Decade
1940s Horror
The horror that defined the 1940s — ranked by Crypt Score, from era-defining classics to the deep cuts worth resurrecting.
87 titles
The Beast with Five Fingers
›1947 · Mystery, Horror · 88m · Robert Alda, Andrea King, Peter Lorre
Locals in an Italian village believe evil has taken over the estate of a recently deceased pianist where murder has taken place. The alleged killer: the pianist's severed hand.
The Invisible Man Returns
›1940 · Horror, Science Fiction · 81m · Cedric Hardwicke, Vincent Price, Nan Grey
The owner of a coal mining operation, falsely imprisoned for fratricide, takes a drug to make him invisible, despite its side effect: gradual madness.
Murder, He Says
›1945 · Comedy, Mystery, Crime · 91m · Fred MacMurray, Helen Walker, Marjorie Main
Pete Marshall is sent as a replacement to the mountain district town of Plainville when a public opinion surveyor who went there goes missing. Visiting the hillbilly family of Mamie Fleagle, Pete begins to suspect that she and her two sons have murdered the surveyor. Pete also believes that Mamie is slowly poisoning wealthy Grandma Fleagle, who has put a vital clue to her fortune in a nonsensical embroidered sampler.
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff
›1949 · Comedy, Horror, Mystery · 84m · Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Boris Karloff
Lost Caverns Hotel bellhop Freddie Phillips is suspected of murder. Swami Talpur tries to hypnotize Freddie into confessing, but Freddie is too stupid for the plot to work. Inspector Wellman uses Freddie to get the killer (and it isn't the Swami).
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
›1941 · Drama, Horror, Science Fiction · 113m · Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman, Lana Turner
Dr. Jekyll believes good and evil exist in everyone and creates a potion that allows his evil side, Mr. Hyde, to come to the fore. He faces horrible consequences when he lets his dark side run amok.
Dr. Cyclops
›1940 · Adventure, Horror, Science Fiction · 76m · Albert Dekker, Thomas Coley, Janice Logan
Four explorers are summoned to Peru by the brilliant physicist Dr Thorkel. They discover a rich source of radium and a half-mad Thorkel who shrinks them down to one-fifth their normal size when they threaten to stop his unorthodox experimentation.
The Return of the Vampire
›1943 · Horror · 69m · Bela Lugosi, Nina Foch, Roland Varno
In 1918, an English family is terrorized by a vampire, until they learn how to deal with it. They think their troubles are over, but German bombs in WWII free the monster. He reclaims the soul of his wolfman ex-servant, and assuming the identity of a scientist who has just escaped from a concentration camp, he starts out on a plan to get revenge upon the family.
Bluebeard
›NR1944 · Crime, Thriller, Horror · 72m · John Carradine, Jean Parker, Nils Asther
Young female models are being strangled. Will law enforcement be able to stop the crime wave before more women become victims?
The Halfway House
›1944 · Mystery, Drama, Fantasy · 95m · Mervyn Johns, Glynis Johns, Sally Ann Howes
A group of travellers, each with a personal problem that they want to hide, arrive at a mysterious Welsh country inn. There is a certain strangeness in the air as they are greeted by the innkeeper and his daughter. Why are all the newspapers a year old? And why doesn't Gwyneth seem to cast a shadow?
Phantom of the Opera
›NR1943 · Horror, Romance · 89m · Nelson Eddy, Susanna Foster, Claude Rains
Following a tragic accident that leaves him disfigured, crazed composer Erique Claudin transformed into a masked phantom who schemes to make beautiful young soprano Christine Dubois the star of the opera and wreak revenge on those who stole his music.
Follow Me Quietly
›NR1949 · Crime, Mystery, Thriller · 60m · William Lundigan, Dorothy Patrick, Jeff Corey
When it rains in the city, a serial killer known as "The Judge" looks for his next strangling victim. For months, the madman has been stalking at night, leaving behind clues, but police efforts have been fruitless. Constructing a life-size dummy of the murderer, police Lt. Harry Grant is growing obsessed with capturing him, and always following Grant is the relentless reporter Ann Gorman looking to break the story, but the hunt continues.
The Amazing Mr. X
›1948 · Thriller, Horror · 78m · Turhan Bey, Lynn Bari, Cathy O'Donnell
On the beach one night, Christine Faber, two years a widow, thinks she hears her late husband Paul calling out of the surf...then meets a tall dark man, Alexis, who seems to know all about such things. After more ghostly manifestations, Christine and younger sister Janet become enmeshed in the eerie artifices of Alexis; but he in turn finds himself manipulated into deeper deviltry than he had in mind...
The Ghost of Frankenstein
›1942 · Horror, Science Fiction · 68m · Cedric Hardwicke, Ralph Bellamy, Lionel Atwill
Frankenstein's unscrupulous colleague, Dr. Bohmer, plans to transplant Ygor's brain so he can rule the world using the monster's body, but the plan goes sour when he turns malevolent and goes on a rampage.
Weird Woman
›1944 · Horror, Mystery · 64m · Lon Chaney Jr., Anne Gwynne, Evelyn Ankers
After bringing his beautiful new wife Paula home to America from a remote island on which she was raised, Professor Norman Reed begins to feel the clash between his world of rational science and hers of bizarre dancing and freaky voodoo rituals. Norman's stuck-up friends also sense Paula's strangeness, and soon their meddling gossip and suspicious scheming push the poor woman to use her magic to defend herself and her husband – and maybe even to kill! Or is it just the power of suggestion...?
The Invisible Woman
›1940 · Comedy, Horror, Science Fiction · 72m · Virginia Bruce, John Barrymore, John Howard
Kitty Carroll, an attractive store model, volunteers to become a test subject for a machine that will make her invisible so that she can use her invisibility to exact revenge on her ex-boss.
The Black Cat
›NR1941 · Comedy, Horror, Mystery · 70m · Basil Rathbone, Hugh Herbert, Broderick Crawford
Greedy heirs wait in a mansion for a rich cat lover to die, only to learn her cats come first.
Man-Made Monster
›1941 · Horror, Science Fiction · 60m · Lon Chaney Jr., Lionel Atwill, Anne Nagel
Mad scientist turns a man into an electrically-controlled monster to do his bidding.
Night Monster
›1942 · Horror, Mystery, Thriller · 72m · Bela Lugosi, Lionel Atwill, Leif Erickson
Kurt Ingston, a rich recluse, invites the doctors who left him a hopeless cripple to his desolate mansion in the swamps as one by one they meet horrible deaths.
House of Horrors
›NR1946 · Horror, Crime, Thriller · 65m · Rondo Hatton, Martin Kosleck, Robert Lowery
An unsuccessful sculptor saves a madman named "The Creeper" from drowning. Seeing an opportunity for revenge, he tricks the psycho into murdering his critics.
The Undying Monster
›1942 · Horror, Mystery · 64m · James Ellison, Heather Angel, John Howard
A werewolf prowls around at night but only kills certain members of one family. It seems like just a coincidence, but the investigating Inspector soon finds out that this tradition has gone on for generations and tries to find a link between the werewolf and the family, leading to a frightening conclusion.
Calling Dr. Death
›1943 · Mystery, Thriller, Horror · 63m · Lon Chaney Jr., Patricia Morison, J. Carrol Naish
Losing his memories of the last few days, neurologist Dr. Steele is told that his wife has been brutally murdered. Steele, aware of his conniving wife's infidelity, believes he may have been the killer and enlists the aid of his pretty nurse Stella to hypnotize him into recovering his lost memories.
The Ghost Train
›1941 · Comedy, Horror, Mystery · 85m · Arthur Askey, Richard Murdoch, Kathleen Harrison
Mismatched travellers are stranded overnight at a lonely rural railway station. They soon learn of local superstition about a phantom train which is said to travel these parts at dead of night, carrying ghosts from a long-ago train wreck in the area.
Before I Hang
›NR1940 · Crime, Horror, Science Fiction · 62m · Boris Karloff, Evelyn Keyes, Bruce Bennett
Dr. John Garth conducting an innovative medical experiment aimed at prolonging life and combating aging. The experiment takes an unexpected turn, placing the doctor in a confrontation with the ethics of his work and the consequences of his research.
The Devil Commands
›NR1941 · Horror, Science Fiction · 65m · Boris Karloff, Richard Fiske, Amanda Duff
A story about a scientist who is obsessed with communicating with the dead.