Pop Culture

Why ‘Sinister’ Might Be the Scariest Movie Ever, According to ‘The Bad Broadcast’

October 31, 2025

Looking for the ultimate “nope, I’m sleeping with the lights on” movie this Halloween? Host Madi Murphy and returning guest Lucy (dressed as Skyler White, naturally) kicked off The Bad Broadcast’s annual Halloween episode by breaking down what many consider the scariest movie of all time: Sinister.

This is the third year Murphy has devoted her Halloween episode to revisiting a horror classic. Previous picks included The Conjuring and Hereditary, so expectations are already sky-high.

**Why Sinister tops the scary movie charts**

If you’ve heard whispers about Sinister but never dared to hit play, you’re not alone. Directed by Scott Derrickson and starring Ethan Hawke, the 2012 film has topped multiple “scariest movie ever made” lists—sometimes even measured by actual heart rates. “They’ll monitor people’s hearts, and the highest heart rates are always in Sinister. It’s continually number one,” Murphy states.

Lucy admits she hadn’t revisited the movie since its original release. Watching it again reminded her exactly why people consider it so terrifying. “It’s like you’re on edge the whole time,” she says. And yes, there are jump scares—”bad ones,” according to her.

For those unfamiliar, the film follows true-crime author Ellison Oswalt (played by Hawke), who relocates his family to a house with a horrifying past. Naturally, he discovers a box of cursed home movies in the attic, each depicting a different family being murdered. From there, the tension builds with grainy film reels, eerie sound design, and the slow, creeping sense that nothing good ever happens in an attic.

Horror without the homework

You don’t have to suffer through two hours of terror to keep up with the conversation. Lucy distills the most chilling moments into a digestible retelling, complete with side commentary that makes the fear a little easier to handle.

At one point, she describes the opening scene—a family of four, hoods over their heads, being pulled into the air by a tree pulley system. Murphy quickly jumps in to remind listeners that this episode is not for the faint of heart. “If you don’t like scary movies or gore or family trauma, this is not the episode for sure,” she warns.

Lucy admits she had to watch Sinister at the gym in broad daylight just to get through it. “People were looking over,” she says, “but no one would come up to me.”

Why Halloween is the perfect time for safe scares

Part of the appeal here is timing. Halloween is the one season where it’s socially acceptable—even encouraged—to lean into the dark side for a bit of fun. Whether it’s a haunted house, a ghost tour, or a slasher film marathon, we permit ourselves to flirt with fear.

Scary stories have been part of human culture for as long as we can remember. They bring us together, let us test our limits, and—when experienced through a podcast instead of a movie screen—keep us at a safe distance.

**What makes Sinister stand out from other horror films**

Plenty of horror movies rely on predictable haunted houses or cheap jump scares, but Sinister does something more unnerving. Lucy points out that the film often leaves you straining to see in near-total darkness, only catching slivers of movement or faint sounds.

“Every time it’s dark, the light is this tiny spotlight so you’re only seeing fragments of things,” she explains. That technique forces the brain to fill in the blanks, and the unknown is always worse than what’s shown on screen. The sound design also contributes to the sense of dread. “It’s not even music—it’s a lot of really out-of-tune sounds and kind of like voices,” Lucy says. “The scariest music I’ve ever heard.”

And of course, there’s Hawke himself, spending the entire film in one cardigan while slowly unraveling under the weight of obsession. “That’s so Ethan Hawke. He would wear one cardigan the entire time,” Murphy jokes. Whether you’re a die-hard horror fan or someone who prefers pumpkin spice over poltergeists, Murphy’s Halloween tradition delivers the perfect mix of creepy and comedic. And if Sinister really is the scariest movie ever made? You won’t have to find out the hard way.