The 13 greatest horror movies you've never seen

With October 31 rapidly approaching, what better way is there to get prepared for Halloween than taking a trip down the horror aisle of the local video store?

The answer is: there is none.

There is nothing quite like a good scare to get into the spirit of the season, because as everyone knows, horror movies and Halloween go together like hatchets and hockey masks. When it comes to horror movies, many people will watch the same flick over and over again, jumping at all the same scares and knowing exactly when to cover their eyes in order to miss the more…"messy" scenes.

Well, this Halloween, rather than picking out a movie you've already seen a hundred times before, why not take a trip off the beaten path and rent one of these masterpieces of shock cinema? Who knows, these films very well may be…The Greatest Horror Movies You've Never Seen. After all, isn't the unknown always more frightening?

1.) An American Werewolf In London- After surviving a grisly attack by a mysterious animal on the English moors, and the gruesome death of his best friend, an American tourist, played by David Naughton, is haunted by more than just bad dreams, as he is repeatedly visited by the continually decomposing corpse of his friend, who warns him of the ungodly horrors that will be unleashed with the coming of the next full moon.

Key Scene: Set to Sam Cooke's "Blue Moon" and shot in a fully lit room, special effects mastermind Rick Baker delivers the greatest, most realistic and painful looking werewolf transformation scene ever captured on film.

2.) Army Of Darkness: Picking up where the first two Evil Dead films left off, Ash (Bruce Cambell), the ultimate horror-movie super-hero, finds himself trapped in 1300 A.D., joining forces with a medieval king and his knights to battle an army of the undead. In order to find his way home, he must retrieve the Necronomican, or The Book Of The Dead, and use it to lead one final assault on the forces of evil.

Key Scene: When the army of the Deadites breaks through the kingdoms defenses, a shot-gun wielding Ash leads a counter attack…from behind the wheel of his Oldsmobile.

3.) Day Of The Dead: By far the darkest of George A. Romero's Dead quadrilogy, Day Of The Dead follows a small band of soldiers, scientists and civilians who have taken shelter in a massive underground military bunker. Unfortunately for them, the horde of the flesh-hungry undead on the surface isn't their only problem, as several members of the rag-tag group are beginning to slip into the clutches of madness.

Key Scene: When base security is inevitably compromised, and the walking dead begin to pour in from all directions, the ruthless Lt. Rhodes decides that it's time to split…literally.

4.) Demons: On the opening night of a Berlin movie theater, the audience is treated to more than complementary tickets as a deadly force quickly spreads through the theater, transforming its patrons into drooling, blood thirsty demons. Anyone not transformed must fight for survival, using anything and everything at their disposal to battle their unholy assailants.

Key Scene: A motorcycle riding movie patron turned demon-slayer tears through the theater on his bike, laying waste to the undead with use of a samurai sword.

5.) Dog Soldiers: When a squad of British soldiers heads into the woodlands of Scotland for a routine exercise, they find themselves up against an enemy much deadlier than the Special Ops team they were scheduled to face. Under the light of the full moon, the soldiers take refuge in a small farmhouse and prepare for an all out war against the pack of ravenous werewolves stalking them from the shadows of the forest. They have their weapons, and they have their wits, but will it be enough to survive until sunrise…?

Key Scene: After a nasty run-in with one of the razor-clawed 7ft. tall lycanthropes, the grizzled Sgt. Welles, played by Sean Pertwee, continues to battle alongside of his men, guns blazing, his insides on the outside.

6.) Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III: In this, the third and most underrated of the six Texas Chainsaw films, two college students are traveling through the heart of the lone-star state on their way to Florida when they fall victim to a trap set by the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface and the rest of his cannibalistic, redneck family, who are just dying to have the unlucky duo for dinner. Luckily for them, a rough and ready survivalist, played by Ken Foree (who horror fans will recognize as the hero or the original Dawn Of The Dead), is on their side and is packing plenty fire power. Can he save them, or will they all end up as the main course in the family's sadistic supper?

Key Scene: In an all out hand-to-hand-to-power tool brawl, Foree goes up against Leatherface and his cross-dressing brother, played by a pre-Lord Of The Rings Viggo Mortensen.

7.) Near Dark: It's your classic case of boy meets girl, girl bites boy, boy is forced to join up with girl's bloodthirsty family of nomadic, RV-driving vampires. Enough said.

Key Scene: In an attempt to entice their newest recruit to feed, the family, which includes Bill Paxton and Lance Henriksen, stops at a roadhouse for a little midnight snack, much to the dismay of the bar's patrons and staff.

8.) Phantasm: After the death of their parents, and young boy and his older brother must find the strength to carry on with their lives. However, they both soon realize that there are some fates worse than death after they cross paths with The Tall Man, who, with the help of his killer flying spheres, reanimates the corpses of a local mortuary and turns them into undead slaves.

Key Scene: When one unlucky individual sneaks into the Tall Man's mortuary, we see the killer spheres in action, latching onto the unfortunate intruders face and drills into his skull, creating quite a large mess.

9.) Pumpkinhead: A small town storeowner, played by Lance Henriksen, seeks the help of a witch to summon a ferocious woodland demon known as "Pumpkinhead" to exact revenge from a group of reckless, motorcycle riding teenagers responsible for the death of his young son. However, as the demon begins to wreak bloody havoc in its quest for vengeance, the farmer begins to second guess his decision, as he is continually forced to bear witness to the grisly killings through the eyes of the demon.

Key Scene: After being forced to see the carnage he has caused, Henriksen realizes that it is up to him to stop the demon's deadly rampage, forcing him to confront Pumpkinhead face-to-face.

10.) Return Of The Living Dead: In this, the first in a series of six sequels to the original Night Of The Living Dead, two bumbling workers in a medical supply warehouse accidentally open a barrel of 245 Trioxin, a putrid green gas with the ability to bring the dead back to life. Unfortunately, once awake, the reanimated corpses are cursed with an insatiable hunger for human brains, which, in turn spells trouble not only for the warehouse staff, but also for a group of punks partying in a local graveyard.

Key Scene: After making a quick meal out of a pair of ill-fated EMTs, the zombies, who are much smarter and faster than your average ghoul, repeatedly use the ambulances radio to call for some take out, as they request more medical and police assistance, only to eat the unlucky officers once they arrive.

11.) They Live: In this John Carpenter classic, a down-on-his-luck drifter simply known as Nada, played by professional wrestler "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, stumbles across an alien plot for world domination. However, unlike with most extraterrestrial attackers, there are no flying saucers, no death rays and no invasion…because they're already here, walking among us, slowly taking over our world through the use of subliminal messages. Now, earth's only chance for survival rests in the hands of Nada and a small group of resistance fighters who have developed a method of seeing the aliens, and the world, the way they really are…

Key Scene: As Nada tries to convince a skeptical fellow drifter to don a pair of glasses that will allow him to see not only the subliminal messages spattered all over the city, but the aliens in their true form, the two break into one of the greatest knock-down drag-out back alley brawls in cinema history.

12.)John Carpenter's The Thing: Horror master John Carpenter scores yet again in his take on the 1951 horror classic The Thing From Another World. Set in a remote U.S. research facility located on the bleak and ominous landscape of Antarctica, a team of scientists and doctors, as well as a hard-as-nails helicopter pilot, superbly played by Kurt Russell, are stalked by a shape-shifting being from outer space, gifted with the ability to perfectly mimic anything it kills. One by one, the team members begin to die off, leaving it up to the survivors to discover who is still human and who is "The Thing."

Key Scene: As flamethrower toting Russell attempts to dispatch a copy cat version of one of his friends, it's head detaches itself from the body before being engulfed in flame, grows legs and runs away, much to the amazement and horror of the rest of the research team.

13.) Zombie: Italian gore guru Lucio Fulci's homage to the undead. When a ship pulls into a New York Harbor, minus the crew, the missing captain's daughter decides to go looking for him with the help of a few friends. The search leads the group to the remote Caribbean island of Matul, where a local doctor is rushing to find a cure to a disease that is bringing the dead back to life. As the group disbands after witnessing the horror that is the walking dead, they find themselves caught in a brutal final showdown with a horde of flesh-eating zombies.

Key Scene: As a woman swims near a coral reef, a hungry shark heads her way looking for a quick bite, however before the finned predator can sink his teeth into the already petrified swimmer, a zombie, crawling from it's hiding spot in the reef, attacks the shark, hoping to get first dibs on the bathing beauty.