O Lucky Man! (1973)
Social Satire
The second of Lindsay Anderson and Malcolm’s McDowell’s social satires with coffee salesman McDowell passing through increasingly more surreal adventures
Mad Scientists
Mad Scientists refers to scientists who are depicted as defying ethical standards and engaged in horrific experiments. The mad part of the title refers less to their sanity and more to their willingness to defy social taboos and engage in experiments of ethical dubiousness.
Mad scientists are frequently engaged in experiments to resurrect the dead, transfer minds/brains into other people’s or animal bodies, transforms animals into humans, create artificial life and such like. Their experiments were always seen as a threat to the social order and doomed or likely to run out of control, where the best solution was setting their laboratories alight by villagers with burning torches.
The heyday of the mad scientist film was between the 1930s and 40s. With the popularisation of the scientist during the Space Age, scientists of the 1950s and beyond became more heroic and friendly. There have still been a plentiful supply of mad scientists since then in assorted B movies. In more modern works, the mad scientist is treated as a comic figure and there have been a number of mad scientists who appear in children’s films.
Our Man Flint (1966)
Spy Film Spoof
One of the more amusing of the numerous James Bond copies of the 1960s featuring James Coburn as agent Derek Flint, this plants tongue in cheek and cheerfully spoofs the whole spy fad
Outpost III: Rise of the Spetsnaz (2013)
Nazi Mad Science Experiments
Outpost was a modestly effective Nazi zombie film. This was the second of two sequels, a prequel that goes back to depict the original Nazi experiments
Poison (1991)
Anthology/Mad Scientist Homage
Todd Haynes’ first film, three stories, two of which are fantastic … Being Haynes’ first film, this is less polished than his later work but circles through familiar themes of social outsiders, gay identity and recreations of previous cinematic styles, including one segment that is a mocked-up 1940s mad scientist film
Poor Things (2023)
Frankenstein Film
Yorgos Lanthimos and Emma Stone conduct a revisionist take on the Frankenstein film. This ended up a critical favourite at most of the 2023 awards with Emma winning the show in an hilarious performance
Rainbow Brite and the Star Stealer (1985)
Animation/Magic Horse Saves the Universe
Slight but colourful animated film for the very young based on the popular series of Hallmark cards and Mattel toys about a magical horse
The Rambler (2013)
Surreal Road Movie
A man just out of jail leaves his wife after an argument and starts hitch-hiking. And then things start to get really weird
Re-Animator (1985)
Resurrection of the Dead/Splatter Black Comedy/H.P. Lovecraft Adaptation
This was one of the classic 1980s splatter films. Stuart Gordon throws most of H.P. Lovecraft’s tone out the window and goes for hilariously black comedy served up with outrageously over-the-top effects
The Return of Dr X (1939)
Mad Scientist/Medical Vampire
Not a sequel to Doctor X despite the title, The main footnote this has is that it stars Humphrey Bogart as a vampire lab assistant. Halfway reasonable despite a bad reputation.
The Return of Swamp Thing (1989)
Comic-Book Mutant Superhero
Wes Craven’s adaptation of DC’s Swamp Thing was not a very good film. This sequel has been handed over to prolific B-budget hack Jim Wynorski who shows he is unable to take any of it seriously
Return of the Killer Tomatoes! (1988)
Genre Spoof
The first of the sequels to Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. Featuring the first screen appearance of George Clooney.
The Rise of the Beast (2022)
Giant Ape Amok
Low-budget British film about environmental protestors pursued by a genetically engineered giant ape
Robotrix (1991)
Female Cyborg Cops
Hong Kong-made copy of RoboCop where Amy Yip has her mind transferred into a cyborg body to track a mad scientist
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
Gender-Bender Rock Musical/Frankenstein Spoof
The No 1 cult film of all time, more a phenomenon than a film, a demented glitter rock homage to mad science cinema and 50s sf films run through with celebration of a gender-bender joie de vivre
The Rocky Horror Picture Show: Let’s Do the Time Warp Again (2016)
Gender-Bender Rock Musical/Frankenstein Spoof
Nothing indicates how miscalculated this remake is than the fact it has been placed in the hands of the director of the High School Musicals and sundry Disney Channel fodder
Santo and Blue Demon vs the Monsters (1970)
Mexican Wrestler Superhero vs the Famous Monsters
Another of the films from the Mexican wrestling superhero Santo where he and his friend Blue Demon encounter assorted Famous Monsters raised by a mad scientist
Santo in the Wax Museum (1963)
Mexican Wrestler Superhero vs Mad Waxworks Curator
One of the films featuring the Mexican masked wrestler Santo. A rehash of Mystery of the Wax Museum/House of Wax with Santo facing a mad waxworks curator who is using human bodies as exhibits
Saturn 3 (1980)
Robot Amok
Ambitious if not entirely successful film with Harvey Keitel building a robot that proceeds to go amok on a moonbase inhabited by Kirk Douglas and Farrah Fawcett
Scream and Scream Again (1970)
Mad Scientist/Android Takeover Conspiracy
Cult Anglo-horror film with a series of vampire killings that lead to Vincent Price trying to replace bureaucrats with androids
Severed Ties (1992)
Scientist's Disembodied Arms on the Loose
Film with a mad scientist creating an army of disembodied arms, this could have been a demented classic but just emerges as cheap
Sharkenstein (2016)
Gonzo Killer Shark Film
Z-budget director Mark Polonia makes a cheap and ridiculous variant on the gonzo killer shark film about a Nazi mad scientist creating a Franken-shark that comes with Hitler’s brain placed into it
Sharktopus vs Whalewolf (2015)
Giant Hybrid Monsters
Third of the Sharktopus films from Roger Corman, an entry in the series that is making no longer making any effort to take itself seriously
She (1983)
Post-Holocaust Amazonian Warrior
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
The Shaft (2001)
Killer Elevator
The English-language remake of the Dutch film The Lift about a killer elevator. Starring a then unknown Naomi Watts in a role that would probably embarrass her now
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004)
Retro SF Adventure/Flying Ace Hero
Superlative film that recreates an imagined world of 1930s retro sf filled with flyer heroes, giant robots and stunning Art Deco designs.
Snake Outta Compton (2018)
Film Parody
As with numerous examples in the zombie and killer shark film of recent, the idea has been to parody an existing title with the addition of a monster and a pun on the original’s title. Essentially what we have is a Scary Movie-like parody of the true-life rapper tale Straight Outta Compton but with the addition of a giant snake
Son of Frankenstein (1939)
Universal Frankenstein Sequel
The third of Universal’s Frankenstein films, the last to feature Boris Karloff as the monster and the last good entry before the sequels became formulaic. Shot with the clear influence of German Expressionism, this is filled with memorable characters and some great performances
SSSSSSSS! (1973)
Mad Scientist Creates Human-Snake Hybrid
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
Stacy (2001)
Schoolgirl Zombies
A bizarre Japanese film about hordes of schoolgirl zombies
Stay Out of the Fucking Attic (2020)
Nazi Mad Scientist
A team of house movers find they are working for infamous Nazi doctor Josef Mengele who has an attic full of deformed mutations
Stitch! The Movie (2003)
Disney Animation Sequel
Cheaply made video-released sequel to Lilo & Stitch, which is only a rehash but does surprisingly reunite all the voice talents
Strange Behavior (1981)
Mad Scientist/Mind Control Experiments
Modestly effective film in which teens in a small town go berserk and begin killing people as a result of experiments being conducted at the university psychology department
The Strange Case of Doctor Rx (1942)
Murder Mystery/Mad Scientist
One of the mad scientist films of the era – or perhaps more correctly a murder mystery/comedy with an identity disorder. This features an amazing cast, including bad guy Lionel Atwill as a sinister doctor and Shemp Howard, of Three Stooges fame, as a comic-relief detective
Sufferrosa (2011)
Interactive Film/Sinister Rejuvenation Institute
Billed as the world’s first interactive film, although it falls well short of what one expected. his involves film noir homage, mad scientists and sinister rejuvenation institutes but lacks any real narrative, just feels like a series of random information pop-ups and flickering MTV graphics
The Suicide Squad (2021)
Team-Up of DC Comics Super-Villains
James Gunn takes over the Suicide Squad franchise and welcomely rescues it from the dud first screen outing
Surf II (1984)
Gonzo Comedy
Eccentric 80s frat rat/surfer comedy – part of the weird joke is that there never was a Surf I. Eddie Deezen is a mad scientist turning surfers into zombies with a soda made of industrial waste.
Swamp Thing (1982)
Mutant Superhero/Comic-Book Adaptation
Wes Craven makes a film based on the DC Comics character but reduces the mood of the original to something cartoonish. One of Craven’s worst films
Tammy and the T-Rex (1994)
Teen Transplanted Into a Robot Dinosaur Body
One of the films that came out in the aftermath of Jurassic Park, notable only for the absurdity of its premise wherein teen Paul Walker’s brain is transplanted into an animatronic dinosaur body and he struggles to reconnect with girlfriend Denise Richards
Tarantula (1955)
Giant Spider
Them! had created the 1950s fad for giant atomically enlarged insects. Here Jack Arnold, one of the most celebrated genre directors of the 1950s, makes a giant spider film and much better than most of the era’s other giant bug films
Tau (2018)
Imprisoned Woman Befriends an A.I.
This comes with an intriguing central premise – a woman is imprisoned in the house of a mad tech genius where her only hope of escape is befriending his home security A.I. that is hungry for input about the world. An interesting idea alas doesn’t carry it past an ill-informed idea of how an A.I. would behave
Terminus (1987)
Future Truck Race
Very strange French SF film about a futuristic truck race
Terror Beneath the Sea (1966)
Amphibian Cyborgs
Japanese movie made for international sales where a scientist has built a race of amphibian cyborgs to take over the world
Terror is a Man (1959)
Scientist Creates Beast People
This has the distinction of being the film that started off the Filipino exploitation industry. A fairly blatant copy of H.G. Wells’s The Island of Dr Moreau, it is mostly routine
The Testament of Dr Cordelier (1959)
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde Adaptation
Jean Renoir is considered one of the greatest of all film directors – this is his only venture into genre material, a version of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Though Renoir seems disinterested in making a horror film, he offers up the most faithful interpretation of the story on screen to date
The Thing from Another World (1951)
Alien Invader
The very first alien invader film of the 1950s. Maybe or maybe not directed by Howard Hawks, this has a dramatic urgency and tight tension that makes it stand head and shoulders above most of the films that came after
The Thing with Two Heads (1972)
Two-Headed Transplant
Ray Milland is a dying white racist millionaire who has hit head transplanted onto the shoulders of a Black man. A film that sees the absurdities of its premise and plants tongue in cheek.
Trail of the Screaming Forehead (2007)
1950s SF Parody/Invading Alien Foreheads
From Larry Blamire, a deliberately ridiculous spoof of the 1950s alien invasion film. Blamire’s dialogue and the deadpan with which everybody plays is frequently hilarious
Trancers (1985)
Time-Travelling Detective
One of the more enjoyable films from Charles Band with Tim Thomerson giving a highly entertaining performance as a hard-boiled detective travelled back from the future
Trancers II (1991)
Time-Travelling Detective
The first of several sequels to Charles Band’s Trancers with Tim Thomerson as a hard-boiled time-travelling detective. This does a passably okay job of following up on its predecessor
Transylvania 6-5000 (1985)
Famous Monster Bash/Comedy
Painfully unfunny comedy from Mel Brooks writer Rudy De Luca with journalists Jeff Goldblum and Ed Begley Jr encountering monsters while on assignment in Transylvania
The Twilight People (1972)
Filipino Exploitation Film/Mad Scientist Creates Beast People
Filipino exploitation film from the director of Blood Island films, an uncredited adaptation of H.G. Wells’ The Island of Dr Moreau about a mad scientist creating beast people
The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960)
Hammer Dr Jekyll Adaptation
Hammer Films had great success with their revivals of Dracula and Frankenstein and went on to adapt other classic horror stories. Here they take on the Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde story as a scientist unleashes his evil personality within
Underdog (2007)
Canine Superhero/Cartoon in Live-Action
Excruciating and unfunny live-action version of the animated tv series about a superpowered dog. Everything is now run over with lame slapstick and smartass one-liners
The Unearthly (1957)
Mad Scientist
One of the very last gasps of the great era of mad scientist films from the 1940s. Despite assembling a great cast of genre regulars, this never does much to stir its pot – the mad scientist’s scheme is vague and the film almost never ventures outside of a single house
The Unknown Terror (1957)
Mad Scientist in the Jungle
Forgotten and not terribly interesting B movie about an expedition to the Caribbean in search of a missing explorer encountering a mad scientist engaged in experiments involving native sacrifices and local fungi
The Vampire Bat (1933)
Mad Scientist/Vampire Bat Killings
Lionel Atwill and Fay Wray star in a film about a mad scientist conducting a series of vampire bat killings. A minor but watchable entry in the Golden Age of Horror.
Vampire Dog (2012)
Children's Film/Cute Vampire Dog
This may quite possibly be the worst vampire film ever made – a children’s film about a boy and a cute vampire dog. Being a children’s film, the vampire dog is not allowed to drink blood so has to have a ravenous hunger for red jelly! The slapstick is excruciating and the film painful on every level
Vampire Girl vs Frankenstein Girl (2009)
Gonzo Japanese Splatter Film
Completely insane Japanese film that wades in gore while playing everything up at a level of demented cartoonish absurdity. Possibly the most delirious movie-watching fun it is possible to have
I Vampiri (1957)
Italian Gothic
The Italian Gothic cycle of the 1960s was filled with works of amazing visual flair – this is where it started. Although this is more a 1940s mad scientist film, it comes with all the decaying old castles and beautifully moody b&w lighting
Van Helsing (2004)
Monster Hunter/Famous Monster Bash
Stephen Sommers conducts a big-budget rehash of a 1940s Universal monster bash. A film so overloaded with CGI bombast and general overkill it becomes utterly absurd.
V/H/S/94 (2021)
Anthology of Found Footage Horror Tales
The popular V/H/S series, an anthology of Found Footage horror tales, is revived for a fourth entry
Victor Frankenstein (2015)
Frankenstein Adaptation
An madcap new version of the Mary Shelley story where everything is turned up to an overwrought 11 on the dial. How more nutzoid can you get than a version where Igor the hunchback (a completely miscast Daniel Radcliffe) is the main character?
The Void (2016)
Hospital of Horrors/H.P. Lovecraft Homage
In his follow-up to Manborg, Steven Kostanski abandons the affectionate homages to 1980s video-released genre films he has specialised in so far. A homage to the works of H.P. Lovecraft, this should be seen for the utterly wild and outlandish makeup effects that Kostanski delivers
Voodoo Woman (1957)
Mad Scientist Creates Voodoo Monster
Low-budget AIP monster movie largely premised around rehashing the monster from The She-Creature and a cheap backlot jungle. Marla English plays for all she can and gives the film an undeniable vigour
The Walking Dead (1936)
Wrongly Executed Man Resurrected from the Dead
Not to be confused with the hit tv series, this features Boris Karloff as a wrongly executed man come back from the dead to exact justice
Waxwork II: Lost in Time (1992)
Horror Movie Pastiches
Sequel to Anthony Hickox’s Waxwork, which ups the number of horror homages but suffers a low budget
We’re Back! A Dinosaur’s Story (1993)
Animation/Talking Dinosaurs
Juvenile animated film from Amblin Entertainment concerning dinosaurs whose intelligence is raised to human level and they are let loose in the present-day
Werewolves of the Third Reich (2017)
Nazi Werewolf Experiments
I was hooked into watching the film from the sensationalism from the title but this is a disappointment due to the attempts to provide World War II setting and werewolf transformation effects on a low budget
Who Killed Doc Robbin (1948)
Old Dark House Comedy
Typical Old Dark House comedy of the 1940s, which has been welded to the formula of the Our Gang comedies with a bunch of kids engaged in a comedic antics in a scary mansion peopled by apes, dead bodies and a sinister scientist
The Wild, Wild Planet (1965)
Italian Space Opera
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
Willy McBean and His Magic Machine (1965)
Children's Time Travel Film
Likeable puppet animated film about a time-travelling boy and his monkey companion
Womaneater (1957)
Mad Scientist Sacrifices Women to a Plant Creature
Behind the lurid title, this concerns a mad scientist sacrificing women to a plant in his basement … This came out the same year as Hammer Films burst onto the English horror scene and by comparison is a plodding affair with no greater ambition than being a 1940s Bela Lugosi cheapie
Wyrmwood: Apocalypse (2021)
Zombie Apocalypse
Sequel to the cult Australian zombie film, this refines the first film and exists as even more of a visual comic-book – all that seems missing is dialogue that comes in comic balloons
Wyrmwood: Road of the Dead (2014)
Zombie Apocalypse
Australian zombie film that comes with a hyperactive fierceness and energy that reminds of early Sam Raimi or Peter Jackson. On the minus side, the zombie genre is now so creatively strip-mined that the film never offers anything original
X – The Man With X-Ray Eyes (1963)
Scientist Develops X-Ray Vision
Great Roger Corman film in which Ray Milland is a scientist who invents a serum that allows him x-ray vision with disastrous consequences
The Yesterday Machine (1963)
Nazi Scientist Builds Time Machine
A complete obscurity that has only been brought to public attention during the YouTube era – not that it has been obscure without justifiable reason. Don’t be hooked by the intriguing premise of Nazis building time machines, this is painfully dull in every regard
Yor, The Hunter from the Future (1983)
Barbarian in a Post-Holocaust World
Italian cheapie that has become regarded as a bad movie classic. This starts out as a Conan the Barbarian ripoff before, in a twist lifted from Teenage Caveman, we learn we are in a post-apocalyptic future
Young Frankenstein (1974)
Universal Frankenstein Spoof
Mel Brooks’ finest moment, a witty stylistic homage to and spoof of the Universal Frankenstein films. A great cast are on perfect form all around.
Zaat (1971)
Mad Scientist Creates Human-Fish Hybrids
A bad movie classic about a scientist turning himself into a fish monster and trying to get fish to walk and take over the Earth. Filled with prize bad movie writing, laughable effects and a ridiculously cheesy monster suit
Zombie Ass: The Toilet of the Dead (2011)
Gonzo Japanese Horror/Zombie Ass Parasites
Completely insane gonzo Japanese horror that feels like it is made by a mad scat fetishist involving parasites that emerge out of people’s asses. The film is driven by its outrageously perverse imagery but for all that is haphazard and incoherent when it comes to explanatory rationale
Zombie Holocaust (1980)
Italian Zombie/Cannibal Film
One of the most extreme films among the early 1980s fad for Italian zombie films, which it also manages to merge with the Italian cannibal film. Beyond the provision of gore effects, there is not much else to the film
Zombie Women of Satan (2009)
Freakshow Troupe vs Zombie Women
A WTF am I watching film where a performing freakshow troupe led by Pervo the Clown are pursued around a farm by topless zombie women
Zombies on Broadway (1945)
Zombie Comedy
A Bela Lugosi comedy in which two inept press agents are ordered to obtain a zombie for the opening of a club