My boyfriend and I (now husband) rented Moulin Rouge when it first came out at Blockbuster. We watched it open-mouthed (literally) and at the end we both stared at each other, mouths still agape. Then at the same time we said, “What the fuck?!?” Five minutes later we were like, “I want to watch it again!”
Now it’s one of my favorite movies, and I think it’s brilliant but still incredibly strange. I mean, this Argentinian with a very deep and scratchy voice singing The Police’s “Roxanne” as a tango? A song from “The Sound of Music” and Nirvana in the same movie? I could go on and on…
So… what’s the best and most wierd film you’ve ever seen?
Eraserhead. It’s not for everybody, but I thought it was great. mostly because it’s so damned weird. No offense, but I thought Moulin Rouge was one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen. No accounting for taste, I guess.
The Forbidden Zone is a 1980s gem - a musical featuring 1930s jazz classics re-imagined by (early, deeply weird) Oingo Boingo. Herve Villachez is the tiny tyrant King of the Sixth Dimension, Susan Tyrell is his Queen, and Andy Warhol’s darling Viva is the Ex-Queen.
The art direction is inspired by Max Fleischer and ether and airplane glue, and… oh hell, just check out a clip. (May not be worksafe.)
The Forbidden Zone
Hilarious, weird, camp, with great music and The Mystic Knights Of The Oingo Boingo. When this film was introduced, the audience were warned that they would either love it or hate it. No middle ground. I loved the cheap sets, the wacky accents, the ‘interesting’ costuming, and most of all the music. Herve Villechaize as a king with a Napoleon complex. My favourite musical.
Leningrad Cowboys Go America
Finnish band struggles to make good in America. They’re always a step behind. They keep their beer in a coffin with their dead guitarist. Maybe it’s not ‘weird’ weird, but charming in a slightly off-kilter way.
Delicatessen
A taste of the Apocalypse. A love story set in a dilapidated building in a blasted landscape, where cannibalism is the norm. I wonder if the clown would taste funny?
Zombie! Vs. Mardi Gras
What if you had a Roger Corman script, George Romero zombies, and got Jean-Luc Godard to direct? Has been called ‘The Worst Film Ever’. Critics hate it. Received well at the New York Underground Film Festival. If you really know your Godard films and a bit about New Orleans you’ll get it.
Meet The Feebles. Or ‘Muppets On Acid’, as I like to call it. Some annoying voice-acting. Everybody run! That muppet has a gun!
Greaser’s Palace. Biblical story set in the Old West. Lots of funny stuff in it. Definitely weird. (Might be the weirdest film after TFZ.) Seaweedhead Greaser keeps killing his son Lamy Homo, and Jesse just wants to be a song-and-dance man. But a very slow film.
Moulin Rouge was ruined for me by the director’s godawfully short attention span. Couldn’t hold any shot longer than four seconds, even when the tone of the scene (e.g., Nicole Kidman’s death scene) really needed it. That’s a great mistrust of your audience, your screenplay, and your actors.
The weirdest movie I ever saw was Holy Mountain. Apparently it has been re-released. When I saw it, it was on a generations copy that someone brought back from like Japan or something since it hadn’t been released for decades due to some kind of dispute.
I was a film major, and I’ve seen a lot of films, including my share of “arty” films- most of which I think are pretty bad. But this takes the cake. Jesus, meat, and most memorably- A costumed recreation of the conquest of the Aztecs done with frogs. This movie was just a complete onslaught of weird.
But damned if I don’t, now and then, think of it. Of all the thousands of movies I’ve seen, that is the one that I can’t quite get out of my head.
I loved Eraserhead. It ranks a 10.5 on the weirdosity scale. However, I’ll offer up ***The Reflecting Skin ***as a close second. I love this movie. Weird and beautiful.
I’m always loathe to give a definitive answer to these types of questions, but I’ll note that, over the years, I’ve bought Tetsuo (AKA Tetsuo: The Iron Man) on three home video formats in addition to seeing it projected in theaters a number of times, so it’s one weird film that I’ve thought worthy of keeping in my life in one way or another.
16 mm grainy black and white footage, industrial music, self-mutilation, metal fetishism, a man transforming into a scrap-metal machine and then killing his girlfriend with a giant drill/penis. What’s not to like?
(I’m a guy who paid $50 a pop in the 90’s to have laserdiscs of individual films from John Waters and Russ Meyer, in addition to the above Tetsuo, so my taste tends to “weird” if not “best weird.”)