Now that we’ve Certified 182 of an eventual 366 movies as Weird, we’re now officially almost halfway through the List of the Best Weird Movies ever made. We’re very near the Point of No Return, about to go over the hump and get on the downhill slope. We’d like you, the loyal (and even the not-so-loyal) readers to chose the movies to celebrate this milestone.

As observant readers notice, some movies make the List on a first screening, while we nominate others as “List Candidates.” Sometimes these films are lovable classics with powerful imagery, but they’re only a little bit weird. Sometimes they’re amazingly bizarre, but utter crap. Sometimes the reviewer was in a bad mood when they screened it and didn’t give it a fair chance. And, although we’d never admit it, sometimes a movie was good enough to make the List on the first ballot, but we were too busy to write up a full Certified Entry that week and dashed off a List Candidate review instead. The end result is that any of the films listed below could have been placed on the List of the 366 Best Weird Movies, but we chickened out and made each of them “List Candidates” instead.

Although these movies arrived at this point by different routes, they’re all in the same boat now. They all need your help to ensure their rightful spot on the List! Usually we only allow readers to vote two films on the List: in celebration of reaching the midway point (and because we have a lot more candidates than usual), we have split the voting into three groups. Please select one candidate from Group A (movies from 1932-1975), one from Group B (1979-2008), and one from Group C (2008-present). You can vote once per day. Voting closes at midnight (EST) on October 29, 2014.

Past Reader Choices that made the List were Alice, Visitor Q, Pink Floyd: The Wall, Trash Humpers, The American Astronaut, Dead Ringers, Keyhole, and Sweet Movie.

Comments are encouraged: maybe you can sway others to vote for your favorite?

You may vote once per day until the poll ends on October 29.

Vote below: Continue reading 5TH IRREGULARLY SCHEDULED READERS’ CHOICE POLL →

Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…

Trailers of new release movies are generally available on the official site links.

IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):

The Canal: A film projectionist suspects his wife of cheating, then discovers archival footage of a murder that took place in the house he now lives in. Another psychological horror in the “descent into madness” genre, this time from Ireland. Reviews have been favorable. The Canal official site.

Giuseppe Makes a Movie: Documentary about Giuseppe Andrews’ vulgar, boozy, super-low budget movies, cast with trailer-park residents and the homeless. This may be both the best, and the only, way for most people to see this Korinesque footage. Giuseppe Makes a Movie official site.

IN DEVELOPMENT:

“Twin Peaks” Season 3 (2016): We’re sure you’ve heard this already, but in case you’ve been in a coma the past week, but David Lynch and series co-creator Mark Frost announced that the cult TV series that brought surrealism into American homes in the form of a police-procedural soap opera will return. Pay network Showtime will be the series’ new home. Lynch will direct all the episodes, producing his first significant film work after a decade of semi-retirement. Sorry we’re late reporting the news, but if Lynch/Frost can wait 25 years between series, we can delay a few days before announcing it. Empire has a nice write-up.

NEW ON DVD:

Choking Man (2006): A shy, possibly schizophrenic Ecuadorian immigrant dishwasher falls in love with a pretty Chinese-American waitress and has animated hallucinations. Not sure why this forgotten indie from the director of that famous “a-ha” video  is suddenly being re-released on DVD, but here it is. Buy Choking Man.

Cult (2013): Three cute female pop idols end up battling a demon when they attend an exorcism as part of a reality show. According to the Twitch quote on the boxcover, it’s a “wacky found footage horror oddity,” which is the kind of thing we tend to look kindly on around here. Buy Cult.

“The Female Gaze: Contemporary Films by Women from Around the World”: Box set of seven international female directed movies, from Film Movement. This is not the sort of thing that would normally catch our attention except for the inclusion of Madeinusa (2006), the story of an isolated Peruvian village where every year sins may be freely committed in the three days leading up to Easter—it’s sort of a Catholic arthouse version of The Purge. Buy “Female Gaze: Contemporary Films by Women from Around the World”.

Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart (2013): A child has his heart replaced by a cuckoo-clock at birth and is told he will die if he falls in love. This Burton-esque animated fairy tale from France is available from Shout! Factory in a DVD/Blu-ray combo pack (neither format sold separately). Buy Jack and The Cuckoo Clock Heart [Blu-ray/DVD Combo].

Sharknado 2: The Second One (2014): This time, the tornado full of sharks is in New York City, and the movie reportedly is more forthright in its comic intentions. The Sharknado movies (and SyFy’s seafood horrors in general) tend to be popular with people who discovered the concept of “so bad it’s good” five minutes ago; but will they have staying power? Buy Sharknado 2: The Second One.

NEW ON BLU-RAY:

Billion Dollar Brain (1967): M1 secret agent Harry Palmer (Michael Caine) goes up against a renegade Texas oil billionaire with a supercomputer who wants to incite a revolution in Latvia. If you ever wondered how a young Ken Russell would handle an assignment to helm a James Bond ripoff , this is your chance to find out. Buy Billion Dollar Brain [Blu-ray].

From Dusk Till Dawn (1996): Criminal lowlifes on the run hide out in a Mexican biker bar that just happens to be home to a tribe of vampires.  Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino‘s first collaboration was a cult success, but no word on how this Lionsgate Blu release differs from the previous Echo Bridge version (if at all). Buy From Dusk Till Dawn [Blu-ray].

Iguana (1988): After a shipwreck, a disfigured whaler makes himself king of the island and tyrannizes those who formerly mocked him. An nearly forgotten ( now out-of-print on DVD) drama-horror from the always unique Monte Hellman. Buy Iguana [Blu-ray].

Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart (2013): See description in DVD above. Buy Jack and The Cuckoo Clock Heart [Blu-ray/DVD Combo].

Nekromantik (1988): Read our review. Seriously: the cheap grime of Nekromantik needs hi-def treatment? Stick to VHS if you just have to watch this trash. Buy Nekromantik (Blu-ray)

What are you looking forward to? If you have any weird movie leads that I have overlooked, feel free to leave them in the COMMENTS section.

Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…

Trailers of new release movies are generally available on the official site links.

VIDEO ON-DEMAND:

The Demon’s Rook (2013): A young man must embrace his demonic heritage to fight off an invasion from Hell. Tribeca Films picked up this over-saturated tribute to early 1980s horror flicks up for distribution, but we haven’t heard anything about a theatrical or DVD release yet—this is the only way to see it, for now, at least. The Demon’s Rook on-demand.

FILM FESTIVALS – Sitges Film Festival (Sitges, Catalan, Spain, Oct 3-12):

Although Sitges as always has a fine slate of fantastic films, they’re more into quantity than exclusivity. We’ve seen most of the offerings at other film festivals (a handful of the features, like the just-Certified Weird The Double, are already out on DVD here in the U.S.). Here are a few notable films we noticed that appear to be debuting there (along with some special screenings of older cult films):

• Accion Mutante (1993) – Spanish horror weirdo Alex de la Iglesia‘s first film was about a group of deformed terrorists who kidnap and mutilate the beautiful. Catch a screening Oct. 5.
• The Distance – An artist imprisoned in a Siberian power plant hires three magical dwarfs to steal “The Distance.” Screens Oct. 5.

• Kiki’s Delivery Service – The live-action version of the Hayao Miyazaki animated classic about a young witch in training looks more like the Japanese version of Harry Potter than anything truly bizarre, but you may want to judge for yourself. Take a chance on Oct. 4.
• Pierrot Lunaire – Provocateur Bruce La Bruce brings his transgressive (and in this case, transsexual) touch to this avant-garde adaptation of Arnold Schoenberg’s atonal composition that now involves a girl’s quest for a penis transplant. Oct. 4.
• Show Pieces – Five short films written by comics god Alan Moore; one involves a stripper and a clown in Purgatory. Screens Oct. 5.

• The Pinkie – An “ugly” girl clones a DIY boyfriend from her would-be lover’s severed pinky in this heavily stylized Japanese exploitation romantic comedy. Oct. 3 only (that’s today, so you probably missed it – sorry!)

NEW ON DVD:

“Betty Boop: The Essential Collection, Volume 4”: Olive Films’ fourth collection of Boop toons is another unthemed jumble of pre-code and post-code shorts, but it does contain her surreal take on “Snow White” (with guest voice Cab Calloway singing a dirge as Betty is borne away in a glass coffin). We do love our Boop ’round here, and it’s gratifying to see restored versions of these classics. Buy “Betty Boop: The Essential Collection Volume 4”.

What are you looking forward to? If you have any weird movie leads that I have overlooked, feel free to leave them in the COMMENTS section.

This post will be a little “inside baseball” for the casual reader of 366 Weird Movies, but it gives at least a little bit of insight into the behind-the-scenes maneuvering that a movie takes on its journey from hopeful new release to Certified entry in the weird movie canon. Bribe amounts are not disclosed in this post: producers who wish to spend your way onto the List, please contact us for a quote. Those who remain curious as to what this masturbatory nonsense is all about may read on.

Those of you who follow this site even casually understand that the backbone and purpose of this entire enterprise is to create a List of the 366 Best Weird Movies of all time. Those who follow us a little more closely will note that we have already certified 179 movies for that List, and those who follow the site closely and are good at math will realize that this means 48.9% of the List is filled in—in other words, we are rapidly approaching the halfway mark, the point of no turning back.

In celebration of reaching the midpoint, soon (before the end of the year, at the very least) we will open up our irregularly scheduled “readers choice” poll to allow you, the 366 Weird Movies fan, to pick which of the movies we’ve designated as “List Candidates” will be officially called up onto the List. Before we do that, I thought that I would go through the List Candidate section and prune off some of the dead weight, movies which were rashly designated as Candidates but which have no realistic shot at making the List. In the interest of transparency and engagement, here are the changes we’re making to the List Candidate section. Note that until a movie is officially Certified for the List nothing is set in stone and its status can move back and forth between Candidate and non-Candidaye, so your feedback here is welcome—I’d be more than happy to reverse myself in the face of a groundswell of opinion.

This morning I counted 161 movies on the roster of List Candidates. Using conservative criteria and choosing to leave a movie on the Candidate list if I thought it was a close call, I came up with 19 titles I thought could safely have their candidacy revoked. In the interest of fairness, I also looked at movies that we had not nominated as List Candidates that probably deserved to be elevated to that status. I discovered 19 movies deserving of such a promotion. This was a complete weird accident, but it defeated the purpose of pruning the Candidate list. With some soul searching I found one additional title to remove so that, after all this reshuffling, the new list of Candidates is exactly one title shorter than it was this morning.

(Note: there are a few movies that are “hidden List Candidates” which aren’t being added to this census because they have re-reviews scheduled).

Let’s start out on a positive note with the roster of movies going up from the ranks of the unrecognized to List Candidate status:

MOVED TO LIST CANDIDATE STATUS: Why did we not consider these in the first place?

Amer (2009) – It seems that back in 2009 we were not routinely marking guest reviews (from reviewers who have since become contributors) as “List Candidate” status. We’re correcting that now.

The Cremator [Spalovac Mrtvol] (1969)

Decasia (2002) – The same explanation as above goes for movies that were only reviewed as part of Alfred Eaker’s Fringe Cinema.

Desperate Living (1977)

Female Trouble (1975)

Flooding With Love for the Kid (2010)

Continue reading LIST CANDIDATE HOUSEKEEPING →

Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…

Trailers of new release movies are generally available on the official site links.

IN THEATERS (WIDE RELEASE):

Tusk: Kevin Smith’s latest horror attempt makes fun of Canadians and involves a walrus. TIFF programmers dubbed it a “double-double of strange,” and subsequent reviewers have chimed in with phrases like “weird and wobbly” and “deeply weird.” Hard to believe it’s getting a fairly wide release, but there you have it. Tusk official site.

IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):

The Scribbler: A woman with multiple personality disorder uses an experimental machine to scrub away various identities. Reviews were generally negative, but Mike McGranaghan thought it was “gloriously bonkers.” Hope you’re right, Mike. The Scribbler Facebook page.

The Zero Theorem: Read James Harben’s review. Terry Gilliam‘s latest dystopian fantasy gets a belated U.S. release. The Zero Theorem official site.

SCREENINGS (We Make Movies Screening Series, Los Angeles, CA., Sunday, Sep. 21):

Way Down in Chinatown: While L. Rob Hubbard didn’t actually love this surrealistic love-it-or-hate-it movie about avant-garde theater during the apocalypse (in fact, he hated it), we can guarantee that it’s 100% weird. We may have an additional announcement about this title soon. If your in Los Angeles, stop by Three Clubs on Vine Street at 7:30. If you say 366 Weird Movies sent you, people will look at you like you’re insane, which could be amusing for you. Way Down in Chinatown at the We Make Movies Screening Series on Facebook.

FILM FESTIVALS – Fantastic Fest (Austin, TX, Sep. 18-25):

The Alamo Drafthouse may be America’s coolest theater. Their brand has grown so big that now they even distribute their own (generally weird) movies. One of the Alamo’s hippest projects is the Fantastic Fest, now in its eighth year. As per usual, there is a fantastic slate of weird movies and some neato revivals here. While there are almost a dozen “of interest” movies showing here that we’ve already noted in our entries on Sundance, Toronto, and other venues, here are some other titles that are special to Fantastic Fest:

• ABCs of Death 2 – Premier of the sequel to the sporadically good, sporadically weird original; the second-string lineup of directors still includes a couple of fascinating names like Bill Plympton and Vincenzo Natali. It opened the Fest, so the premier is past, but you can see it again Sep. 25.
• Blind –  A woman withdraws from the world and begins living inside her own head after she goes blind. Sep. 19 & 22.
• Bugsy Malone (1976) – A special screening of the gangster movie with an all-kid cast (including tiny versions of Scott Baio and Jodie Foster) to promote “Kid Power!,” a book about children in cult movies. Sep. 20, to be followed by a pie fight.
• “Danger 5: Series 2” – Here’s something unusual: three episodes from an Australian TV show about a team of spies dedicated to hunting down Adolph Hitler, who, it turns out, survived his Berlin bunker and who, in the 1980s, is posing as a high school student. Screening together with the Town Called Panic short “The Christmas Log” for a double dollop of kitschy weirdness on Sep. 21 & 25.
• The Editor – A giallo spoof from Astron-6 about a one-handed editor suspected of murder on a movie set. Screening Sep. 20 & 24.
• Free Fall – György Pálfi‘s latest is an anthology of seven absurd stories witnessed by an old woman who has just survived a fall from a seven story building.  Screens Sep. 19 & 22.
• Horsehead – French horror about a woman who explores her nightmares through lucid dreaming. Sep. 19 & 23.
• The Incident – Two separate sets of travelers find themselves stuck in infinite geographic loops in what programmers describe as “a surrealistic sci-fi vision.” See it Sep. 21 or 25.
• Kung Fu Elliot – An actor/director longs to become “Canada’s first action star” with self-produced low budget movies like They Killed My Cat and Blood Fight, but as this self-styled “surreal documentary” continues it seems that his identity is based on a web of lies. Sep. 20 & 24.
• Norway – The story of a dancing vampire, a flaming prostitute, and a drug dealer, and their trip into a subterranean lair. Oh, those crazy Greeks! Sep. 21 & 24.
• The Tale of Princess Kaguya – Studio Ghibli animated Japanese fairy tale about a magic princess discovered growing in a bamboo stalk. Still one screening left, on Sep. 22.
• Tombville – A man wakes up with no memory in a strange town he can’t leave. Part of a heavy Belgian contingent at the Fest. Sep. 20 & 24.
• “The Voice Thief” – We rarely mention short films playing festivals, but this one, about an opera singer who has lost her voice, was co-written by Alejandro Jodorowsky and directed by his son Adan. Catch it as part of the “Fantastic Shorts” program Sep. 20 & 23.
• “Wastelander Panda: Exile” – Six ten-minute episodes of a (web)series about post-apocalyptic samurai pandas we first caught wind of back in 2012. Sep 21 & 24.

Fantastic Fest official site.

NEW ON DVD:

Eraserhead (1977): Read the Certified Weird entry! Here’s an obscure little title some of you may have heard of. The Criterion edition is almost identical to David Lynch ‘s own “Eraserhead 2000″ release, except that it includes a bonus disc of six short films (the same lineup as 2006’s “The Short Films of David Lynch,” minus “The Cowboy and the Frenchman”). Buy Eraserhead [The Criterion Collection].

NEW ON BLU-RAY:

Eraserhead (1977): See description in DVD above. Buy Eraserhead [The Criterion Collection Blu-ray].

What are you looking forward to? If you have any weird movie leads that I have overlooked, feel free to leave them in the COMMENTS section.