Bad Taste (1987)

The population of a small town disappears and is replaced by aliens that chase human flesh for their intergalactic fast-food chain. 

Way before Peter Jackson was lord of the CGI, he was making low budget movies like this slapstick horror. So cheap that he stars alongside the small cast as well, the effects are far more creative and ingenious in my eyes than a lot of the computer generated packages displayed by the heavily funded blockbusters today. Fully resourceful, this New Zealand film makes the most of what it has got, creating a fun and gory little classic.

Coffy (1973)

Coffy is a nurse whose younger sister gets involved in drugs and is severely injured by contaminated heroin. Coffy sets out on a mission of vengeance and vigilante justice, killing drug dealers, pimps, and mobsters who cross her path.

Pam Grier's first leading role, this film already cements her as an iconic actress in cult cinema and is one of her finest performances. From the opening scene this film oozes coolness and Roy Ayers' score is a classic in it's own right, with the title music setting the mood perfectly.

Pi (1998)

A paranoid mathematician searches for a key number that will unlock the universal patterns found in nature. 

Co- writer and director Darren Aronofsky delivers an intense and twisted thriller, pushing its atmosphere to the maximum. An independent film and shot in black and white, the originality of the plot is served classily on a low budget, making the most of editing the visuals alongside the electronic soundtrack to vividly represent the lead character's racing thoughts.

Sleepaway Camp (1983)

Slightly disturbed and painfully shy Angela Baker is sent away to summer camp with her cousin. Not long after Angela's arrival, things start to go horribly wrong for anyone with sinister or less than honorable intentions.

This is an interesting film that at times seems rather melancholic and subdued, but steps on the pedal when it comes to the violence. For a slasher movie, the main cast seem younger than your normal 25 year old actors pretending that their teenagers, and this gives it a more uneasy and realistic feel. The ending alone is a memorable enough scene to make it well worth watching if you're a fan of horror... or comedy, it depends which way you look at it.

Freaks (1932)

A circus' beautiful trapeze artist agrees to marry the leader of side-show performers, but his deformed friends discover she is only marrying him for his inheritance.

Although this film meets mixed receptions over the use of disabled people in the role of "freaks" it says a lot about the time. The mere fact that sideshows were so popular back then proves that there was a desperate hunger to witness the "abnormal". With the poster posing the film's plot in a question, "Can a full grown woman truly love a midget?" it's clear that public opinion at the time was "of course fucking not" which leaves the prejudice in their court and not the films.

Influencing David Lynch among others, this little tale of love and betrayal is a truly unique movie.

La Haine (1995)

Abdel, a local resident, is hospitalized after a riot, where a policeman lost his gun. His friend Vinz finds it and claims he will kill a cop if Abdel dies. 

 Many of the actors involved in this film had no experience passed living on the estates in which it is set, and the film feels authentic and immersing as we journey around their surroundings. Writer/ Director, Mathieu Kassovitz, allows the characters to develop with a lighter side to them, whilst also successfully getting his points across on the social and political problems in France. Vincent Cassel, Hubert Koundé and Saïd Taghmaoui play the leading trio with great chemistry, making the dialogue funny or poignant, even if the viewer is reading it from off of the subtitles.

This is one of my favourite movies ever because it ticks so many boxes for an interesting viewing, not only is the story well told but the artistic techniques used are clever and unconventional.

Heathers (1988)

A girl who tries to be part of the "in crowd" at her school meets a rebel who teaches her a more devious way to play social politics. 

Winona Ryder and Christian Slater star in this anarchic black comedy, which in the light of various Columbine- like incidents of recent years, probably wouldn't get made for the cinemas now. Slater's psychotic J.D. starts persuading Ryder's Veronica to join him on a mission to murder all of the horrible popular kids, beginning with the back stabbing trio of Heathers.

Society (1989)

Bill is a popular teenage jock, yet feels like he doesn't fit in. After finding out more about his family, it's easy to see why...

This is a movie that morphs from your typical high school horror, to something far more strange. Billy Warlock takes the lead role and as an actor who also became famous a few years later as a member of the cast on Baywatch, I was definitely surprised to see him in this sinister and horrific oddity. The effects may look a bit dated now, but the message is still clear.

Hana to Hebi (1974)

A domineering husband orders his impotent employee to train his wife into becoming sexually submissive.  

 

A Japanese pink film that kick started the Nikkatsu studios into S&M movies and gave Naomi Tani a leading platform to partake in sexual punishment on screen. Daring to venture further than just the image of a woman being tied up, this movie is famed for a scene featuring a forced enema which keeps it alternative even to many fans of regular soft core porn.   

I spit On Your Grave (1978)

An aspiring writer is repeatedly gang-raped, humiliated, and left for dead by four men whom she systematically hunts down to seek revenge.

This film could easily be thought of as just nasty trash, and basically that's what it is. There isn't much humor to it, or likeable characters, or great dialogue, or class. But for what it is, an unrepentant revenge thriller, it's very hard to top its level of cruelty. Obviously movies may have become more gory, and a 2010 remake attempted to top it for that, however I challenge any man to sit through the original's suggested bath tub scene and not cross their legs in terror.

Thriller: A Cruel Picture (1974)

A young woman, muted after a sexual assault as a child, is trained to seek violent revenge on those who have wronged her after being kidnapped and forced to work as a prostitute. 

An extreme exploitation flick, this Swedish little nasty was apparently even described by Quentin Tarantino as "the roughest revenge picture ever made". The scene in which the leading actress has her eye sliced out is well done enough to still be shocking and another version, Thriller: They Call Her One Eye, had to be released in America as the original cut included hard core porn scenes.

The Prisoner (1967)

After resigning, a secret agent is abducted and taken to what looks like an idyllic village, but is really a bizarre prison. His warders demand information. He gives them nothing, but only tries to escape. 

An extremely warped television series, mostly conceived in the imagination of its leading actor Patrick Mcgoohan. After every episode a new controller takes over in the attempt to extract information from their captive, using different approaches and methods to break him. But Number 6, as he is labelled, is an extremely determined and single minded individual, defiant of co-operating with their plans and intent on escaping the sugar coated village he is jailed into.

Sometimes funny, sometimes intense, sometimes just fucking mad, The Prisoner is an extreme representation of governmental control and subservient beings at the mercy of the powers that be. It is truly like no other series that I have seen and even a misguided remake after Mcgoohan had died could not tarnish its cult status.

The Wicker Man (1973)

A police sergeant is called to an island village in search of a missing girl whom the locals claim never existed. Stranger still, however, are the rituals that take place there.

This film is an idea that is much less shocking now than I imagine it was back in the predominantly christian days that it was made. In comparison to Edward Woodward's uptight and preaching copper, Christopher Lee's laid back pagan leader seems far cooler and more likable than an evil bad guy, leaving the atheist viewer getting more frustrated with the arrogant pomposity of the film's lead character. It's difficult to tell if the film is pro or anti christian, although its infamous conclusion settles the matter satisfactorily.

ID (1994)

John, an ambitious young copper, is sent undercover into the hardcore football gangs to track down the 'generals' - the shadowy figures who orchestrate the violence. Gradually, the hard drinking, hard fighting macho world - where Saturday's match and Saturday's rumble are all that matters - proves irresistible and John slowly finds himself turning into one of the thugs he has been sent to destroy.

Reese Dinsdale stars in this British drama, morphing from one side of the law to the other in a gradual downfall of sanity. We follow his rise through the underworld as he even surpasses veteran thug Martin, played by Sean Pertwee, to become a top boy at his firm.

With a believable cast, also including Warren Clarke and Philip Glenister among others, and a great script, this film is a series of well constructed scenes that renders it better than your average made for television movie and an enjoyable ride of a story.

The Firm (1989)

This is the story of rival "Firms" of British football supporters, and how one man has a wish to team them up for the European Championships of 1988. However, when this is discussed, the opposing leaders are not happy, as they believe this is a challenge to their authority. 

Made for television as part of the BBC's Screen Two film series, Alan Clarke directs Gary Oldman as a middle class estate agent during the week, but then a viscous thug on the weekends. His character's need for the adrenaline rush of football violence starts to destroy his life, but his addiction to power is too strong to deny. The Firm is another brutal master piece from Clarke, giving the viewer insights into alternative walks of British life.

Scum (1979)

This is the shocking story of life in a British Borstal for young offenders.

Scum was originally made as a BBC play, but after getting banned before ever being shown, Alan Clarke and Roy Minton got it re-made as a film. Ray Winstone plays Carling, a former thug who is trying to go straight, however the harsh life of institutionalized violence allows for no choices when it's survival of the fittest.

This is not an enjoyable watch, with graphic and miserable brutality in the form of various power struggles all over the prison. As well as being famed for the scene in which Carling reinstates his claim as "the daddy" this film is also notorious for its prolonged depiction of a traumatic gang rape, and there is no score throughout to take you away from the sounds of every cruel act. 

Unashamedly in your face, Scum is an anti-establishment explosion of a movie, like cumming in the queen's eye and then telling her to fuck off.

Peeping Tom (1960)

A young man murders women, using a movie camera to film their dying expressions of terror. 

Released within months of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, this film had the opposite reception from critics. It practically killed the director Michael Powell's career and apparently cinema showings in Britain got cancelled after only 5 days. The contrasts between these two movies must have been strong, with the feeling that Peeping Tom lacked the tongue in cheek finesse of the latter and was nothing more than trash. To me, it's an edgy psychological thriller based on an individual concept, and it's also interesting to note that Hitchcock decided to use Anna Massey as a victim for his later movie that was filmed in Britain, Frenzy.

Twisted Nerve (1968)

Martin is a troubled young man. With a mother who insists on treating him like a child, a stepfather who can't wait to see the back of him, and a brother with downs syndrome shut away in an institution, is it any wonder he retreats into an alternate personality... that of six year old Georgie? It is Georgie who befriends Susan Harper, but friendship soon turns into obsession. When Susan begins to distance herself, something inside Georgie snaps and he embarks on a killing spree, with Susan as the next target.

From the start, as we are given a an educational reminder that "mongolism" is not directly connected to criminality, it is clear that this is a film very much on the edge of its time. It was only a few years before that Haley Mills had been starring in Disney films, so to see her appear in this psychological thriller must have unnerved some viewers as to its warped nature. Hywel Bennett uses tongue in cheek simplicity to manipulate his way closer to the source of his character's unhealthy affections and yet still manages to capture the darker side of his personality. The supporting cast is also strong, and apparently Alfred Hitchcock decided to use both Barry Foster and Billie Whitelaw for Frenzy after watching it. For me, Bernard Herrmann's catchy whistling score throughout the film helps to certify it a true original and definitely reaches it to the point of a 1960s cult classic. 

Shogun Assassin (1980)

After his wife is killed by the Shogun's ninja, Lone Wolf seeks revenge whilst also being forced to take care of his young son.

Due to this film being a western cut and using two films from an existing Japanese series called Lone Wolf And Cub, it is a matter of taste on which edits are best. Shogun Assassin is my favorite because I love the soundtrack and over dubbed voices, which give it that cult like status in my opinion. It has also become famed for being sampled by Hiphop group, the Wu-Tang Clan, and for being seen in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill Volume 2.

Barbarian Queen (1985)

Set during the days of the Roman Empire, a simple village is raided by troops, and most of the people are whisked off to be slaves or killed. Three women survive and set off to liberate their people, led by Lana Clarkson as the Barbarian Queen. 

This film is a definitive B- movie classic in my eyes. It features the obligatory 20 minute tit rule, terrible dialogue delivered with worse dubbing and wooden actors stumbling around a clunky plot that attempts to be far more epic than it could ever hope to achieve. It renders a film like Red Sonja into looking like Spartacus and remains entertaining through out due to its sheer low quality. 

Off screen however, Lana Clarkson sadly became the victim of notoriously crazy record producer, Phil Spector, who murdered her in 2003 :(