18 Strangest Movies You Won’t Believe Exist
The Pee-Pee-Poo-Poo Man is coming. You may have already known about this, but I just learned about the upcoming limited release of this docu-comedy about a real piece of modern Toronto history, about a guy who wandered around with buckets of pee and poop. (obviously) and dropped them on unsuspecting college students circa 2019. Definitely not funny if you’re the victim, but ridiculous enough that you might just laugh, especially in a movie starring The Kids in the Hall ‘s Paul Bellini and Kenny ‘s Spencer Rice. against Spenny. Look for it to hit theaters soon or not, depending on how well it does in its limited release.
If you can’t wait for Pee-Poo-Poo Man to come to your town, or better yet, you can’t believe that I didn’t just make up the existence of a movie called “Pee-Pee-Poo-Poo Man.” , you might like other films beyond “How Was It Made?” and enter the realm of “Are you sure you weren’t dreaming this, you huge weirdo?”
So: ready for a truly weird movie marathon? Like this.
Fanatic (2019)
You may not know, but beloved Limp Bizkit frontman and Vladimir Putin enthusiast Fred Durst has some side hustle in independent filmmaking, landing some big names in films like Raising Charlie Banks (with Jesse Eisenberg) and Visionaries (Keke ). Palmer) and also received mixed (at best) reviews. This is a serious study of fan culture star John Travolta as a man dangerously obsessed with his favorite actor, played by Devon Sawa. And all of this would be fine if Travolta’s character weren’t also autistic, which is seen here not as a common form of neurodivergence that real human people possess, but as an excuse for Travolta to devote himself entirely to Battlefield Earth – levels of overacting in the worst possible haircut. which has ever been dedicated to the silver screen. If any of this seems too subtle for you, there’s an incredibly straightforward narrative to help you figure it out.
Where to watch: Prime Video , Tubi
Even Dwarves Start Small (1970)
I’m willing to assume there are interpretive layers here, given that the film was directed by Werner Herzog, one of our finest directors of the absurd. If that weren’t the case, I think we’d be much more inclined to dismiss Even Dwarfs StartSmall as simply stupid. The film shows a riot in a psychiatric hospital, inhabited entirely by small people – the staff and security, by the way, are also short, although the furniture and rooms are more typical in size. Residents break dishes, drive trucks in circles, set fires, mock a camel (for some reason) and stage a crucifixion of a monkey. What’s the bigger point? Who knows, maybe this is all just absurdity for the sake of absurdity.
Where to watch: Tubi, digital rental.
Swiss Army (2016)
I mean, yes, you can believe it exists because it stars Daniel Radcliffe and so you’ve probably heard of it. Here he plays the meteoric corpse Manny, whose erections help him navigate and whose farts allow the film’s living hero Hank (Paul Dano) to travel through the water, as if on a jet ski with a dead body. What’s so impressive and, frankly, incredible about Swiss Army Man is not only how funny it is, but how sweet it is. (Co-directors Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert followed this up with Everything Everywhere at Once .)
Where to watch: digital rental
Krippendorff’s Tribe (1998)
This film has the talent of director Todd Holland, who just finished a long career as director of The Larry Sanders Show . Starring Richard Dreyfuss, Jenna Elfman, Natasha Lyonne, Elaine Stritch and Lily Tomlin have all signed on for the film, in which Dreyfuss plays a New Guinea tribal leader. Well, in a way: he actually plays failed anthropologist James Krippendorff, who fakes the existence of a tribe to support his failed career by starring in a series of fraudulent videos documenting the existence of the supposed tribe. See, it’s funny because native people are pretty stupid in a very stereotypical way (I think we knew better about this in 1998). To make matters worse, Dreyfus is only ever the hero of the story, and when dastardly rival Lily Tomlin threatens to expose his fraud, some real New Guineans step in to cover for him. Even the movie poster is quite scary.
Where to watch: digital rental
Helena Boxing (1993)
Jennifer Lynch’s directorial debut was so maligned that she did not return to the director’s chair for 15 years. There are a lot of wild concepts that come up in the execution, but that’s not the case here. Julian Sands and Sherilyn Fenn play Nick Cavanaugh, an Atlanta surgeon, and Helena, who is kidnapped by Nick. The title here is not entirely metaphorical; the possessed Nick amputates Helena’s legs and then, still finding her inappropriate, takes her arms too. The film takes pains to establish a relationship between the two, which only adds to the surreal strangeness of the basic premise.
Where to watch: Kanopy
Lobster (2015)
In Yorgos Lanthimos’ dark dystopian comedy, single people are given exactly 45 days to find romantic partners or else they turn into animals. This is, of course, the same Yorgos Lanthimos, who later became a deserving Oscar darling for The Loved Ones and the Poor and even received a screenplay nomination for the film. What makes it all the more strange and impressive is that this social satire is about people who turn into animals when they can’t go on a date.
Where to watch: digital rental
Love and air sex (2019)
Perhaps it’s not so much surprising that this movie exists as that it’s based on a real thing called Air Sex. Overall, the film is a cute but rather corny slacker post-college comedy about 20-somethings trying to make sense of the world of blah blah blah. But it’s set in Austin and staged as part of the World Aerial Sex Championships, a competitive event in which fully clothed people simulate graphic sex acts to suggestive music (which is common in Japan). Jeff (Zach Cregger) decides to win the grand prize (a month of free booze) at an event that turns out to be much less interesting than it seems.
Where to watch: Tubi, Peacock , digital rental
The Basket Case (1982)
What if you had a brother who went with you everywhere? It’s a cute question posed by this cult classic, which then asks, “What if this brother lived in a basket and you used to be together but were separated, and now you’re both murderous and vengeful while having a telepathic connection?” The end result is a messy mixture with a strangely bittersweet charm in the relationship between Dwayne (who gained a body when they were separated) and basket-bound brother Belial.
Where to watch: Shudder, Tubi, digital rental.
Arizona Dream (1993)
Studios spent a lot of money on Yugoslavian director Emir Kusturica’s first (and last) American film, a film that features an all-time ridiculous cast that includes Johnny Depp, Jerry Lewis, Faye Dunaway, Vincent Gallo and Paulina Porizkova. The film combines bizarre dream imagery (most memorably a fish with eyes on one side flying through the desert, although we may mourn the 12-minute scene of Jerry Lewis flying to the moon in a Cadillac) with simpler dream imagery. -An earthy story about Depp’s character traveling to Arizona for a wedding and ending up in a relationship with an older woman (Dunaway) and her depressed daughter (Lili Taylor).
Where to watch: digital rental
Slack Bay (2016)
The wealthy and very indigenous Van Petegems live just across the bay from the poor fishermen Bruforts. Slack Bay is a completely wild comedy about manners and class, featuring cannibal fishermen, incest and an inexplicably floating police inspector – starring Juliette Binoche! It’s brilliant and my favorite, even if I don’t know exactly what it’s about.
Where to watch: digital rental
Billy the Kid and the Greencloth Vampire (1987)
Here’s one for the snooker fanatics among you. Who likes musicals as well as vampire movies? Loosely based on the famous (well, then) snooker rivalry (between Ray Reardon and Jimmy White, naturally), the film finds us in an intense tournament involving vampires in a minimalist hellscape. If you don’t quite understand what snooker is, don’t worry – you will by the end of the film, which reaches a rousing climax that reminds us that “Heaven is covered in green baize!”
Where to watch: Tubi, digital rental.
The Human Centipede (Part 1) (2009)
Look, I know we’ve all heard about this Dutch indie. It didn’t make a lot of money (and neither did its sequels), but it definitely tapped into the zeitgeist for a few years. However, it remains a little incredible that much of the film discussion of the early aughts was spent contemplating a film in which a doctor attaches people’s mouths to other people’s asses, resulting in a lot of poop ending up where there shouldn’t be (or isn’t) any Am I too limited in my opinion?). There’s more plot here, but that’s honestly the biggest takeaway.
Where to watch: AMC+, digital rental.
Necromantic (1987)
In 1988, it was shocking that a movie couple would be willing to reveal their relationship to a third, but even in our less judgmental(?) era, I’m not sure we’re ready for that third to turn out to be a corpse. Or, for example, several corpses… because they do not always last as long as we would like. Exciting social commentary and an attack on bourgeois values? Or Splatter, in which scenes of necrophilia are filmed using all the techniques of soft porn? Why choose?
Where to watch: Shudder, AMC+.
The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T (1953)
Dr. Seuss co-wrote this story, as well as the script and lyrics, which may make what follows a little less surprising. But only slightly. A young boy’s well-meaning but overbearing mother forces him to practice the piano when all he really wants to do is go outside and play. What follows is a thrilling, almost film-length dream sequence in which Bart (Tommy Rettig) ends up at the institute of Dr. Terwilliger (Hans Conried), who is keeping the boy’s mother hypnotized, planning to trap and lure 500 other boys into playing a prank on him. a giant piano with 5,000 keys (there are threads here about the dangers of authoritarianism, so it’s not all nonsense). In the end, only a giant atomic noise-sucker can save them all. Although its reputation is much better now, it was a huge flop at the time: legend has it that all but one of the audience walked out of the premiere screening.
Where to watch: digital rental
Apple (1980)
Directed by Menahem Golan, producer and director of such ’80s classics as Masters of the Universe , Delta Force , At the Top and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace , the vibe here is Rocky Horror but disco . The music is only sporadically memorable and sometimes barely listenable, and the plot (about Adam and Eve analogues making a Faustian bargain in a 1994 future world to win a global singing competition) makes almost no sense. However, there is a thong-infused vision of hell in the form of glam rock and a sense that the filmmakers were aiming to create something that they believed was sure to become a global mega-hit.
Where to watch: Pluto TV, Apple TV+.
Wayward Cloud (2005)
In the midst of a severe water shortage, watermelons are still in wild abundance, and the cast of Wayward Cloud are often seen eating them, as well as fucking them. Porn film director Hsiao-kang (played by Lee Kang-sheng) begins a relationship with an old friend, Shian-chi, who only gradually learns about his profession. Before the finale, what started out sweet turns horrifyingly dystopian. Tsai Ming-liang’s musical is mesmerizing and surreal, its charm giving way to horror towards the end.
Where to watch: Tubi
Alina (2021)
Another celebrity biopic? Um… not really. Director/writer/star Valerie Lemercier plays Canadian megastar Aline Dieu, who is, of course, a thinly veiled Celine Dion. That in itself is a bit odd, but where Alina really shines as oddity is in its central conceit: the respectably middle-aged Lemercier plays Aline throughout her entire life, from early childhood. Digitally scaled down, enlarged and wildly altered to fit every stage of the semi-fictional pop star’s life. It’s never quite clear, should we notice it?
Where to watch: Prime Video
Skidoo (1968)
The film that almost single-handedly destroyed the career of legendary director Otto Preminger, Skidoo is the kind of hippie drug comedy that was very popular in the late 1960s, but instead of the usual teenagers, it stars middle-aged Hollywood stars. Jackie Gleason, Carol Channing, Frankie Avalon, Frank Gorshin, Peter Lawford, Burgess Meredith, Cesar Romero, Mickey Rooney are among the actors making the trip, while Groucho Marx reprized his final role as the gangster known only as “God” (Marx, apparently took a lot of LSD to prepare for the role). The highlight is almost certainly Carol Channing’s performance at the climax, when she leads a flotilla of hippies to rescue her husband (Gleason), dressed in the uniform of a very sexy sea captain.
Where to watch: Plex