Some hauntings need an expert. The ten movies below follow the people brave (or foolish) enough to go looking for ghosts on purpose — real-life paranormal investigators, reality-show ghost hunters, skeptical scientists, and a few ordinary people who stumble into a haunting they never asked for, including Buffalo8’s In the Room Where He Waits, Watchful Eyes, and Malibu Horror Story. From the Warrens’ real case files to a fictional cave hiding a very real threat, every entry here treats its ghost story as something worth investigating, not just running from. Listed alphabetically below, along with where to watch each one right now.
As Above, So Below (2014)
Archaeologist Scarlett Marlowe leads a documentary crew into the Paris Catacombs hunting for the legendary philosopher’s stone, recruiting local guides to descend deeper than tourists are ever allowed to go. What starts as an adventure-thriller expedition curdles into a nightmarish descent where the crew starts confronting literal manifestations of their own guilt and past sins. Presented as found footage, it’s one of the most underrated “investigators go somewhere they shouldn’t” movies out there — a close cousin to Malibu Horror Story’s cave-exploring premise, just swapping a sacred cave for six million skeletons.
Where to watch: Prime Video (rent/buy) | Apple TV (rent/buy) | Fandango at Home (rent/buy)
Grave Encounters (2011)
A paranormal-investigation reality show crew locks themselves inside an abandoned psychiatric hospital overnight to film their series finale — and the found-footage “recovered episode” reveals exactly why they never came back. What begins as fairly typical ghost-hunting-show shtick (a skeptical host, a fake psychic, jumpy night-vision cameras) turns into one of the found-footage genre’s most purely terrifying descents, as the hospital’s geography stops making sense and the crew realizes they can’t leave. It’s the spiritual blueprint for Malibu Horror Story’s amateur-investigator setup, just with the stakes turned all the way up.
Where to watch: Tubi (free) | Pluto TV (free) | Prime Video (rent/buy)
In the Room Where He Waits (2026)
After his father’s death, a grieving actor returns to his hometown and checks into a hotel — but grief quickly turns to terror as sinister, unmistakably supernatural events start piling up in his room. Buffalo8’s In the Room Where He Waits keeps its haunting tightly contained to a single space, using that claustrophobia to force its lead to confront both an entity and the past he’d fled. It’s a lean, character-driven ghost story that trades sprawling haunted mansions for something much more intimate and unavoidable: a room he can’t check out of.
Where to watch: Tubi | YouTube
Don’t Let Them Out (2026)
A struggling, grieving woman travels to an inherited desert property to sell it and pay her debts. Instead, she uncovers dark family secrets and terrifying encounters, while lured into a desperate and perilous scavenger hunt.
Where to watch: Fandango at Home
Poltergeist (1982)
The Freeling family’s suburban dream home turns into a nightmare when their youngest daughter, Carol Anne, is pulled into another dimension by restless spirits communicating through the television static. Tobe Hooper and Steven Spielberg’s classic brings in a full team of paranormal investigators — led by parapsychologist Dr. Lesh and, eventually, the unforgettable medium Tangina Barrons — to explain what’s happening and get Carol Anne back. It’s one of the genre’s most influential haunted-house films, and a foundational text for every “team of experts investigates a haunting” movie that came after it.
Where to watch: Philo (subscription) | Prime Video (rent/buy) | Apple TV (rent/buy)
The Conjuring (2013)
Paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren are called to a Rhode Island farmhouse in 1971, where the Perron family is being terrorized by a dark presence tied to an accused witch who once lived — and reportedly cursed the land — on the property. James Wan’s film is loosely based on real cases documented by the real-life Warrens, the same investigators whose work reportedly inspired The Amityville Horror, and its blend of slow-burn dread and jump scares relaunched the modern haunted-house genre almost single-handedly. Required viewing for any “paranormal investigation” list.
Where to watch: Max (subscription) | Prime Video (rent/buy) | Apple TV (rent/buy)
The Frighteners (1996)
After a near-death experience, architect Frank Bannister can see and talk to ghosts — and turns that ability into a con, staging fake hauntings so he can charge terrified homeowners to “exorcise” them. It’s a darkly funny premise until a genuinely malevolent spirit, posing as the Grim Reaper, starts a killing spree that Frank is uniquely positioned to investigate. Peter Jackson’s pre-Lord of the Rings cult favorite is proof that a paranormal investigator doesn’t need to be sincere to be effective — just terrified enough to take the threat seriously once it’s real.
Where to watch: Prime Video (rent/buy) | Apple TV (rent/buy) | Fandango at Home (rent/buy)
The Haunting (1963)
Dr. John Markway assembles a small team — including a woman with a childhood connection to poltergeist activity and a skeptical psychic — to formally investigate reported supernatural phenomena at the notorious Hill House. Robert Wise’s black-and-white classic never shows its ghosts outright, relying instead on doors that breathe, walls that seem to bulge, and masterful sound design to build dread — and it never fully resolves whether the haunting is real or a manifestation of one investigator’s unraveling mind. It’s the film that essentially wrote the rulebook for the “team investigates a haunted house” subgenre.
Where to watch: Tubi (free) | Prime Video (rent/buy) | Apple TV (rent/buy)
The Others (2001)
Grace Stewart cares for her two children in a fog-shrouded Jersey mansion, sealing every curtain against their extreme sensitivity to light — and grows convinced the house is haunted after new servants arrive and unexplained phenomena begin. Nicole Kidman anchors this elegant, slow-burn ghost story to one of the genre’s most well-executed twist endings, precisely because it commits fully to its atmosphere before the reveal changes everything you thought you understood about who’s actually haunting whom. A must for readers who want their ghost stories genuinely unsettling rather than just loud.
Where to watch: Prime Video (rent/buy) | Apple TV (rent/buy) | Fandango at Home (rent/buy)
Watchful Eyes (2026)
Sebastian, a grieving man, takes a janitor job on a university campus, quietly monitoring students connected to a professor’s mysterious death — only to uncover a ghost story that turns out to be far more real than anyone on campus believed. Buffalo8’s Watchful Eyes takes the ghost story to an institutional setting, using the campus’s day-to-day routines to mask something genuinely sinister lurking beneath the surface. It’s a slow-reveal companion piece to this list’s more overt paranormal-investigation entries — proof a haunting can hide in plain sight.
Where to watch: Coming to VOD 7/17/26 — Amazon
