Why are movies confusing?
Well, to have the audience not just watch and enjoy the film, but force them to think about it and test how their minds can interpret the complexity of the storyline.
Many confusing flicks are ambiguous, meaning different people can see it in different ways. This also makes the movie deep and compelling to the viewer(s).
I give you today, the most confusing movies of all time. No one really understands them yet.
1. Memento
Ah, Christopher Nolan. You once again have shown us that you're original work (not counting his amazing The Dark Knight trilogy) hurts our brains trying to figure out what's going on. Memento isn't really confusing so to say, but it just requires intense concentration throughout one sitting of the entire movie. Sometimes it even takes two or three times to really take on what happened, and that's also an important key for a confusing movie. Besides all that, it's played backwards, so the ending is the beginning and the beginning is the ending, which confuses me right there. And after all that, the protagonist has short-term memory loss and is trying to figure out who murdered his wife through photographs and notes that he tries to jot down all the time so he doesn't forget, so now we have a fictional main character that doesn't know what's going on. Christopher Nolan, congratulations.
2. 2001: A Space Odyssey
A classic Stanley Kubrick film about the evolution of mankind, watched over by an extraterrestrial race through a giant floating beacon or a Giant Floating Chocolate Bar. But the reason why this movie confuses so many people when it was made, 1968, and almost 50 years later, 2014, is because it moves at such a slow pace. It's a long movie and I don't know about you, but if a movie is almost silent without a lot of big activity and it's more than two hours long, I get a little antsy, and there's no exception with this film. The first time you watch it, you'll probably fall asleep, but with the ending, you'll be completely oblivious to what's going on. That is, if you can keep your eyes open til the end. With this, it requires you to focus and pay attention to detail in each and every scene. Impressive work, Kubrick.
3. The Tree of Life
The movie starts simple, a 1950's Texas family loses a son/brother, but then it starts going out of control for no reason. The movie starts showing unnecessary and random scenes of the creation of the universe, the inception of life, and the death of the universe. It's so odd and so, ugh, you don't know what the heck's going on anymore by mid-film. Maybe the entire movie's just a metaphor of life and death and time, but who knows? Thank you, Terrence Malick, thank you.
4. Primer
There's nothing more confusing than time travel and this movie focuses heavily on it. Featuring a group of people that try to figure out their new invention, the film is not just extremely complicated, it's loaded with tiny details that leads to ambiguity, intense concentration, multiple viewings, and background readings from fan sites to understand the meaning. I should go back in time to watch it again.
5. Inception
Christopher Nolan's cultural phenomenon that's dropped the jaws and taken the breaths of many with the most complex plot ever, featuring an all-around cast, crazy-good special effects, and requiring multiple viewings with intense concentration in order to connect together the concepts. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as a thief that lives in a world where you go into people's minds and manipulate their dreams. It sounds cheesy, but after you watch it, you'll be racking your own mind wondering if you can be smart enough to understand the overwhelming and rapidly-compelling storyline.
6. The Matrix Revolutions
Let's admit, The Matrix trilogy started off awesome but got worse and worse until it finally just because....not only a disappointment that the Wachowski siblings failed to keep the steam rolling, but just confusing. The ending (no spoilers) leaves so many questions in your head you'll never really know how the story ends.
7. Eraserhead
The weirdness, strangest, and most messed-up things happen in this movie about Henry Spencer who takes care of his mutated lizard child, a blood-gushing chicken, and a swollen-cheeked woman that lives in a radiator. You're too busy so lost and so speechless with all the bizarre things in order to pay attention to the story. Thank you David Lynch, you just gave me nightmares.
8. Donnie Darko
A cult classic and one of the most confusing movies of all time, the film follows Donnie Darko as he's lead by a freaky bunny dude who controls him. Then it spirals into a time travel paradox that basically leads you to give up even trying to understand the meaning, even when the director, Richard Kelly, released a version that was easier to connect together in your head. No wonder it's such a cult, because a film like this would definitely generate a lot of buzz from many other equally-confused fans.
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