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WHAT’S COMING: “THE 366 WEIRD MOVIES GUIDE”

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It’s been whispered around these parts for a while, but, as I look over proofs, I finally feel like the time is finally ripe to make an official in-print announcement:

The Big Book, “The 366 Weird Movies Guide,” is coming. Yes, you’ll soon finally have a physical record of the 366 Weirdest Movies ever made to put on your bookshelf! Something physical and tangible, that will last long after this Internet site has dissipated into the ether.

We don’t have a firm date, except to say the book will arrive in the 2024 calendar year, courtesy of film publishing specialist Bear Manor Media.

The text of the “Guide” does not simply repeat the already published web content. Many of the reviews are entirely new, written by a different contributor than the one who wrote the original. In other cases, the entries are condensed and perfected versions of the originals, with the fat cut out to leave a punchier, more powerful statement about what makes that particular movie a weird classic.

The “Guide” will be available in two formats: either split into two volumes in sturdy hardcover, or in one convenient (if thick) softcover book. Copies will be available for purchase from major retailers, and a smaller number directly from us (I’ll even autograph those, upon request).

We would appreciate it if you would purchase it. It was years in the making.

We’ll drop more nuggets of info as the project develops.

After the book is published, I had originally considered radically revising and redesigning this website. The problem is, that’s a time-consuming process, and instead I would prefer to move on to my next major project: a work of fiction, although one with a weird movie spin. So, for the the time being, the website will remain as you see it before you, with new content and reviews (and Apocrypha!) continuing to accrue.

We also plan to continue Pod 366 for the foreseeable future, and to expand its scope and reach with more guests, platforms, and digital doo-dads (a theme song? A sponsor?)

So that’s where we’re at. The “366 Weird Movies Guide” is the culmination of a large and exhaustive process that has personally brought me much gratification. I hope it will bring readers a smaller, but not inconsiderable, amount of pleasure.

Thanks for indulging us wit this self-serving announcement, and see you tomorrow for the latest episode of Pod 366, where we’ll talk to some of the team behind the telepathic handkerchief horror-comedy Hanky Panky (2023).

List Candidates

APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: KATERNICA (2023)

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DIRECTED BY: James Edward Newton

FEATURING: Fran St Clair, Paul Richards, Annabella Rich, Anna Fraser, Tony Mardon

PLOT: A theater student discovers a forgotten one-act play; its production triggers mysterious disturbances in the lives of both her sister, an aspiring actress, and a washed-up thespian attempting to resurrect his career.

Still from Katernica (2023)

WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: Alarming theatrics—both narrative and cinematic—couple with puzzling body horror, resulting in a baffling and unnerving foray into the improbably verité realm of stage-on-screen.

COMMENTS: Fill me in out-of-focus nougat, dip me in close-up chocolate syrup, and call me an Art House Bar. Katernica is a film about a play about madness, and it could only fall deeper into somber-sweet pretension if it were French instead of British. But mysteriously, this languidly jumpy beast keeps your interest. The characters are broadly relatable and interesting; the coat hanger plot frame holding up the story is quirky; and there’s an undercurrent (and over-current) of something strange—and even more so, it introduces one of the most bizarre characters I’ve ever seen on screen.

With a cast of five, everyone’s at least a little bit interesting. Esther shows an academic’s pluck in decrypting an obscure little play. Her sister Eve fascinates with a mysterious pregnancy and similarly mysterious emotional history. Jerry elicits both sympathy and disdain as a washed-up director. The doctor (named, I should tell you, “Katernica”) turns the knob from coldly unpleasant Eastern Eurotrash archetype to something neat to behold. These four are the main movers and shakers in the story, ticking events forward to a mid-film bit of nastiness and the final scene: a monologue delivered at Art House amped to eleven.

But then there’s Mister Case. This guy… the only (admittedly poor) comparison I can make is to the post-encounter Edgar from Men In Black. We first hear him, painfully expressing the importance of saving Eve’s baby, then see him in a blurry close-up. With every line of dialogue, with every movement, it looks as if he wants to rip out of this suit of human skin that so obviously pains him. He has a very shadowy ambition (which comprises the second of the two interesting and weird things about Katernica), and enlists the aid of the doctor—and the unwitting aid of the pregnant actress. As both a role and a performance, Mister Case is unfailingly, and fascinatingly, creepy.

Katernica has its shortcomings. From my modest encounters with theater, I know that Katernica is accurate—but I simultaneously feel that as a genre it’s best avoided on film. But, of course, sometimes a little rough-cut gem happens. James Edward Newton, the director and co-writer, puts before us something both flashily mundane and obscurely menacing—not unlike an unlabeled box of mixed confectionery.

Katernica [Blu-ray]

Katernica [Blu-ray]
  • A mysterious play envelops the lives of an ambitious drama student, her actor sister, and a washed-up director in a surreal nightmare.
Check Price

 

It Came from the Reader-Suggested Queue, List Candidates

APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: DEATH POWDER (1986)

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Desu Pawuka

Weirdest!

DIRECTED BY: Shigeru Izumiya

FEATURING: Takichi Inukai, Rikako Murakami, Shigeru Izumiya, Mari Natsuki, Kiyoshirô Imawano

PLOT: In a robot’s dying moments, it spews out a mysterious dust that bounty hunter Kiyoshi inhales, causing his body to undergo drastic physical changes and sending him on a terrifying mental journey.

Still from Death Powder (1986)

WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: Death Powder manages to stretch out a visual bouillabaisse to an hour, cramming into a short block of time all of the trippy imagery and body horror that anyone could want. It may be considered a forebear to the “New Flesh” genre, but it easily stands on its own merits as a twisted piece of cinema.

COMMENTS: There are a lot of things a movie can do to catch our attention here, but one surefire way to get us to consider a film for the List is to dispense with the niceties of filmmaking—e.g. discernible plot, delineated characters, visual clarity—but pay them just enough lip service to let the viewer know that they’re going out the window. The first 20 minutes of Death Powder deftly accomplish this, teasing out a proto-neo-Tokyo in which leather-clad, fedora-wearing private contractors chase down robots in a city drenched in neon and rain, like a stepping stone between Blade Runner and Akira. Until Kiyoshi’s hand falls off, that is, at which point Death Powder becomes something very different indeed.

Once he is infected with the titular substance, Kiyoshi can see all, including the impending arrival of the strangely defaced mafia called the Scar People that employs him. He also flashes back to a sort of origin story, a jarring and hilarious jump to what is essentially a rock-star/scientist’s product launch. There’s an immediate change in tone as the robot’s inventor comes leaping in wailing on an electric guitar while the robot—bearing the ominous name “Guernica”—smiles and delivers her personal stats. Kiyoshi also undergoes physical changes, like a grotesquely misshapen face, as well as the sudden ability to punch a man in the face so hard that his head explodes.

Death Powder brings to mind the Greg Bear story Blood Music, in which a man injects himself with self-aware nanoprobes and unwittingly instigates a global biological singularity, as much as it does 1980s Japanese cyberpunk. Guernica speaks to Kiyoshi in his head, making it clear that she intends to propagate herself, and that this is just the beginning. Sure enough, when a group of hitmen arrive, artsy images of maggoty innards and liquid-drenched monster masks convey their demise. It’s not hard to imagine that all of Tokyo will soon join them in an enormous writhing blob.

The copy of Death Powder that I watched (twice, in an effort to make sense of the thing) was dark and muddy, but having seen other clips and stills from the production, I think that’s how it’s meant to be. The film looks like it’s been shot equally on film and video; the good Dr. Loo’s infomercial features classic video toaster effects, and a fight scene includes a character kicking an inset box. But the lo-fi elements only end up adding to the film’s charm. There’s something tight and compact about Izuyima’s vision, how readily he conveys a physiological disaster brought about by technological hubris. This is a movie with the wisdom to get in, confuse and horrify, and get out in a tight hour, with a jaunty saloon singalong to send you on your freaked-out way.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“…a bizarre and barely comprehensible one-hour short… surreal to the point of madness… ” – James Belmont, AnOther Magazine

(This movie was nominated for review by Charlie. Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)

Pod 366: A Weird Movies Podcast

POD 366, EP. 71: SO MANY MOVIES, AND A CAT

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Quick links/Discussed in this episode:

Belladonna of Sadness (1973): Discussion begins. Read the Canonically Weird entry! A presumably beautiful 4K UHD disc of the cult rape/revenge/witchcraft anime. The bad news is it’s being released by Discotek, who normally traffic in popular anime rather than art-house stuff, and who are advertising no special features. Buy Belladonna of Sadness.

Cemetery Man (1994): Discussion begins. Read the Canonically Weird entry! A 4K UHD of the surrealist zombie flick arrive from Severin, with old features ported over from Blu-ray, plus new interviews with director and star Rupert Everett. Buy Cemetery Man.

Cry-Baby (1990): Discussion begins. Read Gregory J. Smalley’s review. What may be ‘ least weird film, with young as a 1950s “drape” who can cry a single tear on command, comes to 4K UHD from Kino Lorber, with the director’s cut of the film and a slew of extras on the included Blu-ray. Buy Cry-Baby.

David Lynch update?: Discussion begins. has something for us to see and hear coming along on June 5. That’s all we know. David Lynch’s mysterious announcement on Twitter.

House of Screaming Glass (2024): Discussion begins. A woman inherits a “spooky” house from her grandmother, and inside she finds evidence of witchcraft as she begins hallucinating. The only place it seems to be available is Fandango at Home. House of Screaming Glass official site.

Kin-Dza-Dza! (1986): Discussion begins. Read the Canonically Weird entry! Deaf Crocodile brings the previously unavailable-in-North-America late-Soviet sci-fi comedy to Blu-ray. Restored with commentary by critic Walter Chaw and lots of interviews as extras. Buy Kin-Dza-Dza!.

“The Other Dimension and the Films of Fabio Salerno”: Discussion begins. A collection of the complete works of an unknown (in the U.S.) Italian microbudget horror filmmaker. Promotional materials call the work “dreamlike” and “the missing link between and George & Mike Kuchar.”  Buy “The Other Dimension and the Films of Fabio Salerno.”

Paganini (1989): Discussion begins. Read Alfred Eaker’s review. ‘s last acting role is also his only directorial effort. He cast himself as a narcissistic, libidinous, demonic version of the Italian composer, in a film with nearly pornographic sex scenes. Previously underrepresented at best on physical media, Vinegar Syndrome gives it a lavish Blu-ray release in a 2K restoration with a commentary track and a host of interviews from surviving cast and crew. Buy Paganini.

Quantum Cowboys (2022): Discussion begins. A Western, animated in twelve different styles that drift through quantum realities. Arrived out of nowhere but with an impressive cast that includes Lilly Gladstone and appearances from , , and alt-country musicians Neko Case and John Doe.  Buy Quantum Cowboys.

Sasquatch Sunset (2024): Discussion begins. Read Gregory J. Smalley’s review. The Zellner brothers strange Bigfoot dramedy arrives on Blu-ray. Buy Sasquatch Sunset.

WHAT’S IN THE PIPELINE:

Next week’s guest(s) on Pod 366 will be and Nick Roth, actors/directors of the telepathic handkerchief comedy Hanky Panky. In written reviews, Shane Wilson inhales the hallucinogenic Japanese Death Powder (1986), while Giles Edwards gets lost in Katernica (2023). Also, Gregory J. Smalley will give you a short update on the new 366 book coming out, and the site’s plans going forward. Onward and weirdward!

Celebrating the cinematically surreal, bizarre, cult, oddball, fantastique, strange, psychedelic, and the just plain WEIRD!