List all of the movies with "things are not what they seem" plot device

[Rusalka]

I love this kind of plot device - I'm trying to compile a list of these types of movies. I'll list a few I think would fit, but I haven't seen every movie and there may be a lot more.

"The Matrix "
"The Thirteenth Floor" (excellent movie - my favorite of this genre)
"Dark City"
"Existenz" (Interesting idea but I didn't particularly like the movie)

I didn't see any of these, do they fall into this category:
"Jacob's Ladder"?
"Vanilla Sky"?
"The Game"?
"The Sixth Sense"?

Can you think of any others?

[Otto]

The Usual Suspects
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
Clue
All About Eve
The Wizard of Oz

[Apos]

Naked Lunch. Nothing is as it seems... but you never find out what.

[Earl of the CC]

This one was totally ruined by the previews, but Terminator 2 was one. There was no indication anywhere in the movie that Ah-nold was a good guy until he protected John Conner from the other Terminator. Until then it seemed like there were 2 terminators coming to kill him.

[Rusalka]

I should have said "the world is not what it seems"
Clue, the Wizard of Oz and the Rocky Horror Picture Show don't fit at all.

I'm talking about where the characters *don't know* the nature of reality.

I'm not talking about a plot where you don't know a character's motives - like in Terminator 2.

[Achernar]

The Truman Show

[Liz]

Magnolia
Memento

[Otto]

Originally posted by Rusalka
I should have said "the world is not what it seems"
Clue, the Wizard of Oz and the Rocky Horror Picture Show don't fit at all.

I'm talking about where the characters *don't know* the nature of reality.

I'm not talking about a plot where you don't know a character's motives - like in Terminator 2. Well, with your modification to the premise I would agree that Clue and RHPS (and the others I mentioned) don't meet the criterion but The Wizard of Oz most certainly does. As do any of the Nightmare on Elm Street movies or any other film that's largely dream sequence or hallucination-based.

[Rusalka]

Hmm. Good point, but the revelation that the world "was a dream" in the Wizard of Oz is not central to the movie. Besides, in the original stories, it *wasn't * a dream. Oz was a real place. The movie makers threw that in as an afterthought and it kind of shows.

[TWDuke]

This thread probably should have "spoiler" in the title, since in many of these movies the fact that the revelation that the world is not as it seems comes rather late in the film.

"The Sixth Sense" doesn't fit, "Jacob's Ladder" is debatable.
In TSS, the protagonist doesn't realize an important fact about himself, but the action does take place in the "real" world. Most of JL takes place in the protagonist's imagination, so if you rule out WofO, you have to exclude this one too. Also, the world he imagines is much like the one he lived in, sprinkled with bizarre, nightmarish elements. It is a much less-different reality than, say, Oz compared to a Kansas farm.

[msmith537]

Total Recall
The Others



Jacob's Ladder - Yes
Vanilla Sky - Yes
The Game - Possibly
The Sixth Sense - Yes


If you include The Game, you may also have to include other movies where the main character is the victim of an elaborate conspiracy or hoax:

The Recruit
The Usual Suspects
etc

[TWDuke]

OK, I guess anybody reading this thread should realize the spoiler potential. I still don't think "The Sixth Sense" fits; once you learn the ghosts are real, which is fairly early in the movie, there's nothing else surprising about the film's world. It's the protagonist's perception of himself that's off.

Rusalka, maybe you should define precisely what you're looking for. The list of movies where something is not as it seems to someone is probably nearly endless.

If you count hallucination- or dream-based movies (and in a sense that's what "The Matrix" is), then you should count "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari", "Fight Club" and some versions of "Alice In Wonderland".

If you mean movies where discovering the real nature of the hero's world is a major part of the plot instead of just a twist at the end, how about "Zardoz"?

[blowero]

They Live

[Scarlett67]

Planet of the Apes?

[bibliophile]

What about Frailty?

[Troy McClure SF]

This movie came out in April and is still in theaters. Knowing that "the world is not what it seems" would spoil it.
Identity

[Rubystreak]

Twelve Monkeys?
Dead Man?

[Diceman]

I say that The Sixth Sense counts.

Because: Harrison Ford's world is definitely not what it seems. He's dead! Noone else (except the boy) is aware of his existance, and it's not until the very end of the film that he realizes this.

Total Recall is an interesting case. It might be real, or it might be a fantasy that Arnold purchased from the Memory Implant guys. We never find out which.

[RickJay]

The OP asked for movies where "THINGS are not as they seem," not the whole world. Clearly, "The Sixth Sense" qualifies.

[Troy McClure SF]

Originally posted by RickJay
The OP asked for movies where "THINGS are not as they seem," not the whole world. Clearly, "The Sixth Sense" qualifies.

Four posts later:
I should have said "the world is not what it seems"

[Mockingbird]

Videodrome, and almost every other movie David Cronenberg, directed comes to mind.

[DataZak]

Errmm...Diceman? Bruce Willis was in Sixth Sense, not Harrison Ford (see your spoiler tag).:)

[Jervoise]

Originally posted by QueerGeekGirl
MagnoliaCan you explain this one? I've seen Magnolia a few times, but saw nothing to indicate the world is not what it seems.

[SenorBeef]

Since Bruce Willis' character is, IIRC, the character the movie really revolves around, you look from his perspective, and in that sense, it definitely qualifies.

Does Fight Club qualify?

[Diceman]

Bruce Willis was in Sixth Sense, not Harrison Ford (see your spoiler tag)
Doh! :smack:

[jinty]

Blade Runner? There's a lot of ambiguity about who is & who isn't a replicant, also who knows they are & who doesn't.

[green_bladder]

Originally posted by SenorBeef

Does Fight Club qualify?

I think it would.

I would also add Mulholland Drive (http://us.imdb.com/Title?0166924). That really messed with my mind ;)

[Joey P]

I'll second Mulholland Drive

[thinksnow]

I was going to say: anything by David Lynch would certainly work, I think.

[Spoke]

The Hitcher. (I maintain that the Rutger Hauer character is a figment of the main character's imagination.)

A Beautiful Mind.

[vl_mungo]

The Stunt Man (1980)
The Manchurian Candidate

[Gyrate]

Baron Munchausen

[tanstaafl]

How about The Others?

[Sigmundex]

I don't see how The Game could not qualify. Michael Douglas goes through the whole movie living in a world that is "not what it seems". I don't think it matters whether or not everyone else's reality fits with his (I'm not going to spoil anything), but he lives in a different reality than everyone else for most of the movie.

I was just thinking about getting this movie the other day, now I'll have to. It's good.

[Spoke]

Angel Heart.

[Spoke]

Rosemary's Baby?

The Stepford Wives?

[Spoke]

Planet of the Apes.

[Guinastasia]

Originally posted by Earl of the CC
This one was totally ruined by the previews, but Terminator 2 was one. There was no indication anywhere in the movie that Ah-nold was a good guy until he protected John Conner from the other Terminator. Until then it seemed like there were 2 terminators coming to kill him.

Not really-because in the beginning narration, you hear Linda Hamilton explaining that they always sent two-one to kill, and one to protect.

Perhaps The Empire Strikes Back, when it first came out-when Palpy says, "The son of Skywalker must not become a Jedi!"

Only to find out that Darth Vader is Luke's father!

[squeegee]

Ocean's Eleven -- there's a slick twist at the end.

[Francis E Dec, Esq]

Mirage with Gregory Peck. I hope this isn't giving too much away, but its somewhat like Total Recall.

[raygirvan]

spoke-, interesting theory about The Hitcher. In the same light, I suggest Staggered (http://us.imdb.com/Title?0111275). There's something odd about this road movie comedy (Martin Clunes as a man drugged at his stag party and having to find his way home after being dumped on a remote beach). There are constant references to death, including an autopsy dream-sequence recalling the "why are you here if you're not dead?" scene in Jacob's Ladder, that make me wonder if Clunes' character is dead.

[Wumpus]

My favorite obscure variant on this genre is THE EXPERTS:

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0097314

It's a comedy about a couple of late-1980s dopes (one of whom is John Travolta) who *think* they're running a nightclub in a rural Nebraska town stuck in the 1950s.

Little do they know they're actually in a KGB training camp in the USSR. It seems the KGB got all of its information about US customs from watching old sitcoms....

[Blake]

I'd have to say that 'The Sixth Sense' doesn't really qualify. The only thing that's uncertain about the world is that the main character is unaware of somehting importnt that has happened to him. Everything else is made perfecly clear.

If we do include TSS then we need to include every other 'amnesia' movie such as The Bourne Identity and every other movie where something happened to the character without their knowledge such as Alien:Resurrection.

[Michael Ellis]

Murder on the Orient Express, although probably all "mystery" films count.

[Spoke]

Originally posted by raygirvan
spoke-, interesting theory about The Hitcher.

It dawned on me on my second watching of the movie. Three clues, IMO.

1. The C. Thomas Howell character is always present when a killing happens.

2. Rutger Hauer has an uncanny ability to find C. Thomas Howell's character. (How did he find him at the motel, for example?)

3. C. Thomas Howell's character sits in on the police interrogation of Hauer. No way that happens, unless Hauer is just a figment and it's really the main character who is being interrogated.

[Fujerica]

Brazil

[TWDuke]

I haven't seen either of these, but I think "Spirited Away" and "Carnival of Souls" may qualify, based on what I've read.