22 Fascinating Facts About the Horror Movies We Love to Revisit

By creammagazine, October 30, 2025

Halloween is just around the corner – as could be any creepy monster-like character, when you’re all alone walking down a dark alleyway at night… Anyway, we can’t think of a better excuse to stay home, quite frankly, and to curl up on the couch with stacks of snacks, and to watch a marathon of very good horror movies.

Cream curates 22 fascinating facts about some of those scary flicks we love to revisit – plus a couple of recently released horror films just out in the cinema.

Antonino Tati

 

01. There’s mad science behind Freddy Krueger’s famous jumper

A Nightmare on Elm Street creator Wes Craven designed antagonist Freddy Krueger’s striped sweater after reading in Scientific American magazine that the human eye finds it difficult to recognise the colours red and green when these are laid side by side.

Craven figured red-and-green stripes would be the perfect pattern, then, to put on serial killer Freddy’s body as it would cause an unsettling effect in audience’s minds.

Even today, fashionistas will state that “red and green should never be seen”. Still, we somehow get to see the colours together a lot come Christmas time, especially on ugly sweaters in American rom-coms.

 

02. Psycho featured the world’s first toilet flush ever seen or heard on film

Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho is a film that offered so many firsts, one of these being the fascinating fact that the toilet flush actioned by Marion Crane was the first ever to be seen and heard in a Hollywood film. The scene – where Marion jots down some incriminating sums and then flushes the paper down the loo – was almost not allowed to be screened due to strict production codes back in 1960. The fact that film producers were too ashamed to show toilets on celluloid tells you just how stringent things were back then.

 

03. Art the Clown has appeared in more than just the ‘Terrifier’ franchise

Terrifier 3 is actually the fourth film by director Damien Leone that features Art the Clown. Before making Terrifier, Leone introduced the character (then played by Mike Giannelli) in short films in the 2013 horror anthology All Hallows’ Eve and in Leone’s The 9th Circle. Said the director, “One of my main goals for Terrifier 3 was to recapture the creep factor present in the original Terrifier short film; that had a genuinely spooky atmosphere that I’m still proud of. If all goes as planned, part three will be the scariest Terrifier [so] far.” I’ve recently seen the film – and is in fact scary as all hell, so kudos to Leone for succeeding in that department. In fact, I think Terrifier 3 could be the most terrifying horror movie I’ve ever seen. The suspense is intense, the gore is over-the-top, the killings appear to have no rhyme or reason, and the main antagonist once again does everything through gesture (or “art”) rather than speak, making things that much eerier. Everything you could want in a horror film, then.

04. The actor who played Dracula the most is in fact not Bela Lugosi

Of all actors to have played Dracula, Bela Lugosi is possibly the most iconic, but he only played the archetypal vampire in two movies. The actor who has played Dracula the most number of times on screen was actually Christopher Lee – who appeared in nine films about the archetypal vampire. People often wonder if the film Nosferatu (1922) is in fact about Dracula. In short, yes. The classic black-and-white film was the first feature-length adaptation of Dracula and saw the antagonist named Count Orlok instead. Still, the film largely follows the plot of the novel and is more faithful than many subsequent official adaptations.

 

05. The name of the shark in ‘Jaws’ was inspired by Stephen Spielberg’s lawyer

Believe it or not, director Stephen Spielberg gave an actual name to the mechanical shark that was used in the making of the movie Jaws. He called him Bruce. No, it wasn’t because he was a Bruce Springsteen fan, but it simply happened to be the name of Spielberg’s lawyer. And who doesn’t see the average attorney as a bit of a shark? Fun fact: the movie Jaws turns 50 years old this year.

06. Blood made of lube and rave party bracelets?

The alien monster in Predator, officially known as Yautja, had vivid green blood which the effects director used two common substances to make: they mixed KY lubricant jelly with neon green glow stick fluid, et voila!

Because the the glow fluid would dry quickly, producers went through bathtubs of the stuff.

Suffice to say, special effects staff probably had their hands full.

07. Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley of ‘The Substance’ have a down-home connection

In body-horror film The Substance, Demi Moore plays ageing TV aerobics queen, Elisabeth Sparkle. Margaret Qualley plays Sue, a younger, “more enhanced” version of Elisabeth once she takes a substance called, you guessed it, The Substance. But while these actors play two sides of the same person, they had never actually met before making the movie. Demi, however, did feature in a film alongside Margaret’s real-life mother, Andie MacDowell. appearing together in St. Elmo’s Fire. Small world.

08. The set of ‘The Exorcist’ was apparently cursed

Production on the horror film The Exorcist was considered cursed with several major problems occurring on set. Some of the actors sustained injuries during performance.

Nine people involved in the movie actually died during the course of filming.

And a pigeon flew into a circuit box, causing it to catch fire and burn down much of the set. One myth also circulated that Linda Blair had to check into a mental facility once she finished making the film but this isn’t actually true.

10. A famous kitchen on TV was revisited for the cult horror flick ‘Bug’

In one scene in the movie Bug, a woman’s hair is set on fire as she stands reading a recipe in the kitchen. Viewers might find the kitchen familiar – indeed, it’s the same set we saw night after night in The Brady Bunch – right where Alice once cooked.

11. There’s a Gaga connection in ‘Smile 2′ plus two degrees of separation from ‘The Shining’

When you see antagonist Skye Riley in the recent horror film release Smile 2, you might think she looks like a cross between Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber, but in a recent interview, actress Naomi Scott, who plays Skye, revealed that Lady Gaga was the main inspiration, particularly elements of her early 2010s era. Naomi shared that her portrayal of Skye also drew from performances by other female artists she’d observed over the years, helping her craft Skye’s persona as a dynamic and captivating performer. We in fact thought she was an actual pop star playing a pop star when we first saw the movie.

Since it’s so new, I’m throwing in another fun fact about Smile 2. The actor who plays Skye’s one-time boyfriend is a guy named Ray Nicholson – who happens to be the son of Jack Nicholson. You can see it when Ray just stands there and smiles – with a set of lips, teeth and eyes that look uncannily like his dad’s did in The Shining. Check out the poster art (left) and say you don’t see a blatant doppelganger there. Freakish smiles aside, the real horror of the Smile franchise seems to me to be that it’s tough enough in life sometimes even just thinking about feeling happy but now we have to contend with the insinuation that cracking a smile might now freak people out.

12. Shots from ‘The Shining’ were recycled for another major movie

For the opening shots of The Shining, so much footage was taken that most of it ended up on the cutting room floor, although some of it was used in another iconic film. In the original theatrical cut of Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, the film ends with a voiceover narration over swooping helicopter shots – a sequence made up of re-used footage from the opening scenes of The Shining. If you watch the negative of Blade Runner in the specific ratio of 1.85:1 you can see Jack Torrance’s small yellow car at the bottom of the frame!

13. Just another ‘John’ murdered at the hands of a serial killer…

Happy Birthday to Me is a 1981 Canadian-made whodunit slasher film directed by J. Lee Thompson. I’ve seen this film about a dozen times. Growing up in the 1980s, my siblings and I would often watch it in celebration of one of our birthdays. Most ads and posters for the movie carried a photo of a young guy about to be orally impaled with a skewer of meat and vegetables, with the slogan “John will never eat shish kebab again”. However, there is no actual character in the film with this name.

14. Mary Shelley didn’t see Frankenstein’s Monster the way we see him

The Monster in the film Frankenstein does not physically resemble the character in Mary Shelley’s novel. It was Hollywood makeup artist Jack Pierce who came up with innovations such as the Monster’s flat head, the bolts through his neck, the droopy eyelids, and the poorly-fitted suit. Since then, the publishers of Mary Shelley’s classic novel have used the filmic version of Frankenstein’s Monster in their cover art. It just works.

15. Skeletons and dead animal carcasses used in ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ were real

It’s a fairly normal scenario to start: five folks take a drive in a van together to visit a house in central Texas once owned by one of their grandparents. But when they pick up and quickly kick out a crazed hitchhiker who brandishes a knife at them, they don’t realise he’s a member of a murderous family of cannibals. The rest, as they say, is a massive mess of blood, guts and gore. Texas Chainsaw Massacre director Tobe Hooper recently revealed that some of the skeletons used in the film were real so as he could save on budget. A lot of the dead animals in the movie are also genuine with a truckload of animal corpses having been dumped into the backyard of the house where they shot the movie in Texas.

16. The ‘Creature from the Black Lagoon’ had a kooky cameo on television

The amphibious humanoid in the Creature from the Black Lagoon – known as ‘Gill-man’ – enjoyed an odd cameo in the television series The Munsters. In the first season episode Love Comes to Mockingbird Heights, the spooky family receive a crate filled with their Uncle Gilbert’s rare treasure. In the final scene, Gilbert shows up and is revealed to be none other than the creature from the Black Lagoon – or at least actor Richard Hale in Gill-man mask and a three-piece business suit. None of it makes sense to us, either.

 

17. The Kraken gets around quite a bit

The multi-tentacled sea monster, The Kraken, is one of old lore that has made its way into many comics, books and films. While some may think the creature’s main aim is to kill and eat humans, that’s not so. The Kraken’s primary goal is to bring down ships at sea. The giant squid of sorts has reared his big fat head in films as eclectic as Clash of the Titans, The Cabin in the Woods, and the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. It’s even appeared in animated features including Who Framed Roger Rabbit? and The Lego Batman Movie. Talk about having your tentacles in lots of pies…

18. Parts of Steven Spielberg’s anatomy feature in ‘Poltergeist’

It’s title taken from the German word for ‘knocking spirit’, Poltergeist the movie focuses on a suburban American family whose home is invaded by malevolent ghosts that abduct their youngest daughter, usually through the television. In one scene where the flesh of an investigator’s face is being ripped off, the hands are actually those of Steven Spielberg. A very hands-on film creator, then.

19. Rosemary’s haircut in ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ cost a heck of a lot

In Rosemary’s Baby, the titular character’s husband has a problem with her haircut for some reason. In the book by Ira Levin (also the author of The Stepford Wives), it is mentioned that Rosemary has her hair cut at Vidal Sassoon, which is where actress Mia Farrow also got her hair cut for the movie. Director Roman Polanski flew the eponymous hairstylist to Hollywood from London in 1968, at a cost of $5,000 (equivalent to $48,000 in 2024), making it possibly one of the most expensive haircuts to grace the silver screen.

20. People rarely remember what antagonist Damien from ‘The Omen’ looks like

While horror icons are usually easy to picture – conjuring an image of Freddy Krueger or Michael Myers is fairly simple – one character who is difficult to conjure quickly is Damien Thorn – he of The Omen franchise. The reason is because Damien was played by five different actors throughout the film series, these being: Harvey Spencer Stephens, Jonathan Scott-Taylor,  Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick,  Bradley James and New Zealand actor Sam Neill. For some strange reason, too, people imagine that Damian is the same character as Malachi in the 1984 film Children of the Corn. Hint: Malachi wears a really big hat.

21. There are actually two Captain Spauldings

Of the 20-plus movies written and directed by all-round creative Rob Zombie, there’s one film he really isn’t happy with. While fans love the shenanigans of carnival clown Captain Spaulding in Zombie’s debut movie House of 1000 Corpses – the film is Rob’s least favourite. Interesting to note, Zombie turned to old-school Marx Brothers movies for inspiration in naming his characters. His most famous anti-hero is named for Groucho Marx’s character Captain Jeffrey T. Spaulding – who actually debuted in a Broadway musical, Animal Crackers.

22. A cunning little Easter egg in the original ‘Halloween’

You probably already know that Michael Myers’ mask from the Halloween movies was just a Captain Kirk (William Shatner) mask that effects staff upcycled, making the eye holes bigger, and brushing the hair out to look freakier. So here’s another fun fact for you: In John Carpenter’s original film Halloween, there’s a scene where the little boy Jamie Lee Curtis’s character Laurie is babysitting is watching a horror movie on TV. The clip is from a 1951 film The Thing from Another World. As it turns out, this was a hint to what Carpenter would be making next: an adaptation of The Thing in 1982, which would star Kurt Russell and feature some of the most full-on face-morphing effects seen on celluloid.

 

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