It takes a lot to terrify horror fans. People who have seen every film from Halloween to Hereditary don't even flinch at jump scares, big reveals, or killers in masks chasing down the main and minor characters. While some people find this genre to be too much, as watching slashers and ghost stories feel too intense, others can't get enough and always want to see what new filmmakers are bringing to the genre.
In the 2008 horror movie The Strangers, Kristen McKay (Liv Tyler) and James Hoyt (Scott Speedman) have just gone to a wedding and things are falling apart in their relationship. Audiences find out that James proposed and Kristen said no, and they're both emotional and hurt. But when they plan to sleep at the house where James grew up, that's when things get terrifying. Is The Strangers the scariest horror movie of recent years? It definitely seems like it.
There are scientific reasons why some movies are scary, and it's definitely a fascinating subject. What terrifies one person might not worry the next at all, and some people enjoy the experience of being scared and watching every horror film under the sun while some would prefer to stick to comedies and romance. Chances are that most people who have seen The Strangers can agree that it's a horrifying tale.
There are some horror movies based on true events and The Strangers seems like it could really happen. According to PopSugar, the director Bryan Bertino had a scary experience when he was younger, and he knew that this could make for an interesting and scary movie. Bertino said, "As a kid, I lived in a house on a street in the middle of nowhere. One night, while our parents were out, somebody knocked on the front door and my little sister answered it. At the door were some people asking for somebody that didn't live there. We later found out that these people were knocking on doors in the area and, if no one was home, breaking into the houses." Just hearing about this story is enough to make horror fans check that their doors and windows are locked. It's easy to imagine this happening, that's for sure, and it makes sense that this would stick with someone for so long and seem like a good concept for a movie.
Watch enough horror movies and it feels impossible to rent a weekend house or stay in a cabin in a forest without wondering who is lurking out there. While it's nice to get out in nature, it's hard not to think about all of these scary stories when masked killers have been attacking innocent people. In The Strangers, Kristen wants to know why these intruders are hurting her and her boyfriend, and one of them says, "Because you were home."
This is a chilling line and definitely the most memorable of the entire movie. While sometimes a horror film ruins its good idea, The Strangers has a scary premise and follows through. As James and Kristen are targeted by people wearing masks, it does feel like terrible luck that they were in this house and that these killers happened to be there, too. Is there anything scarier than someone getting attacked because they're at the wrong place at the wrong time? The fact that Kristen and James are having relationship trouble also makes the movie even more unnerving to watch because it feels relatable. They really could be anyone, just trying to get through the night before going their separate ways in the morning and thinking about their life choices. But instead, they find themselves in a situation that they could never have imagined or predicted.
The Strangers works so well as a scary film because the main characters do fight the best that they can. James and Kristen try to drive away but one of the masked killers stops them. James also has a shotgun, but it doesn't do much good as the killers tie them up and brutally attack them. While Kristen is still alive at the movie's end, it's unlikely that she's going to survive much longer. Unlike in popular horror franchsies where there are motives and reasons why the killer is going after people, there is no "reason" in The Strangers. The killers wanted to commit murder, they found an isolated and desolate house with two people staying there, and that was that. This is enough to run a chill own anyone's spine, no matter how many horror movies they have enjoyed over the years. And in the 2018 sequel The Strangers: Prey At Night, the killers Dollface and the Man in the Mask are still attacking people, proving that this horror is likely never going to end.