Since this is fast turning into a list of good mind-bending movies, I'm going to put a shout out for eXistenZ, as it always seems to be slightly overlooked.
Also, most of Lynch's non-Dune stuff would fit in this category.
Lynch's Dune doesn't belong in the 'mindfuck' category, but perhaps it needs a category of it's own. Something like 'Random nonsense about leather boys and sand worms interspersed with recognizable incidents from science fiction novel of same name'.
There are few recent popular flicks that I think are worthy of consideration -- or at least honorable mention.
I'd add The Matrix. Although it's not great, it did have the most impact on the most people.
I'd add The Sixth Sense for the same reason. When you "get it" then you are almost forced to rewatch the movie to make sure it still all adds up. It does. It was a great work by M. Night, who (to me) is really not doing as well as he used to.
(Bruce Willis was balding the whole time?!)
I love The Matrix. But
However, I think both movies where actually vary straightforward. I suspect they where popular in large part because they felt like mind bending movies, but most people never felt lost. The Usual Suspects is another great example of this. "Wait that was BS?"
That's a good point on both the Matrix and The Sixth Sense, but more so on The Matrix. I think the first one was very well done and while not an entirely original idea, it bent your mind just enough. Sadly, for me anyway, they ruined the whole thing with the sequels.
Awesome, awesome movie. Not for the faint of heart, though.
Let's hope that Will Smith and Steven Spielberg don't actually go ahead with remaking it (http://www.imdb.com/news/ni0615340/). What a travesty that would be.
"I originally omitted Donnie Darko from this list but then I realized I would get hate mail if I omitted Donnie Darko from this list so I put Donnie Darko on this list."
Donnie Darko is such a terrible movie. It's utterly lacking in craft and expertise. People like it because - despite claims - it's easy to comprehend and simplistic in moral, but it's plain bad.
There's always bound to be something you think needs to be on these kinds of lists. Personally, I'm disappointed there are no Alejandro Jodorowsky films on the list. I certainly think those qualify.
Santa Sangre is my favorite movie of all time. I've probably seen it about 25 times since I always make other people watch it and end up watching it with them. It still gets better every new time I see it.
I think this is the only Jodorowsky film that qualifies for the 'mindfuck' category (the others are more just surreal and weird), but it really is mind-blowing once you understand it.
First of all due to this thread I think that I won't be going out for at least a month. Thank you HN.. :P
I'd like to make my own contribution to this thread since it hasn't been mentioned.
It's "The man from earth".
Not exactly mindfuck material, since it lacks that "surreal" element, but at least on my case, each time I finish it I can't help but just sit silent and think about the claims it poses, from a philosophical point of view.
In that sense it could be in the mindflirt-romantic-dinner-with-potential category..
Anybody having any views on Primer? I watched it after reading about it on Kottke. Around the sametime a few days earlier I had watched Memento. And the contrast was as clear as heaven and earth.
Memento was v.intellectually stimulating and if you watched it closely (maybe twice) everything was there in the movie itself to figure out the 'mindfuck' elements. The very minute details which you may still miss were clearly explained in some article online, so all in all it was a comprehensive experience. It made you feel good at the end of it because everything had an explanation.
Whereas Primer just seemed like a bad movie and maybe partially because it was low budget. Throughout the movie I just thought I couldn't clearly see what was there in the scene. Many scenes felt like there was no proper light or sound.(youtubeish). And the storyline seemed so out of whack, and I remember watching it thrice, and lurking on the official movie forums trying to figure out the timeline and 'mindfuck'ness of the movie, but it just seemed like the whole movie could sort of come together only if you could imagine that half the movie was not shown. There were so many timelines in forums, and all of them seemed to miss out on major plotlines, which they would explain with a handwave as "director is v.smart and intended it to be so and you could feel that's what he wanted to portray... it was just not shown on screen...blah blah". The director himself lurked out on forums and gave conflicting and deliberately confusing interviews at the time on indie media sites and honestly he never seemed to explain wtf was going on.
In the end instead of a real mindfuck movie (like Memento), to me it just felt like a bad movie, where nothing could be explained and everything was left half-finished. I am still open to be convinced otherwise though it seems unlikely.
Jacob's Ladder is one of my favorite movies and for me the most mind-blowing ending ever. More recently we've had many movies that somehow had the same idea for an ending (don't want to mention them so not to spoil Jacob's Ladder) but AFAIK this was the first time that it was used.
I love Jacob's Ladder to death, despite the fact that it once gave me vivid nightmares. Or maybe because of that.
But the ending really sucks. The last minute of the film just fucks the whole thing up by being so simplistic--in a sense it makes the whole movie easy to dismiss. It should just end at the stairway.
I haven't seen it since it was in the cinemas but I remember at the time it made a big impact on me. For some reason, I always link it with Angel Heart, in terms of that impact.
Serial Experiment Lain. You probably haven't heard of it, and you had to be introduced first to the anime subculture, then be not frightened away by the number of bad releases in that genre, then adjust to the japan mentality, take into consideration the fact, that it was basically pre-matrix (1998), watch the movie in a one night marathon, then start reading the mentioned, and omitted literature.
However, the sheer amount of mindfuck going on in each, and every episode vastly outnumbers every single movie mentioned above, and this makes it very worthwhile.
Waking Life is a perfect example of something that sends out all the right signals for being artsy and deep to activate the GoodThink centers of your brain without having any actual substance. That movie made me want to punch the director.
I'll check some of these I haven't seen out. He's got a Hitchcock and Kurosawa film on there, and they're two of the finest directors of all time. Rashomon is actually one of my least favorite Kurosawa films, but it's still great - I just much more greatly like Ran (English: "Chaos", his best film), Ikiru ("Life", it drags towards the middle but the government council scene at the end is incredible), Kagemusha ("Shadow", wow what an incredible premise - really an overlooked masterpiece when looking at his career), and of course Seven Samurai. Then you've got Yojimbo which is an interesting story but kind of campy, and Rashomon which is a great piece of storytelling and a great piece of directing, but just isn't as satisfying of an experience as Ran, Ikiru, Kagemusha, or Seven Samurai. If I was recommending Kurosawa to a new viewer, I'd say watch them in that order, and then perhaps Rashomon.
I haven't seen all of Hitchcock's films, but it's something I've been meaning to do. The thing both of these directors (Kurosawa and Hitchcock) have in common - they're both absolutely obsessed with presentation. They don't waste a single scene in their movies. In their better films, Kurosawa and Hitchcock don't even waste a single shot - everything is perfectly constructed for a very specific reason. Really incredible experiences to watch them, and highly recommended for people who love movies, stories, or simply just art.
The Machinist is up there with Memento and Vanilla Sky.
The Butterfly Effect might be in that league (directors cut only - different ending than the theatrical release).
Providence: a story told while it's being written. Sometimes the writer changes his mind, sometimes his imagination takes him where he doesn't want to go. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076574/
Smoking / No Smoking: two films that explore different possible 'forks' of the same story. The first fork is the decision by one character to smoke a cigarette. In the first film she does, in the second she doesn't. There are three or four forks in each film which all completely change the fate of the characters. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108167/
[+] [-] marksutherland|17 years ago|reply
Also, most of Lynch's non-Dune stuff would fit in this category.
[+] [-] browngeek|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brl|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vegai|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unalone|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nreece|17 years ago|reply
El Método/The Method (Spain): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427582/
15 Park Avenue (India): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0449159/
Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi/Spirited Away (Japan/Animation): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0245429/
Moustache, La (France): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0428856/
Monday (Japan): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0239655/
Shutter (Thai/Horror): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0440803/
Gaau ji/Dumplings (Hong Kong): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0472458/
[+] [-] yargseiks|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] DanielBMarkham|17 years ago|reply
I'd add The Matrix. Although it's not great, it did have the most impact on the most people.
I'd add The Sixth Sense for the same reason. When you "get it" then you are almost forced to rewatch the movie to make sure it still all adds up. It does. It was a great work by M. Night, who (to me) is really not doing as well as he used to.
[+] [-] Retric|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] billturner|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tortilla|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] akeefer|17 years ago|reply
Let's hope that Will Smith and Steven Spielberg don't actually go ahead with remaking it (http://www.imdb.com/news/ni0615340/). What a travesty that would be.
[+] [-] jacquesm|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wallflower|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unalone|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|17 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] billturner|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brl|17 years ago|reply
I think this is the only Jodorowsky film that qualifies for the 'mindfuck' category (the others are more just surreal and weird), but it really is mind-blowing once you understand it.
[+] [-] mariorz|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] spyrosk|17 years ago|reply
I'd like to make my own contribution to this thread since it hasn't been mentioned. It's "The man from earth". Not exactly mindfuck material, since it lacks that "surreal" element, but at least on my case, each time I finish it I can't help but just sit silent and think about the claims it poses, from a philosophical point of view. In that sense it could be in the mindflirt-romantic-dinner-with-potential category..
[+] [-] gruseom|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|17 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] areaMan|17 years ago|reply
Memento was v.intellectually stimulating and if you watched it closely (maybe twice) everything was there in the movie itself to figure out the 'mindfuck' elements. The very minute details which you may still miss were clearly explained in some article online, so all in all it was a comprehensive experience. It made you feel good at the end of it because everything had an explanation.
Whereas Primer just seemed like a bad movie and maybe partially because it was low budget. Throughout the movie I just thought I couldn't clearly see what was there in the scene. Many scenes felt like there was no proper light or sound.(youtubeish). And the storyline seemed so out of whack, and I remember watching it thrice, and lurking on the official movie forums trying to figure out the timeline and 'mindfuck'ness of the movie, but it just seemed like the whole movie could sort of come together only if you could imagine that half the movie was not shown. There were so many timelines in forums, and all of them seemed to miss out on major plotlines, which they would explain with a handwave as "director is v.smart and intended it to be so and you could feel that's what he wanted to portray... it was just not shown on screen...blah blah". The director himself lurked out on forums and gave conflicting and deliberately confusing interviews at the time on indie media sites and honestly he never seemed to explain wtf was going on.
In the end instead of a real mindfuck movie (like Memento), to me it just felt like a bad movie, where nothing could be explained and everything was left half-finished. I am still open to be convinced otherwise though it seems unlikely.
[+] [-] EvilTrout|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zerokoder|17 years ago|reply
Check out Charlie Kaufman's "Adaptation".. brain bending on a different level..
[+] [-] lazyant|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pi3832|17 years ago|reply
But the ending really sucks. The last minute of the film just fucks the whole thing up by being so simplistic--in a sense it makes the whole movie easy to dismiss. It should just end at the stairway.
http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4218389/Jacobs_Ladder_(1990)...
[+] [-] Angostura|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sdragon|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zandorg|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] noahlt|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paraschopra|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nazgulnarsil|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brl|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lionhearted|17 years ago|reply
I haven't seen all of Hitchcock's films, but it's something I've been meaning to do. The thing both of these directors (Kurosawa and Hitchcock) have in common - they're both absolutely obsessed with presentation. They don't waste a single scene in their movies. In their better films, Kurosawa and Hitchcock don't even waste a single shot - everything is perfectly constructed for a very specific reason. Really incredible experiences to watch them, and highly recommended for people who love movies, stories, or simply just art.
[+] [-] johnlongawa|17 years ago|reply
The Machinist is up there with Memento and Vanilla Sky. The Butterfly Effect might be in that league (directors cut only - different ending than the theatrical release).
[+] [-] zupatol|17 years ago|reply
Je t'aime, je t'aime: a time machine experiment gone wrong. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063152/
Providence: a story told while it's being written. Sometimes the writer changes his mind, sometimes his imagination takes him where he doesn't want to go. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076574/
Smoking / No Smoking: two films that explore different possible 'forks' of the same story. The first fork is the decision by one character to smoke a cigarette. In the first film she does, in the second she doesn't. There are three or four forks in each film which all completely change the fate of the characters. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108167/
Other films that come to mind:
Code Unknown: Incomplete Tales of Several Journeys , by Michael Haneke. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0216625/
Akira has an ending just about as powerful as the ending of 2001. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094625/
Beyond a reasonable doubt (Fritz Lang) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049006/
(but why am I writing this on hacker news?) Vertigo (Hitchcock) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052357/
[+] [-] bd|17 years ago|reply
Mindfk movies
http://www.metafilter.com/79096/Mindfk-Movies
Help us rally around a common weirdness
http://ask.metafilter.com/109842/Help-us-rally-around-a-comm...
[+] [-] AndrewO|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ojbyrne|17 years ago|reply