Movies like Dark Water (2002)
The best movies like Dark Water (2002) are Shutter (2004), Ju-on: The Curse (2000) and Ju-on: The Grudge (2002). If Dark Water hooked you with its horror and mystery, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedThe Others (2001)7.6/10 from 7,561 votes
- NewestThe Haunted Apartment: "Miss K" (2024)Released 2024
- In JapaneseJu-on: The Curse (2000)Also in Japanese
Shutter (2004)
When Jane and Tun run over a girl in a car accident, they speed away immediately from the crime scene. However, Tun, a photographer, soon discovers strange shadows in his photos, which unsettles them.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisJu-on: The Curse (2000)
When elementary school teacher Kobayashi investigates the absence of one of his young pupils from the classroom, he finds himself at the doorstep of an anonymous suburban house that harbours a horrible secret, and into which all who enter are doomed.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJu-on: The Grudge (2002)
When a social worker is sent to check on a traumatized elderly woman whose family have moved in at the site of a notorious murder case, she unwittingly unleashes a cycle of terror that transmits via its victims.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPulse (2001)
In the immense city of Tokyo, the darkness of the afterlife lures some of its inhabitants desperately trying to escape the sadness and isolation of the modern world.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRing (1998)
A mysterious video has been linked to a number of deaths, and when an inquisitive journalist finds the tape and views it herself, she sets in motion a chain of events that puts her own life in danger.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Others (2001)
Grace is a religious woman who lives in an old house kept dark because her two children, Anne and Nicholas, have a rare sensitivity to light. When the family begins to suspect the house is haunted, Grace fights to protect her children at any cost in the face of strange events and disturbing visions.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Tale of Two Sisters (2003)
Two sisters return home after a stay in a mental institution, only to face disturbing events and a strained relationship with their stepmother. As eerie occurrences unfold, dark family secrets begin to surface, blurring the line between reality and nightmare.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisOne Missed Call (2003)
People mysteriously start receiving voicemail messages from their future selves, in the form of the sound of them reacting to their own violent deaths, along with the exact date and time of their future death, listed on the message log. The plot thickens as the surviving characters pursue the answers to this mystery which could save their lives.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOne Missed Call 2 (2005)
A Japanese restaurant cook/owner dies after answering his daughter's cellphone. Other people are getting strange, same ringtone calls as well and dying painfully. It happened in Taiwan as well. Can the police stop it if it's a ghost?
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisExhuma (2024)
After tracing the origin of a disturbing supernatural affliction to a wealthy family's ancestral gravesite, a team of paranormal experts relocates the remains—and soon discovers what happens to those who dare to mess with the wrong grave.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both mystery & horror
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSinister (2012)
True-crime writer Ellison Oswalt is in a slump; he hasn't had a best seller in more than 10 years and is becoming increasingly desperate for a hit. So, when he discovers the existence of a snuff film showing the deaths of a family, he vows to solve the mystery. He moves his own family into the victims' home and gets to work. However, when old film footage and other clues hint at the presence of a supernatural force, Ellison learns that living in the house may be fatal.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRing (1995)
In different parts of Tokyo, four young and seemingly healthy people suddenly die of heart failure at exactly the same moment. Reporter Kazuyuki Asakawa decides to investigate the deaths, and discovers that the four had stayed at a rural inn together just a week earlier. At the inn, he comes across a strange video that ends with a message saying that anyone who watches it will die exactly seven days later. Now the clock is ticking for Asakawa. Can he break the curse in time?
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Complex (2013)
Nursing student Asuka has just moved into an apartment complex with her parents and younger brother. On the first night in her new room, she is awoken by a strange scratching sound coming from the apartment of her neighbor, a reclusive old man who has refused all attempts at communication. Concerned over his well being, Asuka enters his home only to find him dead from malnutrition. Worse, it looks as if he had been trying to claw his way into her room. Asuka learns that there have been a number of strange deaths in the complex over the years from Shinobu, the handyman cleaning up the old man’s apartment. Even the girls at school whisper rumors of it being haunted.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Haunted Apartment: "Miss K" (2024)
Apartment 610 holds a dark and terrifying secret: anyone who enters it will die within four days. Can Alma and her sister, Mia, escape the curse?
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & thriller
Ju-on: The Curse 2 (2000)
On his request, the sensitive sister of a real estate agent visits a house he intends to put up for sale, only to cross paths with its resident curse.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPhone (2002)
Soon after getting a new phone, a woman notices strange things starting to happen. When she investigates, she discovers that everyone who has had her phone number before her has died suddenly and mysteriously.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both mystery & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShutter (2008)
A newly married couple discovers disturbing, ghostly images in photographs they develop after a tragic accident. Fearing the manifestations may be connected, they investigate and learn that some mysteries are better left unsolved.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
SnoozefestMovies like thisOne Missed Call 3: Final (2006)
The timid, young Asuka is bullied by her classmates. When they embark on a class field trip to Korea, Asuka plans revenge by sending them a cursed phone message they can either pass on or die.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
SnoozefestMovies like thisRe-cycle (2006)
Ting-yin, a young novelist, is struggling to come up with a followup to her best-selling trilogy of romance novels. After drafting her first chapter, she stops and deletes the file from her computer. She then starts seeing strange, unexplainable things and finds that she is experiencing the supernatural events that she described in her novel-to-be.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Ring (2002)
Journalist Rachel Keller investigates a strange videotape that may be behind the untimely deaths of four teenagers. There is an urban legend about this tape: the viewer will die seven days after watching it. Rachel tracks down the video... and watches it. Now she has just seven days to unravel the mystery of the Ring in order to save herself and her son.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNoroi: The Curse (2005)
A documentary filmmaker explores seemingly unrelated paranormal incidents connected by the legend of an ancient demon.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Babadook (2014)
A grieving single mother and her child fall into a deep well of paranoia when an eerie children's book manifests in their home.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Wailing (2016)
A stranger arrives in a little village and soon after a mysterious sickness starts spreading. A policeman is drawn into the incident and is forced to solve the mystery in order to save his daughter.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisIt Comes (2018)
To protect his family from a mysterious being, a man joins forces with a journalist and an exorcist - but they come to learn what they are dealing with is beyond their imagination.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both mystery & horror
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Grudge (2004)
An American nurse living and working in Tokyo is exposed to a mysterious supernatural curse, one that locks a person in a powerful rage before claiming their life and spreading to another victim.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
SnoozefestMovies like thisStir of Echoes (1999)
After being hypnotized by his sister-in-law, Tom Witzky begins seeing haunting visions of a girl's ghost and a mystery begins to unfold around her.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Conjuring (2013)
Paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren work to help a family terrorized by a dark presence in their farmhouse. Forced to confront a powerful entity, the Warrens find themselves caught in the most terrifying case of their lives.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHereditary (2018)
When the matriarch of the Graham family passes away, her daughter begins to unravel cryptic and increasingly terrifying secrets about her ancestry.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Ring Two (2005)
After the ordeal with Samara, Rachel and Aiden move to a rural town. But soon Rachel learns about the death of a girl in a similar fashion. To save Aiden, she must dig into Samara's past even further.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisHowling Village (2020)
After her brother goes missing, a young psychologist visits an infamous haunted and cursed location known as ‘Howling Village’ to investigate his disappearance and uncover her family’s dark history.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both horror & mystery
SnoozefestMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Dark Water?
The closest matches to Dark Water are Shutter (2004), Ju-on: The Curse (2000) and Ju-on: The Grudge (2002). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Dark Water?
People who watched Dark Water most often go on to Shutter (2004), Ju-on: The Curse (2000) and Ju-on: The Grudge (2002).
What is the highest-rated movie like Dark Water?
The Others (2001), rated 7.6/10 by 7,561 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Dark Water?
The Haunted Apartment: "Miss K" (2024) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Japanese movies like Dark Water?
Yes: Ju-on: The Curse (2000), Ju-on: The Grudge (2002) and Pulse (2001).
How are movies similar to Dark Water chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Dark Water, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.