The horror genre exists to help viewers confront their darkest fears. Cinema may offer safe encounters with mostly fictional monsters, murderers, mutants, and other frighteners, but there’s one real-life phobia that fans can’t escape: going to the doctor. Luckily, there are plenty of movies to help patients prepare for the dreaded annual checkup, and these ten horror comedies featuring doctors, nurses, surgeons, and dentists are better than a dose of laughing gas.
Horror comedy is a very difficult subgenre to pull off, but this list shows how a well-placed gag can make confronting your fears a fun experience. These movies about scalpel-wielding slashers, corrupt cosmetic surgeons, and evil orthodontists are as hysterical as they are horrifying, and they’re sure to make a real-life date feel like a walk in the park.
10
A ride in this ambulance costs more than an arm and a leg
The king of cult cinema Larry Cohen excelled in the art of finding the monstrous in the banal. The beastly babies of It’s alive And The stuff Killer yogurts are comfortable with evil paramedics The ambulance. In this paranoid horror comedy, Eric Roberts plays a comic book artist who uncovers a conspiracy in which unwitting victims are lured into an antique ambulance and sold as guinea pigs for illicit experiments.
Eric Roberts plays dangerous Dr. Beck in Lifetime movies Hunted by my doctor, hunted by my doctor: the return, hunted by my doctor: the patient’s revengeAnd Tracked by my doctor: a sleepwalker’s nightmare.
Roberts’ delightfully hammy performance is matched by the late, great James Earl Jones as a cop perpetually on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Jones isn’t the only other famous face in the cast either; Roberts’ character works for Marvel Comics, and The ambulance marks the first of Stan Lee’s many on-screen appearances in the role himself.
The ambulance
- Director
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Larry Cohen
- Release date
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March 22, 1990
9
Body modification exceeds brutal beauty standards in this feminist thriller
In American Marya medical student uses her surgical skills to get revenge on male predators. During her vigilante adventures, she meets women who thrive on extreme cosmetic procedures, and she chooses to serve that community rather than the misogynistic world of mainstream medicine. In a Fangoria interview, the twin filmmakers of the Soska Sisters praised Katharine Isabelle for making their bloody character study:
(We) needed to find an actress who not only embodied the physical demands of the role – there is a huge play between physical appearance and inner personality throughout the film – but who also had the skills and experience to bringing Mary and all her neuroses to life. . …(Katharine Isabelle) is the only person who could be Mary.
In 2019, the Soskas return to the realm of medical horror with their remake of Enraged. In Cronenberg’s original film, a woman contracts a vampiric disorder following an experimental skin graft; the Soska version is set in the world of fashion, allowing them to explore the intersection of medicine and gender expression as they did in American Marie.
American Marie
- Director
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Jen Soska, Sylvia Soska
- Release date
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January 11, 2013
- Writers
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Jen Soska, Sylvia Soska
8
Fans won’t forget to floss after watching this macabre horror comedy
In 1996, the creative team behind the Frankenstein-fragrant Resuscitator created a different type of deviant doctor. Los Angeles Law Regular Corbin Bernsen plays a Beverly Hills dentist who equates moral decadence with tooth decay, carving a delusional path among his wealthy clients. The Dentist Inventive and gruesome makeup effects make this dark comedy as difficult to watch as it is hilarious.
Director Brian Yuzna and co-writer Stuart Gordon developed the story of Honey, I shrunk the kids.
This film’s onslaught of sadistic violence and steamy sex almost eclipses an appearance by Mark Ruffalo. Fans will barely recognize Dr. Bruce Banner as the sleazy talent rep who speaks to a teenage girl waiting to have her braces removed; Little does she realize that her dentist poses an even bigger threat than the slime ball in the hall.
The Dentist
- Director
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Brian Yuzna
- Writers
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Charles Finch, Dennis Paoli
7
Dark Horse Comics’ First Movie Introduces a Creepy Doctor
27 years before Joaquin Phoenix played a villain with a laughing disorder in The JokerLarry Drake (Dark man) did the same thing, with much funnier results. In the Dark Horse Comics cartoon Dr. Giggles, a giggling PhD terrorizes Holly Marie Combs (Charm), a tragic teenager with a sick heart. The film includes some of the grossest murders of the 1990s, while remaining endearingly funny.
When the film premiered in season 6, episode 8 of The last drive-inhost Joe Bob Briggs called him the ancestor of Shout. He said:
They took every horror cliché, every horror trope, and every horror tradition, and put them all together in one movie, with a kind of self-awareness that had never been used before. It was 1992 and the slasher was basically dead…and so it was refreshing because it was horror, but it was also a wink and a nod as they made the horror.
Convinced that Dr Giggles would spawn a franchise, screenwriter Manny Coto wrote additional material that became a Dark Horse comic book series. He later enjoyed more success as a regular writer for American Horror Storyexecutive producer and screenwriter for Right handand as showrunner of Star Trek: Enterprise.
Dr Giggles
- Director
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Manny Coto
- Release date
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October 23, 1992
6
This high-level erotic thriller leaps from the screen
In the scandalous 3D nursePaz de la Huerta plays a medical professional with a penchant for picking on arrogant men. Although this sordid slasher shares the campy side of Showgirlsthe casting of comedy genius Niecy Nash in a supporting role suggests that it’s at least partly intentionally funny. However, not all of the actors seem clear on how much humor to use, including Kathleen Turner in a surprising appearance.
Paz de la Huerta certainly wasn’t laughing when she suffered an ironic injury on set. She was hit by a stunt ambulance; and she later also felt that her career had been harmed by the film, suing the producers for damages caused by the monotonous actress who dubbed over all her lines. 3D nurse may not have made de la Huerta smile, but it seems destined to be enjoyed by fans of quirky cinema and fans of 3D films.
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5
David Lynch’s Daughter Made the Weirdest Dirty Doctor Movie Ever
Jennifer Lynch began developing her film debut when she was just 19 years old – and it would earn her the Golden Razzy for Worst Director. Boxing Helene is a daring erotic thriller starring Julian Sands as Nick, a top surgeon psychotically obsessed with the scandalous Helena (Sherilyn Fenn). He forces her to become dependent on him by amputating her limbs, and she falls in love with him even as her leather-clad lover, Ray (Bill Paxton), learns of her fate.
Madonna and Kim Basinger were the first candidates for the role of Helena. Kim Basinger signed on, but withdrew at the last minute, leading to heavy litigation.
Boxing Helene failed at the box office and with critics, as Jennifer Lynch said The Hollywood interview:
I would love to know why people were so angry at me for telling a crazy fairy tale. I’m the first to say I didn’t know what I was doing. I did my best at 19, and… there were these adults who believed in me, who was essentially a child… (When the National Organization for Women criticized me, it was in sort of the straw that broke the camel’s back.
After a 15-year hiatus – which had more to do with a spinal injury than a bruised ego – Lynch returned with the excellent 2008 thriller. Monitoring. She is a regular television director, with credits including The Walking Dead And American Horror Story.
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4
This disturbing satire calls into question the fertility industry
In False positivethe prestigious Dr. Hindle (Pierce Brosnan) helps Lucy (Ilana Glazer) conceive triplets, but insists that she abort her daughter to favor her twins. When Lucy realizes she’s caught up in a conspiracy, she becomes obsessed with a saintly black midwife (Zainab Jah) who may not be entirely real. This increasingly mind-bending satire is the brainchild of John Lee, co-creator of The Shivering Truth, Xavier: The Renegade Angeland the famous Sesame Street parody Wonder Showzen.
False positive was released in June 2021, almost exactly a year before Roe v. Wade.
Although 2021 False positive is rather surreal, it may have a real reference point. Dr. Hindle uses his patients to father his own children, much like Donald Cline, the subject of the Netflix docuseries Our Father. The fertility doctor was found to be related to more than 90 of his patients’ children and appeared in court regularly until the late 2010s.
False positive
- Director
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John Lee
- Release date
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June 25, 2021
3
This dark comedy about outlaw surgery is criminally underrated
2012 Excision is a minor masterpiece about a marginalized teenage girl who becomes an amateur surgeon in her spare time. While enduring the slings and arrows of high school humiliation, Pauline (AnnaLynne McCord) escapes into elaborate fantasies of sex and surgery that she attempts to fulfill in real life. Although she rebels against her religious mother (Traci Lords), Pauline secretly plans to win her love by operating on her sick little sister.
This often hilarious crossover between Frankenstein And Welcome to the dollhouse has a stellar cast including John Waters, Malcolm McDowell and the cop decoy of a popular unscripted TV show. Filmmaker Richard Bates, Jr. recalls this casting surprise in the Blu-ray commentary:
(Emily Bicks) came to read and I thought, “Oh, she’s very good,” and then I turned her picture over and she said To catch a predatorand I was like, ‘Oh my God!’ I think she was the only person we asked for an autograph while we were making the movie.
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2
This Gender-Driven Frankenstein Story Is a Strange-Girl Classic
years 2002 Can is required viewing for fans of THE Crafts, Ginger Snaps, Wednesdayand any other story of vengeful marginalized women. May (Angela Bettis) is a lonely veterinary assistant who is constantly disappointed by others. So she decides to create her own. Using her medical know-how, she brings together the best elements of fickle romantic characters like those played by Jeremy Sisto and Anna Faris, but viewers will wonder if May can give her creation a soul.
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Filmmaker Lucky McKee has a strong affinity for foreign women, and Angela Bettis is something of a muse. She also appears in his heartbreaking thriller The womanabout a suburban father who imprisons a wild woman, and his Masters of Horror episode “Sick Girl”, about an entomologist whose profession gets in the way of her relationship. McKee praised Bettis in an interview with Fangoria:
Angela is just a delight. Every time I work with her, she amazes me. She has such a gift. It’s like his character is different in The woman as opposed to Can? Or his character in sick girl. It’s incredible, the reach she has. I am lucky to work with her.
Can
- Release date
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April 11, 2003
1
The Original Medical Deviant Gets an Update in One of Bill Murray’s Favorite Movies
Filmmakers adapted Mary Shelley’s film Frankenstein since at least the days of Edison Studios’ 1910 short, but one of the best is a comedy from grindhouse hero Frank Hennenlotter. In a JoBlo interview, he summarized his scandalous story about an aspiring inventor (James Lorinz) who puts his dismembered fiancée (Patty Mullen) back together using parts of 42nd Street sex workers. He said:
(I had the) rather bizarre idea of mixing The brain that wouldn’t die with some T&A and some very affectionate Frankenstein shots from my favorite D-rated films. …I always liked when women kiss Frankenhooker.
It’s easy to understand why Frankenhooker has fans of all kinds. The hilarious Patty Mullen confidently carries this brilliant satire of misogyny and classism in 1980s New York; the film’s wit and creativity even caught the attention of Bill Murray, who happened to be there during the editing process. When it was released in 1990, a quote from the actor adorned the poster: “If you see a film this year, it should be Frankenhooker.»
Frankenhooker
- Release date
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June 1, 1990