12 Future Stars Who Appeared in Obscure Horror Movies

You have to Start Somewhere!

Low-budget horror movies often cast young, inexperienced actors in entry-level roles. Some of these thespians have gone on to become major stars, making their early performances fascinating relics for their fans. Here are twelve future celebrities who once starred in obscure horror movies. In most cases, these were the first or second movies of their careers.

But first, a couple things about this list. I avoided actors who appeared in famous horror movies like Kevin Bacon in Friday the 13th and Johnny Depp in Nightmare on Elm Street. I’m also mainly focusing on actors who are not normally associated with the horror genre.

Warning: Spoilers for the movies below

Meg Ryan and lori loughlin in Amityville 3-D (1983)

Long before becoming the queen of romcoms in the ’90s, Meg Ryan appeared in the first and only horror movie of her career. Amityville 3-D is the third installment of the Amityville series. It’s a ho hum haunted house movie about John Baxter (Tony Roberts), a middle-aged divorcee who moves into the infamous house.

Mr. Midlife Crisis has a rebellious teenage daughter, Susan, who is intrigued by her dad’s new pad. She is played by future Full House star Lori Loughlin. Meg Ryan plays Lisa, Susan’s occult-obsessed friend.

Lisa only appears in a few scenes. She basically exists to provide exposition for the Amityville hauntings and speculate about the ghostly happenings. Susan is a major character and is used mainly as a point of friction between John and his ex wife. Lisa survives the movie, but Susan isn’t so lucky.

Jason Alexander and Holly Hunter in The Burning (1981)

Jason Alexander (wearing the 96 jersey) and Holly Hunter (learning forward in the blue shirt) both appear in this underrated and brutal ’80s summer camp slasher. It’s about a crazed former camp custodian named Cropsy who goes on a rampage years after being hideously disfigured by a cruel prank.

Related: The Top Ten Most Underrated Villains in Horror History

The Burning is a rare slasher with a final guy (instead of a final girl) who battles the killer at the end. And no, sadly, Jason Alexander doesn’t play the final guy. That would have been truly hilarious.

Alexander, the future Seinfeld star, plays Dave, a jokester who is the comic relief of the movie. It’s a small role, but more than Hunter has. Her character is named Sophie. Seriously, blink and you’ll miss her. The future Oscar winner for The Piano later described herself as a “glorified extra” but added that she “had a blast” making the movie. Miraculously, both of these future stars survive Cropsy’s rampage.

Eva Mendes in Children of the Corn V: Fields of Terror (1998)

Eva Mendes made her movie debut in the fifth installment of one of horror’s most wretched franchises. Has anyone actually watched all of the Children of the Corn movies? If so I admire their courage, but fear for their sanity.

Mendes plays Kir, a disaffected teen whose boyfriend has recently died. Like all the actors in this movie, she gives a flat, bland performance. I can’t blame her – she obviously knew that this movie was going to be terrible and just needed the money/experience. Luckily, she moved on to better roles like Training Day.

This movie is a trainwreck in every way, so it’s probably a good thing that Mendes’s character checks out early. Kir abruptly decides to sacrifice herself to the cult and suffers a fiery demise halfway through the flick.

Leonardo DiCaprio in Critters 3 (1991)

Years before he become the heartthrob of millennial teen girls everywhere in Titanic (1997), Leonardo DiCaprio started his career by appearing in this silly low budget creature feature. The Critters franchise was part of the weird little monster movies trend of the ’80s and early ’90s. This horror subgenre is rarely made anymore, although its close cousin, the  killer doll movie, is still going strong.

In this installment, the pesky pint-sized extraterrestrials attack the residents of an apartment building. DiCaprio plays Josh, the cocky and foulmouthed stepson of the corrupt apartment landlord.

He becomes the love interest for the movie’s teen protagonist, Annie (Aimee Brooks). Josh evades the monsters, his mean stepdaddy becomes critter food, and he finishes off the movie by asking Annie on a date. Decent start for Mr. DiCaprio!

Angela Bassett in Critters 4 (1992)

Oh, you didn’t think we were done with the Critters franchise, did you? Critters 4 was filmed back to back with part 3, and it’s just as cheesy as its predecessor. This time, it’s critters in space! This movie’s “space station” appears to be the same set that was used for the apartment building in Critters 3. Hey, when you’re working with a shoestring budget, ya gotta cut corners sometimes!

Angela Bassett is something of a late bloomer compared to the other actors in this list. She didn’t get into the business until she was in her thirties. A year before her breakthrough role as Tina Turner in What’s Love Got to do With It, Bassett plays Fran, a tough space cadet. She teams up with her fellow interstellar adventurers to battle a merry band of critters who have infiltrated their ship. Like DiCaprio, she makes it through alive.

Bassett has a random and blatantly gratuitous nude scene in the middle of the movie. I’m sure this isn’t something she would have agreed to do later in her career, but hey, if you’ve got it, flaunt it!

Brad Pitt in Cutting Class (1989)

Cutting Class is an absolute bottom of the barrel ’80s slasher, a movie so appallingly awful that it made my stomach hurt. This is in spite of featuring Brad Pitt and ’80s scream queen Jill Schoelen in the lead roles. It’s about a group of high school students who are terrorized by a maniac who was mistakenly released from a mental institution.

What was going on behind the scenes was more memorable than anything that happens on screen. Pitt and Schoelen dated and briefly planned to marry before Schoelen broke off the engagement while they were in Hungary. According to Pitt, who was broke at the time, he spent the rest of that night hanging out with a homeless guy on the streets of Budapest.

It’s interesting to wonder if Pitt would have done more horror if his relationship with Schoelen had worked out. Of course, he didn’t abandon the genre completely. He starred in Seven in 1995.

Tom Hanks in He Knows You’re Alone (1980)

Tom Hank’s first ever performance was in this mediocre, occasionally creepy wedding-themed slasher. The villain in He Knows You’re Alone targets brides-to-be on the nights before their weddings. Hanks has a small role as a psych student who lectures his friends about the psychology of fear. It was several more years before Hanks became a big celebrity. He starred in the smash hit Big in 1988.

Like Meg Ryan in Amityville 3-D, Hanks receives little screentime and his character doesn’t make much of an impact on the film. He does make it through alive, though. It would have been fun to see Hanks get a crazy gory death scene, something that he could have laughed about in interviews later in his career. Alas, that opportunity was missed. It would have been even funnier if he was the killer!

Jennifer Aniston in Leprechaun (1993)

Okay, so the Leprechaun movies aren’t *that* obscure, but I bet there are a lot of people who would be shocked to learn that Jennifer Aniston was in one of them. About a year before the premiere of Friends on NBC, Aniston played Tory, a bratty teen girl who battles Warwick Davis’s murderous, rhyme-spewing leprechaun. She had appeared in a handful of previous movies and tv shows, but this was her first starring role.

Leprechaun is hilariously terrible all around, but having a future celebrity in her only horror role adds to the movie’s entertainment value. Aniston reportedly isn’t a fan of the film, describing it as an embarrassment but also acknowledging the cult following that has built up around it over the years.

Bill Paxton in Mortuary (1982)

Mortuary is a strange and often baffling movie that’s best known for its memorable poster, which features a hand reaching out from a grave. After her father mysteriously dies, a young woman named Christy uncovers shocking secrets about a cult that operates in the local mortuary. People are being sedated and embalmed before they are dead. Meanwhile, a mysterious hooded figure is stalking Christy and anyone else who knows too much.

The late Bill Paxton is more closely associated with horror than any other actor in this list, but mainstream audiences know him best for Twister and Big Love. Paxton plays Paul, a creepy embalmer who is the son of the mortuary owner. Paul is obsessed with Christy and wants to marry her. Paxton delivers an energetic and gleeful performance as a villain with a tenuous grip on reality.

After setting up a macabre wedding ceremony with several rotting corpses in attendance (similar to the infamous birthday scene in Happy Birthday to Me), Paul’s plans are upended when he is fatally cleaved in the back with an axe.

George Clooney in Return to Horror High (1987)

George Clooney plays a struggling wannabe actor in Return to Horror High, a mostly forgettable slasher spoof that tries to do what Scream did a decade later. Despite its title, Return to Horror High is not a sequel to anything. There is a movie called Horror High, but it’s entirely unrelated to this film.

This must have been an easy role for Clooney to play, because a struggling actor is exactly what he was at the time. His character, Oliver, is a disgruntled performer who decides to leave a film production for a better role. An actress asks him, “Gonna be a big star, Oliver?” and Clooney replies, “Gonna try!” Prophetic indeed.

It was a long road ahead, but Clooney got his first big breakthrough role on the medical drama ER, which premiered in 1994. Things have worked out pretty well for him, but unfortunately Oliver doesn’t have the same good fortune. He is lured into a classroom and stabbed to death by the film’s masked villain.

This was Clooney’s second movie (after the barely seen Grizzly II: Revenge), but he wasn’t done with low budget flicks just yet. He next appeared in Return of the Killer Tomatoes in 1988. In any case, Return to Horror High is far from the worst movie Clooney has appeared in. Remember Batman and Robin?

The Final Body Count

For a bunch of obscure no-names who were starring in bloody horror flicks, it’s amazing that eight out of twelve survived. Here’s a summary:

Meg Ryan – survives

Lori Loughlin – dies (drowns)

Jason Alexander – survives

Holly Hunter – survives

Eva Mendes – dies (self sacrifices by throwing herself into a fire pit)

Leonardo DiCaprio – survives

Angela Bettis – survives

Brad Pitt – survives

Tom Hanks – survives

Bill Paxton – dies (cleaved with an axe)

George Clooney – dies (stabbed in the face and back with an unknown weapon)

Inspiration?

There’s a lesson to be learned from these stories. These actors started at the absolute bottom and worked their way to the top. Hopefully, their careers will inspire actors who are currently struggling. Keep climbing that ladder to success. You never know where you might end up someday!