These 7 Horror Workplaces Are the Ultimate HR Nightmare
Chloé Harper Gold
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Work sucks; we know. Okay, not always. Sometimes you land a cool job where you get to stretch your creative wings and collaborate with a great team. But unfortunately, most of us, at one point or another, have had to hold jobs that we hated for a steady income and health insurance.
Between a looming recession causing mass layoffs, executives forcing their staffs back into offices, and people like Kim Kardashian erroneously stating that “no one wants to work anymore,” the discourse around labor has been particularly heated lately. Capitalism is exploitative; there’s no getting around that. And a significant number of workplaces are truly horrendous and toxic.
Most of them don’t have monsters and paranormal chaos, though.
Bloodsucking Bastards (2015)
Many of us have had those jobs. The jobs that don’t seem too bad on the surface, but in reality are totally dead-end and completely soul-sucking. The 2015 horror-comedy Bloodsucking Bastards follows the hapless pharmaceutical salesman Evan (played by Fran Kranz) as he navigates his stalled career, office politics, and personal and professional relationships.
When his boss Ted (Joel Murray) hires a new team leader, Max (Pedro Pascal), instead of promoting Evan, it’s just another mundane annoyance in a long list of humdrum grievances…until, one by one, Evan’s coworkers are turned into vampires. Turns out, Max is behind it—and it’s been sanctioned by Ted as a way to increase productivity. Now, Evan must team up with his ex-girlfriend/HR rep Amanda (Emma Fitzpatrick) and his slacker friend Tim (Joey Kern) to survive this new hostile work environment.
Bloodsucking Bastards uses humor and gore to explore the predatory nature of capitalism and corporate structures. Other films in this vein include American Psycho and Mayhem.
Cam (2018)
Meet Alice, a young woman with an entrepreneurial spirit and some serious artistic skills. Alice (played by Madeline Brewer) channels her creativity and business acumen by producing, broadcasting, and starring in live-streamed adult entertainment shows on the platform FreeGirlsLive under the name Lola_Lola, all from a studio she designed and built in her home.
Alice is killing it. She’s financially independent, she has regular viewers and patrons, she has a schedule of themed shows, and she’s steadily improving her ranking on the platform. Through her work, she’s made some friends, and also a rival or two. But hey, that’s just showbiz, baby, right?
Alice wakes up one morning to find that she’s locked out of her FGL account and she can’t regain access, even after hours of going back and forth with customer service. But it gets worse: Alice’s account is still active…and the performer looks and sounds exactly like her. Suddenly, Alice is falling down a rabbit hole of hackers, stalkers, and AI, all while working in a space that’s highly scrutinized and denigrated.
Cam was written by Isa Mazzei, who drew upon her own experiences as a former cam girl, as well as those from other sex workers. While it’s a solid and engaging film on its own, Cam also offers a rarely-seen look into the behind-the-lens labor that goes into camming such as set and costume design, strategy, makeup, and special effects art—and personal safety concerns. In the process of presenting a great story, the film underscores the fact that sex work is not only legitimate work, but also intensely creative work.
The Lighthouse (2019)
Following his directorial debut of The Witch, Robert Eggers brought forth another period thriller/folk horror—The Lighthouse. Co-written by Max Eggers (the former’s brother), The Lighthouse is an intimate and claustrophobic film about two lighthouse keepers (played by Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson) who become stranded at their post after a storm. As their food and alcohol supply dwindles, so does their sanity. Soon, the men’s relationship shifts from tolerable to antagonistic with disastrous results.
Inspired by the Smalls Lighthouse Tragedy of 1801, The Lighthouse encompasses the themes of isolation, masculinity, and mythology. From a 21st-century perspective, it can also be viewed as an exploration of mental health in the workplace.
The Thing (1982) and Alien (1979)
In John Carpenter’s iconic sci-fi-horror film The Thing, American research scientists stationed in Antarctica come face-to-face with a vicious alien creature that’s able to impersonate other living beings, including humans. The Thing wreaks havoc in the station, leading to the destruction of equipment and the disintegration of the trust the scientists had developed in each other as a team.
The workplace in Alien might be even worse. In the first film of the franchise, the seven-person crew of a commercial space tug is under attack by a monstrous alien that has gotten into their ship. “How did such a creature get in there?” you may ask. Without revealing too many details…quarantine protocols were not adhered to. Funny to think about how an entire franchise started with an OSHA violation.
Halloween (1978) and Para Elisa (2013)
Taking care of children is tough. You have to keep them entertained and occupied, feed them, put them to bed, and make sure they don’t get into the cleaning supplies or medicine cabinet. Depending on your current age, you may have even started babysitting when you were twelve years old—basically still a kid yourself!
Childcare is demanding work in normal circumstances. But sometimes life likes to throw us some curveballs in the form of creepy stalkers and murderers. Halloween‘s Final Girl Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) could tell you all about that. Despite the hazardous working conditions she finds herself in, she still manages to keep two young kids alive and in one piece in spite of Michael Myers’ (Nick Castle and Tony Moran) best efforts.
On the other side of the coin, however, that aforementioned curveball might be the behavior of your client’s child. In Para Elisa, a college student named Ana (Ona Casamiquela) answers a help-wanted ad for a nanny only to be held hostage by the client Diamantina (Luisa Gavasa) and her adult daughter Elisa (Ana Turpin), who appears to have some kind of intellectual disability. Elisa doesn’t want a nanny; she wants a living doll…and she’s not going to take no for an answer.
The horror is coming from inside the house.
More occupational hazards:
- The Shining (1980)
- Misery (1990)
- Dellamorte Dellamore/Cemetery Man (1994)
- The Possession of Hannah Grace (2018)
- The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016)
- Case 39 (2009)
- Hell House LLC (2015)
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