History MindScrew / Film

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[[caption-width-right:350:[[GainaxEnding ...Huh?]]]]

** Director of ''Cube'', Vincenzo Natali, also made ''Film/{{Nothing}}'', a [[TheStoner Stoner Comedy]] about non-existence. It's fairly straightforward in its own way, but still...

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* The ending of ''Film/TheNinthGate'' caused everybody to make that sound {{Scooby-Doo}} makes when he's confused.
* The Oscar-nominated French/Canadian/Belgian animated movie ''TheTripletsOfBelleville''.

** The abstract images which open the film are probably an homage to [[UnChienAndalou Un Chien Andalou]]. Bergman realized his work no longer seemed as groundbreaking as it once had, so he was announcing to the world his intention to go deeper into stylistic experimentation.

* My God, ''FelixTheCatTheMovie''. Just...just watch it. Reptilian creatures, a magic bag, a half-robot evil overlord, a sentient tear, a dimensional transporter, mice-lizard hybrids, WesternAnimation/YellowSubmarine-like sea creatures, a CircusOfFear, a forest made of giant hair follicles with head-hunting creatures that are always losing their own heads, evil cubes and cylinders, and a book of ultimate power that defeats the bad guy by being thrown at him. And to top it all off, there's also a German version.

* Generally most of Creator/JohnCarpenter's films are pretty straight forward in their delivery. A partial exception would be ''Film/TheThing1982'', which despite having a narrative that's more or less easy to follow really leaves out a lot of crucial details that the audience is left to fill in. To this day fans of the movie still debate on [[spoiler: who got to the blood, whether Blair was infected before or after he was locked up (which depending on how you look at it can provide wholly different interpretations of his actions over the course of the film), how Fuchs ended up being burned to death outside, and most of all whether the Thing really was defeated, or if perhaps one, both, or neither of the survivors have been assimilated]].

* The 1965 science fiction horror ''Film/MonsterAGoGo'' attempts to pull off a mind screw at its climax, although as with everything else in the film - acting, special effects, sound recording - this fails utterly. In brief, director Bill Rebane ran out of money before he could finish the film; the footage was was later purchased by producer Herschell Gordon Lewis, who finished it as cheaply as possible, with extra scenes shot a year later and some spurious narration. The end result was a disjointed, haunting mess, in which characters we don't know talk at great length about a threat we never see. The kicker comes at the end; after sixty minutes of plotless meandering, it ''finally'' seems as if the radioactive monster has been cornered, in a sewer. The army are called in, and we watch some soldiers dressing themselves in radiation suits for five long minutes. But just as it seems that some action is about to take place, ''a cosmic switch is pulled''. [[spoiler:''There was no monster''. "There was no trail. There was no giant, no monster, no thing called "Douglas" to be followed."]]

* ''BladesOfGlory'' ending.
** Not so much MindScrew as it is RuleOfFunny.

* Film/Lawnmower Man involved a lot of this. Not only is there a very strange VR section involving (at the time) state of the art cgi, there are drugs, a main character having his brain transformed and losing control of himself, and an ending involving something like a messianic ascension that is never explained. Compared to some films on this list, it is still pretty straightforward though.
* The 1965 science fiction horror ''MonsterAGoGo'' attempts to pull off a mind screw at its climax, although as with everything else in the film - acting, special effects, sound recording - this fails utterly. In brief, director Bill Rebane ran out of money before he could finish the film; the footage was was later purchased by producer Herschell Gordon Lewis, who finished it as cheaply as possible, with extra scenes shot a year later and some spurious narration. The end result was a disjointed, haunting mess, in which characters we don't know talk at great length about a threat we never see. The kicker comes at the end; after sixty minutes of plotless meandering, it ''finally'' seems as if the radioactive monster has been cornered, in a sewer. The army are called in, and we watch some soldiers dressing themselves in radiation suits for five long minutes. But just as it seems that some action is about to take place, ''a cosmic switch is pulled''. [[spoiler:''There was no monster''. "There was no trail. There was no giant, no monster, no thing called "Douglas" to be followed."]]
* DavidLynch's ''MulhollandDrive'' Or, to an even greater degree, ''{{Eraserhead}}''.

** ''Inland Empire'' makes Mulholland Dr. seem sensical.
*** As Laura Dern's character describes the events of the film: "I'm trying to tell you so you understand how it went. Thing is, I don't know what was before or after. I don't know what's happened first...and it's kinda layin' a mindfuck on me."
*** And oh good Christ in heaven, ''how many'' false endings did that movie ''have''? I'm fairly sure that they took up the last forty minutes.
** Mr. Lynch is so well known for his [[MindScrew Mind Screws]], that he had to title his one non-maddening movie ''The Straight Story''. And it's still kind of weird.
** Heck, even his films that actually have a comprehensible plot like BlueVelvet or TheElephantMan have their share of mind screw moments.

* [[Film/TheRockyHorrorPictureShow A man and his fiance-that he takes the time to remind everyone of- end up entering a castle inhabited by generic horror movie servants who work for a transvestite Tim Curry who somehow creates a frankenstein monster only for a zombified Meat Loaf to ride a motorcycle out of a giant freezer to sing a song while dry humping his girlfriend only for Tim Curry to slaughter him and then apparently marry the frankenstein only for a narrator with no F***ing neck to introduce Tim Curry having sex with the asshole and the slut followed by the musical sex scene of the slut seducing the frankenstein when the paraplegic, nazi kool-aid man crashes through the wall and announces that meat loaf is his nephew and things about how much of a disappointment Meat Loaf was and this introduces musical attempted rape followed by a musical orgy in a pool and-wouldn't you know it- a musical dance where the servants reveal that they are aliens and kill transvestite Tim Curry, Meat Loaf's girlfriend, and frankenstein and then fly the castle off into space.]] I am obviously talking about Thelma and Louise.

* Parodied with the ending of ''Film/MysteryTeam''.

* ''Film/TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey''. The book, on the other hand, is considerably more comprehensible.
** A popular urban legend (later confirmed by Arthur C. Clarke himself) goes that, after the premiere, Rock Hudson stormed out of the theater yelling, "Can someone tell me what the hell I just watched?"
** The movie was such a mind screw that the film adaptation of ''TwoThousandTenTheYearWeMakeContact'' was largely devoted to ''[[MindScrewdriver trying to explain what had happened in the last movie]].'' You may not have heard of this sequel. There's an excellent reason for that.
** The prologue and ending of the original book of ''2001'' are significantly longer than their movie equivalents for the same reason. There was a lot of 'splaining to do.
* Unless you're a [[{{Music/TheBeatles}} Beatles]] fan and have some basic knowledge of the 60's counterculture movement, ''Film/AcrossTheUniverse'' can be anywhere from "slightly confusing" to "incomprehensible acid trip on film".

* ''Film/BlackSwan''. What's real, what's a hallucination, and what's a visual metaphor? In this movie, it's hard to tell, and increasingly it's hard to tell if there's even a difference. Did the movie even happen at all, or will Nina wake up screaming 5 minutes after the credits?
** Mind screws are a recurring theme in all of Darren Aronofsky's films.

* ''Film/DeadMan'' with Johnny Depp is a very otherworldly film, during which few things happen and most of the dialogues are just plain weird. It's even pointed out in frustration by the protagonist at one point.
* ''DonnieDarko'', to the extent that members of the cast can't agree on whether there is a legitimate TimeTravel story, or just a handful of psychedelic delusions.
** In the DVD commentary, the [[WordOfGod director]] owns up to the fact that even he doesn't really know what's going on and that the plot probably can't be explained without resorting to [[AWizardDidIt divine intervention]].
** Director Richard Kelly's second film, ''SouthlandTales'', somehow manages to be even more violently insane than his first. It was supposed to be part of a massive multimedia experience (that never really panned out), but it would take a ''damn'' lot of graphic novels to explain what on God's green Earth was happening at any point during that movie.
*** Read all about it [[http://www.agonybooth.com/recaps/Southland_Tales_2006.aspx here]].
* ''Film/ForbiddenZone'' is one of the most crazy films you would ever watch.
* The point of the CRS company in the DavidFincher flick ''Film/TheGame''.
* ''GiveMyRegardsToBroadStreet'' has some Mind Screwing - partly from symbolism, partly because of [[DreamSequence Dream Sequences]] started and ended with very little warning.

* Watch the Argentinian film ''Hombre Mirando al Sudeste'' (''Man Looking Southeast'') and try to decide which of the explanations is true. You'll be lying in bed thinking about it, seriously, as it's just that freakin' bizarre, and ends unanswered.

* ''Film/JacobsLadder'' is a Mind Screw from start to finish.

* The 1960s version of ''LordOfTheFlies''. It's not even in a funny way. It's kind of scary.
* ''MirrorMask'' My God, Mirror Mask... If the visual conception isn't enough (and this troper believes it is), then would some other troper explain what the whole point was? Or how it was the SpiritualSuccessor to ''Film/{{Labyrinth}}''?

* The ending of ''TheNinthGate'' caused everybody to make that sound {{Scooby-Doo}} makes when he's confused.

* ''{{Performance}}''. When the sudden MusicVideo ''follows perfectly''...

* Generally most of John Carpenter's films are pretty straight forward in their delivery. A partial exception would be ''Film/TheThing1982'', which despite having a narrative that's more or less easy to follow really leaves out a lot of crucial details that the audience is left to fill in. To this day fans of the movie still debate on [[spoiler: who got to the blood, whether Blair was infected before or after he was locked up (which depending on how you look at it can provide wholly different interpretations of his actions over the course of the film), how Fuchs ended up being burned to death outside, and most of all whether the Thing really was defeated, or if perhaps one, both, or neither of the survivors have been assimilated]].

-->-- '''Dr. Frank N. Furter''', ''TheRockyHorrorPictureShow''

* Two words that have yet to be said despite being the name of one of the most famous incarnate of MindScrew to come out during the 1960s: ''YellowSubmarine''

* My God, ''FelixTheCatTheMovie''. Just...just watch it. Reptilian creatures, a magic bag, a half-robot evil overlord, a sentient tear, a dimensional transporter, mice-lizard hybrids, YellowSubmarine-like sea creatures, a CircusOfFear, a forest made of giant hair follicles with head-hunting creatures that are always losing their own heads, evil cubes and cylinders, and a book of ultimate power that defeats the bad guy by being thrown at him. And to top it all off, there's also a German version.

* Japanese auteur TakashiMiike, when he's not being the master of extreme violence and gore, is a master of the MindScrew. His most mind-bending film, however, has to be ''{{Gozu}}''. Disappearing corpses, a river without a bridge, creepy transvestite waiters, unreliable guides with bizarre skin conditions, young women giving birth to full-grown men, middle-age women selling breast milk, an almost deserted former fishing town, Yakuza who live in a junkyard, an American reading her dialog from a cue card, and a huge minotaur wearing baggy underwear. And that doesn't even begin to describe how twisted this movie is. The strangest thing is that [[MindScrewdriver it all makes perfect sense]] when you realize [[spoiler: it's all a symbolic representation of the protagonist's inner journey, told with symbolism from both Japanese and Greco-Roman mythology, and represents his coming to terms with his own homosexuality and love for his Yakuza "older brother", and his "rebirth" as a new person]].

* DavidCronenberg's ''NakedLunch'' is a lot less disgusting than the book it's named after (it actually borrows from a large part of the works of William S. Burroughs), but only slightly less confusing.
** Speaking of Cronenberg films, ''eXistenZ'' is Philip K Dick-like in the mind screw department. It features a VR game within a VR game within a VR game within a VR game, the characters openly question whether they're still in the game at every level (and for bonus points, compare real-life to VR), switch sides multiple times, and reference things that happened at other levels.

* Most films directed by AndreiTarkovsky, including ''{{Solaris}}'', ''{{Stalker}}'', and ''The Sacrifice''. Also, ''TheMirror'', to which Tarkovsky commented that even he himself didn't understand the full meaning behind some of the scenes.

* The South Korean film, ''Film/ATaleOfTwoSisters''. Two sisters, Su-Mi and Su-Yeon, move to the countryside to live with their aloof father and horrible stepmother after their mother's death. Su-Mi is very protective of her sister, as it is implied that their stepmother abuses her. And then there's a scene that takes place right when dawn is breaking, Su-Mi awakens to a ghost crawling on their bedroom floor, proceeds to stand up and get on the bed in a rather creepy glitchy manner, and then ''a freaking bleeding arm comes out of the ghost's vagina''. Su-Mi wakes up to find that Su-Yeon has started her period, on ''the same day as the stepmother's''. It's later revealed that [[spoiler: Su-Yeon was dead the whole time and Su-Mi promptly flips her shit about it. Later, she discovers a trail of blood leading to a bloody burlap sack, which is implied to have Su-Yeon in it. Su-Mi attempts to try to cut the bag open when her stepmother comes along and knocks her out with a freaking statue.]] Later, Su-Mi's father tells the stepmother [[spoiler: to take her meds (which is shown throughout the film), but then it turns out that it was ''Su-Mi'' that was taking anti-psychotics and is put into a mental facility. As the film comes to a close, it is revealed that after Su-Mi argues with her father and stepmother, she storms outside in a fit and Su-Yeon runs upstairs to cry, where her mother comforts her until she falls asleep. When Su-Yeon wakes up. she discovers that her mother had hung herself in the wardrobe, and in a fit of panic, she knocks down the wardrobe and inevitably dies.]]

** Director of ''Cube'', Vincenzo Natali, also made ''Film/{{Nothing}}'' a [[TheStoner Stoner Comedy]] about non-existence. It's fairly straightforward in its own way, but still...

** Director of ''Cube'', Vincenzo Natali, also made ''Film/{{Nothing}}'' a StonerFilm comedy about non-existence. It's fairly straightforward in its own way, but still...

* Two words that have yet to be said despite being the name of one of the most famous incarnate of MindScrew to come out during the 1960s: [[spoiler:''' '' YellowSubmarine'' ''']]
** And [[spoiler: Magical Mystery Tour]] is even more insane!