Autumn has fallen and it’s time once more to celebrate the primal, compulsive instinct of fear. Rainestorm finishes its horror trilogy and goes to the well one last time to highlight 31 days of spooky scares that season the eerie atmosphere of Halloween.

Hex cast: 1984

The charm: A little levity never hurt anyone. A lot of levity, however, can make you die laughing. I’m not sure anyone watching this movie in its initial release would have predicted its longevity. Born of the improvisational era of the early 1980s, an era that includes Meatballs, Caddyshack and Stripes, Ghostbusters took the loose format of those former films and gave it a solid structure. Dan Aykroyd is a wiz with the technical jargon, turning every sentence into a dry joke with his earnest sincerity. Harold Ramis and Rick Moranis seem to play their roles from another planet. Bill Murray, leading this vaudeville act, lets us know that he’s in on the joke, smirking his way through it as if playing a long con. It’s up to Sigourney Weaver to play straight woman and she holds Murray at bay even while playing the prototypical damsel in distress. Coming late in the game, Ernie Hudson more than holds his own against this comedy troupe. The movie is endlessly quotable and features some wonderful 1980s special effects, which goes against the accepted view that special effects ruin comedies.

Focal point: Bill Murray cons his way into Sigourney Weaver’s apartment looking for evidence of spectral activity… but he has other things on his mind.

Entrancing trivia: We almost got Eddie Murphy as Winston Zeddemore instead of the wonderful Ernie Hudson.

Speak the words: “Nobody steps on a church in my town!”

Companion spell: Young Frankenstein (1974). Long before Ivan Reitman and the gang spoofed the ghost genre, Mel Brooks utterly nailed it with his absolutely perfect send-up of classic Universal horror movies.

Cursed by: The unleashed ghosts wreak havoc, set against the truly terrible 80s song ‘Magic.’