Cult Classics
Log in to copy items to your own lists.
1.
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension
(1984)
Adventurer/surgeon/rock musician Buckaroo Banzai and his band of men, the Hong Kong Cavaliers, take on evil alien invaders from the 8th dimension. (103 mins.)
Director: W.D. Richter
2.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
(1975)
A newly engaged couple have a breakdown in an isolated area and must pay a call to the bizarre residence of Dr. Frank-N-Furter. (100 mins.)
Director: Jim Sharman
3.
Army of Darkness
(1992)
A man is accidentally transported to 1300 A.D., where he must battle an army of the dead and retrieve the Necronomicon so he can return home. (81 mins.)
Director: Sam Raimi
4.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
(1975)
King Arthur and his knights embark on a low-budget search for the Grail, encountering many, very silly obstacles. (91 mins.)
Director: Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones
5.
The Big Lebowski
(1998)
"The Dude" Lebowski, mistaken for a millionaire Lebowski, seeks restitution for his ruined rug and enlists his bowling buddies to help get it. (117 mins.)
Director: Joel Coen
6.
The Princess Bride
(1987)
While home sick in bed, a young boy's grandfather reads him a story called The Princess Bride. (98 mins.)
Director: Rob Reiner
7.
This Is Spinal Tap
(1984)
Spinal Tap, one of England's loudest bands, is chronicled by film director Marty DeBergi on what proves to be a fateful tour. (82 mins.)
Director: Rob Reiner
8.
Raising Arizona
(1987)
When a childless couple of an ex-con and an ex-cop decide to help themselves to one of another family's quintupelets, their lives get more complicated than they anticipated. (94 mins.)
Director: Joel Coen
9.
Blue Velvet
(1986)
The discovery of a severed human ear found in a field leads a young man on an investigation related to a beautiful, mysterious nightclub singer and a group of psychopathic criminals who have kidnapped her child. (120 mins.)
Director: David Lynch
10.
A Clockwork Orange
(1971)
In future Britain, charismatic delinquent Alex DeLarge is jailed and volunteers for an experimental aversion therapy developed by the government in an effort to solve society's crime problem - but not all goes according to plan. (136 mins.)
Director: Stanley Kubrick
11.
Eraserhead
(1977)
Henry Spencer tries to survive his industrial environment, his angry girlfriend, and the unbearable screams of his newly born mutant child. (89 mins.)
Director: David Lynch
12.
Showgirls
(1995)
A young drifter, named Nomi, arrives in Las Vegas to become a dancer and soon sets about clawing and pushing her way to become the top of the Vegas showgirls. (128 mins.)
Director: Paul Verhoeven
13.
Barbarella
(1968)
In the far future, a highly sexual woman is assigned with finding and stopping the evil Durand-Durand. Along the way, she encounters various unusual people. (98 mins.)
Director: Roger Vadim
14.
Brazil
(1985)
A bureaucrat in a retro-future world tries to correct an administrative error and himself becomes an enemy of the state. (132 mins.)
Director: Terry Gilliam
15.
Reefer Madness
(1936)
Cautionary tale features a fictionalized and highly exaggerated take on the use of marijuana. A trio of drug dealers lead innocent teenagers to become addicted to "reefer" cigarettes by holding wild parties with jazz music. (66 mins.)
Director: Louis Gasnier
16.
Zardoz
(1974)
In the distant future, a savage trained only to kill finds a way into the community of bored immortals that alone preserves humanity's achievements. (105 mins.)
Director: John Boorman
17.
Tremors
(1990)
Natives of a small isolated town defend themselves against strange underground creatures which are killing them one by one. (96 mins.)
Director: Ron Underwood
18.
Logan's Run
(1976)
An idyllic sci-fi future has one major drawback: life must end at the age of 30. (119 mins.)
Director: Michael Anderson
19.
Deliverance
(1972)
Intent on seeing the Cahulawassee River before it's turned into one huge lake, outdoor fanatic Lewis Medlock takes his friends on a river-rafting trip they'll never forget into the dangerous American back-country. (110 mins.)
Director: John Boorman
20.
Silent Running
(1972)
In a future where all flora is extinct on Earth, an astronaut is given orders to destroy the last of Earth's botany, kept in a greenhouse aboard a spacecraft. (89 mins.)
Director: Douglas Trumbull
21.
Escape from New York
(1981)
In 1997, when the US President crashes into Manhattan, now a giant maximum security prison, a convicted bank robber is sent in for a rescue. (99 mins.)
Director: John Carpenter
22.
Donnie Darko
(2001)
A troubled teenager is plagued by visions of a large bunny rabbit that manipulates him to commit a series of crimes, after narrowly escaping a bizarre accident. (113 mins.)
Director: Richard Kelly
23.
Flash Gordon
(1980)
A football player and his friends travel to the planet Mongo and find themselves fighting the tyranny of Ming the Merciless to save Earth. (111 mins.)
Director: Mike Hodges
24.
Fantastic Planet
(1973)
This futuristic story takes place on a faraway planet where blue giants rule, and oppressed humanoids rebel against the machine-like leaders. (72 mins.)
Director: René Laloux
25.
The Wicker Man
(1973)
A police sergeant is sent to a Scottish island village in search of a missing girl whom the townsfolk claim never existed. Stranger still are the rites that take place there. (88 mins.)
Director: Robin Hardy
26.
The Warriors
(1979)
In 1979 a charismatic leader summons the street gangs of New York City in a bid to take it over. When he is killed, The Warriors are falsely blamed and now must fight their way home while every other gang is hunting them down to kill them. (92 mins.)
Director: Walter Hill
27.
Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!
(1978)
A group of scientists band together to save the world from mutated tomatoes that KILL! (83 mins.)
Director: John De Bello
28.
Plan 9 from Outer Space
(1959)
Aliens resurrect dead humans as zombies and vampires to stop humanity from creating the Solaranite (a sort of sun-driven bomb). (79 mins.)
Director: Edward D. Wood Jr.
29.
Shaun of the Dead
(2004)
A man decides to turn his moribund life around by winning back his ex-girlfriend, reconciling his relationship with his mother, and dealing with an entire community that has returned from the dead to eat the living. (99 mins.)
Director: Edgar Wright
30.
Harold and Maude
(1971)
Young, rich, and obsessed with death, Harold finds himself changed forever when he meets lively septuagenarian Maude at a funeral. (91 mins.)
Director: Hal Ashby
31.
Re-Animator
(1985)
A dedicated student at a medical college and his girlfriend become involved in bizarre experiments centering around the re-animation of dead tissue when an odd new student arrives on campus. (104 mins.)
Director: Stuart Gordon
32.
Tommy
(1975)
A psychosomatically deaf, dumb and blind boy becomes a master pinball player and the object of a religious cult because of that. (111 mins.)
Director: Ken Russell
33.
Head
(1968)
The Monkees are tossed about in a psychedelic, surrealist, plotless, circular bit of fun fluff. (86 mins.)
Director: Bob Rafelson
34.
Easy Rider
(1969)
Two counterculture bikers travel from Los Angeles to New Orleans in search of America. (95 mins.)
Director: Dennis Hopper
35.
Pink Floyd The Wall
(1982)
A confined but troubled rock star descends into madness in the midst of his physical and social isolation from everyone. (95 mins.)
Director: Alan Parker
36.
Reservoir Dogs
(1992)
After a simple jewelery heist goes terribly wrong, the surviving criminals begin to suspect that one of them is a police informant. (99 mins.)
Director: Quentin Tarantino
37.
Scarface
(1983)
In 1980 Miami, a determined Cuban immigrant takes over a drug cartel while succumbing to greed. (170 mins.)
Director: Brian De Palma
38.
The Meaning of Life
(1983)
The comedy team takes a look at life in all its stages in their own uniquely silly way. (107 mins.)
Director: Terry Jones, Terry Gilliam
39.
The Blues Brothers
(1980)
Jake Blues, just out from prison, puts together his old band to save the Catholic home where he and brother Elwood were raised. (133 mins.)
Director: John Landis
40.
Office Space
(1999)
Three company workers who hate their jobs decide to rebel against their greedy boss. (89 mins.)
Director: Mike Judge
41.
Airplane!
(1980)
A man afraid to fly must ensure that a plane lands safely after the pilots become sick. (88 mins.)
Director: Jim Abrahams, David Zucker
42.
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
(1986)
A high school wise guy is determined to have a day off from school, despite what the principal thinks of that. (103 mins.)
Director: John Hughes
43.
They Live
(1988)
A drifter discovers a pair of sunglasses that allow him to wake up to the fact that aliens have taken over the Earth. (93 mins.)
Director: John Carpenter
44.
Dawn of the Dead
(1978)
Following an ever-growing epidemic of zombies that have risen from the dead, two Philadelphia S.W.A.T. team members, a traffic reporter, and his television executive girlfriend seek refuge in a secluded shopping mall. (127 mins.)
Director: George A. Romero
45.
Pee-wee's Big Adventure
(1985)
When eccentric man-child Pee-Wee Herman gets his beloved bike stolen in broad daylight, he sets out across the U.S. on the adventure of his life. (91 mins.)
Director: Tim Burton
46.
Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
(1971)
A poor boy wins the opportunity to tour the most eccentric and wonderful candy factory of all. (100 mins.)
Director: Mel Stuart
47.
Clerks
(1994)
A day in the lives of two convenience clerks named Dante and Randal as they annoy customers, discuss movies, and play hockey on the store roof. (92 mins.)
Director: Kevin Smith
48.
Real Genius
(1985)
Teenage geniuses deal with their abilities while developing a laser. (108 mins.)
Director: Martha Coolidge
49.
Heavy Metal
(1981)
A glowing orb terrorizes a young girl with a collection of stories of dark fantasy, eroticism and horror. (86 mins.)
Director: Gerald Potterton
50.
Dark Star
(1974)
In the far reaches of space, a small crew, 20 years into their solitary mission, find things beginning to go hilariously wrong. (83 mins.)
Director: John Carpenter
51.
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
(1964)
An insane general triggers a path to nuclear holocaust that a war room full of politicians and generals frantically try to stop. (95 mins.)
Director: Stanley Kubrick
52.
Soylent Green
(1973)
With the world ravaged by the greenhouse effect and overpopulation, an NYPD detective investigates the murder of a CEO with ties to the world's main food supply. (97 mins.)
Director: Richard Fleischer
53.
Young Frankenstein
(1974)
An American grandson of the infamous scientist, struggling to prove that he is not as insane as people believe, travels to his family's home country and discovers the process that reanimates a dead body. (106 mins.)
Director: Mel Brooks
54.
Fight Club
(1999)
An insomniac office worker, looking for a way to change his life, crosses paths with a devil-may-care soap maker, forming an underground fight club that evolves into something much, much more... (139 mins.)
Director: David Fincher
55.
The Swimmer
(1968)
Neddy Merrill has been away for most of the Summer. He reappears at a friends pool. As they talk, someone... (95 mins.)
Director: Frank Perry
56.
Straw Dogs
(1971)
A young American and his English wife come to rural England and face increasingly vicious local harassment. (113 mins.)
Director: Sam Peckinpah
57.
Repo Man
(1984)
Young punk Otto becomes a repo man after helping to steal a car, and stumbles into a world of wackiness as a result. (92 mins.)
Director: Alex Cox
58.
Altered States
(1980)
A Harvard scientist conducts experiments on himself with a hallucinatory drug and an isolation chamber that may be causing him to regress genetically. (102 mins.)
Director: Ken Russell
59.
Big Trouble in Little China
(1986)
An All-American trucker gets dragged into a centuries-old mystical battle in Chinatown. (99 mins.)
Director: John Carpenter
60.
The Evil Dead
(1981)
Five friends travel to a cabin in the woods, where they unknowingly release flesh-possessing demons. (85 mins.)
Director: Sam Raimi
61.
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
(1998)
An oddball journalist and his psychopathic lawyer travel to Las Vegas for a series of psychedelic escapades. (118 mins.)
Director: Terry Gilliam
62.
THX 1138
(1971)
Set in the 25th century, the story centers around a man and a woman who rebel against their rigidly controlled society. (86 mins.)
Director: George Lucas
63.
Twin Peaks
(1990 TV Series)
An idiosyncratic FBI agent investigates the murder of a young woman in the even more idiosyncratic town of Twin Peaks. (47 mins.)
64.
Videodrome
(1983)
A sleazy cable-TV programmer begins to see his life and the future of media spin out of control in a very unusual fashion when he acquires a new kind of programming for his station. (87 mins.)
Director: David Cronenberg