Cult 101

“What are cult movies?” you ask, having stumbled upon Mutant Reviewers through some sort of dimensional portal. Simply put, cult movies are niche films that have developed a passionate and dedicated fanbase over the years.

Most often — but not always — these films are “different” from your mainstream releases, and cult fans such as ourselves appreciate the refreshing variety that such movies provide. Sometimes these films are largely unknown, and sometimes they’re a fixture in the cultural zeitgeist. Categories of cult include B-movies, slashers, creature features, exploitation flicks, guilty pleasures, so-bad-they’re-good experiences, scifi/fantasy, and midnight screeners.

Part of the fun of cult movies is in discovering them, sharing them with friends, endlessly quoting them, and feeling as though you’re “in the know” as to something special. That’s why we created Mutant Reviewers back in the late 1990s, because we had a blast talking about cult flicks with our friends and wanted to include people like you in the conversation!

That said, we are not here to be gatekeepers of what is, and what isn’t, cult. Our approach has always been to generally cover films that have a cult feel about them, whether or not others consider our picks to be too recent, too mainstream, or too obscure. The key to enjoying cult movies is to find the types that you like to watch and indulge in those! To help you get started, we’ve compiled a few lists of suggestions of movies that we love to recommend:

Essential cult viewing

These are generally agreed to be “must watch” movies for those getting into cult movies.

So-bad-they’re-great movies

These are absolutely terrible movies that are so much fun to watch — and mock — because of how legendarily bad they are.

1980s fan favorites

The ’80s seemed to produce a great deal of cult movies that we still rave about today.

1990s fan favorites

Get your Gen X grunge, early CGI, crazy-good mid-budget movies on with these ’90s classics!

Cult horror

If you like a splash of scares, creatures, and slashers, then there are plenty of horror flicks to meet your dark desire.

Offbeat science fiction and fantasy

Many cult fans are scifi or fantasy geeks as well, and there are many more worlds than these to experience!

Super quotable comedies

Laughs and memorable lines go hand-in-hand with these hilarious films.