Here is an alphabetical listing of all the movies (so far) that have been certified as among the 366 weirdest ever made, along with links to films reviewed in capsule form only. (You may need to use your browser’s search function to locate a specific movie).
Our short film reviews have been moved to this page: Shorts.
(Note that the numbers that appear beside the original entries don’t indicate any sort of rank, but refer solely to order of publication).
THE CANONICAL LIST OF 366:
3-Iron [Bin-jip] (2004) – A homeless young Korean man trains himself to be invisible so he can romance another man’s wife
3 Women (1977) – Identities merge and personalities shift when ingénue Pinky becomes obsessed with delusional Millie
8 1/2 (1963) – Memories and dreams collide with reality in Fellini’s self-reflexive, stream-of-consciousness classic about a director trying to make a movie
200 Motels (1971) – Frank Zappa’s psychedelic review includes Ringo Starr as Larry the Dwarf, Keith Moon as a nun groupie, and an oratorio devoted to the penis
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) – Space monoliths turn apes into men and men into star children
The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T (1953) – A mad doctor enslaves 500 boys to play his giant piano in this surreal musical fantasy courtesy of Dr. Seuss
The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) – Art-deco B-movie with fascinating production design and campy acting from star Vincent Price
Adaptation. (2002) – Charlie Kaufman can’t get started on an adaptation of “The Orchid Thief,” so he writes himself (and his twin brother) into the screenplay
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension (1984) – Buckaroo’s a neurosurgeon/particle physicist/secret agent/rock star with a backing band of soldier-of-fortune scientists opposed by transdimensional aliens and… it just goes on from there
After Hours (1985) – A word processor stranded in SoHo overnight is bedeviled by a series of odd women and odder coincidences
After Last Season (2009) – An amateurish embarrassment about two med students, a killer on the loose, and a ghost, so full of misguided directorial choices and failed attempts at cinematic poetry that it takes on a dreamlike character
Akira (1988) – A telekinetic maniac wrecks Neo-Tokyo in this trendsetting cult anime
Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams [Yume; AKA Dreams] (1990) – The master filmmaker relates eight “dreams,” including one where he wanders through Vincent Van Gogh’s paintings
Alice [Neco Z Alenky] (1988) – Ultra-creepy Czech stop-motion animated version of the Lewis Carroll classic, shot in eerie stop-animation in a decaying house
Alice in Wonderland (1966) – Surreal and dreamlike adaptation of the nonsense classic depicts the main characters as Victorian ladies and gentlemen rather than talking animals
Allegro non Troppo (1976) – “The Italian Fantasia” has some mildly surreal animated sequences, with black and white sequences of an orchestra of old ladies that may be even stranger
Altered States (1980) – Ken Russell’s visionary tale of genetic regression under the influence of magic mushrooms may be the greatest “trip” movie ever made
Amarcord (1973) – A year in the life of an Italian town under Fascist rule, as Federico Fellini (mis)remembers his youth in comic vignettes that range from strange to surreal
The American Astronaut (2001) – An absurdist indie sci-fi/western/musical/comedy co-starring the Boy Who Actually Saw a Woman’s Breast
Antichrist (2009) – Controversial, extremely graphic allegory about a man and woman lose their child and retreat to a cabin in the woods where they go crazy
The Apple (1980) – Nutty, campy musical flop that is simultaneously an allegory for the Garden of Eden and the rise of disco
Archangel (1990) – Surreal, nearly silent meditation on forgetfulness set in an icy Russian city just after World War I
Arise! The SubGenius Movie (1992) – “Bob” just might save abnormals from the flying saucers on X-day; learn how in this bizarrely edited fake cult recruitment video
Arizona Dream (1993) – A dream fish swims through the desert and Johnny Depp is romantically trapped between a cougar who dreams of flying and her suicidal daughter
Audition (1999) – A widower holds a fake audition to select a new wife, and makes the absolute worst pick possible
Bad Boy Bubby (1993) – Relentlessly offbeat character study of a man who was locked in a basement until age 35, then unleashed on modern Australia
Barbarella (1968) – Slinky Barbarella flies through the sinful galaxy finding herself in sexy psychedelic situations
Barton Fink (1991) – A leftist Hollywood screenwriter endures a case of writer’s block that turns into a living nightmare on the eve of WWII
Batman Returns (1992) – The Caped Crusader faces off against a capitalist, an S&M themed feline feminist, and a deformed survivor of an infanticide attempt with an army of missile-equipped penguins in the weirdest summer blockbuster ever
The Beast [La Bête] (1975) – A drawing room nuptial drama, only with scenes of explicit (simulated) bestiality
The Beast of Yucca Flats (1961) – Dadaist narration courtesy of the eccentric Coleman Francis makes this tale of a nuclear blast turning Tor Johnson into a ravaging desert “beast” weird indeed
Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) – Six-year old Hushpuppy lives in “the Bathtub” with her dying daddy, and imagines aurochs coming to get her
Beauty and the Beast [La Belle et la Bete] (1946) – One of the greatest fairy tale films ever made, with Surrealist-inspired set design including living candelabras
The Bed Sitting Room (1969) – Ralph Richardson mutates into a bed sitting room in this absurd post-apocalyptic comedy
Begotten (1991) – Legendary experimental film, featuring God disemboweling himself and other metaphysical atrocities
Being John Malkovich (1999) – You can enter the head of the titular actor through this weird metaphysical comedy, the screenwriting debut of bizarre movie titan Charlie Kaufman
Belladonna of Sadness [Kanashimi no Beradonna] (1973) – A medieval beauty is raped on her wedding night and makes a revenge pact with Satan in this violent, erotic, psychedelic anime
Belle de Jour (1967) – A young French housewife has bondage fantasies that gradually merge with her everyday reality in this once-salacious arthouse hit
Beyond the Black Rainbow (2010) – Modern recreation of a circa 1983 midnight movie, about a telepath imprisoned in the mysterious New Age Arboria Institute
Birdboy: The Forgotten Children (2015) – Cute teenage animals are wracked with despair, delinquency and drug-abuse on a post-apocalyptic island
The Black Cat (1934) – The first and best of the Boris Karloff/Bela Lugosi team-ups is an Expressionist horror masterpiece about Satanism and vengeance
Black Moon (1975) – Louis Malle’s unexpected venture in surrealism features gender genocide, breastfeeding, and a unicorn
Black Swan (2010) – A ballerina goes mad as she encounters her lustful double while preparing to dance the lead in “Swan Lake”
Blancanieves (2012) – A modern silent retelling of the legend of Snow White set in the bullfighting culture of 1920s Spain
Blood Diner (1987) – Severely out-of-whack horror-comedy with (possibly unconscious) fascist undertones
Blood Freak (1972) – Pot + experimental turkey meat turns Herschell into a turkey-headed killing machine in the world’s only Christian anti-drug gore movie
The Blood of a Poet [Le sang d’un poète] (1930) – Early Surrealist work where a poet gets a mouth stuck on his hand, visits a strange hotel, and commits suicide after losing a card game on a snowy Parisian street
Blood Tea and Red String (2006) – The Dwellers Under the Oak seek to recover their stolen doll from depraved white mice in this surreal stop-motion animated fairy tale for adults
Blue Velvet (1986) – Jeffrey finds a severed ear and it leads him to a melancholy nightclub singer, a deranged drug-huffing pervert, and a suave karaoke version of Roy Orbison
The Boxer’s Omen [Mo] (1983) – Surreal black magic battles featuring an evil wizard with a detachable head and a nude she-demon birthed from crocodile carcass
A Boy and His Dog (1975) – Post-apocalyptic tale of a wasteland rapist and his far more intelligent telepathic dog companion
Branded to Kill [Koroshi No Rakuin] (1967) – Seijun Suzuki’s surreal, scrambled yakuza thriller about a rice-sniffing hitman famously got him fired by the studio who financed it
Brand Upon the Brain! (2006) – “Guy Maddin” “remembers” his childhood growing up with a domineering mother and a mad scientist father in a lighthouse/orphanage
Brazil (1985) – Terry Gilliam’s must-see dystopian black comedy mixes expressionism, surrealism, fantasy, and film noir to create a keen satire of bureaucracy
Bronson (2008) – Overwhelmingly stylized biopic of Charlie Bronson (born Michael Peterson), the self-mythologizing celebrity who prides himself on being Britain’s most violent prisoner
Bubba Ho-Tep (2002) – Elvis and black JFK team up to fight a mummy terrorizing their rest home
The Butcher Boy (1997) – Neglected and largely left to his own devices, the incredible Francie Brady goes insane before our very eyes
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) – The titular Dr. engages a somnambulist to commit murders in a strangely slanted Expressionist town
Careful (1992) – Residents of an Alpine village fear avalanches and their own incestuous desires in this comic surrealist melodrama shot in “two-strip” Technicolor
Carnival of Souls (1962) – Low-budget creepfest is a minor miracle on film
Catch-22 (1970) – Mike Nichols’ underappreciated adaptation of the classic novel is star-studded absurdism
Cat Soup [Nekojiru-so] (2001) – The surreal adventures of an anthropomorphic cartoon cat and his half-dead sister
Cemetery Man [Dellamorte Dellamore] (1994) – Surrealist arthouse zombie gore film about the caretaker of a graveyard where the dead refuse to stay down
Un Chien Andalou (1929) – A razor through an eyeball announces the Surrealist revolution
Christmas on Mars (2008) – The Flaming Lips bring us the most vaginal imagery ever seen in a psychedelic science fiction Christmas movie
The City of Lost Children [La cité des enfants perdus] (1995) – Visionary steampunk fairytale from Jeunet & Caro
City of Women [La città delle donne] (1980) – An aging Lothario finds himself lost in a province populated and ruled by females, until he finds refuge at the citadel of the world’s last macho man
Clean, Shaven (1993) – A deinstitutionalized man seeks his lost daughter in what may be the most clinically accurate depiction of schizophrenia ever filmed
A Clockwork Orange (1971) – Kubrick weirds it up in this disturbing moral fable
The Color of Pomegranates [Sayat Nova] (1969) – Impressionistic, poetic retelling of the life of Armenian bard Sayat Nova in a series of surreal tableaux
Come and See (1985) – Bleak and intense Soviet WWII classic about a boy solider, with dreamlike passages
The Company of Wolves (1984) – “Little Red Riding Hood” told as the werewolf nightmare of a pubescent girl
Conspirators of Pleasure [Spiklenci Slasti] (1996) – A man with a chicken complex and a woman who snorts dough are two of the six characters whose bizarre fetishes intersect in this intricate Surrealist joke
The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover (1989) – Peter Greenaway’s lavish Jacobean revenge fable is set in a French restaurant where a boorish Thief terrorizes the staff and customers
Cowards Bend the Knee, or, the Blue Hands (2003) – Typically surreal modern silent from the inimitable Guy Maddin mixing melodrama, Greek tragedy, psychosexual guilt, and hockey highlights
The Cremator [Spalovac Mrtvol] (1969) – An oddball Czech cremator harmonizes his homegrown Buddhism with Nazi ideology
Crime Wave (1985) – A silent screenwriter who can only complete beginnings and endings struggles to create the great Canadian “colour crime movie”
Cube (1997) – Five strangers wake up in a hi-tech booby-trapped cube, with no idea who built it or why
Daisies [Sedmikrásky] (1966) – Sexy Czech hippie chicks wreaking havoc in this banned satire of something or other
The Dance of Reality [La Danza de Realidad] (2013) – Alejandro Jodorowsky’s surrealistic autobiography is one of his most accessible films, although it still features a woman who can only sing opera and who cures plague with her urine
The Dark Backward (1991) – The world’s worst comic nearly becomes an overnight success when he grows a third arm out of his back in this grotesque show business satire
Dark City (1998) – Mysterious bald Strangers manipulate events and geometries in a city of endless night for their own purposes
Dead Alive [AKA Brain Dead] (1992) – A rabid monkey incites the most absurdly gory zombie movie ever made
Dead Leaves (2004) – Hyperactive anime about a guy with a television head and a girl with mismatched eyes breaking out of a mutant clone prison on the moon
Dead Man (1995) – Hypnotic, dreamlike Western about a man bearing the name of a dead poet and an Indian named Nobody
Dead Ringers (1988) – Twin gynecologists (!) go crazy in this odd psychodrama from horror maestro David Cronenberg
Death Bed: The Bed That Eats (1977) – Rediscovered oddity about a man-eating bed is a surreal horror/art film/black comedy, or something?
Death by Hanging [Koshikei] (1968) – A Korean killer survives his execution, and puzzled police bureaucrats try to recreate the capital crimes to cure the condemned’s amnesia
Death Laid an Egg [La morte ha fatto l’uovo] (1968) – A Surrealist giallo set at an experimental poultry farm that’s breeding headless chickens
Delicatessen (1991) – Jeunet & Caro’s first film is a bizarre but oddly sweet black comedy involving cannibalism in post-apocalyptic Paris
Dementia [Daughter of Horror] (1955) – Silent, experimental, and noirish horror about a woman soon to be involved in a “mysterious stabbing”
Der Samurai (2014) – A man with a katana in an evening dress terrorizes a rural German town
Desperate Living (1977) – This grunge fairy tale includes cross-dressing, cannibalism, necrophilia, bat rabies, and gap-toothed queen Edith Massey serviced by leather-bound Nazis
Destino (2003) – Reconstruction of an abandoned 1946 collaboration between Salvador Dalí and Walt Disney; it’s a five minute moving Dalí canvas
The Devils (1971) – Ken Russell’s most violently deranged film is the true-ish story of a convent of nuns who accuse a priest of being an incubus in league with the Devil
Dillinger is Dead [Dillinger e Morto] (1969) – Nearly forgotten late 1960s avant-garde alienation piece about a gas-mask designer who spends an evening puttering about his apartment
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie [Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie ] (1972) – Six upper-class twits (and a bishop) attempt to have dinner together, but they are always interrupted
Django Kill… If You Live, Shoot! [Se sei Vivo Spara] (1967) – An ambiguously dead antihero who shoots golden bullets fights Mr. Sorrow and his gang of gay fascist cowboys
Doggiewogiez! Poochiewoochiez! (2012) – A remake of The Holy Mountain composed entirely of found footage of dogs
Dog Star Man (1964) – A man climbs up a mountain, a star explodes, a baby suckles, and probably more things happen, although you can hardly tell through the four layers of superimposed images
Dogtooth [Kynodontas] (2009) – Three children are raised to adulthood in a bizarre estate where words mean just what the tyrannical father wants them to in this shocking Greek art film
Dogville (2003) – This misanthropic fable is like de Sade’s “Justine” played out on the set of Wilder’s “Our Town”
Donnie Darko (2001) – Angsty, apocalyptic, fantastical drama about a screwed-up, possibly time-traveling teen is an irresistibly lovable mess
Don’t Look Now (1973) – Classic psychological horror with a weird twist
The Double (2013) – In a comically nightmarish nowhere, meek clerk Simon James is bedeviled by James Simon, his exact double and his exact opposite
Dr. Caligari (1989) – This pop-surrealist work by a hardcore porn director suffers from bad acting, but it is weird as hell
Eden and After [L’éden et après] (1970) – Bored college students steal a painting and end up in Tunisia, although it could just be the drugs in this surreal sadomasochistic story that could be described as Alice in Wonderland meets Justine meets The Trip
Eisenstein in Guanajuato (2015) – Delirious biopic postulating that Soviet director Sergei Eisenstein lost his virginity to his guide while in Mexico to film a movie that never got made
Elevator Movie (2004) – Surreal and minimalist independent feature about two people trapped in an elevator for months; well-scripted and weird as hell but very amateur
El Topo (1970) – Mystical and surreal Spaghetti Western from Alejandro Jodorowsky
Enemy (2013) – A history professor is obsessed with tracking down a man who appears to be his exact double; spiders appear
Enter the Void (2009) – Provocative and pretentious, Gaspar Noé’s “psychedelic melodrama” is nonetheless the best trip film of the young millennium
Eraserhead (1977) – The ultimate nightmare experience, about horror at procreation and loathing for one’s own offspring
Escape from Tomorrow (2013) – Surrealist satire secretly shot in Disney World, with mad scientists, evil witches, French jailbait, and a cat flu plague
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) – Jim Carrey unexpectedly shines as he fights against a memory-erasing procedure he impulsively undertook; a weird crowd-pleaser
Even Dwarfs Started Small [Auch Zwerge haben klein angefangen] (1970) – Dwarf inmates revolt against their dwarf oppressors at an unnamed institution; they burn flowerpots, crucify monkeys, and laugh at defecating camels
Evil Dead II (1987) – The frenetic, fantastic and crowd-pleasing movie about a man trapped in a cabin menaced by evil spirits, mixing equal parts horror and absurd slapstick comedy
The Exterminating Angel [El àngel exterminador] (1962) – Attendees at a fancy soiree find they cannot leave the premises–for no reason whatsoever
Eyes Without a Face [Les Yeux sans Visage] (1965) – Georges Franjou’s influential, poetic horror film
The Face of Another [Tanin no kao] (1966) – A man whose face has been burned in an accident gets a synthetic mask based on a stranger’s face and sets out to seduce his own wife
The Falls (1980) – Absurdist mockumentary about the 92 survivors of the Violent Unexplained Event whose names begin with “Fall”
Fantasia (1940) – Dinos, demons and hippos illustrate the classical music canon in Walt Disney’s weirdest classic
Fantastic Planet [La Planète Sauvage] (1973) – Tale of humans kept as pets by giant blue aliens, told in a Terry-Gilliam-meets-Salvador-Dalí-in-space animation style
Fantasy Mission Force [Mi ni te gong dui; AKA Dragon Attack] (1983) – An anachronistic team of misfits (including Jackie Chan and guys in kilts) fight Amazons and stay at a haunted house while on a quest to rescue Allied generals captured by Japanese Nazis in Canada
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) – Terry Gilliam’s adaptation of Hunter S. Thompson’s cult novel about two burnouts taking insane quantities of drugs in the City of Sin
Fellini Satyricon (1969) – Bizarre androgynous costuming and mythological leaps of logic gird a great director’s decadent extravaganza
Female Trouble (1974) – Juvenile delinquent Dawn Davenport (Divine) proves that “crime is beauty” on her way to the electric chair
A Field in England (2013) – Deserters from the English Civil War eat psychedelic mushrooms and hunt for buried treasure at an alchemist’s command
Fight Club (1999) – Manhood finds itself tested at the millennium when an actuary and an eccentric soap-maker found an underground “fight club” and find it taking on cult proportions
Final Flesh (2009) – Four separate porn-troupes-for-hire enact an absurdist prank script about the apocalypse
The Forbidden Room (2015) – Guy Maddin’s collection of reimagined lost films, with tales curled inside each other like Russian nesting dolls
Forbidden Zone (1982) – Frenchie is lost in the 6th Dimension and her family and friends must save her from the king and queen in this surreal musical that often looks like a Fleischer Brothers cartoon
Freaks (1932) – A trapeze artist marries a dwarf for his money, leading to gruesome revenge in this infamous film populated by real carnival freaks
Funeral Parade of Roses [Bara no sôretsu] (1969) – Basically, a psychedelic Japanese drag adaptation of “Oedipus Rex”
Funky Forest: The First Contact (2005) – Selection of surreal, interwoven sketches from three Japanese directors is uneven, as you would expect, but contains some of the weirdest sequences you’re likely to come across
Glen or Glenda (1953) – Ed Wood’s pro-transvestite documentary, with Bela Lugosi as an omniscient one-man Greek chorus and a dream sequence featuring bondage
The Godmonster of Indian Flats (1973) – A mutant sheep embryo develops into a monster that threatens an old-West themed town involved in a sticky real estate deal
Goke, Body Snatcher from Hell [Kyuketsuki Gokemidoro] (1968) – Survivors of an airline crash squabble among each other while psychedelic space vampires pick them off
Goodbye Uncle Tom (1971) – A fake shockumentary about slavery in the American south, with nudity and depravity on an epic scale
Gothic (1986) – Hallucinatory excess from Ken Russell, about the night Mary Shelley conceived “Frankenstein”
Gozu [Gokudô kyôfu dai-gekijô: Gozu] (2003) – Erotically charged, grotesquely surreal Takashi Miike horror/yakuza mashup
La Grande Bouffe (1973) – Four successful men lock themselves inside a chateau and eat themselves to death
Greaser’s Palace (1972) – A zoot-suited Jesus visits a Western town to enact a series of absurd parables
The Greasy Strangler (2016) – Lard-loving Big Ronnie (who doubles as the Greasy Strangler) and his son live together and conduct scam walking tours, until a “disco cutie” comes between them
Gummo (1997) – Indisputably weird but ceaselessly unpleasant portrait of hopeless white trash
Häxan [Witchcraft Through the Ages] (1922) – Silent documentary about witchcraft containing the most diabolically visionary horror images of all time
Head (1968) – Prefab pop band the Monkees commit career suicide with this psychedelic spit in the eye of their young fans
Heavenly Creatures (1994) – Peter Jackson brings the fantasy world of two teenaged murderesses to life in this crime drama based on a real-life case
Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001) – Hedwig, a punk band leader and victim of a botched sex change operation, chases the rock star who stole her songs across the U.S.
Hellzapoppin’ (1941) – Anarchic musical comedy from vaudevillians Chick Johnson and Ole Olsen is probably the weirdest Hollywood musical of all time
Help! Help! The Globolinks [Hilfe! Hilfe! Die Globolinks] (1969) – The world’s only psychedelic children’s opera about an alien invasion
Holy Motors (2012) – “Mr. Oscar” drives around Paris taking on “assignments” that require him to become a hit man, accordionist, and a fashion-model abducting leprechaun
The Holy Mountain (1973) – An extravagant, psychedelic tour of world mysticism has a guru lead a Christ-figure and companions on a quest to storm the Holy Mountain
The Horrors of Spider Island [Ein Toter hing im Netz] (1960) – A bad misogynist fever dream involving poorly dubbed buxom women, and some spiders, on an island
The Hourglass Sanatorium (1973) – A man meets strange characters at a dreamy sanatorium where the rules of time and logic do not apply
Hour of the Wolf [Vargtimmen] (1968) – An artist is invited to visit the castle of—demons? ghosts? hallucinations?—in Ingmar Bergman’s Gothic horror
House [Hausu] (1977) – The weirdest haunted house movie ever made; no one forgets the scene where the piano eats the girl
Howl’s Moving Castle [Hauru no ugoku shiro] (2004) – An 18-year old girl is turned into an old woman and goes to work for a wizard in a steampunk castle
How to Get Ahead in Advertising (1989) – A hotshot ad exec grows a pimple that turns into a head in this bizarre, biting satire
Hugo the Hippo (1975) – Hugo’s family is brutally slaughtered by Paul Lynde, who later subjects the hippo and his human pal to horrifying hallucinations in this delightful children’s fare
The Hypothesis of the Stolen Painting (1978) – A Collector poses actors into tableaux vivants in an attempt to divine the esoteric message in a series of 19th century paintings
I Can See You (2008) – This “psychedelic campfire tale” is slow to start, but climaxes in a 20 minute freakout
Idiots and Angels (2008) – A loathsome man grows wings in this occasionally surreal animated black comedy that expertly mixes cynicism with romanticism
If…. (1968) – Malcolm McDowell debuts as a rebellious youth in a British boarding school who fights a (largely imaginary) battle with the authorities
I’m A Cyborg, But That’s OK [Saibogujiman Kwenchana] (2006) – Romantic comedy set in a mental asylum is likely to remain the weirdest example of its genre
The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle (2009) – Experimental cookies cause hallucinations and pregnancy in male janitors in this indie comedy sleeper
Indecent Desires (1968) – This roughie about the symbiotic sexual relationship between a transient, a magic ring, a doll, and a blonde secretary is our choice to represent the oeuvre of Doris Wishman
Inherent Vice (2014) – Pot-smoking detective “Doc” Sportello investigates kidnappings, fake murders, a sinister consortium of dentists, and more in this baffling adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s novel
Ink (2009) – Visually impressive low-budget fantasy about a mysterious figure who snatches a sleeping girl into a world of dreams
INLAND EMPIRE (2006) – This story of Laura Dern trapped in a nightmare while filming a cursed script is perhaps David Lynch’s weirdest movie
Innocence (2004) – A girl arrives, in a coffin, for her first day at a strange all-female boarding school
Institute Benjamenta, or This Dream People Call Human Life (1995) – An ambitionless man enrolls in a school for servants and enters into ambiguous relationships with the brother and sister who run the institute
It’s Such a Beautiful Day (2011) – Psychedelic animation about the life and death of a terminally ill, terminally confused stick figure in a hat
I Will Walk Like a Crazy Horse [J’irai Comme un Cheval Fou] (1973) – Accused of murdering his mother, a man flees to the desert where he meets—and falls for—a mystical dwarf
Jacob’s Ladder (1990) – Big-budget cult mindtrip movie with unforgettable demonic hallucinations
Japanese Summer: Double Suicide [Muri shinjû: Nihon no natsu] (1967) – A nympho who can’t get laid meets a suicidal man who can’t get killed in the surreal Sixties satire
John Dies at the End (2012) – A psychedelic drug called “Soy Sauce” gives two slackers the psychic powers necessary to sense an incoming extra-dimensional invasion
Johnny Got His Gun (1971) – Antiwar classic about a limbless, blind and deaf casualty of the first World War, trapped inside his own head where he lives out a mixture of dreams and fantasies
Keyhole (2011) – A gangster journeys through a haunted house unlocking forgotten family memories
Kin-Dza-Dza (1986) – Russian junkyard sci-fi satire about a planet with bizarre customs and an absurdly arbitrary class structure. Also, koo!
Kontroll (2003) – A kontroller living in the Budapest subway chases after a mysterious killer pushing people onto the train tracks in this mythic thriller
Kung Fu Hustle [Kung Fu] (2004) – Totally off-it’s-rocker kung fu comedy/fantasy that became a smash international hit
Kwaidan (1964) – Old Japanese ghost stories turned into Expressionist art
L’Age d’Or (1930) – A documentary about scorpions turns into the story of a man and woman’s frustrated love, then into Jesus’ Sadean orgy
The Lair of the White Worm (1988) – Ken Russell’s ultra-fun, tongue-in-cheek horror movie filled with phallic symbols and impaled nuns
Last Year at Marienbad [L’Année Dernière à Marienbad] (1961) – Trapped in a ghostly hotel, a man insists he met a woman last year; the woman denies it; things get strange
The Legend of Suram Fortress [Ambavi Suramis Tsikhitsa] (1984) – The fortress of Suram is doomed to crumble eternally until a youth entombs himself in its walls
Lemonade Joe [Limonádový Joe aneb Konská Opera] (1964) – Anarchic Czech Communist musical Western spoof about a lemonade-drinking cowboy who challenges the whiskey monopoly in a frontier town
Léolo (1992) – A French Canadian boy who believes he was conceived from an Italian tomato contaminated with semen uses imagination to escape from his dysfunctional family
L’Immortelle (1963) – A professor in Istanbul finds and loses a mysterious woman in novelist Alain Robbe-Grillet’s directorial debut
L’Inhumaine [The Inhuman Woman] (1924) – Arty avant-garde sci-fi melodrama about a stuck-up diva and the men she drives to madness
Liquid Sky (1982) – Tiny aliens harvest endorphins from New Wave punks at the point of orgasm, killing them in the process
Lisztomania (1975) – Composer Franz Liszt battles composer/vampire Richard Wagner in this crazy classical music comedy
Little Otik [Otesánek] (2000) – A barren woman adopts a log as a child, and it comes to life and begins eating the neighbors in this black comedy adaptation of an Eastern European folktale
The Lobster (2015) – Find a mate in 45 days or be turned into an animal of your choice
Lost Highway (1997) – A jazzman allegedly kills his wife, then one day disappears and a totally different man wakes up in his death row cell
Love Exposure (2008) – A virginal Catholic who makes his living as a pornographer with ninja skills at upskirt photography tries to save his unrequited love from a religious cult in this bizarrely plotted four hour comedy epic
The Love Witch (2016) – A mix of witchcraft, campy romantic melodrama, and bubbling feminist subtext, presented as a tribute to 1960s Technicolor spectacles
Lucifer Rising (1981) – Egyptian gods and goddess conjure Lucifer and flying saucers in this short (30 minutes), occult, avant-garde masterpiece
Lunacy [Sileni] (2005) – Jan Svankmajer directs the Marquis de Sade in a pair of tales by Edgar Allan Poe
The Lure [Córki Dancingu] (2015) -Poland’s disco-musical about killer mermaids
Maelstrom (2000) – This tale of a pretty young socialite’s guilt is narrated by a talking fish
Malpertuis (1972) – Harry Kümel’s big weird dark house tale was confusing and a flop despite the presence of Orson Welles, but drips with surreal atmosphere nonetheless
Mandy (2018) – When a hippy cult leader kills lumberjack Nicolas Cage‘s girl, he goes on a psychedelic revenge rampage
Maniac (1934) – Resurrection of the dead, an orangutan-man rapist and edible cat eyeballs all feature heavily in this deranged exploitation movie that seems to have been directed by an actual maniac
Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966) – Could have been the worst movie ever made, if not for the redemptive presence of the great oddball character Torgo, the spastic satyr
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976) – David Bowie is the alien who falls to Earth and corrupted in this nonlinear, experimental sci-fi movie
Marquis (1989) – The story of the Marquis de Sade’s imprisonment in the Bastille, performed by characters in animal masks and featuring Sade’s penis in a speaking role
Meet the Feebles (1989) – Fragile egos, double-dealings, accidental killings, pornographic sidelines, rohypnol-aided assault, and drug and sex addictions plague puppets at a variety show
Meshes of the Afternoon (1943) – This fifteen minute afternoon nightmare with cloaked figures with mirrored faces gave birth to the American avant-garde
Metropolis (1927) – Fritz Lang’s futurist fantasia, a political allegory with Biblical imagery, undercover robots and Bauhaus designs
The Milky Way [La Voie Lactee] (1969) – A dry and cerebral, but very weird, story by surrealist master Luis Buñuel about two tramps meeting various Biblical characters and embodiments of Catholic heresies while traveling on a pilgrimage
Millennium Actress [Sennen joyû; AKA Chiyoko: Millennium Actress] (2001) – A retired actress recounts her life, with her interviewers entering a story which mixes up reality with scenes from her movies
Mind Game (2004) – Nishi goes on a psychedelic journey after being killed by a yakuza, returns to Earth, and lives in the belly of a whale with an old hermit in this anime with rapidly shifting art styles
Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life (1983) – Monty Python discusses life in a series of (frequently weird) sketches
Mood Indigo (2013) – A wealthy inventor’s wife grows ill from a water lily growing in her lung in this whimsical and surreal adaptation of Boris Vian’s novel
mother! (2017) – Jennifer Lawrence finds hordes of boorish guests descending on, and wrecking, the tranquil home she is refurbishing with her celebrity poet husband
Mr. Nobody (2009) – The last mortal man in the world remembers dozens of parallel reality variations of his life
Mulholland Drive (2001) – Radical identity shifts and surrealistic nightclub acts ignite this dreamlike noir fable about love, guilt and Hollywood
My Winnipeg (2007) – In Guy Maddin’s Winnipeg, sleepwalkers roam the streets at night, horses freeze in the river, and mother is everywhere
Naked Lunch (1991) – David Cronenberg’s adaptation of the unadaptable William S. Burroughs novel features film’s scariest typewriters
Natural Born Killers (1994) – A pair of serial killers become celebrities as they slay their way across a hallucinogenic America
Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion (1997) – This apocalyptic anime feature, serving as an alternate ending to Hideaki Anno‘s popular TV series, is basically Jungian psychoanalysis acted out by giant robots
Never Give a Sucker an Even Break (1941) – The “Great Man” (W.C. Fields) tries to sell a studio an absurd script that begins when he falls out of an airplane chasing his plummeting whiskey flask
Night of the Hunter (1955) – A homicidal Preacher with “LOVE” and “HATE” tattooed on his hands hunts children carrying treasure in this Southern Gothic Expressionist fable
Night Train to Terror (1985) – God and Satan watch badly edited horror films on a train while a New Wave band practices one compartment down
Ninja Champion (1985) – Rose seeks revenge against her diamond-smuggling rapist, while in another movie clumsily pasted on to that one, an Interpol ninja assassinates evil ninjas while they practice circus tricks
The Ninth Configuration (1980) – A psychiatrist argues for the existence of God in an experimental military mental hospital, but is he as crazy as his patients?
Nosferatu [Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens; Nosferatu, a Symphony of Horror] (1922) – F.W. Murnau’s unauthorized Expressionist adaptation of “Dracula” is a melange of sex and disease
No Smoking (2007) – Quit smoking, the Bollywood way, in one of India’s few intentionally weird films
Nostalghia (1983) – Andrei Tarkovsky’s slow, beautiful, dreamlike spiritual parable about a homesick Russian poet in Italy
Nothing but Trouble (1991) – Dan Akroyd’s grotesque Hollywood misfire about a weird old “reeve” ruling from a junkyard in a backwoods New Jersey “shire”
November (2017) – A tragic romance set in a world where our forefathers’ craziest superstitions are literally true
Nuit Noire [Black Night] (2005) – In a world where the sun only shines fifteen seconds a day, a strange African woman crawls into a solitary entomologist’s bed to die
O Lucky Man! (1973) – Sprawling satire with Malcolm McDowell, Kafkaesque interrogations, a half-man half-hog, and breastfeeding
Orpheus [Orphée] (1950) – When Jean Cocteau refashions the Greek myth for postwar France, Orpheus and Death fall in love, and Death’s chauffeur gets the hots for Eurydice
A Page of Madness (1926) [Kurutta ippêji] – A janitor takes a job in an asylum where his wife is held in this silent Japanese film heavily influenced by the European avant-garde
Pan’s Labyrinth (2006) – Guillermo del Toro’s beautiful fairytale; a girl completes quests at a faun’s behest, while her real world Fascist stepfather is a monster beyond all fantasy
Paprika (2006) – Stunning Satoshi Kon animation; scenario involves terrorists invading dreams, then turning them loose on the streets of Tokyo
Perfect Blue [Pafekuto buru] (1997) – A Japanese pop idol tries her hand as an actress, and the pressure of unhappy fans and selling out leads her to a psychotic break with reality
Performance (1970) – Gangster James Fox is fed magic mushrooms and turned into a hippie by Mick Jagger and groupies in this psychedelic stunner
Persona (1966) – A mute actress and her nurse switch personalities at a vacation home – maybe?
Phantasm (1979) – Crazy, nightmarish, obstinately illogical drive-in horror flick about a kid and a sinister funeral home, featuring the terrifying “Tall Man”
The Phantom of Liberty (1974) – A series of Surrealist sketches by the great Luis Buñuel
Phantom of the Paradise (1974) – A rock n’ rollin’ mix of Phantom of the Opera and “Faust,” with just the right amount of crazy
Pi (1998) – Amazing black and white photography and a pulsing electronica soundtrack drive this intellectual thriller about a mad math genius seeking a mystical number
Pierrot le Fou (1965) – A television personality goes on the lam with his babysitter in this playfully fractured, classic Nouvelle Vague road movie
The Pillow Book (1996) – Gorgeous experimental video, full of layered images, illustrates this story of a woman obsessed with creating living books by drawing on nude bodies
Pink Flamingos (1972) – Divine goes to excessive lengths to prove she is the filthiest person in the world
Pink Floyd the Wall (1982) – Bombastic, unfocused, overwrought and often brilliant rock opera, with knockout animation from British political cartoonist Gerald Scarfe
Playtime (1967) – A plotless “day in the life” of modernist Paris that ends with chaotic revelry in a crumbling restaurant
The Pornographers [“Erogotoshitachi” yori Jinruigaku nyūmon] (1966) – Ogata makes pornographic movies while sleeping with his landlady and lusting after her teenage daughter, under the watchful eye of a carp the widow believes is her reincarnated husband
Possession (1981) – Anna leaves her husband, but not for another man… or even another human
Prospero’s Books (1991) – Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” as an avant-garde video version of Renaissance painting come to life, with plentiful nudity and all parts voiced by Sir John Gielgud
Reality [Réalité] (2014) – An aspiring filmmaker gets lost in nightmares inside of nightmares when he is tasked with finding an award-winning scream as a prerequisite to funding his movie
The Red Squirrel [La Ardilla Roja] (1993) – A suicidal man pretends to be the boyfriend of a beautiful amnesia victim, but how long can he keep up the charade?
The Reflecting Skin (1990) – Uneven but sometimes powerful flick teeming with symbolism about a kid who thinks his widow neighbor is a vampire, among other strangenesses
Reflections of Evil (2002) – A bizarrely edited piece of avant-outsider art about an angry, obese street peddler who is watched over by the ghost of his dead junkie sister in a purgatorial L.A.
Repo Man (1984) – A punk kid takes a job as a repo man and searches for a car with a mysterious glowing cargo in the trunk
A Report on the Party and Guests [O slavnosti a hostech] (1966) – Picnickers are kidnapped and taken to a party in this Kafkaesque allegory on totalitarianism made (and banned) in Communist Czechoslovakia
Repulsion (1965) – Disturbing Roman Polanski peek inside Catherine Deneuve’s disintegrating mind
Robot Monster (1953) – A gorilla alien in a diving helmet and his bubble machine invade Bronson Canyon
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) – Even without its bizarre cult following, this naughty musical b-movie spoof would have earned a place on the list
Roma (1972) [AKA Fellini’s Roma] – An infamous ecclesiastical fashion show with roller-skating cardinals highlights this Felliniesque sequence of vignettes set in the Eternal City
Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (1990) – The two minor characters from “Hamlet” wander around the castle of Elsinore, unaware that they are actually characters in a play
Rubber (2010) – The best animated tire serial killer movie ever made gets bonus points for including an audience that comments on the absurdly comic proceedings
Rubin & Ed (1991) – Antisocial weirdo Rubin agrees to attend a real estate seminar with sad sack salesman Ed, if Ed will help him bury his dead pet cat first
The Ruling Class (1972) – The 14th Earl of Gurney is unfit to serve in the House of Lords because he believes he is God, but he becomes even worse after he is “cured”
Run Lola Run (1998) – Lola has twenty minutes to raise 100,000 Deutschmarks and get it to her desperate boyfriend; fortunately, she gets a do-over
The Saddest Music in the World (2003) – A legless Winnipeg beer baroness holds a contest to discover the titular music in this typically retro comic outing by Guy Maddin
Sans Soleil (1983) – Remarkable, meandering mondo-style arthouse documentary that mixes a trip to a cat shrine and a monkey porn museum with cinematic poetry
Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny (1972) – Insanely bad holiday cheer about Santa’s sleigh stuck on a Florida beach, and Thumbelina, and the sad-sack Pirates World amusement park…
Santa Claus (1959) – With the assistance of his henchman Merlin, Santa fights the Devil while delivering presents on Christmas Eve in this culturally confused Mexican take on Kris Kringle
Santa Sangre (1989) – Psychedelic slasher film about a man raised in a circus who acts as the hands for his armless mother
The Saragossa Manuscript [Rekopis Znaleziony w Saragossie] (1965) – A Napoleonic soldier listens to stories inside of stories, all of which may be related to two women claiming to be his Muslim cousins who want to seduce him
Save the Green Planet [Jigureul jikyeora!] (2003) – A man kidnaps and tortures a pharmaceutical executive, believing him to be an alien spy from the Andromeda galaxy
A Scanner Darkly (2006) – An undercover cop addicted to a powerful future narcotic is assigned to investigate himself in this rotoscoped adaptation of the paranoid Philip K. Dick novel
Schizopolis (1996) – Fletcher Munson struggles to write a speech for a Scientology-like leader while his doppelgänger is having an affair with his wife
The Science of Sleep (2006) – The melancholy love life of a man who can’t distinguish dreams from reality
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) – A Toronto slacker must defeat his new girlfriend’s seven evil exes in this video game styled cult pic
The Secret Adventures of Tom Thumb (1993) – The fairy tale retold in stop-motion animation and pixilation, set in a dystopian city full of bugs and monstrosities
A Serious Man (2009) – The Coen brothers’ retelling of the Book of Job as an absurdist comedy is mystifying and brilliant in equal parts
Seven Servants (1996) – A dying Anthony Quinn hires shirtless young men to stick their fingers up his nostrils
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (1964) – An old Ukrainian folk tale told as an elliptical experimental film by incomparable stylist Sergei Parajanov
Shanks (1974) – A mute puppeteer (played by Marcel Marceau) learns to operate dead bodies like marionettes, and ends up fighting bikers
Shock Corridor (1963) – Eccentric auteur Sam Fuller imagines Cold War America as a mental asylum in this campy melodrama with remarkable expressionist visuals
Silent Hill (2006) – Sloppy scripting and apocalyptic imagery combine to create a truly weird experience
Sin City (2005) – Visually stunning, ultraviolent postmodern noir
The Singing Ringing Tree [Das Singende, Klingende Bäumchen] (1957) – This magical fairytale featuring an evil dwarf, a prince in a bear suit, and a nightmarish mechanical goldfish terrified a generation of British children
Sita Sings the Blues (2008) – An animated retelling of the Indian epic “Ramayana,” with music video interludes featuring a Betty Boop-like demigoddess singing the torch songs of Annette Hanshaw
Skidoo (1968) – Carol Channing strips, Jackie Gleason drops acid and Groucho Marx is “God” in this all-star psychedelic misfire
Skins [Pieles] (2017) – The lives of a butt-faced woman, a reluctant pedophile, an eyeless prostitute, and other internally and externally deformed people intersect in unexpected ways
Society (1989) – This horror satire about a teen who doesn’t fit in with his high society family is famous for its wild, surrealist makeup effects
Solaris [Solyaris] (1972) – Minimalist, mystical science fiction about a conscious planet that recreates a cosmonaut’s dead wife
Songs from the Second Floor (2000) – Millennial and existential panic in a nameless Swedish city, told in a spare, absurd style
Sorry to Bother You (2018) – Far-left-field absurdist agitprop satire about a black telemarketer who shoots up the corporate ladder when he learns to use his “white voice”
Spider Baby, or the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967) – The Merrye family reverts to savagery as they age in this horror/comedy with an utterly unique tone
Spirited Away [Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi] (2001) – Hayao Miyazaki’s masterpiece about a girl trapped in a bathhouse of spirits is Japan’s answer to “Alice in Wonderland”
Stalker (1979) – Andrei Tarkovsky’s slow, mystifying, beautiful science fiction parable about three men’s journey to a room which can grant their innermost wishes
Steppenwolf (1974) – The psychedelic effects in this faithful adaptation of Herman Hesse’s novel have dated badly
Strange Frame: Love & Sax (2012) – Romance and intrigue on the moons of Jupiter in this psychedelic animated lesbian science fiction musical
Street of Crocodiles (1986) – Eerie reminiscences unfold when a gaunt man is brought to life after a globule of spittle activates a machine
Survive Style 5+ (2004) – Five fantastical interlocking stories about a revenant wife, a hypnotized salaryman, three teenage burglars, an ad exec, and an assassin with a translator
Suspiria (1977) – Bizarre, unreal color schemes and a pounding score surrealize this horror fairy tale about a coven of witches operating a ballet academy
Sweet Movie (1974) – A beauty contest winner’s prize is to marry a billionaire, while in a second plotline a socialist sea captain sails down an Amsterdam canal with a hold full of sugar in this scatological political satire
Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (1971) – The first blaxploitation movie was actually an experimental art film with explicit sex and a cop-beating hero who spends the movie evading the Man
The Swimmer (1968) – Cheerful go-getter Ned decides to swim home through his neighbor’s pools, but has he forgotten something important?
Swiss Army Man (2016) – A suicidal, shipwrecked man uses for a flatulent, talking corpse to find his way home
Synecdoche, New York (2008) – Charlie Kaufman working without a net in this absurdist, recursive, and dreamlike story of a sad-sack theater director who builds a replica of New York City inside a warehouse
Tales from the Quadead Zone (1987) – We chose this ultra-low-budget anthology of horror stories to represent the work of outsider VHS shlockmeister Chester N. Turner
The Taste of Tea (2004) – The quaintly surreal adventures of a rural Japanese family include a girl plagued by a giant doppelganger only she can see
Taxidermia (2006) – A penis ejaculating fire is the take-home image from this surreal and twisted Hungarian generational epic; barf bags recommended
Tekkonkinkreet (2006) – Orphans White and Black scrape out an existence on the surreal streets of Treasure Town
The Telephone Book (1971) – A nymphomaniac falls in love with the world’s greatest obscene phone caller in this arty underground sexploitationer that climaxes with a surreally obscene animation
The Tenant (1976) – A new roomer in an odd apartment complex takes on the personality of the previous tenant, who committed suicide
Teorema (1968) – A handsome stranger sleeps with each member of a bourgeois family, and their lives self-destruct when he disappears
The Testament of Orpheus (1960) – The conclusion of Jean Cocteau‘s “Orphic” trilogy casts the poet as a time-traveler interrogated by his own fictional characters
Tetsuo: The Iron Man [Tetsuo] (1989) – A man inexplicably transforms into metal, set to an industrial soundtrack in grainy 16mm black and white
That Obscure Object of Desire (1977) – A wealthy French businessman romances a young Spanish girl over the years, but she will never submit to him
Thundercrack! (1975) – An absurdist underground spoof of Old Dark House movies, with hardcore sex scenes and an amorous gorilla
Tideland (2005) – Terry Gilliam’s dark and controversial riff on Alice in Wonderland
Time Bandits (1981) – Time-traveling, thieving dwarfs feature heavily in this weird kiddie film mixing fantasy, comedy and theology
The Tin Drum [Die Blechtrommel] (1979) – A three-year old German boy refuses to grow up, then witnesses the rise of Nazism
The Tingler (1959) – A creature that lives in your spine and causes you to die if you don’t scream gets loose in this very theater
Titus (1999) – Anachronistic avant-garde adaptation of Shakespeare’s most exploitative play, with gang rape, body parts cut off, and cannibalism
Tokyo Gore Police [Tôkyô Zankoku Keisatsu] (2008) – A female cop hunts spontaneously mutating serial killers in this very weird, often imitated splatterpunk classic
Toto the Hero [Toto le Heros] (1991) – A man nurses a lifelong grudge against the neighbor he believes stole his life (and maybe the love of his sister)
Trash Humpers (2009) – Geriatric miscreants vandalize a trash-strewn Nashville and force Siamese twins to eat soap-soaked pancakes in this non-narrative celebration of VHS aesthetics. A “reader’s choice” poll winner.
The Tree of Life (2011) – Terrence Malick wonders how best to tell the tale of a Texas boy’s strained relationship with his demanding father, and concludes the answer is to include dinosaurs
The Trial (1962) – Josef K. finds he’s accused of a crime, but no one will tell him what it is in Orson Welles’ adaptation of Franz Kafka’s absurdist/existentialist classic
The Triplets of Belleville [Les Triplettes de Belleville, AKA Belleville Rendez-vous] (2003) – Three retired jazz singers help a nearsighted grandma and her overweight dog save a bicyclist from art deco gangsters in this dialogue-free animation set in a surrealistic 1940s milieu
Tromeo & Juliet (1996) – The creators of The Toxic Avenger remake the Bard’s tale as an obscene punk epic, with predictably bizarre results
True Stories (1986) – A deadpan narrator in a cowboy hat observes the lives of the strange residents of fictional Virgil, Texas
Tuvalu (1999) – Can Anton get his family’s Turkish bathhouse to pass inspection while winning the heart of the girl who blames him for her father’s death?
Twelve Monkeys (1995) – A time-traveler from a dystopian future trying to investigate a cult called “12 monkeys” is mistaken for a madman
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992) – David Lynch took an on-the-edge TV series over the cliff with this divisive prequel exploring Laura Palmer’s last days
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives [Loong Boonmee raleuk chat] (2010) – Meditative Thai movie where the border between this world and the next is as thin as a strip of film
Underground (1995) – A Yugoslavian gangster tricks his partner into hiding out in a cellar for decades, making him believe WWII is still raging outside
Under the Skin (2013) – An alien dissolves single men in black goo
Upstream Color (2013) – An examination of what happens when a woman is infected with a will-sapping worm that is then implanted in a pig to create a psychic link
Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer (1984) – The characters of an anime sitcom about an amorous flying alien find themselves trapped in one of the cast’s dream
Valerie and Her Week of Wonders [Valerie a Týden Divu] (1970) – The onset of menses turns 13-year old Valerie’s innocent world of childhood into a dream of rapist priests, lesbians, incest, and vampires
Vampire’s Kiss (1988) – Nicolas Cage’s weirdest role features him overacting brilliantly as a literary agent who believes he’s turning into a vampire
Vampyr (1932) – Dreamlike early talkie about a student of the occult who wanders into a French village suffering a vampiric infestation
Vertigo (1958) – An acrophobic detective falls for a mysterious woman in Alfred Hitchcock’s obsessive exploration of sexual desire
Videodrome (1983) – Discovery of a pirate snuff film broadcast leads to a hallucinatory melding of man and media
Visitor Q [Bijitâ Q] (2001) – Takashi Miike’s story about a mysterious visitor who disrupts dysfunctional family dynamics breaks the lactation taboo
Viva la Muerte [Long Live Death] (1971) – Fernando Arrabal’s surreal, semi-autobiographical story about a boy who discovers his mother turned his father in to the Spanish Fascists
Waking Life (2001) – The story of a young man who finds he’s dreaming and can’t wake up, with serious philosophical monologues and dialogues interspersed, painstakingly animated by over thirty artists in differing styles
Waltz with Bashir (2008) – Dreamlike animated documentary about the director’s loss of memories related to his time as a conscripted Israeli soldier during the 1982 war in Lebanon
Wax, or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees (1991) – An experimental mock documentary about a computer programmer who begins communing with Mesopotamian bees, who set him to a strange task
Weekend (1967) – A money-grubbing couple travel through a surreal French countryside full of burning wrecks, fictional characters and feral hippies as they try to secure an inheritance from the wife’s dying father
Werckmeister Harmonies (2000) – A Whale and a Prince bring a local apocalypse to a poor but peaceful Hungarian town
Why Don’t You Play in Hell? [Jigoku de naze warui] (2013) – A team of amateur filmmakers luck out when a real-life yakuza asks them to film a bloody raid
The Wicker Man (1973) – Horrifying and intelligent tale of a devout detective’s search for a missing girl on a Scottish island where the residents have adopted an ancient pagan religion
Wild at Heart (1990) – Sailor and Lulu flee mother’s assassins as they tool down the yellow brick road that leads to madness
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) – A laborer race of orange and green dwarfs and the bad acid boat trip from hell tip this kiddie musical into the weird column
The Woman in the Dunes [Suna no onna] (1964) – Existential allegory where an amateur entomologist is trapped in a sand pit with a widow, forced to shovel sand to survive
Wool 100% (2006) – Our only weird movie revolving around knitting is the tale of a strange girl who appears in the lives of two reclusive old pack-rat sisters
WR: Mysteries of the Organism (1971) – A celebration of the sexual revolution that begins as a straightforward documentary on controversial psychologist William Reich and ends with a decapitated head declaring she’s not ashamed of her Communist past
Yellow Submarine (1968) – Animated film inspired by Beatles songs is a psychedelic trip through surreal seas in a quest to defeat the music-hating Blue Meanies
You, the Living [Du Levande] (2007) – 50 bittersweet, absurdist sketches on the crushing mundanity of everyday life
Zardoz (1974) – John Boorman’s pretentious, campy sci-fi epic full of floating stone heads, psychedelic effects and Sean Connery in a red diaper
Zazie dans le Metro (1960) – 10-year old Zazie explores a Paris filled with transvestites, dirty old men, desperate widows and polar bears in this absurdist tribute to slapstick comedy
A Zed and Two Noughts (1985) – Two zoologist brothers enter a strange menage a trois with the legless woman who survived an accident that killed their wives
Zéro de conduite (1933) – Boys in a French boarding school rebel in this anarchist/surrealist anti-establishment classic
APOCRYPHA (alternates that just missed the cutoff for Canonical status):
The Adult Swim Yule Log [AKA The Fireplace] (2022) – Aliens, serial killers, a little man, and a haunted log make for an absurdly horrific holiday season
La Antena [The Aerial] (2006) – Mr. TV captures the Voice in this Argentinian retro-Expressionist feature with living subtitles
April and the Extraordinary World (2015) – French steampunk animation about the world that results when Napoleon III tries to create an army of invulnerable monkeys
The Baby of Macon (1993) – The story of a pseudo-miraculous infant unfolds in an elaborate passion play
Bad Girls Go to Hell (1965) – A housewife descends into a dreamlike sexual hell in this roughie with lots of random shots of feet and furniture
Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009) – Nic Cage unloosed, iguanas, and an ambiguous ending give this crazy thriller weird cred
Big Man Japan (2007) – Mockumentary about Japan’s last giant monster fighter, featuring remarkably kooky kaiju
Brain Damage (1988) – Elmer/Aylmer attaches himself to Brian’s brainstem, feeding him an addictive hallucinogen in return for grisly murders
Bubble Bath [Habfürdö] (1980) – Hungarian musical about a man getting cold feet on his wedding day, told through psychedelic animation that constantly morphs art styles
Buffet Froid (1979) – A trio of Parisians commit a dreamlike series of murders
Casino Royale (1967) – This all-star spy spoof, from five different directors and based on a James Bond novel, is a famously overindulgent flop
Celine and Julie Go Boating [Céline et Julie vont en bateau] (1974) – The whimsical, magical title characters take memory candies to solve an old mystery
The Congress (2013) – An aging actress (Robin Wright, playing a version of herself) allows her image to be digitized for virtual reality use in the future in this partly animated mindbender
Donkey Skin (1970): A French fairy tale musical with a woman who coughs frogs and a fairy godmother in a helicopter—and even stranger, an incest theme, as the plot involves a King bent on marrying his Princess daughter
Electric Dragon 80000V (2001) – B&W Japanese punk superhero musical with ample industrial noise guitar solos
The Fabulous Baron Munchausen [Baron Prásil] (1962) – An astronaut finds he’s been beaten to the Moon by Baron Munchausen, who thinks he’s a native and returns him to Earth to learn the ways of earthlings
Gemini (1999) – Shinya Tsukamoto adapts an eerie Edogawa Rampo story about a successful doctor’s discovery of the evil twin who was separated at birth
Green Snake (1993) – Opposed by an arrogant monk, two snakes attempt to become human in this mythological wuxia
The Happiness of the Katakuris (2001) – A musical about a Japanese family who keep discovering corpses in their bed and breakfast—partly done in claymation
Jesus Shows You the Way to the Highway (2019) – A CIA agent goes undercover in the virtual world of PsychoBook to fight a virus named “The Soviet Union” and it’s ally, the King of Ethiopia
Juliet of the Spirits (1965) -Housewife Juliet is bedeviled by spirits who bring her visions in Fellini‘s first color film
Keep an Eye Out [Au Poste!] (2018) – An absurdly comic interrogation of a murder witness
The Lighthouse (2019) – Against his superior’s warning, an apprentice lighthouse tender harms a seabird; madness follows
Mad God (2021) – Special effects wizard Phil Tippett’s lifelong labor of love is a relentless stop-motion animated descent into a Boschian hell
Mirror [Zerkalo] (1975) – A man’s life story is told in a confusing welter of flashbacks and dreams
Modus Operandi (2009) – Grindhouse spy spoof with ridiculous amounts of nudity and violence and about a 5% admixture of surrealism
The Mysterious Castle in the Carpathians [Tajemství hradu v Karpatech] (1981) – An opera-singing nobleman investigates a mysterious castle full of steampunk gadgetry supplied by a mad scientist in this Czech comedy
The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl (2017) – The titular Girl walks through an almost endless surreal anime night that includes a philosophical drinking contest and an encounter with the God of Used Books
The Peanut Butter Solution (1985) – This odd story of a kid losing all his hair, then growing it back with the help of hobo ghosts freaked out lots of unsuspecting kids in the 1980s
Poor Things (2023) – A mad scientist reanimates a suicide, implanting her own unborn fetus’ brain
Prometheus’ Garden (1988) – Thirty minutes of morphing claymation insanity in a mythological universe
Saint Bernard (2013) – A conductor carries a St. Bernard’s head in a canvas bag as he navigates a dream landscape
The Servant (1963) – An insidious butler reverses the power dynamic between master and servant in this odd and mysterious allegory
She’s Allergic to Cats (2016) – A would-be director makes “weird video art that no one watches,” while pursuing a beautiful woman and his dream project: a remake of Carrie featuring a cast of cats
Shiver of the Vampires [Le frisson des vampires] (1971) – Dreamlike Jean Rollin vampire picture including a vampire in a grandfather clock and a pair of talky “bourgeois” vampires
Singapore Sling (1990) – While searching for his lost love, a detective is kidnapped by two psychotic women who use them in their S&M roleplaying games in this bizarre cross between film noir and torture porn
A Snake of June [ Rokugatsu no hebi] (2002) – A photographer blackmails a woman into acting out her own sex fantasies
Son of the White Mare [Fehérlófia] (1981) – The title character takes on dragons to rescue a princess in this Slavic folktale delivered in mindblowing stylized animation
Space Is the Place (1974) – Sun Ra returns to Earth to teleport blacks to a new planet using technology powered by avant-garde jazz
Tales from the Gimli Hospital (1988) – Guy Maddin’s debut feature is a smallpox fever dream set in an Icelandic/Canadian fishing village
Teenage Tupelo (1995) – D’Lana Fargo is impregnated by local rockabilly star Johnny Tu-Note in this postmodern grindhouse film that mixes sexploitation with absurdist autobiograpy
Titane (2021) – This story of a car-show dancer with a metal plate in her head goes in at least two unexpected directions
Under the Silver Lake (2018) – A California slacker becomes embroiled in perhaps the biggest cover-up that has ever bamboozled the Golden State
Uzumaki [Spiral] (2000) -Spirals invade a Japanese city, creating a whirlpool of madness
Vinyan (2008) – A couple ventures into an increasingly nightmarish jungle on a vain quest to find their lost son
Walker (1987) – Insane satirical biopic from Alex Cox about the 19th century American mercenary who briefly became President of Nicaragua
The Warped Forest (2011) – Miniature people, semen-shooting rifles, dryads, and monoliths populate this Funky Forest semi-sequel
The Wolf House (2018) – Constantly shifting stop-animation illustrating the fairy tale story of a girl who flees a cult and holes up in an abandoned cabin
APOCRYPHA CANDIDATES (movies we’re still considering)
1 (2009) – The Reality Defense Institute investigates a mysterious book which is turning the whole world mad
7 Faces of Dr. Lao (1964) – A shapeshifting “Chinaman fakir” brings his allegorical circus to a Western town
964 Pinocchio (1991) – A cybernetic male sex-slave is cast adrift in a weird world in this underground Japanese cyberpunk film
9 Lives of a Wet Pussy (1976) – Underground legend Abel Ferrara‘s directorial debut was a XXX film about a lesbian fortune teller and her promiscuous friend
The Acid House (1998) – A trio of tawdry, disturbing fantasies penned by Irvine (“Trainspotting”) Welsh
The Adventure of Denchu-Kozo (1987) – Shinya Tsukamoto‘s warm-up for Tetsuo: The Iron Man involves time travel, vampires, and a boy with a rod growing from his back
The Adventures of Mark Twain (1985) – Claymation selection of Twain stories, with a wraparound story about the author flying a homemade blimp to catch Haley’s comet
Aegri Somnia (2008) – The sick dreams of a disturbed man
The Aerial [La Antena] (2007) – Mr. TV’s monopoly on voices is threatened by a mutant eyeless boy in this modern silent
Alice in Wonderland (1933) – This “star-studded” (W.C. Fields, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant) version of Lewis Carrol flopped on release—could it be because it was too weird for 1933 audiences?
Alice or the Last Escapade (1977) – “French Hitchock” Claude Chabrol tries his hand at a weird movie
Alien Crystal Palace (2018) – An ancient demigod tries to meld a director and a musician into a single androgyene
All Jacked up and Full of Worms (2022) – Worms are the new bath salts
Alphaville (1965) – Jean-Luc Godard‘s dystopian science fiction movie involves Phillip Marlowe-style detective Lemmy Caution facing off against a tyrannical computer
Amélie (2001) – A pixysh girl improves the lives of those around her in a kitschy version of Paris in this magical romantic comedy
Amer (2009) – Atmospheric, erotic giallo tribute
And the Ship Sails On (1983) – Federico Fellini sends a bunch of opera singers, eccentrics, and a rhino on a Mediterranean cruise at the dawn of WWI
Andy Warhol’s Bad (1977) – A pitch-black, campy comedy about murder for hire in which the victims include babies and puppies, starring cult icons Carroll Baker and Susan Tyrrell. Video review.
Angel’s Egg (1985) – Surreal anime about a girl tending an egg in a Gothic city
Angelus (2000) – A few decades in the life of a secret apocalyptic cult in Communist Poland
Angst (1983) – Intense Austrian movie that traps the viewer in the mind of a serial killer
Anguish (1987) – Spiral movie-within-a-movie (within-a-movie?) about a serial killer loose in a theater
Animalia Paradoxica (2024) – In a world of little water and plenty of debris, a creature wishes to find refuge in the sea
Antiviral (2012) – In a satirical dystopian future, people pay to be infected with viruses taken from their favorite celebrities
Arrebato (1979) – Spanish cult film in which opiates are a metaphor for cinema, or the other way around
Asparagus (1979) – Surreal 18 minute tour de force featuring obscene iterations of the title vegetable. Included on The Films of Suzan Pitt.
Asteroid City (2023) – Wes Anderson‘s Cold War fantasia about an extraterestrial event that is itself a play tucked inside a documentary about the play
Atmo HorroX (2016) – A creature with balloons tied to his crotch hunts people who are prescribed a certain medication (I think)
The Atrocity Exhibition (2000) – Series of bizarre sketches based on a J.G. Ballard anthology
The Attic Expeditions (2001) – Mindbending psychological horror that loses its mind, mixing occultism, medical experimentation and general weirdness into a confusing B-movie blend
Avida (2004) – Surreal comedy centered around a dognapping
The Bad Batch (2016) – A girl exiled into the desert in a future dystopia seeks revenge on the bodybuilding cannibals who ate part of her
Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths (2022) – Alejandro González Iñárritu‘s take on a Fellini movie, through the lens of a Mexican immigrant director in Los Angeles
Beau Is Afraid (2023) – Ari Aster swings big with this three-hour surreal panic attack about an anxious loser with mommy issues
Beetlejuice (1988) – Possibly Tim Burton‘s most beloved movie, about a “bio-exorcist” attempting to scare the living out of the home of a nice newly-deceased couple
The Beguiled (1971) – A Union soldier recovers from a wound at an Confederate all-girls school
La Belle Captive (1983) – A man seeks a mysterious woman who may be a ghost, a vampiress or a dream in this film that visually references the paintings of Rene Magritte
Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980) – The misadventures of a pimp/murderer trying to go straight in Weimar Germany; a fifteen hour character study told through a fluid mix of drama, melodrama, poetic monologue, and surrealism
Between Worlds (2018) – The “other” weird Nicolas Cage movie of 2018 has the spirit of Nic’s dead wife possessing a younger woman’s body
Beyond Dream’s Door (1989) – A college student finds himself trapped in a series of nightmares while attending The Ohio State Unversity
Birds Without Feathers (2018) – The lives of six isolated, unhappy characters intersect in increasingly surreal ways
Blind Woman’s Curse (1970) – A feminist yakuza ghost story
Blood for Dracula [AKA Andy Warhol’s Dracula] (1974) – In Paul Morrissey‘s tarsh/camp version of Dracula, the bloodsucker is constantly sick because he can only survive on the blood of virgins
Bloodsucker’s Handbook (2012) – Neo-noir about a priest hunting a vampire in an absurd alternate future
Blue Sunshine (1977) – People who took a particular brand of LSD in the Sixties find themselves transformed into bald killers ten years later
Bobby Yeah (2011) -Grotesque stop-motion short following a bunny-eared, troll-faced creature who makes trouble for himself by literally pushing other people’s buttons.
Border (2018) – A Swedish customs officer with a “chromosonal abnormality” and a superhuman ability to detect when travelers are hiding something meets a traveler with a similar appearance
Borgman (2013) – A criminal insinuates himself into a Dutch family’s home
The Bothersome Man (2006) – A freethinker seeks escape from a bland paradise
The Boy and the Heron (2023) – Hayao Miyazaki‘s semi-autobiographical fantasy about a mysterious heron who guides a boy into a netherworld where the living and dead co-exist during WWII
The Brain That Wouldn’t Die (1962) – A mad scientist searches for a hot new body for the recently decapitated fiancée whose head he’s keeping alive in his basement
Brewster McCloud (1970) – Bizarre, bird-oriented Robert Altman cult satire about a boy who dreams of flying inside the Houston Astrodome
Buster’s Mal Heart (2017) – A hermit warns about the impending “Inversion”
Calvaire (2004) – Strange, surreal, and excessive Belgian horror about a lounge singer stranded in a remote town full of perverted and sadistic men
Capone (2020) – Literally demented biopic with Tom Hardy firing a gold-plated Tommy gun while wearing a diaper and chomping on a carrot
The Catechism Cataclysm (2011) – The world’s least likely (and maybe least effective) priest goes on a beer-drinking, headbanging canoe trip with his high school idol
Cats (2019) – The uncanny valley adaptation of the Broadway musical has camp potential
Chainsaws Were Singing (2024) – Estonian killer chainsaw musical
Chapaqqua (1966): The heir to the Avon fortune spent part of his inheritance to make this self-indulgent psychedelic peyote trip about overcoming addiction
Charms (1973) – Some sort of biker/western/witchcraft counterculture mishmash
Chicken with Plums [Poulet aux Prunes] (2011) – The deathbed hallucinations of a master musician who gives up on life after his beloved violin is destroyed
Chronopolis (1982) – Reader review by Morgan Hoyle-Combs. Seldom-seen abstract stop-motion animation from France
Citizen Dog (2004): Ignoring his grandmother’s warning that he will grow a tail if he leaves home, a young man moves to Bandgkok and falls in love with a strange woman
Climax (2018) – Someone spikes the dance troupe’s punchbowl with LSD, and things get weird
CoinCoin and the Extra-Humans (2019) – Black tar falls from the sky and duplicates French people in this strange sequel to L’il Quinquin
collective:unconscious – Experimental anthology wherein six underground directors film each others’ dreams
“The Comb” (1990) – Quay Brothers animation about a man trying to reach a sleeping woman in her dream
Come to Daddy (2019) – A recovering alcoholic hipster reunites with his estranged father, followed soon by his aggrieved criminal associates
The Complex Forms (2024) – Middle-aged men with few prospects agree to be possessed by entities
Country Gold (2022) – A rising country star meets his hero, George Jones, and endures a series of outlandish tall tales
Country of Hotels (2019) – Three surreal stories set in room 508 of a nameless hotel
Crash (1996) – A jaded man finds thrills among an underground cult who get turned on by automobile accidents
Crimes of the Future (2022) – A late David Cronenberg body horror about a future where some people grow vestigial organs and perform self-surgery as a form of performace art
Crumbs (2015) – A long-dormant spaceship hovers over an apocalypse-blasted earth, so Ethiopian dwarf Candy goes on a quest to secure himself a seat on board
Cuckoo (2024) – A woman hears strange noises in the Alpine forest
The Cult of the Damned [Angel, Angel, Down We Go] (1969) – A rock singer influences a Hollywood household in this psychedelic musical satire
Cure (1997) – Pretty weird Japanese twist in the serial killer/police procedural genre
A Cure for Wellness (2017) – An up and coming young executive goes on a mission to retrieve his presumably insane CEO from a cult-like Swiss wellness resort and finds eels, lots of eels
Cybersatan Apocalype Nightmares (2021) – Microbudget Hungarian cybernoir
Dark Country (2009) – Noir-thriller mix about a honeymooning couple who run over a man in the desert
Dark Star (1974) – Cult sci-fi satire with a farting beach ball alien
Dark Waters (1993) – Nun-too-scary movie about a female island cult
Day of the Wacko (2002) – An easily irritated Pole with OCD spends a long day in increasingly surreal, comic situations
The Death King (1990) – A suite of seven stories about suicide
Death Powder (1986) – A robot spews powder with its dying breath that leads the man who inhales it into a hallucinogenic nightmare
Decasia (2002) – An atonal symphony scored to decaying nitrate images from silent films
Der Bunker (2015) – A Student comes to stay with a very strange family who live in an underground bunker
The Devil (1972) – A Polish soldier goes on a rampage, encouraged by a Mysterious Stranger
The Diabetic (2022) – A duggy character study shot in extreme closeup
Diamantino (2018) – A slow-witted Portuguese soccer idol is manipulated into becoming the spokesman for a right-wing party, while being subjected to cloning experiments
Disco Godfather (1979) – Blaxploitation with disco dancing and PCP hallucinations
The Double Hour (2009) – A woman is haunted by apparitions of the dead and visions from what seem to be an alternate, parallel version of her life
Down and Dirty Duck (1974) – 1970s adult underground animation about a Walter Mitty-style insurance adjuster and his duck companion
Dracula vs. Frankenstein (1971) – A cauliflower-faced Frankenstein’s monster squares off against Dracula with an afro in a very bad (but weird) movie
The Draughtsman’s Contract (1982) – A 17th century draughtsman finds sex, mystery, and an obscure conspiracy in his contract
Dreamland [Bruce McDonald’s Dreamland] (2019) – Stephen McHattie in a dual role as a world-weary jazz musician and the world-weary hitman sent to assassinate him
Duck Soup (1933) – Groucho’s lack of diplomacy leads Freedonia into war in the surrealest of the Marx Brothers features
Dünyayı Kurtaran Adam [AKA The Man Who Saved the World, AKA Turkish Star Wars] (1982) – Nonsensical Turkish dementia that appropriates Star Wars (and a lot of other stolen Hollywood clips)
Edward II (1991) – Flamboyantly gay and anachronistic adaptation of the Christoper Marlowe play about the British monarch
Edward Scissorhands (1990) – A mad scientist fashions a creature with razor-sharp fingers, who then must adapt to suburbia
The Element of Crime (1984) – In a trance, a detective remembers a case in Europe in this literally hypnotic neo-noir
The Empire of the Dark (1990) – A bounty hunter haunted by the memory of an old flame who was killed by a Satanic cult swings into action twenty years later
The Endless (2017) – Two brothers are lured back to the UFO cult they grew up in after receiving a mysterious videotape
Endless Poetry (2017) – The second installment of Alejandro Jodorowsky‘s autobiographical project that began with The Dance of Reality
Entertainment (2015) – An anti-comic on a tour of the Southwest bombs, existentially
Evangelion: 3.0 + 1.0 Thrice Upon a Time (2021) – The conclusion of the “rebuild” of his Evangelion series serves as an alternate version the canonically weird Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion
Excision (2012) – A misfit girl dreams of surgery
Executive Koala (2005) – A koala in a business suit is accused of killing his wife and girlfriend
Exte: Hair Extensions (2007) – A dead woman’s hair brings misfortune to those who dare use it for hair extensions
Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022) – A Chinese immigrant must save the multiverse (including the surreal hot dog finger universe)
eXistenZ (1999) – Bizarre scenarios inside a virtual reality game world
The Falling (2014) – Students at an all-girls school experience a collective mass hysteria after one of their group unexpectedly passes away
Fall of the House of Usher (1928) – French silent film captures the atmosphere of dread in Poe’s classic story
A Family (2019) – A Ukranian man hires actors to portray his family, but the newest actress has ideas of her own
Fando y Lis (1968) – Alejandro Jodorowsky’s first film, from a Fernando Arrabal play, is about a man carrying his lame lover through the desert on a quest to find the magical city of Tar
Father’s Day (2011) – A serial killer who preys on fathers is just the starting point for this lunatic bad-taste comedy that literally winds up in Hell
Faust (1994) – Veteran stop-motion surrealist Jan Svankmajer’s take on the Faust legend
Faust (2011) – Aleksandr Sokurov’s hallucinatory version of the Faust story
The Fifth Thoracic Vertebra (2022) – A mold growing on a mattress develops consciousness and steals sleepers fifth thoracic vertebra
Film (1965) – An avant-garde collaboration between Samuel Beckett (writing his only screenplay) and Buster Keaton
Flaming Ears [Rote Ohren fetzen durch Asche] (1992): Experimental punk lesbian post-apocalyptic Super-8 movie from Austria
The Flesh (1991) – A nightclub pianist drops everything to shack up with a mysterious woman and ends up a paralyzed sex slave
Flooding With Love for the Kid (2010) – Zachary Oberzan’s one-man Rambo adaptation, made for less than $100, is beyond weird or normal
The Forest of Love (2019) – A con-man takes over an amateur film production about his life and turns the crew into a family of serial killers
The Fountain (2006) – The search for the fountain of youth, and also the story of a modern-day scientist seeking a cure for cancer, and also the story of a tree-tending guru floating in a space bubble
Frank (2014) – A mediocre songwriter joins a band led by a genius who refuses to remove his giant papier-mâché head
Frankenstein Island (1981) – Balloon racers land on the titular island and encounter Amazons in bikinis, Dr. Frankenstein’s granddaughter, and extreme foolishness in this incoherently hilarious horrro
Frankie in Blunderland (2011) – Low budget hallucinatory trip through a bizarre hipster L.A.
Fried Barry (2020) – An alien possesses a South African heroin addict
Frownland (2007) – Painfully emotionally intense character study of a loser whose social anxiety disorder ironically turns him into loathsome company
Fuzzy Head (2023) – Struggling with memory and reality problems caused by her fuzzy head, Marla tries to decipher why the police are chasing her
Get Mean (1976) – The only Spaghetti Western with Mongol hordes and a Spanish princess
Ghost Cat Anzu (2024) – A ghost cat shepherds a young girl into the underworld in an anime with shades of Spirited Away
Girl Slaves of Morgana le Fay [Morgane et ses Nymphes] (1971) – A fairy tale for lesbian sex fetishists
Give Me Pity! (2022) – A one-woman 1970s TV special is invaded by demonic vibes
The Glamorous Life of Sachiko Hanai (2003) – Experimental pink film in which a call girl is shot in the head and acquires the finger of a George W. Bush clone
Glorious (2022) – A man in a toilet stall listens to advice from a voice coming from the next stall and finds horror
Greatland (2020) – Ulysses must live up to his namesake when his friend Ugly Duck is exiled to Repentance Island
The Green Knight (2021) – Sir Gawain must face consequences for beheading the Green Knight
Grendel, Grendel, Grendel (1981) – The animated, existential, singing and dancing adventures of Beowulf’s nemesis
Greener Grass (2019) – Jill gives her new baby away to her best friend, but regrets the decision when her remaining child turns into a dog
Ham on Rye (2019) – Small-town kids attend a strange ritual at a diner that will decide their futures
Hansel and Gretel (2007) – Korean adaptation of the fairytale switches the roles of the children and adults; it’s a beautifully made movie but perhaps too predictable in the end
Hard to Be a God (2013) – Undercover Earth visitors are forbidden to intervene in the affairs of a planet stuck in its own filthy version of the Middle Ages
The Hawks and the Sparrows (1966) – Two men meet a talking Marxist raven on the road
Heart of Glass (1976) – Werner Herzog had his cast lietrally hypnotized for this dreamy story of the slow death of a German town after its master glassblower dies, taking his secrets to his grave
Heavy Traffic (1973) – An underground cartoonist animates the highlights of his lowlife neighborhood in this edgy and occasionally surreal mix of animation and live action
Hellzapoppin’ (1941) – Original List Candidate entry
Hereditary (2018) – Disturbing events unfold after the death of a family matriarch, culminating in a bizarrely violent pagan ritual infused with supernatural occurrences
High Life (2018) – A scientist performs strange reproductive research on a crew of convicts on a spaceship headed to a black hole
Hippo (2023) – A boy lives a sheltered life with a very strange family; UFOs and incest come into play
Hitler Lives! (2017) – As the title suggests, but in a bunker in Australia with puppet hallucinations and aliens
Holy Trinity (2019) – A dominatrix finds she can speak to the dead after huffing some new age air freshener
Honeycomb (2022) – Five female friends form an unsettling commune
The Honor Farm (2017) – Teens take shrooms on prom night and grow up fast
Hotel Poseidon (2021) – The incredible set is the star of this nearly plotless feature about a hoteliere trapped in the purgatorial title locale
House of 1,000 Corpses (2003) – Rob Zombie’s cruel and self-indulgent Texas Chainsaw Massacre tribute is weird but not much fun
House of Evil (1968) – One of Boris Karloff’s final, half-Mexican films; also one of his worst
Human Highway (1982) – Neil Young’s anarchic musical comedy about a slightly pre-apocalyptic desert town next to a nuclear reactor
Hundreds of Beavers (2022) – Jean Kayak loses his business in a tragic disaster and rebuilds his life to become legendary fur-trapper Jean Kayak, ultimate foe to… hundreds of beavers!
Idaho Transfer (1973) – Pantsless time-traveling teens try to avert a future dystopia
I [Heart] Huckabees (2004) – An activist hires two existential detectives to investigate the Huckabee’s corporation
I Lost My Body (2019) – An (animated) severed hand searches for it’s owner, who has troubles of his own
I Married a Strange Person (1997) – A man develops superpowers, and uses them mainly to make his wife’s boobs grow larger than their house
Immortal (Ad Vitam) (2004) – The Egyptian god Horus visits future Manhattan in this trippy French sci-fi feature mixing live and computer generated actors
I’m Not There (2007) – Six actors take on the role of not-Bob Dylan
I’m Thinking of Ending Things (2020) – A woman goes to visit her boyfriend’s parents while secretly thinking of ending things, and things get strange
Incredible but True (2022) – A couple buys a new house with a very limited time-travel portal in the basement
Infinite Summer (2024) – A mindfulness app sends users into a purple
Infinity Pool (2023) – Moral dillemas of a third-world country that allows tourists to escape the death penalty by having a clone executed in their place
In Search of the Titanic (2004) – An animated children’s film about the Titanic quickly goes off the rails with a rapping shark backed by a chorus of clams and ever-increasing madness
Inu-Oh (2022) – A blind priest and a deformed dancer team up to lay the lost souls of the Heike clan to rest through storytelling
The Invisible Fight [Nähtamatu võitlus] (2023) – Soveit Union-set action comedy mixing kung fu and Orthodox Christianity
Iron Mask [AKA Viy 2] (2019) – A Russian/Chinese co-production featuring cameos from both Arnold Schwarzeneger and Jackie Chan that you’ve never heard of – for good reason
I Saw the TV Glow (2024) – wo misfit teenagers become obsessed with a paranormal TV show, leading them into delusions that persist into adulthood
The Isle [Seom] (2000) – A mute woman falls for a suicidal man among the floating cabins of a fishing resort in this bizarre sadomasochistic romance
Jesus Christ Superstar (1973) – The film adaptation of the rock opera chronicling the passion of Jesus
Je T’aime, Je T’aime (1968) – French New Wave pioneer Alain Resnais tackles the time travel genre, with weird results
Kaboom (2010) – College student stumbles upon odd murder mystery in this mix of sex and weirdness
Katernica (2023) – A forgotten one-act play produces surreal effects in the theater student who discovers it
The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017) – Giorgos Lanthimos‘ first explicit horror film is every bit as unnerving as you’d imagine
Killing Romance (2023) – Absurdist Korean black comedy about an actress trying to kill her possessive capitalist husband
Kinds of Kindness (2024) – Triptych of bizarre absurdist parables from Yorgos Lanthimos
King Car (2021) – A sentient car forms a cult in Brazil
Kizumonogatari: Koyomi Vamp (2024) – Anime about a newly-minted vampire questing for the missing limbs of his undead crush
Koko-Di, Koko-da (2019) – A Scandinavian nightmare about folkloric creatures killing a grieving couple over and over
Kung Fu Arts [Hou Fu Ma] (1980) – A Chinese princess marries “Sida, the French Monkey Star” in this zany chopsocky
Kurayakuba (2023) – Noirish, steampunk fantasy anime
Labyrinth of Cinema (2019) – Japanese teenagers find themselves thrown into the movies screening at a cinema on the last night before it closes
La Cabina [The Telpephone Box] (1972) – Cult Spanish television short about a man mysteriously trapped in a telephone booth
Lake Michigan Monster (2019) – A clever, mindless monster romp in a scratchy, black and white world à la Guy Maddin
L’Ange (1982) – Experimental film full of repeated variations on vignettes like a servant feeding a headless man
The Last of England (1988) – Utterly avant-garde and abstract, it’s a mad meditation on the decline of Britain in the 1980s
The Last Wave (1977) – An Australian lawyer has apocalyptic visions that suggest a connection to aboriginal lore
Late Night with the Devil (2023) – A 1980s Halloween special goes wrong thanks to an occultist guest
Leda (2021) – A dialogue-free, black and white, 3D postmodern take on the myth of Leda
Lemora: A Child’s Tale of the Supernatural (1973) – An innocent tween-age girl navigates a nightmare vision of post-Prohibition America in a search of her long-lost father, running into danger at every turn
Let the Corpses Tan (2017) – Surreal revisionists Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani tackle the poliziotteschi genre
L’il Quinquin (2014) – When human body parts are discovered in cows, it’s up to a detective with bizarre facial tics to not solve the murder in a French coastal town full of eccentrics
Livide (2011) – Surreal modern French haunted house movie
Lost River (2014) – An urban fantasy/fairy tale set in a city in decline
Love and Work (2024) – Romantic comedy set in a dystopian society where work is illegal and leisure mandatory
Lowlife (2017) – The plans of a luchador bodyguard and other lowlifes intersect in this Pulp Fiction-esque multi-narrative feature
Lux Aeterna (2019) – Strobostropic crucifixion as a metpahor for women’s place in the film industry
Luz (2018) – A police psychologist comes between a cab driver and the demon that lusts after her
The Machinist (2004) – Possibly predictable mindbender starring an emaciated Christian Bale
The Mad Fox (1962) – Opens as a medieval Japanese epic with a folkloric spin and then suddenly goes mad, turning into kabuki theater
Mad God (2021) – A stop-motion explorer descends into Boschian depths, perhaps on a mission to destroy God
Maggie (2019) – Socially aware South Korean madness narrated by a catfish
The Magic Christian (1969) – A billionaire induces people to degrade themselves for money in this series of bizarre satirical sketches
Make-out with Violence (2008) – A young man rekindles romance with his ex; the only issue is, she’s dead
The Manitou (1978) – A native-American medicine man grows out of Susan Strasberg’s back, and fake psychic Tony Curtis must defeat it
Man Under Table (2021) – Surreal satirical meta-movie set in the world of indie filmmaking
Maribeto (2004) – A photographer finds a modern vampire living in the sewers
Marketa Lazarova (1967) – A hallucinatory (and confusing) Czech epic set in the transitional period from paganism to Christianity
Master of the Flying Guillotine (1977) – Crazy kung fu spectacle featuring a decaptitating sidearm and a monk with extensible arms
Maximum Shame (2010) – The tagline describes it as “an apocalyptic fetish horror musical chess sci-fi weird feature movie”—and it is!
Meek’s Cutoff (2010) – Westbound pioneers gamble on a shortcut and find themselves unsure which guide they can trust
Meet the Hollowheads (1989) – Surreal parody of 50s sitcoms
Memoria (2021) – A Scottish woman traveling in Columbia thinks she’s going mad because she’s hearing an intermittent thumping sound in her head
Messiah of Evil (1973) – Zombie cannibal horror that makes little sense but delivers on atmosphere
MFKZ (2018) – French/Japanese anime where a pizza-delivery guy and his flaming-skulled roommate fight aliens with the help of a secret society of luchadores
The Million Dollar Hotel (2000) – U2’s Bono writes a star-studded mystery for Wim Wenders to direct, and the results are strange
Mindflesh (2008) – A taxi driver is haunted by an alien nymphomaniac from another dimension
Mononoke the Movie (2024) – Psychedelic-looking feature adaptation of an anime series about a potential demon invasion of medieval Japan
Moon Garden (2022) – A girl is trapped in a child’s nightmare world while in a coma
Motel Hell (1980) – You get no points for guessing the secret ingredient in Famer Vincent’s fritters in this whackadoodle horror/comedy
The Mouse and His Child (1977) – Philsophical children’s film about two clockwork toy mice seeking autonomy
My Own Private Idaho (1991) – Weaves two weird premises together: the story of a narcoleptic searching for his mother and a modern adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Henry IV, Part I.”
Mystics in Bali (1981) – A witch turns a black magic researcher into a flying head
Nails (2003) – Low-budget Russian video about a hitman who fights ennui by driving nails into his own head
Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984) – Opposing factions clash in a struggle to survive a post-apocalyptic earth plagued by toxic jungles and giant bugs
A New Old Play (2021) – Three-hour Chinese epic about an opera clown’s passage to the afterlife
Night Across the Street (2012) – Raoul Ruiz’ last completed film is an absurdist meditation on death
The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) – Macabre stop-motion animated cult favorite about the Pumpkin King of Halloweentown trying to reproduce Christmas in his own ghoulish style
Night on the Galactic Railroad (1985) – Two kitty cats take a trip on a train to see the sights: candy-flavored herons, self-replicating apples, and stairways that lead to the center of the universe
The Nine Lives of Thomas Katz (2000) – A man who can switch lives with anyone arrives in London to end the world
No Trace [Nulle Trace] (2021) – Tarkovskian post-apocalypyic indie about a smuggler and her human cargo
The Nude Vampire [La Vampire Nue] (1970) – A man kidnaps a vampire hoping to learn the secret of immortality, but it turns out she’s from another dimension, and her kinsfolk want her back
Oldboy (2003) – Excellent, if extreme, Korean revenge drama could stand just a teaspoon more weirdness…
Once Within a Time (2023) – 45 minutes of apocalyptic-but-hopeful surrealist imagery with Mike Tyson as a saxophone-solo-speaking pied piper
One Point O [Paranoia 1.0] (2004) – Computer programmer Simon J develops crippling paranoia, and a craving for branded milk
On the Silver Globe (1977/1988) – Andrzej Zulawski‘s unfinished science fiction epic about the religious rituals of a tribe of humans descended from stranded astronauts
The Ornithologist (2016) – An ornithologist birdwatching in the Portuguese wilderness wrecks his kayak and undergoes hallucinations (?) that mirror the life of St. Anthony
Palindromes (2004) – A 13-year old girl desperately wants to become pregnant; she’s played by 8 different actresses of different ages, weights and races
Paperhouse (1988) – A feverish girl dreams of a house
“Paranoia Agent” (2004) – Our big question regarding Satoshi Kon‘s exceelent amnime miniseries about a mysterious bat-wielding rollerblader is, can we stretch our definitions to consider it a “movie”?
The Passion of Darkly Noon (1995) – A refugee from a religious cult shacks up with a mute carpenter and a possible witch
Penda’s Fen (1974) – An English boy discovers sexuality and England’s pagan past in this philolsophical coming-of-age film
Phase IV (1974) – Noted designer Saul Bass’ only directorial attempt concerns ants creating a neurological singularity with humanity
Philosophy of a Knife (2008) – 4+ hours (!) of surreal re-enactments of torture scenes mixed with documentary footage about Japanese WWII atrocities
The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes (2005) – This Quay Brothers fairy tale about a piano tuner, a mad doctor and a withdrawn opera diva overflows with dream sequences
Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) – The 1900 St. Valentine’s Day disappearance of schoolgirls from a picnic goes unexplained
The Pied Piper [Krysař ] (1986) – Creepy Czech stop-motion animated adaptation of the famous child-stealing fairy-tale
La Pietà (2022) – An overprotective mother is delighted when her son becomes completely dependent on her after contracting a fatal disease
A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence (2014) – More existential sketch comedy from the unique Roy Andersson, featuring two chronically depressed novelty salesmen and King Charles XII
Pigsty [Porcile] (1969) – Parallel stories of a medieval cannibal and an ex-Nazi industrialist
Pinocchio (2019) – Matteo Garrone‘s take on the tale of the wooden puppet who mysteriously comes to life is weirder than Walt Disney‘s
Playdurizm (2020) – A young boy awakes with amnesia into a love triangle with Videodrome references
Playing with Fire (1975) – Surreal softcore porn from Alain Robbe-Grillet
Pom Poko (1994) – Tanuki (“raccoon dogs”) fight against the encroachment of humans into their forests in this animated fantasia from Studio Ghibli
Possession (1981) – The original (and controversial) List Candidate entry
Possum (2018) – A creepy puppeteer can’t get rid of his spider-legged dummy
The President’s Analyst (1967) – The President’s psychoanalyst finds that he knows too much, and various agencies and conspiracies want to find out what he knows
Prisoners of the Ghostland (2021) – A fantasy adventure directed by Sion Sono, featuring Nicolas Cage
Punch-Drunk Love (2000) – A man with anger management issues (Adam Sandler, in a bizarre casting choice) finds love in this eccentric romantic black comedy
Putney Swope (1969) – A militant black man becomes head of a Madison Avenue advertising agency in this absurdist satire from the Swinging Sixties
Quantum Cowboys (2022) – Rotoscoped cowboys explore alternate quantumn realities
R100 (2013) – A man hires dominatrixes to attack him in public, but then things get strange
Rabbits (2002) – David Lynch‘s dread-tinged “sitcom” features actors in giant bunny suits reciting non-sequitors
Raggedy Ann and Andy: A Musical Adventure (1977) – Raggedy Ann and Andy to pursue a toy pirate into a mystical fantasy world to rescue a French waif
The Rambler (2013) – A man is released from prison and hitchhikes across the West meeting mummy-toting professors and a femme fatale who will not die
Rape of the Vampire [Le Viol du Vampire] (1968) – A psychotherapist tries to convince four sisters they aren’t vampires, then gets killed and resurrected to defeat the Queen of the Vampires in this surrealist horror
Re-Animator (1985) – Dr. Herbert West re-animates the dead in this seminal horror/comedy
Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967) – Marlon Brando is a repressed homosexual in John Huston’s way overheated melodrama
Relaxer (2018) – As Y2K approaches, a slacker tries to achieve a perfect score on Pac Man
Repo! the Genetic Opera (2008) – An all singing, all the time sci-fi/horror hybrid about organ repossession
Requiem for a Vampire (1973) – An aging vampire needs two killer lesbian clowns to regenerate his race in Jean Rollin’s most sexually explicit erotic horror movie
Resolution (2012) – Strange things happen when a man tries to kick his meth habit in a remote cabin in this mindbending meta-horror
Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky (1991) – Ricky makes an ultraviolent escape after he’s imprisoned for murdering drug dealers
Roar (1981) – This story of a family threatened by lions and tigers is weird for the incredible (and bloody) story of its production more than anything else
Röckët Stähr’s Death of a Rockstar (2022) – A four-armed glam idol leads a world revolution of the mind in this animated rock opera set in the year 2165
Rondo (2018) – Hyperstylized, grindhouse-y movie about a vet pulled into a sordid world of revenge fantasies
Rubber’s Lover (1996) – In a modern update of the Frankenstein plot, a team of rogue scientists conduct experimental research on abducted subjects in a secret government torture lab
Saint Clara [Clara Hakedosha] (1996) – A psychic Russian immigrant girl in Israel gives her classmates test answers, until she falls in love
Satantango (1994) – Bela Tarr’s glacially paced, almost 8 hour long Hungarian black comedy is a classic and/or an exercise in minimalist extremes
Savages (1972) – A tribe of “mud people” follow a croquet ball to an abandoned manor and turn into dinner-party-hosting dandies
Savage Witches (2012) – Two teenage girls seek to play games and avoid responsibility in this modern experimental tribute to Daisies
Sequence Break (2017) – Nipple console buttons, white goo circuitry, and coital gaming seizures adorn this sci-fi thriller featuring a Cronenberg-inspired video game
Sex and Lucia [Lucia y el Sexo] (2001) – Arty dirty movie with a meta-narrative and nude Paz Vega
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978) – If you hate the Beatles, you’ll love this bizarrely bad disco-era insult to their memory
She Is Conann (2023) – Six actress portray Conann the Barbarian in various times
Sherlock Jr. (1924) – Buster Keaton’s movie projectionist dreams himself onto the big screen as a detective
The Short Films of David Lynch (2002) – The short “The Grandmother” is a weird classic; the rest of this collection, less so
The Show (2020) – A surreal neo-noir blending reality and dreams, life and death
Simon of the Desert (1965) – Truncated (45 minute) surrealist feature about the temptation of a saint who lives on a pillar in the desert
Sir Henry at Rawlinson End (1980) – Nonstop absurdist spoof with titular twit Sir Henry existing in a world of random weirdos including Egyptian princesses, barbershop quartets, stilt-walkers, and so on
Sitcom (1998) – A rat plays the role of God in this sticom-set variation on Teorema
Six-String Samurai (1998) – Buddy Holly is a sword-swinging rock n’ roller seeking to claim Elvis’ throne in an alternate post-apocalyptic reality
Slack Bay (2016) – Weird families, bumbling detectives and unexplained disappearances at a Calais resort
Slapstick of Another Kind (1982) – A pair of ugly twins turn out to be aliens; one of the weirdest (but not the best) adapations of a Kurt Vonnegut novel
Slaughterhouse-Five (1972) – Billy Pilgrim comes unstuck in time in what’s arguably the only decent film adaptation of a Kurt Vonnegut story
Sleepaway Camp (1983) – 1980s teen slasher whose unforgettable ending has given it a cult reputation
Sleeping Beauty (2011) – A young girl takes job as an unconscious prostitute
Slide (2023) – Surreal animated western musical from the unique Bill Plympton
Smoking Causes Coughing (2022) – A series of drak existential shaggy dog stories revolving around a tobacco-themed superheroes group
Snowflake (2017) – The hitmen characters in a dentist’s amateur screenplay force him to update it on the fly to give them a happy ending
Solve et Coagula (2020) – Experimental occult film about the erotic adventures of Orpheus’ severed head
Some Call it Loving (1973) – A jaded, modern, softcore porn take on “Sleeping Beauty”
Something in the Dirt (2022): Two men witness supernatural phenomena and fall into an increasingly paranoid investigation into aliens, multiple dimensions, and secret societies
Something Weird (1967) – A man develops ESP after an electrical shock, is blackmailed by a witch, and then investigates a serial killer under the influence of LSD
Sound of Noise (2010) – A tone deaf detective tries to stop a gang of musical terrorists from staging a conceptual composition in the public spaces of a Swedish city
Southland Tales (2006) – Crazy, near-incoherent apocalyptic epic; a famous flop from the creator of Donnie Darko
Space Ninjas (2019) – A movie combining The Breakfast Club with… space ninjas
Speed Racer (2008) – The Wachowskis (then brothers) followed up The Matrix with this hyperactive, candy-colored live action version of the beloved racing anime
Spider (2002) – David Cronenberg turns inward for this story of a schizophrenic misremembering a family tragedy
Spirits of the Air, Gremlins of the Clouds (1987) – The odd post-apocalyptic story of a crippled inventor, his child-like sister, and a stranger on the run
Stanleyville (2021) – A woman in crisis joins a contest to win a habañero-orange compact SUV
Stingray Sam (2009) – It’s a six part musical/Western/sci-fi serial; need we say more to catch your interest?
Strange Circus (2005) – A 12-year old describes her abusive upbringing for a cabaret show, but is she making it all up?
The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears (2013) – A businessman searches for his missing wife in this stylized neo-giallo from the makers of Amer
Strawberry Mansion (2021) – A dream-tax auditor becomes intoxicated by the dreams of an eccentric elderly woman
Suicide Club (2002) – Japanese surrealism about an unexplained wave of suicides among Tokyo teens
Sunburnt Unicorn (2024) – A boy with a shard of glass windshield stuck in his forehead and a turtle with a partly smushed shell star in this kid-friendly (!) animation
Super (2010) – Uneven comic entry in the “average guy decides to become a masked vigilante” subgenre
Suture (1993) – In an experiment/gimmick that takes non-traditional casting to the extreme, man takes the identity of his “nearly identical” brother
Svidd Neger (2003) – Norwegian black comedy (or Black comedy) about bad behavior among outcasts in Lapland
Symbol (2009) – A Japanese man wakes up in a white room full of cherub phalluses, while a Mexican luchador prepares for a match
Tale of Tales (2015) – Interlocking adaptation of a trio of Giambattista Basile fairy tales
Tales of Ordinary Madness (1981) – There’s little that’s ordinary in these magical realist tales based on the life of skid-row poet Charles Bukowski
Tampopo (1985) – The tale of a wanderer training a widow to establish the perfect noodle shop, interrupted by absurdist foodie skits
Taoism Drunkard [Gui ma tian shi] (1984) – Zany kung fu about a drunken hero fighting a watermelon (or banana) monster
The Temptation of St. Tony (2009) – Kafkaesque Estonian retelling of the temptation of St. Anthony
The Tenants (2023) – Shin-dong subleases his bathroom to a pair of eccentric newlyweds
The Theatre Bizarre (2011) – A puppet version of Udo Kier introduces six perverse tales of terror
Things (1989) – “Things” menace three Canadians in an incompetent horror film that reaches Zen levels of disorientation
The Third Part of the Night (1971) – Andrzej Zulawski‘s first film is a WWII drama where a man finds a double of his dead wife
Three Crowns of the Sailor (1983) – A sailor related the surreal tales of his travels to exotic ports to a student
Time of Moulting (2020) – A series of tableaux showing Stephanie growing up to become a troubled teenager
Todd Tarantula (2023) – Rotoscoped neon-noir about the title character searching for his missing bicycle through time and L.A.
To Die for Tano [Tano da Morire] (1997) – This amateur mafia musical is a cult classic in Italy
Tokyo! (2008) – Tryptich of weird tales set in the titular metropolis, from directors Michel Gondry, Leos Carax and Joon-ho Bong
Tokyo Fist (1995) – Shinya Tsukamoto‘s take on the boxing drama is typically eccentric
Tommy (1975) – A deaf, dumb and blind kid plays a mean pinball in this psychedelic version of the Who’s best-selling rock opera
To Sleep So as to Dream (1986) – An absurdist Japanese film noir comedy that’s also a tribute to silent film (and mostly silent itself)
A Town Called Panic (2009) – The outright insanity of this picaresque children’s adventure appeals to weirder adults
Toys in the Attic (2009) – A dictatorial Head kidnaps a motherly doll in this Czech stop-motion animated kids fantasy
Track 29 (1988) – Outrageous melodrama about a man who shows up claiming to be the lost son of a woman wedded to a model train fanatic
Trans-Europ-Express (1967) – A producer and director invent a movie about a drug smuggler in Antwerp with a strangulation fetish
The Tune (1992) – A tunesmith on a tight deadline gets lost in the wacky town of Flooby Nooby in this Bill Plympton animation
The Twentieth Century (2019) – Comic and highly fictional biopic of Canadian Prine Minister Mackenzie King made in the style of Guy Maddin
Twice Upon a Time (1983) – A shapeshifting “all-purpose animal” and a silent tramp try to save the world from nightmare bombs in this uniquely conceived animated feature
Twilight of the Cockroaches (1989) – Half-animated, half-live-action, anime allegory about the politics of cockroach tribes and human extreminators
Umbilical World (2019) – A remixed collection of David Firth’s absurdist flash animation cartoons
Uncle Kent 2 (2015) – An absurdist sequel to a mumblecore drama almost no one saw
Undergods (2020) – “K” and “Z” drive their van around a ruined shell of a city collecting dead bodies and telling each other about their dreams
Unicorn Wars (2022) – Unicorns battle teddy bears in this animated anti-war allegory
Up! (1976) – Alfred Eaker contends it’s Russ Meyer’s “most surreal live-action X-rated cartoon”
Urotsukidōji: Legend of the Overfiend – The only tentacle porn entry we’re currently considering (but never say never!)
Vera (2003) – A Mexican miner encounters an alien spirit who leads him into the land of the dead in this mystical movie whose visual ambitions exceed its budget
Violence Voyager (2018) – Experimental “gekimation” about the titular location, a mysterious adventure park
A Virgin Among the Living Dead (1973) – This dreamlike tale of a beautiful girl who inherits a home full of strange relatives may be Jess Franco’s best work
Viridiana (1961) – A novice nun inherits her uncle’s estate and turns it into a charitable haven, with disastrous results
The Visitor (1979) – Jesus is an alien in this incoherent flop Exorcist ripoff
Vivarium (2019) – A couple move to the suburbs and are soon trapped with a rapidly–growing kid they’re forced to adopt
The Voices (2014) – A schizophrenic takes advice from his talking dog and cat
The Vourdalak (2023) – Period horror from a Tolstoy story, with a marionette
The Wayward Cloud (2005) – Taiwanese minimalism mixing porno shoots, a watermelon fetish, and musical numbers
We Are Little Zombies (2019) – Four orphans meet at their parents’ funerals, run away, and form a pop band
We Are the Flesh (2016) – A hermit orchestrates two teenage siblings in enacting his depraved and hallucinatory fantasies
Where the Devil Roams (2023) – Depression-era horror about a family of killer carnies
Why Don’t You Just Die? [Papa, Sdokhni] (2018) – A movie-length battle with a Rasputin-style assassin
Winterbeast (1992) – Amateur stop-motion animation about ancient Indian monsters, full of strange touches
Wide Blood (1979) – A strange preacher proclaims the Church of Christ Without Christ in John Huston‘s adaptation of the famous Flannery O’Connor novel
Witching and Bitching [Las Brujas de Zugarramurdi] (2013) – Robbers rip off a pawn shop and then fall into the clutches of a coven of witches in this over-the-top horror comedy
The Wild Boys (2017) – After raping and accidentally murdering their literature teacher—under the prodding of TREVOR—five miscreant boys are sent to sea for discipline
Wild in the Streets (1968) – Psychedelic nugget with a pop star getting elected President after scheming to get the voting age lowered to 14
Wonderwall (1968) – An absent-minded professor spies on a fashion model frolicking in a psychedelic wonderland by peeping through the hole in his apartment wall
World on a Wire (1973) – Werner Rainer Fassbinder does The Matrix 25 years earlier, and does it with more artistry
Wrong (2012) – Absurdist comedy about a man searching for his kidnapped dog
Xtro (1983) – incoherent alien exploitation pic that’s fairly standard, up until when the dwarf clown hits the nanny on the head with a rubber hammer and uses her to incubate alien eggs
Yakuza Weapon (2011) – An already nearly invincible yakuza warrior is turned into a killer cyborg with armaments for arms
Yellowbrickroad (2010) – Decades ago, the residents of a New England town mysteriously disappeared; a new generation unwisely sets out to discover the cause
Yokai Monsters: Spook Warfare (1968) – Japanese yokai unite to defeat a Babylonian vampire in this puppet fantasy
Youth Without Youth (2007) – One of Francis Ford Coppola‘s late-career experimental features, this one involving a man who becomes younger after being struck by lightning
Yumeji (1991) – Seijun Suzuki‘s imaginary bioic of painter Takehisa Yumeji may be his most purely surreal work
ZAPPER! (2023) – Microbudget psychedelia about banana-wielding “zappers” searching for a mystical skateboard
Zebraman (2004) – Softer Takashi Miike outing about a meek elementary school teacher who becomes an absurd superhero
Zerograd (1989) – Absurdist Glasnost-era Soviet satire about a man who can’t leave a town of eccentrics because he’s witness to a suicide
CAPSULES
2012 Aficionado DVD Zine: Issue #0
Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)
Absence of Milk in the Mouths of the Lost (2023)
Acid Head: The Buzzard Nuts County Slaughter (2011)
The Act of Seeing with One’s Own Eyes (1971)
Adam by Eve: A Live-In Animation (2022)
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988)
The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)
The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D (2005)
Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972)
A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
A Journey into the Mind of P (2001)
Aleister Crowley’s the Rites of Mars: A Rock Opera (2014)
Alice Through the Looking Glass (1973)
Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016)
All My Friends Are Funeral Singers (2010)
All the Colors of Giallo (2019)
All the Colors of the Dark (1972)
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)
Amazon Women on the Moon (1987)
An American Hippie in Israel (1972)
The Amusement Park (1973/2019)
Aphrodisiac! The Sexual Secret of Marijuana (1971)
Apocalypse Now Redux (1979/2001)
Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie for Theaters (2007)
The Astrologer (1975) & The Astrologer (1975) – video review
At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul (1964)
Battle at Beaver Creek (2014) –
Beauty and the Beast [Panna a Netvor] (1978)
Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970)
Beneath the Valley of the Ultravixens (1979)
Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes (2021)
Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970)
Billy the Kid vs. Dracula (1966)
Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2008)
The Bitter Tea of General Yen (1933)
Black Belly of the Tarantula (1971)
Black Cobra Woman [Eva Nera; AKA Emmanuelle and the Deadly Black Cobra] (1976)
Black Devil Doll from Hell (1984)
Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman (2022)
The Bliss of Mrs. Blossom (1968)
Blood for Dracula [Andy Warhol’s Dracula] (1974)
Blue Beard [Barbe Bleue] (2009)
Boom! (1968) – video review
Brainiac [El barón del terror] (1962)
Brainscan (1994) (video review)
The Brand New Testament (2015)
The Brave Little Toaster (1987)
The Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974)
The Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001)
B’twixt Now and Sunrise (2011/2022)
Buñuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles (2018)
The Cameraman (1978) – Buster Keaton plays a cameraman with a monkey sidekick
Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death (1989) – video review
The Cars That Ate Paris (1974)
The Cassandra Cat [Az prijde kocour, AKA When the Cat Comes] (1963)
Castle in the Sky (1986) – Kid-friendly anime about a floating city is magical, but not weird
Castle of the Creeping Flesh (1968)
Castle of the Living Dead (1964)
Caterpillar (2010) – A dutiful wife cares for her deaf and dumb quadruple-amputee husband after the Japanese Emperor declares him a “living war god”
Cat People (1942) – A Serbian woman fears that she will turn into a panther and kill her husband if she loses her virginity in this “quiet horror” classic
Cat People (1982) – Strange, hypereroticized and occasionally surreal update of Val Lewton’s classic about a race of people who turn into panthers when sexually aroused
Cauldron of Blood (1970) – Mild psychedelia pervades this otherwise uninteresting horror film, one of Boris Karloff’s final efforts
Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010)
Certified Copy (2010) – An unexplained identity shift provides refined weirdness in this otherwise talky and intellectual arthouse drama
Chafed Elbows (1966) – Walter has a breakdown, gives birth to ten dollar bills and marries his mom in this seminal underground comedy
The Chair (2007) – Interesting Canadian indie horror film about possession that lacks true weirdness
Charley Bowers: The Rediscovery of an American Comic Genius – Collection containing most of the nearly lost silent films of absurdist stop-motion animator and comedian Bowers
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)
The Chaser (1928) – Early gender-switch comedy has Harry Landon sentenced to play the role of wife
Child Bride (1938)– This salacious, leering “exposé” of child marriage among hillbillies is 1930s filmmaking at its most shamelessly exploitative
Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things (1972)
Chronicle of a Wandering Saint (2023)
The Circus (1928) – Charlie Chaplin’s Tramp invades a circus
Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV (2000) – the long running series hits a new low in bad taste with this installment, but of course, that was what they were aiming at
City Lights (1931) – The Tramp romances a blind flower girl
City Ninja [Tou Qing Ke; AKA Ninja Holocaust] (1985) – Another crazy ninja movie, but this time with steamy sex scenes
City of the Living Dead (1981)
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (2009)
The Cloverfield Paradox (2018)
Coherence (2013) – Mindbending, largely improvised eight character sci-fi mini-classic about alternate realities
Cold Souls (2009) – Philosophical satire about soul removal and storage, starring Paul Giamatti as himself and a Russian soul mule
The Collective Vol. 4: Emotions
Common Law Wife (1963) – (S)exploitation hoot about a sugar daddy who wants to dump his common law wife for his stripper niece
The Complete Metropolis (1927/2010) – Report on the restoration of Fritz Lang’s weird silent sci-fi classic
Computer Chess (2013) – Geeks compete at a computer chess tournament in this quirky dramedy with surreal touches
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002)
The Corridor (2010) – Schizoid horror about madness in the woods
Cosmic Disco Detective Rene (2023)
Courageous Avenger (1935) – Johnny Mack Brown B-western pits hero against a gang of gold thieves
Cowboy Bebop: the Movie (2001)
The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future (2022)
Crank: High Voltage [Crank 2] (2009)
Creature from the Haunted Sea (1961)
Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)
Crowley [AKA Chemical Wedding] (2008)
Cuban Story [AKA The Truth About Fidel Castro Revolution] (1959)
Curse of the Cat People (1944)
Curse of the Crimson Altar (1968)
The Curse of the Werewolf (1961)
Damselvis, Daughter of Helvis (1994)
The Dark Crystal (1982) – Weird creature conceptions, beautiful art design, totally conventional fantasy/quest plot
Dark Shadows (2012) – alternate review
The Dark Side of the Heart [El Lado Oscuro del Corazon] (1992)
Da Sweet Blood of Jesus (2014)
Dawn Breaks Behind the Eyes (2021)
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)
Daydream Nation (2010) – Tale of a teen girl in a strange town who finds herself in an unusual love triangle
Day of the Outlaw (1959) – A wounded outlaw rides into town in this bleak, wintry Western
Dead or Alive (Takashi Miike trilogy) (1999-2002)
Death Walks at Midnight (1972)
Death Smiles on a Murderer (1973)
Deep Astronomy and the Romantic Sciences (2022)
Deep Red [Profondo Rosso] (1975)
Destination Planet Negro (2013)
Destroy All Planets (1968) – Gamera the flying turtle fights off beehive-themed aliens in this representative fourth adventure, with fight footage from the three previous entries
Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame (2011) – A mystery/fantasy/kung fu/historical epic with a talking deer; what’s not to like?
Detour (1945) – Cult classic Poverty Row film noir
The Devil Doll (1936) – Tiny killers and Lionel Barrymore in drag make this one of Tod Browning’s more popular b-pictures
The Devil’s Rain (1975) – Video review
Diary of a Country Priest (1951)
Disappearance at Clifton Hill (2019)
A Dog Called Pain [Un Perro Llamado Dolor] (2001)
Dollhouse: The Eradication of Female Subjectivity in American Popular Culture (2019)
Don Giovanni (2006) – Avant-garde staging of the Mozart opera with underwear model extras
Don Peyote (2104) -An unemployed pot-smoker becomes obsessed with conspiracy theories, then has a psychotic break with reality and goes on a vision quest
Don’t Look Back [Ne te Retourne pas] (2009)
Don’t Torture a Duckling (1972)
Double Agent 73 (1974) – Chesty Morgan is back, this time as a spy with a camera implanted in her boobs
The Double Life of Veronique (1991)
Dracula (1931) – Guest review. Alfred Eaker argues that Dracula is more significant than modern critics acknowledge
Dracula (1992) – Francis Ford Coppola’s romantic take on the Dracula myth is so visually extravagant even Keanu Reeves can’t completely ruin it
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968) – The third Hammer Dracula sequel illustrates how far the series fell when director Terence Fisher left
Dracula, Pages from a Virgin’s Diary (2002)
Dracula, Prince of Darkness (1966) – Christopher Lee’s Dracula is mute in this Hammer horror
Drag Me to Hell (2009) – A de-weirdified, PG-13 Evil Dead for the cineplexes?
The Dreams of Rene Sendam (2022)
Dr. Otto and the Riddle of the Gloom Beam (1985)
The Dungeonmaster (1984) – Satan abducts a computer expert and sends him on a series of quests, each created by a different hack director
Easy Street (1917) – Charlie Chaplin’s Tramp becomes a cop and faces off with a henpecked crime boss
Eden Log (2007) – Mysterious French sci-fi about an amnesiac man trapped in a sewer-like maze
Edge of Tomorrow (2014) – Tom Cruise dies over and over while fighting aliens; part of 2014’s “Alfred Eaker vs. the Summer Blockbusters” series
Edmond (2005) – William H. Macy wanders around in a sub-par David Mamet script
Emperor of the North Pole (1973)
Encounters at the End of the World (2007)
The Enigma of Kaspar Hasuer (1974)
Enter the Dangerous Mind (2013)
Escanaba in da Moonilight (2001)
Escape from the ‘Liberty’ Cinema (1990)
Escape to the Silver Globe (2021)
Escoriandoli [Trash–T.R.A.] (1996)
Evangelion 1.11: You Are (Not) Alone (2007/2010)
Evangelion 2.22: You Can (Not) Advance (2009/2011)
Evangelion 3.0: You Can (Not) Redo (2012)
An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn (2018)
Ex-Drummer (2007) – Weird, but tedious and unpleasant, tale of a writer joining a punk group of handicapped misfits to compete in a Eurotrash battle of the bands
The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec (2010) – A turn-of-the-century adventuress deals with mummies and pterodactyls in this French comic fantasy
Exorcist III: The Heretic (1977) – John Boorman’s crazed flop sequel takes the action to Africa in search of the original demon who possessed young Regan four years ago
The Exorcist III (1990) – The original novelist directs this sequel about a serial killer, only tangentially related to the past two films
Fantasia 2000 (1999) – Belated sequel to the 1940 classic includes spectacular new animated musical interpretations of Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue,” Stravinsky’s “Firebird Suite,” and more
A Fantastic Fear of Everything (2012) – Simon Pegg stars as a severely agoraphobic writer forced to brave a laundrette in this strange, only partly effective black comedy
Fast, Cheap and Out of Control (1997) – Documentary exploring the unlikely connections between a lion tamer, topiary gardener, naked-mole rat specialist and a robot designer
Face of the Screaming Werewolf (1964) – Cut-n-paste feature from Jerry Warren mixing scenes from Las Casa del Terror and The Aztec Mummy together with new footage to create an incomprehensible new movie
Faith of Our Fathers (1997) – Low-budget indie satire about modern chimney sweeps
FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions (2004)
Fascination (1979) – Atmospheric but fairly straightforward erotic horror from atmosphere specialist Jean Rollin; the highlight is a topless Grim Reaper
Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill! (1965)
The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967)
Feed (2005) – Grotesque thriller about obesity fetishes features women being fed to death
Fever Night AKA Band of Satanic Outsiders (2009) – Teens go into the woods and summon a psychedelic Satan in this trippy low budget effort
Film Socialisme (2010) – Inaccessible experimental film essay from Jean-Luc Goddard about… well, no one knows what it’s about
The Films of Kenneth Anger, Vol. 2 (1963-1981) – Compilation featuring some of the avant-garde occultist’s most historically important features
The Final Programme [AKA The Last Days of Man on Earth] (1973): An “international man of mystery” searches for a computer program that will create the Messiah
La Finta Giardiniera (2006) – Mozart’s craziest opera libretto is given a b-movie style treatment, complete with a man-eating plant and giant plastic spider
La Finta Semplice (2006) – Avant-garde staging of an opera Mozart wrote when he was 15 years old
Flaming Star (1960) – Elvis Presley stars as a half-breed in this progressive Western
Flesh for Frankenstein [Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein] (1973)
The Fool and the Flying Ship (1991)
Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell (1974) – Terence Fisher’s final film, and Hammer studio’s final Frankenstein movie, as a weary swan song to both
Frankenstein Created Woman (1967)
Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster (1965)
Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed (1969)
Frankensteins Bloody Nightmare (2006) – A visually and aurally ingenious, surrealistically inspired remake of a trash horror in the style of Andy Milligan, which sadly suffers from having no story to tell
Freaks vs. the Reich [AKA Freaks Out] (2021)
Free Radicals: A History of Experimental Film (2012)
From a Whisper to a Scream (1987)
From Beyond (1986) – Experiments to activate the dormant human pineal gland result in paranormal mayhem
From Dusk Till Dawn (2006) – Reprobates on the run are trapped in a bar full of vampires
Funny Games (1997) – Unmotivated sadists break the fourth wall in this controversial exercise from Michael Haneke
Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus (2006) – A freak awakens Diane Arbus’ artistic impulses in this fantastical fictional biopic
Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life (2010)
Gallino, the Chicken System (2012)
Garden State (2004) – Quirky indie from “Scrubs”‘s Zach Braff about young adult returning home to face his crazy family after mom dies (reader review)
Garden State (2004) – 366’s official review of the quirky romantic comedy Garden State
Gauguin: The Full Story (2003) – Documentary about the post-Impressionist painter
Georges Méliès: Encore (DVD compilation 2010, original films 1896-1911)
Get to Know Your Rabbit (1972)
Ghost in the Shell (1995) – A cyborg cop hunts a hacker in this seminal cyberpunk anime
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (2004)
Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2012) – Rant on the witless sequel and the sorry state of superhero movies
Giorgio Moroder Presents Metropolis (1927/1984) – Giorgio Moroder’s 1984 restoration of Fritz Lang’s classic is visually splendiferous; the tradeoff is that Loverboy and Billy Squier are on the soundtrack
The Girl on a Motorcycle (1968)
A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014)
Girly [AKA Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny and Girly] (1970) – Arrested development in a bizarre British “family” of ritualistic murderers
Giving Birth to a Butterfly (2021)
Gods and Monsters (1998) – Biopic of James Whale, director of Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein, among other horror classics
God Told Me To (1975) – Larry Cohen’s wild bizarre genre pastiche mixes horror, science fiction and detective elements as a cop tries to find out why unrelated murderers all claim “God told me to do it”
The Gold Rush (1925) – The Tramp travels to the Yukon to become a prospector in one of Charlie Chaplin’s most popular features
The Good, the Bad, the Weird [Joheunnom Nabbeunnom Ishaghannom] (2008): “Noodle Western” recasting the Leone classic in 1930s occupied Manchuria
The Gorgon (1964) – Hammer horror meets Greek mythology
Go West (1925) – Buster Keaton falls for a cow and puts on a devil suit
The Grass Labyrinth [ Kusa-meikyû] (1979)
Graveyard Alive: A Zombie Nurse in Love (2003)
The Great Dictator (1940) – Charlie Chaplin’s anti-Hitler satire
The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965) – Campy all-star disaster version of the New Testament, with John Wayne as a centurion with a Texas drawl
The Great K & A Train Robbery (1926) – Silent Tom Mix western
Growing Out (2009) – Low-budget film about a man growing out of a basement floor squanders its weird potential by focusing on romance
The Gruesome Death of Tommy Pistol (2011) – A struggling actor has four weird dreams in this grossout gore flick/Hollywood satire
The Guatemalan Handshake (2006) – Quirked-out indie that pushes into surreal realms; it’s like Gummo if directed by Jared Hess as a comedy
The Gunfighter (1950) – Gregory Peck plays an aging gunfighter weighed down with regret
Gutboy: A Badtime Story (2017)
Hallucination Generation (1966)
A Hard Day’s Night (1964) – Four cheeky lads from Liverpool join a band, get popular, and run around like slapstick madmen
Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction (2012)
A Haunted Turkish Bathhouse (1975)
Heads of Control: The Gorul Baheu Brain Expedition (2006) – Very obscure and very weird feature told from the point of view of pharmaceutical molecules inside the brain of a madman
Heart Attack! The Early Pulse-Pounding Cinema of Kelly Hughes (2012)
Heart of the Beholder (2005) – Documentary on a crusade against a video store for stocking The Last Temptation of Christ
Hellacious Acres: The Case of John Glass (2011) – A man awakens trapped in a bio-suit in a post-apocalyptic future where the desolate landscape is patrolled by energy aliens
Hell Comes to Frogtown (1988) – A rare non-sterile man in the post-apocalyptic future goes on a mission to rescue a harem full of virile woman held captive by a town of mutant frogs
Hellevator (2004) – A future dystopia where floors of an underground society are linked by a single elevator shaft. A reader recommendation.
Hell’s Hinges (1916) – Overwrought early silent western is an unsubtle lesson in Christian vengeance
The Hellstrom Chronicle (1971) – Mondo insect documentary with a fictional mad scientist as narrator
Her (2013) – A man falls in love with an artificial intelligence in Spike Jonze‘s melancholy science fiction romance
Hercules in the Haunted World (1961)
Her Master’s Voice (2012) – Ventriloquist Nina Conti takes her deceased master’s dummies to be buried at a graveyard for puppets in this offbeat documentary
Highlander II (Renegade Version) (1991)
High Noon (1952) – Gary Cooper in a classic (but admittedly not weird) Western
The Hitch-Hiker (1953) – Two fisherman unwisely give a ride to a killer in the only classic film noir directed by a woman
Holy Flame of the Martial World (1983)
The Horror of Dracula (1958) – Hammer’s first Dracula movie is considered a horror classic by critics
Horror Express (1972) – A frozen caveman comes to life while being hauled on the Trans-Siberia express
Horror Rises from the Tomb [El Espanto Surge de la Tumba] (1973)
The Hound of the Baskervilles (1959)
The House of Last Things (2013)
House of Pleasures [AKA House of Tolerance] (2011)
House of Screaming Glass (2024)
The House That Jack Built (2018)
The House with Laughing Windows [La Casa dalle Finestre che Ridono] (1976)
How Strange to Be Named Federico (2013)
How to Talk to Girls at Parties (2018)
The Human Centipede (First Segment) (2009)
I Bury the Living (1958) – A cemetery caretaker believes he can kill people by placing a pin in a map of the graveyard
If Footmen Tire You, What Will Horses Do? (1971)
Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS (1975)
The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus (2009)
The Important Thing Is to Love (1975)
Inception (2010) – Enormously entertaining thriller about the theft of ideas through entering dreams, but not really all that weird
The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies (1964)
Incubus (1966) (alternate mini-review here)
In My Skin [Dans ma Peau] (2002) – Disturbing, unflinching movie about a woman who begins devouring herself
In Old Santa Fe (1934) – “Singing Cowboy” movie featuring an early appearance by Gene Autry
In Search of the Ultra-Sex (2015)
International Guerillas (1990)
In the Realms of the Unreal: The Mystery of Henry Darger (2004)
The Intruder (1962) – Roger Corman’s surprisingly progressive civil rights movie, starring William Shatner (!) as a racist demagogue
Iron Sky: The Coming Race (2019)
The Island of Lost Souls (1932) – The first adaptation of H.G. Wells’ “The Island of Dr. Moreau” is a since-unequaled horror classic
The Iron Rose (1973) – Poetic but extremely slow-moving film about a young couple trapped in a picturesque French graveyard overnight
Isle of the Snake People (1971)
The Item (1999) – video review
I Think We’re Alone Now (2008)
It’s in the Blood (2012) – Father and son try to reconnect in a haunted wood in this psychological horror
Ivan’s Childhood (1962) – Andrei Tarkovsky’s first movie is a touching war drama about a child spy, but frequent dream sequences hinted at the direction he would take
I Walked with a Zombie (1943) – Literate horror classic based loosely on “Jane Eyre” – but with voodoo and zombies!
Jack and Diane (2012) – Reader recommendation. A lesbian turns into a monster.
James and the Giant Peach (1996)
Jannie Totsiens (1970) – South African film archivist Trevor Moses describes the weird and allegorical South African variation on One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. To our knowledge, this is the only full-length English language review of of this Afrikaans film available online!
Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975) – 20 minutes of a housewife cracking up, three hours of her cooking meatloaf and shopping for buttons in this experiment in inactivity on screen
Jerry Springer: The Opera (2005) – The famously sleazy talk show host goes to hell in this production that holds the world record for most f-bombs dropped in an opera
Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Daughter (1966)
Jesus and Her Gospel of Yes (2004) – Guest review of the low-budget, avant-garde, performance artist retelling of the Gospel with Jesus as a woman
Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter (2001)
Johnny Guitar (1954) – Guest review of the feminist, camp western cult fave by Kevyn Knox
Journey to the West [Xi You] (2014)
Jug Face (2013) – A cult of hillbillies worship a pit that demands human sacrifices in this effective low-budget backwoods horror with a unique premise
Karajan, or Beauty As I See It (2008) – documentary on the life of eccentric conductor Herbert von Karajan
Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989)
Kill Bill (Vols. 1 & 2) (2003-2004)
Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)
King of Pluto (2004) – Underground documentary about oddball artist Mike Wrathell
KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park (1978)
Kung Pow: Enter the Fist (2002)
La Cicatrice Intérieuere (1972)
The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun (2015)
The Last Circus [Balada Triste de Trompeta] (2010) – A sad clown and a happy clown battle for the love of a beautiful trapeze artist in this bloody and ridiculous Spanish Civil War allegory
Last Life in the Universe (2003)
The Last Road (2012) – An underground fighter wanders around in a low-budget afterlife
Legacy of Satan (1974) – Video review
Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974)
The Lego Movie (2014) – A toy commercial that’s also–surprise!–a witty, touching kids’ movie
Let’s Scare Jessica to Death (1971)
Letters to Paul Morrissey (2018)
A Liar’s Autobiography: The Untrue Story of Monty Python’s Graham Chapman (2012) – More than a dozen animators illustrate comedian Graham Chapman’s surreal and facetious autobiography
License to Kill (1989) – The film is discussed in light of Timothy Dalton’s redefinition of Bond
Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004) – Oceangoing documentarian Zissou assembles a quirky team to search for the elusive jaguar shark that killed his partner
Life Blood (2009) – Squanders a weird premise—vampires are God’s avenging lesbian angels—to become an undistinguished B-movie
Lifeforce (1985) – Tobe Hooper’s followup to Poltergeist is a little flick about gratuitously nude space vampires
The Little Shop of Horrors (1960)
Live a Little, Love a Little (1968)
A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin (1971)
Long Day’s Journey Into Night (2018)
Look What’s Happened to Rosemary’s Baby (1976)
Lords of Salem (2012) – Rob Zombie’s witchcraft movie plays a little bit like Rosemary’s Baby directed by 1980s-era Ken Russell
Loren Cass (2006) – Dull, pretentious punk tale of teen anomie that goes beyond the pale with unrelated live suicide footage
The Los Angeles Ripper (2011): Modern grindhouse effort with serial killer stalking Los Angelites
The Lost One [Der Verlorene] (1951)
Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley’s ‘The Island of Dr. Moreau’ (2014)
Love Express: The Disappearance of Walerian Borowczyk (2018)
Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon (1998)
The Lovely Bones (2009) – A murdered girl watches her grieving family and unrepentant killer from a colorful, fantastic afterlife in Peter Jackson’s iffy adaptation of a bestselling novel
The Lovers on the Bridge [Les Amants du Pont-Neuf] (1991)
Lulu (2010) – Controversial staging of Alban Berg’s perverted opera about incestuous clown/prostitute Lulu
Machete Maidens Unleashed (2010)
Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)
Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985) – The weirdest Mad Max movie is good goofy fun
Mad Monster Party (1967) – Rankin/Bass monster mashup, feature-length Halloween fare in the style of their famous “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”
Magic Magic (2013) – An emotionally fragile college-age girl goes crazy when she’s left among strangers in a foreign country
Mahler (1974) – One of Ken Russell’s surrealist biographies of classical composers
Man Bites Dog [C’est arrivé près de chez vous] (1992)
Man of Steel (2013) – Alfred Eaker considers Man of Steel (2013) in the context of Supermen past
Man of the West (1955) – Gary Cooper plays a reformed desperado caught in a dangerous prodigal son scenario
Manos: The Rise of Torgo (2015)
The Manster (1959) – A Japanese scientist injects an American with an experimental virus that turns him into a drunk, a lech, and a two-headed killer
Mantua (2012) – A comedic “Twin Peaks” variation with public access TV production values
The Man with the Magic Box (2017)
Man With the Movie Camera (1929) – This experimental Soviet propaganda film is a catalog of then avant-garde camera tricks and editing techniques
Mark of the Vampire (1935) – Talkie remake of the lost London After Midnight
The Master (2012) – A paint-thinner drinking, sandcastle-humping sailor falls in with a cult leader in postwar America
Matrimony (2007) – Romantic Chinese ghost story with a weird (if not satisfying) ending
Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005)
Mega Python vs. Gatoroid (2011) – The title creatures do appear, but it probably should have been called Debbie Gibson vs. Tiffany instead. Special Guest Reviewer Cleverbot shares its thoughts.
Melancholia (2011) – A planet named “Melancholia” is set to crash into the earth in this metaphorical movie about depression from always-odd Lars von Trier
Memento Mori (2018)
The Merry Widow (1925) – A light operetta re-imagined as a silent fetishistic melodrama
Message from Space (1978) – Nutty Japanese/American Star Wars ripoff featuring sailing ships in space
Messiah (2010) – Claus Guth’s staging of Handel’s Christmas oratorio invokes infidelity and suicide
Metallica Through the Never (2013)
Midnight Skater (2002) – This gore/comedy with a serial killer is a student film, but the students involved weren’t film majors
The Miracle Rider (1935) – Western serial with sci-fi elements, starring cowboy icon Tom Mix
Miracles for Sale (1939) – Tod Browning’s final film, about a charlatan medium
Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985)
The Missing Picture (2013) – Rithy Panh recreates his childhood memories of growing up in a Cambodian death camp using clay figures of his own design
Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (2016)
Momotaro, Sacred Sailors (1945)
Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon (2021)
The Monster (1925) – A campy Lon Chaney stars in Roland West’s first stab at an Old Dark House mystery
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
Moon (2009) – Thoughtful hard science fiction that flirts with weirdness in the opening reels
The Moon in the Hidden Woods (2019)
Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium (2007)
The Mummy (1932) – The original Mummy is a slow-paced, atmospheric, yearning version of the tale
The Mummy (1959) – Hammer horror’s version of the mummy legend
Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932) – In his immediate followup to Dracula for Universal, Bela Lugosi plays a “Darwinist pervert” with a murderous pet monkey
Mutant Girls Squad (2010) – A cheerleader with a chainsaw in her butt is just one of the strange sights in this wild Japanese mutant gore spoof from three directors
My Dinner with Andre (1981) – Wallace Shawn has dinner with Andre Gregory and they talk, talk, talk in this talky but surprisingly engaging minimalist experiment
My Entire High School Sinking into the Sea (2016)
My Neighbor Wants Me Dead (2019)
The Mysterious Mr. Wong (1934)
Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933)
Mystery Ranch (1932) – Atmospheric B-western with Gothic influences
Mystery Ranch (1934) – Unrelated to the 1932 version, this oater involves a city-slicker who writes Western novels traveling out to the real West
Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie (1996) – Disappointing feature adaptation of the cult TV series, ripping on the colorful 1955 sci-fi feature This Island Earth
The Mystic (1925) – Typical early Tod Browning melodrama about a charlatan medium
The Navigator (1924) – Buster Keaton plays a landlubber set adrift
Nazarin (1959) – Luis Buñuel‘s exploration of religious hypocrisy concerns a suffering priest with an impotent faith; from his Mexican social “realist” period
Necromentia (2009) – Derivative horror with one memorably weird scene of a pig-man singing an ode to suicide
Nekromantik (1987) – Notorious, badly made necrophilia movie that’s more concerned with grossing out than weirding out it’s audience
Neon Genesis Evangelion: Death and Rebirth (1997)
Night and a Switchblade (2013)
Night Dreams (1981) – Surrealist hardcore porn, complete with trips to heaven and hell and sex with the man in the Cream of Wheat box
Night Has a Thousand Desires (1984)
Night of the Living Dead (1968)
Nightmare Alley (1947) – Oddball film noir about an alcoholic carny posing as a psychic
A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010) – Predictably, this remake sucked, and it’s not weird to boot
Nightmares Come at Night (1970) – An exotic dancer has murderous nightmares that she can’t distinguish from reality
Nightmares in Red, White and Blue: The Evolution of the American Horror Film (2009) – Massive survey of American horror films from 1910 to the present; several Certified Weird picks are mentioned
Night Nurse (1931) – Pre-Code naughtiness starring Barbara Stanwyck
Night of the Demons (1988) – T&A teen horror is a bit of a cult item, thanks to Linnea Quigley’s lipstick
Night of the Hunted (1980) – Patients who can only remember events from the past two minutes are held in a secret mental hospital at the top of a skyscraper
Night of the Living Dead: Reanimated (2010) – A team of animators tackle George Romeros’ zombie classic, using the original soundtrack but drawing or using puppets or baby dolls to illustrate the scenes
Night Tide (1961) – Dennis Hopper’s sailor meets a maybe-mermaid
The Night Walker (1964) – Obscure William Castle thriller featuring Barbara Stanwyck suffering surreal nightmares. Guest review by Pamela de Graff.
Nine (2009) – Non-weird musical ostensibly based on the twisted love life of Federico Fellini while making 8 1/2
Ninja Scroll (1993) – Sexy and ultraviolent, but this anime is basically a straightforward fantasy adventure
Noah (2014) – Visionary director Darren Aronofsky tackles the story of the Flood in a Hollywood blockbuster
Nobody Else but You [Poupoupidou] (2011) – A crime novelist investigates the death of a woman who believed herself the reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe in this offbeat French mystery
A Noisy Delivery (2013) – An extremely minimalist noise music/performance art piece about an undelivered package
No Man’s Law (1927) -Strange, silent oater featuring Oliver Hardy (of Laurel and Hardy) as a sleazy villain whose attempt to rape a pioneer woman is foiled by top-billed Rex the Wonder Horse!
No More Excuses (1968) – A Civil War soldier loose in modern Manhattan, documentary footage of the singles bar scene and an amorous chimp mix in this sketch comedy farrago
Northfork (2003) – A dying orphan dreams he is an angel while bureaucrats try to evacuate stragglers from a town that’s about to be flooded by dam construction
Nothing (2003) – Two losers wish the world away; possibly the best movie about nothing ever made
Nothing but Trouble (1991)
Nothing but Trouble (1991) – Second opinion
Nymphomaniac, Vol. I & II (2013)
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019)
Once Upon a Time in Uganda (2021)
Order of Chaos (2010) – Offbeat thriller about a passive attorney and the newcomer who throws his life out of whack
“The Ossuary and Other Tales” (2013)
The Other Side of the Wind (2018)
The Other Side of Underneath (1972)
Overdrawn at the Memory Bank (1983)
The Painting (2011) – Figures in a painting leave their canvas and seek out the Painter to find out why they were left incomplete
The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) – Alfred Eaker believes Carl Theodore Dreyer’s devastatingly emotional account of the martyrdom of Joan of Arc may just be the greatest movie ever made
The Passion of the Christ (2004) – Alfred Eaker’s title says it all: “the most reprehensible anti-Christian film ever made”
Passion Play (2010) – Megan Fox is an “angel,” Mickey Rourke is a jazz musician and Bill Murray is a laid back gangster in this modern fairy-tale misfire
Peacock (2010) – Cilian Murphy in drag in a gender-bending psychothriller
Pearls of the Deep (1966) – Czech New Wave sampler film with a couple of surreal segments
Pee-wee’s Big Adventure (1985) – Man-child Pee-wee searches America for his stolen bike. A reader recommendation.
The Penalty (1920) – One of Lon Chaney’s most painful performances; he plays a legless crime boss who models as the Devil in his spare time
A Perfect Day for Caribou (2022)
Perfume of the Lady in Black (1974)
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (2006) – Period piece about a serial killer who slays women to make perfume; features a truly bizarre climax
The Perils of Gwendoline in the Land of the Yik-Yak (1984)
Petey Wheatstraw, the Devil’s Son-in-Law (1977)
Phantasm IV: Oblivion (1998) – Underbudgeted and incoherent rehash of the first three Phantasm movies
The Phantom Carriage (1921) – Atmospheric and influential Swedish silent based on Scandinavian folklore claiming the last person to die before the New Year comes is fated to become Death’s coachman
Phantom from 10,000 Leagues (1955)
The Plague of the Zombies (1966)
The Pocket Film of Superstitions (2023)
Pokemon Detective Pikachu (2019)
Ponyo [Gake no ue no Ponyo] (2008) – Hayao Miyazaki’s Japanese variation on “The Little Mermaid” is enchanting, but is considered one of his lesser works
Pope Francis: A Man of His Word (2018)
Prayer of the Rollerboys (1990)
Primer (2004) – Intricate and confusing time travel puzzler, made by an engineer for an amazing $7,000.
Private Parts (1972) – A teenage runaway flees to her eccentric aunt’s decrepit hotel in this deviant psychosexual debut from professional oddball Paul Bartel
Prometheus Triumphant (2009) – This attempt to make a modern Gothic silent film is a well-intentioned failure
The Promise [La Promesa] (2004) – Nanny experiences religious visions and encounters a telepathic child
Proxima (2007) – Science fiction tribute that appears to pose the question: what if a Phillip K. Dick-ish writer really was contacted by an alien race?
Psycho Ape Part II: The Wrath of Kong (2024)
Psycho Gothic Lolita [AKA Gothic & Lolita Psycho] (2010)
Psychomagic: A Healing Art (2019)
Le Quattro Volte [The Four Times] (2010) – A soul migrates from a shepherd to a goat to a tree to charcoal in this odd, wordless experiment
“The Quay Brothers: Collected Short Films” (2015)
A Quiet Place in the Country (1968)
Race War: The Remake (2011) – Bad taste ethnic comedy about a drug turf war, and the Kreecha from a Lagoon
Rainbows End (2010) – A psychobilly band, a baton twirler, a singer with a mild speech impediment, and a cockfighter take a road trip to California in this documentary celebrating East Texas eccentrics
Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010)
Rat Pfink a Boo Boo (1966) – This kidnapping film with the mangled title turns into a superhero comedy midway through, and is surely one of the worst movies ever made
The Raven (1935) – Lugosi hams it up as a torture-loving doctor who experiments on escaped convict Karloff
Religulous (2008) – Bill Maher’s one-sided documentary satire on religious belief
The Return of the Bionic Boy (1979)
Return of the Kung Fu Dragon (1976) – Bizarre characters and a rambling plot make this kung fu fantasy from Taiwan stand out as one of the weirder examples of the genre
Return of the Living Dead (1985)
Return to Oz (1985) – Jesse Miksic discusses the “three fetishes” of the mythical kingdom in this essay (not review) of the odd Oz sequel
Return to Oz (1985) – review
Rhymes for Young Ghouls (2013)
Riders of the Whistling Pines (1949) – Gene Autry ties to save an endangered forest using the miracle of DDT in the ecologically naive oater
Riders of the Whistling Skull (1937) – “The Three Mesquiteers” star in a genre mishmash adventure featuring Indian cults and mummies
The Ring (2002) – This eerie tale of a murderous videotape may be the best American remake of a J-horror
Road to Mandalay (1926) – Partially lost Tod Browning/Lon Chaney Oedpial melodrama set in the seedy seaports of the Orient
Rock ‘n’ Roll High School (1979)
Rock ‘n Roll Frankenstein (1999) – video review
Room 237 (2012) – Documentary exploring fans crazy theories about Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining
Ruben Brandt, Collector (2018)
The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea (1976)
Saint John of Las Vegas (2009)
Salo, the 120 Days of Sodom (1975) – No, just no
Samurai Princess (2009) – Japanese splatterpunk fantasy about a woman who becomes a cyborg and takes on the souls of eleven raped virgins in a quest for revenge
Samurai Rauni Reposaarelainen (2016)
Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964)
Satanico Pandemonium: La Sexorcista (1975)
Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973)
Satoshi Kon: The Illusionist (2020)
The Scary of Sixty-First (2021)
Scream of the Butterfly (1965) – Soapy Sixties sexploitation involving a cheating nymphomaniac and her bisexual (male) lover
The Search for Weng Weng (2007/2013)
Seconds (1966) – A middle-aged man is offered the chance to fake his own death and begin life anew as Rock Hudson
The Secret of Kells (2009) – Brilliantly animated story of the clash between early Christianity and paganism; every frame looks like a cross between classic Disney and an eighth-century illustrated manuscript
A Serbian Film (2010) – A porn star finds himself unwittingly drugged and cast in a sadistic movie enacting real-life atrocities in this controversial, frequently banned shocker
The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988) – Wes Craven serves up a few memorable hallucinatory sequences in this interesting but uneven “serious” take on zombies
Scream and Scream Again (1969)
The Seven Faces of Jane (2022)
Seven Stages to Acheive Eternal Bliss (2018)
Shanty Tramp (1967) – Sleazy exploitation melodrama with interracial sex
Shock Treatment (1981) – This belated sorta-sequel to The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a wacky musical satire of TV that has slightly more detractors than defenders
The Shooting (1967) – Existential, enigmatic Western from Monte Helleman, starring Warren Oates and Jack Nicholson
The Shootist (1976) – John Wayne’s swan song
Silent Hill: Revelation (2012) – Lackluster sequel to the Certified Weird original brings no new ideas to the table
The Silent Scream (1980) – Proto-slasher featuring cult icon Barbara Steele
Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (2014) – More stylish, ultraviolent comic book noir that is definitely of a piece with the 2005 original
Slacker (1991) – Reader recommendation for the movie listed above.
Slaughtered Vomit Dolls (2006) – Satanist puke-fetish torture porn experimental film. Weird? Yes. Recommended? No.
The Snake Girl and the Silver-Haired Witch (1968)
Il Sogno di Scipione (2006) – Staging of Mozart’s mythological dream opera, from the M22 series
Somebody Up There Likes Me (2012) – Incredibly deadpan comedy about a waiter who doesn’t visibly age thanks to a magic suitcase
Someone’s Knocking at the Door (2009) – The spirits of serial killers rape drug-abusing medical students to death in this hallucinatory disgusto horror film
Space is the Place (1974) – video review
A Spell to Ward off the Darkness (2013)
Spider Mites of Jesus: The Dirtwoman Documentary (2018)
Spindrift’s Haunted West (2020)
Splice (2010) – Genetic horror/parenthood allegory from Vincenzo Natali about the drawbacks of mixing human and animal DNA
The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge out of Water (2015)
Star Trek Time Warp Trilogy (2010-2013)
Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989) – The crew of the Enterprise go looking for God in space in the most embarrassing entry in the franchise (directed by William Shatner)
Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)
Steak (2007) – reader recommendation from Caleb Moss
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Miss Osborne (1981)
The Strange Woman (1946) – Edgar G. Ulmer noir starring Heddy Lamarr as a woman more evil than strange
Street Trash (1987) – Killer rotgut causes hobos to melt in this bad taste black comedy
Strings (2004) – High fantasy set in a kingdom of marionettes, exploring all aspects of marionette culture
The Strong Man (1926) – Manchild Harry Langdon survives a tour in WWI and becomes a circus strong man while searching for his love
Subject Two (2006) – The subject of a medical experiment must die over and over so that the doctor can perfect his faulty resurrection formula
Sukiyaki Western Django (2007)
Sun Don’t Shine (2012) – Florida noir with a great performance from Kate Lyn Sheil that would have benefited from more weirdness
Sunset Boulevard (1950) – Reader recommendation of the Billy Wilder Hollywood noir classic about a failed screenwriter who becomes the boy-toy of an aging, delusional ex-star
Superman and the Mole Men (1951) – Dwarfs with an Electrolux vacuum cleaner threaten the Man of Steel
Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (1987)
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One (1968)
Sympathy, Said the Shark (2015)
Tabloid (2010) – Errol Morris documentary documenting the bizarre story of Joyce McKinney, the former Miss Wyoming who allegedly kidnapped and raped a Mormon missionary in 1977
The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (2014) – Beautiful animated fairy tale from Studio Ghibli about a bamboo cutter who adopts a miniature princess he finds in a bamboo shoot
Tales That Witness Madness (1973)
Tamala 2010: A Punk Cat in Space (2002) – Video review
Targets (1968) – Boris Karloff stars as an aging horror host caught up in a real-life shooting spree
Tchoupitoulas (2012) – Impressionistic tour of New Orleans as seen from the viewpoint of three boys stranded in the city overnight
The Ten (2007) – Occasionally absurd, occasionally amusing short films based on the Ten Commandments, made by TV sketch-comedy vets
Ten Animated Films by Signe Baumane (2006)
Ten Minutes to Midnight (2020)
Terribly Happy (2008) – Offbeat, Coen-esque tale of a Danish marshal reassigned to a small rural town full of dirty secrets
Tetsuo: The Bullet Man (2009) – Visually impressive but pointless third remake of Tetsuo: The Iron Man
Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation (1994)
Theory of Obscurity: A Film About the Residents (2015)
They Came Back [Les Revenants] (2004)
They Saved Hitler’s Brain (1963/197?)
The Thing with Two Heads (1972)
Thirst (1979) – Australian vampire tale about a lineal descendant of Elizabeth Bathory’s involvement in the commercial blood farming industry
Thirst [Bawkji] (2009) – Chan-wook Park’s take on the vampire legend is arty and bloody, as expected, but surprisingly conventional at its heart
The Thirteenth Chair (1929) – Tod Browning’s first sound film features Bela Lugosi as an investigator in a drawing-room murder mystery
This Is Me… Now: A Love Story (2024)
This Must Be the Place (2011) – Sean Penn plays a retired goth rocker who hunts down an elderly Nazi war criminal
This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse (1967)
Three’s a Crowd (1927) – Guest review of Harry Langdon’s neglected silent classic
Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie (2012)
Time Masters [Les Maitres du Temps] (1982)
Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films of All Time, Vol. 1: Midnight Madness (2020)
Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films of All Time, Vol. 2: Horror & Sci-Fi (2020)
Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films of All Time, Vol.3: Comedy & Camp (2020)
Tiny Tim: King for a Day (2020)
To Die Like a Man [Morrer Como Um Homem] (2009)
Tombs of the Blind Dead (1971)
The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism (1967)
The Toxic Avenger, Part II (1989) – “Toxie” goes to Japan for more mayhem; the craziness remains, but the lighter tone makes this a moderately more pleasant entry in the series
The Toxic Avenger, Part III: The Last Temptation of Toxie (1989) – The producers scrape the bottom of the toxic waste barrel to come up with this third installment composed partially of extra footage from Part II
Trailers from Hell, Vol. 2 (2011)
Trance (2013) – A hypnotherapist tries to uncover a gangster’s repressed memory of where he hid a stolen painting
Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014) – It’s bad
Trash [Andy Warhol’s Trash] (1970) -Joe Dallessandro’s too stoned on junk to get an erection, but he sure meets a lot of weirdos in NYC in the late 60s, including his garbage-collecting transvestite roommate
Triangle (2009) – Weirdness hits the high seas in this psychological mindbender about a single mom trapped on a not-so-abandoned ocean liner
Trollhunter [Trolljegeren] (2010) – Truth in advertising in this Norwegian “found footage” horror movie about a man who hunts trolls
True Stories (1986) – The Talking Heads investigate the “typical” American town of Virgil, Texas
The Truth About Emanuel (2013)
Tusk (2014) – From the pitch meeting: it’s Human Centipede meets Clerks in the Great White North
Twilight of the Ice Nymphs (1997) – Guy Maddin’s color misfire has intriguing art design, at least
Twister (1989) – Proof that a quirky dysfunctional family comedy can star both Harry Dean Stanton and Crispin Glover and still be boring
Two Tons of Turquoise to Taos Tonight (1975) – Impenetrable avant-garde comedy that’s a collection of not very funny or otherwise interesting scenes
UHF (1989) – Despite the author/star’s name, “Weird Al”‘s TV and movie spoof is only mildly offbeat
The Unholy Three (1925) – Silent film involving hte criminal activities of three carnival hustlers who open a pet shop selling counterfeit parrots
The Unknown Man of Shandigor (1967)
Until the End of the World (1991)
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017)
Vampire Burt’s Serenade (2020)
Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl (2009) – Gory Japanese horror/comedy sees DG fight FG for the hand of a handsome high school lad
Vanishing Waves (2012) – A scientist working on a method to enter others’ minds falls in love with his test subject, a woman in a coma, in this erotic science fiction film from Lithuania
Visitors from the Arkana Galaxy (1981)
Vixen Highway 2006: It Came from Uranus (2010)
Viy (1967) – Classic Gothic horror about a seminarian who must spend three nights praying over the corpse of a witch produced in the Soviet Union, under-seen in the West
Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women (1968)
Welcome to Nowhere (Bullet Hole Road) (2013)
Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995)
Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory (1961)
Werner Herzog – Radical Dreamer (2022)
What? [Che?, AKA Diary of Forbidden Dreams] (1972)
Where the Wild Things Are (2009)
The White Ribbon [Das Weisse Band: Ein Deutsche Kindergeschichte] (2009)
White Tiger [Belyy tigr] (2012)
The Wick: Dispatches from the Isle of Wonder (2013)
Wild Tigers I Have Known (2006)
Wild, Wild Planet [I Criminali della Galssia] (1965)
The Wild World of Batwoman (1966)
William S. Burroughs: A Man Within (2010)
Winners Tape All: The Henderson Brothers Story (2015)
Winter of Frozen Dreams (2009)
Wishmaster 2: Evil Never Dies (1999)
The Witch Who Came from the Sea (1976)
The Wizard of Speed and Time (1988)
The Wolf Man (1941)/The Wolfman (2010)
The Wonderful Land of Oz (1969)
Wristcutters: A Love Story (2006)
X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key (1972) – video review
Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain (1983)
TV/WEBSERIES/MISCELLANEOUS
“30 Coins” [“30 Monedas”] (2020)
“Abnormal: The Cinema of Nick Zedd”
“The Adventures of Superman” (1952-1958) – Episode guide: Season 1, Part 1; Season 1, Part 2; Season 2; Seasons 3-4; Seasons 5-6
“Batman” (1968-1968) – Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
“Betty Boop, The Essential Collection” – Also see Vol. 2.
“Boris Karloff’s Thriller” (1960-1962) – Episode guide: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5
“Brand New Cherry Flavor” (2021)
“Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance” (2019)
“Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency” (2016)
“Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency,” Season 2 (2017)
“Frankenstein’s Monster’s Monster, Frankenstein” (2019)
“Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities” (2022)
“I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson” (2020-2021)
“Junjo Ito Maniac: Japanese Tales of the Macabre” (2023)
“The Kingdom” (1994, 1997)/”The Kingdom: Exodus” (2022)
“The Man Who Fell to Earth” (2022)
“The Mighty Boosh” (2003-2007)
“Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures” (1997-1989)
“Paul Anthony’s Talent Time” (2008-present)
“The Paul Lynde Halloween Special” (1976)
“The Prisoner” (1967-1968) – Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
“Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” (1964)
“Russian Doll, Season 2” (2022)
“Saturday Morning with Sid & Marty Kroftt”
“Scott Pilgrim Takes Off” (2023)
“Serial Experiments Lain” (1998)
“The Star Wars Holiday Special” (1978)