Spooky cinema: My 53 personal favorites

Happy Halloween!

Earlier this month I mentioned programming my own Halloween movie marathon. But how could I ever choose just four or five movies?!! Instead, I decided to compile a list of my spooky favorites, including TV mini-series. Other than deciding to exclude outstanding movies that lean almost entirely toward being horror comedies (think Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein), the criteria used here is that these are simply films I love. Not the best, in all instances. And not the only ones I love. Just personal favs.

It's a list of 53 because I'm 53. Maybe I'll revise it every year and add one to the overall number.

Here they are, chronologically. Looking at it myself, I think this list makes it pretty easy to make some assumptions about me and see some trends. The assumptions would be correct. I'm not complex. Also, wonderfully, I still have a lot to see for the first time.

• The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
• Nosferatu (1922)
• Le Manoir de la Peur (1927) pictured at top
• The Old Dark House (1932)
• The Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
• Cat People (1942)
• The Curse of the Cat People (1944)
• Ugetsu (1953)
• Night of the Demon (1957)
• The House on Haunted Hill (1959)
• The Brides of Dracula (1960)
• The Innocents (1961)
• Carnival of Souls (1962)
• The Haunting (1963)
• Black Sabbath (1963)
• Kwaidan (1964)
• The Last Man on Earth (1964)
• The Plague of the Zombies (1966)
• Quatermass and the Pit (1967)
• Viy (1967)
• The Devil Rides Out (1968)
• Night of the Living Dead (1968)
• Robin Redbreast (1970)
• The House That Dripped Blood (1971)
• Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things (1972)
• Gargoyles (1972)
• Horror Express (1972)
• Messiah of Evil (1973)
• The Exorcist (1973)
• From Beyond the Grave (1974)
• The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue (1974)
• Black Christmas (1974)
• The Signalman (1976)
• The Man from Nowhere (1976)
• Suspiria (1977)
• Cathy's Curse (1977)
• Dawn of the Dead (1978)
• Halloween (1978)
• Salem's Lot (1979)
• The Shining (1980)
• The Changeling (1980)
• Poltergeist (1982)
• The Midnight Hour (1985)
• The Lost Boys (1987)
• The People Under the Stairs (1991)
• The Sixth Sense (1999)
• Session 9 (2001)
• Trick 'r Treat (2007)
• Let the Right One In (2008)
• The Cabin in the Woods (2011)
• The Conjuring (2013)
• The Haunting of Hill House (2018)
• Midnight Mass (2021)

High honorable mention and/or I forgot about them at the time I wrote the post: The Skull (1965), Isle of the Dead (1945), The Appointment (1981), A Warning to the Curious (1972), Misery (1990), Psycho (1960), The Golem: How He Came Into the World (1920), The Haunted Palace (1963), House (1977), Dead of Night (1945), The Hound of the Baskervilles (1959), Frankenstein (1931), Kill, Baby, Kill (1966), The City of the Dead (1960), Ghostwatch (1992), Burnt Offerings (1976), The Body Snatcher (1945), Tales from the Crypt (1972), House of Usher (1960), Son of Frankenstein (1939), I Saw the TV Glow (2024), The White Reindeer (1952), The Wicker Man (1973), Doctor Sleep (2019), Deep Red (1975).

1967 advertisement for a flying saucer lamp in Saucer News

One of these days, I'll post about the Summer 1967 "Special Convention Issue" of Saucer News that I found years ago. For today, however, here's a groovy advertisement from one of the inside pages. 

It's for a flying saucer table lamp ("a scientific marvel") that was hawked by Amalgamated Flying Saucers Clubs of America, Inc. That group was founded in 1957 and was led by Gabriel Green (1924-2001), who was also a write-in candidate for president of the United States in 1960 and 1972. Apparently, they also made and sold lamps.

The lamp, which was about seven-and-a-half inches across, is described thusly: "The rotating inner chamber projects a miriad [sic] of light beams against walls and ceiling in gentle, soft-radiant, colorful, pulsating, ever-changing patterns. Uses no mechanical parts. Costs only 6¢ per month to use."

For adults, the benefits included meditation, an "ideal romantic atmosphere," relief from daily tensions and help falling asleep. It could also help kids fall asleep, per the advertising copy, and could soothe their "mid-night fears." 

If you're still not sold, how about this: "Moving light beams protect against burglars."

The lamp, plus a record album added to your order for free, cost $4.98. Apparently that included shipping, too. That's about $46 in today's dollars, so maybe the lamp was pretty decent. Who knows?

I can't find any definitive photos or first-person reviews of this lamp. I wonder how many were made. I wonder how many are still around. I wonder if they were anywhere near as cool as advertised. The truth is out there! Please leave coded communications in the comments regarding how we can get in touch regarding the details of this vintage UFO lamp.

Previous UFO posts

• Some spacey tidbits from the Fall 1966 issue of Saucer News
• 1988 UFO Magazine: John Lennon, Gulf Breeze sightings and more
• Galactitags: The must-have accessory in the event of alien abduction
• Book cover: "The Case of the Ancient Astronauts"
• "Fate" magazine classifieds, August 1975
• Book cover plus some bonuses: "The Oak Island Quest"
• 1976 booklet on UFOs, occult from Southwest Radio Church
• Book cover: "Investigating UFO's"
• Questions, answers & mysteries with Hookland's David Southwell
• RIP Art Bell, of the Kingdom of Nye
• Three sci-fi paperback covers with UFOs (and one with a chimp)
• "Secret of the Old Museum," with tangents, footnotes & Nimoy
• Hoping to see UFOs for 1976 bicentennial Independence Day
• Book cover: "Strangers from the Skies"

Peaceful pet cemetery

Five years ago today, we said farewell to Huggles, our three-legged cat, and Ashar wrote a wonderful tribute to him. Ashar also took this photo on that day, after we buried Huggles in the backyard and decorated his peaceful gravesite with tiny gourds and pumpkins that had grown wild at our house in Dover, Pennsylvania. It was a nice way to say goodbye. A few weeks later, we got some early snow.