Human beings like to use the word “inhuman” to describe those who have done terrible things. We have to. To acknowledge the humanity of someone who could, say, stab a stranger in the neck with a pair of scissors is to acknowledge your own potential for violence, as well as that of everyone around you. And how are you supposed to go about your day like everything is fine when the guy squeezing kiwis at the grocery store could have human heads in his freezer?

In 2007, Mitchell Lichtenstein’s Teeth premiered at Sundance, and audiences had no idea what to expect. Centered around an abstinence advocate who discovers she has sentient teeth inside her vagina, Teeth was a film that horrified and disgusted the majority of the cis men who saw it and was overwhelmingly loved by just about everyone else. Lionsgate and The Weinstein Co. immediately purchased the film, an irony that cannot go unnoticed.

An endless stream of ghosts, demons, and monsters have been lifted from the realm of religion and adapted into on-screen terrors. Though these are often taken from Christianity, there are ruthless baddies that have been lifted from Judaism. The most common of the Jewish spooks is an old one known as the dybbuk.