Five cosmic horror movies to stream if you liked Iron Lung

Iron Lung- Courtesy of Piece of Magic Entertianment

YouTube personality Markiplier's indie horror movie Iron Lung was a box office hit this past weekend, earning $21 million worldwide, an impressive feat and major win for the horror genre, considering that the movie was self-financed and initially couldn't find distribution. The film is an adaptation of a popular video game, following a convict on a suicide mission. He explores an ocean of blood on a desolate moon.

If you enjoyed Iron Lung and want more cosmic horror vibes, here are five recommendations, including where to stream them.

In the Mouth of Madness

In the Mouth of Madness is the final entry in John Carpenter's apocalypse trilogy, which began with The Thing, then Prince of Darkness, and finally In the Mouth of Madness. The movie is very Lovecraftian, even though it's not based on a specific Lovecraft story. The film centers around the missing horror novelist Sutter Cane (Jurgen Prochnow). Insurance investigator John Trent (Sam Neill) scrutinizes a claim made by his publisher and vows to retrieve the to-be-published manuscript and find Cane in the process.

The more Trent reads Cane's novels, the more disturbed his dreams become. Reality starts to merge with fiction. There are also a few gnarly Lovecraft-inspired creatures thrown into the mix. As he ventures to a New Hampshire town, Trent soon learns he should have never read Sutter Cane in the first place.

In the Mouth of Madness is currently streaming for free on Tubi.

The Void

The Void is another movie that feels like it was ripped straight out of a Lovecraft story, even though it's not based on a specific story. The 2016 feature focuses on a small hospital besieged by cultists and monstrous creatures. They trap Deputy Carter (Aaron Poole) and others inside. There's also a gateway to another dimension, leading to unspeakable cosmic horrors and bodily transformations.

Directed by Jeremy Gillespie and Steven Kostanski, The Void is simply one of those movies that you have to see. It's tough to explain, and it's worth a watch just for the practical effects and creature designs. It also has one heck of an ending.

The Void is currently streaming for free on Tubi.

Annihilation

Directed by Alex Garland, 2018's Annihilation is another film on this list that has some stellar creature designs. Who can forget that bear? The movie is loosely based on the 2014 novel by Jeff VanderMeer. It stars Natalie Portman as Lena. Working with other scientists, she enters the Shimmer, a mysterious, quarantined zone of mutating plants and animals caused by an alien presence.

The deeper they venture into the Shimmer, the more the team questions everything they thought they knew about reality and human biology. This movie is a real mind-bender, maybe even more so than The Void. It also has some incredible transformation scenes.

Annihilation is currently streaming for free on Pluto TV.

Underwater

Directed by William Eubank, Underwater stars Kristen Stewart as Norah Price. She, along with a group of workers, labors at a drilling facility at the bottom of the ocean. They encounter hostile creatures after an earthquake destroys the facility. Though the film didn't do too hot when it was released in January 2020, it has since established a cult following.

This movie feels incredibly claustrophobic and contains some great scares and action sequences. It also understands that it's sometimes better to show less and leave the creature design up to the viewer's imagination. A glimpse or two is all we need in certain scenarios.

Underwater is currently streaming on Hulu and Disney+.

Event Horizon

Sam Neill earns a second spot on this list for his role in the cult classic Event Horizon. This movie is sheer cosmic terror. It follows a rescue crew investigating the reappearance of a ship named Event Horizon, hence the title. The ship has been lost for seven long years. Oh, and during that time, it opened a portal to another dimension, unleashing unspeakable torture in the process.

The film has wild and gruesome hallucinations, a heck of a cast, which also includes Laurence Fishburne as Captain Miller, and quite the bleak ending. This movie is basically a portal to hell set in space. Maybe one day, we'll get the full cut of this movie that's long been rumored, though that seems doubtful.

Event Horizon is currently streaming on Paramount+, Prime Video, and Hulu.