Top 10 Horror Movies That Make Everyday Things Terrifying

Drano
This late 90s offering was chock full of murder scenes ripped right out of modern myths and legends. At one point the killer corners a frat boy, Parker, in the bathroom. Pouring Pop Rocks in his mouth, the villain follows them up with not soda, but a drain cleaner chaser. And just to make sure he doesn’t miss a drop, the considerate killer uses a funnel to aim it right down Parker’s throat. The filmmakers ensure that we get to hear every one of the student’s pained gurgles as he swallows the caustic fluid. You’ll never look at a bottle of the stuff the same way again. Our stomachs burn just thinking about it.

Pogo Sticks
Bouncing on a spring-loaded stilt may not be a particularly efficient method of travel, but this 1993 cult classic showed us it could be a pretty brutal method of murder. Warwick Davis’ Leprechaun is way more funny than he is scary. He’s constantly going on about his gold and delivering quirky limericks as he indulges in violence and mayhem. He’s pretty playful as far as horror villains go, but there’s no denying that watching him batter a shop owner to death with a pogo stick, of all things, is unforgettable. If the blood doesn’t get to you, the crunching of bones probably will.

Umbrellas
Garbage day isn’t the only everyday thing you have to worry about after seeing this bonkers slasher sequel. Ricky Chapman didn’t just inherit his murderous brother’s madness. He also inherited his flair for the dramatic. Confronting a loan shark in an alley, Ricky makes do with the nearest possible weapon. He impales the guy right through the stomach with the point of an umbrella. But he’s not done. Ricky then opens the umbrella, making his victim look like some deranged peacock. The next time you go out in the rain, maybe grab a poncho instead.

Garbage Disposals
From carving knives to stoves to blenders, if we’ve learned anything from horror movies, it’s that everything in a kitchen is a potential weapon. In the 2009 version of “The Last House on the Left,” two parents take revenge on one of their daughter’s attackers by shoving his hand in a garbage disposal. If you’ve ever lived with one of these contraptions, chances are you’ve wondered exactly what would happen if you got a finger caught in it. Well, wonder no more. As actor Aaron Paul twitches and screams in agony, it gives you some idea of how that might go. It’s a torturous scene just to watch.

Cars
From the trucker in “Duel” to the maniacal stunt driver in “Death Proof,” there have been all sorts of scary movies about bad drivers. But John Carpenter and writer Stephen King took it a step further by making the car itself the villain. “Christine” is a fiery red 1958 Plymouth Fury, and that’s appropriate. She’s fast, furious, and in one scene, she’s even on fire. The inhuman nature of the threat is what makes Christine so haunting. There’s not much rhyme or reason to her. She’s simply a case of human-made technology turning against us. Christine is an unstoppable hunk of heavy metal and gasoline that can’t be reasoned with or understood.

Garage Doors
The chances of getting trapped in a garage at night by a vicious, horror-loving murderer are low but never zero. If you were planning on trying to squeeze through a doggy door in that situation, or trying to escape via the main door, forget it. “Scream” ruined that one for everybody. The squirm-worthy sequence where Rose McGowan gets stuck in a slowly rising garage door only to get her head crushed was instantly iconic. But it also made the simple act of walking under an open garage door enough to give us instant chills.

Tanning Beds
We could do an entire list like this one with only entries from the “Final Destination” series. After all, who didn’t avoid driving behind those big logging trucks after the first sequel? But as far as everyday things go, the tanning salon deaths in the third movie really take the cake. When a bizarre series of coincidences traps them inside their respective machines, we watch as Ashley and Ashlyn are roasted alive due to a malfunction. With its unnatural light and coffin-like shape, there’s already something claustrophobic about a tanning bed. This movie just doubles down on everything that makes them creepy to begin with.

Birds
This Hitchcock classic plays on the seeming harmlessness of our feathered friends, and the horror that might ensue if they suddenly turned on us. Birds, especially small, common ones, aren’t typically threatening to humans. That’s comforting, seeing as how there are so many of them, and they have the advantage of flight. Coordinated attacks like the ones in this movie would normally stretch an audience’s suspension of disbelief. It’s only director Alfred Hitchcock’s mastery of suspense and technical innovation that makes them utterly terrifying. After watching multiple scenes of gulls and crows attacking schoolchildren, suddenly the otherwise pleasant sound of birds chirping feels like a threat.

VHS Tapes
DVDs were only just starting to take hold when Hollywood dropped this static-filled nightmare on us. Adapted from a Japanese film, “The Ring” features a cursed videotape whose viewers die under mysterious and grotesque circumstances a week after watching it. For viewers in 2002, who still probably had dozens of VHS tapes lying around the house, this was a hard one to shake. It was a reminder that anyone could record something and put it on a tape, and you might have no idea what was on one until you watched it. Analog horror owes a debt to “The Ring” and its Japanese original for keeping VHS technology alive through sheer force of terror.

Dolls
Chucky was far from the first killer doll. Movies like “Trilogy of Terror” and “Poltergeist” had wrung some scares out of the trope before he came along. But something about Chucky’s foul mouth, his pre-recorded child’s voice, and his viciousness made him an unforgettable villain. His height, his clothes, his weird little plastic body – all the things that should have been silly or cute instead made him that much scarier. It’s pretty safe to say Chucky ruined talking dolls for all of us. Even the cutest and most innocent looking ones suddenly had us on our guard and checking for their batteries.