Cult Movies II: 15 More Films That Inspire an Unhealthy Level of Devotion

Hello and welcome to Cinema Wellman! Today we have the second part of a “mini-series” about Cult Movies. 

If you’re a regular here at Cinema Wellman, first of all thank you, we appreciate your consumption of all things Cinema Wellman whether it be the blog, podcast, or YouTube show. Thank you so much for being here with us when there’s so much out there for you to graze. 

A special thank you to those of you who remember Season 1: Episode 14: A Beginner’s Guide to Cult Movies from last October! You’ve been with us a while! In that episode, we took a look at 20 essential cult films and also attempted to define exactly what a cult film is since that classification means so many things. 

We here at Cinema Wellman chose to agree with author Jennifer Eiss’s definition, “A cult film is one that inspires an almost unhealthy level of devotion in its fans.”

Keep in mind the “fact” that you cannot intend on making a cult movie. It just doesn’t work that way. Kind of like you not being allowed to decide what your nickname is. 

If you haven’t seen that initial cult movie episode, I think you should since today’s episode is really only half of the list as it were. If you were to watch all 35 movies featured in these two episodes, you’ll be more than able to hold your own in a barroom discussion on the subject. Cheers!

The following films are presented in alphabetical order since I didn’t want to offend any members of any cults by attempting to rank them. 

Here we go…unleash the madness!

An American Werewolf in London (1981)

R/97 m/IMDb: 7.5

Director John Landis began working on this project when he was 19. But it wasn’t until he had directed three hit movies Kentucky Fried Movie (1977), National Lampoon’s Animal House (1978), and The Blues Brothers (1980) before he had enough “cred” and could secure the $10 million he needed to finance this film. 

That’s right. Ten million dollars used to be a lot of money in Hollywood. 

Most producers thought what Landis wanted to do was too scary to be a comedy and too funny to be a horror movie.

I think they were right on both counts, and yet this film is great no matter what genre is attached to it. 

The music itself is wild. Three different versions of “Blue Moon,” Van Morrison’s “Moondance,” and Creedence doing “Bad Moon Rising” help to make this very watchable. 

David Naughton (the werewolf) and Griffin Dunne (the best friend/early victim) are tremendous in this. 

Naughton’s David Kessler carries on the Hollywood tradition of a good person who through no fault of his own becomes a werewolf. He’s a very likable and sympathetic character. This movie deals with “the hopeless, lonely struggle of the good, decent protagonist once he realizes he has become a werewolf, must murder innocent people, and is a threat to the ones he loves.” Danny Peary from “Cult Movies 3.” 

The transformation is horrific and painful to watch. Special Effects Makeup GOAT Rick Baker won the first Oscar ever given in the special effects makeup category. It’s still amazing 42 years later, especially since it’s all makeup and practical effects and no CGI. 

Dunne is along for comic relief and does a tremendous job with that task (even when he appears as a rotting corpse). 

This movie is a lot of fun and perfectly walks that line between horror and comedy. 

Basket Case (1982)

NR/91 m/IMDb: 6.1

The fact that Basket Case and E.T. came out in the same year gives me great joy. 

This film, about a young man and his formerly conjoined, extremely deformed twin brother who he carries around in a big wicker basket, is not for the faint of heart. “What’s in the basket, kid? Easter eggs?”

A reviewer for the Detroit Free Press wrote, “It’s like E.T. as written and directed by a psychopath.”

Famous film critic Rex Reed declared it, “the sickest movie I’ve ever seen.”

That’s high praise!

When it was first made, the distributors wanted to make it the next Eraserhead, but one of the problems was that Eraserhead is an art film, while Basket Case is a monster movie.

And the monster is quite monstrous. The basket dwelling Beliel is uncomfortable to watch, but he’s a very sympathetic character. One reviewer noted, “Belial has a personality. Besides his annoying tendency to murder, he’s jealous, sulky, possessive, witty - and even can be grotesquely cute.”

The viewer feels bad for what’s happened to him and his brother, and we actually root for them as they seek revenge on the doctors who separated them against their will.

It’s gory, but sometimes the gore is so excessive that it’s funny. 

My only problem is how the filmmakers turned Beliel evil evil towards the end. There’s an extremely distasteful scene in this film that I won’t go into, but it’s kind of when you stop supporting Beliel and his brother. 

Basket Case is extremely more accessible than Eraserhead, but then again, a lot of movies are more accessible than Eraserhead.

The Beguiled (1971)

R/105 m/IMDb: 7.2

If you know Clint Eastwood and like his movies, you may have missed this one since it’s so “non-Eastwood.”

The Beguiled is a story that takes place during the Civil War. Eastwood plays a wounded Union soldier who is taken in by a group of women at a Confederate boarding school for girls. While recuperating there, he charms his way into many of the girls’ hearts (older students and teachers) causing them to turn on each other, and, eventually, on him. 

I remember watching this thriller with my mom and we kept looking at each other with wide eyes as if to say, “This is NOT going to end well!”

And we were right. 

Catch this if you can. It’s a sleeper that won’t allow you to sleep. There’s a lot to unpack. 

Big Trouble in Little China (1986)

PG-13/99 m/IMDb: 7.2

I’m not going to spend too much time on Big Trouble in Little China because it’s quite difficult to explain everything that’s going on.

For example, we have:

*Kurt Russell playing Jack Burton who is like Snake Plissken Lite

*Ancient Chinese Wizards

*Alley fights featuring what seems to be hundreds of people fighting

*The Three Storms (kung fu masters who appear out of nowhere), and they fly, which I love!

*Green-eyed girls being sacrificed to monsters

*David Lo Pan sending people to “the hell where people are skinned alive!”

*Elaborate airport fight scenes

And

*Some oddly distracting knee-high boots on Burton (I seriously couldn’t look away - they’re terrible!)

So, this comedy/fantasy/adventure pretty much has everything you’d want in a cult movie. And who doesn’t love John Carpenter and Kurt Russell?!?

Carnival of Souls (1962)

AP/78 m/IMDb: 7.0

If I owned a haunted hayride, I would have screens set up along the route, and I would show Carnival of Souls on a loop.  This thing is visually bananas. 

IMDb tells us this, “After a traumatic accident, a woman becomes drawn to a mysterious abandoned carnival.”

Any film that has anything to do with an abandoned carnival is a horror movie in my book. 

Carnival of Souls stars no one you’ve ever heard of and was shot in three weeks for about $30,000. For a low budget film, it has plenty of thrills and chills. It was a box-office failure, a trait shared by many cult movies. 

Because the filmmakers never secured a copyright, the film went immediately into public domain. If you’d like to see this, just look around for it. It’s most likely streaming everywhere for free. 

Carnival of Souls was creepy enough to inspire George A. Romero to make Night of the Living Dead six years later. That should be all you need to hear to put this one on your list. 

You have a list, don’t you?

Dazed and Confused (1993)

R/103 m/IMDb: 7.6

Alright, alright, alright…

Cinema Wellman’s love for director Richard Linklater and his films (especially this one!) is no secret. There is something about his style, the way he creates characters, and how he tells a story that has always appealed to me. 

Dazed and Confused is about the adventures of high school and junior high school students in Austin, Texas on the last day of school in May 1976.

I think the reason I love this movie so much is the fact that I was in 8th grade in May of 1976. There’s an awful lot of this movie that feels like going home to me. 

There’s no way I was ever cool enough to hang out with the coolest kids depicted in Dazed and Confused, but so much of what Linklater puts on the screen in this film was personally familiar to me. 

Just about every character depicted in this film reminded me of someone I went to high school with. I guess things tended to be the same all over in May 1976.

I love this movie so much that when I visited Austin with my cousin John a few years ago I insisted we find a Moon tower because, you know, “Party at the Moon tower!” I was not disappointed. Those have a wild story behind them that should be a documentary.

I rewatched the trailer while writing this to get the next part right because of its importance. I’ve quoted this many times, but usually end up paraphrasing, but this is right from the source.

“Behind every good man there’s a woman. And that woman was Martha Washington, man. And every day George would come home, she’d have a big, fat, bowl waiting for him, man when he’d come in the door, man. She was a hip, hip, hip, lady, man…”

Amazing.

Death Race 2000 (1975)

R/80 m/IMDb: 6.2

Some cult movies are deep and disturbing and grim. Other cult movies push the limits of taste when sex and violence are involved. And then there are those cult movies that are just downright silly and outrageous.

Death Race 2000 definitely belongs in that last group. 

This is so overly campy that parts of it are hysterical. 

Here’s how IMBd describes it: “In a dystopian future, a cross country automobile race requires contestants to run down innocent pedestrians to gain points that are tallied based on each kill’s brutality.”

Yep, that’s it!

Paul Bartel directs and stars along with Mary Woronov and it was produced by Roger Corman. That is a cult trio if I’ve ever seen one!

The top billed stars are David “Kung Fu” Carradine as Frankenstein, and Sylvester Stallone as Machine Gun Joe Viterbo. Stallone is more convincing in this than in parts of Rocky.

This is a high (33) body count comedy that is impossible to enjoy if you take even a second of it seriously. 

Donnie Darko (2001)

R/113 m/IMDb: 8.0

There are some cult movies out there that people totally love, but don’t quite understand. You may be able to top such a list with Donnie Darko.

I’ve seen this movie over a dozen times, and I absolutely love it. It gave Dakota the idea for my first tattoo. Donnie Darko will always be special to me. 

But I’m not going to sit here and lie to you by telling you that I understand it. 

Does IMDb understand it?

Synopsis please.

“After narrowly escaping a bizarre accident, a troubled teenager is plagued by visions of a man in a large rabbit suit who manipulates him to commit a series of crimes.”

Oh, and there’s time travel. 

Not to mention a tremendous cast, Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Mary McDonnell, Patrick Swayze, Drew Barrymore, Seth Rogan, Katharine Ross.

And a tremendous soundtrack featuring the music of Echo & the Bunnymen, Tears for Fears, Duran Duran, The Church, and Joy Division among others. 

Great cast, great soundtrack, compelling story, and I still dare anyone to totally explain it to me. 

You do not have to understand a movie to love it. You heard it here. 

Harold and Maude (1971)

PG/91 m/IMDb: 7.9

A pre-release review by Variety said the following about Harold and Maude; “Harold and Maude has all the fun and gaiety of a burning orphanage.”

Sounds like a cult movie to me!

This film was a failure at the box office upon its release, but thrived in the “cult” world as it was embraced by college-age moviegoers in both the United States and Canada. It failed in many places, but was a hit in many college towns. 

In his book “Cult Movies,” Danny Peary writes, “While Harold & Maude is at best only intermittently funny, there are some brilliant comic moments.” Which is to be expected when you’re dealing with a 20 year old suicidal Harold (Bud Cort) and his relationship with octogenarian Maude (the wonderful Ruth Gordon).

Everyone in Harold’s life (mother, uncle, priest, psychiatrist) is horrified about his relationship with Maude and tries instead to fill his mind with ideas of conformity. 

More from Peary; “For Harold, Maude is a liberating force, the only thing in the world that keeps him from conforming.”

“Maude tells Harold simple things: not to back away from life, to be an individual, to experiment, to take chances, to sing and dance, to play music. It is her optimistic nature, and her enjoyment of life to the fullest, that give her words meaning.”

I always felt the ending was unsatisfying, but it doesn’t hurt the overall impact of the film.

“Harold and Maude is a film about death and resurrection, where death and life continuously overlap.”

With Maude’s help, love, and guidance, Harold transforms into a young man wanting very much to live as his friend taught him. 

Nightmare Alley (1947)

P/110 m/IMDb: 7.7

Romantic idol Tyrone Power plays a geek. Before that, he’s an opportunistic, woman-using, blasphemous cad. He seduces every woman who can help him get ahead in the world, and tosses them aside once he can no longer exploit them. 

This movie is ultra-sleazy. No matter if the action is taking place in a place where the rich hang out, or if it’s the carnival sideshows and the flea-bitten hotel rooms they stay in. This is pure sleaze.

Time Magazine’s James Agee wrote; “They didn’t forget that the original novel they were adapting is essentially intelligent trash; and they have never forgotten that on the screen pretty exciting things can be made of trash.” Amen!

Power’s performance is outstanding as he morphs from gum-chewing, soda-drinking, T-shirted hot shot to cigarette-smoking, boozing, sharply dressed conniver, to mad-eyed, drunken geek.

It’s an amazing transformation you watch as if you’re witnessing a car accident.

The noir photography is stunning, turning what is essentially a strong drama into a frightening horror film. All the sets, including the carnival and cathedral-like garden are eerie and claustrophobic. Much of this film feels like it’s creeping up on you from behind and enveloping you.

Nightmare Alley is a great example of the film-noir genre and should be seen by all film fans. Check out Guillermo del Toro’s 2021 remake while you’re at it! A great interpretation!

Planet of the Apes (1968)

G/112 m/IMDb: 8.0

The ending of this movie was one of the most mind-blowing I have ever seen. I feel bad for anyone who saw it later on and already knew what Charlton Heston’s astronaut Taylor was about to encounter on that beach.

It truly is one of the best endings of a film ever. And the movie itself isn’t bad either. 

The makeup on the apes is terrifying. I remember being really scared of the whole concept of this when I was a kid. 

I love all of the original movies in this series, and I have mixed feelings about the newer versions. 

One of my favorite things about this movie is the quality of actors and actresses that they covered in ape makeup! Those weren’t nobodies under those layers of latex. There was a lot of talent under there!

Parts of this are quite campy, Heston overacts as usual, but here’s another movie that checks all of those “cult” boxes. 

I’m a big Dr. Zaius fan, by the way. 

Repo Man (1984)

R/92 m/IMDb: 6.9

I’m going to read two things to you that will tell you everything you need to know about Alex Cox’s punk sci-fi action comedy. The first is from the poster. A poster that hung in my dorm room at BU for a while.

“Meet Otto. He’s a clean-cut kid in a dirty business. He’s a Repo Man. He steals cars legally. Now, he’s out to repossess a ‘64 Chevy Malibu…with an amazing reward of $20,000. But, Otto is not alone. There are others who want the car and will do anything to get it. The risks are great, because hidden in the trunk is something so incredible it could destroy them all. We’ll give you a hint…it glows in the dark. It’s 4 A.M. Do you know where your car is?”

That’s all on the POSTER!!!!

The second bit is from the “Repo Man’s Code” that is recited by Bud (Harry Dean Stanton).

“I shall not cause harm to any vehicle nor the personal contents thereof, nor, through inaction, let that vehicle or the personal contents thereof come to harm.”

That’s all I’m giving you about this one.

Oh, and the music is terrific!

Vanishing Point (1971)

R/99 m/IMDb: 7.2

“Speed means freedom of the soul. The question is not when he’s going to stop, but who’s going to stop him.”

So says DJ Super Soul (Clevon Little) as he broadcasts the exploits of Kowalski (Barry Newman), a man on a mission that we’re really not quite sure of at times, but it makes for an interesting film for the most part. A film that was seen in more than a few drive-ins during my youth. 

Our mysterious protagonist is an ex-cop, ex-war hero, ex-professional race car driver, and a current nobody knows. 

Here’s what critic Jon Carroll had to say about Vanishing Point; “The youthcult ate this up. Never mind that the picture makes little sense because these were the years when stoned and tripping moviegoers were so thankful for any cinematic puzzle/head trip that they were willing to give the filmmaker the benefit of the doubt and believe he really had something to say. While pretending to deal with EVERYTHING, Vanishing Point is about nothing. Burn this film.”

Wow. Everyone’s a critic. Yet I have to agree with a lot of what Carroll was saying. Danny Peary in his book “Cult Movies 2” adds, “There is much in Vanishing Point to dislike. The dialogue is stupid and trite. All the women are portrayed as love objects willing to hop in the sack with any lonely stranger. The ending makes little sense. There is much in Vanishing Point that is confusing.”

Correct! And yet, this is a cult film. Cult films are anything but perfect, and a ton of them have distasteful themes and events. 

Peary then says something positive, “But the scenery we glimpse is indeed breathtaking, and the camerawork from fast-moving vehicles and helicopters is stunning.”

This film was definitely one many films at the time that tried to cash in on the success of Bullitt (1968) by cranking out movies with elongated car chases. Nothing ever came close to Bullitt, by the way. 

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971)

G/100 m/IMDb: 7.8

“So shines a good deed in a weary world.”

I’m sure you’ve all seen Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, and I’d venture a guess that you have fond feelings about it. Your memories are of a magical candy land with chocolate rivers and edible everything. 

But do you remember how sick and twisted and disturbing this movie is?!?! Some of it is high octane nightmare fuel. 

Danny Peary calls it, “the strangest ‘children’s’ film ever made. It’s neither a children’s film nor an adult film. Its adult characters, for the most part, are scary or foolish. Its children characters, except for Charlie, are brats. Even the most benign transgression is punished with inordinate violence.”

Yeah! It’s really messed up!

Willy Wonka is terrifying! His total 180 at the end scared the shit out of me as a kid! Does this guy have serious mental issues that need professional attention? How is someone like that even allowed to be around children in the first place?

And what about that acid trip of a boat ride on the S.S. Wonkatania?!? The imagery in that looks like stuff out of American Horror Story! There’s a worm slithering along someone’s lips! There’s a chicken being beheaded!

The Oompa-Loompas also scared the hell out of me. Just like the flying monkeys in The Wizard of Oz. I must have an issue with minions.

All that being said, this is a tremendous film. It happens to be our musical director Andy’s favorite movie, and I respect his opinion on all things. 

Gene Wilder is tremendous, and there is no other actor in the history of acting that could have pulled off this performance. 

Danny Peary again, “Willy Wonka is everything that family movies claim to be but aren’t: witty, frightening, exciting, and best of all, truly imaginative.”

Spot on Mr. Peary. 

Our final cult film on today’s list is out of alphabetical order for a reason. The previous films discussed today were American films. The next one comes to us from Hong Kong.

I saved it for last in order to announce a Season 3 episode highlighting “International Cult Movies.” 

Other countries have cults, too, you know. Look for that next season!

And our first International Cult Movie is…

Enter the Dragon (1973)

R/102 m/IMDb: 7.6

According to Danny Peary in “Cult Movies,” “Between 1972 and 1975, the talk of the film industry (in addition to porno films) was the martial arts movies - ‘chop sockies’ as the genre was dubbed - that were being churned out in Hong Kong.”

Many of those films were made by dear friends of Cinema Wellman, the Shaw Brothers. 

I usually don’t do this, but I want to include a lengthy excerpt from Peary’s “Cult Movies” book because I think it perfectly describes what this genre is all about.

“The martial arts films were influenced by ritualistic life-and -death combat found in such diverse forms as ancient Chinese drama, opera, folklore, and fairy tales. Jacobean revenge plays, American pulp fiction and superhero comics, Japanese samurai pictures, Italian muscleman epics, European-made westerns, and Hollywood fantasy films. These blood-soaked spectacles - in which every character is proficient in kung fu and it is not uncommon for even the most run-0f-the-mill fights to include castrations, beheadings, disembowelments, eyes gouged out, throats slit open, and back and necks broken.”

Wow. Well done, Mr. Peary. Thank you. And thanks to Peary for writing the three cult movie books that I used and quoted many times during this episode. 

Enter the Dragon starred the one and only Bruce Lee. The greatest martial artist ever to appear in films. While other actors won their film fights with the aid of special-effects (pulleys, trampolines, fake props), Lee refused to use any of those tricks. He showed only what was real or at least possible.

Lee’s fastest movements were not able to be captured at regular film speed by cameramen. He was that fast. He was that good. 

Enter the Dragon grossed more than 20x what it cost to make in the United States alone. It is Lee’s most widely seen film, and the last film he completed before his untimely death. 

Peary calls it, “arguably the best, most colorful kung fu film ever made.”

I’m not here to argue with Danny Peary about movies. 

I’ll let him sum up this one.

“While the flaws are abundant, they are trivialized by the spectacular kung fu sequences that take place every few minutes. Enter the Dragon is on a comic-book level for sure, but great entertainment nevertheless. And most significantly it stars the finest action hero in cinema history in one of his few roles: the one and only Bruce Lee, at his remarkable best.”

Thanks again to author Danny Peary for his huge assist in preparing this episode. Another thanks to my good friend Larry who helped me narrow down the field at the end. Much appreciated!

And that is a wrap for “Cult Movies II: 15 More Films That Inspire an Unhealthy Level of Devotion.”

Thank you for joining us. We hope you’ll be back next week when we present “Which Was Worse 5” where we’ll get all claustrophobic and compare two movies that take place in elevators! We give you Devil vs. Elevator!

In one of these, people are trapped in an elevator with a killer. In the other, people are trapped in an elevator with Satan. 

I wonder if either elevator has a valid inspection certificate. They better!

Those movies sound terrible, but please join us anyway!

And until then, take care.