“Daddy would have gotten us Uzis.”
In the vein of “early films by famous directors”:
The Frighteners
THX 1138
My wife LOVES that one. When it became available on tape, she ran out to get it and we watched it together. Didn’t do a thing for me.
Angel Heart
Pope of Greenwich Village
Das Boot
The Keep*
Das Boot can be an entertaining watch, or an epic marathon depending on which cut you get. I think the ‘Director’s Cut’ was longer than the actual war.
(Yes, I know…)
Bad Santa.
Escape from New York/L.A.
Highway to Hell. (1992)
One not mentioned that I was reminded of when someone above mentioned Peter O’Toole:
My Favorite Year (1982)
And if you want something a little dramatic…Peter O’Toole and Katherine Hepburn in The Lion in Winter (1968)
Strange Brew - Esteemed cerebral de-construction of one of Shakespeare’s classics.
Bad Taste - Peter Jackson’s first feature film has brain-eating aliens, Morris Minors and, happily, Derek.
The American Astronaut - this B&W sci-fi western musical about a space trucker guy being chased by his insane murderous old friend Professor Hess is absolutely unforgettable and one of the most fun movies I have ever seen. It’s also weird as fucking hell. 10/10
The Specials. Maybe doesn’t rise to “cult classic”, but it should. (Here’s a clip.)
Believe it or not, TCM recently showed Beyond the Valley of the Dolls so it must be worthy, just to see Roger Ebert’s name in the credits for screenplay. It’s pretty wild as long as you view it as the parody as it was intended.
I love Near Dark. I only have about a dozen actual DVD’s left, and this is one of them. I don’t think it’s such a great movie, but it has some wonderful scenes and performances, and is filled with, “that guy” actors. If you’re looking for something different, well, this one is. . . finger-LICKIN’ good!
I feel like The 13th Warrior misses being a great movie by just a hair. I’m not even sure how to classify this one: Action-Horror? Antonio Banderas, at the height of his good looks, stars as an Iraqi ambassador, who is punished for his infidelities by being sent to someplace Wikipedia calls the, “Volga Bulgars”, to do ambassador stuff. He is dragged into a mission with 12 Vikings to fight a mysterious, almost ghostly/demonic enemy who is plaguing a nearby kingdom. A couple performances here should have made stars of the actors, but the film was a notorious flop, costing an estimated $160 million to make. This film caused Omar Sharif to quit acting for awhile.
Can’t believe I’m the first to mention Eraserhead. I had to watch it three times before I understood what was happening.
Anything with six oscar noms is not a cult film.
I nominate Darkstar.
I don’t know if you meant it that way, but “Das Boot” was scored by Klaus Doldinger, not Tangerine Dream.
It’s always hard to do this, partly because it’s difficult to figure out the border between classics that someone who doesn’t watch a lot of older films isn’t familiar with and those that are obscure enough that they can be more easily classified as cult movies. It’s also hard to distinguish between those that you think are solid cult films and those that aren’t that great but have some very good parts. In any case, here are what I think are the lesser known ones on my list of my 100 favorite movies:
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989, U.K./West Germany, dir. Terry Gilliam)
After Hours (1985, U.S., dir. Martin Scorsese)
American Splendor (2003, U.S., dir. Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini)
Army of Shadows (1969, France/Italy, dir. Jean-Pierre Melville)
Blood Simple. (1985, U.S., dir. Joel Coen)
Chungking Express (1994, Hong Kong, dir. Kar Wai Wong)
Code of Silence (1985, U.S., dir. Andrew Davis)
Dark Star (1974, U.S., dir. John Carpenter)
Diner (1982, U.S., dir. Barry Levinson)
Excalibur (1981, U.K., dir. John Boorman)
Fantastic Planet (1973, France, dir. Rene Laloux)
House of Games (1987, U.S., dir. David Mamet)
Invaders from Mars (1953, U.S., dir. William Cameron Menzies)
La Jetée (1962, France, dir. Chris Marker)
The Last American Virgin (1982, U.S., dir. Boaz Davidson)
McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971, U.S., dir. Robert Altman)
Moonrise Kingdom (2012, U.S., dir. Wes Anderson)
My Brilliant Career (1979, Australia, dir. Gillian Armstrong)
The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970, U.K./U.S., dir. Billy Wilder)
Ride the High Country (1962, U.S., dir. Sam Peckinpah)
Salvador (1986, U.S., dir. Oliver Stone)
Seven Beauties (1976, Italy, dir. Lina Wertmuller)
Slacker (1991, U.S., dir. Richard Linklater)
Sorcerer (1977, U.S., dir. William Friedkin)
They Live (1988, U.S., dir. John Carpenter)
The Tree of Wooden Clogs (1978, Italy, dir. Ermanno Olmi)
The Year of Living Dangerously (1983, Australia, dir. Peter Weir)
And now I’m afraid of having you tell me that some of those aren’t obscure and some of them aren’t good.
The Red Shoes (1948) - the best movie about professional ballet ever made
Clip
The Secret of Roan Inish (1994) - Irish family movie - magical realism - definitely not Disney-like
Trailer
Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) - weird and wonderful
Trailer
Iron Sky - The Nazi’s escaped and lived on the dark side of the moon for 50 years.
Real Genius - Mentioned earlier, great teen movie.
Pump up the volume - One of the teen movies often missed too.
Twelve Monkeys - Probably not cult anymore
Leon, The professional - Jean Reno as a hitman in New York, left with taking care of a 12 year old Natalie Portman. With one of the best “hits” ever.
The greasy strangler - Recent. Exactly the title. Someone covers himself with grease and strangles people.
Hawks - Timothy Dalton and Anthony Edwards humourous defiance when dying of cancer. Funny and Dark. Unfindable, never released on dvd, only VHS.
The lobster - Probably less cult now the director did the favourite. In a world where when you find yourself single, you have to find a partner or change into an animal.
Train to Busan - South Korean Zombie movie on a train. Best recent zombie movie.
Daybreakers - In a world where the Vampires rule, and humans have been farmed to extinction.
In a world - tale of a girl who does voiceovers for movies.
“The car didn’t know the difference…”
Another vote for Heathers, and for some campy fun if you haven’t seen it, Clue. Based on the board game with Tim Curry, Leslie Ann Warren, Martin Mull, Madeline Kahn and Michael McKean - I never get tired of watching that one.
Let’s see…
Lifeforce (1985). Come for the absolutely stunning naked Mathilda May; stay for the campy fun of London getting overrun by a plague of vampires. Plus Patrick Stewart!
L.A Story (1991). More Patrick Stewart as the world’s snobbiest maitre’d. Really a very insightful, love letter to how surreal life in Los Angeles was in the late 80s. Steve Martin and Sarah Jessica Parker are great in it.
The John Cusack movies of the 80s were good for a laugh. Better off Dead is I think the best of the bunch. Though Grosse Point Blank is even better.
I’ll think of some more.