CULT MOVIES : Great Cult Movies For Cult Movie Lovers
Jan 06 '04
The Bottom Line 20 Cult Films you can probably find,that don't show up too often on Best Cult Film lists.
Aargh! I can’t possibly do justice to Cult Films with one bursting at the seams article and list. It is, after all, the little films, and cult films that made me fall in love with movies. So many seem so much more important than they really are. I found out I’m weird and different because of my affection for some of these odd strips of celluloid. I also discovered groups of people who love some of 'em even more than I do.
What is a cult film? What is Love? Oh sorry. You can define it in dozens of ways and there are scores of sub-genre categories that can fit under the cult banner.Cult movies shouldn't be mainstream movies... well usually... unless the mainstream movie really tanks at the box-office and so it moves into the so-bad-it's-good category of cult films... but I digress. Where was I? Ah yes, what is a cult film? Usually they aren't mainstream movies with big stars that received wide distribution. They probably aren’t easy to describe and probably aren’t ones that you would describe at dinner tables with non-cult lovers present. Sub genres would include gore films, sexploitation films, blaxploitation films, science fiction and horror films, foreign films, motorcycle movies, drug movies, psuedo documentaries, gross-out movies (early John Waters for instance), nudist camp movies, roughie movies, erotic film (but not porno) movies, intentionally campy movies, unintentionally campy movies, laughable tear-jerkers, porno movies (I suppose), Art films, experimental films, short films, animated films, take-off or parody films (that aren’t made by Mel Brooks, the Zuckers or Wayans), tasteless black comedies, not for everybody parables and message movies, Troma movies, Giant 50s Monsters, Hammer films (maybe), Anthology tale films (Dead of Night, Tales from the Crypt, Creepshow, etc. etc) and dozens of more sub genres.
You can argue that a movie like RETURN OF THE SEACAUCUS SEVEN which was ripped off and remade as THE BIG CHILL is a cult film. You can call an important, influential film classic like Buster Keaton’s Sherlock Junior, or The Passion of Joan of Arc or Chris Marker’s 1962 short film LA JETEE’ (the inspiration for TWELVE MONKEYS) cult films simply because they are not well known and are not ‘normal’ films.
Here’s a list of 6 films most categorize as cult films:
Rocky Horror Picture Show
Eraserhead
Pink Flamingos
Repo Man
Night of the Living Dead.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
They are widely known at least by title and reputation by even casual film-goers. The first 3 didn’t do particularly well when they were first re-leased in theaters but upon re-release and midnight showings they became incredibly successful and have generated 100s of millions in revenues from spin-offs, videos, cable t.v. showings, DVDs, merchandising, etc.
So they really aren’t cult films by definition any more unless millions of fans constitute a cult to you.
There are some who call MEMENTO-- one of the most successful and highly rewarded independent films of the last 10 years a cult film. It’s a genre film with an interesting creative twist that became a critics darling. It’s different and it wasn’t released or distributed by a big studio and so a lot of people figure it’s a cult film.
Monte Hellman movies are cult films. Two Lane Blacktop is fairly well known, but films like Cockfighter and Ride the Whirlwind even less so. They break lots of rules, aren’t mainstream films, and don’t comfortably fit into a particular category. Some critics have adopted them and write about them, but their audience will never be huge.
Some will find them dull, esoteric films. Others won’t quite understand the films or like parts of them or performances in them but not the entire film.
Then you have a film like MEAN STREETS or AFTER HOURS or KING OF COMEDY that might fit into a cult film category, but these are made by Scorcese and have been seen and accepted by way too many people to seriously consider them cult films.
HAROLD AND MAUDE is a cult movie in several ways; dark comedy, tabu subject matters, innovative use of music, not marketed as a mainstream movie; but it’s known and loved by far too many people to seriously call it a cult movie. It’s sold more videos and DVDs that some of the movies that appear on the 100 greatest moneymakers of all time lists. It seems perfectly correct however to refer to it as a cult movie. It seems also correct to refer to THIS IS SPINAL TAP, TAXI DRIVER, SATYRICON, TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, A SHOT IN THE DARK, THE PRODUCERS, LIFE OF BRIAN, TIME BANDITS, BANANAS, BLADE RUNNER, THE THING WITH TWO HEARDS, GLENN OR GLENDA, ROBOT MONSTER, MARK OF THE DEVIL, SWITCHBLADE SISTERS, COFFY, and many, many others as cult films. Some of these films were very popular when they were initially released, others have become known by millions through the years and they all seem to be made of the stuff of cult films, so.. cult films they must be.
Who am I to argue? Call them cult films. That’s what a lot of them have become known as, and I won’t spoil anyone’s party by insisting you shouldn’t call them cult movies anymore. Now when someone insists that a film like Ladyhawke is a cult movie.. well that’s another matter, but in some people’s film-watching experience and in their circle of influence, perhaps the film qualifies somehow, despite the budget, wide distribution, availability, star names involved etc. So be it. People call very successful films like Enter the Dragon cult films too. You can split hairs over a couple of films I will eventually mention in my own list, but I can offer up a pretty good defense that the film’s I’ll be mentioning were at best only popular regionally for a period of time and were not very successful at the box office and have faded with time off the radar of many people.
For my list of cult films, I’ve come up with movies that aren’t as well known as they should be by people who claim they love cult films. I’ll skip over some well known cult films like ‘Bucket of Blood’ and ‘Little Shop of Horrors’, and I’ll forget to give proper acknowledgement to ‘Carnival of Souls’ because if you don’t know about that movie you should and it’s easy to find out about these days. Most of the films on my list aren’t well known but they aren’t so obscure as to be impossible to find either. The few that you have heard of before I think should be more popular and show up on more lists of Great cult films so I’ve put ‘em on mine and come up with what I hope are some interesting factoids. Thanks to DVD most of them you can find…somewhere, but probably not in your local Blockbuster.
20. THE MONSTER AND THE STRIPPER aka The Exotic Ones (1968 – Ron Ormond)
Ron Ormond directed dozens of serials, westerns and television shows during the 40s and 50s often starring cowboy star Lash LaRue before producing writing and directing half a dozen grade z movies usually with his wife, June and later using his friends and son Tim as well. Ron also wrote music and let other producers borrow his recordings to use as soundtracks in their own films (you’ll here Ron Ormond music in some Ed Wood movies for instance). Ron Ormond is not as well known as some other filmmakers that are known for making truly awful but entertaining films like Ed Wood or Phil (Robot Monster) Tucker or Ray Dennis (Incredibly Strange Creatures..) Steckler (aka Cash Flagg), but he should be since he was responsible for incredible cinematic wonders like ‘Mesa of Lost Women’, ‘White Lightning Road’ and ‘Please Don’t Touch Me’. This one starts out like a Travelogue of New Orleans very well shot and then takes us inside the sleazy world of a nightclub owner where we meet some strippers, drug dealers and unpleasant types. There’s also a swamp monster that attacks the strippers and anyone foolish enough to get in the way. The film features Rockabilly Music, lots of topless nudity, and cult country star “Sleepy LaBeef’ as the monster. He rips apart a chicken and even tears off a man’s leg and beats him with it. (It’s not particularly gory but obviously not for the feint of heart either). Just as this movie was being completed, Ron Ormond was ‘born again ‘ after a near fatal plane crash and devoted his life to producing, directing and distributing religious Christian films with his wife and family. Hopefully more of his films will be available on DVD in the future.
19. FLESH GORDON (1974)-- It’s sleazy, vulgar, witty, sexy, rated x, loaded with low budget effects, intentional bad dialogue, intentional stylized wooden acting, and it’s a blast from start to finish IF you are at all familiar with the old Flash Gordon serials starring Buster Crabbe that were extremely popular in the 30s and 40s and again in the 1950s during the early days of television. The film is a sexed up spoof of the serials with something to offend nearly everyone, lots of nudity, completely politically incorrect and sick humor. It is not a porno-film, but it was made by a producer,writer,director team that made many short porno films in the 1970s. Bill Osco is the director and they make the cheapness of the film part of the joke and it works wonderfully if you’re in the mood for naughty sophomoric humor. A movie aimed much lower than low-brow, but it works. The special edition DVD includes a must-have commentary track for anyone that fondly remembers this film during its college film society/ midnight cult film showings in the mid 1970s. WARNING: Avoid the R rated version and the so-called sequel.
18. HEAVY TRAFFIC (1973)-- Fresh off the success of Fritz the Cat, Ralph Bakshi really rolled the dice on this mix of animated and live action which is a character study of a depressed guy from a dangerous neighborhood in New York City conjuring up some cool cartoons and finding some sense of sanity and purpose in his art. Its pretty raw, vulgar and alternates between being funny, depressing and just sleazy. The X-rated version is the one you want to be sure to experience, not the stripped down R rated thing they sometimes show on cable tv. This is the kind of film they wouldn’t even attempt to make anymore.
17. DOLEMITE 2: The Human Tornado (1978) There wasn’t a big cross-over audience for this wild over the top blaxploitation comedy back in the day. Rudy Ray Moore was a Red Foxx kind of ‘blue’ comic who made a string of films where he wrote and cast himself as an action hero. He had a pretty big surprise success with the low budget amateurishly made Dolemite in 1975, so he raised perhaps a couple hundred dollars more for the sequel and did it even.. um better…(?) Moore is no Jim Brown or Fred Williamson and he makes fun of the big and bad macho image like no one else did until almost 20 years later. The opening of this film should have your jaw hitting the floor. I don’t want to spoil a moment of this one for any of you who have yet to discover it. Its packed with nudity, coarse language, and violence. Its low-budget. Moore can’t act, and he fancies himself a player and an R rated rhyming Nipsey Russell character who can pull a few Jim Kelly karate moves. Its utterly ridiculous and absolutely entertaining from start to finish. If you haven’t seen this film and it’s been a long time since you’ve seen a Rudy Ray Moore film, then make sure you see this one (rather than some of his other films). This is the most consistent, over-the-top and most enjoyable one he ever made.
16. SANTE SANGRE: Alejandro Jodorowsky's take on the psycho killer/ slasher genre is so different, you might not even realize what it is until it is almost over and then have to watch it again to make sure. But it's gruesome Fellinesque images are just perfect for a horror film marathon. A dutiful son, is the arms for his Saint-like mother. He will do anything for her, including murder. Full of bizarre and disturbing images (some will consider part of the film blasphemous), and sometimes gruesome gore, this is one of the strangest films you'll ever see. Jodorowsky however has crafted a film that does make sense in a traditional sense (though how it gets there is bizarre) and is not as flawed as El Topo, or Holy Mountain.El Topo incidentally is the father of all cult films, beginning the phenomona of midnight showings in large city theatres with its success in 1970 as a midnight show in a Greenwich Village (NYC) theater. Legal issues stemming from a twisted personal disagreement between the film’s producer Alan Klein (and now his daughter) and Jodorowsky has kept the film out of circulation for years (though it briefly was released on a Japanese Laser Disc where the best bootlegs have been made of the film. Son of El Top was in pre-production and may have been shot but legal problems have stopped that project. Jodorowsky is now working on two gangster films—one of them should be released shortly. Jodorowsky at one time was trying to bring Dune to the screen (many years before the Lynch version) and the pre-production work on that project led to H.R. Geiger's making some production sketches that were eventually used in part to create the sets and spaceships of ‘Alien’.
15. Martin 1978- George Romero Martin is Romero (Night of the Living Dead), mixing social satire and comment and gore in a strange modern tale that makes up its own rules about vampirism and addiction. It was ahead of its time. Martin thinks he’s a vampire and lacking fangs and hypnotic powers he resorts to razor blades and needles. He explains: "There's no real magic," he says. "There's no real magic, ever." And becomes a celebrity of sorts with his calls to an all night radio d.j. There’s a lot of interpretations you can form about Martin and that insures it’s not a film for everybody and a cult film hall-of-famer. Is Martin a disturbed serial killer or a vampire?
14. SPIDER BABY (1964 – Jack Hill)
Director Jack Hill, who made such cult favorites as: ‘The Big Bird Cage’, ‘Switchblade Sisters’ and the blaxploitation classic ‘COFFY’, was responsible for this low budget quirky film that was following in the heels of the better known ‘Little Shop of Horrors’ and ‘Bucket of Blood’ by mixing sick humor and horror in one quirky package. This one stars Lon Chaney Jr in good form as the ‘normal’ chauffeur of a very strange family of psychos who have very odd quirks and behaviors. Imagine what John Waters might have done with the Adams family. It’s dated, but I think it holds it very nicely and because it’s not as well known as some others I made it a point of putting it on this list.
13. GOD TOLD ME TO aka DEMON (1977 – Larry Cohen)
Here’s a strange film that slowly reveals a unique occult twist that you haven’t seen before. It’s got a great shocker of an opening and if you look for him, you’ll easily spot Andy Kauffman in a small straight role as a cop. Cohen had been making on location films for several years and made Fred Williamson a star with Black Caesar. He also directed the It’s Alive films and the wonderful Q . He also has written or co-written many screenplays that he hasn’t directed including Maniac Cop and the recent PHONE BOOTH. This one stars Tony Lo Bianco, Sandy Dennis, Richard Lynch.
12. TOO MUCH, TOO OFTEN (1968)
This is one of Doris Wishman’s most polished and best produced 60s films. Now if you have seen Wishman’s early nudie cuties like Nude on the Moon, or early ‘roughies’ like Bad Girls Go To Hell and Another Day, Another Man you know more than a couple a sets, synchronized sound, and dialogue that makes sense would constitute polish and good production. In this R equivalent adult ‘roughie’ film we are introduced to a truly despicable sadistic, misogynistic, creep by the name of Mike Toreen. He supplies a masochistic ad executive some thrills and then blackmails him into giving him a job. He then meets the boss’ daughter and turns her into a sex slave and prostitute and has affairs with other women. Eventually all good things and nasty schemes must come to an end, but there’s much sleaze to be enjoyed before that happens. All of the Wishman touches are here, but this time the plot kind of makes sense and the characters are fairly consistent. 1967s somewhat surreal Twiligh Zone-ish sexploitation roughie INDECENT DESIRES is another best of Wishman you won’t want to miss. Wishman would later make the somewhat recommended, Deadly Weapons, The Amazing Transplant, Love Toy, Let Me Die a Woman, The Immoral Three, A Night to Dismember, Satan Was a Lady and others.
11. KILL BABY KILL -- 1966
Mario Bava made several noteworthy genre films, inspiring Italian directors such as Fulci and Argento to make their own cult classics (DEEP RED, SUSPIRIA, THE BEYOND, DON’T TORTURE A DUCKLING). Bava’s BLACK SUNDAY is a horror classic and his early 70s BAY OF BLOOD, aka TWITCH OF THE DEATH NERVE is the direct inspiration for the slasher movies and Friday the 13th series. He made sex comedies, westerns, a wild super-hero movie: DANGER DIABOLIK and a horror omnibus film BLACK SABBATH. KILL BABY KILL is perhaps my favorite for it is here several horror elements combine with the surreal and something truly nightmarish was created which inspired several modern film makers including David Lynch. The film is a testament to skill, innovation and filmmaking genius as very, very little money was spent making the film and yet atmosphere, mood and several dreamlike effects were convincingly accomplished. Supposed suicide victims are found with gold coins implanted into their hearts. A strange little girl is seen. The superstitious townspeople fear the countess and the huge estate she lives in.
10. THE GIRL WITH GOLD BOOTS (1968/69 Ted V Mikels)
When I first saw the Roger Ebert written, Russ Meyer directed, 1970 camp classic BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, I wondered if the inspiration had really been Ted V. Mikels’ 1968 film, GIRL IN GOLD BOOTS. Even though Jacqueline Susan sued (and lost), the film had little relation to VALLEY OF THE DOLLS except for its title. It more closely resembled BOOTS. When I saw the unbelievably over-produced over-long bomb SHOWGIRLS in 1995, I thought to myself, don’t they realize the plot is identical and the dialogue nearly as goofy as THE GIRL IN GOLD BOOTS (a film made for under $50,000)?
BOOTS is my favorite Mikels movie. It has no gore, no nudity, several bad rock and roll pop songs, un-even acting, goofy dialogue, and an absurd story-line, but I like it better than ASTRO-ZOMBIES, THE CORPSE GRINDERS or THE DOLL SQUAD. This time the genre Mikels delivers to us, is the Show Business Expose. The one where the naïve good girl goes to the big bad city seeking fame and fortune. This time it’s not about a girl trying to be a movie-star or a pop singer or even a world famous model—no… it’s about a girl who dreams of being a go-go dancer in a nightclub.
In fact the film starts out with a credit sequence that looks like a really cheap version of an early Bond movie. Go Go Dancers are groovin’ to a song that someone thinks is much better than it really is. The outfits switch from mini-dresses to bikinis and back to mini-dress outfits again. You will probably notice if you watch the film more than once the lead dancer appears to have on silver rather gold boots on and the lead dancer isn’t the same one that winds up being the star of the film. It’s the wacky world of tiny budgeted picture that can always afford to worry about continuity perfection, folks. This film is pretty silly but always entertaining. It also features my favorite Ted V. Mikels supporting character William Bagdad who plays a nightclub owner’s henchman in this film. Bagdad has more oil on his hair than Jerry Lewis circa 1965 and every so often he twitches and contorts his face stealing every scene he appears in. You just don’t see too many guys that look like Bagdad does in this film and it’s hard to take your eyes off of him (he was also memorable playing John Caradine’s assistant Franchot in ASTRO-ZOMBIES and Joseph in THE DOLL SQUAD). Leslie MacRea (sometimes MacRay) worked with Bagdad again in Mikels’ 1973 epic BLOOD ORGY OF THE SHE DEVILS (which despite the title had very little gore and no nudity) and she played Cinderella in DEATH RACE 2000 and Cindy in COFFY (the Jack Hill/Pam Grier blaxploitation classic).
9. TARGETS (1968 - Peter Bogdanovich)
Roger Corman gave Peter Bogdanovich a few rules, and some money to shoot his first full length feature with as a reward for his hard work fixing other films and contributing to others as a director and editor. Boris Karloff owed Corman three days work, so Karloff had to be in the film. At least 20 minutes from the film The Terror (the famous cheap film with Karloff and Nicholson) had to be used in the film. Bogdanovich bent the rules a bit and spent more money than he was originally supposed to, but his completed film was considered good enough to get a release by Paramount as a good movie, not just a drive-in cheapie. The film is even better today than when it was first made. There are two stories going on in the movie and we wait in suspense for the paths of the stories to cross. Karloff pretty much plays himself as an aging horror star about to retire. He is preparing for a live appearance at a local drive in. Meanwhile a young man has gone psycho, shot his family and has shot cars on the freeway from a water tower and now intends on…. well you can guess. Way ahead of its time, this disturbing film is one you don’t want miss. Lazlo Kovaks shot the film. The recently released DVD has a Bogdanovich introduction and a feature length commentary very much worth listening to.
8. WHERE’S POPPA (1970 Carl Reiner)
Robs dad who was a writer and performer with Your Show of Shows, (Sid Ceasar’s classic ground-breaking 50s tv show) and Steve Allen (the original Tonight show host who was crazier and funnier than David Letterman many years ago) also created the Dick Van Dyke Show. He also came up with this utterly irreverent and very sick comedy which features unforgettable performances from Ruth Gordon (Harold and Maude, Rosemary’s Baby), George Segal and especially Ron Leibman (who was also superb in The Hot Rock with Segal). The story concerns putting Mom in an old age home because she’s just impossible for Segal to handle on his own. Look fast for a young Meathead as a draft resister in a funny courtroom scene. Not for the easily offended. This is a politically incorrect comedy. Which brings us to…
7. GREETINGS & HI MOM! 1968 & 1969/70 Brian DePalma
Counter-culture classics featuring the little known talents of folks like Robert DeNiro, Gerrit Graham, Allen Garfield and others. It’s a very loose satire about the draft, sex and is set in New York City’s Greenwich Village. Greetings is almost plotless, while Hi Mom! focuses on Vietnam Veteran DeNiro who turns his voyeurism into dirty movies to support his protests which involves blowing up buildings. Greetings was originally rated X. Well worth finding and watching.
6. COCKFIGHTER 1974 Monte Hellman
Roger Corman produced this brilliant classic film that’s in my cult list because far fewer people know of it then they should. Warren Oates is at his best, playing a cockfighting near-champion who has taken a vow of silence until he becomes champion. The world of illegal cockfighting in the early 70s is explored. Corman tried to exploit the nudity, violence and Southern settings as a Drive-in Movie and even re-titled it as BORN TO KILL. But it didn’t too well as an exploitation film. The film is a superb character study, beautifully done—one of the best movies of the 70s as a matter of fact and it is not what you are expecting it to be. The Anchor Bay DVD features a superb documentary on Warren Oates as an extra and a good commentary track.
5. KING OF HEARTS (1966 Directed by Philippe De Brocca)
I can’t believe Alan Bates is no longer with us. He’s the star of this international film. It’s a fable, an anti-war allegory, one of the sweetest most heartfelt movies ever made in my opinion. It’s set during World War 1 and involves the inhabitants of a small town finding out the Germans are going to blow everything sky high. As they desert the town they open the gates to the insane asylum and the insane take over the town role playing and having a wonderful time. At first the French/English scout (Bates) doesn’t realize the people in the town are from the asylum. When he does catch on, he can’t seem to get anyone to believe him that the place is going to blown up. There’s verbal, subtle, broad and slapstick humor. There’s romance, satire, a haunting and beautiful music score. There’s a very young Genieve Bujold. One of a kind. Priceless.
4. BREWSTER MCCLOUD (1970- Robert Altman)
Robert Altman surprised the world when his MASH became a huge hit. So he made his next film without much interference from studio heads. It was a box office bomb. Part of Brewster McCloud has something to do with a serial killer, the other part has something to do with the strange boy who lives in the Houston Astrodome and is determined to build and fly in a machine he’s created (played by Harold and Maude’s Bud Cort). Unique, very weird, quirky, bizarre film that some will love and others will just go huh?,
3. FASTER PUSSYCAT KILL KILL KILL (1965 – Russ Meyer)
Russ Meyer’s best film is the story of a three go-go dancing race car drivers who have a scheme to get to an old man’s fortune by seducing, manipulating, and terrorizing everyone around him including his dumb brute son. It’s a wild flick with plenty of cleavage and crisp black and white images (but no nudity). Tura Satana, Lori Williams and Sue Bernard star. Filmmakers from Speilberg to John Waters to Quentin Tarantino have been influenced by this and other Meyer films. It works best with a crowd of appreciative cult movie fans in a movie theater of course, but it’s one not to miss if you get the opportunity to see it.
2. FREAKS (1932- Tod Browning)
This creepy, horrifying tale starred real circus freaks as the sympathetic protagonists and normal people are the antagonists in one of the strangest, creepiest stories every filmed. Browning had made directly several successful Lon Chaney (Sr) films and the classic Lugosi Dracula. This film was attacked by censors as obscene, and pulled from theaters. MGM disowned the film taking it’s logo off the film and selling it Dwain Esper who traveled the country with a couple of prints of it, showing it city by city with other forbidden films and some shockfest movies he made like MANIAC! (1934). It first became popular among cinema buffs in the late 60s and has been restored. I’ve written about it several times before and if you aren’t familiar with this still powerful and disturbing film it is time for you to watch it.
1. EL TOPO (1968/69 Alejendro Jodorowsky) The Granddaddy of cult movies. It started the phenomena known as the midnight movie in New York City. It’s a bizarre, weird, allegorical film of an utterly schizophrenic nature. The first part of the film is like a blood red spaghetti western and if you want to see a weird exploration of several Eastern religions amidst the weird characters, bizarre shootouts and gory violence you can do so. It’s kind of fun to do that. Then suddenly it becomes a blasphemous re-telling of the New Testament with a really brutal and bloody finale that was shot prior to Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch. You’ll be embarrassed if you insist that it’s a good movie, because it has some truly off-the-wall and utterly ridiculous things in the film. It is however unique and few would find it boring.
Here’s several films that are often categorized as cult films and considered to be among the most popular and best of the ‘cult films’. If you ask me many of them were more popular and had a much higher profile than a true cult film should have, but none of them were considered mainstream or top of the line releases. Those that were box-office duds have picked up hundreds of thousands if not millions of fans. Most are on DVD as well. Explore these titles a bit and enjoy.
VANISHING POINT (1971, Richard C. Sarafian); STREETFIGHTER (SONNY CHIBA SERIES), BULLET IN THE HEAD (a John Woo classic), CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE SPOOKY KIND (Samo Hung), THE HARDER THEY COME (1973, Perry Henzell); IN THE REALM OF THE SENSES (1976, Nagisa Oshima); DARK STAR (1974, John Carpenter); THE WICKER MAN (1973, Michael Winner); I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE (1973, Meir Zarchi); CAPTAIN KRONOS: VAMPIRE HUNTER (1974, Brian Clemens); ANDY WARHOL'S BAD (1977, Jed Johnson); DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS (1971, Harvey Kumel); BREWSTER MCCLOUD (1970, Robert Altman); THE HONEYMOON KILLERS (1969, Leonard Kastle); PERFORMANCE (1970, Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg); BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS (1970, Russ Meyer); GET CARTER (1970 Mike Hodges); SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE (1973 Victor Erice): Five Deadly Venoms (1978); The Warriors (1979 Walter Hill);Dazed and Confused (1993); Hard-Boiled (1992); The Mack (1973); Black Caesar; Superfly, Coffy, Waxstacks; Dynamite Chicken; Bad Sneakers, Bad Taste; Meet the Feebles; Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (1985); Un Chien Andalou (1928, France); Akira (1988);The Toxic Avenger (1985); It’s Alive!; The Stuff; Basket Case; Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971); Stranger Than Paradise (1984); Clerks (1994); Slap Shot (1977); Re-Animator (1985); Grey Gardens (1976); The Big Lebowski (1998); Withnail and I (1987); Showgirls (1995); A Bucket of Blood (1959); They Live (1988); Barbarella (1968); Heathers (1989); Rushmore (1998); The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984); Love Streams (1984); Husbands; Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (1987); Bambi Vs. Godzila; Aguirre, The Wrath of God (1972); Walking and Talking (1996); Croupier (1999 Mike Hodges); The Decline of Western Civilization II: The Metal Years (1988, Penolpe Spheeris); Friday (1995); Mondo Cane 1963; Faces of Death (1978); Mommie Dearest (1981); Glory Stompers, Hells Angels on Wheels; Little Shop of Horrors; The Terror (1963); The Ultimate Solution of Grace Quigley (1985), Phantom of the Paradise (1974-Depalma); A Boy and His Dog (1975, L.Q. Jones), The Kingdom (1994 Lars Von Trier), Liquid Sky ( 1983-better remembered than revisited but an interesting very odd, early 80s curio with a gimmick of having the lead actress play both female and male roles); H.G. Lewis’ Blood Trilogy: Blood Feast, Two Thousand Maniacs and Color Me Blood Red (Friedman and Lewis brought the gore film completely out of the closet and into the public); and thousands more that belong on a quick list like this with several I will kick myself for not including (like the 50 or see Hong Kong movies not here including: BLACK CAT, NAKED KILLER and THE SEVENTH CURSE) but I must stop now.
Copyright© Christopher J. Jarmick 2004
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Member: Chris Jarmick
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