Films like The Human Centipede or Salo are notorious for being one-time watches. Viewers are left traumatised after the first session and prefer to not go back once again. The psychological repercussions of these films as well as the connotations are rooted in the general air of discomfort and shock.
With a few days left before Halloween, horror buffs are perhaps gearing up to load their watchlists with films that will last them the entire week. Netflix and its burgeoning collection of horror content have rarely left us disappointed and have some of the best horror films streaming on their platform right now.
However, there are quite a few films that are too unsettling to be watched again. Harrowing and nightmarish, often with a dollop of blood and scatological humour, these films leave even the horror aficionados confused and creeped out, shaken to their very core.
Here, at Best of Netflix, we compiled a list of six such horror films that even fans will probably refuse to watch twice:
6 Netflix horror films fans won’t watch twice:
6. Hush (Mike Flanagan, 2016)
Starring Kate Siegel as a deaf and mute author living in a solitary cabin in the woods, a deadly masked killer, high on bloodlust, pursues her and attempts to kill her in various gory ways.
While the background music and scares are essential in horror films, silence in horror is especially unsettling. Flanagan capitalises on this and adds plenty of eerie jump-scares to this already nerve-wracking premise. Considered to be one of his creepiest flicks to date, the auditory impairment of the protagonist makes the situation appear way more ominous.
Surely the audience members would not like to live through the same anxiety and anticipation that the film holds in its entirety.
5. Raw (Julia Ducournau, 2017)
After a hazing ritual at college exposes her to meat, strict vegetarian Justine begins to experience a craving for meat, specifically human flesh. Thus, the gory saga begins!
While the film itself abounds in blood, gore, nudity and sex along with a lot of drug abuse, Justine’s low yet steady descent into the carnivorous obsession for raw flesh is quite unnerving. The madness and obsessive behaviour of the character heightens the overall sinister atmosphere of the film, making it one of the most controversial films streaming on Netflix right now.
Fans will surely be repulsed by the premise itself and despite enjoying Garance Marillier’s dexterous performance, never return for second servings!
4. The Swarm (Just Philippot, 2020)
Amidst raging poverty and a failing business desperate to provide for her family, a woman discovers locust farming as well as how locusts thrive the best on blood, especially that of humans. Determined to stop at nothing, the woman goes to the extent of drawing her own blood to feed the swarms.
A terrifying French film that was recently added to Netflix, the underlying horror in The Swarm does not only depend on its gory premise but also on the intrinsic relationship between financial downfall and psychological degradation and subsequent depravity.
Starring Sofian Khammesas, Suliane Brahim and Marie Narbonne, the film is a harrowing and nightmarish ride.
3. Hereditary (Ari Aster, 2018)
Aster himself found the film to be a difficult creative product. “I don’t feel comfortable being explicit about it,” he says. “It’s easier for me not to go into detail. I was pulling more from feelings than experiences.”
The film is indeed pretty ominous and is a harrowing take on trauma, grief and demonic possession as a family death begins to take a toll on the family members, gradually overwhelming them with a malevolent supernatural presence. The claustrophobic silences, the general eeriness of the characters, especially the youngest character Charlie and her bizarre clicking noises make it a difficult watch.
It is too unnerving and horror fans, despite their high levels of tolerance, might feel suffocated by it.
2. Hostel (Eli Roth, 2005)
In Amsterdam, three backpackers are locked out of the establishment they are residing in and soon gets ushered into a Slovakian hostel where they are surrounded by attractive women who lure them into dangerous and deadly traps.
If you love backpacking across the country, avoid this film as it will make you have nightmares every time you travel. Grisly and gory with unimaginable torture methods being employed. The general air of madness, tension, violence and horror is filled with scatological humour, sex and drugs, but the terror heightens with an entry into the hostel.
Essentially known as “torture porn”, the film will most likely leave you scarred for life.
1. The Platform (Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia, 2019)
Providing a jarring look into the depravity of the human psyche, the film shows the distress of humanity at the brink of a catastrophic conflict that threatens their sanity and dignity. Prisoners receive the leftovers of people on preceding floors and as the food shortage gradually increases, they turn wild and cannibalistic.
This Spanish sci-fi horror film is brutal, disgusting and a hellish watch. With its grotesque scenes of ravenous feeding that follows extended periods of intense starvation, the film is too unsettling to return to.
Not only does it provide a brutal and scathing commentary on the politics of hunger but also drive in the ideals regarding capitalism, class and economic divides and more. Man is imprisoned by greed and the fruitlessness of life is heightened in this disturbing film.
