visibly uncomfortable for Will, and because of that, the other guests assume he’s paranoid and mean-spirited every time he questions something. But is he paranoid? Is he really?

THE WITCH (2015)

Written and directed by Robert Eggers

In 1600s puritanical New England, a religious family move to an isolated location to live off the land. One day, the eldest child, Thomasin, is looking after her baby brother when he is taken by someone – or something – unseen. Fingers are pointed, accusations are made, and fear builds. There’s something evil in those woods.

MIDSOMMER (2019)

Written and directed by Ari Aster

After suffering a traumatic loss, Dani travels to a commune in Sweden with her boyfriend and his friends for a midsummer festival. It seems friendly and beautiful and relaxing. It seems that way…

THE THING (1982)

Written by Bill Lancaster & John W. Campbell Jr. ::::: Directed by John Carpenter

I’m sorry but any excuse I have to include this movie in a list and I will take!

A group of researches in Antarctica discover an insidious being that’s able to imitate whatever and whomever it wants. It assimilates itself into the group, no one knows who’s real and who isn’t, and tensions fly.

THE BLACKCOAT’S DAUGHTER (AKA FEBRUARY) (2015)

Written and directed by Oz Perkins

A favourite of mine.

A quiet introvert waits too long for her parents at her boarding school after it closes for the season, her only company the nuns and one other student, who couldn’t be more different to her. Is it the solitude and the worrying about her parents that gets into her head, or something else?

THE AUTOPSY OF JANE DOE (2016)

Written by Ian Goldberg and Richard Naing ::::: Directed by Andre Ovredal

A father and son are about to close up for the night when a Jane Doe is brought in for an autopsy. They’re alone with the body and should be safe, but with every incision comes questions, and then scariness ensues.

VIVARIUM (2019)

Written by Lorcan Finnegan & Garret Stanley ::::: Directed by Lorcan Finnegan

A young couple go to view a house in a new and seemingly idyllic neighbourhood, where they are swiftly ditched by the strange estate agent who took them there. They figure they’ll just leave. They can’t.

PYEWACKET (2017)

Written and directed by Adam MacDonald

After the death of her father, distraught teenager Leah also loses the life she knows and her friends because her mother decides to move them hours away for a fresh start. Infuriated and inconsolable, Leah performs a demon-summoning ritual in a reactive act of spite.

THEY LOOK LIKE PEOPLE (2015)

Written and directed by Perry Blackshear

Christian bumps into an old friend, Wyatt, on the street, and invites him over, only to quickly realise he’s homeless and has nowhere to go. Wyatt is not quite the same person that Christian remembers, and Wyatt has dangerous and alarming suspicions of his own…

HUSH (2016)

Written by Mike Flanagan and Kate Siegel ::::: Directed by Mike Flanagan

A deaf woman who lives alone in a remote location becomes the victim of a psychotic killer, who hunts her for sport. You’ll bleet (or scream, if you’re not a goat) at the screen every time you hear something that she doesn’t.