Films to stream

Ghosts have stalked many film genres since the earliest days of cinema, from horror to comedy and romance. Here are a few of the most interesting – and occasionally plain scary – examples:

Ugetsu Monogatari From the coldly beautiful Kwaidan to the terrifying Ring, ghost films loom large in Japanese cinema. Ugetsu is the finest, a poetic take on a medieval folk tale released in 1953. Its director, Kenji Mizoguchi, made many such period dramas and is sometimes seen as the country’s greatest film-maker.

The Haunting Adapted from a Shirley Jackson novel, Robert Wise’s 1963 film tells of a group of paranormal investigators gathered in a Gothic mansion to determine if rumours of a poltergeist are true. Wise’s clever use of design and cinematography to bring the house itself frighteningly to life has proved very influential.

The Devil’s Backbone

Guillermo del Toro’s poignant and painterly 2001 drama works both as a gripping supernatural tale and as a film about history. It’s set during the Spanish Civil War, in a Republicanrun desert orphanage under imminent threat from Franco’s advancing troops, and haunted by the ghost of a drowned child.

The Others Alejandro Amenábar’s 2001 chiller stars Nicole Kidman as a brittle, anxious mother isolated with her two children on Jersey at the tail end of WWII. Their country house is dark (the children are allergic to sunlight), the servants are sinister, and she becomes convinced they are not alone.

A Ghost Story In David Lowery’s 2017 fantasy drama, a young man dies and reappears in his beloved family’s house as a child’s image of a ghost, a figure draped in a white sheet with dark eyeholes. The effect is strangely moving.