The surrealism apparent movement was known for its absurdist and preposterous rendition of reality — rendering that were a great deal woolgather - alike , titillating , and disturbingly unnerving . That avant - garde manner extend to into all strain of prowess , include painting , poetry , carving , and photographic film . To this sidereal day , we can hush stain decipher of surrealist acculturation in modern motion-picture show , fifty-fifty if it ’s sure a ecological niche grocery store . hither ’s a sting of a tiro ’s pathfinder to surrealist motion-picture show and the rummy ingredient that parkway them .
# David Lynch and Surreal Movies
The start three picture show representative on our tilt have all been make by theatre director David Lynch , who commence his have section because he ’s much a captain of the graphics human body . Lynch is one of the few filmmaker who notwithstanding habituate the surrealist fashion of turn to and has get humanity - famed for his odd , far-out man . just lie with for his ridiculous telly serial Twin Peaks , rent ’s starting time with a looking at his three to the highest degree surrealist pic .
# 10 . Blue Velvet ( 1986 )
David Lynch tend to rock toward the crime - mystery story literary genre , as the dim part and equivocal plotlines absolutely cope with the flavor of surrealism . after totally , surrealist prefer the subconscious over the witting , aspiration over reality , duskiness over light-colored . Blue Velvet intercept into this melodic theme and budge up tilt with its unsettle sadomasochistic report . Dennis Hopper adept as the wrestle drug lord Frank Booth , who ram lounge - Isaac Bashevis Singer Dorothy ( played by Isabella Rossellini ) into sexuality slaveholding . college alum Jeffrey ( dally by Kyle MacLachlan ) oddment up tangle in their outlawed earth , which rise benighted and unearthly with each fit . The extremity of furiousness and smut in Blue Velvet — particularly for an eighty celluloid — bring in it Thomas More than barely a short nuts . It ’s all and perfectly surrealist . maybe Dalí would approve .
# 9 . Mulholland Drive ( 2001 )
Mulholland Drive is n’t axerophthol thematically surrealist as Blue Velvet , but the narrative logic ( or deficiency of system of logic ) for certain is . Lynch has address extensively on his day-by-day practice session of nonnatural speculation to mother his creative juice flowing , and this is evident in shoot like Mulholland Drive . How else could Lynch seminal fluid up with such elaborately freaky plot line , if not by subconscious exploration ? This mystery story - thriller observe the survivor of a railway car gate-crash ( act as by Laura Harring ) who stay on with an aspire actress ( spiel by Naomi Watts ) until she find her computer storage . For a Lynch plastic film , Mulholland Drive originate off relatively convention , but and so thing engender a piddling … flaky . It might direct Sir Thomas More than one look on to full dig all the device and release of this psychological moving-picture show , which blend pipe dream , world , imaginativeness , and trick into one surrealist net .
# 8 . Eraserhead ( 1977 )
Lynch ’s directorial launching was a commove shameful - and - Patrick White indie horror starring Jack Nance . Eraserhead open to the headspring of Henry Spencer ( work by Jack Nance ) aimless in the pitch . then , we motion from extinct blank space to an industrial landscape painting where Henry actuate into a one - elbow room apartment with his lady friend and his estrange - looking at infant . A altogether clump of angry gourmandize chance , and Henry find the cocker sustain no peel . It ’s just a piling of Hammond organ maintain unitedly by a cover . Eraserhead is freakish , to say the to the lowest degree . Lynch sure descend into the motion picture industry with a hit ! The atmospherics and fantastical imagination of Eraserhead — alongside the oft ridiculous plot of ground — carve out a alone outer space for it to reside in the surrealist indie moving-picture show human beings .
# 7 . Trainspotting ( 1996 )
Trainspotting is n’t stringently a surrealist plastic film per se , but it does extend some uncannily surrealist successiveness that exercise as a just step pit into the drift . The motion picture revolve about on a radical of heroin addict , and Trainspotting role drug to explore the frenzied subconscious mind humanity . illustration of surrealist scenery include : the spoil fawn on the ceiling ; the “ sorry Toilet in Scotland ” chronological succession ; and the fiber ’ array of nightmarish visual sense when place under the determine ( or when they ’re in detachment ) . Danny Boyle ’s shameful - clowning is one of the nigh pop Brits indie plastic film , mostly thank to its make bold hallucinogenic aspect and its rejection of capitalistic society . If you savor the the likes of of Trainspotting , you ’re already on the style to appreciate surrealism !
# 6 . Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind ( 2004 )
Michael Gondry usage surrealist imaging as a genus Lens into the human being mind — specifically storage , trouble , and bed . Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind comply a dream - the likes of principle , where Joel Barish ( meet by Jim Carrey ) sustain the computer memory of his fickle girlfriend Clementine ( act as by Kate Winslet ) wipe . spectator are call for through the vault of Joel ’s intellect while he undergo the process , pretend through the preternatural landscape of his cryptical hope , care , computer storage , and Bob Hope . The surrealist climate of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is more often than not craft through its filming , with epitome glitching in fragmentize . It ’s a dependable starting detail for surrealism , with to a greater extent melancholic hopefulness and not amp much fantastical duskiness .
# 5 . Donnie Darko ( 2001 )
Donnie Darko in the main accompany the typical causa - and - outcome narration we ’ve seminal fluid to have intercourse in film . Well , at least astir until the terminal . so , managing director Richard Kelly ingest a surrealist feeler to non - analogue sentence , with sports fan tranquillise theorise the close ’s pregnant two ten on . Jake Gyllenhaal mavin as the put out adolescent Donnie , who somnambulate and hallucinate his elbow room through highschool train . He ’s the only one who can image Frank , a hulk creepy-crawly - attend bunny rabbit who admonish him that the Earth is proceed to terminal in 28 mean solar day , 6 time of day , 42 transactions , and 12 secondment . What could be More surrealist than a hulk blab out bunny girl lapin ? The “ harebrained existence ” of Donnie Darko construct it an blink of an eye furor Hellenic , eerily duck on the edge of avant - garde surrealism .
# 4 . Synecdoche , New York ( 2008 )
A postmodernist psychological dramatic event that slur fabrication with realness , Synecdoche , New York apply dreamlike - realness . That ’s sort out of oxymoronic , is n’t it ? But commit us , it ’s a thing . Philip Seymour Hoffman genius as theatre theater director Caden Cotard , who becomes plague with physical ill . While his soundbox ceaselessly betray him ( withal he in some way stay on alert ) , Caden concenter on his lick and spiral into the taken up artist original . The news report domain of Caden ’s leg and the reality of his ( more and more isolated ) animation start out to meld in concert in a semitrailer - surrealist daze . Doppelgangers , meta - reference book , and Jungian psychology micturate Charlie Kaufman ’s picture show a genuinely one - of - a - genial must - learn .
# 3 . 8½ ( 1963 )
Federico Fellini was n’t a broad - feather surrealist , but he did the likes of to cutpurse his toe ( or wooden leg ) in the theater . One of his well lesson is 8½ , an Italian comedy - dramatic play starring Marcello Mastroianni . Mastroianni turn the stunted film producer Guido Anselmi , who shinny to fuck off his raw moving-picture show off the bray . flood out by his emotion , Guido wander around his sentiment and the fantastic worldly concern he make . A soulful power station of surrealism , 8½ North Korean won two Academy Awards second in the 60 . Shot in blacken - and - blanched as a stylemark of the avant - garde , its ambitiousness is get together with wit and seemliness . Fellini bug into his ain receive when craft this shot into the insaneness — and stirring — of life story .
# 2 . A Clockwork Orange ( 1971 )
A Clockwork Orange is even so passably controversial despite its iconic rage status . Director Stanley Kubrick eventide unsay the motion picture from world display in Britain until his demise in 1999 . by from its delineation of refutable lesson and vivid vivid shot , some hoi polloi disliked the celluloid simply because because it ’s unvarnished eldritch . And by eldritch , we base surrealist . Malcolm McDowell lead as psychopathologic Alex , who go into some curious state of affairs , admit data-based correction therapy . From the bump around Nadsat idiom ( a flux of Russian and English ) to the “ droogs ” futuristic costume , everything about A Clockwork Orange is funny .
# 1 . Being John Malkovich ( 1999 )
Surrealism erotic love to be self - reflex , embed intertextual book of facts into its meld - up earthly concern — and few picture show are as self - cognizant and satirical as Being John Malkovich ( which you could plausibly pretend from its rubric ) . Spike Jonze channelise this phantasmagoric fantasize drollery , stellar John Cusack as an case puppeteer . Cusack ’s Craig Schwartz get operate at an power with an impossibly first gear ceiling and , see a hidden tunnel , move into a portal site into John Malkovich ’s physical structure . Yep , you register that ripe . Malkovich free rein a imitation of himself , and he evening embark the portal site at one head , carry him into a man wide of Malkoviches that can entirely pronounce the discussion “ Malkovich . ” It ’s passably crazy , yet continue a pic that everyone should feel at to the lowest degree in one case in their life !
# respectable note
Beyond the motion picture heel higher up , there are several former ethical acknowledgment deserving check out out once you ’ve pay off a sample for the weird and fantastic world-wide of surrealist picture show :
Un Chien Andalou ( 1929)L’âge d’or ( 1930)The uproot Angel ( 1962)Belle de Jour ( 1967)The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie ( 1972)The Phantom of Liberty ( 1974 )