Hidden gems on Netflix: 'Scary' movies to stream in October

In this age of digital media, Netflix Instant Play is entering nearly everyone’s homes. The streaming service is now part of approximately 40 million American households, a number that is steadily growing by the day. With that in mind, we highlight a few horror films you may have overlooked on Netflix. This month, in celebration of Halloween, don’t forget to turn the lights off when watching these chillers. 

“Tucker and Dale vs. Evil” (2011)

Best friends Tucker (Alan Tudyk, “Firefly”) and Dale (Tyler Labine, “Rise of the Planet of the Apes”) are simple men with a shared aspiration: To buy their own vacation home in the West Virginia mountains. The dream comes true for these lovable good ol’ boys when Tucker purchases a cabin in the woods, and they head there for a weekend of fishing and beer drinking.

Also spending the weekend in the mountains are Allison (Katrina Bowden, “30 Rock”) and her friends from college, for whom camping is essentially equivalent to partying in tents. The two groups encounter each other early and often, beginning with Dale’s misguided attempt to hit on Allison at a gas station. City-dwellers and rural folks never get along in horror movies, and “Tucker and Dale vs. Evil” loves to toy with that trope.

The film’s humor comes from its examination of perception. The camping teens constantly misread Tucker and Dale as murderous backwoods freaks — which is hilarious enough — but the perceptual jokes don’t stop there. For example, when Tucker and Dale first enter their ‘vacation home,’ it looks like the cabin from “The Evil Dead.” Yet, to Tucker and Dale, it’s better than they could have imagined — “Look at this place! It’s a mansion! A little dusty is all!”

When Allison slips on a rock and hits her head while swimming at night, Tucker and Dale rescue her from drowning, pulling her out of the water onto their boat. However, Allison’s friends immediately assume Tucker and Dale kidnapped her. When she wakes up, she’s initially wary of Tucker and Dale, before understanding their good-natured efforts to help her.

Allison’s city-slicker friends set out to rescue her from her would-be captors. Unfortunately, they are so hapless in the wilderness that they keep finding ways to die in gruesome accidents, making Tucker and Dale look ever more like the serial killers the kids believe them to be. For their part, Tucker and Dale think that the college students are part of a suicide cult, hell-bent on killing themselves using the dangerous equipment on their land.

With “Tucker and Dale vs. Evil,” writer/director Eli Craig serves up a viciously funny commentary on the suburban upper class looking down on small-town residents. Horror films tend to demonize redneck characters, but “Tucker and Dale” positions the city-dwellers as the antagonists, even though most of them are simply in that role out of confusion.

What’s impressive about this film is that it’s basically just one joke, told as many ways as possible. As it turns out, there’s a tremendous amount of comic potential in Craig’s setup, and he manages to craft an entire film out of successfully executing culture-clash humor. 

The comedic horror subgenre is experiencing a refreshing rejuvenation in recent years. “Tucker and Dale vs. Evil” may not be as groundbreaking as “Cabin in the Woods,” but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a thoroughly entertaining comedy/horror romp in its own right.

“Tucker and Dale vs. Evil” is rated R for adult situations, language, sex and violence.

“You’re Next” (2013)

Home-invasion thrillers are in no short supply in modern-day cinema. The last decade has been littered with entries of varying quality in this subgenre: “Them,” “Inside,” “Funny Games,” “The Strangers,” “Kidnapped,” “The Purge,” I could go on and on. Some of these films are quite good — namely “Them” and “Inside” — but the formula is almost always cut from the same cloth.

Finally, someone decided to flip the home-invasion film on its head, and the result is the fun-filled, blood-soaked “You’re Next.” Featuring taut direction from Adam Wingard (“The Guest”) and a smart script that refuses to stick to conventions, “You’re Next” is far more than a typical masked-intruders hack-and-slash flick.

College professor Crispian (AJ Bowen, “The Signal”) brings his former student — and current lover — Erin (Sharni Vinson) to his parents’ anniversary celebration. A dinner scene early on in the film puts the family’s divisiveness front and center, as Crispian’s older brother Drake (Joe Swanberg, “Drinking Buddies”) scathingly belittles his siblings and their partners.

Soon, everyone at the table is shouting over each other — until an arrow from a crossbow flies through the window and ends up in one of their heads. With their attackers blocking cell-phone signals — and the only neighbors already dead themselves — the dysfunctional family tries to band together enough to survive the night, and each other.

Even after the siege begins, all the siblings can do is bicker. This creates some great comedic moments, especially when they get in a heated argument over which of them is the fastest runner, and should therefore be entrusted to make a run for the cars. (“I’m the fastest, but I have this arrow in my shoulder.” “What does your shoulder have to do with your legs?”)

Erin is positioned from the start to be the ‘Final Girl.’ While the Final Girl is always resourceful, it’s never to this degree. Erin doesn’t just know how to survive, she might just be the best killer of the bunch. It’s equal parts funny and satisfying to watch Erin dispatch the family’s attackers in increasingly clever fashion, and her backstory supports her extreme abilities perfectly.

The ‘why’ behind the madness is more clever than your usual explanation as well. Suffice it to say, this isn’t one of those ‘random attack’ home-invasion thrillers — which is arguably a sub-subgenre of its own — and the reason for the siege ups the ante of the entire affair.

“You’re Next” may not completely reinvent the home-invasion film, but it certainly does revitalize it. 

Kudos to Wingard and company for breathing some much-needed life into an oversaturated subgenre.

“You’re Next” is rated R for strong bloody violence, language and some sexuality/nudity.

 “Creep” (2014)

Ask any horror fan what they’re sick of in the genre today, and you’ll likely get one of two answers — either “Hollywood reboots” or “found-footage films.” “Creep” is settled firmly into the latter camp, and if you can’t stand another faux-documentary horror flick, I certainly can’t blame you.

However, “Creep” is far from a typical found-footage movie. Created by Mark Duplass (“The League,” “Safety Not Guaranteed”) and director Patrick Brice (“The Overnight”) — with a minuscule budget and bare-bones crew — “Creep” feels like the type of movie made by two buddies on a random weekend, except those two buddies are both brilliant cinematic minds.

Filmed improvisationally, Duplass and Brice sketched out a basic outline, before shooting each scene about a dozen times, from which Brice pieced together the final product. The off-the-cuff nature of the shoot gives the film a vibe of authenticity that is often lacking from found-footage material.

Aaron (Brice) is a freelance cameraman who takes a one-day job filming the reclusive Josef (Duplass). As soon as Aaron arrives, Josef tells him that he’s a cancer survivor, but has now contracted an inoperable brain tumor.

With just a couple months to live, Josef wants Aaron to film a video diary of a typical day in his life. That way, his unborn son can see what his father was like, in case he doesn’t live long enough to welcome him into the world.

Josef is definitely an oddball, as the first scene he asks Aaron to shoot is of Josef in a bathtub, pretending to bathe his imaginary son — an act he lovingly refers to as “tubby time.” Still, for as weird as he is, he seems like a genuinely friendly guy, and Aaron decides to stick it out for the day.

Duplass is so good as Josef, partially because he’s most commonly known for his comedic work. Duplass does maintain some of his trademark goofiness, but this is a far cry from playing Pete on “The League.” Part of Duplass’ talent is his ability to project an easygoing, affable demeanor, and that makes his work in “Creep” all the more effective.

The title refers not just to the Josef character, but is also representative of the way Brice’s camera slowly creeps around, to develop an agonizingly slow build to the film’s scares. The other major benefit is to alleviate the shaky-cam syndrome that plagues so many found-footage movies. 

Additionally, when Aaron isn’t actively carrying the camera, he often sets it down on a table or countertop to provide a steady base.

The main downfall of “Creep” is that some of the cards Duplass and Brice eventually play are quite predictable, but I also found myself pleasantly surprised by some of the left turns taken in the final act. The climactic scene is a long, wide static shot — sumptuously framed — which delivers a visual whopper of a payoff.

Word has it that Duplass and Brice have two sequels planned, and I’m certainly looking forward to climbing back in for more tubby time with these weirdos.

“Creep” is rated R for brief language and violence.

Strandberg writes for the Norman (Oklahoma) Transcript.