Best Spanish-Language Horror Movies Ranked by Tomatometer
From Mexico to Spain to Argentina and beyond, featuring Pan's Labyrinth, REC, Dracula plus more!
Best Spanish-Language Horror Movies Ranked by Tomatometer
Here you’ll find only the Freshest scary selections from Mexico (Cronos), Spain (The Orphanage), Uruguay (The Silent House), Chile (The Wolf House), and Argentina (Cold Sweat). Inside each film, an underworld teeming with our favorite monsters. Zombies in [rec]! Mad scientists in The Skin I Live In! Vampires in Dracula! (Yep, there was another version to the Universal classic.) Creepy kids in The Orphanage! And In the Devil’s Backbone, maybe something beyond…
We gathered virtually every Spanish-language horror movie we could find, separating the Fresh and Certified Fresh. If you’re wondering about the decided lack of chucapbras and La Llarona on this list, it’s because there hasn’t been a critically-noted movie made yet. Though KM 31 comes closest with its take on Mexican folklore.
And most recently we’ve added the Certified Fresh films When Evil Lurks, Huesera: The Bone Woman, Piggy, and The Count. See where they place with our guide of the Best Spanish-Language Horror Movies by Tomatometer!
#1
Tigers Are Not Afraid (2017)
97%
#1
Adjusted Score: 102803%
Critics Consensus: Tigers Are Not Afraid draws on childhood trauma for a story that deftly blends magical fantasy and hard-hitting realism - and leaves a lingering impact.
Synopsis: When a girl's mother disappears leaving her on her own, she goings a gang of street children, leading to a...
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#2
Huesera: The Bone Woman (2022)
97%
#2
Adjusted Score: 101919%
Critics Consensus: A bone-chilling body horror, Huesera offers genre fans a twisted take on What to Expect When You're Expecting.
Synopsis: Valeria's joy at becoming a first-time mother is quickly taken away when she's cursed by a sinister entity. As danger...
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#3
When Evil Lurks (2023)
96%
#3
Adjusted Score: 102290%
Critics Consensus: A hard-hitting horror film whose surface-level frights are just as engaging as its thematic concerns, When Evil Lurks marks a viscerally unsettling addition to the possession horror canon.
Synopsis: When brothers Pedro (Ezequiel Rodríguez) and Jimmy (Demián Salomón) discover that a demonic infection has been festering in a nearby...
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#4
La llorona (2019)
96%
#4
Adjusted Score: 100401%
Critics Consensus: La Llorona puts a fresh spin on the familiar legend by blending the supernatural and the political to resolutely chilling effect.
Synopsis: Alma is murdered with her children during a military attack in Guatemala, but when the general who ordered the genocide...
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#5
The Wolf House (2018)
96%
#5
Adjusted Score: 98162%
Critics Consensus: Surreal, unsettling, and finally haunting, The Wolf House is a stunning outpouring of creativity whose striking visuals queasily complement its disturbing story.
Synopsis: A young woman takes refuge in a strange house in the woods after escaping from a German colony in southern...
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#6
Pan's Labyrinth (2006)
95%
#6
Adjusted Score: 105168%
Critics Consensus: Pan's Labyrinth is Alice in Wonderland for grown-ups, with the horrors of both reality and fantasy blended together into an extraordinary, spellbinding fable.
Synopsis: In 1944 Spain young Ofelia (Ivana Baquero) and her ailing mother (Ariadna Gil) arrive at the post of her mother's...
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#7
The Devil's Backbone (2001)
93%
#7
Adjusted Score: 97023%
Critics Consensus: Creepily atmospheric and haunting, The Devil's Backbone is both a potent ghost story and an intelligent political allegory.
Synopsis: After losing his father, 10-year-old Carlos (Fernando Tielve) arrives at the Santa Lucia School, which shelters orphans of the Republican...
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#8
Piggy (2022)
91%
#8
Adjusted Score: 95973%
Critics Consensus: Brought hauntingly to life by Laura Galán's committed performance, Piggy deftly deploys genre thrills in service of sharp social commentary.
Synopsis: With the summer sun beating down on her rural Spanish town, Sara hides away in her parent's butcher shop. A...
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#9
Timecrimes (2007)
90%
#9
Adjusted Score: 92165%
Critics Consensus: Timecrimes is a low-budget thriller that's well-crafted and loaded with dark humor and bizarre twists.
Synopsis: Nacho Vigalondo's time-travel thriller opens with Hector spying on a beautiful woman undressing in the woods near his property. Investigating,...
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#10
Cronos (1993)
90%
#10
Adjusted Score: 95282%
Critics Consensus: Guillermo del Toro's unique feature debut is not only gory and stylish, but also charming and intelligent.
Synopsis: Antique dealer Jesus Gris (Federico Luppi) stumbles across Cronos, a 400-year-old scarab that, when it latches onto him, grants him...
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#11
Rec (2007)
90%
#11
Adjusted Score: 90872%
Critics Consensus: Plunging viewers into the nightmarish hellscape of an apartment complex under siege, [Rec] proves that found footage can still be used as an effective delivery mechanism for sparse, economic horror.
Synopsis: A reporter (Manuela Velasco) and her cameraman record the horrifying outbreak of a disease that turns humans into vicious cannibals....
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#12
Julia's Eyes (2010)
90%
#12
Adjusted Score: 90796%
Critics Consensus: Smart, suspenseful, and visually distinctive, Julia's Eyes marks another modern Spanish thriller that quickens the pulse while engaging the mind.
Synopsis: The closer she gets to solving her sister's death, a woman (Belén Rueda) with a degenerative eye disease becomes increasingly...
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#13
The Orphanage (2007)
87%
#13
Adjusted Score: 94067%
Critics Consensus: Deeply unnerving and surprisingly poignant, The Orphanage is an atmospheric, beautifully crafted haunted house horror film that earns scares with a minimum of blood.
Synopsis: Laura (Belén Rueda) has happy memories of her childhood in an orphanage. She convinces her husband to buy the place...
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#14
The Untamed (2016)
86%
#14
Adjusted Score: 88735%
Critics Consensus: The Untamed attempts some ambitious tonal juggling between fantastical and disturbing -- and draws viewers in with its slippery, inexorable pull.
Synopsis: A couple in a troubled marriage locate a meteorite, initiating an encounter with a mysterious creature. Their lives are turned...
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#15
El Conde (2023)
82%
#15
Adjusted Score: 87992%
Critics Consensus: A darkly delirious satire rooted in real-life horror, El Conde finds Pablo Larraín revisiting familiar themes without losing their provocative power.
Synopsis: El Conde is a dark comedy/horror that imagines a parallel universe inspired by the recent history of Chile. The film...
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#16
The Skin I Live In (2011)
81%
#16
Adjusted Score: 87984%
Critics Consensus: The Skin I Live In lacks Almodovar's famously charged romance, replaced with a wonderfully bizarre and unpredictable detour into arthouse ick.
Synopsis: Ever since his beloved wife was horribly burned in an auto accident, Dr. Robert Ledgard (Antonio Banderas), a skilled plastic...
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#17
The Platform (2019)
81%
#17
Adjusted Score: 85455%
Critics Consensus: While it may feel muddled at times, The Platform is an inventive and captivating dystopian thriller.
Synopsis: In the future, prisoners housed in vertical cells watch as inmates in the upper cells are fed while those below...
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#18
We Are the Flesh (2016)
74%
#18
Adjusted Score: 75353%
Critics Consensus: Visually striking and aggressively confrontational, We are the Flesh may prove as difficult to watch as it ultimately is to forget.
Synopsis: After wandering a ruined city for years, two siblings enter a building and find a man who makes them a...
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#19
Disappear Completely (2022)
100%
#19
Adjusted Score: 83696%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: After visiting a crime scene, an ambitious and insensitive tabloid crime photographer falls victim to a mysterious illness that makes...
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#20
The Darkness (2016)
100%
#20
Adjusted Score: 35827%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: An invisible monster torments a boy living with his father, brother, and sister in a house in the woods; the...
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#21
#22
The Similars (2015)
95%
#22
Adjusted Score: 95150%
Critics Consensus: A smart homage to genre filmmaking, The Similars is a fun and frightening film that balances socio-political issues with aplomb.
Synopsis: Eight people experience a strange phenomenon while waiting for a bus at a remote station on a rainy October night....
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#23
Shrew's Nest (2014)
95%
#23
Adjusted Score: 92769%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: Monte's agoraphobia keeps her secluded in her apartment until a young man is injured in a stairwell and crawls to...
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#24
Sleep Tight (2011)
92%
#24
Adjusted Score: 92588%
Critics Consensus: The strong lead performance, clever plot turns, and the unsettling ending makes Sleep Tight worth stalking.
Synopsis: César is the superintendent of an apartment building and keeps very close tabs on the tenants. He secretly enjoys inflicting...
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#25
The Coffee Table (2022)
86%
#25
Adjusted Score: 87050%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: Jesús and Maria love each other, endlessly, magnificently, even though they sometimes just don't notice. But hey, now that their...
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#26
The Last Matinee (2020)
86%
#26
Adjusted Score: 86350%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: The audience attending the last showing of a horror film in a small downtown cinema are terrorized by a murderer...
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#27
Everyone Will Burn (2021)
85%
#27
Adjusted Score: 85403%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: In a small village in Leon, Spain, María José prepares to end her life after failing to get over the...
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#28
#29
Witching & B...ing (2013)
84%
#29
Adjusted Score: 84610%
Critics Consensus: Dark, nasty, and delightfully subversive, Witching and Bitching is gross-out genre fun with a heaping helping of warped comedy for good measure.
Synopsis: Jewel thieves flee into the Basque forests and are captured by a coven of witches....
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#30
Juan of the Dead (2011)
83%
#30
Adjusted Score: 83015%
Critics Consensus: Filled with wild splatter slapstick, Juan of the Dead also deftly uses its zombie premise as an undead Trojan horse for insightful political commentary.
Synopsis: When the dead rise and attack the living, Juan starts a zombie-killing business, until he has to save his small...
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#31
#32
#33
#34
Luciferina (2018)
83%
#34
Adjusted Score: 29161%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: A young woman travels into a jungle to find a mystical plant to help her dying father....
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#35
Sister Death (2023)
82%
#35
Adjusted Score: 82016%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: In post-war Spain, Narcisa (Aria Bedmar), a young novice with supernatural powers, arrives at a former convent, now a school...
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#36
Errementari: The Blacksmith and the Devil (2017)
80%
#36
Adjusted Score: 46904%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: A blacksmith holds a demon in captivity, torturing it as revenge for his troubles. One day, an orphan girl stumbles...
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#37
#38
Tombs of the Blind Dead (1971)
77%
#38
Adjusted Score: 77706%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: Cowled skeletons of Spanish knights ride again, blinded by crows for their 13th-century savagery....
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#39
The Day of the Beast (1995)
77%
#39
Adjusted Score: 77096%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: A heavy-metal fan (Santiago Segura) and a psychic (Armando De Razza) help a priest (Alex Angulo) seek the infant Antichrist...
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#40
The Passenger (2021)
73%
#40
Adjusted Score: 58961%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: A group of strangers sharing a ride have their trip interrupted when the driver hits a woman hiking in the...
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#41
We Are What We Are (2010)
72%
#41
Adjusted Score: 73110%
Critics Consensus: We Are What We Are is elevated horror that combines family drama and social politics, with plenty of gore on top.
Synopsis: When his father dies unexpectedly, Alfredo (Francisco Barreiro) must step up and become the man of the house, providing for...
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#42
#43
Cold Sweat (2010)
69%
#43
Adjusted Score: 40276%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: A young man's search for his missing ex-girlfriend leads him to an old house filled with stolen explosives and two...
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#44
The Silent House (2010)
68%
#44
Adjusted Score: 68257%
Critics Consensus: Shot in a single take, The Silent House may be a gimmick movie, but it's one that's enough to sustain dread and tension throughout.
Synopsis: Laura and her father stay in a house overnight, but a mysterious noise makes her very frightened....
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#45
Rec 4: Apocalypse (2014)
67%
#45
Adjusted Score: 67079%
Critics Consensus: After a lackluster third entry, [REC] 4 gets the series back on track, at least to the level of the first sequel.
Synopsis: Survivors of a strange contagion which turns humans into ghouls find themselves aboard a ship where a doctor is trying...
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#46
In a Glass Cage (1987)
67%
#46
Adjusted Score: 62973%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: Years after committing atrocities as a torturer of interned children during the Holocaust, Nazi doctor and certified pedophile Klaus (Günter...
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#47
The Chalk Line (2022)
67%
#47
Adjusted Score: 35341%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: After a couple finds a traumatized child of unknown origins, wife Paula must decipher the girl's strange behaviors to unlock...
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#48
Rec 2 (2009)
66%
#48
Adjusted Score: 68174%
Critics Consensus: It lacks the surprising jolt of the first installment, but [REC] 2 almost maintains the original's chilling momentum -- and proves not all horror sequels were made equal.
Synopsis: A doctor and a SWAT team enter a quarantined building where a virus has turned the residents into a pack...
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#49
The Wasteland (2021)
64%
#49
Adjusted Score: 48313%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: The tranquility of a family that lives isolated from society is suddenly disturbed by a horrific creature that would put...
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#50
Don't Listen (2020)
63%
#50
Adjusted Score: 30932%
Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.
Synopsis: After the strange death of his young son at their new home, Daniel hears a ghostly plea for help, spurring...
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