Editorial · List
10 Underrated Horror Films of the 2010s
By Alan Willey ·
The 2010s reshaped horror with A24's prestige films and a folk horror revival, but the decade's deepest catalog stayed at the edges: Karyn Kusama's The Invitation, Babak Anvari's Iranian-set Under the Shadow, S. Craig Zahler's horror-Western Bone Tomahawk, Issa López's Mexican magical-realist Tigers Are Not Afraid. These 10 horror films from 2012 to 2017 — spanning four distinct modes (psychological dread, body horror, horror-Western, and arthouse experiment) — earned active critical advocacy without crossing into household-name recognition.
- 01
The Loved Ones(2012)
Sean Byrne's Australian debut weaponizes prom-night iconography into one of the most relentlessly mean horror films of the decade. Stays out of polite conversation; deserves more.
- 02
Housebound(2014)
Gerard Johnstone's New Zealand debut blends haunted-house tropes with deadpan kiwi humor and an actually-shocking final act. Should have been the breakout Edgar Wright comparison everyone reached for that year.
- 03
The Invitation(2015)
Karyn Kusama's slow-burn dinner-party nightmare is a masterclass in dread architecture. Critically beloved on release; commercially invisible. The kind of film that retroactively becomes a how-have-you-not-seen-this recommendation.
- 04
Bone Tomahawk(2015)
S. Craig Zahler's debut crosses Western with cannibal horror and arrives at one of the decade's most viscerally upsetting climaxes. Kurt Russell anchors a deliberate, almost novelistic pace that locks audiences in for the gut-punch.
- 05
The Devil's Candy(2015)
Sean Byrne's follow-up to The Loved Ones is metalhead family horror filtered through a paintbrush and an electric guitar. Drowns its supernatural conceit in real-feeling family tension and one of the loudest soundtracks in horror.
- 06
Under the Shadow(2016)
Babak Anvari's Iranian horror set during the Iran-Iraq War uses the chador and air-raid sirens as elemental dread material. Politically charged, formally controlled, and almost never mentioned in horror conversations.
- 07
The Autopsy of Jane Doe(2016)
André Øvredal's contained two-hander between Brian Cox, Emile Hirsch, and a corpse on a slab is one of the cleanest tension exercises of the decade. The conceit alone is worth the watch; the escalation is masterful.
- 08
Better Watch Out(2017)
Chris Peckover's holiday-set home-invasion film pivots from a familiar setup into something genuinely surprising and deeply unsettling. Buried under more obvious Christmas horror that year; rewards anyone who finds it.
- 09
Tigers Are Not Afraid(2017)
Issa López's Mexican magical-horror fable about cartel-war orphans is heartbreaking and visually inventive in equal measure. Guillermo del Toro called it a masterpiece. Almost no one saw it.
- 10
The Endless(2017)
Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead's Lovecraftian time-loop indie was made on basically nothing and is one of the most ambitious low-budget horror films of the decade. Works perfectly on its own and connects to their broader cinematic universe (Resolution, Spring, Synchronic).
Common questions
- What makes a horror film 'underrated'?
- For this list, underrated means a film that earned critical praise on release or in the years since but never crossed into household-name horror recognition. All ten films here have IMDb ratings above 6.5 and active critical advocacy, but limited theatrical releases or modest streaming visibility kept them outside mainstream horror conversation.
- Are these films streaming?
- Streaming availability changes constantly. Most of these films cycle through Shudder, AMC+, and Prime Video; some are on Tubi and Kanopy. Check JustWatch or your usual streaming aggregator for current availability.
- Which is the scariest?
- By traditional dread + atmosphere metrics, The Autopsy of Jane Doe and The Invitation are the most relentlessly tense. For body horror and shock, The Loved Ones and Bone Tomahawk are the most visceral. Under the Shadow is the most quietly devastating.