Sometimes, these eco-horror films take a page from science fiction horror films. Of course, what constitutes science, in this case, can be quite a bit closer to fiction. However, there is some science behind it. That can mean a mutated animal, or some sort of chemical compound taking everyone out. Other times, it’s really more of a kind of fantasy horror where monsters or the earth itself are fighting back based on nothing more than a writer’s imagination. What tends to marry all these ideas together is that human beings have absolutely done something to deserve the horror that comes their way. That is actually a bit different from other sub-genres in the horror movie world. When it comes to slasher films, there are some mild warning signs such as underage sex. But that’s not really the same kind of direct “deserving” that factors into the victims from the best eco-horror movies out there.
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The Bay
The Bay is a movie that almost didn’t exist because the director almost worked on something else instead. Director Barry Levinson was originally asked by PBS to make a documentary about pollution in Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay. However, he dropped that project when he found out that another director was already doing the same sort of thing. Instead, the man that has put together stories like Good Morning Vietnam and Wag the Dog went in a completely different direction, though it was along the line of what he was going to be making in his documentary.
What Levinson ended up making was a found footage horror movie about a town next to the Chesapeake Bay that suddenly has an outbreak of people that develop boils all over their body over the course of one weekend. It turns out that the boils are actually housing insects that are normally microscopic but have grown by hundreds of times because of a combination of the waste that’s been spilled into the bay over the decades. This film really hits because the bugs aren’t really mutant monsters. They don’t have some oddly evil motive. They’re simply doing what they would always do given the situation. The movie is also spooky because the people involved aren’t evil, but at the same time, they’ve been ignoring what’s happening in the water around them and have now reaped the consequences.
Silent Night
Silent Night actually fits into several different categories at once. There’s the fact that it can very easily fit into the “holiday horror” subgenre quite nicely. Some people have also called it a black comedy. However, the impending horror of the situation certainly allows this to also count as an eco-horror movie. It’s also one that sort of sneaks up on the audience as it first looks like just another Christmas movie in Great Britain.
The family is getting together to celebrate the holiday but slowly and surely the real situation unfolds. It turns out that the earth is basically rebelling against those who live on it and have been polluting it for decades. A giant toxic cloud has burst forth from the earth and is slowly but surely encompassing the globe. The family that has gotten together is getting ready to basically commit suicide using a special euthanasia pill before the cloud eventually reaches their location.
The Host
This South Korean monster movie and eco-horror film is by the same director who was quite a bit more subtle in Parasite. The Host features a mutated lizard monster thing that is born from pollution in the Korean river Han. The monster does more than simply destroy things and kill people. It also snatches some of them.
When the daughter of the film’s protagonist is snatched by the monster, he embarks on a mission to find her and get her back. While this could also be considered a black comedy in parts, the monster effects of a movie that is now 15 years old is actually really, really impressive.
Mimic
While this movie is also about punishing humans for their actions, it’s not quite as specific as some of the other films on this list. Mimic is a movie about a bug that was created by people in order to try and take out another species of bug that was carrying a disease that was killing children at an alarming rate. Unable to create an effective vaccine, the medical community has instead created a “judas breed” that carries its own brand of virus that eventually kills off the cockroaches that have caused the problem. It turns out this is just where Mimic starts.
This is also where the movie turns into part-monster movie, part eco-horror as the bug that was designed to disguise itself as a roach has mutated and grown to the point where it can actually mimic a man who appears to be wearing a trench coat and hat. From there on, the scientists that bred the bug are racing against time trying to find a way to catch it and kill it, as it continues killing people indiscriminately. The added bonus of this film is that it’s among Guillermo Del Toro’s earliest English-language flicks.
Annihilation
This particular eco-horror is different than all the rest because it’s not the side effects of pollution or odd chemicals or radiation. Annihilation is a film that has nature attacking people, but it appears it’s doing so because some sort of alien race has managed to affect it and the reality around it.
Not only is this an incredibly trippy movie but it’s also got some truly chilling monsters in the form of animals that have been affected by the mutation. Perhaps the most terrifying aspect of the whole thing is that the people don’t know where it came from, don’t really understand where it went, and don’t understand if it’s still around.
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