This is the tenth entry in a series that I am doing on the best, or at least my favorite, live-action horror films of each year. I am excited to be covering 1999 here as it means that I can close out the first decade of this series, and we can do it on a high note. Each entry in this series includes a winning film along with up to five or so honorable mentions for each year. I also throw in some of what I call “tangential bonus films” at the end. These are films that incorporate horror elements but, in my view at least, do not primarily fit within the horror genre. These tangential bonus films are thus not actually horror films per se but are films that should be enjoyed by horror fans for their comedic or other use of horror elements and subject matter.
Overall, 1999 was possibly the strongest year of the entire 1990s decade for horror. 1999 itself was one of the strongest years for film in general and might actually be my favorite film year of my entire life. So, with that it makes sense that the strength of films would carry over into horror. Several of the films on this list are iconic films in their own right and would have influence far beyond the world of horror fanatics. As per usual, there are always some obvious choices for each year that horror fans would expect to see on here, as these films are known and regularly make appearances on best of the decade lists. I definitely include some of those, but I also try to include some smaller, oddball, or cult films that I particularly enjoy. Given that these are my picks, of course they all come recommended. I also went overboard again and included four entries in the category of the tangential bonus film. I recommend all of those as well, as films that are perhaps a better classification fit with other genres though they certainly incorporate some horror elements and should be of interest to a horror audience. I am not sure that I can identify any clear themes that connect the six horror entries for this year. The one thing that I can say was that 1999 was a good year for ghost movies.
As always, horror is one of the truly underappreciated film genres, and the 1990s as a decade is one of the underappreciated eras within horror film. That decade is often thought of as a bit of a ‘dark ages’ situation between the numerous horror classics of the 1970s and 1980s and the modern revival of the genre and the dominance of highbrow, artsy, or ‘elevated’ horror films during the late 2000s and especially during the 2010s. That reason, and that we are now culturally in a bit of a 1990s nostalgia period, is why I wanted to start in the 1990s and proceed through the decade year by year. There were quite a few quality horror films that came out during the 1990s that are worth rediscovering. So, whether you are a horror fan, or just looking for a hit of that sweet 1990s nostalgia, I hope you enjoy this list. Previous horror lists for 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, and 1998 are available, so check those out as well.
Winner: The Sixth Sense
MPAA Rating: PG13
The Sixth Sense is one of those special movies for me that has left a lasting impression on me. On some level it really is that great of a film that made a name (and career) for writer-director M. Night Shyamalan. It is also the only movie that I have ever walked out of because it was too scary for me. I was about eleven years old when this movie came out and I saw it in theaters, and it legitimately scared me and gave me nightmares. The entire beginning of the movie was tense and got to me, but what really got to me as a kid was the scene of the ghost of the kid who found his father’s gun and thus had part of his head blown off. It was just too much for me as a kid. And I did not see this movie in its entirety for years after that. Obviously since then I have seen it many times and quite enjoy it. That is of course why it tops our list here.
For those that do not know, I will try to give the spoiler free version of the plot. The story is about a child psychologist (played by Bruce Willis) whose new patient is a disturbed young boy (played by Haley Joel Osment). We learn that this boy is psychologically disturbed because he has the ability to see and interact with ghosts. The iconic line from this movie, that is even in the trailer, is him saying “I see dead people”. Willis’ character tries to help the kid come to understand his ability and if he cannot get rid of the ghosts then at least transform his ability into something productive. There is of course a famous plot twist at the end of the movie that I am almost certain that everyone knows but still I do not want to spoil it for the five people in the world that do not know it. There is great writing, great character development, and great scenes throughout the movie. This was not Shayamalan’s first film, but it was his first in the horror genre and is truly the film that establishes the tropes and characteristics that define a Shayamalan type film. The twist ending is certainly one of those elements.
One of the great things about The Sixth Sense is that the film comes across as gripping and suspenseful the first time that you watch it without knowing the twist. However, it might get even better the second, third, and fourth times that you watch it when you already know the twist. And that is the mark of a great movie, and in particular a very well written movie. You can see how Shayamalan weaves the clues seamlessly throughout the story, and you can even focus on the other elements of the story, like the stellar acting performances. Haley Joel Osment gives the best acting performances by a child actor that I have ever seen. Bruce Willis is the star actor and his performance in this movie is fine, but Osment steals the show. Osment was nominated for both the Academy Award and Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor, and if you ask me, he should have won. Toni Collette also gives a great performance as the boy’s mother, and she was likewise nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. We also get some quality smaller role performances by Olivia Williams and Donnie Wahlberg. In all, The Sixth Sense was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Film Editing. The Sixth Sense was also one of the most commercially successful films of the year and was actually the second highest grossing film in the world in 1999.
In short, The Sixth Sense is tense and well made from start to finish. It is still my favorite ghost movie ever. And it might actually be my favorite movie from 1999 itself, and not just my favorite horror movie from 1999.
Honorable Mention: Sleepy Hollow
MPAA Rating: R
Tim Burton is one of those famous directors that has flirted with horror or at least lived in the horror-adjacent sphere for most of his career with his myriad dark fantasy films. However, Sleep Hollow is one of those times where he clearly steps into the horror genre with both feet. What is particularly enjoyable about Sleepy Hollow is that it works simultaneously as a horror film and as a Tim Burton film. If you were a casual viewer just going through and watching Tim Burton’s filmography, Sleepy Hollow is not out of place tonally with the rest of his catalog. Sure, it is a bit darker and more explicitly violent than many other Tim Burton films, but he is able to maintain that quirky gothic atmosphere and style in Sleepy Hollow that is so characteristic of Tim Burton. Tim Burton movies all look and feel a similar way, and Sleepy Hollow is consistent with that Tim Burton feel, style, and atmosphere. However, if you are a horror fan that stumbles across this film in looking for a good gothic and supernatural horror adaptation of the classic The Legend of Sleepy Hollow story by Washington Irving, then you would also be satisfied with Sleepy Hollow as a film. Though it certainly takes some liberties with and embellishes on Irving’s story, the film delivers an engaging story and character performances alongside the well-executed ghostly and supernatural visual effects, violence, gore, and imagery that you would expect from this type of movie. It is difficult to make a movie that appeals to that broad of a viewer base, but this movie manages to accomplish that task.
Because this is a Tim Burton movie, of course we get Johnny Depp in the lead role as Ichabod Crane. Feel how you want about Depp, but he is actually decent in this, and he notably does not overact to the degree he does in other Burton films. The supporting cast is particularly strong, including the likes of Christina Ricci, Miranda Richardson, Michael Gambon, Casper Van Dien, Jeffrey Jones, Christopher Lee, Christopher Walken (as the Headless Horseman), Richard Griffiths, Ian McDiarmid, and Michael Gough. If the film was too reliant upon Depp, then it probably would not work as well. But the strength of the supporting cast really elevates the film. Sleepy Hollow actually won the Academy Award for Best Art Direction and was also nominated for Best Cinematography and Best Costume Design. I agree that those are strengths of the film as well. Overall, Sleepy Hollow is a well-made film and is a surprisingly satisfying one that holds up now decades later.
Honorable Mention: Stir of Echoes
MPAA Rating: R
In an alternative universe where The Sixth Sense was never released and thus did not become a massive success and influential film, then Stir of Echoes would be remembered by horror fans as the great ghost movie from 1999. But unfortunately for Stir of Echoes, we do not live in that universe. And it pains me to say it, given how solid Stir of Echoes is as a film, but it is merely the second greatest ghost movie of 1999. It was released one month after The Sixth Sense and things could have gone one way or the other. Stir of Echoes could have been either boosted by the success of that film with audiences wanting to see another ghost movie, or it could have been buried by it with audiences being turned off by the idea of seeing yet another ghost movie about someone who can interact with a ghost. Sadly, the latter is what happened, and Stir of Echoes was buried in the wake of the success of The Sixth Sense.
Stir of Echoes is loosely based on the book A Stir of Echoes by Richard Matheson published back in 1958. For the plot, Kevin Bacon stars as a working-class man in Chicago who after being hypnotized begins receiving terrifying premonitions and even images of the ghost of a missing girl from the neighborhood. Stir of Echoes is its own distinct story, but it does have some commonalities with some older films. For one, it shares an important plot element with the great 1980 horror film, The Changeling, involving a man receiving messages from a ghost who wants the man to solve the mystery of their death and disappearance.
Unfortunately for both this film and for audiences, people missed out on this one in theaters. In any other year, this film would have likely been more commercially successful. It is now correctly regarded as a cult classic and an overlooked gem from the era. The acting in the film is solid, but Kevin Bacon in the lead role really delivers the standout performance. Regular readers will remember that Kevin Bacon was also good in 1990’s Tremors film which was of course on the list for that year. Kevin Bacon is often overlooked and underappreciated as an actor in general, but that is particularly the case here in several of his horror films.
Honorable Mention: Audition (Ōdishon)
MPAA Rating: R
Audition is one of these movies that premiered late in 1999 but did not receive a wider release until the early 2000s. According to the rules of my lists, I try to place films (and albums) in the year of their initial release, rather than when they arrived in the United States. Back on the 1998 horror list, I talked about how The Ring was a breakout film for Japanese horror internationally. Audition was one of the Japanese horror films to attain international acclaim in the wake of The Ring and was thus another of the films that contributed to increased international awareness of and interest in Japanese horror films.
Audition is based on the novel of the same name by Ryu Murakami published in 1997. The film was directed by Takashi Miike, who is one of the more prolific directors in Japanese cinema in a variety of genres. However, horror fans will also know him for directing 2001’s Ichi the Killer and 2003’s One Missed Call. As for the plot, the story centers on a widower who has a friend that is a producer. They plan to stage an audition of actresses for a fake show in order for our widower to meet and essentially interview women for the part of his romantic partner. He is quite taken with one woman in particular and they begin dating. However, she has a brutally violent game of her own that she plays against men who break her trust and their pledge of love for her. The film thus touches on themes of the objectification of women, the abuse of one’s job and position of power for personal gain, and female vengeance against a misogynistic society. Now obviously because we are in the horror genre, we are presented with a particularly violent, extreme, and disturbing version of that. But of course, the extreme version of things is the specialty of the horror genre.
Honorable Mention: The Blair Witch Project
MPAA Rating: R
The Blair Witch Project is another of these movies that I have a strange history with. Unlike The Sixth Sense, I did not see this one in theaters and instead only saw this one years later when I was in either high school or college. Because of how hyped this movie had been for being supposedly the most tense and terrifying movie ever, I was disappointed by The Blair Witch Project for not living up to my expectations. I also had the attitude back then of how nothing can scare me, and it led me to not take a lot of movies seriously and not try to appreciate them for what they are. I would like to think that I have gotten wiser as I have gotten older, but you all can decide on that for yourselves. But in recent years I have been able to go back to some of the films from that era and reevaluate them. Some of them really were trash, while others like this one were unworthy of my immediate dismissal.
While not the first film in the found footage subgenre, The Blair Witch Project is the one that really popularized this narrative style and was the most well-known found footage movie until at least 2007’s Paranormal Activity. The found footage subgenre is characterized by being entirely from the perspective of the characters within the story. What the viewer sees in the film is only the footage that was taken by the characters themselves. For example, in The Blair Witch Project our three characters (Heather, Mike, and Josh) are making a documentary film about the legend of the Blair Witch in rural Maryland. The footage that we the audience see is the supposedly raw footage from their handheld camera as they are interviewing people, as they are walking around and getting lost in the woods, and as they eventually disappear under mysterious circumstances which is implied to be caused by the Blair Witch.
The relative uniqueness of this filming and narrative technique allows for the audience to suspend a degree of disbelief, and it allows the film to build genuine tension and suspense which makes all of the random sounds that they hear when lost in the woods that much scarier and more effective. The film also works effectively because they do not try to over dramatize it or embellish it with overtly supernatural elements. Everything here is presented in a very grounded way which aids the believability. Audience inexperience with the found footage style, the fake viral website, and that lack of supernatural elements contributed to many people at the time believing that this was actually like a snuff film and that these were three real people that went missing.
The Blair Witch Project was filmed on a ridiculously low budget of $60,000 and became a massive commercial success. It was actually the tenth highest grossing film in the world in 1999, which makes it one of the most profitable movies in history. I am also here to tell you that beyond its commercial success, the film is still quite effective if you go into it with the correct mindset. And even over twenty years now since it was released, it is still easily one of the best ‘found footage’ movies ever made.
Honorable Mention: Deep Blue Sea
MPAA Rating: R
Back on the 1995 horror movie list, I said that Lord of Illusions might just be a schlocky B-movie, but it is one of the best and most enjoyable B-movies that I have ever seen. The same is entirely true here with Deep Blue Sea. It might be a schlocky B-movie, but it is the best kind of schlocky B-movie. This movie is endlessly enjoyable to watch even though walking into it there are no real surprises, and you are already familiar with all of the story elements. You are already familiar with the story because (as they mention in the Honest Trailer) this movie is a glorified rip-off of Jaws meets Jurassic Park. Even just in labeling it as a cross between Jaws and Jurassic Park, you probably already have the correct idea in your head about what happens in this movie. A team of scientists at this ocean research station manipulate and enhance the brains of sharks in order to develop a cure for Alzheimer’s. But of course, when you create genetically engineered super-intelligent sharks, they will of course find a way to escape and wreak havoc on the people at the research station. The sharks here perform a similar intelligent monster function as the velociraptors in Jurassic Park.
The cast certainly elevates the film and makes it more enjoyable than it would be otherwise. This includes Thomas Jane, Samuel L. Jackson, Saffron Burrows, LL Cool J, Stellan Skarsgard, and Michael Rapaport. Given the type of movie this is, it would be all too easy for the cast to phone in their performances. But they do not. The cast actually puts effort into these performances, which again elevates the movie. Michael Rapaport is particularly enjoyable, and I have said it before, but he is one of those fun comedic character actors that deserves more recognition than he gets. The only actual truly bad thing about this movie is the CGI. The CGI was not even that great for the time, and definitely has not held up well twenty years later. However, the dodginess of the CGI does make the viewer that much more aware of how great the practical effects are, especially when it comes to the robotic sharks.
There were a few of these schlocky creature features that came out around this time period, with Lake Placid being the other one that most readily comes to mind. However, Deep Blue Sea was the best of them, and it is truly better than it has any right to be. There is genuine tension in many of these scenes, and this movie has some of the best and most surprising kills in any of these shark or creature movies. There is not exactly much in the way of stiff competition for the title, but Deep Blue Sea is definitely the best shark movie of the 1990s decade.
Tangential Bonus 1: The Green Mile
MPAA Rating: R
The Green Mile is another great film adapted from a great Stephen King story. It is based on the novel of the same name published back in 1996. This movie came in at number six on my previous list of the best films based on the works of Stephen King. This is writer-director Frank Darabont’s second of three King adaptations. The first was The Shawshank Redemption which was in this same tangential bonus section back on the 1994 list. Darabont’s third King adaptation would be 2007’s The Mist film. Like Shawshank, The Green Mile is another King prison drama. However, The Green Mile incorporates some supernatural elements. It truly is a great film and was both critically acclaimed and commercially successful. It was the ninth highest grossing film in the world in 1999. The film also received four Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (for Michael Clarke Duncan), Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Sound. The Green Mile also features a great cast including Tom Hanks, David Morse, Bonnie Hunt, Michael Clarke Duncan, James Cromwell, Sam Rockwell, William Sadler, Jeffrey DeMunn, Michael Jeter, Graham Greene, Doug Hutchison, and Patricia Clarkson, etc. At three hours in length, it is definitely on the longer side, but is obviously worth checking out if you have not seen it.
Tangential Bonus 2: The Mummy
MPAA Rating: PG13
The Mummy is one of these great films that I have been fortunate enough to have enjoyed at various points in my life, including around the time it came out. If 1999 was a weaker year in horror, this might be the type of movie that I would try to stretch into the horror category because it does have some horror elements. It is ostensibly a remake of the 1932 The Mummy movie starring Boris Karloff. However, this version of The Mummy incorporates a lot of narrative and genre elements including horror, action-adventure, comedy, and romantic drama. As they even say in the Honest Trailer, this movie is basically just a mummy-themed version of an Indiana Jones type of movie. Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz are two leads, and they are wonderful in these roles. But we also get good supporting cast performances by John Hannah, Arnold Vosloo, Kevin J. O’Conner, Jonathan Hyde, Oded Fehr, and Patricia Velasquez, etc.
Tangential Bonus 3: eXistenZ
MPAA Rating: R
Unlike the other three films in this tangential bonus section, eXistenZ was not a movie that I saw when I was younger. That is for two reasons. For one, as a kid, I was too young for this movie and was not exactly up on the David Cronenberg films. The other reason is just that this film was not commercially successful at all, and was a flop even compared to its modest budget. This is a bit surprising given that The Matrix was released just a month earlier and featured some similar themes of the blurring of reality and virtual reality and that uncertainty about which is real and which is not. Perhaps this situation is analogous to what I mentioned above about how Stir of Echoes was really buried in the wake of The Sixth Sense. Even though they touch on some similar themes, though not in the same way, eXistenZ was definitely nowhere near the commercial success and popular culture sensation that was The Matrix. While Cronenberg is known for body horror, eXistenz is not one that I would classify as a proper horror film. It certainly features some body horror elements, but it integrates them into a story that is more of a science fiction action-drama about a video game virtual reality. Cronenberg is known for his numerous horror films from the 1970s and 1980s, but he really moved away from horror during the 1990s. While eXistenZ may not be a proper horror film, it is still refreshing to see Cronenberg move back in the direction of this type of genre fare at the end of the decade. eXistenZ stars Jude Law and Jennifer Jason Leigh in the lead roles and contains strong supporting performances by the likes of Ian Holm, Willem Dafoe, and Christopher Eccleston.
Tangential Bonus 4: Double Jeopardy
MPAA Rating: R
Double Jeopardy is a fun movie as crime thrillers go, and it is unfortunately one of those movies that I feel that people have somewhat forgotten about. Ashley Judd plays a woman whose husband (played by Bruce Greenwood) disappears one night when they are out on a boat together. Police find her on the boat out in the ocean with a knife, blood all over, and a missing husband. She is convicted for his murder and incarcerated. However, while in prison she discovers that her husband might have framed her and faked his own death for the insurance money and run off under a new identity with their son and the nanny as his new wife. When she gets out of prison, she is determined to track him down, recover her son, and kill her husband at all costs. This involves breaking her parole, which then sees her being pursued across the country by her parole officer (played by Tommy Lee Jones). The story is admittedly a bit bonkers, and the writers’ interpretation of the legal concept of double jeopardy might not exactly be something you want to take as your defense in court, but I challenge any of you to not have fun watching this movie. For those of you that care about Rotten Tomatoes, the 30+ point difference between the critic score and the audience score will tell you a lot. This movie is fun, and people enjoy it. I am also unabashedly a fan of Ashley Judd, which you might remember from the inclusion of Kiss the Girls on the 1997 list. She is largely underappreciated as an actress and is always a pleasure to see on screen. And she shows that here with a rather strong performance in Double Jeopardy.
Doctored Entertainment 