The path to a career in filmmaking is never an easy one, but in the age of social and online video platforms, aspiring directors have the ability to put their work out for potential audiences of millions to see and spread. With horror having always been favorable to indie filmmakers, it's only natural that the genre would attract those who make up the dedicated community of online creators.
Recent YouTubers who have made the transition include both online critic Chris Stuckmann, whose debut film, Shelby Oaks, just had its trailer drop, and Markiplier, whose video game adaptation Iron Lung is currently looking for distribution, but those two are hardly the first to venture into the blood-soaked waters of horror feature filmmaking. These are five horror films from former YouTubers.
Evil Dead (2013)
Fede Álvarez has made a name for himself in horror thanks to films like Don't Breathe and the recent midquel Alien: Romulus. Way back before all that, though, the director became an overnight sensation when he premiered his short film Panic Attack! on YouTube. The giant robot invasion short got the attention of director Sam Raimi and producer Rob Tapert, who brought Alvarez into the fold of their production company Ghost House Pictures, where he was eventually given the reins to remake Raimi's cult classic The Evil Dead.
Remaking the film that birthed a beloved horror franchise that has a fervent following of fans was an unenviable task, but Álvarez rose to the occasion by delivering a nasty, gnarly, bloody-as-hell horror ride that managed to pay homage to the original deadite trilogy while also carving out its own unique place in the lore. Making the heroine of the remake a woman struggling to get clean off drugs at the iconic cabin in the woods setting adds a new layer of complexity, especially when blood starts to spill. Evil Dead brought the franchise screaming back to the big screen and announced Álvarez as a new name in horror to be watched.
10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)
Dan Trachtenberg has become the key creative behind the Predator franchise, beginning with the back-to-basics prequel Prey and continuing with this year's double feature of an animated anthology and a sequel that's set to hit theaters. That's not bad for a filmmaker who started his career as part of the video podcast The Totally Rad Show and directing Portal fan films. Between that video game short film and his big-budget takes on the galaxy's most famous trophy hunters, Trachtenberg delivered the best installment in an otherwise lackluster sci-fi horror anthology series.
10 Cloverfied Lane originally began its production as a wholly original horror thriller before J.J. Abrams came on board as a producer with his production shingle Bad Robot and decide to turn the film into a spiritual successor to Matt Reeves' Cloverfield. Other than a supernatural turn in the final act, the film has little in common with its kaiju predecessor, instead telling a tense, claustrophobic story of survival following a young woman (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) who awakens in the underground bunker of a mysterious man (John Goodman). It's a small-scale nailbiter built on the performances of Winstead and a never-more-terrifying Goodman.
Annabelle: Creation (2019)
Swedish director David F. Sandberg jumpstarted his career by releasing no-budget short films made by him and his wife on YouTube. One of these short films, Lights Out, garnered over a million views and got Sandberg's name on to the lists of Hollywood producers. His first feature film would be a feature-length adaptation of Lights Out, and he would follow it up with an entry in one of the biggest horror franchises of the 21st century. While the first Annabelle film, a spin-off of James Wan's The Conjuring, couldn't find anything compellingl to do with the titular possessed doll, Sandberg's prequel Annabelle: Creation improves on the formula exponentially by simpling relying on classic scares and tension.
Set in the home of a grieving couple who have lost their daughter to a tragic accident and subsequently opened their home to a group of orphans and their nun caregiver, Sandberg's film borrows liberally from a half dozen other haunted house classics. While it doesn't manage to match its more iconic inspirations, it's a more than serviceable throwback horror film that fits nicely alongside the other films in the Conjuring-verse.
Skinamarink (2022)
Skinamarink is an unconventional horror film that is more interested in vibes and atmosphere than it is in traditional scares or even a coherent narrative, but that makes sense given its inspirations. Writer-director Kyle Edward Ball had previously created lo-fi recreations of people's nightmares on his YouTube channel Bitesized Nightmares. He then decided to upscale this concept into a feature film inspired by his own nightmare that he found was shared among many of his subscribers.
Shot on location in Ball's own childhood home for $15,000, Skinamarink follows a young brother and sister who awaken one night to find their father has disappeared and the exits to their house have vanished as well. What follows is a surreal, dream-like succession of events that, depending on one's predilection for abstract, slow-burn horror, may inspire more restlessness than unsettled horror. Certainly not for everyone, Skinamarink operates on its own wavelength and its lo-fi aesthetic has gained its own cult following.
Talk to Me (2022)
Possibly the most exciting names in horror to come from the digital halls of YouTube, sibling directors Danny and Michael Philippou (previously known together as RackaRacka) are not only behind 2025's must-watch Bring Her Back but also the best horror film of 2022, Talk to Me, which brought the concept of spirits and seances into the 21st century with a clever premise, grounded performances and gut-wrenching violence.
When a group of Australian teens discover that a severed hand can open the doorway between the lands of the living and the dead, they do exactly what teens would do: bring it to parties and post videos of themselves getting possessed. Things go from party trick to terror when the trauma-ridden Mia (Sophie Wilde) gets a little too close to the spirits and they start taking over her life. Talk to Me mixes its emotional themes with impactful practical effects for one of the best horror debuts of all time.