Uncommonly-themed Movies
by voyeur_vision | created - 21 May 2013 | updated - 03 Feb 2014 | PublicThese movies have a twist that make them stand out from other films and/or explore concepts not commonly explored.
- Different
- Unusual/extraordinary situation
- Not many similar films
- Instant Watch Options
- Genres
- Movies or TV
- IMDb Rating
- In Theaters
- Release Year
- Keywords
1. 127 Hours (2010)
R | 94 min | Biography, Drama
A mountain climber becomes trapped under a boulder while canyoneering alone near Moab, Utah and resorts to desperate measures in order to survive.
Director: Danny Boyle | Stars: James Franco, Amber Tamblyn, Kate Mara, Sean Bott
Votes: 400,984 | Gross: $18.34M
A guy gets his arm caught in a rock in the middle of nowhere.
2. 247°F (2011)
R | 88 min | Horror, Thriller
Four friends travel to a lakeside cabin for a carefree weekend, the fun turns into a nightmare when 3 of them end up locked in a hot sauna. Every minute counts and every degree matters as they fight for their lives in the heat up to 247°F.
Directors: Beqa Jguburia, Levan Bakhia, Beka Jguburia | Stars: Scout Taylor-Compton, Christina Ulloa, Travis Van Winkle, Michael Copon
Votes: 6,729
Friends get locked in a sauna and the temperature's rising.
3. 50 First Dates (2004)
PG-13 | 99 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Henry Roth is a man afraid of commitment until he meets the beautiful Lucy. They hit it off and Henry think he's finally found the girl of his dreams until discovering she has short-term memory loss and forgets him the next day.
Director: Peter Segal | Stars: Adam Sandler, Drew Barrymore, Rob Schneider, Sean Astin
Votes: 381,621 | Gross: $120.91M
A guy trying to woo girl with amnesia has to start again every day.
4. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
PG-13 | 146 min | Adventure, Drama, Sci-Fi
A highly advanced robotic boy longs to become "real" so that he can regain the love of his human mother.
Director: Steven Spielberg | Stars: Haley Joel Osment, Jude Law, Frances O'Connor, Sam Robards
Votes: 322,775 | Gross: $78.62M
Follows the life of a robot boy who is designed to be a substitute child.
5. Bicentennial Man (1999)
PG | 132 min | Drama, Romance, Sci-Fi
An android endeavors to become human as he gradually acquires emotions.
Director: Chris Columbus | Stars: Robin Williams, Embeth Davidtz, Sam Neill, Oliver Platt
Votes: 124,563 | Gross: $58.22M
Follows life of human android.
6. Boys Don't Cry (1999)
R | 118 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
A young man named Brandon Teena navigates love, life, and being transgender in rural Nebraska.
Director: Kimberly Peirce | Stars: Hilary Swank, Chloë Sevigny, Peter Sarsgaard, Brendan Sexton III
Votes: 103,235 | Gross: $11.53M
Follows a woman living as a man.
7. The Brass Teapot (2012)
R | 101 min | Comedy, Fantasy, Thriller
When a couple discovers that a brass teapot makes them money whenever they hurt themselves, they must come to terms with how far they are willing to go.
Director: Ramaa Mosley | Stars: Juno Temple, Michael Angarano, Alexis Bledel, Billy Magnussen
Votes: 17,020 | Gross: $0.01M
Poor couple finds magic teapot that gives them money.
8. The Butterfly Effect (2004)
R | 113 min | Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Evan Treborn suffers blackouts during significant events of his life. As he grows up, he finds a way to remember these lost memories and a supernatural way to alter his life by reading his journal.
Directors: Eric Bress, J. Mackye Gruber | Stars: Ashton Kutcher, Amy Smart, Melora Walters, Elden Henson
Votes: 520,620 | Gross: $57.94M
Guy attempts to create a satisfactory present day for him and his loved ones by going back in time and tweaking the same events over and over.
9. Cast Away (2000)
PG-13 | 143 min | Adventure, Drama, Romance
A FedEx executive undergoes a physical and emotional transformation after crash landing on a deserted island.
Director: Robert Zemeckis | Stars: Tom Hanks, Helen Hunt, Paul Sanchez, Lari White
Votes: 637,851 | Gross: $233.63M
A man survives alone on an island after his plane crashes into the sea.
10. Click (2006)
PG-13 | 107 min | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
A workaholic architect finds a universal remote that allows him to fast-forward and rewind to different parts of his life. Complications arise when the remote starts to overrule his choices.
Director: Frank Coraci | Stars: Adam Sandler, Kate Beckinsale, Christopher Walken, David Hasselhoff
Votes: 356,292 | Gross: $137.36M
Guy has remote control for life that allows him to pause, fast forward, etc.
11. Contagion (2011)
PG-13 | 106 min | Drama, Thriller
Healthcare professionals, government officials and everyday people find themselves in the midst of a pandemic as the CDC works to find a cure.
Director: Steven Soderbergh | Stars: Matt Damon, Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow
Votes: 315,701 | Gross: $75.66M
Virus is killing the world.
12. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)
PG-13 | 166 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance
Tells the story of Benjamin Button, a man who starts aging backwards with consequences.
Director: David Fincher | Stars: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton, Julia Ormond
Votes: 695,053 | Gross: $127.51M
Guy ages backwards. He's born an old-man baby and gets progressively better looking whilst everyone else is getting older.
13. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007)
PG-13 | 112 min | Biography, Drama
The true story of Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby who suffers a stroke and has to live with an almost totally paralyzed body; only his left eye isn't paralyzed.
Director: Julian Schnabel | Stars: Mathieu Amalric, Emmanuelle Seigner, Marie-Josée Croze, Anne Consigny
Votes: 110,393 | Gross: $5.99M
Guy is fully paralysed in the hospital. Entire film is through his eyes.
14. Edward Scissorhands (1990)
PG-13 | 105 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance
The solitary life of an artificial man - who was incompletely constructed and has scissors for hands - is upended when he is taken in by a suburban family.
Director: Tim Burton | Stars: Johnny Depp, Winona Ryder, Dianne Wiest, Anthony Michael Hall
Votes: 523,341 | Gross: $56.36M
Edward Scissorhands, a Frankenstein of sorts, moves to town with normal people after his scientist creator dies.
15. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
R | 108 min | Drama, Romance, Sci-Fi
When their relationship turns sour, a couple undergoes a medical procedure to have each other erased from their memories forever.
Director: Michel Gondry | Stars: Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Tom Wilkinson, Gerry Robert Byrne
Votes: 1,076,671 | Gross: $34.40M
People voluntarily get their minds wiped.
16. Frozen (I) (2010)
R | 93 min | Adventure, Thriller
Three skiers stranded on a chairlift are forced to make life-or-death choices, which prove more perilous than staying put and freezing to death.
Director: Adam Green | Stars: Shawn Ashmore, Emma Bell, Kevin Zegers, Ed Ackerman
Votes: 80,655 | Gross: $0.24M
3 friends get stuck on a ski lift and will freeze to death if they don't get down, but it's a long way.
17. Groundhog Day (1993)
PG | 101 min | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
A narcissistic, self-centered weatherman finds himself in a time loop on Groundhog Day.
Director: Harold Ramis | Stars: Bill Murray, Andie MacDowell, Chris Elliott, Stephen Tobolowsky
Votes: 684,106 | Gross: $70.91M
Guy is stuck in time; the same day repeats itself over and over. He runs amuck knowing that tomorrow it will all be forgotten.
18. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001)
PG | 152 min | Adventure, Family, Fantasy
An orphaned boy enrolls in a school of wizardry, where he learns the truth about himself, his family and the terrible evil that haunts the magical world.
Director: Chris Columbus | Stars: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Richard Harris
Votes: 855,126 | Gross: $317.58M
Orphaned boy discovers he's a wizard and goes to wizard school.
19. The Hot Chick (2002)
PG-13 | 104 min | Comedy, Fantasy
An attractive and popular teenager, who is mean-spirited toward others, finds herself in the body of an older man, and must find a way to get back to her original body.
Director: Tom Brady | Stars: Rob Schneider, Rachel McAdams, Anna Faris, Matthew Lawrence
Votes: 102,497 | Gross: $35.08M
A hot chick turns into Rob Schneider.
20. The Hunger Games (2012)
PG-13 | 142 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
Katniss Everdeen voluntarily takes her younger sister's place in the Hunger Games: a televised competition in which two teenagers from each of the twelve Districts of Panem are chosen at random to fight to the death.
Director: Gary Ross | Stars: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Stanley Tucci
Votes: 1,002,556 | Gross: $408.01M
Group of young people are locked in an arena to fight to the death.
21. In Time (2011)
PG-13 | 109 min | Action, Sci-Fi, Thriller
In a future where people stop aging at 25, but are engineered to live only one more year, having the means to buy your way out of the situation is a shot at immortal youth. Will Salas is accused of murder and on the run with a hostage.
Director: Andrew Niccol | Stars: Justin Timberlake, Amanda Seyfried, Cillian Murphy, Olivia Wilde
Votes: 445,622 | Gross: $37.52M
Time = money. People buy and sell things with the time they have to live.
22. The Island (2005)
PG-13 | 136 min | Action, Sci-Fi, Thriller
A man living in a futuristic sterile colony begins to question his circumscribed existence when his friend is chosen to go to the Island, the last uncontaminated place on earth.
Director: Michael Bay | Stars: Scarlett Johansson, Ewan McGregor, Djimon Hounsou, Steve Buscemi
Votes: 327,445 | Gross: $35.82M
Clones bred for spare parts realise they're clones bred for spare parts and try to escape.
23. Jack (1996)
PG-13 | 113 min | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Because of an unusual disorder that has aged him four times faster than a typical human being, a boy looks like a 40-year-old man as he starts fifth grade at public school after being homeschooled.
Director: Francis Ford Coppola | Stars: Robin Williams, Diane Lane, Brian Kerwin, Jennifer Lopez
Votes: 63,773 | Gross: $58.62M
Young boy has an ageing disorder that gives him the body of a man when he's only a kid.
24. The Joneses (2009)
R | 96 min | Comedy, Drama
A seemingly perfect family moves into a suburban neighborhood, but when it comes to the truth as to why they're living there, they don't exactly come clean with their neighbors.
Director: Derrick Borte | Stars: Demi Moore, David Duchovny, Amber Heard, Benjamin Hollingsworth
Votes: 41,784 | Gross: $1.47M
Advertising extremes. Group of actors pose as a perfect family to sell their friends and neighbours products.
25. The Lake House (2006)
PG | 99 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance
A lonely doctor who once occupied an unusual lakeside house begins to exchange love letters with its former resident, a frustrated architect. They must try to unravel the mystery behind their extraordinary romance before it's too late.
Director: Alejandro Agresti | Stars: Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock, Christopher Plummer, Ebon Moss-Bachrach
Votes: 157,547 | Gross: $52.33M
Pen-pal exchange. They both live in the same house, but one in the past and one in the future.
26. The Matrix (1999)
R | 136 min | Action, Sci-Fi
When a beautiful stranger leads computer hacker Neo to a forbidding underworld, he discovers the shocking truth--the life he knows is the elaborate deception of an evil cyber-intelligence.
Directors: Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski | Stars: Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving
Votes: 2,049,868 | Gross: $171.48M
Explores the concept of what is real. Hard to explain.
27. Meet Joe Black (1998)
PG-13 | 178 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance
Death, who takes the form of a young man killed in an accident, asks a media mogul to act as his guide to teach him about life on Earth and, in the process, he falls in love with the mogul's daughter.
Director: Martin Brest | Stars: Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins, Claire Forlani, Jake Weber
Votes: 264,506 | Gross: $44.62M
Death/The Grim Reaper decides to spend some time living, takes the form of Brad Pitt, and hangs around his next victim.
28. Melancholia (2011)
R | 135 min | Drama, Sci-Fi
Two sisters find their already strained relationship challenged as a mysterious new planet threatens to collide with Earth.
Director: Lars von Trier | Stars: Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Kiefer Sutherland, Alexander Skarsgård
Votes: 195,658 | Gross: $3.03M
A planet is going to collide with the earth and destroy it. Fact.
29. Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005)
PG-13 | 120 min | Action, Comedy, Crime
A bored married couple is surprised to learn that they are both assassins hired by competing agencies to kill each other.
Director: Doug Liman | Stars: Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Adam Brody, Vince Vaughn
Votes: 540,704 | Gross: $186.34M
Husband and wife who are both assassins unbeknownst to each other, are hired to kill one another.
30. One Hour Photo (2002)
R | 96 min | Drama, Thriller
A mentally unstable photo developer targets an upper middle-class family after his obsession with them becomes more sick and disturbing than any of them could imagine.
Director: Mark Romanek | Stars: Robin Williams, Connie Nielsen, Michael Vartan, Dylan Smith
Votes: 131,624 | Gross: $31.60M
Photo developer stalks a family he develops for, making copies of all their photos for himself.
31. Saw (2004)
R | 103 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Two strangers awaken in a room with no recollection of how they got there, and soon discover they're pawns in a deadly game perpetrated by a notorious serial killer.
Director: James Wan | Stars: Cary Elwes, Leigh Whannell, Danny Glover, Ken Leung
Votes: 466,169 | Gross: $56.00M
Victims locked in a room are given puzzles and stuff to solve if they want to live.
32. Shallow Hal (2001)
PG-13 | 114 min | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
A shallow man falls in love with a 300-pound woman because of her inner beauty.
Directors: Bobby Farrelly, Peter Farrelly | Stars: Jack Black, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jason Alexander, Joe Viterelli
Votes: 144,618 | Gross: $70.84M
Guy is hypnotised to see ugly chicks as hot.
33. The Sixth Sense (1999)
PG-13 | 107 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Malcolm Crowe, a child psychologist, starts treating a young boy, Cole, who encounters dead people and convinces him to help them. In turn, Cole helps Malcolm reconcile with his estranged wife.
Director: M. Night Shyamalan | Stars: Bruce Willis, Haley Joel Osment, Toni Collette, Olivia Williams
Votes: 1,050,060 | Gross: $293.51M
Psychologist counsels young boy who sees dead people.
34. The Skin I Live In (2011)
R | 120 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
A brilliant plastic surgeon, haunted by past tragedies, creates a type of synthetic skin that withstands any kind of damage. His guinea pig: a mysterious and volatile woman who holds the key to his obsession.
Director: Pedro Almodóvar | Stars: Antonio Banderas, Elena Anaya, Jan Cornet, Marisa Paredes
Votes: 165,636 | Gross: $3.19M
Doctor kidnaps his daughter's rapist and gives him a sex change. He gives the rapist his dead wife's face and tries to have a romantic relationship with him/her.
35. Splice (2009)
R | 104 min | Horror, Sci-Fi
Genetic engineers Clive Nicoli and Elsa Kast hope to achieve fame by successfully splicing together the DNA of different animals to create new hybrid animals for medical use.
Director: Vincenzo Natali | Stars: Adrien Brody, Sarah Polley, Delphine Chanéac, Brandon McGibbon
Votes: 101,726 | Gross: $17.00M
Scientific couple raise a human/animal hybrid.
36. The Terminal (2004)
PG-13 | 128 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
An Eastern European tourist unexpectedly finds himself stranded in JFK airport, and must take up temporary residence there.
Director: Steven Spielberg | Stars: Tom Hanks, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Chi McBride, Stanley Tucci
Votes: 494,718 | Gross: $77.87M
Immigrant lives in airport for a while because he's not allowed into the country.
37. The Truman Show (1998)
PG | 103 min | Comedy, Drama
An insurance salesman discovers his whole life is actually a reality TV show.
Director: Peter Weir | Stars: Jim Carrey, Ed Harris, Laura Linney, Noah Emmerich
Votes: 1,194,036 | Gross: $125.62M
Truman was born into a Big Brother dome. Everyone in there except him is an actor. He has no idea his life isn't real.
38. Twilight (I) (2008)
PG-13 | 122 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance
When Bella Swan moves to a small town in the Pacific Northwest, she falls in love with Edward Cullen, a mysterious classmate who reveals himself to be a 108-year-old vampire.
Director: Catherine Hardwicke | Stars: Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, Billy Burke, Sarah Clarke
Votes: 487,097 | Gross: $192.77M
Girl falls in love with a guy at her school who is supposedly 17, but actually a 100 year-old vampire who can read minds.
39. Waking Life (2001)
R | 99 min | Animation, Drama, Fantasy
A man shuffles through a dream meeting various people and discussing the meanings and purposes of the universe.
Director: Richard Linklater | Stars: Ethan Hawke, Trevor Jack Brooks, Lorelei Linklater, Wiley Wiggins
Votes: 66,863 | Gross: $2.89M
Rotoscoped random philosophical musings and conversations.
40. What Dreams May Come (1998)
PG-13 | 113 min | Drama, Fantasy, Romance
Chris Nielsen dies in an accident, and enters Heaven. But when he discovers that his beloved wife Annie has killed herself out of grief over the loss, he embarks on an afterlife adventure to reunite with her.
Director: Vincent Ward | Stars: Robin Williams, Cuba Gooding Jr., Annabella Sciorra, Max von Sydow
Votes: 114,303 | Gross: $55.49M
Dead man looks for his dead wife in the afterlife.
41. Womb (2010)
Not Rated | 111 min | Drama, Romance, Sci-Fi
A woman's consuming love forces her to bear the clone of her dead beloved. From his infancy to manhood, she faces the unavoidable complexities of her controversial decision.
Director: Benedek Fliegauf | Stars: Eva Green, Matt Smith, Lesley Manville, Peter Wight
Votes: 15,181
Woman gives birth to, and raises, a clone of her dead boyfriend.
42. Yes Man (2008)
PG-13 | 104 min | Comedy, Romance
A man challenges himself to say "yes" to everything.
Director: Peyton Reed | Stars: Jim Carrey, Zooey Deschanel, Bradley Cooper, John Michael Higgins
Votes: 382,818 | Gross: $97.69M
Guy has to say 'yes' to any request that comes his way.
Tell Your Friends