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What Are Your Favorite Obscure Movies?
At the bottom of a webpage, between the “Actresses Who Age Badly” and “Bizarre Creatures of the Sea,” was a clickable list I couldn’t resist — “9 Great Movies You’ve Never Seen”. It turns out I had seen two of the movies, both of which I liked; the original Das Boot (with subtitles), and Fearless. The ones I hadn’t seen were:
- Amazon Women on the Moon
- Swimming With Sharks
- The Wild Blue Yonder
- May
- Secretary
- Hard Eight
- Bob Le Flambeur
Have you seen these films? If so, opinions please! What other lost gems should I be watching?
Published in General
I recently exposed my kids to a couple Harold Lloyd movies. (“Safety Last” and “The Freshman.”) My kids are not put off by the idea of old, black and white movies, but this was their first exposure to silent movies.
They LOVED them.
My mother suggested Lars and the Real Girl, otherwise I probably never would have seen it, and you’re right, it is very sweet. It’s also a sensitive portrayal of what a caring community really means.
I really need to see that.
A few more that are extremely schlocky, but it you like good bad movies, these should be on your list:
Whenever something goes wrong, my wife and I have a habit of saying “Could be worse: could be in [expletive] Bruges!”
Not to pick on you Tom, but a claim to “dark humor” is usually a red flag for me indicating “awful”. As far as I can tell, it’s usually a justification for divergent reactions to quality. Very Bad Things is my go-to example. I was told up and down that it was dark humor, and I must not like dark humor if I didn’t like that movie. I disagree: accidentally killing a hooker (on a hook!) and covering it up and all that could be portrayed humorously and as humorful on its own terms – Very Bad Things just failed to do so (badly failed). Otherwise, good movies just claim to be funny or good full stop, without the qualifier. I’ll give In Bruges a shot based on your recommendation. Or maybe I shouldn’t; that way I can maintain my respect for you even if it turns out to be a terrible movie. ;-)
There is great pleasure in watching movies like Buckeroo and Big Trouble about once a year with the kids, as we anticipate our favorite scenes that get a lot funnier each time. I can’t think of Kurt Russell and lipstick without cracking up.
“O” is a retelling of “Othello,” set in an American high school and with the title character as a basketball star rather than a general. Very good, sadly neglected.
“Little Man, What Now?” is a 1934 American movie based on Hans Fallada’s superb book about a young couple in the late-Weimar era in Germany. Pretty well-done, but a Hollywood happy ending replaced the much darker ending of the book. Movie review.
“Dark Blue World”…Czech fighter pilots in Britain during WWII. Review.
In that vein I’d include Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins. This too is probably more of a movie to be enjoyed with the kids than admired as great art.
Manos: The Hands of Fate is a movie you have to see once. You probably won’t want to see it more than that. It’s not as obscure if you grew up watching Mystery Science Theater 3000.
The Warriors is one I try to watch once a year. The only word to describe it is craptacular. It’s one of those movies where every time you see it on TV, you stop and watch the rest of it.
@Ed G.
If you are at unsure about In Bruges, don’t watch it. It was recommended to me, I watched it and I would not recommend it.
Local Hero
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nh0ja-BTpbk
(hyper link function is not working) Great movie
For the record, I thought Very Bad Things was disgusting, morally and otherwise. In Bruges contains a great deal of murder, violence, and bad behavior but I think it’s ultimately redemptive.
Moon Zero Two (1969) and The Green Slime (1968)
And we have to mention Eraserhead (1977)
The Green Slime! That was one of those movies I saw one glorious Saturday after the Saturday morning cartoons were over. Haven’t seen it in years, but it is perennially on my Christmas list. I’m not even sure if I’d like it anymore, but the nostalgia alone would be worth it.
Well that squares your account with me then.
Me too. I used to love those Thanksgiving Day marathons. They still have the Stooges, and I wish they’d do more.
Is it just that those old movies have so physically deteriorated that the film just can’t be rescued, leaving the actual movie to be unwatchable? I can understand the resistance to colorizing them, but I’d like to see them preserved.
The thing that bugged me about Bruges is that the makers really seemed to have it in for Americans. Americans were either extremely fat or ready to sue over cigarette smoke. There was also the racist American dwarf.
If one likes Das Boat as much as I did, then Der Untergang (The Downfall) about the last days of Hilter is a must.
I say “meh” to Eraserhead.
If you want a good David Lynch movie, you go for either The Elephant Man or The Straight Story.
If you’re really adventurous, you can try Lynch’s short-lived foray television sitcom, On The Air.
Cool to see Bob le flambeur (Bob the Gambler) on the list. It’s part of a whole mother-load of majorly enjoyable French gangster movies, many directed by J-P. Melville. With Rififi (directed by Jules Dassin, a black-listed American) and Touchez pas au grisbi (Hands of the Loot, which has become Don’t Touch My Junk in my sad, sick mind–directed by Jacques Becker, and starring the magnificent Jean Gabin) you start to dig down. And have a real long way to go. Like them or not, you get to say stuff like “One prefers pre-Nouvelle Vague (new wave) French cinema, of course.” Just be sure to mention Rene Clair, and you’re set poser-cineaste-wise–although who’ll be impressed is anybody’s guess (along with how you do diacritics in R2.0). The hot tips there are the very fine comedies A nous la liberte (Freedom for Us)–and where are my accents grave and acute?– and Le million.
“Don’t say nest, don’t say egg”…Lost in America is a must see.
And, it features a young Peter Capaldi, one of my favourite British actors (and the next Doctor Who).
(Dear Ricochet 2.0, if yer gonna get rid of nesting comments, then you also gotta get rid of the “reply” button.)
That I concede.
Great post – lots of good suggestions that will keep me in Friday-night movies for the next month or so! Some weird and obscure films that I’ve enjoyed:
• C’était un Rendezvous / 1976; Claude Lelouch – a nine-minute film (yes, nine minutes) that consists almost entirely of onboard footage from a Ferrari 275 GTB barreling through the streets of Paris at top speed on an early weekend morning; no special effects, and filmed entirely without police permission or cooperation (could never be done today!)
• The Fourth Protocol / 1987; Pierce Brosnan and Michael Caine – excellent adaptation of a Forsyth Cold War spy novel
• Drop Zone / 1994; Wesley Snipes, Gary Busey, and Yancy Butler – Federal marshal Snipes teams up with south Florida redneck skydivers (really!) to hunt for his brother’s killers; one of the rare Hollywood movies where rednecks are the Good Guys
• The Canterville Ghost / 1996; Neve Campbell and Patrick Stewart – based on an Oscar Wilde short story about an American family that moves into an English manor house complete with Elizabethan ghost; charming, sweet, and a good family-oriented message about love and forgiveness
The Way, Way Back was the perfect summer movie from last Summer `13, yet remains obscure. It opens and closes with a painfully awkward teen in the late, lamented way-way-back of a 1970 Buick Estate Station Wagon.
In between he spends a life-changing summer at the beach house of his Mom’s jerk boyfriend, played to loathsome perfection by a never better Steve Carell. Fortunately he gets taken under the wing of Sam Rockwell’s carefree water park manager, allowing the boy to break the bad man’s spell by learning from a good man. This avuncular triangle is composed of staggeringly strong performances from two proven moviestars and a terrific new one in Liam James. Carell, Rockwell & James — three outstanding actors.
Along the way he meets super cute girls, more than his fair share of out-of-control adults and assorted summer vacation characters young and old. The girls are perfect bitches, except one who is way, way cool.
More in my review>> Wick on The Way, Way Back
OK, mine are two foreign films: 1. The 1946 English movie, “A Matter of Life and Death” with David Niven, Kim Hunter and Roger Livesey. A lovely humanistic (and I mean that in a good sense) movie in technicolor and B&W. 2. 1989 French movie “Life and Nothing But” (subtitled) with a great performance by great French actor Philippe Noiret. Basically, this about how two people deal with the outcome of a long and devastating war. It’s an anti-war movie, for sure, but given the immediate circumstances of the long trench warfare in France, understandable.
Oh, and one more in honor of the Mackinac Island Meet Up this summer:
• Ice Bridge: Mackinac Island’s Hidden Season / 2008 – feature-length documentary about life on Mackinac Island during the off-season; shows the islanders commuting by snowmobile and bicycle across the Straits of Mackinac when the Straits ice over, also the spring and fall transitions on the island; gorgeous photography by a husband-and-wife team who specialize in nature documentaries; good family viewing
Be grateful that the Meet Up is in June and not January…
This is my all-time favourite spy movie.
Not sure what counts as “obscure” but I’ll bring up Guy Ritchie’s Snatch, which is on my quite short “will watch repeatedly” list.