When it comes to horror, Hollywood tends to dominate the conversation. But the truth is, some of the scariest horror films I’ve ever watched weren’t made in the US at all. They came from Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, and beyond, bringing with them new myths, unfamiliar rhythms, and a willingness to truly unsettle.
7
Noroi: The Curse (2005, Japan)
Watch Noroi: The Curse on SHUDDER
The first film I saw using “found footage” was The Blair Witch Project. I would think it’s the same for many folks. And while the idea of found footage has been used in countless other films, some have aged well, like Cloverfield, and others haven’t, like Paranormal Activity.
Noroi: The Curse is among the best found footage films. Shot as a faux documentary, it follows journalist Masafumi Kobayashi as he pieces together a web of strange events: missing children, psychic experiments gone wrong, and a woman who hears terrifying noises in her home. Everything seems unconnected—until it isn’t.
What makes Noroi special is its pacing. It never resorts to cheap scares. Instead, it builds layer upon layer of unease until you feel as if the curse has started leaking out of the film and into your living room. The “found footage” style feels disturbingly authentic, and it’s one of the few films that really feels scary.
6
Train to Busan (2016, South Korea)
Watch Train to Busan on Netflix or Kanopy
Zombie films are everywhere, and I’ll admit, I went into Train to Busan expecting just another bloodbath. Instead, I got one of the most intense, heartbreaking horror films of the last decade.
The setup is simple: a father and his young daughter board a train just as a zombie outbreak grips South Korea. As the infection spreads carriage by carriage, the survivors have no choice but to fight or sacrifice themselves. Director Yeon Sang-ho uses the confined setting brilliantly, turning the train into a claustrophobic nightmare where there’s nowhere to run.
5
Shutter (2004, Thailand)
Watch Shutter on Kanopy
I’ve seen a lot of ghost films, but Shutter unnerved me in a way few others have. After a car accident, photographer Tun and his girlfriend Jane start noticing ghostly figures appearing in their photos. As the hauntings intensify, the truth about Tun’s past begins to surface, and it’s darker than either of them imagined.
The film uses photography as a perfect horror device. There’s something inherently eerie about photos capturing what the human eye misses, and Shutter wrings every ounce of fear from that idea. The jump scares land hard, but it’s the oppressive atmosphere that really gets under your skin.
Hollywood tried to remake Shutter in 2008, but it couldn’t match the slow-burn terror of the original.
4
Under the Shadow (2016, Iran)
Watch Under the Shadow on Netflix
Under the Shadow is one of those rare horror films that feels both supernatural and painfully real. Set in Tehran during the Iran–Iraq War, it follows Shideh, a mother trying to protect her daughter, Dorsa, as strange occurrences plague their apartment.
At first, you wonder if the stress of living under constant bombardment is making Shideh paranoid. But soon, the line between psychological trauma and genuine haunting blurs. The “djinn” that stalks them may be supernatural, but it’s also a metaphor for fear, repression, and powerlessness.
What makes this film hit hard is the sense of claustrophobia. They’re trapped not just by the haunting, but by war itself. There’s literally nowhere safe to run. Every creak of the building, every flicker of shadow, feels like it might be the end.
This is absolutely one of those horror films you must watch, but nobody ever talks about them.
3
Verónica (2017, Spain)
Watch Verónica on Netflix
The scariest horror films are those with a grounding in a real story, and that’s exactly what Verónica brings to the table.
It’s loosely based on a real case documented by Spanish police in 1991, following the tale of a teenage girl who, while babysitting her younger siblings, tries to contact her deceased father using a Ouija board.
Director Paco Plaza ([REC]) builds tension masterfully, and Verónica is packed with terrifying set-pieces. In that, the jump scares aren’t subtle. Yet, what grounds Verónica is how believable its characters are. Instead of pushing into classic horror archetypes, she’s just a teenager trying to look after her siblings while coping with grief.
2
Incantation (2022, Taiwan)
Watch Incantation on Netflix
Incantion combines two of the styles and topics I’ve already talked about: found footage and inspiration from real-world events. And in Incantation, this combination delivers an intense, unsettling experience.
It follows Li Ronan, a woman who broke a taboo years earlier and is now trying to protect her young daughter from the resulting curse. What really brings the horrors unfolding to life are the Taiwanese religious beliefs, which infuse the film with specific cultural references that lend a level of realism to the events.
Here and there, it also breaks the fourth wall and really makes you part of the ritual, like you’re complicit in what you’re viewing. It really is troubling.
There is a reason this became Taiwan’s highest-grossing horror film of all time.
1
The Wailing (2016, South Korea)
Watch The Wailing on Amazon Prime Video
The Wailing is a complete horror experience, from start to finish. At two and a half hours, it’s not a quick watch, but that’s part of its power.
Set in a rural Korean village, it begins as a police investigation into a string of violent murders and mysterious illnesses. But as suspicion falls on a strange outsider, the film spirals into a hallucinatory nightmare of possession, paranoia, and ancient evil.
It mixes crime drama, religious horror, and folklore in a way Hollywood rarely dares. I’ve watched it twice, and each time I came away with new questions and new theories. And as the film winds its way through the horror, slowly tightening its noose, your feeling of disorientation will only grow.
Hollywood knows how to make a scary movie, sure. But foreign horror pushes boundaries in ways mainstream US films rarely attempt. Some of the topics explored by these films wouldn’t get the time of day.
Of course, this is a tiny sliver of the best foreign-language horror films. Thankfully, these days, streaming platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, SHUDDER, and even Kanopy (accessible with a US library card!) are bringing these amazing films to US audiences.
