The best way to define a psychological thriller is to say it’s the type of story that explores the inner workings of one’s mind, will generally feel dark in tone, and will usually be suspenseful and/or twist-filled. Defining a supernatural movie is a good deal simpler, as supernatural films will often combine fantasy and horror, and will revolve around ghosts, spirits, or other extraordinary phenomena.
It thereby stands to reason that a supernatural psychological thriller film will simply do all of that all at once, and ideally, will provide an exceedingly scary viewing experience in the process. The following movies are some of the greatest of all time to blend classic supernatural horror tropes with oftentimes grittier or more relatable psychological themes, and given they can disturb and unnerve on multiple levels, they’re not all for the faint of heart. Nonetheless, those feeling brave might want to check some of the following titles out if they haven’t already.
10 ‘The Babadook’ (2014)
The Babadook shows that you don’t need a huge budget to deliver genuine scares and devastating amounts of uneasy psychological tension. It’s about a single mother looking after her troubled young son, with both being distraught due to a recent tragedy – one that seems to have the young boy fearing a monster he claims is lurking within their house.
The monster is called the Babadook, which sounds silly and perhaps not that scary a name, though it’s all in the execution, because this childish-sounding monster is pretty terrifying. The film’s an even more devastating exploration of grief and has its two main characters go through feature-length nervous breakdowns. It’s not easy to watch, but it’s incredibly well-made, and as a film, it lives up to the hype.
9 ‘The Witch’ (2015)
Though The Witch has a relatively small scale and a limited cast, it manages to be hugely ambitious when it comes to the assortment of genres it belongs to. It’s got a historical setting (taking place in the early 1600s), has fantasy/supernatural horror elements, becomes a demonic possession movie of sorts, and functions as a psychological drama/thriller.
It centers on a family that’s exiled from their main village, and the struggles they go through when they all move out into the woods to live out a lonely existence. Robert Eggers’s following feature, The Lighthouse, may have worked more effectively as a psychological thriller, but The Witch (his debut feature) still has elements of that kind of movie, and pairs such things with supernatural horror, in turn becoming a gripping film.
8 ‘The Orphanage’ (2007)
The only thing scarier than a normal ghost is a child ghost, which naturally implies someone dying before their time… that’s also sad. So it follows that any supernatural horror movie revolving around kids or child ghosts in some way is probably going to be at the very least a little eerie. In the case of 2007’s The Orphanage, it’s safe to say that it all gets very eerie.
It’s about a woman trying to turn her old childhood home into an orphanage, which it once was in the past, only for her son to begin seemingly communicating with spirits that might exist there. This sets off a slow-burn horror story that pays off in a way that’s worth the wait, with plenty of startling moments and an overall uneasy atmosphere that makes the film linger in one’s mind once it’s over.
7 ‘The Devil’s Backbone’ (2001)
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The Orphanage was a 2007 Spanish supernatural horror movie about, well, an orphanage, and 2001’s The Devil’s Backbone is also a Spanish supernatural horror/psychological thriller movie revolving around an orphanage. Here, it’s set during the end of the Spanish Civil War, and follows a young boy who arrives at an apparently haunted home for orphans and begins communicating with unusual forces there.
It’s a film that’s arguably Guillermo del Toro’s first great one, being his third feature overall and one where he really came into his own, and started delivering compelling drama, dark fantasy, and disturbing horror in spades. For those feeling brave, The Orphanage and The Devil’s Backbone could well make for a good double feature, as they have comparable narrative elements while still also feeling distinct.
6 ‘The Wailing’ (2016)
The Wailing is a South Korean movie that runs for over 2.5 hours, and isn’t afraid to keep viewers in the dark and on edge about things for much of that runtime. It largely takes place in a small village that’s been decimated by a mysterious sickness, with the film following a policeman who finds himself, for more than one reason, determined to resolve the incident at hand.
It might first and foremost be a mystery film, though that sense of not knowing inevitably causes great psychological distress for the characters, and maybe some for the viewers, too. It gradually becomes more of a horror film as it goes along, with the movie’s ambition and length ensuring it largely achieves what it sets out to do.
5 ‘The Innocents’ (1961)
An early film that understood how unnerving kids can be in the right kind of story, The Innocents is a very classy, mostly understated, and largely efficient horror movie. It’s about a woman looking after two young kids and tending to their large estate, and the way she gradually starts to feel the place might be haunted the longer she stays there.
Horror fans used to more modern movies might find it all a bit too restrained, but those who like older works from the genre will find a lot to love here. It’s expertly shot throughout, undeniably atmospheric, and Deborah Kerr gives a great lead performance, entirely conveying the psychological turmoil her character goes through.
4 ‘The Sixth Sense’ (1999)
Honestly, 1990s movies don’t get much more iconic than The Sixth Sense, which just snuck its way into the decade and, in turn, made its director, M. Night Shyamalan, a household name. It’s about a young boy experiencing strange events after a tragedy, at which point a child psychologist is sent to see him and work out what’s going on.
It revolves around one character who believes they can see ghosts, and another character whose life is irrevocably changed by the knowledge that the first character could be telling the truth. Even with the famous ending aside, the way it functions as a supernatural horror/mystery movie while giving two characters personal demons to grapple with – all without collapsing under its own weight – is undeniably impressive.
3 ‘Hereditary’ (2018)
Ari Aster’s one of the best filmmakers working today when it comes to psychologically devastating, disturbing, and intense horror movies, all things that can be said about Midsommar, Beau Is Afraid (to some extent), and certainly Hereditary. This is an uncompromising look at tragedy and grief that also happens to be very scary. It is, to put it mildly, a traumatic movie.
Of those, Hereditary is also the one that flirts the most with supernatural horror, given Midsommar’s conflict feels largely grounded, and Beau Is Afraid goes for surrealism over the supernatural. Few horror movies in recent memory have dealt with intense emotions like Hereditary has, with it also putting a unique (and stomach-churning) spin on more familiar horror conventions.
2 ‘The Exorcist’ (1973)
William Friedkin was a director who knew how to provoke strong emotional responses from his audience, and The Exorcist demonstrated this skill at its best. It’s arguably Friedkin’s best movie, and also one of the greatest horror movies of all time, being about the desperate attempts to exorcise a demon from a young girl who’s been behaving in an increasingly erratic fashion.
For those terrified by the idea of something horrible happening to a loved one (that should go for just about anyone, honestly), The Exorcist is nerve-wracking. For those terrified by the idea of losing control of one’s self and doing unspeakable things against their will (also pretty universal), The Exorcist is stomach-churning. That it does both at once is a key reason why it’s such a horror classic.
1 ‘The Shining’ (1980)
Perhaps the only horror movie to combine the supernatural with the psychological even better than The Exorcist would be Stanley Kubrick’s film adaptation of The Shining. Controversially, he emphasized psychological terror over the ghosts here, but by the film’s end, it does seem to become more apparent that this film is unnerving audiences with both types of horror at once.
The novel was intended to be a bit more of a ghost story, and that’s one reason why Stephen King – the original writer – didn’t think much of the 1980 adaptation. Still, though it might not be entirely faithful, this take on The Shining is absorbingly terrifying, and easily one of the all-time greatest horror movies.
