Verotika: 10 Obscure So-Bad-They're-Good Movies To Watch If You Liked This Guilty Pleasure
There’s something uniquely pleasurable about watching a film that’s so bad that it’s good. It’s hard to say why, exactly, such films are enjoyable. Perhaps it’s the sense of superiority that it gives us, or perhaps it’s that we enjoy the way that the phrase “so bad it’s good” cleverly inverts the way that we typically think about taste and what is accorded artistic value in our society.
Whatever the case, if you want to relish the so bad it’s good film, here are ten that you should check out if you enjoyed Verotika.
9 The Return of the Living Dead (1985)
There’s no question that this film has very high intentions, and it’s true that it introduced some key ideas of what we think about zombies, including the idea that zombies eat brains. However, it’s very much a creation of the 1980s, and though it hasn’t aged very well and looks more than a little silly by contemporary standards, it’s still fun to indulge in a camp appreciation interesting take on the idea of the zombie film.
8 The Baby (1973)
In some ways, the 1970s are a forgotten decade of American cinema, and in others it is a veritable treasure trove of camp classics like The Baby. This truly disturbing film focuses on a social worker who discovers a man kept in a perpetual state of infancy by his controlling family, and though she seeks to free him, it is really for her own, sinister, designs. It’s a strange and unsettling film, and it is, in a word, in incredibly poor taste.
7 Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2010)
If you ever wondered what would have happened in Hitchcock’s classic film The Birds had been an independent and poorly-financed film instead of a studio production, look no further than this film. The only truly horrifying thing about the film is its truly abysmal quality, which reaches truly sublime levels of trash (you can’t get worse than vultures that crash and burst into smoke). And, in case you were wondering, yes, there is a sequel and yes, it’s even worse.
Though it might be hard to imagine a gritty and bloody film such as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre having a sequel that had elements of comedy, that’s exactly what happened. The director believed that the comic elements were there in the original and sought to bring them out with his film.
It received a rather lukewarm reception from both critics and audiences--largely as a result of its genre-crossing--but it has since developed its own cult following.
6 Trog (1970)
There’s so much to say about Trog that it’s hard to know where to start. In addition to featuring a strange storyline about a caveman that is brought back to life in 20th Century England, it is also the last film of famed star Joan Crawford. Though Crawford gives her all--she was a consummate actress and a woman devoted to her craft--the film never really manages to rise about the absurd. For all that, it’s still an eminently watchable film, if only to see Crawford herself.
5 Sleepaway Camp (1983)
In many ways, the 1980s was the golden age of the slasher film. For some reason, the idea of teens getting cut up by a bloodthirsty murderer seems to stir something deep inside of us. Though it’s rather a bad film, there’s no question that Sleepaway Camp has become something of a hallmark of the slasher genre, in part because it’s ending (no spoilers!) is one of the most shocking to be seen in a slasher film.
4 Ancient Evil: Scream of the Mummy (2000)
This film clearly wanted to cash in on the success of the previous year’s box office hit The Mummy. This film, however, never quite raises itself out of the realms of the B-movie. In addition to shifting the setting from Egypt to Mexico, so that the mummy is a relict from the Aztec era. The film has genuinely disturbing moments, and there’s a nice bit of apocalypse to the plot, as well.
3 Venus Flytrap (1970)
Also known as The Revenge of Dr. X and actually finished in the 1960s, it wasn’t released until 1970. It focuses on a mad scientist who decides--based on a theory that plants are the ancestors of humans--creates a man-eating plant that goes on a rampage in a nearby village.
Needless to say, it’s an absolutely ridiculous film, but it’s precisely the pulpy nature of the plot and the performances that makes it so enduringly entertaining and campy.
2 The Last Slumber Party (1988)
This film is what would happen if The Room, notoriously one of the worst films ever made, were to become a horror film. It’s hard to summarize what exactly happens in this film, precisely because so many elements of the plot, to say nothing of the many misfires--ranging from a scalpel that spurts blood to the repetition of a particular scene to the truly terrible acting--are just so execrable. Still, sometimes it’s fun to watch something that is so truly, desperately bad.
1 Bats (1999)
This film, directed by John Logan (who would later go on to create the hit Showtime series Penny Dreadful) is, at its title implies, about a small town that is attacked by genetically modified bats. It is, admittedly, a horror film that really isn’t all that scary, and there are some rather uninteresting characters to boot but, despite the fact that it was savaged by the critics, it does invite a special sort of camp appreciation.