Best Horror Movies of 1981

Bubba, an intellectually disabled man, is falsely accused of attacking a young girl. Disguised as a scarecrow, he hides in a cornfield, only to be hunted down and shot by four vigilante men. After they are acquitted due to lack of evidence, the men find themselves being stalked one by one.

A truck driver plays a cat-and-mouse game with a mysterious serial killer in a van who lures young female hitchhiker victims on a desolate Australian highway.

A priest-doctor chasing a man with supernatural regenerative abilities, who has recently escaped from a medical lab, reaches a small town where the mutant goes on a killing spree.

Rejected by her lover, the only man left in Cheryl's life is the orphaned nephew she has raised as her own son. She'll stop at nothing to keep Billy with her. When her plans misfire, she is swept up into an insane frenzy that means death to anyone who comes between her and her obsession. But the investigating detective is convinced that Billy is the real killer - and determined to prove it. Madness and fanaticism work together to drag all concerned into a terrifying vortex of blood-letting that adds a nightmarish twist to the classic Oedipus story.

Madman Marz, an old folklore legend who murdered his family before escaping into the woods, is inadvertently summoned to a campsite to finish the spree he started decades ago.

In the Oregon mountains, a pair of hunters encounter a machete-wielding killer in an abandoned church. Meanwhile, five campers arrive to examine some property one of them has inherited but are warned by the forest ranger not to venture forth. Soon after they set up camp, they begin hearing strange noises, encounter a mysterious singing girl and start disappearing one by one.

A New York City cop and an expert criminologist trying to solve a series of grisly deaths in which the victims have seemingly been maimed by feral animals discover a sinister connection between the crimes and an old legend.

Bullied by classmates, a pudgy military-school student fights back by computer with the devil.

As a lone spaceship proceeds on its long voyage across space, the crew are surprised to encounter a strange pyramid form. Surprise turns to horror as one by one, they discover that their darkest nightmares are all starting to become real. The pyramid has to be behind it all somehow, but how can they save themselves from its influence?

After the death of a high school track star during a race, a mysterious killer in a fencing mask begins murdering her friends and teachers.

A Boston police detective investigates a series of gruesome decapitations of various college coeds, committed by a helmeted, black-leather clad serial killer.

After a doctor kills his mistress and himself while researching the mysterious previous owner of his Boston home, his colleague, Dr. Norman Boyle, takes over his studies and moves his family into the Boston mansion. Soon after, Boyle's young son Bob becomes plagued by visions of a young girl, who warns him of the danger within the house.

Three friends out to disprove cannibalism meet two men on the run who tortured and enslaved a cannibal tribe to find emeralds, and now the tribe is out for revenge.

As an initiation rite into Alpha Sigma Rho fraternity, four pledges must spend a night in Garth Manor, twelve years to the day after the previous resident murdered his entire family.

Thirty years after a murder on the night of Avalon Bay's graduation dance, the sleepy town's teens meet grisly ends at the hands of a prowler once thought to be a jilted soldier home from war.

Damien Thorn has helped rescue the world from a recession, appearing to be a benign corporate benefactor. When he then becomes U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, Damien fulfills a terrifying biblical prophecy. He also faces his own potential demise as an astronomical event brings about the second coming of Christ.

Four successful elderly gentlemen, members of the Chowder Society, share a gruesome, 50-year-old secret. When one of Edward Wanderley's twin sons dies in a bizarre accident, the group begins to see a pattern of frightening events developing.

Rebellious teen Amy defies her parents by going to a trashy carnival that has pulled into town. In tow are her boyfriend, Buzz, and their friends Liz and Richie. Thinking it would be fun to spend the night in the campy "Funhouse" horror ride, the teens witness a murder by a deformed worker wearing a mask. Locked in, Amy and her friends must evade the murderous carnival workers and escape before it leaves town the next day.

In 1970, three children are born at the height of a total eclipse. Due to the sun and moon blocking Saturn, which controls emotions, they have become heartless killers ten years later, and are able to escape detection because of their youthful and innocent facades. A boy and his teenage sister become endangered when they stumble onto the bloody truth.

After failing to kill stubborn survivor Laurie and taking a bullet or six from former psychiatrist Dr. Sam Loomis, Michael Myers has followed Laurie to the Haddonfield Memorial Hospital, where she's been admitted for Myers' attempt on her life. The institution proves to be particularly suited to serial killers, however, as Myers cuts, stabs and slashes his way through hospital staff to reach his favorite victim.

After a series of gory murders commited by mobs of townspeople against visiting tourists, the corpses appear to be coming back to life and living normally as locals in the small town.

A caretaker at a summer camp is burned when a prank goes tragically wrong. After several years of intensive treatment at hospital, he is released back into society, albeit missing some social skills. What follows is a bloody killing spree with the caretaker making his way back to his old stomping ground to confront one of the youths that accidentally burned him.

Twenty years after a Valentine's Day tragedy claimed the lives of five miners, Harry Warden returns for a vengeful massacre among teen sweethearts gearing up for another party.

A young woman inherits an old hotel in Louisiana where, following a series of supernatural "accidents", she learns that the building was built over one of the entrances to Hell.

Five years after the horrible bloodbath at Camp Crystal Lake, new counselors roam the area, not sensing the ominous lurking presence that proves that the grisly legend is real.

A young woman left her family for an unspecified reason. The husband determines to find out the truth and starts following his wife. At first, he suspects that a man is involved. But gradually, he finds out more and more strange behaviors and bizarre incidents that indicate something more than a possessed love affair.

After a man with extraordinary, and frighteningly destructive, telepathic abilities is nabbed by agents from a mysterious rogue corporation, he discovers he is far from the only possessor of such strange powers. Some of the other “scanners” have their minds set on world domination, while others are trying to stop them.

After a bizarre and near fatal encounter with a serial killer, a newswoman is sent to a rehabilitation center whose inhabitants may not be what they seem.

American tourists David and Jack are savagely attacked by an unidentified animal while hiking on the Yorkshire Moors. After retiring to the home of a beautiful nurse to recuperate, David soon begins experiencing disturbing changes to his body and mind.

In 1979, a group of college students find a Sumerian Book of the Dead in an old wilderness cabin they've rented for a weekend getaway.