As tastes and technology evolved, so did the monsters. You can chart a history of human fear through the changing nature of what has tormented actors in Hollywood and the cinematic beyond. Creatures of folklore and forces of gothic malevolence gave way to atomic behemoths, the irradiated bugs, reptiles and suddenly colossal housewives of the 1950s. War, disease, space, the digital revolution — our anxieties about all of the above took a physical, sometimes gooey form. Meanwhile, advances in special effects diversified the menagerie, as artists like Ray Harryhausen (the skeleton warriors of 1963’s “Jason and the Argonauts”), Tom Savini (the undead of 1978’s “Dawn of the Dead”) and Stan Winston (the animatronic dinos of 1993’s “Jurassic Park”) found new ways to bring our nightmares to life.
For better or worse, the new century has been dominated by monsters made from ones and zeros instead of clay or latex. It has also given rise to monster movies fixated on what the monster really represents. Any student of mythology will tell you that a werewolf has always been more than a werewolf. But in an age of baldly metaphoric horror, it’s hard to find a creature feature that doesn’t trample its subtext like a guy in a rubber suit stepping on model cars.
What’s the mark of a great movie monster? Ingenuity of design matters, certainly. When you’ve seen a thousand zombies, a fresh configuration of teeth and limbs can make all the difference. They should be scary, too, although that’s subjective: One person’s nightmare fuel is another’s sleeping aid. And the best movie monsters transcend the effects behind them through the intangibles of screen presence. You accept the strange, uncanny reality of their existence — a reality born from how they look, sound, move and behave. They come alive before our awed eyes, compelling us to avert our gaze.
Rampaging mutants, autonomous tumors and the fanciest gentleman in horror since Dr. Caligari — the best movie monsters of the new century have imprinted their own diabolical mark on the collective psyche. We would put the 10 ghastly things ranked below up against the best that Universal or Hammer or Toho has to offer. So long as there are movies, there will be movie monsters. Pray to the Devil that they keep making them this cool.
10. Moder, ‘The Ritual’ (2017)
“The Ritual,” about four friends whose hiking trip leads them into occult danger, is no modern genre classic. But the David Bruckner film does feature a truly remarkable monster: a towering folkloric entity with an elklike body and an antlered head that — if you look closely — resembles a limp human figure with grasping hands. While the word “Lovecraftian” leaps to mind, the reality is that the mighty Moder, worshiped by a woodland cult of true believers, resembles only itself. Sometimes, all you need to make horror-movie history is to give evil a new shape.
9. Sam, ‘Trick ’r Treat’ (2007)
Before he unleashed yuletide critters in 2015’s “Krampus” and orchestrated the city-leveling mayhem of 2019’s “Godzilla: King of the Monsters,” Michael Dougherty pitted a cranky Brian Cox against a miniature prankster from hell. The final segment in his holiday anthology “Trick ’r Treat” is, well, a treat. Its darkly comic pleasures hinge on the puckish malevolence of Sam, a pajama-clad instrument of chaos who comes to look like the irreverent spirit of Halloween incarnate. His climactic unmasking is a gift from the underworld gods of nifty prosthetic makeup effects, sure to leave monster lovers grinning ear to ear like a jack-o’-lantern.
8. The Shimmer bear, ‘Annihilation’ (2018)
Though not entirely a horror movie, Alex Garland’s science-fiction whatsit about an expedition into a mysterious mirror realm called the Shimmer does feature one nightmare for the ages: a deformed bear that “speaks” in the voice of its victims, parroting their death screams every time it opens its massive, dripping jaws. Plenty of monsters provoke yelps of fear. This one perversely echoes them, almost mocking the terror of those staring into its maw.
7. Gabriel, ‘Malignant’ (2021)
We’ll tread lightly here, as the true nature of this monster qualifies as a plot twist. Let’s just say that the villain of “Malignant,” an anatomically inverted, parkouring shadow slasher, possesses an unexpected relationship to the film’s heroine, played by Annabelle Wallis. When Gabriel finally gets his big, shocking close-up — a scene so brutal in its violence that it begins to look like slapstick comedy — he tilts this unpredictable James Wan potboiler into a new register of deranged fun. The demon lies within, the movie says with a bloody, crooked smile.
6. The Pale Man, ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ (2006)
No rundown of modern cinema’s best monsters would be complete without something from the twisted imagination of Guillermo del Toro, a mad scientist who has spent most of his career flooding theaters with frightening, sometimes sympathetic new organisms. Arguably his most striking creation is the Pale Man, the gaunt, child-devouring predator whom Doug Jones plays for five suspenseful, unforgettable minutes in the Oscar-winning “Pan’s Labyrinth.” The most inventive touch: those peepers on his clawed hands, rising to give the monster sight at the exact moment that audiences might decide to block their vision with a defensive palm.
5. It, ‘It Follows’ (2014)
Not to be confused with Pennywise the Clown, the shape-shifting menace of David Robert Mitchell’s brilliant supernatural thriller has no original, official form. Instead, it disguises itself as ordinary people, swapping its appearance out every few minutes while slowly but relentlessly pursuing the unlucky teenagers cursed by its attention. That it can look like anyone is the key to its fearsomeness; by the end of the movie, the audience has become as paranoid as the characters, scanning every inch of the frame for the slow approach of danger. Who needs creature effects?
4. Eli, ‘Let the Right One In’ (2008)
Conceptually speaking, there’s nothing unique about the childlike bloodsucker Lina Leandersson plays in the moody Swedish horror movie “Let the Right One In,” directed by Tomas Alfredson. Vampires are a dime a dozen, right? But Eli is a great character, a tragic creature of the night who has relied on manipulation and self-mutilation to survive for decades. Her relationship with a young, bullied outcast is at once touching and disturbing — a bond forged around the promise of violence. And she cements her place alongside the greatest minions of Dracula in the film’s bravura swimming pool climax, where this ageless girl next door demonstrates her awful, tremendous power.
3. Jean Jacket, ‘Nope’ (2022)
It’s arguably a spoiler to even include Jordan Peele’s spectacular sci-fi thriller on this list, given how long the film takes to reveal the truth about the unidentified flying object hovering over its California setting. But what a reveal! Only when “Nope” has taken us inside the infernal innards of its mysterious flying saucer do we understand what’s really abducting the local population. The final-boss version of Jean Jacket, peacocking against a vast expanse of sky, is breathtaking enough to attend the Met Gala. Peele’s most wicked trick, though, is unleashing a creature this original and then arguably upstaging it in the scares department with an ordinary chimpanzee.
2. The Babadook, ‘The Babadook’ (2014)
“The real monster is grief,” insist countless art-house horror movies made in the image of “The Babadook.” But don’t blame the dapper demon for these wannabe trauma phantoms. While Jennifer Kent’s influential creepshow might cast its storybook boogeyman as a metaphor for repressed emotions, that never interferes with his primary duty, which is scaring the living daylights out of you with his croaked mantra, slithering vertical movements and demented vaudeville, silent-movie-villain routine. Few modern movie monsters are so instantly, chillingly recognizable in silhouette. Plus, how many of them have achieved the status of queer icon?
1. The Gwoemul, ‘The Host’ (2006)
Godzilla for a new generation is how you could describe the star attraction of “The Host,” the genre-blending kaiju movie from “Parasite” director Bong Joon-ho. Except that there’s really no confusing this movie monster for any other. Brought to life via animatronics and the digital magic of Weta (the New Zealand CGI shop that worked on the “Lord of the Rings” movies), the Gwoemul is a marvel of singular creature design that suggests a fish crossed with a frog crossed with one of the dinosaurs of “Jurassic Park.” As with the original King Kong, it’s the impression of a sentience, even a personality, that makes the beast so memorable: From the moment it emerges from the water and gallops down a Seoul riverbank like an overgrown puppy, we believe in it.
