What's on in October?
Written by Uma Bahl, BA Anthropology and History.
Supermarkets are stocked with pumpkins, costume plans are being discussed between friends, and all of a sudden the walk back from campus is getting dark by teatime. That can mean only one thing: Halloween has arrived.
Luckily, horror fans are eating well this October, with fresh releases clawing their way onto our screens, and a graveyard's worth of classics waiting to be rewatched. So if you’re searching for the perfect film for those Autumn evenings, look no further.
This bite-sized list includes a film for everyone, no matter your taste or your scare threshold!
My recommendations begin with critically acclaimed 2026 psychological horror, Curry Barker’s ‘Obsession’. The movie follows Bear (played by Michael Johnston), a socially awkward teen who would do anything to date his co-worker when he comes across the mysterious ‘One-Wish-Willow’.
What stands out about ‘Obsession’ is how, instead of using loud jumpscares to shock the audience, Barker utilises the uncanny valley hypothesis to make your skin crawl and leave you shaken long after the credits roll.
Next on the list, we take a stranger turn with the surrealist ‘Buddy,’ directed by Casper Kelly. It's 1999 – a group of missing children find themselves trapped in the TV world of ‘It’s Buddy!’ and must find a way to escape the grasp of the tyrannical host Buddy the unicorn (think Barney if he was a serial killer). This movie is super fun, it has a great mix of dark-humour and scares. It might be a ridiculous concept, but it works.
If you like horror with a body-count, ‘Colony’ might be for you. Directed by Jun Ji-hyun, the mastermind behind ‘Train to Busan ’, ’Colony’ has an interesting take on the zombie survival trope, where quarantined survivors have to protect themselves against a zombie herd that is continuously evolving. If you’re an action fan, I highly recommend this film, the fight scenes are intense and exhilarating.
That’s all for the recent releases, next I’ll introduce you to my must-see films.
‘The Fly’ (1986) is a David Cronenberg body-horror classic starring Jeff Goldblum as Seth Brundle, an overly ambitious scientist who, in an experiment mishap, fuses himself with a housefly. While bizarre at first, his slow transformation is just as heartbreaking as it is gross (and it gets really gross).
No horror list would be complete without my personal favourite, Dario Argento’s ‘Suspiria’ (1977). American ballet student Suzy arrives at a prestigious German dance academy, but her excitement dims as she soon comes to learn the school’s terrifying secret.
The visual style is where this film shines. The technicolour palette alongside dramatic lighting turns every corridor and dance studio into something deeply unsettling and dreamlike.
Lastly, I’ll leave you with two recently released films to check out this October. ‘Other Mommy: Your Mommy Won't Save You,’ released on 9 October, and ‘Clayface: Look Fear in The Face,’ released on 23 October.
Happy Halloween!
