Kids in the Hall: Brain Candy (1996)
A film spun off from the popular Canadian comedy troupe Kids in the Hall. The loose plot concerns a happiness drug but is mostly there to feature the regulars playing multiple character
They Saved Hitler’s Brain (1964)
One of the all-time classic bad movie titles, this is cheap and dreary on almost every level, although does offer mild amusement when it comes to the provision of the title concept near the end
Grampire (1992)
New Zealand director David Blyth’s children’s film starring Al Lewis (the grandpa from tv’s Te Minsters) as a grandfather vampire is a toothless oddity that fails to work
The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973)
The second of Ray Harryhausen’s Sinbad films, an Arabian Nights adventure. Made as a vehicle for Harryhausen’s stop-motion effects, which are stunning. Everything about the film is classic
THX 1138 (1971)
George Lucas’s first film and always a puzzle to those who come to it after the Star Wars series where its antiseptic, dehumanised aesthetic and dystopian future seems almost the polar opposite of the Star Wars universe
Son of Godzilla (1968)
The eighth Godzilla film featuring the introduction of his son Minya in a shameless pitch for juvenile audiences. The series is no longer taking itself seriously, although ends up more likeable than some of the other entries of this period
The Little Shop of Horrors (1960)
The original, Roger Corman’s zero budget film about a killer plant is an hilarious black comedy that has become a cult favourite and remains his most well remembered film
Ernest Scared Stupid (1991)
The fourth of Jim Varney’s Ernest P. Worrel comedies. This pits Ernest in a series of knockabouts routines against a troll that is resurrected on Halloween
The Girl with the Hungry Eyes (1993)
Based on a short story by Fritz Leiber, this is a low-budget vampire film that quickly collapses amid its absurd artistic pretensions
The Golem (1920)
Classic silent film from the German Expressionist period in which a rabbi brings to life a creature made of clay (played by Paul Wegener), which then proceeds to go amok
The Halfway House (1944)
A very nicely made British Wartime film about an ensemble of varied characters gathered at a ghostly inn that comes to have an effect on all of them
Four Rooms (1995)
An anthology of blackly funny tales, including episodes directed by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, all centred around Tim Roth as a long-suffering hotel bellboy
Freaks (1932)
Shock film in which director Tod Browning depicts the lives of the deformities at a circus, casting real-life freaks in the roles. This was banned for many years before being discovered as a cult classic
She (1983)
A mind-bogglingly bad film that has absolutely nothing to do with H. Rider Haggard and is a post-holocaust film with Sandahl Bergman as an Amazonian warrior. The film is made with a bizarreness that may cause mental damage
Mr Vampire (1985)
Hong Kong hopping vampire film that produced a string of sequels. The original is the best, a clever, fast-paced blend of comedy, supernatural and traditional Eastern beliefs
Daddy’s Gone A-Hunting (1969)
Psycho-thriller about a woman who has an abortion and then years later is married and pregnant when she is stalked by her ex-boyfriend demanding that the child is his. From an early Larry Cohen script
The Barefoot Executive (1971)
Very slight Disney live-action comedy with Kurt Russell as a tv network mailboy with a chimpanzee that can predict which tv shows are going to be hits
Rollerball (2002)
Remade, the 1975 dystopian film about future sports is stripped of any of its big message (even of its future setting) and is turned into no more than a formulaic action film
One Hour Photo (2002)
Robin Williams gives a creepy performance as a one hour photo employee with stalkery tendencies who becomes obsessed with a family
Oh, God! (1977)
Amiable and quite likeable light fantasy in which supermarket manager John Denver receives a visit from God in the person of George Burns. This throws barbs in the direction of organised religion but in a way intended not to offend anybody
The Love Bug (1969)
This was the first of Disney’s Herbie films about a Volkswagen with a life and mind of its own. Not quite as good as the sequels, this still has a charming silliness to it
The Cat and the Canary (1927)
The film that defined the Old Dark House genre with spooky thrills as people are stalked around a big mansion. Expatriate German director Paul Leni brings an extraordinarily sophisticated arsenal of visual tricks to bear
The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes (1969)
One of a spate of Disney live-action comedies that was successful enough that it spawned two sequels. A young Kurt Russell is a college student who gets the contents of a computer accidentally transferred into his head
Godzilla vs the Sea Monster (1966)
The sixth Godzilla film and the point where the series started to become silly and juvenile in its focus. A weak entry featuring some of the shabbiest effects of this era.
Tales That Witness Madness (1973)
Director Freddie Francis had had great success making several of the Amicus horror anthologies then went independent to made another Amicus-styled anthology here with mixed results
Ghoulies (1985)
A copy of Gremlins produced by Charles Band’s Empire, featuring much slime and cheap-looking creatures. A surprise hit on video shelves; three sequels followed.
Enough (2002)
Thriller about an abused wife standing up to take the law into her own hands against her husband. This has its credibility shot out by being made as a Jennifer Lopez film who does not seem to want taint the glamour of her image by seeming battered
I Drink Your Blood (1970)
A classic horror film undeniably influenced by Night of the Living Dead wherein a group of hippies are turned into zombies after they are fed rabies-infected meat pies
Ed Gein (2000)
A film based on true-life necrophile killer Ed Gein starring Steve Railsback. While accurate to the case, this suffers a crucial tameness of spirit when it comes to depicting Gein’s activities
Glen or Glenda? (1952)
Classic film from Edward D. Wood Jr, an hilarious pseudo-documentary where Wood earnestly tries to make a case for transvestism. This has bad movie moments that are utterly surreal.
Story of Ricky (1991)
An outrageous Hong Kong prison film that comes filled with mind-bogglingly over-the-top splatter effects
Warlord 3000 (1993)
Shabbily made copy of Mad Max 2 that plays out with minimal action
The Heroic Trio (1993)
Enormously entertaining and hilariously tongue-in-cheek Hong Kong action film featuring three popular actresses as superheroines who go into action in a series of wildly over-the-top moves
Wings of Desire (1987)
Wim Wenders’ exquisitely lovely film about angels that hover over West Berlin invisibly observing the human condition. One of the most beautiful of all paeans to the human condition.
Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991)
The sixth of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films, sold with the gimmick of a 3D release. New director Rachel Talaly refuses to take the material seriously and turns the show into an absurd cartoon
The Hole (2001)
British psycho-thriller about teenagers trapped inside a bunker. This does an interesting mid-film twist to offer an entirely different version of the story but never rises above the middle-of-the-road
The Ghost Goes West (1935)
A light fantasy comedy with Lucas Donat as the inheritor of a Scottish castle that is haunted by a ghost and the problems faced when the castle is sold to be shipped to America
Sword of the Valiant: The Legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (1984)
Cannon Films make an adaptation of the Mediaeval legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Routine 1980s fantasy cinema with Sean Connery looking embarrassed as the Green Knight
Poltergeist III (1988)
The third of the Poltergeist sequels, which moves the locale to an apartment building and is better than its predecessor thanks to a series of eerie mirror effects
Reign of Fire (2002)
This has the interestingly original premise of being set in a post-apocalyptic world where revived dragons have eliminated most of humanity. The show is stolen by Matthew McConaughey in wild man mode
Red Dragon (2002)
Following the success of the Hannibal Lecter films, Dino de Laurentiis smartly repackaged Thomas Harris’s earlier novel as a Hannibal Lecter prequel
The Man in the White Suit (1951)
Classic Ealing comedy where Alex Guinness causes social disruption when he invents a suit that never wears out or gets dirty
Rashomon (1950)
Classic film from Akira Kurosawa about the subjectivity of perception in which a trial is held about a murder and all four witnesses retell an entirely different story about what happened
Cat-Women of the Moon (1953)
Classic bad movie in which astronauts land on The Moon and encounter an all-female society. Some really datedly war of the sexes politics play out amid the laughably impoverished sets and effects
Galaxy of Terror (1981)
An Alien copy produced by Roger Corman that creates a constantly eerie atmosphere in between the usual slime-drooling monster attacks. With production design by a then unknown James Cameron
Godzilla vs the Thing (1964)
The fourth Godzilla film, the first in which Godzilla battled another Toho monster, namely Mothra. Colourfully enjoyable and taking itself more seriously than many of the entries that would follow
Stuart Little 2 (2002)
The sequel to Stuart Little proves as equally likeable as its predecessor
Ghost (1990)
A popular hit in which Patrick Swayze is killed and becomes a ghost. Bruce Joel Rubin’s script has enormous fun in interpreting aspects of the ghost story from the ghost’s point-of-view.
xXx (2002)
One of the most brainless action films ever made. This has the laughable notion of trying to make a James Bond film but recasting it with Vin Diesel as an extreme sports junkie. Everything about the film is absurd.
Gas; or It Became Necessary to Destroy the World in Order to Save It (1970)
Satiric Roger Corman film in which a gas kills everyone in the world over the age of 25. Corman indulges his droll and surreal sense of humour in what amounts to a parody of his own films
The Testament of Dr Mabuse (1933)
The second of Fritz Lang;s films about the criminal mastermind Dr Mabuse, which was banned under the Nazi regime and forced Lang to flee the country. Not quite the equal of its predecessor, Lang is still on fine form and makes an exciting crime melodrama
Freejack (1992)
Emilio Estevez is snatched into the future and pursued for his body by bounty hunter Mick Jagger in an SF film that makes no sense at all. A film more worth watching for some bizarrely awful performances
Gothic (1986)
There is a good idea here, exploring what happened in the meeting between Lord Byron, Mary Shelley et al at the Villa Diodati in 1816. However this is hijacked by Ken Russell in lunatically over-the-top-mode
The House Where Evil Dwells (1982)
US-made ghost story set in Japan with a couple moved into a house haunted by a dead samurai, his wife and her lover. Not a patch on any of the classic Japanese kaidan eiga
Eight Legged Freaks (2002)
Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin turn their attentions to revamping the 1950s giant insect film. They bring top-drawer effects to bear but everything else plays to standard formula
From Dusk Till Dawn (1996)
Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino combine forces on a film that begins as a getaway thriller and then abruptly morphs into a vampire film. This has a smart edginess to it but the vampire scenes have not dated well
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
The first full-length animated film ever made and the beginning of the Disney tradition. A superlative effort, full of an adorable anthropomorphism where Disney instinctively grasps all the elements of the formula
Hercules (1983)
An incredibly bad Hercules film from Cannon Films made in Italy by Luigi Cozzi. This was the immediate aftermath of Star Wars so we get a bizarre attempt to rework Greek mythology as science-fiction
The Sore Losers (1997)
Film that seems to be trying to cram in as many exploitation elements as possible from UFOs to spree killers, zombies, Women in Prison and rock’n’roll
The Tomb of Ligeia (1964)
The eighth and last of Roger Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe adaptations. Some claim this tale of possession by a late wife is the best but it feels an uninspired rehash of the plot elements from Corman’s other Poe films.
Parasite (1982)
The second directorial outing of a young Charles Band, this is essentially an earthbound version of Alien. Not a very good film, the principal reasons to watch are some cheap effects and a young Demi Moore
A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Child (1989)
The fifth of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films offers up the same old thing but director Stephen Hopkins enters at an inspired level that transforms the set-pieces with a genuine weirdness
The Most Dangerous Game (1932)
The first and best version of the oft-told story in which shipwreck survivors are forced to survive with their bare hands while being hunted by a mad Russian aristocrat
Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)
This is Francis Ford Coppola’s version of Back to the Future wherein housewife Kathleen Turner wakes up back as her high school self and gets the opportunity to remake her life’s choices
Raging Angels (1994)
Christian film in which Sean Patrick Flanery is a recovering rock musician who fights to rescue his girlfriend from the clutches of a music promoter who is the Ant-Christ
Lilo & Stitch (2002)
Likeable Disney animated film about a young misfit Hawaiian girl who befriends an unruly alien creature. This has a good deal of oddball energy and humour that makes it rather appealing
The City of Lost Children (1995)
The almost indescribable second film from Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet of Delicatessen fame, a Dicekensian street urchin fantasy that takes place in a stunningly designed almost-familiar world filled with eccentric characters
Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002)
Third of the Austin Powers films and the point where the amusements of the other films topples over into a pandering indulgence to Mike Myers’ mugging, which is allowed to overtake the whole show
Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (2001)
A strong and powerful depiction of historic Inuit culture in the Arctic Circle, which has been shot and acted by Inuit people. Included here because of some Magical Realist elements.
Poltergeist II: The Other Side (1986)
This was the first sequel to Poltergeist but it only demonstrates that without Tobe Hopper in the director’s seat it is an unimaginative by-the-numbers effort
Devil in the Flesh (1998)
One of the better copies of Fatal Attraction with Rose McGowan as school pupil with a crush on her teacher who proceeds to ruthlessly eliminate all in her way
Strange Invaders (1983)
Appealingly quirky film that pays homage to the alien invaders genre of the 1950s as filtered through post-E.T. sensibilities where the invaders still live in a fifties timwarp
The Fisher King (1991)
Terry Gilliam’s finest moment, a modernised knightly quest where radio dj Jeff Bridges is dragged into helping homeless man Robin Williams find the Holy Grail. A film made by its performances and warm and eventually soaring characterisations
Insomnia (2002)
Christopher Nolan’s second film, an English-language remake of a Norwegian thriller. The action is relocated to Alaska and gets the addition of Robin Williams as a serial killer but is far less effective than the original
The Funhouse (1981)
Tobe Hooper makes a slasher film that is well above the average and one of his better films. Taking place in a carnival haunted house, Hooper shakes the slasher tropes up with undeniably freakish effect at times
D-Tox (2002)
Thriller where Sylvester Stallone is a detective who goes into alcoholic rehab after his wife is killed by a serial killer only to realise that the killer is posing as one of the attendees
Full Circle (1977)
A Peter Straub adapted ghost story that sits in an ambiguous state about whether Mia Farrow is seeing her dead daughter or going mad. This comes influenced by Don’t Look Now
That Eye, The Sky (1994)
A very strange Australian film set in the Outback where Peter Coyote plays an ambiguous stranger who appears to a troubled family claiming to have been sent from God
Treasure Hunt (1994)
Rather silly and plotless Hong Kong comedy with Chow Yun Fat as a CIA agent encountering a magical girl at a monastery in China
The Sender (1982)
Excellent and overlooked film with Kathryn Harrold as a psychiatrist trying to deal with the fact that one of the patients in an asylum has vast psychic powers
From Beyond the Grave (1974)
One of the best of the Amicus horror anthologies. All of the episodes are strong, well cast and well directed. The third episode offers a particularly funny comic take on the exorcism film
Frogs (1972)
Classic film from the 1970s Nature’s Revenge fad with a group gathered for a party on an island finding that flora and fauna all around has become malevolent and turned against humanity
Habitat (1997)
Baffling mix of teen drama and eco-SF film set in an ozone depleted future with Tcheky Karyo engaged in a series of human-plant mutations that transform him into a swarm of insects
A Nightmare on Elm Street IV: The Dream Master (1988)
Fourth of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films. Under Renny Harlin’s hand, the unworldly atmosphere of Wes Craven’s original is replaced by moments of incredible silliness
Replicant (2001)
Halfway reasonable Jean-Claude Van Damme film in which he plays the clone of a serial killer who is brought to life in attempt to track down the original
The Offering (1995)
Obscure, little seen but beautifully made Magical Realism film set amongst witches and romantic rivalry in Mexico
Murder By Numbers (2002)
Thriller with Sandra Bullock as a burned-out detective investigating two teenagers who have decided to commit a murder as an experiment in amorality
Butterfly Kiss (1995)
An early Michael Winterbottom film. Far superior to the over-praised Heavenly Creatures, this has Saskia Reeves being drawn in by a crazed Amanda Plummer who gives the performance of a lifetime
Robot Monster (1953)
One of the most entertaining bad movies ever made, an alien invader film featuring the famous Ro-Man, a gorilla suit with a diving helmet
Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959)
This has become legendary as the Worst Film Ever Made. Maybe it is but the audience that celebrates its technical gaffes, the purple prose and bizarre bheind-the-scenes stories has contrarily made it one of cultish fascination
The First Men in the Moon (1964)
Adaptation of the H.G. Wells novel about a Victorian journey to the Moon and encounter with its denizens. The film comes with Ray Harryhausen effects but is considerably weakened by a buffoonish tone
Friendship’s Death (1987)
A strangely affecting SF film that takes place entirely in a hotel room with Bill Paterson as a journalist in a Jordanian war zone and Tilda Swinton who insists she is an alien android
The Young Poisoner’s Handbook (1995)
A true-crime film based on real-life British murderer Graham Young, this comes with a black humour tone and a great performance from Hugh O’Conor as Young
Fright Night Part 2 (1989)
Sequel to Fright Night, this basically rehashes what went before but introduces Jerry Dandridge’s sister. This does come with the benefit of some way-out stylistic effects from director Tommy Lee Wallace
Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995)
Mel Brooks had a huge hit with Young Frankenstein, an affectionate spoof of the Universal Frankenstein films. Two decades on he returns to do the same for the Dracula film but with far more scattershot results.
Tainted Love (1995)
Tawdry copy of Basic Instinct, an erotic thriller about a woman detective going undercover to investigate a series of murders that are linked to a health club
SSSSSSSS! (1973)
Throwback to the mad scientist film with modern makeup effects in which scientist Strother Martin injects Dirk Benedict with a serum that turns him into a snake man
Frog Dreaming (1986)
Modest Australian-made children’s film that imports Henry Thomas riding on the success of E.T. as a teen inventor finding a lake purported to contain a creature from Aborigine legend
Frankenstein: The True Story (1974)
The ‘true story’ bit is contentious but this tv mini-series was the first production to take the Frankenstein story back to the way Mary Shelley told it. Lavishly produced and with a fantastic cast
1990: The Bronx Warriors (1982)
An Italian exploitation film about gangs fighting in the ruins of a future New York. Director Enzo G. Catsellari has ripped off both Escape from New York and The Warriors