CultMovies Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Wouldn't it be cool if President Obama and Vice President Biden sat around chatting about cult flicks like the rest of us weird movie buffs? Sure, they've got the economy, two wars, the nominating of a Supreme Court Justice, and the preservation of democracy to worry about this week, but what if they decided to eat burgers and share their love of psychedelic drug movies featuring topless dancers?

Obama and Biden did, in fact, pay a surprise visit on Tuesday to Ray's Hell Burger in Arlington, Virginia, for what the Washington Business Journal described as a "quick working lunch." They waited in line, placed their orders, and sat down to await their burgers. Did they choose to sit at that particular table so they could contemplate the poster for William Rotsler's 1968 cult flick Mantis in Lace? Or was that the only one empty?

The blog Popcorn and Sticky Floors posted the photo, but in case you're thinking it was doctored, I've included a couple of photos I've found at other sites -- one a broader view of the restaurant with the two men and owner Michael Landrum, and another from last year showing that the restaurant decorates its walls with posters.

Obama has gone on record ranking Casablanca, The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, Lawrence of Arabia, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest as his favorite movies. But I wonder: What are his favorite "guilty pleasure" movies? Is Mantis in Lace on that list?

[ Thanks to Colin Geddes for the pointer and headline.]

Have you ever watched a movie about a kid who shrinks himself and then finds himself inside the underwear of a cute teen girl?

This may seem like a random question, but it is a serious one. See, years ago I was up late watching television, and I spotted this weird, low-budget movie. I tuned in just as this kid shrunk himself (or got shrunk?), got on a bicycle seat, and made his way into a girl's underwear. Now usually this isn't the sort of film that I'd be dying to see years later, but the execution was classic -- a kid climbing up a white sheet with big barbs hanging out of it. While he did that, the girl found all sorts of pleasure in class ... you get the drift. The scene, in all of its low-cost glory, has stuck with me all these years, and I can't expunge it!

I'm quite sure that it's something from Rhonda Shear and USA's Up All Night, which seems to inspire many viewers to try and figure out which cult movie they saw. So I figure, who better to ask this pressing question, than Cinematical readers? If you can help me, I'll love you forever, but I figure this can also help out any of you in the same boat. Got a film you're dying to put a name to? Ask away below!

Update: Thanks to the wonderful reader known as Goldstein, my movie has been found! It is Getting Lucky (1990).

Just attempting to make a small list of any large field of film will immediately invoke dissatisfaction. It doesn't matter if you cloak it in your own personal favorites, or try to narrow it down to a specific theme. Someone, somewhere will say you're missing X, or have forgotten Y. I get that, and I try not to be one of those people when I scoff at lists I don't agree with.

But sometimes it's just inevitable, especially when the lists talk about super-loved geek fare or cult favorites. Both have die-hard fans, and when it comes to the cult genre, it's fans who adore and fight for a film without having met seas of marketing and press. The movie itself is what inspires the cult following, rising the film from the forgotten piles of dust and into the never-forgotten ranks of cult infamy.

So I have to say, I'm pretty darned surprised at Entertainment Weekly's The Cult 25: The Essential Left-Field Movie Hits Since '83. (It's pretty much this list, without the older films.) At the very least, they narrowed the time frame down, but as soon as I saw "essential," I knew there would be holes, and strangely placed films.

There's really nothing like a good cult flick. It's fun, engaging, and wonderfully quotable. Even the vibe is different -- fans of cult films don't just sit quietly, catatonically watching the screen -- they radiate energy -- hooting, hollering, and reciting. It's why films like Bubba Ho-Tep should be seen in a theater -- it's there to have fun. Others, like Fight Club and Donnie Darko, are a little darker and serious, but just as engaging. So, the question VH1 is asking: Is Wristcutters: A Love Story destined to be the cult classic?

I, for one, am dying to find out. Way back in the beginning of 2006, Karina Longworth reviewed it and said: "It's a bold first effort, with a distinct, swaggering sense of style and humor that's hard – even for a cynical blogger sick to death of indie 'quirk' – to resist." Sounds good to me! The flick also had a controversial ad campaign to elicit buzz and anger, while appealing to the darker more cult-driven movie fans. Topping all that off, it's even got a following already, according to Courtney Solomon, the head of After Dark films. While it's going into limited release on October 19, he says: "People do actually quote the lines, and it's gotten such an underground following just from doing the festival circuit." Maybe, just maybe, this is the next big thing. But either way -- people have to stop comparing these sorts of films to Heathers -- they never live up to it and just make expectations way too high.