The Mortuary Assistant may not have lived up to anyone’s expectations, but fear not, crypt crawlers. I sensed that you were feeling let down by the empty plot and lackluster scares, and you really wanted to prowl around a morgue or funeral home while being scared out of your minds.

Below you will find 5 films featuring coroners and morticians, just trying to make an honest day’s living with the dead – and you’ll see how the dead pay them back. As a bonus, all of these films are available on Tubi, so you won’t spend another dime getting the terryfying kicks you so richly deserve. I also linked them, so you’re welcome.

Have you got a terrifying film about people who work with the dead that I may have missed? Let me know in the comments.

The Decedent (2025)

"Crowd-funded", "found footage", and "Tubi" are often enough to make anyone turn of the tv and play in traffic. Writer/director Andrew Bowser finds a quiet night in a family funeral home prepping decedents the perfect setting for a supernatural nightmare.

Bella Brady films instructional videos of mortuary prep for her blog, giving back to the community, as it were, when her night goes sideways. She doesn't know the history of who she's working on, only that she has a face to rebuild, but by the time she finds out, it's already too late. Faces are for closers. There's unfinished business and lots of sharp objects. Remarkably clever and very tense, The Decedent needs more eyeballs.

The Decedent
Starring Zoe Graham Andrew Bowser Paul Schwartz
Written and directed by Andrew Bowser
Rated TV-MA, 82 Minutes

The Possession of Hannah Grace (2018)

I love possession movies, even when they don't involve the obligatory and entirely laughable exorcism ritual that almost never works. In The Possession of Hannah Grace audiences get to see what happens when it doesn't work and the earthly remains are left unattended.

Megan (Shay Mitchell), disgraced cop turned morgue attendant is back on her feet after a shaky relationship with rehab. Taking the overnight shift in a hospital morgue? What could go wrong? Is her growing anxiety just a case of first night jitters or os there something to her latest arrival and the man who keeps trying to chop it into pieces. Yes. To all of it.

The Possession of Hannah Grace
Starring Shay Mitchell Grey Damon Kirby Johnson
Written by Brian Sieve
Directed Diederik Van Rooijen
Rated R, 86 minutes

The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016)

This was probably the first movie I every paid for through a streaming service. It was Apple TV and I discoveed the joys of streaming a film from my computer to a large screened tv. It was well wirth the $16.99 I paid to watch it.

Father and son morticians, Tommy (Brian Cox) and Austin (Emile Hirsh) atempt to determine the cause of death of a young woman (Olwen Kelly) found in the basement of a horrific crime scene - except she doesn't have a mark on her. She'll spend the whole movie cold and naked on the coroner's slab, while Tommy and Austin's evening goes from minor detective mystery to Lovecraftian horror. Jane Doe's injuries are less than commonplace, and some are downright impossible, and what they inadvertently release with their careful scalpel and natural curiosity will become the stuff of nightmares - if they survive the night.

TW: there's an animal death

The Autopsy of Jane Doe
Starring Brian Cox, Emile Hirsch, Olwen Kelly
Written by Ian Goldberg Richard Naing
Directed by André Øvredal
Rated R, 86 Minutes

The Corpse of Anna Fritz (2015)

This Spanish-language import was a slight de[arture from my usual fare, but it was no less gripping. The monsters here are the human variety and it gets icky super quick.

Anna Fritz (Alba Ribas) is world famous It Girl and her high visibility career as an actress has made her face impossible to miss. When she's found dead in her hotel room, steps are taken to make sure her body is secreted away in an unnamed hospital. Pau (Albert Carbó), the night orderly in the morgue shares with his friends Iván (Cristian Valencia) and Javi (Bernat Saumell) the special someone he's literally keeping under wraps, they can't wait to party with a famous corpse. But friends, this isn't a lighthearted take on "you only live once". They've decided that now is the time to fulfill all of their fantasies with a famous actress, and even though she's dead, they know she'll warm up to them in time. Despite their fun and games and lots of drugs, they cross several lines they may not live to regret.

The Corpse of Anna Fritz
Starring Alba Ribas, Cristian Valencia, Albert Carbó, Bernat Saumell,
Written by Isaac P. Creus Hèctor Hernández Vicens
Directed by Hèctor Hernández Vicens
Unrated, 76 minutes

Pathlogy (2008)

In what feels like a cross between ER (1994-2009) and Flatliners (1990), medical residents in an elite pathology program compete against each other for who can perform the perfect undetectable murder. Doctors Grey (Milo Ventimiglia and Gallo (Michael Weston) engage in a lot of dick-swinging to be perceived as the best at what they do, which is supposed to be diagnosis and medicine, but Grey finds out it's killing people while not getting caught. The stakes get higher when sex is swirled into the mix, and then it's a race to see who can survive all of that testosterone.

Again, human monsters are the worst, especially when they think three steps ahead. Pathology is an edge of your seat thriller with bright splashed of horror, so it's more than welcome on this list.

Pathlogy
Starring Milo Ventimiglia, Keir O'Donnell, Michael Weston, Alyssa Milano
Written by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor
Directed by Marc Schölermann
Rated R, 95 minutes

Articles by
MontiLee Stormer
Movie Reelist Contributor: MontiLee Stormer
MontiLee Stormer is a writer of horror, dark and urban fantasy. She’s also is a troublemaker, concocting acts of mayhem and despair for her own selfish pleasure. An avid movie watcher, she prefers horror but will see just about anything if you're buying. Poltergeist (1982) is her favorite movie and she actively hates The Shining (1980) due to its racism, misogyny, the butchering of the source material. She could host a TEDtalk on this single subject. Writing about herself in the third person is just a bonus.

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