The 10 Most Terrifying Documentaries, According To Reddit
By Erin Whitten
1) ‘The Bridge’ (2006)
There have been many shocking documentaries over the years but few will hit you as hard as The Bridge. Captured over a year of filming, it shows suicide at its most tragic. Witness the deaths on San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, with chilling footage and haunting interviews with family, witnesses and survivors. This is unflinching look at the reasons why people end their own lives, while raising difficult questions about prevention and whether anyone can ever stop it. It’s one of the most distressing films ever made.
2) ‘The Nightmare’ (2015)
“The Nightmare” (2015) was created by Rodney Ascher. It is a documentary-hybrid that goes to great lengths to describe one of the most common and terrifying sleep issues, the sleep paralysis. Narrated by first person accounts and eerie reenactments, The Nightmare attempts to bring to life the experiences of eight individuals who were victimized by shadowy figures, loud noises, and an all-consuming fear and pressure as they lay paralyzed and unable to move. It’s hard to explain the feeling of horror as you watch this true life documentary, which is why you can say that this is a horror film itself, because for some people, it really is.
3) ‘There’s Something Wrong About Aunt Diane’ (2011)
On July 26, 2009, cable-TV executive and mother Diane Schuler drove almost two miles the wrong way on New York’s Taconic Parkway, killing eight people, including herself. HBO’s documentary film There’s Something Wrong About Aunt Diane, by director Liz Garbus, assembles interviews, police audio recordings, forensic reports and family testimony to reconstruct her final hours – from a “tranquil” campsite to her niece’s 911 call: “There’s something wrong with Aunt Diane.” Toxicology reports revealed Diane had a .19% blood alcohol level, as well as high levels of THC. Diane had been seen as a reliable, “supermom” figure with no history of substance abuse. Diane’s husband, Daniel Schuler, flatly disputes the toxicology results. He maintains Diane “rarely drank”, and would never have knowingly driven while intoxicated. The film offers few simple explanations, instead presenting a maddening account of perfectionism, stress, and denial in a woman whose hidden unraveling would leave eight dead and no easy answers.
4) ‘The Keepers’ (2017)
The Keepers is a 2017 Netflix docu-series on the unsolved 1969 murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik, a teacher and nun at a Catholic high school in Baltimore, Maryland. Although police located her body after two months, they did not resume the investigation until former students alleged Father Joseph Maskell of sexual abuse in the 1990s. A student also alleged Maskell threatened to use Cesnik’s body against her if she told anyone. Filmmaker Ryan White follows the testimony of survivors, journalists, and investigators to uncover not only a network of abuse and cover-up, but also decades of courage in the search for the truth. The Keepers becomes less of a whodunnit, and more of a searing indictment of both the Catholic Church and police—and those who have fought against both for years.
5) ‘Dear Zachary: A Letter to Son About His Father’
Kurt Kuenne created this profoundly personal documentary named Dear Zachary about his best friend Dr. Andrew Bagby who was murdered by his former girlfriend Shirley Turner in 2001. Through Kurt’s compilation of Andrew’s friends’ testimonies, family interviews and home videos he captured with Andrew the documentary evolves into a heartfelt message to Zachary, Andrew’s son who would sadly never meet his father. The situation became even more shocking when Turner, who was pregnant with Andrew’s son, was released on bail in Canada, and given custody of Zachary, later killing them both in a murder-suicide in 2003.
6) ‘Tickled’ (2016)
The documentary Tickled begins with David Farrier’s innocent exploration into “competitive endurance tickling”, but he discovers shocking videos of men being tickled while chained and then himself vanishes. The early findings of their research reveal a conspiracy of abuse because David Farrier and co-producer Dylan Reeve face online homophobic attacks and legal threats from the anonymous group that created the videos. Participants who spoke out against the tickling videos faced blackmail and public shaming which included the release of their personal information online. The project morphs into a real-life conspiracy thriller, as the pair uncover the identity of the mysterious ringleader, real life American David D’Amato, aka “Terri Tickle,” and expose a long-running exploitation racket operating under the guise of a bizarre fetish culture.
7) ‘Capturing the Friedmans’ (2003)
Capturing the Friedmans documents the disintegration of a seemingly middle-class family from Long Island after father Arnold Friedman and his teenage son Jesse are accused of sexually abusing students in their home-based computer classes. Following what begins as a child pornography investigation, the case degenerates into a media feeding frenzy with dozens of students accusing the Friedmans of abuse—and the family members denying and asserting their guilt. Filmmakers use home videos that the family shot during the investigation, as well as interviews and court proceedings, to chronicle a family falling apart. Though both father and son ultimately pleaded guilty, the movie leaves open the questions about the accuracy of witnesses’ accounts, police manipulation and even if justice was served.
8) ‘Just, Melvin: Just Evil’ (2000)
Just, Melvin: Just Evil, directed by James Ronald Whitney, is an American documentary which tells the tragic story of the filmmaker’s grandfather, Melvin Just, a pedophile. The film attempts to bring to light a series of abuse and family problems and the filmmaker himself was a victim in his early life. James did not know what really happened to his family until he confronted the now convicted felon. Just, Melvin is a twisted tale about sexual abuse and generational trauma which caused a family to be broken in numerous different ways, but was also able to create and build strength out of the mistakes made by the older family members. The documentary is a raw look at the evil that Melvin had done and many people of the family were still living through the generational trauma.
9) ‘Abducted in Plain Sight’ (2017)
Abducted in Plain Sight is a nearly unfathomable true-crime story based on the life of Jan Broberg, who as a 12-year-old girl in the 1970s was taken from her home in Idaho by a neighbor and family friend. Berchtold, who posed as a member of her parents’ social circle, wooed Jan’s religious parents into trusting him—even sleeping with both of them—and was able to use lies, psychological grooming, and an outlandish alien abduction story to make Jan think she must comply with his abuse in order to “save the world.” The movie exposes Berchtold’s manipulations as well as the mind-boggling ways in which Jan’s parents made it all possible. Odd at first, it soon becomes a shocking demonstration of how predators can use manipulation, trust, religion, and childlike innocence to worm their way into families, and it’s both horrifying and perplexing in equal measure.
10) ‘Night Stalker: The Hunt For A Serial Killer’ (2021)
Night Stalker is a tense, adrenaline-fueled Netflix docuseries about the hunt for the infamous Richard Ramirez. During the mid-1980s, Ramirez terrorized the city of Los Angeles with a random and highly violent string of home invasions. An extremely brutal killer with no particular victim profile, the Night Stalker targeted everyone from school children to the elderly. Ramirez was also known for a clear interest in Satanism and ritualistic elements in his crimes.
Night Stalker is told through a combination of interviews with detectives and experts, as well as archival footage and photos. This includes a lot of the original crime scene and suspect photos as well. Fearful and on edge, the docuseries conveys the desperation and stress of living through an event like this. There’s also a more microscopic look at the psychological profile of the killer, his time in jail, and the obsession of those determined to stop him. However, while it can be gory and upsetting at times, Night Stalker also rightly prioritizes the victims and the hunt for justice.
