The Final Features From 10 Iconic Horror Directors, Ranked According To IMDb – Screen Rant

Horror is an expansive genre relying on both real and imagined fears to generate emotional responses from audiences. Since the dawn of the film era, horror movies remain consistently popular among filmgoers. Over the decades, certain iconic directors have set standards in the genre that continue to be replicated.

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From Alfred Hitchcock to George Romero to Wes Craven, influential horror movie makers revolutionized the genre with their styles, casting, and approaches to scary storytelling. This list highlights the final features from well-known horror directors. All of the directors featured below have died, but their legacies live on through their movies. The films are ranked based on their IMDb rating.

Tobe Hooper fueled the slasher craze with his low-budget masterpiece, 1974's The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Hooper went on to direct other acclaimed films like the original Salem's Lot and Poltergeist before he died in 2017.

Hooper's final film, Djinn, is the first horror movie set in the United Arab Emirates. Djinn are supernatural entities in Islamic mythology and folklore. Djinn follows a young couple who come into contact with these ancient beings. The movie turned out to be a complete flop, receiving bad reviews across the board.

Survival of the Dead is the sixth installment in George Romero's groundbreaking Night of the Living Dead franchise. Unfortunately, it pales in comparison to Romero's original run of zombie movies.

The 2009 movie focuses on a group of AWOL National Guardspeople during a zombie pandemic. Survival of the Dead lacks any original or new ideas, instead regurgitating the same storytelling tactics employed by its predecessors. Romero died in 2017, and it's too bad this lackluster movie is his last.

A seminal Italian horror director on par with Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci developed a reputation for making excessively gory movies. In addition to making giallo horror movies like The Beyond and The House by the Cemetary, Fulci also made comedies and spaghetti westerns.

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Fulci died in 1996. His list film Door to Silence stars John Savage and is set in New Orleans. Savage's character Melvin Dovereux returns to the city for his father's funeral, and a strange series of events haunt him.

The last film from James Whale, a seminal horror director in the '30s, is a romance set during WWII. They Dare Not Love tells the story of an Austrian prince who flees Hitler's Nazi regime and falls in love with an Austrian woman hiding out in London.

James Whale directed several classic Universal Pictures monster movies, such as Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, and The Bride of Frankenstein. Whale also directed The Old Dark House. Whale's career took a turn south after They Dare Not Love, and he made no additional movies before he died in 1957.

Wes Craven returned to the franchise that revitalized his career in the '90s before he died in 2015. The fourth installment of the Scream movies sees Ghostface up to the same antics. Scream 4 also continues the satirical style of its predecessors by making fun of social media and horror tropes.

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Scream 4 is definitely not the best in the franchise, but it still employs plenty of smart dialogue and top-notch directorial work from Craven.

Another early horror auteur, Tod Browning's horror films are imbued with noir aesthetics. Browning's heyday was the transition between silent and sound films. He directed important features like Bela Lugosi's Dracula and Freaks in addition to dozens more underrated horror films.

Browning died in 1962, but his last film is 1939's Miracles for Sale. This thriller is referred to as a "locked room mystery," meaning the crime being solved occurred under seemingly impossible circumstances.

Mario Bava's films are considered instrumental in developing the unique style and feel of Italian horror movies. Coined "The Master of Italian Horror," Bava made dozens and dozens of low-budget, visually stunning slasher films before he died in 1980.

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The final film Bava directed, Shock, isn't considered one of his best, but it still contains all of the elements Bava is revered for. These elements include psychological breakdowns, slow pacing, surrealistic storytelling, and dark humor.

Stuck is a tense psychological thriller from Stuart Gordon, known for his stylized and comedic hybrid films like Re-Animator and The Beyond. Gordon died early in 2020, but 2007's Stuck is his final feature.

Stuck stars Mena Suvari as a young woman out celebrating a promotion at work. After her character Brandi strikes a man with her car on her way home, she must decide whether she will be accountable for her actions by getting him help or flee from the scene of the crime. Stephen Rea co-stars.

Terence Fisher is affiliated with Britain's Hammer Films, a production company known for its gothic horror features. Fisher directed Hammer's The Curse of Frankenstein, Dracula, and The Mummy. Fisher worked frequently with actors Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee.

Fisher died in 1980, and his final film is Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell. Cushing plays Baron Victor Frankenstein, who is up to his regular antics experimenting on human corpses.

Alfred Hitchcock's final film while a chic psychological feature is much more comedic and tongue-in-cheek than the British icon's previous works. Hitchcock died in 1980, and he clearly had fun making this ensemble film about a hack psychic who gets involved with a pair of professional robbers.

Family Plot stars Bruce Dern, Karen Black, Barbara Harris, and William Devane. The movie brings Hitchcock's prolific career to a cheerful conclusion.

NEXT: The Debut Features Of 10 Iconic Horror Directors, Ranked According To IMDb

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Megan is a public librarian by trade obsessed with the intersections between art, culture, and society. She's a nerd for horror, obscure memes, weird history, graphic novels, and binge-worthy science fiction series.

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The Final Features From 10 Iconic Horror Directors, Ranked According To IMDb - Screen Rant

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero