14 Bizarre Movies Everyone Should See
I love movies and I know I’m not alone in this. Every once and awhile I like to sit back and watch something that isn’t of the norm, something that is bizarre. Some of my favorite movies of all time are also some of the more bizarre movies I’ve seen. Here is small selection of movies that I think are excellent movie, but also very bizarre. Hope you enjoy, please comment!
Eraserhead
Eraserhead is a surrealist-horror film written and directed by David Lynch, and released in 1977. The sound accompanying this movie is frankly a disturbing concoction of industrial score and white noise with undercurrents of musical hall and sonorous church organ, it is almost an extra character in the film, and easily it’s most prominent factor.
Brazil
Brazil is a 1985 film directed by Terry Gilliam. It was written by Gilliam, Charles McKeown, and Tom Stoppard and stars Jonathan Pryce. In an Orwellian vision of the future, the populace are completely controlled by the state, but technology remains almost as it was in the 1970’s. Sam Lowry is a civil servant who one day spots a mistake in one of the pieces of paperwork passing through his office. The mistake leads to the arrest of an entirely innocent man, and although Lowry attempts to correct the error, it just gets bigger and bigger, sucking him in with it.
Pink Floyd’s The Wall
Pink Floyd The Wall is a 1982 musical film by British director Alan Parker based on the 1979 Pink Floyd album The Wall. The screenplay was written by Pink Floyd vocalist and bassist Roger Waters. The life of the fictional rock star ‘Pink’ is the subject of the visually evocative cult film based upon the music and visions of the group Pink Floyd as portrayed in the album of the same title. Relationships, drug abuse, sex, childhood, WWII and fascism combine in a disturbing mix of episodic live action and lyrical animation drawn by British caricaturist Gerald Scarfe.
Battle Royale
Battle Royale is a 2000 Japanese film based on the novel of the same name and directed by Kinji Fukasaku. It was written by Kenta Fukasaku, and stars Takeshi Kitano and Tatsuya Fujiwara.Ninth-grade students are taken to a small isolated island with a map, food, and various arms. They have to fight each other for three days until the last one remains, and they are forced to wear a special collar that will explode when they break a rule..
Clockwork Orange
A Clockwork Orange is a 1971 satirical science fiction film adaptation of a 1962 novel of the same name, written by Anthony Burgess. The adaptation was produced, co-written, and directed by Stanley Kubrick. In a futuristic Britain, a gang of teenagers go on the rampage every night, beating and raping helpless victims. After one of the boys quells an uprising in the gang, they knock him out and leave him for the police to find. He agrees to try “aversion therapy” to shorten his jail sentence. When he is eventually let out, he hates violence, but the rest of his gang members are still after him.
200 Motels
200 Motels is a 1971 musical film featuring Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention, produced at Pinewood Studios, England. Directed and written by Frank Zappa and Tony Palmer. Absurd and witty, 200 Motels is a mixture of musical, opera-rock and sitcom truthfully conveying the catatonic state of any rock band on the road. Includes The Dental Hygiene Dilemma segment, animated by Chuck Swenson.
A Scanner Darkly
A Scanner Darkly is a 2006 film directed by Richard Linklater based on the novel of the same name by Philip K. Dick. The film tells the story of identity and deception in a near-future dystopia constantly monitored by intensive high-technology police surveillance in the midst of a drug addiction epidemic. To give the film its distinct look, the movie was filmed digitally and then animated using interpolated rotoscope over the original footage.
The Magic Christian
This is a 1969 film directed by Joseph McGrath and starring Peter Sellers, Ringo Starr, John Cleese, Raquel Welch, Christopher Lee, Richard Attenborough and Roman Polanski. It was loosely adapted from the 1959 comic novel by U.S. author Terry Southern. Most mainstream critics have been quite negative on the film, especially for its extensive use of black humor.
Mulholland Drive
It is a surrealistic, neo-noir psychological thriller directed by David Lynch, and starring Naomi Watts, Laura Elena Harring and Justin Theroux. The film tells the story of an aspiring actress named Betty Elms, newly arrived in Los Angeles, California, who meets and befriends an amnesiac hiding in her aunt’s apartment. The story includes several other seemingly unrelated vignettes that eventually connect in various ways, as well as some surreal scenes and images that relate to the cryptic narrative.
Surf Nazis Must Die
An earthquake leaves the California coastline in ruins and reduces the beaches to a state of chaos. A group of Neo-Nazis led by Adolf (Brenner), the self-proclaimed “Führer of the new beach,” take advantage of the resulting chaos by fighting off several rival surfer gangs to seize control of the beaches. Meanwhile, an African American oil well worker named Leroy (Harden) is killed by the Nazis while jogging on the beach. Leroy’s mother “Mama” Washington (Neely), devastated by the loss of her son, vows revenge. After arming herself with a handgun and grenades, she breaks out of her retirement home and sets out to exact bloody vengeance on the Surf Nazis. What a bizarre movie!
Even Dwarfs Started Small
A group of dwarfs confined in an institution on a remote island rebel against the guards and director (all dwarfs as well) in a display of mayhem. The dwarfs gleefully break windows and dishes, abandon a running truck to drive itself in circles, engineer food fights and cock fights, set fire to pots of flowers, kill a large pig, torment some blind dwarfs, and crucify a monkey. Ohhh haha little people.
Little Otik
When a childless couple learn that they cannot have children, it causes great distress. To ease his wife’s pain, the man finds a stump in the backyard and chops it and varnishes it into the shape of a child. However the woman takes the root as her baby and starts to pretend that it is real. When the root takes life they seem to have gained a child; but its appetite is much greater than that of a normal child. When you watch the trailer you’ll realize why the movie is on this list.
Scanners
Darryl Revok is the most powerful of all the scanners, and is the head of the underground scanner movement for world domination. Scanners have great psychic power, strong enough to control minds; they can inflict enormous pain/damage on their victims. Doctor Paul Ruth finds a scanner that Revok hasn’t, and converts him to their cause – to destroy the underground movement.
Tron
Programmer Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) has been swindled. His former colleague Ed Dillinger (David Warner) stole the ideas for several popular arcade games from Flynn. Flynn is sure that if he can get inside his old company, he can successfully crack the system and find the stolen code — proving that it’s his. Ok so this isn’t the most bizarre, but it’s definitely an awesome one.
What? Where’s Jodorowski’s “Holy Mountain?” Or “Candy”? And I’m afraid the weirdest movie ever made is “Can Heironymous Merkin ever forget Mercy Humppe and find true Happiness?”
[...] can be dangerous (funny pic) -Here’s a main reason you may be more likely to get laid -14 bizarre movies everyone should see -Rape Game gets high school student put in jail -5 common Facebook terms that plague us daily -The [...]
Where the hell is Gummo?
[...] 14 Bizarre Movies Everyone Should See – [Gunaxin] [...]
where the fuck is the dark crystal?
Altered States should make this list.
I agree, Gummo should definitely be up there in addition to Tideland. Also, Eraserhead is the strangest movie I have ever seen. I was in a daze for two days after viewing it, not knowing or understanding what I had seen.
popurls.com // popular today…
story has entered the popular today section on popurls.com…
no happiness?
Yes, these are strange movies, but “Naked Lunch” would have been a great addition. (That movie freaked me out)
Blah blah blah. When Evil Dead 2 or Videodrome doesn’t make this list, I’LL SWALLOW YOUR SOUL!
some great ones mixed with some really really weird twisted ones.
Ichi the killer and sympathy for lady vengence should be added.
Forbidden Zone. The movie no one’s seen, but is f*ing weird yet extremely entertaining.
What about Freaked? I mean Mr. T is a bearded lady! Bobcat Goldthwait is a dude with a sock for a head! Keanu Reaves is Ortiz the Dog Boy! It’s the only Non Bill and Ted movie that had Bill and Ted in it! It has Rastafarian Eyeballs with Uzis!
And how about Teeth? Two words: Vagina dentata. ‘Nuff said.
What about the old classic….Fantastic Planet?
Piano Tuner of Earthquakes should be there
What about The man who fell to earth with David Bowie? Seems to be a forgotten classic!
What about “Lost Highway”, “Donnie Darko”, “Blood Simple”, “Blue Velvet”, or “Memento”?
Where’s Japanese film, “The Katakuris”?!? Or “Visitor Q”?
of the movies you chose, I think Battle Royale is by far the superior one…as for “Little Otik”, not bad, but Svankmajer’s “Faust” is a much better realized example of his craft…
Twin Peaks
No Troll 2. No list.
I agree that Gummo should be on that list.
My dad took me to see Eraserhead when I was 11. It completely fucked me up.
Surprised Riki-Oh wasn’t on this list.
Awesome that you mentioned Battle Royale!
Being John Malkovich????
Good list, I’ve seen most of them. Would have definitely included Bob Balaban’s film “Parents” on the list.
WHAT ABOUT “Funny Games”?
Liquid Sky. See it.
Anyone ever heard of “Bad boy bubby”, that is a seriously disturbing movie!
no lost highway?
Wait, you have to have some rules here. You can’t count movies like Forbidden Zone, which are weird just to be weird, even if it’s just as a way to be funny (though FZ is great!) Also you can’t just count nonlinear storytelling as “weird”. Or anything by Sam Raimi, David Lynch, David Cronenberg, Guillermo del Toro, the Coen brothers, or Jim Jarmusch. Those are just too easy.
Well, OK, you can count them if you want.
Google image search “Zardoz”, then try to un-see the pictures of Sean Connery you get back. Holy flying g-strings Batman.
I’m amazed nobody mentioned Pi. That’s the most paranoid movie I’ve ever seen. And Naked Lunch (breaking my rule about no Cronenberg) left me gagging every time I thought of it for about two weeks. (But in a good way.)
jodorowski’s holy mountain, or Gozu by takashi miike
How could you forget Harold and Maude? If that’s not bizarre nothing is.
In place of Linklater’s bland science fiction adaptation, why not mention the movie where he first made use of the bizarre rotoscope animation: Waking Life? It’s a superior movie, and definitely a lot stranger than A Scanner Darkly was.
Nice job doing a copy and paste from Wikipedia for the description of movies.
[...] Here is the original: 14 Bizarre Movies Everyone Should See | Gunaxin [...]
Jacob’s ladder !!
What, no Time Bandits?
Bump for The Kentucky Fried Movie! Still, it’s a good list. You could easily make one that’s 50 titles long.
Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter! …assuming we are talking about weirdness and not quality.
Where’s “Sweet Movie” or “W.R. Mysteries of the Organism”???
Dude, stop ripping off other peoples comments….Like you Eraserhead caption…. You copied it from http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074486/usercomments-56
Great list. Some I’ve never heard of. Also check out:
The Monkees’ “Head”
The Who’s “Tommy”
“Triplets of Belleville” Frech-Canadian animated feature. too weird for words
“THX-1138″ George Lucas’s first feature. Dystopic pic starring Robert Duvall. Director’s cut is better.
where is Ken Park, movie was very weird and disturbing
Mulholland Drive, a few good hours wasted. At least there’s only one redeeming scene.
And to put Tron on the list with all of the others? Seriously, you could have easily put the Last Starfighter or Enemy Mine on there as well.
Some cliche choices here. Truly bizarre is “Boxer’s Omen”.
Also missing “Tetsuo” (aka Tetsuo The Iron Man)
“The Dark Backward” should definitely be on this list.
I would have included Phantom of the Paradise (1974)
definetly strange and weird
Wait wait, I got one. Gigli.
[...] 14 Bizarre Movies everyone should see. [...]
That movie scares me to this day. It was just so awkward to watch the retarded camel baby dying D
FrankenHooker, Tetsuo, anything by Park Chan-Wook, Un Chien Andalu, 2001, any Hentai anime, Equus, 1984, etcetcetc
Donnie darko
I agree with heccubus. Nobody should be recommended to see A Scanner Darkly, it’s a terrible boring film with the Rotoscope technique stuck on top for NO REASON. Philip K Dick’s stories deserve to be treated better. Whereas Waking Life uses the same Rotoscope technique, but it fits thematically, and is a more bizarre but far more interesting and thought provoking piece of film-making.
Waking Life should replace Scanner Darkly on this list.
[...] Posts Birmingham Jazz » Blog Archive » Some Random Thoughts at the End of March…14 Bizarre Movies Everyone Should See | Gunaxin… « Edward Arnold Anthony Zappa » © 2009 [...]
I’ve never seen eraserhead.. Now i’m a little scared to.. But matt’s right.. I only watched it cuz my grandma was playing a salvo – bad boy bubby is all kinds of fucking weird..
That’s a great list (although I’m not so sure about “Tron,” “Surf Nazis” or “Scanners,” but every list needs something to generate a little controversy). Obviously, I couldn’t limit myself to just 14 bizarre movies, but here are 14 additional suggestions to check out: “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” (1920), “Un Chien Andalou” (1929), “Orphee” (1950), “Glen or Glenda” (1953), “Carnival of Souls” (1962), “8 1/2″ (1963), “Repulsion” (1965), “El Topo” (1970), “The Devils” (1971), “Begotten” (1990), “Jacob’s Ladder” (1990), “The Reflecting Skin” (1990), “City of Lost Children” (1995), “Tromeo and Juliet” (1996)
I agree Holy Mountain by Jodorowsky is a MUST for bizarre movie fans, but no one here named THE bizarre movie….I even bet you money you can’t find anything as bizarre as the next movie, which is..(drums rolling)
HAUSU !!!! A 1977 japanese film directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. You MUST see that movie, is not only the weirdest thing ever filmed, but a SUPERB cult classic. ENJOY!
[...] 14 Bizarre Movies Everyone Should See [...]
Where is Izo?
Does anyone know or remember the name of this movie? In the begining a dog takes off with a freches big boy arm and takes it home where there is alot more arms. and the dude drives some wierd go cart.
if you know email me notaredneckx@gmail.com
Begotten is one of the best movies I’ve ever seen.
How in the hell can Repo Man not be on the list? It’s the best film ever made.
Other notable exceptions
Jacob’s Ladder
Dellamortre Dellamore (Cemetary Man)
Braindead
City of the Lost Children
Delicatessen
12 Monkeys
Naked Lunch
Donnie Darko
Run Lola Run
Bad Lieutenant
I’m ok with everything but Tron. Bizarre? Not exactly. Watch Gummo and tell me which one you think is more bizarre.
Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom -1975
sweet movie – 1974
A Real Young Girl -1976
and i have to agree holy mountain is way out there
You must see the 1989 version of Dr. Caligary!!! Or the 6 minute film deadsy.
Please continue discussion on the forum: link