Beloved(1998)
1998 · Jonathan Demme · 172 min
After Paul D. finds his old slave friend Sethe in Ohio and moves in with her and her daughter Denver, a strange girl comes along by the name of "Beloved". Sethe and Denver take her in and then strange things start to happen...
Drama · Horror · Thriller · Mystery
5.8112 votes
TMDB score
4/5
Intensity
2/5
Gore
5/5
Stays with you
How Beloved scares
It opens as a quiet, grounded drama about a family trying to rebuild after slavery, and only gradually lets a ghostly presence creep into that stillness. The pace is slow and heavy, more about grief and buried trauma pressing in than any kind of scare-machine pacing. There are almost no jump scares here; the dread comes from what's unspoken, from memory, and from a past that won't stay buried. It's not fun-scary at all — it sits with you and leaves you shaken rather than thrilled, so it's best for people wanting a serious, emotionally heavy film rather than a horror ride.
On The Horror Database's 0–5 scare profile, Beloved rates psychological 5/5, visceral 2/5, gore 2/5, lingering effect 5/5, and overall intensity 4/5.
- Psychological: 5 of 5
- Visceral: 2 of 5
- Gore: 2 of 5
- Lingering: 5 of 5
- Intensity: 4 of 5
Slow burn vs Jump scares: 8 of 100 — leans Slow burn
Supernatural vs Real-world: 20 of 100 — leans Supernatural
Fun-scary vs Disturbing: 88 of 100 — leans Disturbing
Intensity over runtime
Shape only — no eventsReveal pacing shapeHide pacing shapeHidden by default — shows where the tension peaks and lets up.
A slow, haunting drama that quietly unsettles for most of its length before building to a harrowing, intense climax, then eases into a somber close.
Intensity across the runtime, 0 to 100: 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 3.
How scary is Beloved?
On The Horror Database's 0–5 intensity scale, Beloved rates 4/5 — one of the more punishing watches in the catalog, building its fear through slow-burn dread rather than shocks. The fear is mostly in your head — it unsettles far more than it assaults. Expect it to be moderately gory and genuinely disturbing. Expect it to stay with you for days.
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