The Blair Witch had a vivid sense of eeriness throughout the film, but the voice in the woods really sent shivers up my spine. I realised later that playing voices backwards gives that creepy quality.
I don't remember what Hellraiser was about but I remember it was especially scary as a kid.
Hellraiser has the puzzler box that opens to torture people. The main demonic thing is Pinhead with the nails in his head.
He has some great lines: In the depths of hell your suffering will be legendary.
The evil and horror is that certain of the characters want pain and want to die and are cold blooded bastards to everyone and enjoying it. They take pleasure and revel in their pain and the pain of others.
The Hellraiser clips on Youtube look really terrifying with a Tim Burton on acid design.
I didn't know that Saw was written and directed by Australians. Leigh Whannel co-wrote and also played Adam in the first film. Explains why he looked so familiar.
While I agree with Dave that Wait Until Dark still ranks far up the list, I was astounded that Peter47 - NL came up with Straw Dogs. That is definitely my number one, all-time choice. My hands begin to sweat everytime I think of it. I saw it in a main-stream theater in Canada when it first came out, but thought I was the only one affected so strongly by it. But perhaps my reasons for finding it so scary are different than many others'.
I found it frightening because I so identified with the main character. Meek, mild, easy going ... but led to a breaking-point of committing much violence himself. It was the first time I realized that I,too, could be capable of violence. Peckinpah revealed to me that most of us are susceptible to doing extreme mayhem given the right circumstances. Prior to that, I think I saw the world as good-guy, bad-guy oriented. Ever after that film, I've known that all of us have the potential to do major harm to our fellow man. And that IS scary!
When I was a kid saw a B&W called The Screaming Skull at a Saturday matinee. Scared the piss outta me. The next week saw House on Haunted Hill with Vincent Price. Both those films swore me off scary films since.
House on Haunted Hill with Vincent Price is the quintessential haunted house story. It is stylish and well done. It builds on scare after scare to an excellent ending.
