The 20 best Southern Gothic movies and TV series

The Night of the Hunter is the only film ever directed by actor Charles Laughton. Its story about a pair of children who are hunted by a sinister serial killer (posing as a preacher) has many of the features of Southern Gothic, and its West Virginia setting contributes to its brooding atmosphere. Robert Mitchum’s villainous “Preacher” Harry Powell elevates this into one of the great pieces of Southern Gothic, and he is somehow terrifying yet utterly charismatic.

If there’s one director who knew how to capture the absurdities and excesses of American life, it was Douglas Sirk. His film Written on the Wind is the very definition of sordid, with its tale of thwarted desires and Freudian psychodramas and its lush Technicolor cinematography. All of this unfurls against the background of Texas and oil, adding a layer of Southwest decadence to the affair. To top it off, it’s also an embarrassment of riches when it comes to its cast, which includes Lauren Bacall, Rock Hudson, and Robert Stack.

Sofia Coppola is one of those directors who has an undeniable sense of style, and she brings all of her instincts to bear on The Beguiled.  Its seamy story focuses on a Union soldier who ends up being taken care of by the residents of a girls' school in Virginia, with tragic results. It evokes a particular kind of atmosphere, and its potency also stems from the performances of its cast, which include such heavy hitters as Kirsten Dunst, Nicole Kidman, and Colin Farrell. While it stumbles a bit regarding issues of race — primarily by not addressing it — it’s still a powerful piece of Southern Gothic filmmaking.

Based on John Berendt’s book of the same name, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which takes place in Savannah, Georgia, and stars Kevin Spacey as Jim Williams, an antique dealer accused of murder. While the murder is obviously key to the plot, the film also showcases the many strange and eccentric residents of the beautiful Georgia town. Even though some of the novel’s complexity is lost (thanks in part to Clint Eastwood’s direction), there’s still enough of the Southern Gothic to make the film a pleasure to watch.

Even though Southern Gothic tends to have a darker atmosphere and ethos, there are some lighter entries in the canon. One of these is the Coen Brothers’ O Brother, Where Art Thou? Which is a retelling of The Odyssey set in a Depression-era American South. It’s a very funny and visually evocative film, combining elements of screwball with the vaguely supernatural trappings one often associates with Southern Gothic. It also makes very clever use of its Homeric source material and, combined with its stellar soundtrack, makes it one of the Coen Brothers’ most beloved films.

On one level, Fried Green Tomatoes, based on the novel by Fannie Flagg, is a heartwarming story of female friendship and (barely concealed) lesbian desire. Yet there are also darker notes running through it. This film involves a man being killed and then barbequed and fed to the police officer who is investigating his murder. The film is quite adept at keeping the Southern Gothic elements at a low boil, and this, in combination with remarkable performances by the likes of Kathy Bates and Jessica Tandy, helps explain its enduring popularity.

Almost every region of America has stories of some sort of Bigfoot-like creature, and in Arkansas, it’s known as the Fouke Monster. The Legend of Boggy Creek is a chilling and disturbing film that feels and masquerades as a documentary, and though it was clearly made on a small budget, it nevertheless manages to be a very effective horror film. It shows that there are all sorts of sinister legends lurking in the darker and more remote corners of the American landscape, and the Southern Gothic tradition excels at bringing these into the light. 

Though it was sadly denied the second season that it so clearly deserved, Lovecraft Country nevertheless made the most out of its first season. As its title suggests, it draws on the ethos of Lovecraftian horror to explore the sinister underbelly of Jim Crow America. The series brilliantly uses the conventions and thematic interests of the Southern Gothic mode to show the more vexing and troubling aspects of recent American history, and the fact that it uses Lovecraftian horror to do so makes it an even more extraordinary accomplishment.

The setting of The Skeleton Key is, in proper Southern Gothic fashion, an old plantation home. When a nurse, Caroline Ellis, takes up service there, she soon finds that there are very dark and sinister histories at work in her new place of employment and that no one there is quite what they seem. There are more than a few chilling plot twists in this horror film, and while not all of them make a great deal of sense, the film’s spooky and sinister atmosphere and mastery of the ethos of Southern Gothic horror more than make up for its gaps in logic.

Ode to Billy Joe is one of those extraordinary movies that is inspired by a song (in this case, Bobbie Gentry’s song of the same title). The film essentially provides an explanation for why the title character took his own life by jumping off of a bridge. In its exploration of forbidden desires and the sadness lurking beneath Southern American life, it clearly partakes of the Southern Gothic tradition, and it features a number of stirring performances, including by Robby Benson and Glynnis O’Connor.

Anne Rice’s novel Interview with the Vampire received a much-needed update in 2022 when AMC released a television adaptation of the novel. Starring Jacob Anderson and Sam Reid as Louis and Lestat, it brings out the queerness of the original novel while also staying true to its Southern Gothic ethos. It’s a sumptuously produced series filled with decadent and destructive desires, and the chemistry between Jacob Anderson’s Louis and Sam Reid’s Lestat is very much in keeping with that found in Anne Rice’s original novel. The series demonstrates the extent to which the late author’s works remain as intoxicating as when they were first published.

The first season of True Detective  was a definite hit for HBO, and it’s easy to see why. In addition to its Southern Gothic vibes — which were very apparent in both the first and third seasons — it also features some stunning performances from the likes of Woody Harrelson, Matthew McConaughey, and Mahershala Ali, who in their respective seasons, investigate various brutal and possibly supernatural crimes. As with the best Southern Gothic productions, True Detective captures the ambiance of a part of the country that has fallen into corruption and decay, a place where the sinister aspects of the human mind can play.

True Blood, the HBO series based on The Southern Vampire Mysteries by Charlaine Harris, focuses primarily on telepath Sookie Stackhouse and her entanglements with vampires and sundry other supernatural creatures. Like Interview with the Vampire, the series wears its Southern Gothic trappings on its sleeve. This is a series, after all, that not only takes place in Louisiana but also features storylines involving witches, vampires, werewolves, shapeshifters, and even a maenad. It might be unremittingly silly, but it’s also a very good Southern time.

Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story has long had an interest in Southern Gothic, and this emerges quite strongly in season three (Coven), season four (Freak Show), and six (Roanoke). The series makes no bones about its love of the Southern Gothic, and it often achieves a remarkable balance between its horrifying and camp elements. Jessica Lange pushes the show into sublime Gothic territory, and her performances as the fading Supreme Fiona Goode and the tragic freak show owner Elsa Mars elevates the entire show around her.

Based on the novel of the same name by Gillian Flynn, Sharp Objects  focuses on Amy Adams’ Camille Preaker, a journalist who goes back to her hometown and finds things with her mother and half-sister aren’t nearly what they appear. It’s a twisted and haunting story of murder and disappearing girls, with some plot developments that stay in the mind long after the series is over. It’s a sordid tale of the modern American South, and it’s another piece of evidence that Southern Gothic is alive and well in the contemporary imagination. 

Netflix took a page out of Breaking Bad’s book and gave viewers a compelling crime drama in Ozark,  which stars Jason Bateman and Laura Linney as Marty and Wendy Byrde, who find themselves increasingly drawn into the dark and dangerous world of drug dealing and money laundering. After they relocate to the Ozarks, they soon begin their own descent into corruption, and the series is a fascinating look at their rise to power. Bateman and Linney give remarkable performances, and the series is a haunting reminder of how easy it is for ordinary people to become monsters.

Released in 1972, Deliverance still has the power to thrill and shock. What begins as a story about four Atlanta businessmen who go on a rafting adventure soon turns much darker once they encounter a sinister bunch of inbred hillfolk. It may not be a particularly flattering portrait of Appalachia and Appalachians, but there’s no doubt that Deliverance  manages to hook the viewer from the first moments to the last with its stories about the horrors lurking in the American backcountry. The strong performances from the likes of Burt Reynolds and Ned Beatty elevate into the realm of true cinematic greatness. 

Tennessee Williams had a knack for capturing the flavor and corruption of the American South, so it’s not surprising many of his works found their way to the screen. One of the best adaptations of his work is A Streetcar Named Desire,  which elevated Marlon Brando to superstardom and also included Vivien Leigh as the tragic belle Blanche DuBois. It remains a steamy and haunting portrait of Southern decadence and toxic desire, anchored by knockout performances.

Following the success of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, Bette Davis followed her foray into hagsploitation with the equally camp Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte, in which she plays the tragic figure of Charlotte Hollis. Charlotte is haunted by the fate of her lover of years earlier, and she is slowly driven mad by her conniving cousin, Miriam, and her accomplice, Doctor Drew Bayliss. Davis and Olivia de Havilland are well-matched as Charlotte and her cousin, and Joseph Cotten is likewise perfect as the conniving doctor.

If there’s one 20th-century author who can be said to have been the mistress of Southern Gothic, it would have to be Anne Rice. The year 1994 saw the release of the adaptation of her novel Interview with the Vampire,  with Brad Pitt in the role of her tormented vampire Louis and Tom Cruise as the daring and debauched Lestat. The film captures the delicious melancholy and melodrama of the original book (Rice herself wrote the screenplay), and it has some fantastically evocative setpieces in New Orleans (arguably the heart of Southern Gothic).