Line #61 Film/Mandy2018


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mandy_poster.png]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:''"Under the crimson primordial sky, the wretched warlock reached into the dark embrace."'']]
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4	[[AC:For the best reading experience, play the music from [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KZxeSATdXI this clip]] while reading on.]]
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6	''Mandy'' is a 2018 psychedelic ActionHorror film co-written and directed by Creator/PanosCosmatos of ''Film/BeyondTheBlackRainbow'', starring Creator/NicolasCage, Creator/AndreaRiseborough, and Creator/LinusRoache.
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8	Set in 1983 near the Shadow Mountains of California, the film centers on a logger named Red Miller (Cage) who lives in the Shadow Mountains with his beloved wife Mandy Bloom (Riseborough). When she is spotted by the sadistic cult leader Jeremiah Sand (Roache), he has a demonic gang kidnap Red and Mandy, bringing their tranquil existence to a horrifying end. Now, driven by fury and vengeance, Red goes after the cult and the entities that they have brought forth.
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10	The film was co-written by Cosmatos from a story he conceived, and co-produced by Creator/ElijahWood through his [=SpecterVision=] company. It premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival in January of that year before getting a theatrical release in mid-September from RLJE Films.
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12	''Mandy'' is one of the last films scored by composer Music/JohannJohannsson (''Film/{{Sicario}}'', ''Film/{{Arrival}}'', ''[[Film/Mother2017 mother!]]''), its premiere occurring under a month before his death. The film is dedicated to him.
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14	In 2020, Sacred Bones Records released ''Lift it Down'', a [[{{Defictionalization}} defictionalized]] version of Jeremiah Sand's second album performed in-character by Roache.
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16	----
17	!!This film provides examples of:
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19	* AbusiveParents:
20	** Mandy had a psychologically abusive father. It's partly why she's too tough for Jeremiah to intimidate -- because she's faced bullies like him before.
21	** Jeremiah's mother was most definitely abusive, verbally and physically. She would often lock him in a closet for extended periods of time.
22	* AffablyEvil: The Chemist, who's friendly, helpful, and sympathetic towards Red, and is heavily implied to have been the drug manufacturer who made the Black Skulls into what they are and the "Minister" who set Jeremiah on his current path.
23	* AintTooProudToBeg:
24	** Red gets a touch of it when he's been imprisoned by the Black Skulls. When Sis starts harassing him, he just begs for mercy. However, [[InvokedTrope it turns out to be a trick]] to goad the Skull into bullying him enough that a loose pipe breaks off and he can beat the monster with it.
25	** Played straight with [[spoiler: Jeremiah's VillainousBreakdown at the end. When his TheReasonYouSuckSpeech against Red utterly fails and Red forces him to his knees, he pleads for his life while offering to suck Red's dick]].
26	* AlienSky: [[spoiler: One with three moons appears in the landscape Red's driving through at the end.]]
27	* AllBikersAreHellsAngels: In this case, having the bikers in question ''only'' be Hells Angels would be [[HumanoidAbomination an improvement.]] Or perhaps the "[[LegionsOfHell Hells]]" part is a little bit more literal than usual.
28	* AllThereInTheManual: There's a sixteen-minute track available on the soundtrack's Bandcamp page in which Jeremiah Sand (Linus Roache speaking in character) narrates his own StartOfDarkness, beginning with [[spoiler: successfully murdering his abusive mother and emotionally distant father, moving to San Francisco and then to Los Angeles to spend his inheritance on making an album and doing drugs. We learn that his birth name was Jeremy Rygaard, that he's been in the habit of forming exclusive, tight-knit groups with cultish overtones all his life, and that Marlene was his first follower after he experienced his spiritual "awakening" in SF.]]
29	* AlwaysABiggerFish: There's a moment when Red [[ChainsawGood revs up a chainsaw]] in preparation for murdering a guy with it, only for that guy to pull out his own chainsaw that's nearly ''[[SerialEscalation twice as long]].''
30	* AmbiguousEnding: [[spoiler: The movie ends with Red driving away from the burning church as the landscape around him appears phantasmagorical and otherworldly and he sees Mandy in the passenger seat. [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane It's not clear]] if he's hallucinating from grief, pain, and the [[MushroomSamba drugs he ingested]], or whether he's really followed them into some kind of bizarre alien hell, with Mandy's ghost beside him.]]
31	* AmbiguouslyBi: Though his harem consists mainly of women, Jeremiah's conversations with Brother Swan give this vibe. There's also his ... unexpected offer to Red at the end.
32	-->'''Jeremiah:''' I'll blow you, man! ''I'll suck your fucking dick!''
33	* AmbiguouslyHuman: The Black Skulls, with the scales tipping ''heavily'' towards "[[HumanoidAbomination no]]". [[spoiler:And Red himself at the end, after he's ingested their drugs.]]
34	* AnimalMotifs: Red is associated with tigers. He wears a t-shirt with a tiger's face on it for much of the movie, he's left unharmed by the Chemist's pet tiger, and several times in the second half of the movie he roars in animalistic rage.
35	* AnnoyingArrows: Red gets the "Reaper" (a modern crossbow) and two specially made bolts from Caruthers. He shoots one of the Black Skulls, knocking the punk off his bike. The fall did more damage than the Reaper, so Red had to ram him with a car. Also when Red fights Skratch, the final Black Skull, [[spoiler: he shoots him through the neck. Skratch simply yanks out the bolt and tosses it in amusement]].
36	* ArtShift: Three dream sequences in the film are done in 2D animation.
37	* AuthorAppeal: If ''Film/BeyondTheBlackRainbow'' wasn't enough to show you how much Panos Cosmatos likes 70s/80s psychedelia, extreme color-tinged cinematography, and heavy metal/prog rock, this film should erase all doubt.
38	* AwesomeButImpractical:
39	** As awesome as a duel with chainsaws is, the film also shows how impractical they are as weapons.
40	** Red retrieves "the Reaper", a badass modern crossbow with specially made bolts that his friend Caruthers has been keeping for him for a special occasion. He fires it exactly twice, and both shots do [[NoSell negligible damage.]]
41	* BadassBiker: The Black Skulls are a rather demonic version.
42	* BadassBoast: Red delivers one to Jeremiah [[spoiler:while high on the Skulls' LSD]]:
43	-->'''Red:''' The psychotic drowns where the mystic swims. You're drowning, I am swimming.
44	* BadBoss: In addition to his other [[SarcasmMode lovely qualities]], Jeremiah Sand is rather mean to Mother Marlene, gets Sister Lucy to play RussianRoulette to demonstrate her love for him to Red and sacrifices one of his own men to the Black Skulls.
45	* BaitAndSwitch: An early shot shows what appears to be some kind of pitch-black spiky EvilTowerOfOminousness rising into a cold green sky, until it slowly topples over and the camera pans to show it's just a tree Red's cut down as part of his lumberjack work.
46	* BarbarianHero: Red may not be an actual barbarian, but he's almost certainly meant to evoke this trope. He's a solitary man who lives alone in the wilderness, who is heavily implied to have some sort of violent past that he's left behind to live with Mandy. His enemies include a depraved, cowardly cult leader who may possess some sort of magical ability, and his gang of demonic biker servants (mirroring the SorcerousOverlord trope often found in barbarian stories). When he's called into action, he does so with medieval weaponry, specifically an ax forged by his own hand and a crossbow, and in hand-to-hand confrontations he's TheBerserker.
47	* {{Bathos}}:
48	** While Red is wallowing in the shock and horror of watching [[spoiler:his wife burning to death in front of him]], he walks into his home, where the television set is playing a goofy mac-n-cheese commercial.
49	** Jeremiah also falls into bathos through a FailedAttemptAtDrama. The whole scene where he puts on music and talks hypnotically to a drugged Mandy is an obvious attempt to seduce her into his cult, but as things proceed it becomes clearer that it isn't working. The moment where [[spoiler:he undoes his bathrobe]] is clearly meant to be some kind of climax, but since [[spoiler:he [[TeenyWeenie doesn't exactly have the body of a young demigod under there]], it turns into a slightly creepy instance of NakedPeopleAreFunny]].
50	** Inverted when Red begins an intense battle with one of the Black Skulls, Sis, by dropping a PreMortemOneLiner that despite its political connotations, is so out of place that it borders on self-parody. It's almost impossible to imagine this line being said by anyone ''other'' than Nicolas Cage.
51	--->'''Red:''' You're...a vicious... snowflake.
52	** Red seemingly ends a battle with Fuck Pig where he [[GroinAttack almost loses his manhood]] by way of a bladed codpiece, only to find out he's still alive shortly after. He proceeds to brutalize the Black Skull that gets the drop on him before dropping a hammy PreMortemOneLiner and then snapping her neck and grinning.
53	--->'''Red:''' YOU RIPPED MAH SHIRT! YOU RIPPED MAH SHUUUUUUURT!
54	* BattleTrophy: After Red [[spoiler:takes down the Black Skulls]], he takes a leather vest from one of them and wears it for the rest of the movie.
55	* BeetleManiac: The floor at the Chemist's lair is littered with black worms. Or at least Red ''sees'' black worms.
56	* BerserkButton:
57	** Jeremiah does NOT like being laughed at.
58	** One for Red: ''don't'' rip his favorite shirt. [[spoiler: He'll snap your neck for it, even if you're a Black Skull.]] Justified, since at the end of the film, the audience learns that [[spoiler:it was the shirt he wore the very first time he met Mandy]].
59	* BigBad: Jeremiah Sand, leader of [[HorrorHippies the Children of the New Dawn]].
60	* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler: Red kills all the cultists and avenges his wife's death, but Mandy is still dead and it seems to be that Red has traveled to some [[GainaxEnding bizarre alien hell]] in the process. That, [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane or his mind is broken from what he's gone through]].]]
61	* BlackEyesOfEvil: Everyone under the influence of the FantasticDrug has their iris turn black.
62	* BlatantLies: In his song "The Amulet of the Weeping Maze", Jeremiah refers to himself as a "[[{{Narcissist}} righteous man whose heart was full of love]]" -- an assertion which he does absolutely nothing to prove.
63	* BlindWeaponmaster: The supposedly fearsome leader of the biker gang Skratch somehow rides a motorcycle through the forest and fights hand to hand while starting facing away from his opponent [[spoiler:with what looks to be a leather sack over their head and no eye holes.]]
64	* BlingBlingBang: The Chemist has a gold-accented Luger.
65	* BloodSplatteredWarrior: Red gets covered head to toe with the blood of his enemies during his RoaringRampageOfRevenge, starting when he cuts [[spoiler: Fuck Pig]]'s throat with a box cutter and the arterial spray covers his face.
66	* BottomlessPit: The Skulls' torture dungeon inexplicably contains one. [[spoiler: Red knocks his would-be torturer into it with a pipe]].
67	* BoundAndGagged: Mandy and Red, with ''barbed wire'' in Red's case.
68	* CatharticScream: Red indulges in a prolonged screaming session after [[spoiler:the title character's death.]]
69	* ChainPain: During the chainsaw fight, Red hurls a metal chain around his opponent's neck.
70	* ChainsawGood: The film takes place in a forested area where loggers like Red are plentiful and chainsaws are common. Red uses one to attack a cultist, who pulls out a much longer one of his own, allowing them to ''duel'' with chainsaws.
71	* CharacterBlog: The [[https://twitter.com/CheddarGoblin Cheddar Goblin]] has his own blog.
72	* ChekhovsSkill: Red is a logger, and the first shot we see of him is him cutting down a tree with a chainsaw. He later uses a chainsaw in a ''[[RuleOfCool duel]]'' against a man with an even larger one. Before that, he makes himself an axe, and, appropriately for a lumberjack, does quite a bit of ''[[OffWithHisHead chopping]]'' with it.
73	* ClassicalAntiHero: Red is a very violent, merciless, unstable and questionably sane man, but his anger is quite justified and the people he's hunting totally deserve it.
74	* ColorMotif:
75	** There's a hell of a lot of red in this movie, which underscores the film's satanic elements. The main character is even named Red.
76	** Red and Mandy's home is often lit with blue light, such as the cool light coming from the television set or the moonlight pouring into their bedroom.
77	** Mandy is associated with black; her hair (which features prominently in Red's dream sequences) is black, a shirt she wears in pivotal scenes is black, and she wears an old black-and-white T-shirt of Red's to bed. (We later see Red wearing the same T-shirt.)
78	** The introductions of two "mystical" objects in the Children's possession -- the Horn of Abraxas and the Tainted Blade -- are accompanied by flashes of an ugly greenish-yellow.
79	** The one scene that isn't bathed in color and instead uses natural light is when Red visits Caruthers, probably to show that Caruthers is the most sane person in the cast.
80	* CombatSadomasochist: Implied with the Black Skulls. Their outfits are reminiscent of BDSM gear, and Caruthers mentions that the drugs they took leave them in near constant pain.
81	-->'''Caruthers:''' When I've seen... them things... they were in a world of pain. But you know what the freakiest part was?\
82	'''Red:''' What's that?\
83	'''Caruthers:''' They fucking loved it.
84	* CouldntFindALighter: Done by Red with [[spoiler:''Skratch's flaming skull'']].
85	* CruelAndUnusualDeath:
86	** [[spoiler:The title character is trapped in a sleeping bag and burned alive until only ash remains.]]
87	** Fuck Pig of the Black Skulls has a bladed dildo a la ''Film/{{Se7en}}'' that he uses to rape people to death.
88	** Red [[spoiler:stabs Brother Swan through the ''mouth'', and he dies choking on and vomiting up his own blood.]]
89	** Red later [[spoiler:crushes Jeremiah's skull with his bare hands. [[YourHeadAsplode Slowly.]]]]
90	* CynicismCatalyst: [[spoiler: Mandy's death by the hand of Jeremiah Sand and his cult is the main reason which drives Red into a bloodthirsty vengeance against them]].
91	* DarkAndTroubledPast: Red and Mandy are both implied to have one.
92	** Mandy recounts to Red a nightmarish story about her father and the horrific thing he did to an annoying flock of starlings when she was a child. She also has a large scar on her left cheek, just under her eye, which is never explained.
93	** In one of Red's first scenes, he's shown refusing a beer from a co-worker, and later on when he needs alcohol, he has to retrieve it from deep inside a cabinet in his bathroom -- which, in addition to his fearlessness in trying drugs, suggests a RecoveredAddict. And when he shows up at his friend Caruthers's trailer home to retrieve his old crossbow ("the Reaper"), Caruthers expresses surprise that he's come back for it "after all these years". Given the PTSD from which Red appears to suffer, the fact that he's quite good at guerilla warfare, and the year in which the film is set, it's possible he's a [[TheVietnamVet Vietnam veteran]].
94	* DarkIsEvil: Do you think a group called the "[[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Black Skulls]]" sounds like somebody who would be on the side of the good guys?
95	* DarkMistress: Sister Lucy and Marlene both appear to service Jeremiah sexually. The conflict is kicked off because he wants to add Mandy to his harem.
96	* DealWithTheDevil: Jeremiah chronicles his encounter with an unnamed "him", a being of radiant light who helped him achieve his status as a cult leader. From the way he describes the encounter, it sounds an awful lot like this trope.
97	* DecapitationPresentation: [[spoiler: Red decapitates Mother Marlene and then chucks her head at Jeremiah.]]
98	* DecoyProtagonist: Mandy. She gets more focus and more solo scenes than Red in the early part of the film.
99	* DefiantCaptive: [[spoiler: Mandy's laughing and mocking Jeremiah, even while he has her bound up and is preparing to rape her, leads ''directly'' to her death when he has her set on fire in rage.]]
100	* DefiantToTheEnd: One of the Skulls taunts Red about [[spoiler:Mandy's immolation]] as Red prepares to deliver a coup de grace to him, as does one of the cultists.
101	* DevelopingDoomedCharacters: [[spoiler: Technically, the title character qualifies, since it's her death that drives the entire back half of the film.]]
102	* DisproportionateRetribution: How does Jeremiah handle Mandy laughing at his music ([[TeenyWeenie and other things]])? [[spoiler:By burning her alive, of course. All while forcing Red to watch.]]
103	* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: When Red enters the church hideout, the illuminated cross on the far wall positioned directly behind the corrupted pulpit forms the towering illusion of [[ExcaliburInTheStone a brilliantly glowing sword plunged into a stone]].
104	* DontLookAtMe: When Mandy laughs at Jeremiah, after screaming futilely at her to shut up, he then screams at his cult members: "Don't you ''fucking'' look at me!"
105	* TheDreaded: When Red tells Caruthers that he's hunting "Crazy Evil", Caruthers warns him that he's heard terrible stories on CB radio about a wandering cult and the black riders who accompany them. They've left a trail of destruction through countless roadside diners and small towns. Caruthers doesn't think Red'll survive his hunt.
106	* DroneOfDread: The soundtrack is full of low-frequency droning sounds, most of them produced electronically. The song that plays when Red enters the church, however, is a very heavy stoner doom song that almost sounds like a Music/SunnO or Music/{{Sleep}} track.
107	* EldritchAbomination: The way Jeremiah describes his god, the Pale Knight (implied to be Satan in disguise), sounds like this. He apparently casts [[LightIsNotGood a radiant light]] and has control over the entire world.
108	* EntitledBastard: ''Jeremiah Sand,'' through and through. He thinks he deserves anything he wants, and [[PsychopathicManchild flips his shit when it doesn't go his way]].
109	* EpilepticFlashingLights:
110	** The screen turns [[ColorWash green]] and frantic lights are flashing when Brother Swan shows the Horn of Abraxas to Jeremiah.
111	** The lights are flashing menacingly when the baddies invade Red and Mandy's home at night.
112	* EveryoneHasStandards: By the point where he reaches Brother Swan, Red has clearly gone full BloodKnight in a combination of grief [[spoiler:over the loss of Mandy]] and trying a dose of the Skulls' LSD. [[spoiler:However, this does not stop him from sparing the ultimately innocent and harmless Lucy after he brutally murders Swan.]]
113	* EvilGloating:
114	** [[spoiler:Skratch]] does this as Red prepares to behead him.
115	---> "'''[[spoiler:SHE IS STILL BURNING.]]'''"
116	** [[spoiler:Brother Swan]] does some of this too, also before being executed.
117	--->"Better to ''[[KickTheDog burn out]]'' than [[KilledMidSentence fade]]--"
118	* EvilSorcerer: Jeremiah at least ''claims'' to have some kind of magical power. He's able to use the Horn of Abraxas to summon the Black Skulls to do his bidding, which may or may not be magic of some sort.
119	* EvilSoundsDeep: The Black Skulls all speak with deep, distorted, inhuman voices. Jeremiah's voice also distorts menacingly while he speaks to Mandy under the effect of a MushroomSamba. Red's voice itself distorts near the end of the film. [[spoiler: After he's ingested their drugs, notably.]]
120	* FaceDeathWithDignity: [[spoiler: Brother Swan]] calmly tells Red "Well, [[WaxingLyrical better to burn out than fade awa]]--" [[KilledMidSentence before Red stuffs an ax in his mouth]], in a stark and direct contrast to [[spoiler: [[VillainousBreakdown his boss]].]]
121	* FaceRevealingTurn: The first of Red's three {{Nightmare Sequence}}s about Mandy starts on her nude with her back turned...only to turn and reveal a rotting, melting face.
122	* FanDisservice: Red's nightmares about Mandy show her completely nude in animated form with a perfect hourglass figure, the eroticism of which will likely pale in comparison to the evil in her face.
123	* FantasticDrug:
124	** Whatever that gray sludge is that the Black Skulls are doing, in addition to the piles of cocaine. [[spoiler:Red dips ''one finger'' into the jar, tastes it, and ''immediately'' has a brief but intense acid vision that points him toward the Chemist, who in turn can point him toward Jeremiah's hideout.]]
125	** Also the yellow powder mentioned in Jeremiah's spoken word screed "My Journey" from the film's soundtrack, which gave him visions of "God" and caused his "spiritual awakening". The "Minister" who gave it to him may or may not have been the Chemist from the movie.
126	* FantasyAmericana: It's essentially a gritty HeroicFantasy story set in '80s California, complete with a BarbarianHero, an EvilSorcerer BigBad, and inhuman {{Mooks}}.
127	* FauxAffablyEvil: Sister Marlene is obsequiously nice to Mandy when probing her for information. By the end of the conversation, Mandy clearly senses that something is off. When they meet again, Marlene again starts to behave sweetly but immediately turns nasty and sadistic.
128	* ForcedToWatch: Red is forced to see [[spoiler: his wife burning alive to ashes]] while tied and gagged up by the cult.
129	* ForgingScene: A [[Film/ConanTheBarbarian1982 Conan]]-esque one in which Red forges his battle ax, the Beast, after visiting Caruthers.
130	* {{Foreshadowing}}
131	** Red is introduced chainsawing a tree. He later puts a chainsaw to good effect.
132	** The passage that Mandy reads from her book is prophetic: "''Under the crimson, primordial sky, surrounded by the jagged rocks of the ancient volcanic mountain, the wretched Warlock reached into the dark embrace of the fissure until his hand touched a smooth glassy surface. Cold as ice. His fist closed around The Serpent's Eye. Slowly he withdrew it and held it before him in the fading light of the blood-red suns. It glowed from within. A ghostly emerald light. Strange and eternal''." Jeremiah seems to be the "wretched warlock." The "ancient volcanic mountain" is his quarry hideout in the Shadow Mountains. The "blood red suns" are the AlienSky that materializes in the end. The "Serpent's Eye" is Mandy herself.
133	** The first thing Mandy says to Jeremiah is, "The Reaper is near." It turns out that Red calls his crossbow "the Reaper."
134	* FourIsDeath: There are four members of the Black Skulls: Skratch, Sis, Scabs and Fuck Pig. Red also wears a shirt with "44" on the front during his rampage, though it's quickly cobered by a vest.
135	* FreakOut: Red has an ''intense'' one in the bathroom [[spoiler: after Mandy's murder]], as the full weight of what he's just witnessed comes crashing down on him.
136	* FreudianExcuse: Downplayed with Jeremiah Sand. His mother would lock him in the closet for no reason at all, and he believed his father was too apathetic and useless to help him, but his ego was apparently just as large when he was a child and he's so evil as an adult that it's still practically impossible to feel anything but disgust for him. That is, if he's [[UnreliableNarrator even telling the truth]].
137	* GainaxEnding: [[spoiler:Red kills all of those involved in Mandy's murder (save for one innocent cult member), but as he drives away from the burning church, we see a sort of hellish landscape behind him including an AlienSky, as though he's crossed over into some alternate dimension]].
138	* GenreBusting: Containing way more weirdness and psychedelia than most violent revenge thrillers, and way more violent revenge than most weird psychedelic flicks. Horror movie? Action movie? Art movie? You decide.
139	* GenreShift: While it never lets up on its surreal, disturbing tone, the film can be argued to consist of two halves: its bleaker, more horror-inspired first half in which Red and Mandy are targeted and abducted by the cult, and its more energetic, action-filled second half in which Red embarks on his quest for vengeance. The montage of Red gearing up for his journey is even followed by the main title of the film appearing over halfway through the runtime, as if the action is the true essence of the movie, and everything prior was merely a prologue.
140	* GettingHighOnTheirOwnSupply: It's implied the Chemist habitually does this. We see him manufacturing blotter acid with no gloves on, and he puts one still-wet finger in his mouth when he speaks to Red.
141	* GlowingEyesOfDoom: Invoked. When the Black Skulls first appear, the headlights of their motorcycles are made to look like the eyes of monsters glaring through the fog.
142	* {{Gorn}}: {{Downplayed\|Trope}}. While ''Mandy'' is an incredibly violent movie, it notably almost never lingers for very long on the actual carnage, with the worst details often being difficult to make out through the psychedelic cinematography.
143	* GreenEyedMonster: Marlene despises Mandy because Jeremiah becomes infatuated with her. She clearly enjoys beating Mandy and injecting her with wasp venom and is smiling joyfully when [[spoiler: Mandy is burned]].
144	* GroinAttack: Narrowly averted. Fuck Pig's codpiece nearly falls on Red's crotch, but Red manages to move up just enough to prevent that.
145	* GutPunch: Following [[spoiler:Mandy's incredibly horrific death]] along with an [[TearJerker incredibly heartbreaking]] scene of [[spoiler: Red [[DespairEventHorizon breaking down mentally and emotionally]]]], the movie completely refuses to hold back on violence.
146	* HateSink: Far from the "righteous man, whose heart was full of love" he proclaims himself to be, Jeremiah Sand is a megalomaniac who believes that God (or perhaps Satan) granted him the right to take whatever he thinks he's entitled to. He treats his own followers like dirt, being willing to dispose of them when he sees the need and using the women for sexual gratification whether they're fully compliant or not. He hides behind the Black Skulls gang to do his dirty work for him and is more than happy to [[spoiler:torment Red by having Mandy killed in front of him before leaving him to die]].
147	* HeadCrushing: In the climax, [[spoiler:Red crushes Jeremiah's skull]] with his bare hands.
148	* HeartbrokenBadass: Red's loss of his wife fuels his rage-filled rampage against the cult.
149	* HellIsThatNoise: The arrival of the Black Skulls is accompanied on the soundtrack by a [[SensoryAbuse painfully loud]] ''SCREECH'' like tearing metal.
150	* HeWhoFightsMonsters: Hinted at in the ending. [[spoiler: Red starts speaking in the same VoiceOfTheLegion as the Black Skulls, and gains superhuman strength - enough to crush a man's skull with his bare hands.]]
151	* HigherUnderstandingThroughDrugs: Tasting the drug paste, Red gets a vision of where he has to start his revenge trip. He then meets the drug cook who, under the influence of the drug, can sense Red's tragic past.
152	* HighPressureBlood: Most of the baddies seem to suffer from this. Most memorable in the scene where Red gets sprayed with blood from [[spoiler:Fuck Pig]]'s SlashedThroat.
153	* HowlOfSorrow: After snapping out of the immediate overwhelming shock from [[spoiler:witnessing Mandy's death]], Red breaks down screaming uncontrollably in anguish.
154	* HumanSacrifice: Evidently how one pays the Black Skulls for their services. The Children of the New Dawn get them to kidnap Red and Mandy by offering up one of their own members to be dragged off and presumably murdered.
155	* HumanoidAbomination: The Black Skulls. They are supposedly just the victims of severe drug-induced psychosis. [[spoiler: But their [[VoiceOfTheLegion voices are demonic,]] they can be called and bargained with using a demonic instrument, and some of them seem to be made at least partially out of metal. One of them even brushes off a crossbow bolt through his throat.]]
156	* IAmGreatSong: "Jeremiah Sand [[BlatantLies was a righteous man, whose heart was full of love]]..."
157	* IfICantHaveYou: [[spoiler: Jeremiah sexually covets Mandy, and when she rejects him, he burns her alive in rage]].
158	* IfYouCanReadThis: We get a look at the novel that Mandy is reading. A warlock has just gained a prize, but at great cost to himself and to others. [[RuleOfSymbolism Not unlike a certain Mr. Sand.]]
159	* ImpaledPalm: [[spoiler: The Skulls nail Red's hand to the floor after knocking him out and tying him up. It barely slows him down]].
160	* ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: Red impales one of the cultists through the ''mouth'' with the sharpened back end of his axe.
161	* ImpossiblyCoolWeapon: Red's gloriously extreme axe-glaive from hell. The script calls it The Beast.
162	* ImpromptuTracheotomy: [[spoiler: Which does ''[[NoSell jack shit]]'' to the Black Skull leader, Skratch, whom Red inflicts it on.]]
163	* INeedAFreakingDrink: The first thing Red does after the home invasion incident is to grab a bottle of vodka which he downs in large gulps between [[HowlOfSorrow animalistic screams of anguish and terror]] over what happened.
164	* InelegantBlubbering:
165	** During his FreakOut in the bathroom, Red alternates between sobbing like a lost child, screaming like a wild animal, and chugging down vodka, often within seconds of each other.
166	** When Jeremiah's messiah act finally fails him, he descends into pathetic blubbering and vain appeals.
167	* ItsAllAboutMe: Jeremiah, [[{{Narcissist}} in spades]].
168	-->'''Jeremiah:''' ''[to Mandy, quoting his vision]'' "They were wrong, and you were right... You are not separate from all that is, so all that is, is yours."
169	-->''[later, to his own reflection]'' Never doubt yourself.
170	** Worth noting: The sheer narcissistic self-absorption of the song Jeremiah plays for her (aside from it being [[StylisticSuck painfully stereotypical folk]]) is what enables Mandy, through her hallucinogenic haze, to turn down Jeremiah's advances. Instead, she laughs scornfully in his face until he begins [[BigShutUp screaming at her to shut up]].
171	--->'''Mandy:''' You made this song? And it's about ''you?''
172	* KillItWithFire: Happens multiple times in the film.
173	** [[spoiler:Mandy, regrettably, is the first example.]]
174	** [[spoiler:Red pays it back, however: after killing Marlene and Jeremiah, he douses the corpses with gasoline and starts a fire that burns the Children's church down.]]
175	* LargeHam: Red, though it goes without saying being played by Nic Cage (that said, he has plenty of quieter moments as well). [[EvilIsHammy Jeremiah]] is this as well.
176	* LastNoteNightmare: "Amulet of the Weeping Maze" is mostly just a hilariously bad song serving as a vehicle for Jeremiah's ego, but the final verse ''[[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane might]]'' place the movie in CosmicHorrorStory territory.
177	-->The rushing fools in plastic homes\
178	These busy little bees\
179	Running, busy back and forth\
180	They never see\
181	Their master's hand in everything\
182	The order of the trees\
183	The song that's whistling on the breeze\
184	This song of you and me
185	* LaughablyEvil: Occasionally, Jeremiah is so full of himself, it comes off as hilarious.
186	* LeaveTheCameraRunning: Red's epic sobbing, screaming FreakOut in the bathroom plays out in one take.
187	* LeFilmArtistique: Possibly the first time in movie history where a film both qualifies for this label and also features a ''[[RuleOfCool sword fight with chainsaws.]]''
188	* LensFlare: There are more shots ''with'' lens flare in this movie than without them. RuleOfCool applies.
189	* TheLostLenore: [[spoiler:Mandy becomes this for Red.]]
190	* LoveAtFirstSight: Somewhat implied towards the end in a HappyFlashback when Red remembers when he first met Mandy.
191	* MadnessMantra: Jeremiah Sand repeats the line "Tell me what to do" numerous times [[MirrorMonologue in front of a mirror]].
192	* MagicalRealism: [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane Technically]] [[SurrealHorror speaking]], nothing happens in this movie that's outright ''impossible''.
193	* MaleFrontalNudity: [[spoiler: Jeremiah undoes his robe while attempting to seduce Mandy, revealing he's got nothing on underneath. We see everything as she does, and she is [[TeenyWeenie less than impressed]]]].
194	* {{Mangst}}: Oozing from every frame (along with blood and cocaine.)
195	* ManOnFire:
196	** [[spoiler:Mandy]] is burned alive, a fact that both a Black Skull and Brother Swan both mock.
197	** Skratch goes up in flames after Red pushes him against a burning car.
198	* AMasterMakesTheirOwnTools: We are treated to a ForgingScene of Red, well, forging The Beast.
199	* MaybeMagicMaybeMundane: Lots of things appear to be supernatural, but with the amount of psychedelic drugs being taken, it's hard to tell.
200	** The Black Skulls are called forth using "the Horn of Abraxas," a weird looking, (and weirder sounding) musical instrument. Their appearance is barely humanoid, their voices are inhumanly guttural, and they sometimes seem to shrug off grievous injuries. However, they're explained to be a drug-running outlaw biker gang driven mad by drugs. In spite of their supernatural overtones, Red manages to kill them about as easy as humans. It's unclear whether they're supernatural or just incredibly freaky bikers too high to feel pain.
201	** Does the Chemist and Red actually form a psychic connection, or is the Chemist just really good at intuiting Red's thoughts?
202	** Early on, Mandy and Red have a discussion about what their favorite planet is. Mandy cites Jupiter, because it's surface is "a storm that's been raging for thousands of years." Later on, when he finds Red in his lair, the Chemist echoes the words he could not possibly have heard earlier, calling Red the "Jovan warrior brought forth from the eye of the storm." Just a bizarre coincidence, an indicator that the Chemist and Mandy subscribe to similar schools of astrological mysticism, or does he truly have some kind of omniscient/telepathic powers?
203	** The "cherry on top" is apparently a bird-sized wasp with a psychedelic sting, which doesn't exist in reality. Is it supernatural? Does it actually exist in-universe?
204	** Much of the MindScrew third act. Red is [[SanitySlippage clearly unhinged]] and has taken some [[MushroomSamba powerful psychedelics]], so how much is real and how much is [[ThroughTheEyesOfMadness in Red's head]] is open to interpretation.
205	* MeaningfulName:
206	** Red is part of the ColorMotif of the film, with all the blood and hellish ambiance. It's also the main character's name. By the end of the film, he's covered head to toe in red blood.
207	** Brother Swan may be named after William Swann, the psychologist who developed the theory of identity fusion.
208	* MediumBlending: Red's dreams of Mandy take the form of disturbing animated sequences.
209	* MindScrew: The film is intentionally made to feel like a bad trip, made worse when some of the characters start ''actually'' tripping on drugs.
210	* MoodWhiplash: At the halfway point of the movie. Red's at the lowest point of his entire existence. [[spoiler: He's been bound with barbed wire, stabbed, and forced to watch the woman he loves incinerated.]] He drags himself home and struggles to heal his wounds while drowning his sorrows in vodka. Suddenly, [[spoiler:goblin pasta commercial]]!
211	* MoreThanMindControl: Jeremiah ''tries'' doing this to Mandy while she's under the effects of the hallucinogens to sway her to his side but fails miserably, resulting in her laughing at him and severely bruising his ego in the process.
212	* MushroomSamba:
213	** The Black Skulls are on some weird-ass LSD that basically turns them into demons. [[spoiler: After he kills them off, Red samples the same wares, which doesn't make the last act of the movie any ''less'' weird.]]
214	** The Children also put Mandy through this in an attempt to sway her to Jeremiah's side; she has some sort of hallucinogen introduced into her system via eyedrops, and as "the cherry on top" is subjected to the sting of a gigantic wasp.
215	* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: We feel this bears repeating: how 'bout the [[ObviouslyEvil Black Skulls]]? Do they sound like the good guys to you? Specifically, the one with the bladed codpiece who rapes at least two people to death offscreen is named "Fuck Pig".
216	* {{Narcissist}}: Jeremiah Sand, even by cult leader standards. If anyone takes a jab at his music, he feels personally insulted and tends to react violently.
217	* NeckSnap: After getting his shirt ripped, Red kills Sis with a frontal neck snap. This is ''before'' he takes some of their LSD paste.
218	* NeverTrustATrailer: A slight example. The trailer gives the impression that Red's violent rampage happens very early on, when there's actually a full hour of buildup before then.
219	* NightmareFace:
220	** In one of Red's nightmares, Mandy turns around and her face melts.
221	** There's also Red's blatantly unhinged grin [[spoiler:at the end of the film, when he seems to hallucinate Mandy sitting next to him in the car]].
222	* NightmareSequence: Red has [[RuleOfThree three]] following [[spoiler:Mandy's death]], all distinct from the rest of the film in that they're [[ArtShift animated]].
223	* NoHistoricalFiguresWereHarmed: The main villain of the movie is a burnt-out musician who tries to regain his former glory through occultism and abducting a nice rock and roll girl believing it will help him regain what he had. Wait, are we talking about Jeremiah Sand.... or UsefulNotes/CharlesManson?
224	* NoNameGiven: Most of the cast, with their names only revealed in the end credits. Mandy -- the title character -- even only has her name mentioned once in the entire film.
225	* NonActionBigBad: Jeremiah gets the Skulls to do all the heavy lifting for him. He himself is passive and physically unimpressive.
226	* NoSell: [[spoiler: Red nails Skratch through the trachea with a crossbow bolt. The Black Skull leader barely even considers this worth responding to.]]
227	* NotSoHarmlessVillain: Jeremiah Sand is a [[StylisticSuck painfully bland]] folk musician and almost comically self-absorbed, which at times makes him seem unintentionally funny. He's also a vicious deranged maniac who thinks nothing of sacrificing his own men and burning someone to death for [[DisproportionateRetribution laughing at him.]]
228	* NothingIsScarier:
229	** Carefully and effectively utilized with the Black Skulls; even when they are in full view, they are always lit in such a way that we can never tell exactly what they are or what is wrong with them.
230	** Used effectively again with the sect's Bible. We never find out what's in it, but the [[TakeOurWordForIt look on Red's face when he finds it]] indicates it's not something you'd learn in Sunday school.
231	* ObviouslyEvil: Has there ever been a clearer sign of "yup, they're the bad guys" in cinema history than a band of [[EvilSoundsDeep deep]]-[[VoiceOfTheLegion voiced]] [[LegionsOfHell possibly demonic]] [[AllBikersAreHellsAngels bikers]] [[SpikesOfVillainy covered in spikes]] who call themselves the [[DarkIsEvil Black]] [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Skulls]]?
232	* OddNameOut: Three out of four of the Black Skulls have names that start with the letter "S", Skratch, Sis, Scabs, and... [[AtrociousAlias Fuck-Pig?]]
233	* OffWithHisHead: [[spoiler:Skratch and Sister Marlene get their heads chopped off by Red.]]
234	* OneManArmy: Only around 2 of the film's total deaths are not at the hands of [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge Red]]
235	* OnscreenChapterTitles: The film has three, each given title cards reminiscent of heavy metal covers:
236	->1. The Shadow Mountains\
237	2. Children of the New Dawn\
238	3. Mandy
239	* OnlyAFleshWound: Jeremiah gives Red a stab wound in the side that is a good six inches deep, but once Red pours some vodka on it and bandages it (off-screen, after a night's rest), he's perfectly fine. This isn't the only time this happens to Red, as he ends up impaled by one of the Black Skulls.
240	* OverlyLongGag: After sounding the Horn of Abraxas, there's a long, awkward bit with one of the cultists playing with the power window on the van.
241	* PayEvilUntoEvil: Red commits some pretty gruesome acts of violence, but all of his victims completely deserve it.
242	* PeriodPiece: The film takes place in [[TheEighties 1983]]. Red hears UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan's "Evil Empire" speech on the radio. It's implied that Red is a Vietnam War veteran with PTSD. Mandy devours HeroicFantasy pulp novels, wears heavy metal shirts, and paints Creator/FrankFrazetta-style art. Both she and Red smoke.
243	* PhysicalScarsPsychologicalScars: Mandy has an unsettling scar down the left side of her face. It is never explained, but it along with her haunted demeanor and the ugly story she tells about her father forcing children to kill baby birds hints that she has had a very hard life.
244	* PreAsskickingOneLiner: As the pipe comes loose and Red uses it to beat one of the Black Skulls into the bottomless pit.
245	-->'''Red:''' You're ... a vicious ... snowflake.
246	* PreMortemOneLiner: Just before [[spoiler:crushing Jeremiah Sand's head between his hands, after he weakly insists that he carries "God's gift" in his heart:]]
247	-->'''Red:''' ''[[AGodAmI I'M YOUR GOD NOW.]]''
248	* ProlongedPrologue: The film is broken into three chapters with {{Title Card}}s. The title card "Mandy" appears 75 minutes into the film, implying that the first 75 minutes was a prologue for the movie as a whole.
249	* PsychopathicManchild: Jeremiah Sand. For all his claims of being a prophet who can lead his children to a better future, Sand is a petty and entitled man who flips his shit if he isn't immediately given what he wants.
250	* RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil:
251	** [[spoiler:Subverted. Jeremiah ''plans'' to do this, but Mandy's mocking him puts him out of the mood, so he just [[KillItWithFire lights her on fire instead]].]]
252	** [[spoiler:Played straight by Fuck Pig. He has a bladed codpiece that he used to rape people to death. Red discovers a couple of violated bodies that met their end that way.]]
253	* RatedMForManly: Lumberjack Nicolas Cage in the 80s hunting down the evil cultists who [[spoiler: [[{{Mangst}} murdered his wife]]]] (which includes an army of {{Badass Biker}}s [[SpikesOfVillainy covered in spikes]], who [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane might be]] the LegionsOfHell) and murdering them all in an incredibly violent fashion with chainsaws, crossbows, and an insanely large axe of hardened steel.
254	* RecoveredAddict: It's been theorized that Red is a former alcoholic. He turns down a beer from a co-worker, and the liquor in his house is found in the bottom-rightmost cabinet of his bedroom's armoire.
255	* ReligionOfEvil: Jeremiah's cult. Made scarier because it's never made clear exactly ''what'' they believe. They look like Jesus hippies and display crosses, but Jeremiah is disdainful of Jesus at one point. They also carry an artifact called "the Horn of Abraxas" and a sword with an eyeball in the hilt that Brother Swan claims came from the Abyss. Then there's their alliance with... ''whatever'' the Black Skulls are, who might be in service to Satan, if the [[https://steemit.com/occult/@jeremycrow/the-sigil-of-lucifer-an-exploration sigil of Lucifer]] on one of their members' vests is anything to go by. When Red skims their Bible, he's disturbed by what he sees.
256	* RoaringRampageOfRevenge: The last third of the movie is all this for Red.
257	* RuleOfCool: To whit: Nicolas Cage getting in a sword fight with ''[[ChainsawGood chainsaws]]''.
258	* RuleOfSymbolism: Jeremiah's followers tie Red up vertically with barbed wire (including wrapping it around his face), stab him in the side, and leave him to die in a [[ImpaledPalm twisted version of the crucifixion]].
259	* RussianRoulette: Jeremiah forces Lucy, as a show of devotion, to kneel in front of Red and play a round of Russian roulette; to Red's horror, she goes through on pulling the trigger, but the chamber is empty.
260	-->'''Jeremiah:''' You think you're so "in love." ''I'll'' show you ''love''.
261	* SacrificialLamb: Jeremiah orders that the cult's overweight member be given up to the Black Skulls.
262	-->'''Brother Swan:''' Good idea. That lardass couldn't find his own nose in a mirror.
263	* SamusIsAGirl: Most don't realize that the glass-masked Black Skull, Sis, is a woman.
264	* SceneryPorn: Every single shot is either steeped in intense colors, lens flares, beautiful landscape shots or all four at once.
265	* SecondaryCharacterTitle: Mandy is the DecoyProtagonist and TheLostLenore for Red.
266	* SelfMadeOrphan: Jeremiah's [[https://mandysoundtrack.bandcamp.com/track/my-journey backstory]] reveals he killed his own parents before fleeing his home and starting the Children of the New Dawn.
267	* ShoutOut:
268	** Mandy informs Marlene that she and Red live near [[Franchise/FridayThe13th Crystal Lake.]]
269	** The Freudian contraption Fuck-Pig wears (essentially a bladed strap-on) is taken from ''Film/{{Se7en}}''.
270	** The shot of [[spoiler: the Cheddar Goblin rising out of the pot of Mac-n-Cheese]] is a deliberate take on the famous shot of Martin Sheen rising out of the water in ''Film/ApocalypseNow''.
271	** Jeremiah's most beloved disciple is named Swan. ''Film/LordOfIllusions'' has Phillip Swan, who is a former follower of a cult also led by a megalomaniac in a white robe.
272	** The Black Skulls, especially Scabs (the guy with spikes all over his body) are very reminiscent of [[Film/{{Hellraiser}} the Cenobites]]. Their group makeup also matches the Cenobite group original film, there's four of them, one of them has spikes in his face, and [[TheSmurfettePrinciple one of them is female]]. They have even more in common with [[Film/HoboWithAShotgun The Plague]], another probably-demonic, nearly-invulnerable biker gang covered in spikes and metal. Their individual names are similar as well.
273	** Brother Swan tells Red "It's better to burn out than to fade away", which is either a reference to ''Film/{{Highlander}}'', Music/NeilYoung or Music/DefLeppard.
274	** Red's ax, The Beast, was designed to resemble the F in the Music/CelticFrost logo. The ForgingScene where he constructs it in his workshop is very similar to the famous opening of ''Film/ConanTheBarbarian1982''. Connections to that film are driven home by Red's role as a BarbarianHero taking violent revenge on a clan of murderous cultists.
275	** Red's BadassBoast when he confronts Jeremiah at the end is a paraphrased reference to Joseph Campbell's quote, "The psychotic drowns in the same waters in which the mystic swims with delight."
276	** The most devout of Jeremiah's followers is called [[Film/MarthaMarcyMayMarlene Mother Marlene, which in addition to Mandy]]...
277	** Red first says his favorite planet is Saturn, then changes his mind and says ComicBook/{{Galactus}} is his favorite, because he eats planets.
278	** The fact the demonic Black Skulls includes a member called "Fuck Pig" who rapes people to death sounds like a reference to Garth Ennis's infamous ComicBook/{{Hellblazer}} arc "Son of Man", which features a demon who rapes people to death called "Fuckpig".
279	** The chainsaw duel is similar to a scene in ''Film/PhantasmII'' which also involves a battle between a hero with a small chainsaw and a {{Mook}} with a bigger one.
280	* SkewedPriorities: What's Red's one-liner of choice when he has one of the Black Skulls at his mercy? Something like "You kidnapped me and my wife", or "[[spoiler:You killed the woman I love?]]" Actually...
281	-->'''Red:''' You ''ripped'' my ''[[LargeHam SHHHHHHIIIIRRRRRRRRRRRTTTTTTT]]!''
282	* SilentCredits: Music is used powerfully throughout the movie, but the closing credits run with nothing more than quiet ambient sounds.
283	* SingleTear: Mandy does this during a dream sequence after she finds a dead fawn in the woods, and Sister Lucy does this after [[spoiler: Red brutally kills Brother Swan in front of her]].
284	* SissyVillain: Jeremiah is cowardly, emotionally fragile, and physically unimpressive [[NonActionBigBad in multiple]] [[TeenyWeenie ways]].
285	* SlashedThroat: [[spoiler: Red slices Fuck Pig's throat with a rusty box cutter, causing HighPressureBlood to spew out of his neck and onto Red's face]].
286	* SlasherSmile: The final close shot of Red we see in the film is of him with a maniacal grin on his blood-soaked face.
287	* SmallNameBigEgo: [[TeenyWeenie Small dick]], big ego as well. Jeremiah is a failed musician and a leader of a cult composed of gullible individuals (some of whom he likely raped) who thinks he's literally God's gift to women.
288	-->'''Jeremiah:''' (playing his song, "Amulet of the Weeping Maze" in front of Mandy) Do you like Music/TheCarpenters? I think that they're sensational. But ''this'' is even better.
289	* SmugSnake: Jeremiah Sand. While some villains' ego serves to make them more entertaining, in his case [[HateSink it only serves to highlight how repulsive he is]].
290	* SmokingIsCool: Red and Mandy, our most sympathetic characters, both smoke, and at one point Red even lights a cigarette on ''the flaming skull of a dead enemy''.
291	* TheSmurfettePrinciple: Sis is the sole female member of the Black Skulls.
292	* SpikesOfVillainy: Several of the Black Skulls have them. Scabs appears to be covered in literally nothing but solid steel spikes.
293	* SpiritualAntithesis: To Cosmatos's previous film ''Film/BeyondTheBlackRainbow''. He explained in the interview that not only did he consider it as a companion piece to ''Black Rainbow'', but also a ''yang'' to the latter's ''yin''. They both combine surreal and nightmarish imagery with [[LeaveTheCameraRunning very long takes]] and monochromatic light saturation, though as an action/revenge story, ''Mandy'' has a tighter plot and more emphasis on action and gore.
294	* SquishyWizard: Assuming that Jeremiah is actually the sorcerer that he claims to be (which he very well could be, if the dagger Brother Swan shows to Red is what he says it is), he deflates whenever he encounters a physical threat.
295	* StackedCharactersPoster: The poster gives us a pyramid filled up with the characters, the protagonist Red (Creator/NicolasCage) in the center and the [[spoiler:DecoyProtagonist Mandy]] on top.
296	* TheStinger: There is a post-credit scene showing Mandy's sketches from earlier in the film.
297	* StylisticSuck: "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hteniPFMfek Amulet of the Weeping Maze]]", a song from Jeremiah Sand's failed folk musician career; what we hear of it is stereotypical Sixties-Seventies folk rock with ethereal acoustic guitars and flutes, and half-baked overly earnest New Age mysticism and mixed in with gratuitous self-praise in the awful lyrics.
298	-->''Every seed that gives us life\
299	Every man must take a wife\
300	Only one sun ever shines\
301	Only one sun, yours and mine''
302	* SuperStrength: Red seems to gain this after taking some of the Black Skulls' drugs, as after this he's able to crush a man's skull with his bare hands.
303	* SurrealHorror: Surreal ''action'' horror, no less.
304	* SurrealHumor: [[spoiler: [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment The Cheddar Goblin commercial.]]]]
305	* SwordAndSorcery: A rare, perhaps only, contemporary take on the genre. A man who lives in the wilds, forges his own axe, wields a crossbow, wears animal hide (a leather vest here), and fights a cult with a dark lord as their leader.
306	* TakeThat: Red turns on the radio in his car while driving home and is greeted with a speech from UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan. He immediately turns it off again.
307	* TeenyWeenie: [[spoiler: When Jeremiah whips his dick out while preparing to rape Mandy, it... isn't exactly impressive. She starts giggling while glancing at it, and this evolves into full-blown laughter when he starts masturbating in response, presumably because his dick isn't getting any bigger.]]
308	* ThousandYardStare: After [[spoiler: witnessing Mandy's immolation]], Red wanders through their house in a traumatized daze, having apparently been driven into a kind of fugue state by the trauma of the last few hours.
309	* TokenGoodTeammate: Lucy is the sole member of the Children of the New Dawn who isn't thoroughly evil, and is clearly scared for her life when she sees Red [[spoiler:kill Brother Swann in front of her.]]
310	* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness: [[spoiler:Everything from the throbbing red glow in Jeremiah's lair to the three moons in the sky call Red's sanity into question by the end of the film.]]
311	* TranquilFury: During the final third of the film, after beginning his MushroomSamba, Red barely says anything for the rest of the film, and the rest of his RoaringRampageOfRevenge.
312	* TwoActStructure: The film is divided by three title cards, but it's really a two-act film: the first half is almost entirely quiet, almost tranquil domestic scenes exploring Red and Mandy's relationship. The second half is almost entirely gory, balls-to-the-wall action and insanity.
313	* UnderestimatingBadassery: A villainous edition. Red sees the muscular cultist and after [[spoiler:killing the Black Skulls]], he thinks it's going to be an easy kill just like the rest of the cultists. So instead of fighting pragmatically and using the Reaper or the Beast from behind, Red takes a nearby chainsaw that barely works. The alerted cultist then pulls out a MUCH longer chainsaw and gives Red one of the toughest battles in the movie.
314	* UnexplainedRecovery: Red knocks [[spoiler:Sis into a seemingly bottomless pit, but she gets out later and comes after him with a shotgun]].
315	* TheUnfettered: Jeremiah, who believes that whatever god he worships has given him permission to do literally whatever he wants.
316	* UnflinchingWalk: At the end, when Red walks away from the burning church.
317	* UnstoppableRage: Red gets one so bad, he's able to crack open a man's skull with his bare hands! Even earlier he's so pissed off that a Black Skull ripped his favorite shirt that he snaps its neck with no effort and this was ''before'' [[spoiler:he took that drug paste]].
318	* UnusualPetsForUnusualPeople: The Chemist keeps ''[[PantheraAwesome a tiger]]'' in a cage, and implies that he allows her to sample his wares ("When she's calm, I know it's good"). When Red visits him, the Chemist decides it's time to set her free -- and instead of killing the men, she merely leaves the Chemist's warehouse.
319	* VillainousBreakdown: [[spoiler:Jeremiah turns out not to be so tough once Red has him cornered, and alternates between sputtering with outrage and pathetically begging for his life.]]
320	* VillainsWantMercy: [[spoiler:Jeremiah frantically begs for his life when Red finally catches up with him, eventually being reduced to sobbing and offering to give Red oral sex in exchange for letting him go. [[YourHeadAsplode It doesn't work.]]]]
321	* VoiceOfTheLegion: The Black Skulls speak with it. [[spoiler:During the final confrontation with Jeremiah, Red does too. It is worth noting that this is after he has sampled the Black Skull's goop.]]
322	* WasOnceAMan: [[spoiler: The Black Skulls]], according to Carruthers.
323	* WaxingLyrical: Brother Swan says "[[Music/NeilYoung it's better to burn out than fade away]]" [[spoiler:as Red moves in on him to kill him. Red finishes him off [[KilledMidSentence before he can complete the quote]].]]
324	* WellDoneSonGuy: Gender-inverted version. Marlene appears to be this to Jeremiah.
325	-->'''Marlene:''' Did I do something wrong?\
326	'''Jeremiah:''' Wrong? ''Everything'' you do is wrong.
327	* WhatBeautifulEyes: Most scenes featuring Mandy focus heavily on her eyes.
328	* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: [[spoiler:Sister Lucy witnesses Red killing Brother Swan. He notices her, but walks away and she is not seen again. The fate of the Chemist is also left unstated.]]
329	* YourHeadAsplode: [[spoiler:A partial example when Red finishes Jeremiah off by literally ''squeezing'' his brains -- and one of his eyes -- out with his bare hands]].

Context Film / Mandy2018