Horror films have had a bit of a renaissance over the last few years, something that tends to happen in times of economic uncertainty. While many of these have been remakes and sequels (have they stopped making Paranormal Activity films yet?) this latest rebirth has seen the emergence of some modern classics in the genre. With so many being produced, however, it's difficult to know where to start. 

Well fear not dear reader. To save you the sleepless nights, we've spent the last few weeks in front of the TV with the doors locked and curtains drawn to bring you a list of 5 of the most unsettling, upsetting and downright horrifying films from the last 5 years.

Anya Taylor Joy in 'The Witch'

The Witch (2015)

A wise man once said, a movie that frightens you with jump scares is a like a comedian making you laugh by tickling you. So with that in mind, first up on our list is The Witch, a film that isn't scary in the traditional sense, but instead draws you in with its intensity and atmosphere and doesn't let go until the insidious conclusion.

Set in 17th century New England, The Witch tells the story of a Puritan family who are forced to set up their own farm on the edge of a forest after being excommunicated from their village. Also living in the forest happens to be an ancient and malevolent witch, which is bad luck. When their son disappears, suspicion falls on their oldest daughter. This isn't helped by the fact that the younger children start accusing her of being a witch and working for Black Peter, their pet goat. 

Everything about The Witch is incredibly immersive, from Writer-Director Robert Eggers use of language accurate for the time to the costumes, and even the look and feel of the film. This, combined with the claustrophobia of the endless surrounding forest, means this is a film that will stick with you for a while without truly terrifying. Although I am now scared of black goats.

It Follows (2014)

If you're a fan of really slow and brutal games of tig, It Follows is the film for you. The story centers on Jay (Maika Monroe), a girl who meets a boy who gives her a sexually-transmitted death sentence. She is now the recipient of a ghoulish stalker, who looks a bit like my Grandma at one point, and will follow her wherever she goes without stopping. If "It" ever catches up to her, she'll be killed in a less than elegant fashion. The only thing she can do is sleep with someone else, who then becomes the target for "It". Until they die, then it's right back to Jay, and then the person before her, and so on down the line.

What follows (get it?) is an hour and a half of the creepiest cat-and-mouse game imaginable, as Jay and friends try various tactics to desperately get away from Grandma. Part of the trouble is, Grandma isn't always Grandma. "It" regularly changes appearance, and there's a lot of very tense moments when the gang don't know if the person shambling towards them is the entity or just a hung-over teen. I had flashbacks to this on a recent tour of The London Bridge Experience as, what I assumed were mannequins suddenly jumped through a wall and began chasing me, although they were a bit quicker.

It's a great premise, and the eerie electro soundtrack works brilliantly, but it's the crushing inevitability of this film that really gets to you. No matter how far or how fast you go, eventually "It" will catch up to you. The combination of these things means It Follows will follow (last one, promise) you in your every waking moment for a few days after watching.

The Babadook (2014)

The best horror films are always about something else. The monster under the bed isn't scary because it's got sharp teeth, it's scary because it is a mirror or metaphor of the deeper psychological issues plaguing the characters. The Babadook is a classic example of this, and indeed is a classic of the entire genre.

The story follows Amelia, grief-stricken over the death of her husband, and her 'difficult' son Samuel. Amelia's husband was killed 6 years earlier while driving Amelia to the hospital to give birth to Samuel, an incident which has irreparably damaged her ability to truly love her son. 

Samuel has a constant fear of monsters, which isn't helped when he finds a book called "The Babadook" - seemingly a children's book, but one that warns of a malevolent creature that comes to snatch people away. Samuel becomes convinced the Babadook has invaded their home, and as strange occurrences start happening around the house, Amelia begins to believe that the Babadook may be real after all.

The movie walks the fine line between psychological and supernatural horror for almost its entire length, leaving the viewer wondering if the Babadook is real or a figment of mother and son's crumbling minds. But the true horror of the Babadook is the way it takes the most beautiful relationship, that of a parent and child, and corrupts it absolutely.

It has also caused my wife to hide in various places around the house and croak "Babadook Dook Dook" at me . Which is fun. And I'd only recently got her stop making that creepy croaking noise from The Grudge down the phone.

The Wailing (2016)

South Korea has a proud history of overpoweringly bleak films that leave audiences with a feeling of "why did I put myself through that?" (see: I Saw the Devil and Oldboy as good examples of this). With Na Hong-jin's The Wailing, this happy tradition continues. 

Set in a remote area of the Korean mountains, the story follows Kwak Do-won as a police officer trying to solve the case of a deadly virus that has appeared in the village at about the same time as a mysterious stranger. When his daughter starts showing symptoms, the family visits the local shaman (as you do) which turns out to be a pretty bad idea.

Na creates a thoroughly unsettling picture that wonderfully builds the feeling of dread. His handling of the pacing is near perfect and the use of humour works well at keeping the community and characters feeling human and maintaining the audience's empathy as things go from bad to really really bad before ending up really really really bad. It's a long one, clocking in at 156 minutes, but it might just be one of the best Korean thrillers of the last 10 years.

Just don't watch it if you're a fan of chickens.

A Quiet Place (2018)

The world's most extreme game of hide and seek follows a family trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic America where making noise will get you killed. After some kind of ecological disaster or invasion (the film isn't explicit in this) humans have been thinned out by a race of giant reptile predators who are blind but have exceptional hearing. So, as long as you can keep silent at all times and can live without crisps or breaking wind, you'll be alright.

The family has something of an advantage over other humans as their daughter is deaf, meaning they've been communicating in sign for some time before everything fell apart. But their situation is complicated by the fact that the mother of the family (played brilliantly by Emily Blunt) is heavily pregnant for much of the film. One can't help but think that this could have been better planned, but as a plot device it's bloody brilliant.

Directed by John Krasinski, who is rapidly becoming an accomplished filmmaker in his own right, A Quiet Place is a nerve shredder and provides considerable post movie entertainment if you go about your daily tasks imagining a life where you can't make a sound. Try eating your Crunchy Nut Cornflakes in silence. Hours of fun.

Many of the great horror movies make an audience become actively invested in the fate of the characters, and in this respect A Quiet Place is a triumph. 

The ending is a bit of a crowd-pleaser and it uses the crutch of jump scares a bit too much. But the use of visual storytelling and silence is superb. Will it stick with you after the credits have rolled? Absolutely. If you aren't left contemplating 'the nail', then quite frankly, what's wrong with you? 

Honorable mentions:

IT (2017)

More coming-of-age story than straight horror but has quickly become one of the better Stephen King adaptations. 

The Conjuring (2013)

Following the classic 'Family moves into new house without knowing about its sordid past' trope, The Conjuring is jumpy, it's cliched and it's great.

It Comes at Night (2017)

It's just so bleak that I don't really want to talk about it.