10 Scariest Korean Movies To Never Watch Alone, Ranked

South Korea is no slouch when it comes to horror. The amount of scary movies the country has amassed since the great boom in the 2000s is downright astounding. It was during that time that various Asian countries were all but competing to see whose movies could frighten people the most. In terms of diversity, though, Korean horror has other places beat. At its disposal, “K-horror” boasts ghost stories, vicious slashers, psychological horror, and so much more besides. Fans of all kinds of horror are catered for.

It’s the creativity and high production values that combine to bring audiences back to modern Korean horror again and again. More importantly, though, what really matters is whether or not the movies can chill us to the bone. Here are our picks for some of the scariest Korean horror movies to watch… so long as you’re not alone!

10 Horror Stories (2012)

When a man abducts a teenager, he forces her to tell him scary stories. The tales include a couple of children who are harassed by a stranger lurking outside their apartment, a flight attendant battling a serial killer during a flight, stepsisters who are both interested in a man with sinister plans for them and a nurse forced to make a life or death decision during a zombie apocalypse.

This movie is the first in a trilogy of anthologies. Every story here is agreeable, with half of them being more heart-racing than the others. The last one, however, steals the show.

9 Whispering Corridors (1998)

A strict all-girls school is under attack by what seems like a malevolent force. When one student investigates, she starts to believe something else is at play here.

The Whispering Corridors franchise is a seminal part of modern South Korean horror. The first film seems like a Scream cash-in, but there’s more to it than meets the eye. If anything, the movie is more comparable to Suspiria. As of today, there are five Whispering Corridors movies in total.

8 Say Yes (2001)

A romantic getaway for a couple goes terribly wrong when they cross paths with an unhinged drifter. For the remainder of the trip, the disgruntled hitcher stalks the couple at every turn.

Sometimes dismissed as nothing but a Korean version of The Hitcher, Say Yes doesn’t operate on autopilot. This is a riveting, panic-inducing, cat-and-mouse thriller. It goes against the grain of other, more subtle thrillers released around the same time. Instead, Say Yes is completely, unashamedly direct. Some of the twists will definitely shock viewers!

7 Loner (2008)

Teenage Soo-na has lived with her uncle and grandmother since her parents’ deaths. Her life is fairly average until someone else close to her passes away. This trauma causes Soo-na to retreat from life. She refuses to leave her bedroom, and her family is gravely worried. Even more so when they think Soo-na is talking to someone else living inside her room.

Loner is one long and calculated red herring. What you think you’re getting is another ghost story based around someone’s inner pain. What the movie ultimately evolves into is something absolutely out of the blue.

6 Phone (2002)

A journalist named Ji-won receives threatening calls on her cell phone, and she thinks a controversial story of hers is the reason why. When she changes her number, the calls don’t stop. They’re now even more frightening. Ji-won finally learns that the people who had the same phone number before her have since died under unusual circumstances.

Phone sounds like a rip-off of The Ring. Critics wouldn’t be entirely wrong to think that, as there are glaring similarities. The origin of the death curse, however, is nothing like Sadako’s. In 2009, the rights to an English remake were bought. Yet, as of today, no movie has ever surfaced.

5 The Red Shoes (2005)

After learning her husband has been unfaithful, an unhappy housewife leaves with her young daughter. They move into a run-down apartment while the mother attempts to start anew. In her journey towards independence, the woman comes across a pair of foreboding pumps in a subway station. Anyone who now wears them falls under a deep, unsettling spell.

The Red Shoes is an arresting thriller with a supernatural sharpness. Yes, the shoes in the movie aren’t actually red, but this dark, untethered interpretation of Hans Christian Anderson’s fairy tale should not be missed.

4 Someone Behind You (2007)

Following her aunt’s wedding, a teenager named Ga-in becomes the target of a series of brutal attempts on her life. It appears there’s a curse that is aiming to kill members of her family, one by one.

Released overseas as Voices, Someone Behind You examines the concept of fate through the lens of horror. This movie holds a remarkable level of violence, but it’s not gratuitous in the way of many slashers.

3 Bloody Reunion (2006)

A teacher’s former students gather at her home for a reunion. The teacher has since become ill, and she needs the care of a nurse. When the students were younger, their teacher was unfair and spiteful. Now, she wants forgiveness. The gathering eventually turns into a massacre as the guests are systematically murdered by an unknown assailant.

Bloody Reunion (or To Sir With Love) is a thrilling take on Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None. It delivers a twist you have to see to believe.

2 Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum (2018)

A web-based horror show travels to the infamous Gonjiam, an abandoned and supposedly haunted psychiatric hospital in Gwanju. Lore states that the hospital’s director murdered all of the patients before going missing. Now, the crew attempts to rake in their greatest views yet. Unfortunately for them, this may also be their last show ever.

The now-demolished, real-life Gonjiam is at the center of this successful spook tale, but filming was actually conducted inside a Busan high school. Nonetheless, this found-footage movie delivers big and unrelenting scares.

1 The Wailing (2016)

A mysterious disease affects the residents of a mountain village. The malady causes the afflicted to become erratic and violent. When a local police officer investigates, his daughter becomes sick, too. He and his friends then suspect this is all the doing of a stranger who’s moved to the village. Little do they know, there’s something far more menacing than they could have imagined at work here.

The Wailing is a knock-out of a film. It seamlessly marries a number of emotions that collectively drain you by the film’s end. One minute, you’ll be laughing. The next, you’ll be horrified. The Wailing doesn’t lay its entire deck out on the table, but that’s exactly why the conclusion is so unforgettable.

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