If you’ve heard the phrase “monster movie,” you might think you are aware of what to expect. A huge, radioactive bug is afoot all over an urban area, maybe, or perhaps an unnatural beast stalking campers who are foolish enough to wander into the territory of its occupants.
The meaning of “monster” is negative; in fact, it also is a sign of the prejudices inherent to those who employ it. The term “monster” is simply what we find to be bizarre, scary, and difficult to classify. It’s an atypical element of the normal order, and the fear is natural when we realize it. We’re always scared of things we do not understand.
“Best Monster movie” or “monster movie,” then is a more broad term than most people be aware of, encompassing all sorts of things from human battles with nature (as the case in Jaws) as well as fighting with the self that is repressed that is seen in virtually all werewolf films.
There are plenty of beasts to be seen here and even a handful of aggressive aliens, but there are also cute creatures and misunderstood ones that did not intend to cause harm. Some are unabashed villains, while others are protagonists in their movies.
Defining a “Monster Movie”
A horror film’s danger or subject must be that it is not human. Human behavior may, of course, appear “monstrous,” but a monster, as defined, isn’t a person in the sense that it hasn’t changed physically in some way.
In this way, any animal that is not human (like the shark from Jaws or the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park) may constitute “monsters,” per se, particularly if they’re depicted in an unrealistically exaggerated manner that makes them appear larger than the norm or acting in an unnaturally violent way. Humans can also transform into a monster when it comes to the werewolf.
List of Best Animals Make the Best Monsters Movie?
Little Shop of Horrors (1986)
The Best Monsters Movie: Adapted from an off-Broadway musical version of a 1960 Roger Corman horror comedy, Frank Oz’s adaptation of the story puts Seymour (Rick Moranis), an amiable shopkeeper, caught in an awkward situation. Seymour is forced to search for the victims of a plant that is demanding.
Monster: Who doesn’t love a man-eating plant? Audrey II (voiced by Levi Stubbs) looks like an enormous Venus fly-trap. Instead of eating insects, it feasts on human flesh. It’s hilarious.
Tremors (1990)
The Best Monsters Movie: An action-comedy horror featuring Kevin Bacon as a handyman named Val; his small valley town is under attack by an enormous worm population. The town’s inhabitants band together to fight the creatures that live underground! Bacon had once thought it to be a low point in his career; however, it’s much worse than The Darkness.
Monster: Massive multi-tongued creatures called graboids live underground and then appear to eat human beings. Their speed is impressive, given their heavy ballast. It’s enough to make one feel grateful for asphalt.
Troll Hunter (2011)
The Best Monsters Movie: A Norwegian mock-doc that follows three excited filmmakers (think Blair Witch but less map-related banter) who come across tired Troll hunter Hans (Otto Jespersen). He’s tired of the government’s dirty work, so he agrees to be photographed doing his job with horrifying and hilarious outcomes.
“The monster: It’s all right within the name! Trolls of all dimensions, shapes, and personalities. They all have one thing in common: they like shady areas under bridges and hate humans. Many.
Monsters (2010)
The Best Monsters Movie: Famously made on a minimal budget and without a script written by a first-time director Gareth Edwards (you might recognize his work from a smaller film named Rogue One). Monsters follow a journalist (Scoot McNairy) and his boss’s daughter (Whitney Able) in their quest to escape safety after an alien race arrives.
Monster: Tentacle-y, squid-like extraterrestrials that have invaded Earth and have caused chaos in Mexico.
Cabin in the Woods (2012)
The monster movie: Joss Whedon’s ode to old horror films is an ode to a meta-mashup with epic scale. The title says the film revolves around a cabin set in the woods where a group of friends meets on the weekend. Are they on their own? Do they have a problem? In the nick of time, somebody gets caught with an old, dusty object in the basement.
“The Monster: How many do you would like to have? Nearly every monster you can imagine is present toward the end when the plot goes off-track, and they’re released accidentally. Werewolves, vampires, zombies and giant snakes, psychotic killer unicorns… They’re all ready for a slice and dice.
The Wolf Man (1941)
Larry Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr.) returns to the undiscovered Welsh village where he was raised in hopes of reconciling with his father, who is a distant one. However, he falls victim to an ancient curse that turns him into the Wolf. It’s not Universal’s sexiest film about monsters. However, it does have an ethereal style.
Monster: The werewolf. The werewolf is. Universal had previously released a werewolf film. However, it was this one that made the rules official.
The Descent (2005)
Equal parts thrilling thriller and a frightful gorefest, The Descent is a film about a group of women who spelunk in a cave filled with ancient humanoid beasts.
It follows grief-stricken Sarah ( Shauna Macdonald) following the loss of her spouse and infant; Neil Marshall’s The Descent follows Sarah and her spelunking group of tough daredevil buddies as they go into deep, dark adventures to rescue Sarah out of her slumber. Naturally, everything happens to be a disaster.
The exit pathway is blocked, and the ladies are trapped in a gruesome, off-the-map cave with no idea about how to escape, and no one else knows exactly where they are.
Marshall is wise enough to avoid jumping into the bloody action, and the film is amazing long before the monsters appear.
While the women look for an escape, we are allowed to look into the intricate nature of their relationship. The feeling of claustrophobia and tension between the two women rise by themselves, bringing the whole scene to a climax of anxiety akin to a piano.
To add to emotions, Marshall, and cinematographer Sam McCurdy mess with our minds, playing with the most fundamental fears: the darkness and the fear of being entrapped. The women sink further into a night lit solely by glow sticks and camcorders and a palette of greens and reds.
It’s a confusing illusion of light and color that intensifies the sense of anxiety and creates a tight, mystical space. As the fear reaches its peak, Marshall drops the monster bomb, and the carnal Darwinism starts. It’s a bloody, horrific event that layers horrors in a sequence of frightening frights that escalate until they reach a peak of visceral-saturated, kinetic terror.
Dog Soldiers (2003)
If I ever get asked to offer my opinion on the best-looking, practical effects or full-body werewolf costumes employed in a feature-length horror film, my choice for Dog Soldiers will be a simple choice to develop.
It’s not precisely an empathetic story like American Werewolf in London. Instead, it’s an action-packed wolf story that pits a group of soldiers against a raging family of lycanthropes living in the Scottish Highlands.
The story borrows from the outline used in Night of the Living Dead to achieve this with our team of characters hunkered down in a decaying, shabby farmhouse, which a huge group of werewolves surrounds.
As the team members are being systematically killed in increasingly brutal ways, The only question to be asked is who will remain alive? Dog Soldiers is one of the most stylish (although at times a bit obscure and difficult to appreciate) films in the genre, featuring fantastic action scenes and, as I mentioned previously, incredible werewolf designs.
I am awed by the strange proportions that they offer the monsters: humanoid bodies with long, a bit thin legs that give werewolves a huge height; however, their heads are straight-up wolves instead of being a mix of man and Wolf. They look completely alien, and they’re great.