Some of the strangest films I've seen.

I'm not sure about this one. I can't say that I really enjoyed it, but I can certainly say that I'm glad to have seen it. This movie is impossible to describe and of all the films I've ever seen, this is the closest I've seen a film resembling one of my nightmares.

The film is completely silent, and displays a series of abstract and crass events that from what I gather - are a parable of both the creation of man, as well as the various forms of suffering that men and women go through. Hard to argue the suffering part seeing as it deals with suicide, deformity, loneliness, torture, rape, death, and murder; but I'm not sure what it has to do with the creation of man.

This truly is the strangest film I can think of. I recommend it and at the same time I don't. Only go into this film if you want something beyond logical comprehension with a mystifying and disturbingly unique visual design. It's an art film, through and through.

Takashi Miike is a director that perplexes me. He's both surprisingly reserved and yet undeniably audacious and crazy. One second he could be making a mediocre drama or run of the mill horror flick, the next he could be making a film that outsteps every boundary of good taste. Miike is well known for graphic violence, dark humour, overt sexuality, and abstract imagery. Gozu is the prime example - a melting pot of crass ideas that form what is undeniably his most bizarre endeavor - and trust me, that is saying A LOT.

With the exception of one scene involving a prostate, a murder, and a ladle - I enjoyed Gozu. Its insanity had a certain energy to it that made it loud and crass, but never obnoxious. It holds your attention and you are pulled along through foul set piece after foul set piece. Gozu is also surprisingly funny, with a strange balance of goofball humour and humour that relies on crude sex gags or violence. From the old lady who breast feeds her 40 year old brother, the murder of a poodle in the name of saving a Yakuza boss, or birth by incest; Gozu is one sleazy and one VERY bizarre film. If you enjoy this sort of thing, you'll love it - but it may be a bit too strange and offensive for some.

Eraserhead is one of my favourite movies. It is one of the few movies to genuinely scare me. Until Begotten came along, I regarded this as the closest to one of my nightmares a movie has come. My nightmares are often bleak, lonely, devoid of colour and life and filled with strange and unpleasant sounds. Eraserhead captures that style neatly, and the whole movie is unnerving and unique.

It's not actually the baby that serves as the most disturbing element of the film (Granted - it's still pretty unpleasant) it's just the way the film itself is made. Every second is strangely somber and creepy, and there's a psychological edge to the film. People have speculated for eons what this film is about, but the most visible and accepted translation is a story about a man who is plagued by a bad relationship and Murphy's Law. He doesn't want to be a father, he doesn't want a wife, he doesn't want responsibility. His wife is cruel and never there, leaving him with his disfigured baby. He constantly attempts to escape, but something always holds him back - even at the whim of the super-natural, as evidenced by the babies ability to come down with sickness just to keep him by its side.

It seems that you either love or hate Eraserhead, but I love it even if I find it just as perplexing as a lot of people do.

Oh look, a movie called "Strange Circus" is appearing on my list of strange films. What a twist. Yet this film deserves its title, this is one of the strangest films I have seen in awhile. It is a very morbid, sick, and disturbing film that relies on sexual depravity combined with surrealistic horror. It is NOT for the faint of heart and is best viewed with an empty stomach.

Yet if you can handle the sickening and grotesque imagery, this is a unique and elegantly made picture (As elegant a picture dealing heavily with subjects such as child rape, incest, mutilations etc. can be....) and if you want something shocking and disturbing to the core, this may be for you. I can't say I loved it - rape is a very, very touchy subject for me and I did not how frequently it was brought up in this film. Yet even though this film pushed what I consider to be good taste, it BARELY escaped what I could deem offensive - and so I was able to enjoy some of the artistry underneath.

Tetsuo is a very unpleasant, very strange, but very memorable film. I saw it mainly due to my wife (who is Japanese) and her love of this picture. While I found some scenes to be unpalatable, in the end I found myself fascinated with this abstract gem.

The film deals with a "Metal Fetishist" (And what a perfect genre to slip this movie into, it's a Metal Fetish movie.) who is injured by a Salary-Man and gets his revenge by turning the Salary-Man into an ever expanding and sickeningly grotesque and cruel man made of, well, Iron. The visuals are slick and have that raw feel that I like to call "Nightmare-Vision," and as I stated with Begotten and Eraserhead; I feel that this visual style evokes my own personal nightmares more than most other films.

Let it be said... this is the greatest film I have ever seen in my life. I have a love of both good and bad movies, and Forbidden Zone somehow stands on both precipices. On one hand - it's gross, offensive, exploitative, silly, abstract and utterly bizarre. On the other hand - it's a loving tribute to an age of more adult cartoons long past and classic 30s music and culture.

The film was made by Richard and Danny Elfman; and was Danny Elfman's first score. He also has a cameo as possibly the best devil ever; any devil that sings a rendition of "Minnie the Moocher" has earned my soul. The film appears to have a budget that can't even be called shoe-string; sets are scribbled on cardboard walls and a good chunk of the background is wrinkly black tarp that's supposed to represent open space. Yet it all adds to its surreal charm. This definitely is one of the weirdest flicks ever, but it is also one of the funniest and if you don't mind the weird and sometimes offensive content - it is pure, undiluted fun. This movie ALWAYS cheers me and my wife up, and we even perform it on stage at a local midnite movie theatre.

Can't believe I forgot about this one for this list. Cat Soup is certainly one of the strangest animated films I've ever seen - and that's saying something. I was fairly young when this came out - and it scared me then, and it scares me now.

It's very much a fairy tale, but it doesn't know whether it wants to be classic Grimm or Mother Goose. Despite the cute visual style and protagonists, there is some very, very dark imagery in this twisted little flick; from a montage of death featuring nuclear bombs, execution squads, etc. and a scene in which a man wearing a gimp suit with giant scissors tries to cut our heroes into meat for a giant pot of soup.

Yet as genuinely surreal as this thing is, I still enjoyed it. It can be a bit tough to swallow seeing as so many insane things happen in the span of 30 minutes and it certainly transcends its simple premise (A reaper like fellow tries to steal the soul of a young kitten, but her brother defends her and the soul ends up splitting in half, and they set out on a journey to get the other half of her soul back.) but if you want something... uhm, different; it is worth a look.

I do not understand this film fully, and I doubt I ever will. It is so fractured and abstract that even the disturbing revelations that the audience does learn don't make much sense... but you know what? That's why this film is so great. It is like no other movie and it paints a poetic and dark fairy tale and thankfully, it is very competently made. The movie looks beautiful and picturesque. Definitely worth a look, even if you do not like Asian horror films.

Ahh, Ken Russel. I could easily populate this list with Ken Russel films. Russel even somehow managed to make the psychedelic rock Opera Tommy even stranger than it already was. There's no denying that Ken Russel is an imaginative fellow... it's just a shame he isn't a very good director.

His films just aren't very well made and rarely work. Gothic does, and it doesn't. For me it was a somewhat disappointing film. The problem is, it has a great story and idea but amateurish direction, low-grade stock, and more plague it. Regardless it is worth seeing for its inventive content, and it does provide some interesting scenes that are genuinely disturbing.

The film itself is about Mary Shelley, the woman responsible for the legendary novel "Frankenstein; or, the modern Prometheus" and follows a night of sex, drugs, and depravity that lead to her inspiration. The film wants to be a classic portrayal of a nightmare, and when it works; it works; but when it doesn't, it comes off as a bit silly. Regardless - it's one of the only Ken Russel films that I actually enjoy, even if it could have been paired with a more talented director.

Dead Leaves is one of the few films on this list that ISN'T a horror movie, but rather an action comedy and it certainly takes the cake as the strangest one of those I've seen. It also takes the cake for being the most energetic and twisted action film I've ever seen. When I walked out of the theater, my wife & I had whiplash and after Dead Leaves it's practically impossible to look at loud, fast paced boom fests like Transformers and not say they move at a snails pace.

Dead Leaves is a film of raw, undiluted, juvenile energy. Some people like to leave their brain at the door, but you might want to take it in just in case you need some grounding. From the second the film starts, it is always loud and crass but thankfully it doesn't have time to be obnoxious. In fact - it's kind of fun. It may be as juvenile as can be, consisting entirely of juvenile sex gags (Haha that guy has a drill on his penis) and a gory and violent jail escape. The only time this movie stops is a painful scene of exposition that explains the reason behind the strange genetic experiments, but thankfully during this scene a character becomes pregnant and almost instantly gives birth to a being that gets the action flowing again.

It doesn't outstay its welcome at only about 45 minutes, and if you like anime and crazy stuff like this - check it out, if not for its bizarre and unique rush of energy and inventive visual style.

This, along with David Cronenberg's "The Fly;" Chan Wook-Park's "Lady Vengeance;" and Richard & Danny Elfman's "Forbidden Zone" make up my all time favourite movies. There has never been a movie like The Wall before it, and there will never be a film like it after it.

The strangeness of the film precedes it - many people like to say "It is impossible to understand without drugs." I call bull. Sure, it can be pretty abstract but it all has meaning. Every frame and every note and noise has some context, but only hardcore Floyd fans apply - thankfully I fit that niche as Floyd is my all time favourite band. I may not know the meaning behind every piece of this film, but every time I watch it I learn more.

What makes it unique in the long run is the fact that it is in a nameless genre that no other film occupies. It would be easy to classify it as a musical drama, afterall it's a very dramatic picture and the music drives the story - but it relies on the conventions of neither. No one truly bursts into song unless you count a scene at a concert where it was called for. In fact - no one truly speaks. It is all narration, it just so happens that narration rhymes and is set to music. I love musicals, but I know a lot of people who don't and yet I'd still recommend this film to them. It's visuals are haunting and while many will mostly remember the psychadelic animated sequences, the entire look of the film is mesmerizing and oddly enough the scene that sticks out in my mind as the most disturbing and most memorable was the image of a child-hood Pink walking through a desolate wasteland only to wander into a hospital to find his older self cowering in a corner completely insane.

Let me express something: Fooly Cooly isn't just a stylish and wacky comedy. People give me funny looks when I say this, but I actually derive a genuine sense of drama, art, and reflections on life from this piece and it is a very personal series. It reminded me of my childhood. I was much like Naota, and my life partner Chie is undeniably the strange and complex psyche of Mamimi.

It also prominently features The Pillows. I spent most of my childhood in Japan despite being an English fellow at birth, and The Pillows were my favourite band. So if nothing else; people can at least understand why I identify with the use of The Pillows score for this show.

Yet the reason you are here is to read about weirdness and there is no denying that this is a pretty strange piece. It's got plenty of abstract energy, the animation flits back and forth in style and it features a guy wearing sea-weed above his eyes in a vain attempt to impress women and headwounds that blister into electric guitars. I recommend it to anyone who is into anime though, even if they don't connect with the underlying drama - they can at least enjoy the crazy energy, genuinely funny humour, and a style that has been unequaled in the history of anime. The company that made this piece, Gainax, has tried several times to recapture the flair and unique style that made this a cult hit but have failed on almost every count.

Here is the first in a trend you will soon notice: Cronenberg films. Cronenberg is my all time favourite director, and he has turned out some very strange works. Naked Lunch is probably his most off the wall, and that is why I consider it his strangest; even if another film that will be mentioned earlier is truly stranger in the long one.

Anyone who has read William S. Burrough's gross and shocking novel will know that it is pretty much 100% impossible to adapt his novel; so Cronenberg didn't bother. Instead, the film is about the writing of the novel - but the narrative is structured like the novel, and many elements from the novel do make an appearance and it certainly does retain the crass elements of its highly controversial source material.

Like any good Cronenberg, this movie is filled with abstract bodily fluids and inhuman images. Yet this movie is not a horror; no, it is a comedy. There are some unnerving elements, but the film is lined with a sort of sick and warped humour that it takes a viewer with special taste to enjoy. If you can laugh at a cross-dressing doctor who harvests an aliens insemination fluid or a typewriter that turns into a slippery amalgam of various sexual organs, then you'll probably enjoy the twisted genius of this film.

Awhile ago, I did an essay on the infamous video nasties. I viewed nearly the whole list in about a period of a month (The only 2 I did not view were I Spit on your Grave and Faces of Death. I had already seen and despised I Spit on your Grave, and I have no desire to see Faces of Death) and while most of them were trash, there were a few gems hidden amongst the seedy ranks; one of them is the truly strange and highly inventive "Possession."

My wife likes this film even more than I do, namely because she is studying sexual psychology and this is a fine example of it. Andrzej Zulawski is a surprisingly talented director and this tale of a wife finding her pleasures lying with a creature from the beyond is surreal and certainly worth checking out.

I saw this recently, and all I can say is that you MUST see it. The Japanese word "Jigoku" means hell, and that is what this film is.. Hell. One of the most haunting, disturbing, bizarre and memorable depictions of hell ever put on screen. This is a movie very much ahead of its time, and even today is shocking and yet brilliantly made. Definitely recommended if you want to see something bizarre, disturbing, yet memorable and unique.

It pains me to say this... but I do not like this movie. I am a Cronenberg devotee and in truth, this is one of his most refined films but the subject matter is far too outlandish even for my tastes. My wife, however, likes it a bit more due to her interest in sexual psychology, and the film itself deals with a man who finds sexual pleasure in car accident victims. I drew the line when he began making love to an open flesh wound. The film is fiendishly bizarre and very unpleasant.

As most people know by now, Peter Jackson got his start not making things like Lord of the Rings or King Kong but rather starting off with trash. Bad Taste and BrainDead are often regarded as B-Movie classics, and why not? They're hilarious, gory, and foul. Yet neither are as strange as his second effort - Meet the Feebles.

While it may not be as gory as BrainDead by ANY stretch, it makes up in bodily fluids. What bodily fluids? Pick one. It doesn't have to be a real one, just pick one and assign it to a random orifice. There's a 90% chance that it is in this VERY strange film.

If you ever wanted to see The Muppets deal with drug addiction, the vietnam war, pornographic movies and cold blooded murder - then you'll no doubt enjoy Meet the Feebles. Its cast is just as outlandish as the film itself, being completely and utterly reprehensible and foul - yet somehow that makes their characters more memorable, not more annoying. It's a pretty gross and bleak comedy, and one strange one at that.

Like Cat Soup, I'm shocked I didn't add this earlier - especially seeing that I absolutely adore this film. Unlike the HORRENDOUS adaptation of "Tomie" that came the year before, Uzumaki (Japanese for "Spiral") actually does some justice to the Junji Ito comic it is based on. It isn't perfect, unlike the comic the film isn't really all too scary, save for a couple scenes and the genuinely disiturbing shots in the films epilogue.

Yet it makes this list for being utterly bizarre. Even the premise is bizarre, it is about a town cursed by spirals. Sound strange? Well, it gets weirder from there. People transform into snails, a man commits suicide by snapping his bones and curling himself up inside of a dryer making his body a spiral, a girls hair grows into several spiral shapes and strangles her - and many other utterly bizarre and strange sequences. It works as a dark comedy as well as a piece of curious and imaginative fiction.

Another Cronenberg, and my favourite next to his masterpiece; "The Fly." VideoDrome is sort of where Cronenberg hit his stride. The Brood was a great film and Scanners was trashy fun, but VideoDrome marks the point where Cronenberg truly learned how to make his strange and outlandish ideas do more than just confound the viewer; with this film, he learned how to dig under your skin.

VideoDrome is a brilliant and disturbing film and the whole film is just plain weird, but the weirdness is what makes it so great. We are viewing a distorted reality through the eyes of a man going insane - and it sure feels like it. We are subjected to a genuine feeling of insanity and outlandish fear, and the subject matter is gripping and disturbing. Highly recommended.

Jacob's Ladder is, in my eyes, one of the greatest horror films ever made. Period. That's saying a lot seeing as I'm a connoisseur of horror films from all over the planet. Jacob's Ladder is definitely a very strange and unique film, though I do wish to emphasize that it is a different kind of strange.

Much of the "Strange" I've been covering on this list is loud, crass, or shocking. The strange part of Jacob's Ladder is actually how the subtle juxtaposes the more shocking elements. What makes this such an effectively strange and terrifying film is the reality we are forced to accept. The scenes that are perceived as nightmares are far more sane and grounded in reality than the ones that take place in the "regular" world; a cruel and unusual hell, to be sure. I'm tap dancing around spoilers here - but people who have seen this films ending will know exactly what I am talking about.

I know what you are saying - "Why is an Uwe Boll film on here?" Well... have you SEEN Postal? This is one weird goddamn movie. I'm going to say something I never thought I'd say and actually state that I somewhat enjoyed this film; in fact it was probably the weirdness that attested to that.

True - a lot of the jokes were painful and just baaaaaaaaaad, but some were so bizarre and non-sequitur that they carried a tiny bit of wacky genius. Fat jokes? Boo. Uwe Boll in Lederhosen being attacked by a man in a giant penis costume? *smirk* WHAT THE HELL? *giggle smirk followed by straight face* Okay then. The ending was also undeniably funny, shame it's ruined on the films poster.

Another Miike film - and easily his best. It really pisses me off that the cover to the releases of this film shows as much as it does. The thing is - this isn't truly a horror film. This is a romantic tragedy with a thriller twist. Most of it is suspense and character building. It just so happens that the love interest - Asami - has had a very unpleasant life, and in the last 40 minutes of the film Miike forces you straight into the mouth of madness and you experience Asami's trauma first hand as it all leads up to her inflicting her anger on another in one of the most disturbing and shocking bits of cinema ever.

It works as a thriller with a bleak and uncompromising emotional twist, and as terrifying as Asami becomes in the films final scenes she is truly a tragic and sympathetic character. Regardless - the way the film portrays her trauma and the revelations of her past onto the director Aoyama is strange, nightmarish, and undeniably abstract which is why it is on this list.

Never has a films title so perfectly encapsuled what you should expect from a movie. This is a collection of Dreams, and as well all know Dreams rarely make sense or follow the logic of reality. Dreams are also unique to the dreamer - so this is one of Kurosawa's most personal ventures; thankfully, his talent and imagination make them interesting and stylish. It can be an up and downer - despite its visual impressiveness, I was not fond of the first dream and I didn't much care for the sci-fi one involving nuclear radiation much either. Yet other people may feel different, simply due to varying tastes.

However I did enjoy the film overall and all the other dreams impressed me in some way. My favourite was the dream in which an artist chases Vincent VanGogh through his paintings. The scene is one of the most beautiful sequences ever put to film and I get chills just writing about it. I also loved the somewhat Twilight Zone-like dream in which a former Army general is haunted by the ghosts of his troops. Dreams is an ethereal and beautiful film, and it represents the haunting and ethereal world that lies in the human mind perfectly.

This would be higher on the list, if it weren't for the fact that the allegorical contents of this unique picture are actually quite easy to follow up on. Yet the film is still a bizarre film - particularly in its visuals, which are quite reminiscent of Terry Gilliam's work for the Monty Python shows.

Yet Fantastic Planet lives up to its name - it has a thought provoking story, but it actually manages to captivate the audience with its bizarre visuals. This truly is a fantastic and strange planet, and while we may not get some big description of how things work there, the film understands that all it needs to do is to show us; something many films fail at.

Dr. Frankenstein gets off by squeezing human organs; and as the name suggests, the movie was produced by Andy Warhol. 'Nuff said.

Tommy is a pretty crazed flick, but it gets a low rating on this list mostly because you can tell that Ken Russel is trying a bit *too* hard to be trippy. Compared to a couple of his other films (Such as Gothic, mentioned earlier in this list) which feel naturally strange.

To be honest, I've had mixed feelings about this film. "Tommy" is one of my favourite albums and simultaneously one of my favourite Stage musicals. A lot of dumb decisions were made with this film, like assuming that big name actors who've never been in a musical film can sing. There's also the fact that Ken Russel's direction is clumsy and often forced. But there are still things to enjoy about the movie Tommy. I absolutely love the "Acid Queen" scene, both for its craziness and for an absolutely fantastic performance from Tina Turner. Let's also not forget Elton John's appearance in "Pinball Wizard," which was popular enough he later covered the song.

Really? Really? I have to justify my inclusion of a film called "Death Bed: The Bed that Eats" on a list of "Strange films"? Okay, fine. This truly is a strange one though. It could've just been a gore film, but instead the director and writer of this picture decided to have existential narration and some overtly complex and obtuse method of explaining how the bed came to be possessed.

It also appears everyone is psychic and contains the ability to communicate through inner-monologue. If you want a taste of this film, let me use this time to plug an internet-funny man: The Cinema Snob. I actually sent a donation of this film (As well as a donation of "Weasels Rip my Flesh") as that is how he finds most of the films he reviews, and it ended up on the show. Watch his review for a few laughs as well as an understanding of how weird this movie really is considering its simple premise.

The Guinea Pig series, for the most part, isn't worth your time. It is just tactless and boring torture and wanna-be snuff. Yet a friend coaxed me into watching the 3rd, and I have to admit - I.... liked it?!? It wasn't just pointless torture (Though it's still very grotesque and disturbing in terms of visuals.) it was an incredibly asinine, bizarre, yet somewhat entertaining dark comedy.

The film is more or less about a man who gets depressed and tries to commit suicide, but winces out because he can't stand the pain of even the tiniest cut. However, when his lover leaves him, he tries it again. There was no pain, yet he took out a massive chunk from his wrist. He bends over and expects to bleed out but no blood comes. Then he chops his head off, nothing doing. He cannot feel pain, and he cannot die. Ensue quest to die. If you want something f**ked up and don't mind the graphic and twisted violence - this one is actually kind of an entertaining dark comedy and a departure from "Lets strap someone to a bed and torture her for an hour."

I don't need to say anything to qualify this films weirdness, just check this scene from the film. NSFW. http://vimeo.com/15495910

Okay, okay... I will say something about this film: It is hilarious!! Definitely worth while if you like cult B-Movies, and admittedly this is one of the most wild and insane ones in recent memories. It mocks many of the traditions of the zombie genre, but traditions tend to get thrown out of the window when the zombies themselves are constantly erect, constantly ejaculating men powered by an evil Viagra type virus. Yes, I am totally serious about that by the way.

I'll admit, unless you count "Sweeney Todd" I actually have yet to see any of Sacha Baron Cohen's films. However, I recently woke up to hear my wife laughing her arse off, walked over to the computer, and saw Bruno's talking, constantly swinging penis. I kept watching, I had no idea what the hell was going on - all I knew is I had to see what happened next. This is by no means the strangest film on the list, but it's still VERY demented. Afterall, it has a swinging, talking penis. It was hilarious though, and piqued an interest in Borat that I honestly didn't have before.

I'll admit, I was hesitant to add this. This movie disappointed me greatly, the original graphic novel "Gyo" by Junji Ito was one of the greatest pieces of Japanese horror EVER written. It was disturbing, creative, and excellently written. It is a shame then, that the recent animated "Gyo" was a missed opportunity, removing the emotional elements of the manga, truncating the story and replacing characters with stereotypes...

But at the end of the day, it was still "okay" and if there's one thing it captured perfectly - it was the visuals. The animation and artwork is actually VERY high quality for an OVA, and it brought the hideous creatures of the graphic novel to glorious, horrifying life. I won't lie, seeing the corpse-walkers actually... well, walking was undeniably chilling and bizarre, and the films last act does stick to the source material and creates an excellent atmosphere.

At my wifes request, I actually gave another one of the "Guinea Pig" films a chance - despite the worthlessness of the first two, even if I did get a few kicks from the 3rd. She also convinced me to give it a try by saying that it was based on one of Hideshi Hino's original stories, rather than his piss poor attempts to tell story on film in the first two. (The "story" of the first two films: Torture! The end.)

And thankfully, this actually felt like one of Hideshi Hino's drawn stories. That also means that it successfully managed to genuinely disturb the hell out of me; it may lack some of the weird poignancy of some of his better stories like "Panorama of Hell" (If you have the stomach for it, check it out. It is brilliant.) but it's just as horrific. The premise is VERY simple, an artist finds a mermaid in the sewers of Japan and puts it in his bath, and studies it in his artwork; even as it contracts a sickening disease and suffers, decomposing and mutating alive. It's not pleasant, the direction sometimes is poor, but if you can handle the typical disgusting qualities of the body horror genre, this is a genuinely disturbing and VERY odd piece.