I go out of my way to watch the weirdest movies I can find. I could go on listing them all day, but here are a few picks:
El Topo and
The Holy Mountain: Two of the weirdest films from king wierdster Alexandro Jodorowsky. Trying to describe these films is futile, but in a lifetime of watching as many weird films as I can, I can say with confidence these two are definitely the weirdest. (Or at least, they're the weirdest films where the weirdness was actually about something and wasn't just "because random".) Be warned: if you're not used to weird movies, don't start with these. These are the "climbing the Madderhorn" of weird movies - you need to train up to them or you might harm yourself.
Institute Benjamenta and
The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes: Two films from the Brothers Quay, a pair of filmmakers famous for their stop-motion animations. Some find their films to be insufferably "artsy", and I can see why, but what captivates me about them is that they manage to create a dreamlike quality that I've never experienced as powerfully in any other film. Find a couple of hours when you know you won't be disturbed, turn your phone off, and watch these movies in a quiet, dark room, and you will almost feel as though you are floating.
Eraserhead: David Lynch needs no introduction, and this is one of his most surreal films (though oddly enough, I also find it to be one of his more easily understood films - most people disagree with me on that point, though). A man is confronted by a past girlfriend with an unplanned-for baby, that also happens to be a weird monster-like creature. Forced to take care of the baby, the man's life slowly unravels into madness.
Upstream Color: a recent film by Shane Carruth, previously known for making Primer (which is one of the better time-travel movies I've seen). Upstream Color is a lot harder to classify - on one level its a horror film about a scientist who uses some sort of brain-worm to briefly mind-control victims, though it gets a fair bit stranger than that. Where the film really twisted the knife in my brain, though, was that much of the second half of the movie (which concerns several survivors of the mind-control assault and how they try to put their lives back together) is shot in the visual style of some life-affirming feel-good movie, even though the subject matter continues to be objectively horrifying. A very uncomfortable sit, but one that I do recommend.
Possible Worlds: A story about a man who shifts between alternate realities, and tries to "ground" himself in each one by always pursuing the same woman, whoever she might happen to be in that reality. The film is actually about something totally different, but I don't want to spoil anything. I was worried that this film was going to be insufferably pretentious, but was pleasantly surprised - it is well-shot, well-acted, and manages to be compelling and even quite humorous at times.
Greaser's Palace: At a guess, I'd say this is one of those "A bunch of people went out into the desert, took a lot of drugs and made a movie" movies. It seems to be trying to parody El Topo on some levels, the main difference being that in El Topo, all the weirdness clearly had some symbolic meaning, whereas Greaser's Palace feels like "weird for weird's sake" a lot of the time. Still, it does get pretty damn strange in its own right, so it makes the list.
And here are some that I wouldn't really call mind-screws, but that are still weird and entertaining:
The American Astronaut: I could describe this as a "musical space-western comedy", but that really wouldn't convey just how strange this film is. I think the best way to describe it is that a group of musicians wanted to feature their music in a movie, so they wrote a loose sci-fi script that would give them excuses to pepper their songs throughout film. (I don't know that for a fact, but that's what it feels like.) Usually that sort of thing ends in disaster, but in this case it gives the whole film a delightful "Where the hell did THAT come from?" feeling to it. Tell you what - find this film and watch it it as far as the song-and-dance number that takes place in the men's toilet of a bar - if you're not grinning ear-to-ear by that point, then this probably isn't a movie for you. Otherwise, strap yourself in.
The Nine Lives of Tomas Katz: A bizarre comedy about the end of the world. A mysterious man appears in London - all he tells us about himself is that he comes from "the sewer" and that he "cuts people open to find out where their dreams live". He then proceeds around London taking over the lives and identities of various individuals, from the minister of fisheries to a schoolyard boy, always sowing chaos in his wake. A blind police chief with psychic talents tries to work against him before he can "shut everything down". Highly recommended if you can find it.
Survive Style 5+: I can't even begin to explain this movie - the best I can do is to list some of the things that are in it. You've got a guy who keeps murdering his wife, only to have her come back with increasingly bizarre undead powers to beat the crap out of him for it. You've got a boring working-class dad hypnotized into thinking he's a bird, whose son decides to make the best of it and try to teach him to fly. You've got Vinnie Jones as an international assassin who goes around angrily questioning people about their purpose in life. I'm not sure what it all adds up to, but every time I watch it I've got this big stupid grin on my face from beginning to end.
The Noah: A lone soldier washes up on a beach - it is implied that there has been some sort of nuclear holocaust and that, for all he knows, he may be the last human being alive. He starts creating imaginary companions to keep him company (we never see them, but we hear their voices), but they increasingly take on a life of their own, with the soldier slowly taking on the role of an angry God towards his disobedient creations. This was the director's first film, and it shows (the film has some definite pacing issues), but on the whole I found it unusual and intriguing enough to be worth the sit.
Bad Boy Bubby: Could be described as a darker, more disturbing "Rain Man". This film has a lot of subject matter that will disturb the hell out of some people - incest, cat-murder, people-murder, exploitation of the mentally ill - and yet by the end it's somehow managed to be funny and oddly uplifting.
The Navigator - A Medieval Odyssey: A group of medieval villagers have to tunnel through the earth into a modern-day city in order to perform an act of religious devotion that will save their town from the black plague. Feels a bit like a cross between "The Seventh Seal" and "Time Bandits".
The World's Greatest Sinner: An insurance salesman decides to run for president on the platform that he can transform humans into super-human gods. I'm still not sure if I think this is a good movie or not, but the lead performance by Timothy Carey is so utterly hypnotic that the film is worth watching for that alone.
