Modern Horror Movies That Feel Like Forgotten VHS Tapes

Added: 2026-05-22

[00:00:00]We love looking back at the 70s and 80s searching for forgotten horror gems, but what if the next cult classics are already here? Somewhere underneath the mainstream releases, there's another world of horror happening right now.

[00:00:13][clears throat] Creature features, nightmare fuel, disturbing indie experiments, alien parasites, possessed dolls, movies that feel like they were discovered on damaged VHS tapes at 2:00 a.m. And tonight you found them. Welcome to the broadcast, the late-night horror show where we dig through forgotten nightmares, underground horror, and cult movies that feel lost in time. Tonight's broadcast is dedicated to modern horror movies that are carrying that weird 80s cinema feel. These may be movies that were released in 2026, but they very well could have been found on them dusty VHS shelves from the 80s. You think that they don't make 80s cheesy B horror movies today? They do, and I'm going to prove it. So, turn the lights off because we're going to start with one that feels like a bad decision immediately. And that movie is called Touch Me. And yes, it is exactly how it sounds.

[00:01:16]No, honestly.

[00:01:17]>> [laughter] >> Imagine meeting the perfect person and then realizing they might not actually be human. Touch Me is a mix of body horror, alien seduction, psychological obsession, and neon-drenched nightmare fuel. This movie follows two friends whose lives spiral into something terrifying after an encounter with a mysterious being that may or may not be extraterrestrial. That's right, guys, you heard it here first. This is an alien movie, and the practical effects in this movie are absolutely amazing.

[00:01:49]The alien looks like something straight out of the 80s. It is sloppy, goopy, disgusting.

[00:01:57]Just like I said, this alien seduces these two friends and it gets weird. This is a story that could only be told from the '80s and we're getting it today. All the movies on this list are ones that flew under the radar at the beginning of this year and people are not talking about them. So, that's another reason why we're discovering these movies today because I want people to see these, not just for the '80s nostalgia that they clearly possess, but also because they're super great movies that need to be checked out. This movie has amazing body horror. From beginning to end, it feels like a nightmare. It has this fever dream aspect to it. You never really quite can tell if you can trust our characters or not. And then by the end, you do end up feeling for them.

[00:02:48]They do the character building really well in this movie. But, I'm here for the gore. I'm here for the slime. I'm here for the alien. Check this movie out specifically for that alien mess. It doesn't get any more '80s than saucy aliens, right?

[00:03:07]>> [laughter] >> But, if alien body horror isn't enough for you and you want more, this next one is even nastier. And that's Cold Storage. And this one is by far my favorite movie we're going to discover today. Cold Storage feels like the kind of creature feature people used to rent purely because the VHS cover looked disgusting. The movie centers around a deadly parasitic organism hidden inside a storage facility and starts turning into an absolute nightmare once it escapes containment. What makes this one exciting is it looks fun, not overly polished, not afraid to get weird, just pure chaotic horror energy with monsters, infection horror, and practical effects style madness. This movie feels like the type of movie horror fans discover at midnight screenings and then quote for years to come. I absolutely loved this movie. It has Liam Neeson in it and he plays such a fun funny character. This is a horror comedy, a pure heartfelt horror comedy. And those are my favorite 80s horror movies are the cheesy B horror comedies that know exactly what they are. This movie also stars Joe Keery, Curry, I might be saying it wrong, whatever. He's the kid that plays in Stranger Things and he's phenomenal in this movie. Super charming, super funny, absolutely loved him. This movie goes for it. And like I said, it knows exactly what it is. Has bad CGI effects in it, but it also has super great practical effects in it. So, don't let the CGI [ __ ] deter you from this movie because the practical effects are equally as good. There are just certain things nowadays they can't do practically anymore, such as animals, which is what this movie has in it. There are a few animals in this movie that they had to do CGI. This movie is straight-up balls-to-the-walls bonkers. It is just a bonkers horror movie from beginning to end and it is a splatterfest.

[00:05:15]It does not hold back on the gore. This movie is gory. It's gross. There's vomit.

[00:05:22]>> [laughter] >> This parasite that infects these people and causes them to get all gross and then the way that it infects their bodies and what happens to them after it's done is just gruesome.

[00:05:40]I absolutely loved this one. I had not had this much fun with a horror movie in a really long time. This the is well worth your time. It is just so much fun.

[00:05:51]Definitely check this one out. And speaking of chaotic midnight movie energy, this next one might have the greatest title of any movie we're going to talk about tonight. And that movie is Vampire Zombies from Space.

[00:06:07]>> [laughter] >> Look, [gasps] if a movie's called Vampire Zombies from Space, I'm already interested in it.

[00:06:17]This movie is full-blown retro sci-fi horror comedy explosion packed with practical effects, campy monster madness, grindhouse energy, and pure B-movie chaos. It feels completely unapologetic and in the best way possible. Like someone combined old drive-in creature feature and late-night cable horror insanity. And honestly, we need more movies willing to just be weird and fun again like this one. MVD put out a release of this movie on Blu-ray, and I have it in my hands. So, if you want to pick this movie up, I highly, highly recommend it. This movie was so much fun, so campy. This is a horror comedy. It totally rips off those old '50s cop dramas and black-and-white ones with the police detectives smoking their cigars and drinking their whiskeys and the lighting absolutely mimics that as well. But the campiness of this movie is so much fun. The comedy hits every time.

[00:07:29]It is kind of slap-happy, but it hits.

[00:07:32]It is good fun. And there is so much good gore. I had so much fun watching this. It is not what I expected either, but right when it started, I was all in.

[00:07:46]I was all in on this one in the first 30 seconds. It's basically about these space vampires, and they come down, and they want to take over the Earth, and Dracula, it's his mission to do it, or he's going to be killed because he's not pulling his weight, and his son creates this serum that kind of protects the vampires against the the weird anomalies that can kill them, like crosses and things like that. Like, it is just so fun. There is just so many fun things about this movie. The time that it takes place in, even though this is a modern movie, it takes place in the '50s. Like, it doesn't get much better than this movie. And the best part about it is the filmmakers intentionally designed this movie to look like a lost VHS era cult classic. So, it was just made to be talked about tonight, and it is a movie that I will watch over and over and over again. I had that much fun with it. I was that entertained by it. And I cannot gush about this one enough.

[00:08:46]Definitely check out Vampire Zombies from Space.

[00:08:53]But now, we're going to take a turn into kind of nightmare territory with this next discovery. And that is Over Your Dead Body. Over Your Dead Body is the kind of horror movie where everything feels wrong before anything even happens. Almost starring Jason Segel, and it is already a darker, stranger role than we are used to seeing him in.

[00:09:13]The movie is a blend of psychological horror, obsession, paranoia, and relationship breakdown into something deeply uncomfortable. What makes this one stand out is the tone. It doesn't feel loud or overly theatrical. It feels cold, awkward, emotionally unstable.

[00:09:28]This movie is basically about a couple who are trying to reconcile their differences. They're trying to save their relationship. So, they go on a retreat to a cabin to spend some time together, but low and behold, there is ulterior motives on both sides. And when the couple get to the cabin, neither one of them know that both of them had planned to kill each other.

[00:09:54]This is a dark role for Jason Segel.

[00:09:56]He's usually in romantic comedies, so that is one reason why I definitely wanted to check this one out. It's also starring Samara Weaving, who I think did an amazing job in this one, too. The performances were really spot on, especially Jason Segel considering horror is not his genre.

[00:10:14]But, the best thing about this movie is how bonkers it goes. So, it also stars Timothy Olyphant and Juliette Lewis.

[00:10:23]Juliette Lewis is one of my favorite actresses like ever. I just absolutely love her. I love her look. I love everything about her. Timothy Olyphant is just he's charming.

[00:10:35]He's oddly charming in everything that he does. Like, there's nothing that he has ever done where he has not been charming. It's just kind of weird, but he is oddly charming in this one. What's great about this movie is where it goes.

[00:10:46]You don't understand how bonkers this movie gets towards the end, and the gore is awesome. This movie is oddly gory.

[00:10:55]You do not think upon the setup of this movie where it goes towards the end. It is kind of a horror comedy, but I don't think it's as much of a horror comedy as some of the previous films that we've talked about. The comedy does hit when it's there, but the gore is what really makes this one shine, and they really go for it, and they don't hold back. And they're not trying to make you feel good with this movie, either, because there are certain parts in this movie that do not feel good, and you don't want them to go where they go, and they do it anyway.

[00:11:29]>> [laughter] >> But, it's so good, and it's such a well put together movie and it is so fun. And what makes this one feel like a movie straight out of the 80s is that story.

[00:11:38]It's the story and how bonkers this movie goes that you feel like it's not a movie that would have been made today.

[00:11:45]It's a movie that would have been made back in the 80s and that is what makes it great. Definitely check this one out.

[00:11:51]From emotional collapse, we move on to something a little more surreal. The next movie we're going to discuss is Slanted.

[00:11:59]This one is terrifying but in kind of a different more emotional way. Slanted mixes body horror, social pressure, beauty obsession and identity crisis into something that already looks deeply uncomfortable. Without spoiling too much, the film explores transformation, self-destruction in a way that [clears throat] feels modern, surreal and painfully relevant. This is the kind of horror that gets under your skin because it doesn't feel impossible.

[00:12:26]Slanted is a movie about a girl who's in high school and she's suffering social pressures that most people don't.

[00:12:34]This movie is about a young Asian woman who wants to fit in. She wants to feel normal. She doesn't feel normal in her own body and she wants to change it. And when I say she wants to change it, I mean she wants to change it. And that's what makes this movie so much fun. This movie has some good body horror but it does have some underlining social commentary and it does kind of kick you in the face with it a little bit.

[00:13:01]However, it is pretty self-aware of what it's doing so I don't think that it's in any kind of negative way or it felt to me more like here's the story, this is what's going on, this is what we're going to show you. It felt very real. It felt like maybe a person in this situation would maybe feel this way. I enjoyed the movie for what it was. I was not deeply offended by it. I appreciated the gore in this movie.

[00:13:30]I thought the performances were really great. I understood what the main character was going through even though I don't personally fit into her shoes. I have fit into other situations that are similar and I could relate in that way. I definitely feel like people should check this one out because it's not getting talked about enough and it definitely fits into that 80s VHS era because it has those practical effects that are really awesome and it gets real bizarre by the end. But this next movie we're going to discuss feels like it crawled right out of VHS folklore and that movie is They Will Kill You. I absolutely loved this one and it is such a crying shame because this movie came out right alongside Ready or Not 2 and I feel like it just got overshined by that movie. So I wanted to talk about it because I want to put it on people's radar. This movie gave me such Evil Dead feels [clears throat] which is right in that VHS era and I also feel like people don't understand what this movie's about. I think people saw the trailer for this movie, saw the trailer for Ready or Not 2 and thought these movies were pretty much the same but they are not the same. They Will Kill You goes to places that you do not see coming and it goes there a hundred miles an hour. This movie gets bizarre. This movie gets gory. This movie is splatter fest.

[00:15:00]This movie's awesome. They Will Kill You is the kind of horror movie you'd randomly catch playing on cable at 1:00 a.m. and you spend the next week thinking about it. The movie looks grimy, paranoid, violent and deeply uncomfortable in a very specific way a lot of late 70s and early 80s urban horror movies used to feel.

[00:15:20]Everything about it feels dangerous. Not flashy, not polished, just pure anxiety.

[00:15:24]It has a dirty city nightmare atmosphere [clears throat] where it feels like something terrible could happen in literally every scene.

[00:15:32]And honestly, that's the exact kind of energy a lot of modern horror has been missing lately. This movie is about a woman who applies for a job at a hotel high-rise building, and when she gets there, she's not expecting what she finds. She's technically looking for her sister that she abandoned in the beginning. That's not really a spoiler, it happens right away in the beginning.

[00:15:55]There's an occult that takes over this building, and what they're doing there is mind-bending.

[00:16:03]How they are maintaining their occult status in this building is where this movie differs from Ready or Not, too.

[00:16:11]Like I said, it is 100 miles an hour. I believe Zazie Beetz plays the main character. I have never seen her play a character like this before, but I absolutely loved it. She kicks so much ass in this movie. It is fantastic, and it has that splatter gore that you are used to seeing from those '80s horror movies. It is fantastic.

[00:16:40]The ending is batshit crazy. It just goes for it and gives no [ __ ] about it, and I absolutely love it. There is some CGI effects in this flick, and I don't [ __ ] care.

[00:16:50]>> [laughter] >> It is so great. Heather Graham is in this movie, and she does such an amazing job being such an [ __ ] I loved her performance. All the performances in this flick are so great. I highly recommend checking this one out. It is fun. So many of these movies that we talk about today are just so fun. We are discovering fun modern movies that could have been made in the 80s, but they're being made today and nobody's watching them. They're just being completely missed and I don't want you guys to miss these. So, check these movies out. But, if Zazie Beetz wasn't enough for you, this next flick is going to give you straight TCM vibes and I was there for it. And that is Dolly. This one is available on Shudder right now if you want to check it out. There's something about creepy doll horror that never dies and Dolly is genuinely unsettling. The movie leans into eerie imagery, slow-building dread, and that classic feeling that something in the room is very, very wrong. What makes this stand out is how stripped down and atmospheric it feels. It's not relying on giant jump scares and massive CGI spectacle. It feels personal, small, claustrophobic, like the kind of horror movie you watch alone and immediately regret afterwards.

[00:18:08]Dolly is amazing. It's about this couple who go out into the woods and they run into this serial killer. I mean, that's basically what it is, dressed up like a doll. And she isn't [ __ ] around. She [ __ ] up the dude right away.

[00:18:28]And what happens to him is unseeable.

[00:18:35]And he [ __ ] lives. [laughter] >> [gasps] >> That was like the best part. That was what like kept me watching this movie was the dude and he's not even like playing the main part in the movie.

[00:18:47]Like, Dolly takes the woman and is trying to be her caretaker. She wants the woman to be her like baby or something like that and then the movie kind of progresses from there. Um and it definitely has these TCM grindhouse feels from back in like the 70s.

[00:19:05]It's It has that cinematography grainy feel to it, you know? It's shot in that color grade, you know? It's super fantastic. It's quiet and it takes itself kind of seriously.

[00:19:19]I absolutely love this one. It definitely is a shift in tone from the other movies we talked about. We discovered a lot of fun horror comedies, but this one isn't fun. This one is drenched in blood and gore and horror. I definitely recommend checking this one out if you love TCM and you want some of that grindhouse feel, this one is the one to check out. Don't let Dolly pass you by.

[00:19:44]But now we're going to get into our honorable mention and that is Iron Lung.

[00:19:49]And this one is on honorable mention because it's not technically overlooked or underrated. It did get a theatrical release and people did praise it quite a bit, but I wanted to throw it in this video because I feel like it does have that VHS era feel to it. And the quality of this movie, it being one man in one situation in one set piece, is very VHS area because there wasn't a lot of money to be doing a lot of things.

[00:20:24]And this movie is definitely has those eerie suffocating vibes to it and I absolutely loved it. Iron Lung is a horror movie set almost entirely inside a tiny submarine drifting through an ocean of blood in a claustrophobic atmosphere that's absolutely brutal.

[00:20:40]Everything about this movie feels suffocating. The darkness, the isolation, the sound design, constant feeling that something massive is outside waiting for you. This could easily become one of the most anxiety induced horror movie in years. An interesting fact about this movie is it's based on an indie horror game. I've never played it, but I hear it's pretty closely depicted to it. It's so eerie.

[00:21:02]It's so dark. It's so claustrophobic.

[00:21:05]It's so lonely. I highly recommend checking it out. Mark Kurlian does such an amazing job in this movie. She is literally like one man throughout the entire movie performing by himself to himself. This movie is basically about a prisoner who volunteers to go explore the depths of this particular ocean to see what is down there. He does feel regret after volunteering. He's scared. He's going through some things. He's seeing some things down there. It's always in what you don't see that freaks you out the most and that's what this movie does phenomenally. I didn't even know what I was getting into and I hadn't played the game either. So, which one of these movies are you watching first? But most importantly, what modern horror movies do you think people are sleeping on right now? Because honestly, it feels like horror movies are getting weird again and that is exactly why this era of filmmaking is exciting. If you enjoy discovering strange and forgotten horror movies, check out one of my other videos. Let's hang out some more. This has been so much fun.

[00:22:05]I release a new video every week, so subscribe to the channel cuz you don't want to miss a thing that's going on around here.

[00:22:14]But until next time, have a killer day.

[00:22:17]Peace.

[00:22:25]My Killer Podcast.

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