Entertainment

22 Scary Movies To Watch With Your Kids So You Don't Have To Be The Only Scaredy Cat In The Family

by Chrissy Bobic

Watching your first horror movie is a rite of passage. For some of us, it might have been something as iconic as Scream. Others got their first taste of scary movies in the form of something a little tamer like Gremlins or Beetlejuice. In those cases, it was easier to watch scary movies as a kid and slowly ease into the Nightmare on Elm Street of it all. As a parent, I couldn’t wait to force my son to be as obsessed with horror movies as I am. And these 22 scary movies to watch with your kids will give you a new scary movie partner to watch movies through your fingers with.

First, it's important to note what constitutes an appropriate scary movie for kids. The way I see it, as long as it is rated G or PG and it won't give my kid nightmares, then it's good to go. There are a few exceptions to this rule, like the Ghostbusters reboot, which is rated PG-13 but it is still mild enough for my little one to enjoy. The Addams Family and The Addams Family Values are both also rated PG-13 but are what I would consider great jumping off points for young horror movie fans.

At the end of the day, it all depends on what your kid can handle, even with you next to them having the feeling squeezed out of your hand. But if you want to introduce your kids to scary movies, these are the ones to start with.

1. Hocus Pocus

Hocus Pocus was everything to me when I was 10 and it's still the best kids Halloween movie out there. As an adult, it doesn't scare me anymore, but as a kid, Billy Butcherson was no joke.

Walt Disney Pictures/YouTube

2. Goosebumps

You don't have to have read every single Goosebumps book to appreciate the Jack Black movie adaptation, but it helps if you want to be able to appreciate every Easter egg. For me, these books are probably where my love for horror began.

Columbia Pictures/YouTube

3. Gremlins

Like a lot of movies from the '80s, the PG rating on Gremlins is a little questionable when you look back at the alcohol-swigging wild gremlin creatures. But for a lot of people, this was the first *appropriate* scary movie they could watch.

Warner Bros./YouTube

4. Poltergeist

The '80s were a different time. But acid wash jeans and blown out hair aren't the only things that have changed since then. Today, a movie about a family terrorized by spirits and demons like Poltergeist would definitely garner a PG-13 or R rating. But if your older kid is ready for some genuine jump scares, Poltergeist will deliver.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/YouTube

5. Beetlejuice

Beetlejuice is more creepy than terrifying, even for some younger viewers. But there is always going to be something scary about the demons in the movie, despite the '80s special effects making things a little more cartoonish.

Warner Bros./YouTube

6. Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween

The 2018 sequel to Goosebumps didn't include a return of Jack Black for the entire movie, but it did prominently feature Slappy the dummy. I'm a 30-year-old woman and that doll still scares me.

Columbia Pictures/YouTube

7. Coraline

Even though Coraline is an animated movie, the overall tone is dark, so it's going to depend on your kid if they can handle it or not. The premise of a lonely girl with busy parents finding a parallel universe starts off innocently enough, but quickly turns dark as she loses her way back to her own dimension.

Focus Features/YouTube

8. The Witches

The Witches still gives me nightmares. Not only because of the true form the witches take when they curl their toes and remove their masks and wigs, but because it forces me to see Anjelica Huston as ~not~ glamorous.

Jim Henson Productions/YouTube

9. Casper

Casper has a couple of scenes where the scares are legit, but for younger viewers who you are eager to introduce to horror, this is a solid movie to start them off with.

Universal Pictures/YouTube

10. Monster House

Monster House is another animated movie that is surprisingly creepy from start to finish. The animation looks like a cross between stop motion and computerized animation and it makes for some unsettling scenes. As the title suggests, it is literally about a house that comes to life to eat passersby, including a couple of police officers and a little girl on a bike. I promise it has a less sinister ending.

Columbia Pictures/YouTube

11. Halloweentown

Gone are the days of the true Disney Channel Original Movies, but you can't embark on a scary movie marathon with your kids without including a classic like Halloweentown.

Disney Channel/YouTube

12. The 'Burbs

The ‘Burbs has everything you could possibly need in an ‘80s thriller. Tom Hanks plays a guy who is suspicious of his new neighbors and sends his family away while he tries to figure out who (or what) they are. His wife is played by Carrie Fisher and Corey Feldman plays a neighborhood kid.

Universal Pictures/YouTube

13. Edward Scissorhands

Like a lot of Tim Burton’s movies, Edward Scissorhands is more whimsical than scary, but to a kid, that can equate to a scary movie. Just be prepared for all kinds of questions about what a waterbed is when Edward and his finger blades do a number on one.

Twentieth Century Fox/YouTube

14. The Nightmare Before Christmas

I still don't know where I stand on the debate of whether The Nightmare Before Christmas is a Christmas movie or a Halloween movie, but I do know that either way, Jack Skellington is terrifying with his black abyss eyes and that’s enough to make it scary for any kid.

Touchstone Pictures/YouTube

15. Ghostbusters

My son’s obsession with the original Ghostbusters started when he was three years old, so some toddlers can totally handle the ghostly characters in the movie. There are some *adult* themes, especially where Bill Murray’s character is concerned, but with a harmless PG rating, it's a mild version of what could have been a much scarier movie.

Columbia Pictures/YouTube

16. The Addams Family

This Addams Family movie starts with the return of Uncle Fester, who had been missing for several years and was brainwashed to cheat the Addams family out of their fortune. Wednesday and Pugsley are more charming than scary as warring brother and sister who use a guillotine for fun, but the minor kid-friendly horror elements come into play thanks to characters like Lurch and Thing.

Paramount Pictures/YouTube

17. Ghostbusters (The Reboot)

I wouldn't be a fan of literally everything Kate McKinnon does if I didn't call out the Ghostbusters reboot for its own contribution to the world of horror for kids. As an updated version of the original movie with a few modern twists of its own, the 2016 Ghostbusters reboot has more genuinely scary moments, but that’s what helped set it apart from its predecessor.

Columbia Pictures/YouTube

18. Labyrinth

There is something absolutely horrifying about the non-CGI characters in scary movies from the ‘80s. The makeup and costumes end up being a lot scarier and that’s the case in Labyrinth with Hoggle and Sir Didymus.

TriStar Pictures/YouTube

19. Little Monsters

I will never see Howie Mandel as anything other than Maurice, no matter how many game shows he hosts. But once your kid gets over the fact that the movie is primarily made up of monsters whose goal it is to scare children and live under their beds, they will (hopefully) come to love the blue-faced monster.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/YouTube

20. My Babysitter's A Vampire

My Babysitter's A Vampire is your classic made-for-kids scary movie, which is why it works so well for a younger audience. It follows a brother and sister who find out their new babysitter is — you guessed it — a vampire. It blends the sort of scary and silly in a way to help bring in new scary movie fans.

Disney Channel/YouTube

21. R.L. Stine's Mostly Ghostly

Based on a book series of the same name, R.L. Stine's Mostly Ghostly is about an 11-year-old girl who meets two young ghosts and launches an investigation about how they died.

Commotion Pictures/YouTube

22. The Addams Family Values

The second installment of the Addams Family movies follows Wednesday and Pugsley to camp. Like the other Addams Family movie, this one doesn't have any major jump scares, but these are the Addamses we’re talking about. Being scary is their nature, so the creepiness comes naturally.

I can't promise that your kids will be able to handle all of these scary movies, because I know that mine needed me to walk him down the hall to the bathroom after watching Monster House for the first time. Part of the fun in watching scary movies is getting scared, though, which my guy learned soon enough. Start them off with something tame like Halloweentown and work your way up to Poltergeist and you will have a horror cinephile on your hands in no time.

Paramount Pictures/YouTube
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