We really, really wish this movie existed.
Anonymity – Maison Margiela FW27
POD 366, EP. 188: KANSAS BOWLING’S “CUDDLY TOYS” AND MORE WEIRD MOVIES
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Discussed in this episode:
Cuddly Toys (2022): Kansas Bowling‘s firecracker mondo-mockumentary about the dangers facing teenage girls is screening in various cities, No official site, but the movie is available on Blu-ray or VOD (it’s even free now on Amazon Prime).
- Giles Edwards’ Cuddly Toys review
- Kansas Bowling website
- Kansas Bowling Instagram
- National Sexual Assault Hotline
The Acid Eaters (1968)/Space Thing (1968): Read Alfred Eaker’s review of The Acid Eaters. AGFA/Something Weird pairs the wild low-budget acidsploitation trip with a more obscure 1968 sexploitation movie, Space Thing, about which little is known. Buy The Acid Eaters /Space Thing.
Buffet Infinity (2025): Read Giles Edwards’ Apocrypha Candidate review. Watch a series of local commercials to reveal a secret occult conspiracy in this amazingly inventive (and weird) low-budget comedy; now on Blu-ray with commentary from director Simon Glassman and producer Mike Peterson, and lots of bonus features. Buy Buffet Infinity.
Digger (2026): Tom Cruise shoots for an Oscar in Alejandro González Iñárritu‘s environmental satire that aims to be a modern Dr. Strangleove. In fact, the film has divided critics and preview screeners who see it as a “pretentious” train-wreck—just the kind of Hollywood movie we like to put on our radar! Digger official site.
Donnie Darko (re-release): Read the Canonically Weird entry! A 4K restoration of a true weirdo classic in theaters from Oct 2-4 only, with a new filmed introduction from director Richard Kelly reflecting on the film’s enduring legacy. Check out Fathom for showings near you.
Jesus Christ Superstar (1973): Read Shane Wilson’s review. The anachronistic cult rock opera retelling of the Passion gets the 4K treatment (Blu-ray and 4K UHD included). Buy Jesus Christ Superstar.
Studio Ghibli Steelbooks: There are actually too many titles to list here, as it seems that this week Shout! Factory issues a limited edition steelbook Blu-ray of every single Studio Ghibli title (including 2 canonically weird movies). Buy Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, or, for rich folks, buy the entire Miyazaki set.
“Three Films by Leos Carax”: This Criterion collection set includes the early Carax movies Boy Meets Girl, Mauvais Sang, and The Lovers on the Bridge. All star Denis Lavant and exhibit at least a moderate degree of French weirdness. Buy “Three Films by Leos Carax.”
WHAT’S IN THE PIPELINE:
Next week’s guest on Pod 366 will be young director Xavier Terhorst of the new underground movie My Vegas Eyes. In written content, Michael Diamades covers the new lesbian coyote feature Bouchra, Shane Wilson stays Halloweeny with a deeper look at Brian De Palma‘s Sisters (1972), Giles Edwards reviews the new underground occult mystery When the Sun Stands Still, and, as mentioned in the podcast, Gregory J. Smalley plans to dig into 2026 Oscar hopeful Digger. Onward and weirdward!
IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: HYSTERIA (1997)
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DIRECTED BY: Rene Daalder
FEATURING: Patrick McGoohan, Amanda Plummer, Michael Maloney, Emmanuelle Vaugier
PLOT: Clinical psychiatrist Dr. Samuel Fry delivers an especially troubled patient to the only place he believes can help, the remote Langston Clinic, where he discovers that the cure for mental illness may be worse than the ailment.
COMMENTS: “Welcome to the last good old-fashioned madhouse!” exclaims Dr. Harvey Langston, and he does not deceive. They just don’t make mad scientists like they used to, and Hysteria is a throwback to that wonderful time, both historically and cinematically, when society just threw all its lunatics into one big Gothic mansion and trusted to let God sort it out. The fun is in seeing just how nuts people are going to get, and once you’ve made the decision to cast Patrick McGoohan as your mad scientist and Amanda Plummer as his majordomo, you’re setting the crazy bar pretty high.
A prologue hints at a sinister explanation for what’s going on at the Langston Clinic (and is quickly forgotten), but soon after Fry’s arrival, the real secret is revealed: Dr. Langston has pioneered the use of neurotransmitters to establish a mental link among everyone at the clinic, patients and doctors alike, turning the whole place into a kind of hive mind. The result is that the afflictions of these patients are shared among the group, meaning anyone could suddenly lapse into Tourette’s or begin stuttering or suddenly rip open their blouse. Hysteria‘s great innovation is not that everyone in the asylum is crazy, but that the crazy is collective. This spirit informs the film’s wildest scene, in which a sexual encounter is appreciated far more widely than one might expect.
Despite moments like this, or a surprisingly moving scene in which a victim of paralysis attempts to crowdsource the ability to dance, Hysteria isn’t weird so much as it is ambitious. Presenting itself as a traditional horror flick in which a lone man must do battle with the forces of insanity, it eventually reveals itself to be a lunatic-themed metaphor for “it takes a village.” It’s arguable that everyone we meet is at least a little bit wacko, especially our hero Dr. Fry, esteemed clinical psychiatrist and clear voice of reason in a world gone mad. Of course, the only reason he is driving his troubled patient to a mysterious clinic in the woods is because he’s blown up his spot in the big city, raging out at a policy that favors drugs over hugs and fiercely determined to rescue this woman for whom he secretly harbors a crush. We buy in because of Michael Maloney’s passionate demeanor and plummy English accent, but the movie wants you to know you’re backing the wrong horse.
Hysteria is best enjoyed as a fun bit of misdirection masquerading as a traditional horror. The effort is aided its strong cast, including McGoohan playing both paternal and happily demented, and Plummer as the true mastermind, earning pathos through her full commitment. (Special shout-out to Vaugier, who successfully accomplishes the two tasks set before her: to play convincingly crazy and to look beautiful when called upon to take off all her clothes.) It’s far from groundbreaking, but moves in enough unexpected directions to reward the casual viewer: a good old-fashioned madhouse.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
(This movie was nominated for review by jamesoliva76. Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)
I think this movie is weirder than average
I think this movie is better than average
IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: THE BUBBLE (1966)
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AKA Fantastic Invasion of Planet Earth
DIRECTED BY: Arch Oboler
FEATURING: Michael Cole, Deborah Walley, Johnny Desmond
PLOT: When a storm, and his passenger’s birth pangs, force a charter pilot flying a pregnant woman and her husband to make a sudden landing during a storm, the travelers find themselves trapped in a strange community.
COMMENTS: Another brainchild of Arch Oboler, The Bubble is an odd little curiosity. Oboler had a surprise hit with the first American 3-D picture, Bwana Devil, in 1952. Fourteen years later, he tried to replicate this success, despite the subsequent boom and bust of the 3-D fad. Not only do The Bubble‘s technical gimmicks hearken back to the 50s, its plot derives heavily from another cheap sci-fi horror flick made ten years previously, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). But while Body Snatchers would earn a place in the American psyche, and become subject to numerous remakes (along with Night of the Living Dead, the zombie film these earlier efforts anticipate), The Bubble never gained quite the same degree of cultural cachet.
The Bubble begins in the heart of the action. A young married couple, Mark and Cathy, plan a brief stay in a remote mountain cabin before she gives birth to their first child. They hire a charter pilot, Tony Herric, to fly them to their destination but their plans go awry when they encounter unexpected bad weather and Cathy goes into labor. After losing radio contact, Tony makes a sudden descent onto what he thinks is a landing strip, but turns out to be a deserted stretch of road flanked by street lamps. Having no idea where they are, the trio seem to experience amazing luck when a cab pulls up out of nowhere.
“Cab, mister?” asks the driver.
Mark and Tony hurriedly explain how they need to get Cathy to a hospital ASAP.
“Cab, mister?” replies the driver, as though he hasn’t heard a word they’ve just said.
They manage to make it to the hospital, but since the baby is a month premature, the doctor insists on keeping him in a incubator for at least a week. While Cathy recovers in the hospital, Mark wanders empty streets, trying to find a working telephone. Having no luck, he finally runs into Tony at a bar that looks suspiciously like a saloon from a Western movie set. Here they encounter more odd behavior from the bartender. Like the cab driver, he’s a one trick pony. He polishes glasses and repeats the phrase, “What’ll it be, gents?,” but that’s it.
The 3-D action heats up a little when a cabaret dancer performs, her fishnet-stockinged legs projecting off the stage into the audience, which includes the very appreciative Tony. He then offers her a drink, and in an otherwise unexplained moment, the tray of beer bottles and glasses floats off the counter and flies across the room—
Continue reading IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: THE BUBBLE (1966)
APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: DEMONIA (1990)
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DIRECTED BY: Lucio Fulci
FEATURING: Meg Register, Brett Halsey, Lucio Fulci, Lino Salemme
PLOT: An archeological dig unleashes vengeful ghosts. 
WHY IT MIGHT MAKE THE APOCRYPHA: It’s a matter of balance with Fulci: do the weird parts outweigh the boring parts? Consider Un Chien Andalou. That movie has a razor blade slicing an eyeball. Fulci (famous eye assassin, apparently settling a score from childhood where optometrists beat him and took his lunch money) has a cat jump up onto a woman’s face and chomp her eyeball out and eat it, amid a screaming swarm of clawing kitties. This, in a film that would play well next to a Rollinade, complete with otherworldly dream logic and characters that act like anything but normal human beings with brains. Fulci is oft-capsuled in our pages, but never listed. One Fulci madhouse or another should ultimately claim the throne of weirdest, and we just as well might pick this one, if not The Beyond.
COMMENTS: Demonia is chock full of images you don’t see everyday. Fulci outdoes himself in his notoriously over-the-top death scenes. One notable flashback has a nun collect a fresh-born baby swaddled in blankets and then unceremoniously toss it into a flaming altar to burn. In a super-imposed effects shot, we see the baby’s arm amid crackling flames sticking out of the blankets as it uncurls its fist into a very distinct middle finger salute. So, there’s no shortage of off-the-wall death scenes. You could also pick the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it scene where a naked cultist nun ghost materializes brandishing a ghost-harpoon-gun, only to fire a very physical harpoon into some guy’s gut and quickly vanish.
The trouble with this title is the parts between the deaths: talky, boring, slow-paced, sloppily written. Fulci released Cat in the Brain, a parody with the director playing himself as a director who gets Hollywood hallucination fits after his sanity is taxed by directing endless gore scenes (a plot ripped off in Evil Ed) in the same year. Just sayin’. Fulci wasn’t exactly swinging for the pro leagues in 1990. In Demonia, Fulci is so low-effort between gore scenes that he might as well carry around a margarita to sip as he plays a police inspector who fruitlessly tries to solve these ghost murders.
What holds this movie back and divides Fulci fans? The acting is atrocious all around, the characters make no sense and are all dumb as cheese, the dialog is flat, the plot might as well be steered by dartboard, the low budget production makes everything look cheap and dirty, and Fulci phones in a performance of himself phoning it in. The first half hour’s slow pace almost kills it, but this is largely just set-up for characters that will later die to the ghost-nun rampage like so many roaches writhing in bug spray fumes. The second two-thirds grinds to the film’s advantage as the craziness starts to pile up. How many ways can we kill a person? How about tie this guy’s legs to two different trees so when you trigger the trap, they split him in two? The non-murder parts also have quirky details worth mentioning, Continue reading APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: DEMONIA (1990)