Now Stream This: 'The Night Comes For Us', 'The Old Dark House', 'Tales From The Crypt', 'Ghost Stories' And More For Halloween

(Welcome to Now Stream This, a column dedicated to the best movies streaming on Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, and every other streaming service out there.) 

Welcome, streamers! I have some good news: Halloween is less than a week away! If you're like me, you like to spend October watching as many creepy, weird, strange movies as you possibly can. As we close out the month, I've compiled a list of horror and horror-like films for your Halloween season pleasure. These aren't the typical horror films – The Exorcist or The Shining don't appear here, sorry. Instead, I've tried to bring you titles outside the norm, ready for you to stream whenever you want. Happy Halloween!

These are the best movies streaming right now. Let's get streaming!

Release Date: 2018Genre: Ultra-Violent ActionDirector: Timo TjahjantoCast: Joe Taslim, Iko Uwais, Julie Estelle, Sunny Pang, Zack Lee

You might think The Night Comes For Us is out of place on this list. After all, everything else on here is a creepy film for your Halloween season pleasure, while this is billed as an action movie. I won't argue on that front – The Night Comes For Us is very much an action movie. In fact, it's one of the best action movies you'll ever see. But the intensity is so high, and the blood and gore is so plentiful, that the film is as close to horror as you can get without being firmly within the genre. The plot is relatively simple: Ito (Joe Taslim) betrays the criminal empire he works for to save the life of a small girl. Now he has approximately 500 people coming after him, hoping to obliterate him with machetes, guns and more. What follows is one jaw-dropping fight scene after another, where Ito, and others – including a scene-stealing Julie Estelle – beat the ever-loving shit out of each other. In each and every fight, the blood flows like a tidal wave – heads explode, bones snap, wounds burst. It is, in the literal sense of the word, horrifying. You'll find yourself squirming and jumping out of your seat as you watch The Night Comes For Us just as you would while watching a horror movie.

For fans of: The Raid, The Raid 2, Headshot, non-stop stabbing.

Release Date: 1932Genre: Horror-ComedyDirector: James WhaleCast: Boris Karloff, Melvyn Douglas, Gloria Stuart, Charles Laughton, Raymond Massey and Ernest Thesiger

After he directed Frankenstein, and before Bride of Frankenstein, director James Whale reunited with Boris Karloff for the delightfully campy horror-comedy The Old Dark House. A group of travelers get caught in a dangerous storm, and take refuge at an old dark house (hey, that's the title!). The house is owned by the mysterious Horace Femm (Ernest Thesiger), who has a creepy, mute butler (Karloff). As the night wears on, things start to grow spooky and potentially dangerous. Whale was a master at blending humor and horror, and in many ways, Old Dark House was a precursor to the darkly comedic Bride of Frankenstein. The most remarkable thing here though is how snappy and modern the movie seems. The editing, and the way the dialogue is handled, is much more fast paced than most movies fro this era, and it makes Old Dark House extra fresh.

For fans of: Bride of Frankenstein, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, lots of movie lightning.

Release Date: 1960Genre: French HorrorDirector: Georges FranjuCast: Pierre Brasseur, Édith Scob, Alida Valli, Juliette MaynielGeorges Franju's eerie French psychological thriller is like a precursor to the body horror of David Cronenberg. After Dr. Génessier (Pierre Brasseur) and his daughter Christiane (Édith Scob) are in a car crash, Christiane's face is horribly disfigured – which triggers terrible guilt within Génessier. To make up for destroying his daughter's once beautiful face, the doctor begins kidnapping young women with the hopes of removing their faces to graft onto Christiane. Yes, it's as ghoulish as it sounds, but it's also oddly beautiful in many ways. Eyes Without a Face is loaded with startling, arresting imagery – gory shots of faces being removed contrasted with the haunting sight of Christiane wearing an unsettling mask. If you're looking for horror outside the norm this Halloween season, this is the movie for you.For fans of: Les Diaboliques, Dead Ringers, The Skin I Live In, the totally normal practice of removing faces.

Release Date: 2016Genre: Slooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww-burn ghost storyDirector: Osgood PerkinsCast: Ruth Wilson, Paula Prentiss, Bob Balaban, Lucy Boynton

If you like you scary movies peppy, with lots of jump scares, stay far away from Oz Perkins' I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House. This is the very definition of slow burn, which may turn off some, while appealing to others (like me). I Am the Pretty Thing... is a ghost story cut from the same cloth as the work of Shirley Jackson – and there's even a character in the film who resembles Jackson. Ruth Wilson plays a live-in nurse who comes to take care of an aging writer who is now suffering from dementia. But the two women aren't alone in the house. There's someone – or something – else lurking in the shadows, around the corners, and in the walls themselves. Perkins lets his film build, and build, and build, to the point where the tension becomes almost unbearable. This is spooky stuff, and if you're not averse to quiet horror, this is for you.

For fans of: The Blackcoat's Daughter, Burnt Offerings, The Changeling, slow spookiness.

Release Date: 1973Genre: ThrillerDirector: Brian De PalmaCast: Margot Kidder, Jennifer Salt, and Charles DurningMargot Kidder plays conjoined twins Danielle and Dominique, who were surgically separated. Danielle wins a date on a game show (don't ask), and while the date starts off while, it goes very, very wrong, ending with a brutal knife attack. The murder was witnessed by one of Danielle's neighbors (Jennifer Salt), who suspects Dominique of the crime. But what is really going on here? Brian De Palma's twisty thriller pulls out all the stops, employing brilliant split-screens to crank up the thrills and chills. While this isn't De Palma's first film, it is the first film that explore the themes that would color the rest of his career – voyeurism, horror, shocking violence, and of course, shameless Hitchcock homages.For fans of: Dressed to Kill, Raising Cain, Rear Window, bloody birthday cake.

Release Date: 1988Genre: Monkey-based horrorDirector: George A. RomeroCast: Jason Beghe, John Pankow, Kate McNeil, Joyce Van Patten, Stanley Tucci, Steven Root

Here it is: the weirdest movie George Romero ever made. In Monkey Shines, athlete Allan (Jason Beghe) is struck by a car and rendered quadriplegic. Depressed, and even suicidal, Allan gets a new lease on life thanks to a service monkey – a Capuchin named Ella. Ella has been injected with human brain tissue, which makes her smarter than the average service monkey. It also makes her dangerous! Allan and Ella somehow have a psychic bond, and soon Ella is going out into the night and murdering people who have pissed Allan off. It gets even weirder from there. There's a playfulness here – Allan and Ella bond over cheesy romantic music at one point – that make Monkey Shines a true oddity. The fact that it descends into brutal violence only makes it more strange.

For fans of: Upgrade, Martin, Cujo, cute but murderous monkeys.

Release Date: 1972Genre: Horror AnthologyDirector: Freddie FrancisCast: Joan Collins, Ian Hendry, Robin Phillips, Richard Greene, Nigel Patrick and Ralph Richardson

When you think Tales From the Crypt, you likely picture the over-the-top HBO series hosted by the cackling, wise-cracking Crypt Keeper puppet. But long before the HBO show aired, there was this semi-serious 1972 horror anthology that takes classic Tales stories and mixes them together. A group of strangers end up in a crypt, where they're confronted by a mysterious Crypt Keeper (Ralph Richardson). The Crypt Keeper proceeds to tell them each of the strangers a ghastly story that involves their potential deaths. The best of the bunch is "...And All Through the House" (which was also adapted into the first episode of the HBO series). In this segment, Joan Collins finds herself stalked by a killer Santa Claus after she murders her own husband. Tales From the Crypt is an underrated horror anthology waiting for more audiences to find it.

For fans of: Creepshow, Trick 'r Treat, The Vault of Horror, Crypt Keepers who aren't puppets.

Release Date: 1995Genre: Mystery-HorrorDirector: Clive BarkerCast: Scott Bakula, Kevin J. O'Connor, Famke Janssen, Daniel von Bargen

Ready for my most controversial horror opinion? Here goes! I think Clive Barker's Lord of Illusions is better than his Hellraiser. I know, this sounds nuts! But while I like the ideas in Hellraiser, and the make-up effects, I find the storytelling, and execution, lacking. Lord of Illusions, meanwhile, works. Barker blends film noir mystery with graphic horror to tell a tale of murder, mystery and magic. Private eye Scott Bakula gets drawn into a case involving a famous magician (Kevin J. O'Connor). It turns out that years ago, the magician and his friends faced-off against a cult lead by another magician who was prone to using dark and dangerous magic. What follows is a weird, violent journey that ended up being the last film Barker directed (for now).

For fans of: Angel Heart, Nightbreed, The Craft, magic!

Release Date: 2018Genre: AnthologyDirector: Andy Nyman and Jeremy DysonCast: Andy Nyman, Martin Freeman, Alex Lawther, Paul Whitehouse

This curious, quirky anthology film builds towards a somewhat questionable conclusion, but the journey to get there is appropriately creepy. Andy Nyman plays a professor who specializes in debunking psychics, and has a strong skepticism about the paranormal. But Nyman's skepticism is challenged when he begins investigating a series of ghost-related cases given to him by another paranormal investigator. Nyman's character firmly believes he can debunk all the ghost stories (hey that's the title!), but that won't be so easy. Ghost Stories does what most horror anthologies don't – it connects its stories together, sometimes in very surprising ways.

For fans of: Tales from the Hood, Twilight Zone: The Movie, Body Bags, "Monster Mash."

Release Date: 2006Genre: Psychological HorrorDirector: William FriedkinCast: Ashley Judd, Michael Shannon, Lynn Collins, Brian F. O'Byrne, Harry Connick Jr.

Wiliam Friedkin's adaptation of Tracy Letts' play locks us in a motel room with Ashley Judd and Michael Shannon, and forces us to watch them go insane. This results in one of the most unpleasant movies you'll ever see – and yet, Bug is fascinating. You can't look away. Judd plays a waitress who begins a relationship with a stranger, played by Michael Shannon. Shannon character eventually reveals that the military injected an insect into his skin. Soon, Shannon is seeing bugs everywhere – bugs that we never actual see. Is he crazy? Oh yes. But his madness is infectious, to the point where Judd's character starts to share his delusions. Shannon is, as usual, great here, bringing an intensity that burns off the screen.

For fans of: Killer Joe, Take Shelter, My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done?, feeling very uncomfortable.