The Boy With Green Hair (1948)
A very young Dean Stockwell stars in this strange anti-war fable about a boy who wakes up to find his hair has turned green
Stir of Echoes (1999)
Enormously underrated directorial effort from screenwriter David Koepp in which Kevin Bacon gains the ability to see the dead. A film filled with some genuinely spooky moments
Blue Thunder (1983)
Dan O’Bannon scripted film about a hi-tech helicopter, this crackles with great writing and some immensely exciting aerial action scenes from director John Badham
The Crimson Ghost (1946)
A rather dull twelve-chapter serial in which a criminologist tries to stop the titular criminal mastermind tries to steal a device that can block electrical transmissions
Alice (1990)
One of Woody Allen’s less interesting films, a modernised version of Alice in Wonderland with Mia Farrow as a bored housewife who passes through various surreal experiences
The Bishop’s Wife (1947)
A typical entry in the 1940s fad for light fantasy films in which Cary Grant plays an angel who comes down to Earth to assist poor overworked bishop David Niven
Stigmata (1999)
This seems caught between offering an earnest theological debate about Catholicism and being a standard possession film. The results are not entirely uninteresting
Sex & Zen II (1996)
Sequel to the Hong Kong erotic film, an entirely unrelated work that inflates the original into a madcap Wu Xia film filled with crude, rude humour
Breakfast of Champions (1999)
Disappointing adaptation of the Kurt Vonnegut novel from Adam Rudolph that substitutes Vonnegut’s satire for clumsy, ham-fisted farce that never gives us any clear idea what it is satirising
The Dark Side of the Moon (1990)
Conceptually ridiculous film where a spaceship crew in lunar orbit come across a space shuttle that disappeared through the Bermuda Triangle and contains a parasitic organism that is The Devil
Miracle in the Rain (1956)
One of a spate of miracle films during this period, Catholic nonsense with Jane Wyman and Van Johnson finding love that transcends death
Fortress (1993)
Stuart Gordon, a cult director on the basis of Re-Animator, ventures into making an SF action film set in a futuristic prison. The film has a bone-headed script that feels like it is only rehashing cliches from every SF film
Leprechaun (1993)
The first in the popular series of films starring Warwick Davis as a malevolent leprechaun. Fairly cheesy and silly, mostly known today for featuring a pre-Friends Jennifer Aniston
Death Line (1972)
Film about cannibalistic survivors of a cave-in who lurk in the tunnels beneath the London Underground, this has gained a reasonable cult following over the years
Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989)
A quirky hit that jumped aboard the 1980s popularity of time travel themes and laid into them with an appealingly offbeat eccentricity. The film that propelled Keanu Reeves onto become a star
Brigadoon (1954)
The film adaptation of a hit musical from Alan Jay Lerner and Fredreick Loewe in which Gene Kelly discovers love in a village that exists outside of time in the Scottish highlands
Chill Factor (1999)
An inane action film that sets out to copy Speed with Skeet Ulrich and a motormouth Cuba Gooding Jr forced to drive an ice cream truck filled with chemical weapons
A.P.E. (1976)
South Korean-made cheapie intended to ride the coattails of the 1976 remake of King Kong, this must be one of the worst films ever made with some of the most pitiful special effects ever put on film
The Black Widow (1947)
A rather dull fifteen-chapter serial about the efforts a detective who sets out to stop Sombra, an Asian spy intent on stealing US atomic rocket secrets
Big Meat Eater (1982)
Highly enjoyable Canadian-made parody of bad 1950s B movies that throws in everything from alien invaders to zombies and splatter. And is a musical to boot!
Phenomena (1985)
Another of Dario Argento’s giallo thrillers filled with all his trademark artily extravagant deaths. At the centre of the film is a teenage Jennifer Connelly who can psychically communicate with insects
The Falls (1980)
Early Peter Greenaway film where in typically eccentric fashion he tells a series of absurd stories about survivors of a mysterious event who names all begin with Fall who have begun to mutate and develop an obsession with birds
Ultraviolet (1998)
A British mini-series that offers an ingenious modernised reconeptualisation of the vampire genre, depicting the activities of a secret agency of vampire hunters
Nosferatu (1922)
The first screen adaptation of Dracula and one of the most amazing of all vampire films, a German Expressionist fairytale that exists in haunted netherworld through which stalks the crepuscular figure of Max Schreck
Raggedy Man (1981)
Beautifully shot Sissy Spacek starring work of American nostalgia set in rural 1940s Texas that takes a turn into Southern Gothic in its last quarter
Ring (1998)
Kaidan eiga (Japanese ghost story) that was a huge hit, spawning several sequels and an English-language remake, plus a horde of imitators. For all its reputation, the film is often crude, nevertheless does evince an eerie atmosphere
The Muse (1999)
Albert Brooks film with Sharon Stone as a Greek muse. This suggests a Woody Allen whimsy crossed with something of Robert Altman’s The Player and its satire on Hollywood with real-life celebrities playing themselves
Black Mask (1996)
A Jet Li vehicle that falls into the masked superhero genre where the show has taken a few leaves from the tv series The Green Hornet. Enjoyable fun with some exhilarating action sequences
The 13th Warrior (1999)
Michael Crichton was hot as a result of Jurassic Park. Although mostly seen as an historical spectacle, this is an adaptation of his novel that attempts to retell the legend of Beowulf with Vikings against Neanderthals
The Visitors (1993)
Hilarious French comedy where a filthy Mediaeval knight and his servant are transported into the present-day
Forever Young (1992)
Popular film with Mel Gibson as a man who is cryogenically frozen in the 1940s and thawed out in the present. The romantic focus of the film is undone by some absurd plotting. An early script from J.J. Abrams
The Astronaut’s Wife (1999)
Charlize Theron becomes paranoid and suspects her space shuttle astronaut husband Johnny Depp of returning possessed by an alien. Essentially an SF version of Rosemary’s Baby
Elvira, Mistress of the Dark (1988)
The film debut of the horror hostess Elvia (Cassandra Peterson), a good natured film containing more bimbo jokes, double entendres and bad puns than one thought possible
Dark Waters (1993)
A film about a woman’s journey to a convent of sinister secrets that is aswim in religious imagery, although the film itself eventually proves to be all imagery with no coherent plot
Teaching Mrs. Tingle (1999)
Scream writer Kevin Williamson’s made his directorial debut with this playful thriller in which Katie Holmes and fellow students imprison a teacher who has marked down her grades
Night Terrors (1993)
Another example of Tobe Hooper’s slight into mediocrity in the 1990s, an erotic thriller that features a madly overacting Robert Englund as the Marquis de Sade and an innocent being corrupted by his descendant in the modern day
The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue (1974)
One of the better copies of Night of the Living Dead, a Spanish film where an agricultural pesticide causes the dead to rise from their graves in rural England
The Trollenberg Terror (1958)
Modestly effective British entry into the 1950s alien invasion genre with people fighting invaders on a Swiss mountainside
The Wild, Wild Planet (1965)
One of the cheap Italian space operas of the 1960s from Antonio Margheriti. This has a certain colourful absurdity amid the mostly dull happenings and B-budget effects
Honey I Blew Up the Kid (1992)
The first sequel to Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, which far less effectively reverses the scenario and has Rick Moranis accidentally enlarging his child to giant size
Bunny Lake is Missing (1965)
Psycho-thriller from Otto Preminger about the disappearance of a young girl. As much for the twists and turns of the story, Preminger enjoys the portrayal of the darkly laced characters on the periphery
The Testament of Orpheus (1960)
Jean Cocteau’s follow-up to his earlier Orpheus becomes an opportunity where Cocteau makes an autobiographical films, revisiting his own life and works
Who is Running? (1997)
Debut feature from Oxide Pang of the Pang Brothers fame. A variant on the tv series Early Edition in which a man receives newspapers that foretell the future and must race to prevent fates from occurring in order to earn karmic salvation for his girlfriend
The Crow: City of Angels (1996)
The first sequel to The Crow extends the look of the original into an amazingly lit Goth designer world. However, the plot (an early work from David S. Goyer) is no more than a rehash of the first film
The Sixth Sense (1999)
The film that made the name of M. Night Shyamalan and still a strong and spooky story despite the variability of Shyamalan’s offerings since then. What made the film a classic was its twist ending, something that has been relentlessly copied by numerous genre films since
Bride of Chucky (1998)
Fourth of the Child’s Play films where the importation of Hong Kong director Ronnie Yu doesn’t do much to enliven proceedings, although this does embellish the black humour element considerably
Rampage (1987)
Overlooked film from William Friedkin in which Michael Biehn as a lawyer prosecuting a serial killer. Not without some effective horror moments but Friedkin is more interested in examining the legal justification for the death penalty
Clay Pigeons (1998)
Small town murder/psycho film where an initially promising black sense of humour soon loses its head of steam. On the other hand, a talented cast keeps the fiim going
Asterix in Britain (1986)
One of several animated films based on the popular comic-book characters Asterix and Obelix made by Dargaud Films
The Blood Spattered Bride (1972)
A Spanish-made adaptation of the classic lesbian vampire story Carmilla that modernises the story and inflates it with much eroticism and surrealistic imagery
Gattaca (1997)
The first film from Andrew Niccol, a smart work set in a dystopian future where genetic engineering has perfected the human species and those who are born naturally are doomed to an underclass
The Appointment (1982)
A very obscure title, this is a fascinatingly enigmatic and arty film in which Edward Woodward has a dream of having a car crash that then starts coming true as he sets out
Blades (1989)
Rather witty little Troma release about a killer lawnmower hunting people at a golf course that in its last half becomes an hilarious parody of Jaws
Blood Diner (1987)
Wonderfully demented and outrageously over-the-top splatter comedy from Jackie Kong that originally started out intended to be a sequel to Herschell Gordon Lewis’s Blood Feast
Edge of Sanity (1989)
Probably the worst film adaptation of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, this opts for a trashy sordidness with a lunatically over-the-top Anthony Perkins in the centre of the show
Mars Needs Women (1966)
Larry Buchanan was a low-budget director whose cheapness easily equaled Edward D. Wood, Jr. This alien invasion effort features Tommy Kirk come to Earth to procure women for repopulation purposes
Addams Family Values (1993)
Sequel to the live-action Addams Family film that reunites the same cast who fine-tune their roles, while the black comedy has an even more barbed bite second time around
The Iron Giant (1999)
The first animated film from Brad Bird is a sweet and lovely piece about the friendship between a young boy and a giant robot. Underrated at the time, this has subsequently become regarded as a classic
Black Widow (1987)
A sharp, sophisticated thriller reminiscent of 1940s film noir with FBI agent Debra Winger tracking Theresa Russell as a femme fatale who marries and kills her husbands
Mystery Men (1999)
A superhero parody about a group of reject superheroes with useless powers. Despite moments of amusement, this fails to quite come off
Amityville 3-D (1983)
This was the third of the Amityville films, released amid the early 1980s 3D revival. Nothing more than the usual except for various things popping out of the screen
The Spirit of 76 (1990)
Clearly an attempt to copy the success of Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, this is a comedy with time travellers visiting the 1970s. Lots of 70s pop culture and faces without any of it being funny
Arachnophobia (1990)
Executive produced by Steven Spielberg, a popular revival of the 1970s bugs amok genre about a town overrun by deadly spiders, although this avoids the horror label and plays itself with much humour
Back to the Future Part III (1990)
Third of the Back to the Future films, which takes everything back in time to the Old West. Probably the slightest of the trilogy, this nevertheless goes out with a rousing farewell
Alice (1988)
A work of bizarre genius from stop-motion animator Jan Svankmajer. A surrealist take on Alice in Wonderland that is more Eraserhead than Lewis Carroll, filled with Svankmajer’s bizarre Claymation creatures
Incense for the Damned (1969)
A striking variant on the vampire film full of rich metaphor. Set against the backdrop of Oxford university, this explains vampirism as a psychological condition brought on by sexual impotence and academic pressure
Looker (1981)
Michael Crichton’s works are about fears of science and technology going amok. Here he attempts to address tv and advertising in a film about virtual models but the ideas in his script are muddled
Baby – Secret of the Lost Legend (1985)
Disney family film about an expedition to Africa to find a dinosaur. This was made before Jurassic Park and so the effects are physical and variable but the film has an undeniable tenderness
Nosferatu in Venice (1988)
Sequel to Nosferatu the Vampyre featuring a return performance from Klaus Kinski with the action (or lack thereof) relocated to Venice
Ruby (1977)
The underrated Curtis Harrington makes a quickie possession film about a haunted drive-in theatre. Cast soon after Carrie, the film is headed by a fierily passionate performance from Piper Laurie
Akira (1988)
The film that created the cult of anime in the West. Essentially a Cyberpunk version of The Fury, this has been construed as a series of climaxes that get progressively larger in scale until they almost reach a point of sensory overload
The Blair Witch Project (1999)
This shot-on-video film that became a word of mouth sensation with many people believing they were watching real video footage of a trio lost in haunted woods by a witch. Of course, what nobody knew at the time was this was creating the Found Footage film
Cyborg (1989)
The first of Albert Pyun’s kickboxing killer cyborg films featuring Jean-Claude Van Damme who was largely unknown at the time. Pyun creates wall-to-wall action but there is almost nothing else to the film
The Aurora Encounter (1985)
A low-budget cute alien film made in the aftermath of post-E.T., this purports to be based on the true story of a UFO and alien visitor who landed in 19th Century Texas
Asterix vs Caesar (1985)
One of the sillier among the animated Asterix films maintained at a high-level of slapstick and with badly dubbed voices that do not suit the characters
Lost in Space (1998)
Surprisingly halfway reasonable big screen remake of the 1960s tv series, this welcomely dumps the campy silliness of the show for a grittier, much more realistic take on the characters
Deep Blue Sea (1999)
A killer shark film by way of Jurassic Park. The perpetually terrible Renny Harlin creates something almost watchable that vies between moments of tension and the entertainingly absurd
Armageddon (1998)
A film that relentlessly celebrates its own brainlessness. Michael Bay directs an asteroid collision film amid plenty of loud noise, mass destruction, flag-waving patriotism and resolute heroism
Run Lola Run (1998)
Tom Tykwer’s visually inventive variant on the alternate timelines theme with Franka Potente trying to replay events to save her boyfriend’s life
The Jungle Book (1967)
The Disney animated version of Rudyard Kipling’s Mowgli tales, the one that everybody remembers, a lively affair with talking and singing animals
Big Man on Campus (1989)
An amiable comedy that relocates the basic story of The Hunchback of Notre Dame to a modern American campus about the taming of a scruffy hunchback who lives in the university belltower
What’s So Bad About Feeling Good? (1968)
Mary Tyler Moore stars as a beatnik in a bizarre comedy where people are infected with a virus that makes them happy
Weekend at Bernie’s II (1993)
The first Weekend at Bernie’s had the lame concept of two jerks forced to pretend that their boss’s body was still alive. For the sequel, the body is resurrected by voodoo
Inspector Gadget (1999)
A live-action adaptation of the popular animated series, one of the spate of such films made after the live-action The Flintstones. Amiably silly and frequently slapstick fun that proves to be exactly what one expects of it
The Haunting (1999)
The original 1963 version of The Haunting was a masterpiece of unseen psychological horrors. This, in which all of the psychological horrors are replaced by loud and unsubtle CGI bombast, is one of the worst remakes of all time
Lake Placid (1999)
David E. Kelley, better known as a high-profile tv producer, turns his hand to writing a killer crocodile film, although the result never ends up satisfying either as a monster movie or the jokey tone Kelley wants to take
Straw Dogs (1971)
Strong and powerful formative entry in the Backwoods Brutality genre where Dustin Hoffman and wife Susan George stir up locals in a small Cornwall town and are forced to mount a brutal siege after he shelters a man hunted by a lynch mob
The Tai Chi Master (1993)
Hong Kong action choreographer Yuen Woo-Ping directs a masterpiece of martial arts cinema, featuring some of the sensational fight sequences ever put on film
Omega Doom (1996)
Albert Pyun cheapie in which the plot of Kurosawa’s Yojimbo is relocated to a post-apocalyptic setting and cast with androids
Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie (1996)
Film spinoff from tv’s Mystery Science Theater 3000 and its deplorable habit of inserting jokes into old films. Here it is the turn of This Island Earth, which is a far better film than the attempt to send it up here
Rock-a-Doodle (1991)
The worst of Don Bluth’s animated films in which a young boy is sent on a quest to find a rooster that does Elvis impersonations
Heatseeker (1995)
Another of Albert Pyun’s cyborg films set around a kickboxing competition where Pyun seems to have cut costs by using real competition footage with dramatically dull results
Kull the Conqueror (1997)
Disappointing adaptation of Robert E. Howard’s other barbarian hero. Cast with Kevin Sorbo, it comes out as Kull: The Legendary Journeys and the material is killed by the filmmakers taking an unserious approach
Dr Black and Mr Hyde (1976)
After the Blaxploitation fad gave us Blacula and Blackenstein, there came this wild variation on the Jekyll/Hyde story where a good African-American doctor takes a potion and turns into a rampaging white monster
Terror in the Wax Museum (1973)
Creaky old film that feels like it belongs in the 1940s about a series of murders at a wax museum. It does have a great cast line-up of genre veterans
Muppets from Space (1999)
The third and one of the better of the generally insipid Muppet movies produced following Jim Henson’s death. This tells the story of Gonzo’s origins as an alien where the film borrows spoofs the then-popularity of tv’s The X Files
Godzilla (1998)
Much disliked English-language version of Godzilla from Roland Emmerich is a more watchable film than one might think. Emmerich does well when the film allows him to do what he does best – being a big, budget, massively scaled epic of mass destruction
Pleasantville (1998)
Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon are modern teens who become trapped in a 1950s tv show and end up puncturing its innocence. The messages made end up being broad and heavy-handed but the premise and the visual palette of the film is extremely clever
Meet Joe Black (1998)
Ponderous big screen remake of Death Takes a Holiday where Death in the form of Brad Pitt comes to Earth, engages in a romance
The Borrowers (1997)
Amiable adaptation of Mary Norton’s books about a family of miniature people that live in hiding in a human house. Aimed for big scale effects and slapstick set-pieces but sufficiently engaging nevertheless