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Movies: Best "avant garde" Movies


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481 movies found (page 1/17):

Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion(1997)

4.2/5 (with 703 votes)

The second of two theatrically released follow-ups to the Neon Genesis Evangelion series. Comprising of two alternate episodes which were first intended to take the place of episodes 25 and 26, this finale answers many of the questions surrounding the series, while also opening up some new possibilities.

Santa Sangre(1989)

2h 3min | Horror, Mystery, Drama
3.5/5 (with 172 votes)

A young man is confined in a mental hospital. Through a flashback we see that he was traumatized as a child, when he and his family were circus performers. Back in the present, he escapes and rejoins his surviving and armless mother.

The Baby of Mâcon(1993)

NR
| 2h 2min | Drama, History
3.5/5 (with 37 votes)

Set halfway through the 17th century, a church play is performed for the benefit of the young aristocrat Cosimo. In the play, a grotesque old woman gives birth to a beautiful baby boy. The child's older sister is quick to exploit the situation, selling blessings from the baby, and even claiming she's the true mother by virgin birth. However, when she attempts to seduce the bishop's son, the Church exacts a terrible revenge.

Lux Æterna(2020)

51min | Drama, Horror
3.1/5 (with 94 votes)

Two actresses, Béatrice Dalle and Charlotte Gainsbourg, are on a film set telling stories about witches.

Koyaanisqatsi(1982)

NR
| 1h 26min | Documentary
4.0/5 (with 271 votes)

Takes us to locations all around the US and shows us the heavy toll that modern technology is having on humans and the earth. The visual tone poem contains neither dialogue nor a vocalized narration: its tone is set by the juxtaposition of images and the exceptional music by Philip Glass.

Directed by Godfrey Reggio

Sweet Movie(1974)

R
| 1h 39min | Mystery, Comedy, Drama
2.7/5 (with 50 votes)

The winner of the Miss World Virginity contest marries, escapes from her masochistic husband and ends up involved in a world of debauchery.

Berlin: Symphony of a Great City(1927)

1h 9min | Documentary, History
3.9/5 (with 44 votes)

A train speeds through the country on its way to Berlin, then gradually slows down as it pulls into the station. It is very early in the morning, about 5:00 AM, and the great city is mostly quiet. But before long there are some signs of activity, and a few early risers are to be seen on the streets. Soon the new day is well underway. It's just a typical day in Berlin, but a day full of life and energy.

Directed by Walter Ruttmann

3 Women(1977)

PG
| 2h 4min | Drama, Mystery
3.7/5 (with 115 votes)

Two co-workers, one a vain woman and the other an awkward teenager, share an increasingly bizarre relationship after becoming roommates.

About Nice(1930)

24min | Documentary
3.5/5 (with 56 votes)

What starts off as a conventional travelogue turns into a satirical portrait of the town of Nice on the French Côte d'Azur, especially its wealthy inhabitants.

Directed by Jean Vigo

Eden and After(1970)

1h 33min | Mystery, Drama
3.2/5 (with 21 votes)

A group of French students are drawn into the psychological and sexual games of a mysterious Dutchman. Once they sample his "fear powder" the students experience a series of hallucinations.

WR: Mysteries of the Organism(1971)

1h 24min | Drama, Fantasy, Comedy
3.0/5 (with 36 votes)

What does the energy harnessed through orgasm have to do with the state of communist Yugoslavia circa 1971? Only counterculture filmmaker extraordinaire Dušan Makavejev has the answers (or the questions). His surreal documentary-fiction collision WR: Mysteries of the Organism begins as an investigation into the life and work of controversial psychologist and philosopher Wilhelm Reich and then explodes into a free-form narrative of a beautiful young Slavic girl’s sexual liberation.

Fata Morgana(1971)

1h 16min | Documentary
3.4/5 (with 31 votes)

Shot under extreme conditions and inspired by Mayan creation theory, the film contemplates the illusion of reality and the possibility of capturing for the camera something which is not there. It is about the mirages of nature—and the nature of mirage.

Directed by Werner Herzog - With Lotte H. Eisner
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Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets(1971)

2h 17min | Drama
3.8/5 (with 20 votes)

Conditions have been better for the nameless protagonist: his grandmother is a shoplifter and his war criminal father and sister have an unhealthy, intimate relationship with the family rabbit.

Directed by Shūji Terayama

Re/cycle(2019)

1min | Fantasy
3.9/5 (with 21 votes)

With input from actor and writer Jan Hlobil, director and cinematographer Rene Smaal presents a film in the true surrealist tradition, in the sense that only 'found' elements were used, and that it defies interpretation based on ordinary cause-and-effect time sequence.

Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One(1968)

R
| 1h 15min | Documentary
3.7/5 (with 19 votes)

In Manhattan's Central Park, a film crew directed by William Greaves is shooting a screen test with various pairs of actors. It's a confrontation between a couple: he demands to know what's wrong, she challenges his sexual orientation. Cameras shoot the exchange, and another camera records Greaves and his crew. Sometimes we watch the crew discussing this scene, its language, and the process of making a movie. Is there such a thing as natural language? Are all things related to sex? The camera records distractions - a woman rides horseback past them; a garrulous homeless vet who sleeps in the park chats them up. What's the nature of making a movie?

Directed by William Greaves - With Don Fellows

Luz(2019)

1h 10min | Horror, Mystery
2.6/5 (with 27 votes)

Luz, a young cabdriver, drags herself into the brightly lit entrance of a run-down police station. A demonic entity follows her, determined to finally be close to the woman it loves.

Directed by Tilman Singer - With Jan Bluthardt, Julia Riedler

Still Life(1974)

1h 30min | Drama
3.4/5 (with 9 votes)

A minimalist study of lonely, isolated existence. Mohamad Sardari has spent thirty years at a remote outpost raising and lowering a gate to keep road traffic from crossing tracks when a train passes. He lives with his wife in an unadorned shack; a few bare trees dot the threadbare landscape.

Rabbit's Moon(1971)

16min | Drama, Fantasy
3.0/5 (with 24 votes)

A Japanese fairy tale meets commedia dell'Arte. All in white, the naïf Pierrot lies in a wood. Doo-wop music plays as he rises, stares about, and reaches for the moon. Although music abounds and the children of the wood are there at play, Pierrot is melancholy and alone. Harlequin appears, brimming with confidence and energy. He conjures the lovely Colombina. Pierrot is dazzled. But can the course of true love run smooth? Filmed in France in 1950, it was not completed nor released until 1971.

Directed by Kenneth Anger

Return to Reason(1923)

3min
3.2/5 (with 35 votes)

Experimental film, white specks and shapes gyrating over a black background, the light-striped torso of Kiki of Montparnasse (Alice Prin), a gyrating eggcrate. One of the first Dadaist films.

Directed by Man Ray - With Alice Prin

Totally F***ed Up(1994)

NR
| 1h 18min | Comedy, Drama, Romance / Love
3.3/5 (with 35 votes)

Gay, alienated Los Angeles teens have a hard time as their parents kick them out of their homes, they don’t have money, their lovers cheat, and they are harassed by gay-bashers.

Directed by Gregg Araki - With James Duval, Roko Belic, Clay Walker, Robert McHenry, Craig Gilmore

Taris(1931)

3.2/5 (with 34 votes)

Short documentary directed by Jean Vigo about the French swimmer Jean Taris. The film is notable for the many innovative techniques that Vigo uses, including close ups and freeze frames of the swimmer's body.

Directed by Jean Vigo - With Jean Taris

Atman(1975)

12min | Horror, Animation
3.3/5 (with 11 votes)

ĀTMAN is a visual tour-de-force based on the idea of the subject at the centre of the circle created by camera positions (480 such positions). Shooting frame-by-frame the filmmaker set up an increasingly rapid circular motion. ĀTMAN is an early Buddhist deity often connected with destruction; the Japanese aspect is stressed by the devil mask of Hangan, from the Noh, and by using both Noh music and the general principle of acceleration often associated with Noh drama.

Directed by Toshio Matsumoto

Vinyl(1965)

2.2/5 (with 16 votes)

Andy Warhol’s screen adaptation of Burgess's "A Clockwork Orange”.

Sombre(1998)

1h 52min | Drama, Horror
3.3/5 (with 18 votes)

A serial killer stalks a woman he befriended after her car broke down.

Mondo Hollywoodland(2021)

3.3/5 (with 1 vote)

Homage to the cult classic “Mondo Hollywood”, a groovy mushrooms dealer and a man from the 5th dimension journey through Hollywood to find the meaning of “Mondo.”.

60 Seconds of Solitude in Year Zero(2011)

2.0/5 (with 1 vote)

An anthology of one-minute films created by 60 international filmmakers on the theme of the death of cinema. Intended as an ode to 35mm, the film was screened one time only on a purpose-built 20x12 meter public cinema screen in the Port of Tallinn, Estonia, on 22 December 2011. A special projector was constructed for the event which allowed the actual filmstrip to be burnt at the same time as the film was shown.

Directed by Brillante Mendoza

The Age of the Earth(1980)

2h 28min | Drama
3.0/5 (with 8 votes)

Four Third-World Christs try to stop the American industrialist John Brahms in Glauber Rocha's experimental film inspired by Pier Paolo Pasolini's murder.

Big Bang Love, Juvenile A(2006)

1h 25min | Fantasy, Drama
3.2/5 (with 24 votes)

An unknown future. A boy confesses to the murder of another in an all-boy juvenile detention facility. More an exercise in style than storytelling, the story follows two detectives trying to uncover the case. Homosexual tension and explosive violence drives the story which delivers some weird and fascinating visuals.

At Land(1944)

15min | Mystery, Fantasy
3.6/5 (with 43 votes)

A woman lies on the sand, left there by the tides and waves (and in a pose that would be copied in From Here to Eternity). She reaches up across tree roots and makes a difficult climb. Only to discover herself climbing horizontally along a long dinner table as bourgeoise black-tie guests chat and drink and smoke, oblivious to her. At the top of the table, a man is playing chess but abandons the game. Fascinated, she gazes at board, the pieces moving unaided. The woman chases a pawn as it falls to the floor. Falls down a waterfall. Is lost.

Directed by Maya Deren - With John Cage

Anemic Cinema(1926)

7min
3.1/5 (with 36 votes)

A spiral design spins. It's replaced by a spinning disk. These two continue in perfect alternation until the end: a spiral design, a disk. Each disk is labelled and can be read as it rotates. The messages, in French, feature puns and whimsical rhymes and alliteration. The final message comments on the spiral motif itself.

Directed by Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray
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