Horror Movie Real Estate

Horror movies are often set in the big city, the suburbs, or the middle of nowhere. There are advantages to all of those environments. In the city, you've got endless setpiece possibilities. In the suburbs, built-in satire. In the middle of nowhere... well, in the middle of nowhere, no one can hear you scream.

But seeing Slither reminded me that, sometimes, you're best off setting your horror in a small town.

Unlike a suburb, a small town is a microcosm. It's an entire world in and of itself. You get the schoolteacher fighting alongside the sheriff fighting alongside the old priest.

And everybody's neighbours; because everybody knows one another, the stakes feel somehow higher. "Oh no, it got old Mrs. Vandercramp! And her pet parakeet Simone!"

Plus, in the small town, you get that bonus feeling of things just being more wrong somehow. People get eaten at the church bake sale or whatever. There's a bigger gap between the world that should be, and the world that is. (Let's face it, those of us in big cities pretty much expect death by masked serial killer and/or werewolf.)

Look out, small towns: we're coming after you.