Eighteen Film Buffs Talk About The Scariest Movies They’ve Ever Seen
Even film critics watch these movies with the lights on.
Dead Europe
Matt Ravier, The Festivalists
Commercial horror films exploit irrational fears of a supernatural world – monsters under the bed. It’s a world I don’t believe in, not even alone in the dark under the grips of paranoia, and so these movies – good for a few jump scares – don’t deliver true existential fright.
Not so Tony Krawitz’ adaptation of Christos Tsiolkas’ Dead Europe. The horrors he relentlessly brings up along this oppressive and nightmarish road trip are unforgivable atrocities that fester in the Old Continent like an infected wound. It’s a hellish vision of a world where hatred poisons the blood, manifesting itself in all forms of abuse.
The inhumane treatment of refugees echoes the persecution of the Jews, and sexual exploitation resonates with the austerity measures paralysing a continent wrestling with liberalism and globalisation. These monsters are real: we are in bed with them.