You can watch them straight, drunk or completely high but the overall effect will probably be the same. These are great movies to watch with friends, or alone … whatever.
Dogma
Comedies are often a bit weird, but Dogma is quirky, cheeky and brilliant. Name any other movie where you could see Alanis Morrisette playing the part of God.
This is the best of Kevin Smith's movies by far. It's not just funny … there's never been another movie like it. This one really stirred up the Catholic Church because it's about 2 fallen angels trying to exploit a loophole to get back into heaven and by doing so will prove God imperfect and therefore undo all creation.
I'm not sure how this movie got away with everything it did, but I'm so glad Kevin Smith Succeeded.
Labyrinth
A brilliant Jim Henson classic. The best of its kind without any doubt. What I love most about Labyrinth are the clever uses of camera distortion and the amazingly beautiful scenes inside the ephemeral labyrinth walls.
The film was inspired by classics such as the Alice in Wonderland and the Wizard of Oz. Now add to the equation the master of quirk himself, David Bowie, and you have the most wonderfully wicked and enchanting movie ever made. That's not an opinion, that's a fact.
Memento
Now we have a thriller movie that's told partly in reverse just to really mess with our heads so we'll be as confused at the beginning of each scene as the main character who suffers total short-term memory less and is unable to make any new memories.
Guy Pearce is fantastic in this dark role as a seriously messed up man trying to solve the mystery of his wife's murder, the last thing he remembers. He draws inspiration from the self-inflicted tattoos scrawled all over his skin and he lives in a motel, so you can be sure that something will go horribly wrong.
Donnie Darko
Jake Gyllenhaal stars as an isolated teen searching for meaning and a solution to all the problems in his life. This crazy film features a repeating hallucination of a man in a rabbit costume and lots of space-time discontinuum.
The ending is confusing, the soundtrack haunting and the overall impact is psychologically damaging. This is a movie worth watching a few times, drinking a couple of beers and having a good ol' fashioned argument with friends over the meaning of it all. It doesn't get any weirder than Donnie Darko, it just doesn't.
Trainspotting
The game of trainspotting involves recording engine numbers from passing trains. Luckily, that is not what this movie is about.
Back in the day, Ewen McGregor was a well-respected Scottish actor who worked on some great films. This movie propelled him to global fame after he fabulously portrayed the role of scrawny heroin-addict, Renton who lives a grotty life with questionable friends and a complete lack of morals.
A movie about drug-use must have some weird scenes and this one delivers. When Renton goes for a swim in the nastiest toilet in the world … well that's just an image that will stay with you forever.
Being John Malcovich
What's weirder, the premise of this strange movie with scenes that takes place literally inside John Malcovich's head or the fact that beauty-queen Cameron Diaz is unrecognisable in her role as the sexually-conflicted animal lover who is set free by a monkey suffering post-traumatic stress disorder.
One of my favourite features of this movie is the brilliant puppetry. A movie featuring John Malcovich's brain and marionettes, you have to admit it's very original.
Fight Club
How ugly can a movie be staring pretty boy, Brad Pitt? Well, he did have pieces of his teeth cosmetically chipped off to star in this exquisitely violent film that takes on consumerism and beats it to a bloody pulp.
While Edward Norton's no-name character is busy collecting catalogue furniture, Brad Pitt's Tyler Durden is making soap out of human fat, collected from an industrial waste bin outside a liposuction clinic. When the two meet … well let's just say the results are truly explosive.
But I can't say too much because the first rule of Fight Club is, you do not talk about Fight Club.
Identity
A group of strangers become trapped in a motel when a storm floods their escape routes. They quickly start dying off, one by one.
One of them is a murderer, but which one? It's never apparent. And what is their connection with the serial killer undergoing psychological assessment in a separate story unfolding at the same time?
The film sweeps from the detective genre, through thriller into open horror territory, and keeps you on the edge of your seat because not only do you not know whodunit, but you don't even have a clue what you're watching. What a wild ride to take on a stormy Friday night.
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Here we have a movie with a silly title staring a very silly man and what do you know … it's not a silly movie at all, but it is very strange.
This all-star cast (Jim Carey, Kate Winslet, Elijah Wood, Kirsten Dunst) come together in this peculiar film about relationships, deception, lost love and targeted memory erasure.
In a particularly unique chase scene the main characters, Joel and Clementine, withdraw into the deep recesses of Joel's childhood memories to escape deletion from his mind. There are some beautiful images and great acting, but nothing can change the fact that this movie is Grade-A Weird and Wonderful. It probably should have topped the list, but it works just as well bringing up the rear.
