10 Must-See Halloween Movies For Non-Horror Fans

While Halloween is known for all the horror movie marathons and things that go bump in the night, many fans of the holiday simply can’t seem to get behind all the jump scares of modern horror and the true frights that come with ghosts, zombies, and murderers.

However, Halloween is about the trick and the treat, and some Halloween themed movies are just a complete delight and must-watch for each new spooky season. Not everything has to be terrifying, and some of these films are sure to be on your must-watch list for the season.

10 Practical Magic

Practical Magic is an incredibly adorable film about two sisters who grow up with their aunts after the death of their parents. The catch is, these sisters and their aunts are witches. The film follows the two girls as they grow up, fearing the curse that has plagued their family for so long. Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman play the sisters who try to show the town they grow up in that they are nothing to fear, while also getting rid of a pretty bad ex-boyfriend.

9 Hocus Pocus

Hocus Pocus is a classic and a definite must-see for each and every spooky season. This film takes place on Halloween night when a virgin, new kid Max Dennison, lights the black flame candle and summons the three children-eating witches back from the dead. If the witches consume children by daylight, they can stay in the mortal realm and get younger and younger with each soul, but if they can’t then they will be sent back to which they came. And they have their eyes set on Max’s little sister.

8 Halloweentown

Halloweentown is a Disney Channel Original Movie that has three sequels after the original, all relating back to the mystical other-dimensional Halloweentown. Marnie is the eldest of three siblings and wishes her life would be filled with just a little magic. Her grandmother, who only visits once every Halloween, encourages Marnie to seek magic whenever she can because she has a secret.

Marnie (and her entire family) are witches, and her grandmother lives in Halloweentown which only opens to the mortal realm every October 31st. Marnie and her siblings follow their grandmother home and uncover a plot that threatens the creatures of this other world.

7 The Nightmare Before Christmas

Another classic on the list is The Nightmare Before Christmas, a must watch of every holiday season, for Halloween and Christmas. This film follows Jack Skellington, the Pumpkin King of Halloweentown which has just finished celebrating yet another successful spooky season. But Jack starts to realize that he isn’t finding joy in doing the same old thing every year. After chasing his dog, Zero, deep into the forest, he happens across a number of doors with different holiday symbols on them. After choosing the Christmas themed door, he lands in Christmastown and becomes completely enthralled, wanting to recreate it in his own home.

6 Casper

Casper has been around for a while, but it wasn’t until the 1990’s that he began so popular with his own live-action film in which the friendly ghost befriends Christina Ricci’s character, Kat. Kat is dragged along by her family to search the haunted manor that Casper resides in for ghosts. But while Casper falls in love with Kat, despite his transparent state, his trickster and angry uncles pull a number of pranks on Kat’s family, some that aim to cause actual harm to the living. This film is lighthearted while still dealing with ghostly hauntings and is perfect for anyone who wishes to get into the spooky season.

5 Beetlejuice

Beetlejuice is another classic. After a young couple has untimely deaths, they end up getting stuck in the afterlife as ghosts to haunt their old home. In order to get their house back and try to move “on” the couple ends up feeling totally out of options, so they contact that ghastly ghoul, Betelgeuse. Of course, this couple is incredibly kind and warm and don’t actually want to scare the new family that moves in, especially when they find themselves attached to their daughter, Lydia. But now Betelgeuse has his eyes set on them and he won’t give up till he is free.

4 Clue

Tim Curry starred in Clue in 1985 before he became Pennywise the Dancing Clown and after he stared as Dr. Frank-N-Furter in the smash hit, The Rocky Horror Picture Show (another film that would be perfect for this season). In Clue, however, Curry played the role of the infamous butler in the house of characters who all managed to become suspects of a murder.

The film is utterly hilarious and still deals with a wild murder mystery much like the original board game. This film is absolutely perfect for anyone looking for a Halloween atmosphere that can’t really handle anything scary.

3 Fun Size

This Nickelodeon produced movie is about a Halloween night that goes totally wrong when Wren (Victoria Justice) is forced to babysit her wild little brother who wanders off mid-way through trick-or-treating. Wren, and her friends, go through all kinds of trouble to find him as they go from place to place on Halloween night, many of the places leading to wild adventures. This movie is super fun and sweet and will take viewers down a road they wouldn’t expect.

2 Coraline

Coraline is another fan-favorite movie this season. This young, blue-haired girl has just moved into a new house with her parents who are seemingly busy all the time, with either work or house stuff. Coraline gets bored and lonely and ends up finding her way to another dimension, another version of her own world. Her “other-mother” is loving and kind, her “other-father” enjoys having fun and hanging out with her. So while Coraline finds herself preferring this other world, she also uncovers that something incredibly creepy is going on with her other parents.

1 What We Do In The Shadows

What We Do In The Shadows, from hit directors and writers Jermaine Clement and Taika Waititi, has now become a cult classic. This mockumentary follows the lives of four vampires who live together and their daily lives as vampires living in the 21st century. Each of the vampires in this film is based on another popular vampire in media (such as Nosferatu or Dracula) and is absolutely hilarious, so much so, that the film was given a television series. This movie is absolutely perfect for Halloween and will make everyone who watches it an instant fan.

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