The 1980s was the ultimate decade for movies that seamlessly blended horror and comedy. Killer Klowns from Outer Space, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2, Night of the Creeps, Return of the Living Dead, Creepshow, Re-Animator, Gremlins, Evil Dead 2, they all work like a charm. But the 1990s was no slouch, as it too contributed some wonderful horror-comedies to the history of such genre-blenders. What follows are the ten best movies that succeeded in producing both laughs and squirms, giggles and gasps, guffaws and gross-outs. There was only one caveat, which was that the movie has to actually be labeled as a comedy.
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This means that Scream was not included. It has funny moments, yes, but it’s a horror movie with some humorous moments included (most of them courtesy of Matthew Lillard, an actor recently and unfairly ripped on by Quentin Tarantino).
10) Lake Placid
Steve Miner, best known for helming the first two Friday the 13th sequels (and serving as associate producer on the original), has had the most impressive career of any director who got his start with the Voorhees saga. None of his works have been masterpieces, but several have been entertaining popcorn films, e.g. Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, Forever Young, Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken, Warlock, and House.
Add Lake Placid to that list, because it definitely is enjoyable, even if it doesn’t have quite as high a kill count as it should to actually pull off its desired level of tension. However, as a comedy, it’s more effective. Not because of Oliver Platt’s irritating character (who is clearly meant to be the main source of laughs), but because of Betty White’s game performance as Mrs. Delores Bickerman, who has been feeding Lake Placid’s gator resident cows even after said gator devoured her husband. The way she’s so snarky with the police officers is gold. Lake Placid is like Anaconda, you appreciate it for what it is and then avoid its direct to video sequels like the plague.
9) Idle Hands
There were a glut of teen market-aimed horror movies that came out in quick succession in the wake of Scream‘s success. Movies like Valentine, Halloween H20, Urban Legend, and the like. Some of them attempted to incorporate comedy within the horror, but Idle Hands is more of the inverse, it’s predominately comedy with a dash of horror. It’s essentially a take on Oliver Stone’s The Hand if The Hand had a sense of humor (or worked at all as a movie).
It’s all a slapstick spookfest with a strong cast (particularly Elden Henson and a physical performance by Devon Sawa) and a memorable alt-rock soundtrack. Not all of its jokes land, but it’s the type of movie that is extra fun because the cast and crew were clearly having fun making it.
8) Army of Darkness
Army of Darkness is a big step down from The Evil Dead and Evil Dead 2 (though that statement would be fiercely debated by some of its fans, which is understandable). However, it is every bit the display of Sam Raimi’s unique brand of humor as the first sequel was.
It’s also a further display of just how fluid Bruce Campbell makes elaborate and bizarre physical comedy look. He walks a tightrope with it perhaps even better than anyone else ever has. He’s silly because he’s trying to be silly, but not so silly that we’re rolling our eyes. The third act with skeletons fighting Medieval soldiers doesn’t quite land but even still there are flashes of Evil Dead 2‘s brilliance sprinkled throughout. It also has the best poster of any movie on this list.
7) Tales from the Darkside: The Movie
Tales from the Darkside: The Movie is the real Creepshow 3. The success of George A. Romero’s Creepshow led to him creating Tales from the Darkside which then led to this. Toss in the fact that, like the two Creepshow movies, Tales from the Darkside: The Movie has a segment based on a work by Stephen King, and the throughline is clear.
And, if viewed through that lens, it’s a step down from Creepshow but a noticeable step up from Creepshow 2. The look is crisp, the three stories are increasingly entertaining (with the third segment, “Lover’s Vow,” also being fairly heartbreaking), and the pacing clicks. It’s a fantastic anthology movie, and one that has developed an audience over the course of time.
6) Gremlins 2: The New Batch
Like most of the entries on this list, Gremlins 2: The New Batch underperformed at the box office. In fact, it performed so poorly that it put the budding franchise on ice for over thirty years.
But time has been kind to the movie. It’s the ultimate Looney Tunes cartoon brought to life, even factoring in Space Jam and Looney Tunes: Back in Action (which was also directed by Joe Dante). The Key & Peele sketch taking place in the Gremlins 2 writing room is the best possible explanation of how this thing came together. If it’s zany, it’s included.
5) Tales from the Crypt Presents: Demon Knight
Tales from the Crypt was such an early days hit for HBO that it led to two theatrical films. One of them worked and one of them very much did not. Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight was the first of the two and the one that worked. Bordello of Blood is entirely skippable, even for die-hard fans of the show.
Demon Knight succeeds thanks to several factors. For one, the single location, an inn, where it spends most of its narrative is nice and spooky once it gets surrounded by demons (and a little even before that). Two, the occupants of said inn are played by actors who understand the IP’s wavelength, e.g. William Sadler, Jada Pinkett Smith, and CCH Pounder. Three, and most importantly, Billy Zane’s work as the antagonist, The Collector, is not only his best to date, but one of the most infectiously gleeful performances in horror-comedy history. Zane has said that this was his favorite role to play, and that fully carries through in the viewing experience.
Stream Tales from the Crypt Presents: Demon Knight on Starz.
4) Bride of Chucky
After Child’s Play 3, it was clear that the franchise needed an injection of life. Fortunately, franchise spear header Don Mancini knew how to do just that, and he wrote a script that seemingly evolved Chucky while simultaneously showing him incapable of change.
What really works about Bride of Chucky is the fact that it still works as a Chucky movie while also working as an absurdist road trip of a movie featuring two murderous dolls falling in their version of love. Thanks to consistently fantastic work by Brad Dourif and the note-perfect addition of Jennifer Tilly it all manages to work exceedingly well, tight roping its way between being so scary it dilutes the humor and too funny to still be scary. Unfortunately, the subsequent Seed of Chucky would squander this tonal dynamic, resulting in another franchise overhaul.
3) The People Under the Stairs
The People Under the Stairs was a nice financial hit for Wes Craven in the early ’90s, and thanks to its offbeat but sharp focus on gentrification (impressive for the time in which it was released) it still has its fans today. But it’s still not given quite the amount of credit it’s due.
This is a seamless blend of horror and comedy, something more consistently seen in the ’80s. Once the three burglars (one of whom is a child) is within the house where most of the narrative takes place, it doesn’t take long for the viewer to realize all bets are off. And thanks to some well-orchestrated twists, we never quite know what to expect next. As for the film’s comedy, it mostly comes in the form of the viewer recognizing just how wacky the film’s pair of antagonists are. Deadly, horrible individuals, but kind of laughable in just how normal they find their perpetually bizarre behavior to be.
2) Arachnophobia
Director Christopher Landon (Happy Death Day and Freaky) was attached to helm a remake of Arachnophobia, but like his plans for Scream 7 that didn’t end up coming to fruition. It came down to cold feet regarding his approach, which would have had spiders laying eggs inside human bodies. The goal was to craft a grotesque body horror film.
That would have been interesting, but it’s also entirely different from the tone of the original, which is a nice small-town vibe systematically dismantled by the presence of a particularly deadly (and quick breeding) spider. Arachnophobia is very much the sister film to Gremlins, which isn’t but so surprising considering they both had Steven Spielberg on as executive producer.
Stream Arachnophobia on fuboTV.
1) Dead Alive
Peter Jackson’s Braindead, titled Dead Alive in the United States, is one of the goriest, most repulsive movies ever made. However, its greatest trick is pulling that off without being totally off-putting.
Like Evil Dead 2, everything is so wacky that we aren’t as repulsed by the gore as we would be were the film taking itself remotely seriously. And at the heart of it all is a pretty simple tale of a boy and his overbearing mother, a dynamic played to perfection by Timothy Balme and Elizabeth Moody.
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