Acting might not seem too important in the horror genre, but in this year alone, Pearl, Barbarian, and Werewolf By Night have all had great casts whose acting elevated the terror. It’s easy to single out great individual performances in horror movies, like Daniel Kaluuya in Get Out or Toni Collette in Hereditary, but it’s rare that a horror film comes along with every actor in the cast working at the top of their game.
From Jaws to The Thing to The Silence of the Lambs, some horror movie casts have impressed Redditors with powerful performances and no dead weight.
10 Scream (1996)
According to Redditor u/Past-Adhesiveness691, Wes Craven’s self-aware slasher satire Scream has one of the greatest horror movie casts of all time. Neve Campbell is iconic in the role of Sidney Prescott, but she’s surrounded by lovable supporting actors, too.
From Drew Barrymore to Matthew Lillard to Rose McGowan to David Arquette to Courteney Cox to Jamie Kennedy to Henry Winkler, the cast of Scream is full of fantastic performers.
9 The Lost Boys (1987)
The uniquely camp, darkly comedic tone of The Lost Boys wouldn’t work nearly as well without its dedicated ensemble of brilliant actors. According to Redditor u/akennelley, this vampire-infested cult classic has one of the best casts in any horror movie.
Jason Patric and Corey Haim star as two brothers who move to a new town with their single mother and learn that it’s crawling with the undead. Kiefer Sutherland is wildly charismatic as vampiric gang leader David Powers, while Corey Feldman and Jamison Newlander are endlessly watchable as the Frog brothers.
8 Barbarian (2022)
Redditor u/hellosidney_24 named the recent horror hit Barbarian as having one of the best casts in the genre’s history. While admitting that the film has “a small main cast,” the Redditor writes that this small cast gave “solid performances across the board for me.” Georgina Campbell and Bill Skarsgård anchor the first act as a pair of double-booked Airbnb residents before Justin Long steals the show.
Even Matthew Patrick Davis as the movie’s monster, “The Mother,” manages to be both terrifying and sympathetic as a feral underground creature who just wants a baby to take care of.
7 Aliens (1986)
Sigourney Weaver’s iconic portrayal of Ellen Ripley was supported by a strong cast of screen icons in the first movie, but Redditor u/ericbkillmonger feels that James Cameron’s sequel, Aliens, has an even stronger supporting cast as Ripley joins a band of Colonial Marines to infiltrate a xenomorph nest.
The Redditor writes that the chemistry and interplay between these actors “felt so real and natural” that it undoubtedly “enhanced the overall believability” of the story.
6 Addams Family Values (1993)
Redditor u/Comic_Book_Reader feels that the cast of Addams Family Values “takes the cake over the first one by having a more solid supporting cast.” The sequel brings back all the legendary cast members from the first one like Anjelica Huston as Morticia, Raul Julia as Gomez, Christina Ricci as Wednesday, and Christopher Lloyd as Uncle Fester.
But it also brings in supporting players like Peter MacNicol, Christine Baranski, David Krumholtz, and “Joan Cusack being delightfully insane as Debbie.”
5 The Thing (1982)
John Carpenter’s The Thing is one of the few horror films to shed a spotlight on its actors. As an alien shapeshifter makes its way into a remote Arctic facility, none of the scientists at the outpost know who they can trust, so they turn on each other in what is essentially a sci-fi whodunit.
According to Redditor u/Joverby, The Thing is “perfectly cast and acted. You know everything you need to know about each character with little screen time.”
4 Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
One of the aspects that makes Rosemary’s Baby such a revered horror classic is that it portrays a Satan-worshipping cult with startling realism. A large part of that is having a cast full of gifted actors to bring the story to life.
Redditor u/The-Curious-Sofa sings the praises of this cast: “Mia Farrow, John Cassavetes, [and] Ruth Gordon (who won a rare Oscar for a horror movie) are all brilliant. They are surrounded by a bunch of great Hollywood veterans. As a bonus, Charles Grodin [can be spotted] in an early role.”
3 Shaun Of The Dead (2004)
Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead might be a comedic take on the zombie genre, but it has much more believable and three-dimensional characters than the average straightforward zombie film. Redditor u/MembraneSweeper believes it has one of the best horror movie casts of all time.
Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are perfectly matched in the lead roles, and the supporting cast is rounded out by screen legends like Penelope Wilton and Bill Nighy and British comedy staples like Dylan Moran, Lucy Davis, and Peter Serafinowicz.
2 Jaws (1975)
The star of Steven Spielberg’s Jaws is, of course, the 25-foot great white shark lurking around the waters of Amity Island. But it’s the human characters that make the movie endlessly compelling, from Roy Scheider as the everyman police chief to Richard Dreyfuss as the frustrated marine biologist to Robert Shaw as the grizzled veteran shark hunter.
Redditor u/AZtoOH_82 writes, “I just rewatched it not long ago and I seriously could have watched those three guys out at sea for hours on end. Such amazing chemistry and dialogue throughout.”
1 The Silence Of The Lambs (1991)
Redditor u/wtfisthisnoise named The Silence of the Lambs as the horror film with the strongest cast: “This one got both lead acting Oscars and the supporting cast is stacked all the way up... Even Precious [the dog] is outstanding.”
Everybody remembers the tense dialogue scenes between Jodie Foster as Clarice Starling and Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter, but Scott Glenn as Jack Crawford, Ted Levine as Buffalo Bill, and Anthony Heald as Dr. Chilton are all terrific, too.