Dude, Where’s My Car?
I thought it was gonna be a dumb stoner movie, but it is actually amazing and hilarious.
While simultaneously being a dumb stoner movie. Don’t tell me it wasn’t, cause I still am!
It was a genius stoner movie.
There’s a B movie that I really like but it’s name is off putting to say the least. It’s a solid movie, its funny and silly but most of the cast play serious characters just dealing with something absurd. It’s a cat and mouse detective story and the film is free to watch on places like Tubi.
It’s called Butt Boy
In the same b movie realm, I have a favorite that is so horrible, it’s good.
Dead snow
Basically about Nazi zombies, but it’s hilariously bad. And the best part? There’s a sequel, dead snow 2, which is phenomenal! Like a total 180 from the first one.
Hey Dead Snow is amazing! Norwegians having fun with American teen-slashers tropes and nazi zombies, what not to love?
In the same vein, Iron Sky is a movie about Nazis having secretly built a moon base and being accidentally discovered. The first one is dumb but actually an enjoyable movie. The second one is truly, truly awful and shouldn’t even be watched out of curiosity.
I watched Pig just recently almost as a joke. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
A movie made by a student of the film academy, and it was made with a ridiculously low budget of course, but still contains some wild special effects and a spaceship and an alien creature and a title song written especially for it. Looks quite a bit outdated (and I wonder if it looked that even then when it was new :)), but still a lot of fun, and even a message about artificial intelligence:
“Dark Star” by John Carpenter
Dark Star was fucking nuts but it was fun to watch with friends. Also the music won’t be new to anyone who has ever seen a John Carpenter film. I think I remember the same music in They Live and Vampire$.
Probably not the answer you’re looking for, but Puss In Boots 2. The second Shrek spinoff about the cat? Who honestly expected that to be such a banger
The only thing that put me off was the weird animation style. Otherwise it was a truly great film
Lol now that you mention it, I didn’t see the first Puss in Boots, but took my kids to see the 2nd in the theater. I distinctly remember thinking “God damn, this movie is fucking good for a sequel to a spinoff to a movie that had two mediocre sequels.”
Tank Girl. It may just be a guilty pleasure but I’ll defend it.
I guess Starship Troopers is THE movie for this, although I’m always suprised to find out people used to like it unironically.
Due date, with Robert Downey Jr and Galifianakis is a surprisingly earnest soft remake of Planes, Trains and Automobiles and nobody remembers it exists.
Speaking of unexpectedly fun raunchy comedies, Booksmart.
I want to say The Long Kiss Goodnight, but man, the action in that is janky in exactly the ways modern action movies get right, so it can be a rough watch if you’re not ready. It also reads worse now that there’s a million John Wicks. Still, ahead of its time and actually well written.
Does Slither count? I feel like it’s on that Tremors territory where everybody knows it’s cool and ironically that thing, so it may not count. Somebody said Cabin in the Woods below, so… maybe it does count.
Oh, Ready or Not. It’s actually really funny and kind of a looser take on Knives Out as a horror movie. Good stuff.
The original TMNT movie should have sucked. How they snuck that tone into a whole movie before they made them tone it down for censorship and toyetic tie-ins is anybody’s guess.
Brick doesn’t count. Does Brick count? I think it doesn’t look like it’d suck, it’s just people don’t know about it. I mean, if I tell you “film noir by way of high school drama” you may get the wrong impression, so… maybe?
And I mentioned it below, but 2001 Metropolis is awesome despite a lot of people not being able to get past the designs or even being aware of what it is.
Slither!! I love that movie. An early James Gunn flick
Gosh I remember watching Brick when it first came out and thought it was overrated and pretentious but I feel like I deserves another chance.
I guess it depends how you go into it? To me it always read trashy. Like a pulp detective novel by way of Degrassi.
I don’t know that it has much to say beyond that pitch, but man, do I like it saying it. And if you slot it alongside the Knives Out movies as a detective trilogy it all kind of works.
Clueless.
As if!
Not sure it fits your criteria, but Sausage Party was a complete surprise for me. I never wanted to watch it because it seemed dumb and purile. And it is, but also somehow it blew my mind and became one of my favourite movies.
It’s a funny movie as long as you skip the final scene. It’s a funny bit but goes on for FAR too long, Imo.
Turbo Kid
That movie look like it was made in the 80s and released in the 2000s. It was not my experience it was all that great but maybe I was looking at it wrong
Yea which is why i thought it would be terrible but liked it
Clue - A movie based on a board game sounds terrible, but it’s really funny.
For more of a movie that visually looks bad.
Primer - Very low budget time travel movie that gets better every time you watch it.
After the second watch, you should read the hours and hours of content covering the time loops and paradoxes, and then watch it three or four more times to begin to grasp what you read.
Clue didn’t work in the theater because they did this gimmick where they made three versions with three different endings. So because it had to be consistent with three contradictory endings, you CAN’T solve it as you go; it doesn’t function as a mystery movie. And, it was kind of short.
The TV cut crammed all three endings at the end with the “Here’s what REALLY happened” cards inserted, so one ending is now canonical while the others are plausible alternatives, it runs longer, especially the frantic, energetic ending plays longer, so while it still doesn’t function as a mystery movie, it is now an excellent farce.
I think it also found its audience in young millennials on television; it was made for and by my parents’ generation but they don’t like it, while a lot of people my age love it.
There’s a particular character arc twist in Clue that made me jump out of my seat.
Man Bites Dog (C’est arrivé près de chez vous)
A mockumentary made by student filmmakers. The plot is that they are doing a documentary following the life of a serial killer.
The dark humor of this movie is incredibly disturbing but it’s really a movie to watch.
The movie is available on archive.org : https://archive.org/details/man-bites-dog
Whoa that’s a deep cut. Extremely jacked up satire.
I haven’t thought about this movie in like 30 years. Deep cut indeed.
I’ve got the criterion DVD when it first came out and yeah it’s been at least 20 years since I’ve watched it!
I only know this movie because it showed up on some “the most messed up movies” list I remember seeing many years ago.
Mystery Men
I don’t understand why this one isn’t better known. It’s great.
Tucker and Dale vs Evil.
It has a silly/dumb sounding name, a premise with every likelihood of being schlocky garbage, and no budget or marketing to speak of. And some of the cast certainly act like they know they’re in a low budget flick just phoning it in. Yet Tyler Labine as Dale and Alan Tudyk as Tucker bring so much humor and endearing energy to it as a couple of misunderstood sweethearts, that it is one of my all-time favorite films.
Honestly I like its message too. If nobody told stories about crazy homicidal hillbillies, none of the movie would’ve happened.
A Knight’s Tale. Not only is it a good movie but it was my introduction to Paul Bettany and Alan Tudyk and they were brilliant in it.
I just can’t get past the dance scene.
I love it. Starts off cringe but then once the Golden Years kicks in it’s magical.
And it left its mark on renaissance jousts everywhere. Always hear We Will Rock You at so many different ren fairs.
Genuinely a top 3 movie for me. Heath, Paul and Alan are all fantastic in it. I will never not watch it if an opportunity presents itself.
Thank you for posting this so I didn’t have to.
Just a gem of a movie.
Lets not forget Rufus Sewell, who is such an excellent villain
Liked him since Dark City which could be another candidate for this list.
Alan Tudyk is a gem! There’s a scene that I love from a doc about the voice acting on Moana. Cuts to Tudyk doing chicken sounds (he played the chicken), when he slyly looks into the camera and says “I went to Julliard”.
If you haven’t, watch Resident Alien.
I must watch the new season of that. And Con Man is so good, too.
Just finished season 3 on Netflix. It was some bullshit. :P
Have to look up Con Man
I think Con Man is available on Prime. I just watched the first couple episodes, myself.
the clip in all its glory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaGYXjMwS60
It didn’t click until I’d finished watching it that they’d tricked me into loving a sports underdog movie.
It’s true. The cocky rival who cheats, the training montages, the win despite all odds… It has every trope of the genre with a medieval set dressing.
Why dont they do this with more genres? Like I want a musician biopic movie ala Bohemian Rhapsody or Rocketman about a couple bards in England in the dark ages, and it is just Simon and Garfunkel doing Simon and Garfunkel songs on lyres and flutes completely anachronistically. Not satirically. Completely earnestly and yet fun.
Danny Boyd wrote an excellent video essay on A Knight’s Tale. I too always wonder why there’s always someone cutting onions when I choose to watch.
Because you have been judged, and likely not found wanting if you don’t suppress feelings.
“Trudging!”
“I will fong you. I will fong you until your entrails become extrails! I will—pain! Lots of pain!”
I do believe I’ll be watching this movie again today. 😁
That movie has perfect casting. Everyone in it is exactly right for their parts. There is a B movie feel that I can’t quite put my finger on but it is an outright excellent film, one of my personal favorites.
I think it’s that it doesn’t take itself too seriously, while still remaining carefully in the world/rules they set.
Well, that’ll piss some folks off I think. I actually appreciate things like the crowd at the opening joust rocking out to We Will Rock You. The banquet dance scene is better executed; they start out with the old time dance and then fade into modern club dancing, as if to say “Here’s what’s actually taking place” versus “Here’s how the characters feel about it in terms a modern audience can understand.”
I think I’m more talking about how a lot of the sets look like styrofoam? Especially castle interiors or other masonry? There’s just something very 80’s Gragthar The Destroyer about it.
Alaska. SW prequels. There’s also the Soviet movie “Until first blood”, where kids play “Zarnitsa” and learn something.
