Movies
Eat Me! The Nastiest of Human Consumption Horror, as Recommended by John Waters
Waters has been known throughout his career to give great film advice, from B-movie gems to wacky splatter flicks. Notably, Waters has always been fond of films featuring cannibalism and often includes them in “best of” lists and film articles. While some, like Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and Night of the Living Dead (1968), have been admired by audiences for decades, several of Waters’ favorites have been left in the gore-y past of midnight movies and grindhouse picture houses. I have unearthed just a few from the archives of Waters, and I am not at all surprised at just how depraved and trashy they are. Mainly found in the pages of Crackpot, in which Waters’ film knowledge is impressive and intimidating, the following list can give you a glimpse into the gooey, delightfully twisted mind of the Pope of Trash. Here is a selection of cannibalistic films applauded by Waters throughout his career.
The horror film Multiple Maniacs, released in 1970, was John Waters’ debut (talking) feature. In one hour and thirty minutes, we see murder, mariticide, sodomy, “actual queers kissing on the lips,” and cannibalism. The last of these sins is a personal favorite of Waters.
Waters has been known throughout his career to give great film advice, from B-movie gems to wacky splatter flicks. Notably, Waters has always been fond of films featuring cannibalism and often includes them in “best of” lists and film articles. While some, like Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and Night of the Living Dead (1968), have been admired by audiences for decades, several of Waters’ favorites have been left in the gore-y past of midnight movies and grindhouse picture houses. I have unearthed just a few from the archives of Waters, and I am not at all surprised at just how depraved and trashy they are.
Mainly found in the pages of Crackpot, in which Waters’ film knowledge is impressive and intimidating, the following list can give you a glimpse into the gooey, delightfully twisted mind of the Pope of Trash. Here is a selection of cannibalistic films applauded by Waters throughout his career.
Warning: these films are not for the faint of heart. Luckily, some of them barely last an hour!
A Selection of Films Recommended By John Waters
Blood Feast (1963)
Directed by Hershell Gordon Lewis
Duration: 1 hour 7 minutes
Streaming: Tubi
“Can we watch that scene again? You know, the one where he rips her heart out? Please?” – Mrs. Beverly Sutphin, Serial Mom
As with TCM and NOTLD, Blood Feast is an obvious favorite of Waters. He has cited Blood Feast as an inspiration for his early filmmaking and included scenes and posters for the film in his 1994 horror comedy Serial Mom. In a world of CGI and now AI technology, the graphic practical effects of Blood Feast feel incredibly refreshing when watching today. Blood Feast was produced, scored, and directed by gore legend Herschell Gordon Lewis. Mr. Ramses, a local butcher and original “Florida Man,” manipulates a housewife into letting him cater her daughter’s birthday with an Egyptian blood feast. This blood feast uses the flesh, blood, and organs of beautiful young women, all blonde and white (just like the film’s ancient Egyptians). One of these women, Connie Mason, graced the centerfold spot in PlayBoy magazine when the film was released! Bad acting, great interior decorating/costuming, and long takes with few cutaways would ultimately influence Waters’. And don’t worry: the tongue scene is still gooey after sixty years.
The Undertaker and His Pals (1966)
Directed T.L.P. Swicegood
Duration: 1 hour 3 minutes
Streaming: Tubi
“Our host’s office was the original one where the Watergate scandal was born… We ate in the White House dining room for guests and talked about movies such as Chesty Morgan’s Deadly Weapons (she kills people with her breasts), The Undertaker and His Pals, Please Don’t Eat My Mother, and other cinematic shockers… Only in America could you get invited to a Republican White House for making films that the very administration would pay to have burned.” – Waters in Crackpot
This film must have engrained itself in Waters’ psyche, particularly regarding the color palette and opening credits complete with rockabilly surf music. If you enjoy A Bucket of Blood (1959), The Undertaker and His Pals will not disappoint. Armed with a phone book, vicious motorcyclists target random locals to provide a funeral director with fresh bodies. This gooey horror comedy incorporates actual medical footage, resulting in, among other factors, canceled film screenings and confiscations by authorities.
The Corpse Grinders (1971)
Directed by Ted V. Mikels
Duration: 1 hour 12 minutes
Streaming: Internet Archive
“It used to be the way to start [in film] was to make a low budget exploitation film […]. But now it’s not so simple. Hollywood has co-opted the slash-and-trash formula, and these days garbage needs a big budget. It’s not nearly as much fun. A $10 million version of The Corpse Grinders just wouldn’t have the charm of the original.” – Waters in Crackpot
The Corpse Grinders is grainy, extremely low-budget, and bizarre. To make extra money, a poverty-stricken couple provides dead bodies to Lotus Cat Food. Local cats soon crave human flesh and start attacking their owners. Local veterinarians and lovers Dr. Glass and Nurse Robinson investigate the phenomenon. This grindhouse flick opts for joltingly fast cutaways to dripping meat grinders, though unfortunately, most of the muscle and bone evisceration happens off-screen.
Bloodsucking Freaks (1976)
Directed by Joel M. Reed
Duration: 1 hour 24 minutes
Streaming: Tubi
“I’m the happiest in my office… First duty— call the box offices of the theaters in town playing the most embarrassing movies so I can hear the mortified employees say the title. ‘Yes, what’s playing, please?’ ‘Bloodsucking Freaks…” Waters in Crackpot
This is one of the nastiest movies I have ever seen.
Villain Sardu (Seamus O’Brien) is Master of the Theater of the Macabre. With a personality teetering between Allister Crowley and Andrew Tate, Sardu performs live mutilations, torture, and murders of naked young women before a captivated yet skeptical audience. Torture is art! This film has surprisingly beautiful cinematography at times and is quite hypnotic. Blood Sucking Freaks has since been hailed a cult classic, and was re-released by Troma Entertainment in 1981. Sadly, director Joel M. Reed passed away due to complications from the COVID-19 virus in April 2020. The Brooklyn native directed other bloody gems such as Night of the Zombies (1981) and Blood Bath (1976), and even wrote a book about Donald Trump’s scandals in 1990. Scary! And another frightening note, O’Brien was murdered in his Greenwich Village apartment a year after the film’s release! Blood Sucking Freaks walked so Hostel (2009) could run.
Zombie Holocaust (1980)
Directed by Marino Girolami
Duration: 1 hour 24 minutes
Streaming: Plex!
“Being a Catholic, guilt comes naturally. Except mine is reversed. I blab ad nauseam about how much I love films like Dr. Butcher, M. D. …” – Waters in Crackpot
Zombi Holocaust is an Italian grindhouse picture rereleased as Dr. Butcher M.D. in the U.S. in 1982. Twenty-five minutes in, I wished death upon all characters. Luckily, most of them meet their demise by the film’s end! The dialogue is all overdubbed and questionable, and the script holds plenty of racist tropes. Along with general silliness, the gruesome practical effects that undoubtedly inspired the torture porn subgenre make this a fun watch. The attempts to make this film look New York City enough are comical and add to its overall charm.
If you ever walk into a medical school that looks like this one, be prepared to receive no scientific help and run like hell!
The Best Movies to Stream on Shudder This Month
Tragedy Girls (2017)
A dark, comedic, high school romp about best friends gaining internet clout through murder. It may feel dated due to its use of Twitter rather than X, but it adds charm and reminds us of a simpler internet age. Brianna Hildebrand and Alexandra Shipp deliver devilishly fun performances, and their slasher personas are heavily under-appreciated in the horror community. There are lots of familiar faces here, including Josh Hutcherson, Jack Quaid, Craig Robinson, and not to mention the director, Tyler MacIntyre, who went on to be one of the writers for Five Nights at Freddy’s (2023).
Seance (2021)
This Is Not a Test (2025)
School’s Out (2018)
Graduation Day (1981)
One of my absolute favorite things to do when I’m on vacation is to visit horror filming locations. Wherever you happen to be going, odds are that at least one horror project was filmed there at some point. There’s something magical about seeing the places that helped bring iconic scary stories to life on the big and small screens.
However, some locations are better than others. A lot of them (like the original A Nightmare on Elm Street house, Stu’s house from Scream, and the schoolhouse from The Birds) are private property and aren’t always owned by people who are particularly happy to have horror fans milling around out front. Others (like the schools from Buffy, Elm Street, and many other teen horror titles) are active educational institutions that don’t welcome strange visitors.
But I’m here to deliver a guide to some of the coolest horror filming locations in North America that give you that magical vibe without somebody calling 9-1-1 on you. Because the best things in life are free, so are all the locations on this list.
The Bridge from A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
Location: Linnie Canal Ct. Los Angeles, CA 9029, USA
The bridge where Glen (Johnny Depp) and Nancy (Heather Langenkamp) discuss the Balinese method of dreaming is nowhere near the movie’s fictional town of Springwood, Ohio. It’s actually one of the bridges over the human-made canals in Venice, California. Specifically, it’s the bridge over the Eastern canal that connects to Linnie Ct. It’s totally free to visit, and once you’re done taking photos and quoting “I’m into survival” to your heart’s content, you’re still in Venice. Not a bad place to be!
The Movie Theater from Scream 2 (1997)
Location: Rialto Theatre, 1019-1023 Fair Oaks Ave. South Pasadena, CA, 91030 USA
Although the majority of the campus scenes in the college-set slasher sequel Scream 2 were filmed at Agnes Scott College in Georgia, a lot of the school’s surrounding environs were filmed closer to Hollywood, in sunny Pasadena. While the movie theater where poor Phil (Omar Epps) and Maureen (Jada Pinkett Smith) are killed in the movie’s prologue is no longer an operating cinema and you can’t go inside (the building has been taken over by a church), the exterior has been well preserved and looks more or less exactly the way it did in the late 1990s.
This horror filming location is also just an 11 minute drive from the street where the film’s famous car crash sequence was shot, which is part of Green Street between South Los Robles Avenue and Madison Avenue in Pasadena.
The Myers House from Halloween (1978)
Location: 1000 Mission St, South Pasadena, CA 91030, USA
Although the building has been moved from its original location, it was rebuilt to look exactly the way it does when young Michael Myers is stalking his way around it in the iconic opening sequence of Halloween. There is a business operating out of the building, so don’t bother them or try to get inside (the interiors aren’t the same, anyway). But at this point, they’re very used to people doing photo ops out front. If you find yourself in Pasadena on October 31, it’s a can’t-miss destination, as a nonstop torrent of cosplayers swarm the area.
Other free Halloween locations in South Pasadena include the exterior of the hardware store where Michael gets his mask (right around the corner at 966 Mission St – it’s now the Radhika Modern Indian restaurant) and the famous hedge he hides behind when stalking Laurie Strode (just one mile away, at 1019 Montrose Ave S).
Brennan’s Tip: If you do have money to burn, check out the SugarMynt Gallery next door, which is chock full of horror-themed artwork. Also grab a snack at the Heirloom Bakery across the street! They’ve got all kinds of great treats (I even had them do the desserts for my wedding), and you can enjoy them on the outdoor patio with the Myers house looming over you.
The Town Square from Scream (1996)
Location: Healdsburg Town Square, Healdsburg, CA 95448, USA
Scream was filmed in and around Sonoma County, but the core town playing Woodsboro was the real-life wine country borough of Healdsburg. The town square, complete with fountain, is still there, and surrounded by cute shops and restaurants. You can also find the police station exterior where Sidney punches out Gale at Oakville Grocery (124 Matheson Street) nearby, but it has changed enough to be barely recognizable at this point.
Derry from It (2017), It: Chapter Two (2019), and It: Welcome to Derry (2025-)
Location: Port Hope, Ontario L1A 2Y7, Canada
The majority of the important locations in It and Welcome to Derry’s fictional town of Derry, Maine are all located along the main road of Port Hope, including the movie theater (Capitol Theatre on 20 Queen St), the library (Port Hope Town Hall, 56 Queen St), the park with the bandshell, and the alleyway outside the butcher shop, which still has the door painted with the faux sign from the movie.
Brennan’s Tip: Check out the river that runs parallel to the main street. When I went, there were hundreds of fish making their way upstream for spawning. Multiple species do this in Port Hope, in various seasons, so you never know if you’ll get lucky.
The University from Black Christmas (1974)
Location: Soldiers’ Tower at the University of Toronto, Hart House Cir, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3H7, Canada
The college from the 1974 proto-slasher Black Christmas is played by the real-life University of Toronto, with the most notable area being the plaza outside Soldiers’ Tower, where Clare’s dad is seen waiting for his ill-fated daughter.
Brennan’s Tip: If you’re a huge Killer Party (1986) fan like I am, the Children’s Aid Foundation of Canada building (25 Spadina Rd), which plays the haunted frat house, is just a short walk away.
Abe’s Snake Bodega from Scream VI (2023)
Location: Dépanneur St.Ambroise, 5701 Sherbrooke St W, Montreal, QC H4A 1W9, Canada
Our next horror filming location is of a more recent vintage, but it’s an instant classic: the “New York City” bodega in which Ghostface hunts down Sam (Melissa Barrera) and Tara Carpenter (Jenna Ortega) in Scream VI. Both the exterior and the interior of the shop were used for filming, though they changed a great deal of the inside to make it look more New York-y. You don’t have to pay to visit, but if you want to do a photo op posing like Ghostface at the end of the row of refrigerator cases, you might as well buy a soda on your way out as a thank you.
Other worthwhile free Scream VI filming locations in the area are the campus of Blackmore University (McGill University at 845 Sherbrooke St W), and “Central Park” (Parc La Fontaine, 3819 Av. Calixa-Lavallée).
Crawford Academy from Happy Birthday to Me (1981)
Location: Concordia University – Loyola Campus, 7141 Sherbrooke St W, Montreal, Quebec H4B 1R6, Canada
The fictional high school from this classic Canadian slasher was played by the real-life Concordia University (except for the opening kill scene, which was shot around Douglass Hall at McGill University). It’s a relatively small campus, so you can’t miss the grand brick buildings, which look exactly the same now as they did 45 years ago, though the quad has been relandscaped.
The Steps from The Exorcist (1973)
Location: Corner of Prospect St and 36th St NW, Georgetown, Washington, D.C., 20007, USA
William Friedkin’s landmark classic The Exorcist is home to one of our most iconic horror filming locations yet. The steps that claim the lives of both Burke Dennings (Jack MacGowran) and Father Karras (Jason Miller) are still there more than 50 years later, and you’ll almost certainly find people exercising on them, as if they aren’t worried that Pazuzu is gonna fling another victim toward them when they least expect it.
While the house from The Exorcist is indeed at the top of the steps (at 3600 Prospect Street), it is more set back than the movie implies (the exterior of Reagan’s window was a facade). But it’s still there, as is the Georgetown campus, where other scenes from the movie were filmed.
The Crystal Shop from Obsession (2026)
Location: The Green Man, 824 N Hollywood Way, Burbank, CA 91505, USA
Our tour of some of the greatest free horror filming locations of North America comes full circle now, bringing us back to Southern California with the most recent movie on the list. Curry Barker’s Obsession was entirely shot in and around Burbank, and the metaphysical supply store The Green Man looks almost exactly like the fictional store from the movie, both inside and out. Just don’t go in hoping to find a display of One Wish Willows.
