Best surprise in a rental you expected crap from

[Chopper]

A friend of mine recently leant me a movie called the Cooler. I had very low expectations of it. The cover looked cheesy and it had Alec Baldwin it. Even though Baldwin played his typical type-cast character of a smooth-talking, sleazy, bad guy, the film was actually a very fresh surprise.

[Gerry]

A friend lent me CARNIVAL OF SOULS and it has since come to be one of my favorite 60s horrors.  I had very low expectations when I first popped it into the VCR.

[mr. henry]

EVIL ED is fun. it pays homage to so many other horror flicks. just don't get the DVD, it's severly edited. Get the VHS.

[mr. henry]

yeah, the cooler was good. i like bill macy. he should have let his son fry though...

check out HARD EIGHT by P.T. Anderson. it's a cool vegas/revenge flick.

[spncrdstractn]

i rented a phreakin' oddbird of a film a few years ago from a blockbuster in Austin, TX. it was called either "Dead Water" or "Dead Waters", and it was amazing.
I have since moved and have never been able to find it anywhere else....
Plus, every time I mention it to anyone, noone knows what the hell i'm talking about! an art restorer on an island owned by a convent with nuns and the devil in the walls and an ocean shore covered in dead fish with a woman crawling across, taking a bite out of one along the way. like i said, very bizarre.
Also genuinely creepy was "funny games", a German film about a family being tortured by creepos who wink at the camera.

[Brother Ragnarok]

Microwave Massacre or Psychos In Love.  Both rock the proverbial house.

[maria paula]

evan3 wrote:
"I know I will get a lot of crap for this, but I really enjoyed Resident Evil after my ex girlfriend had picked it up"
well, i really thought it was oing to be a big crap, moreover, i payed 6 euros, and thats a bit more than 6 dollars to watch this movie at cinema, i was convinced that i would be really bad, but oh,....  big surprise, i found it very enjoyable, i had so much fun that now i cant wait for the second part, and this time i know it will be a big crap, or maybe i will have another surprise?.
this could be another post:
" worse surprise in a rental u expected good from"
yes this weekend i had a big disapointment, "storytelling", i really thought i would love this film as much as i did with "happiness" , and no, i was completely wrong, now im feeling bad because i spent some money renting this little "swindle"

[Kory]

2 recent ones that pleasantly surprised me:

The Bourne Identity
and
Stuck on You

[BoyScoutKevin]

Do not despair. I know what you are talking about. Indeed, both films are mentiioned in a book, as are some of the films reviewed at this site. Unfortunately, I can't remember the name of it or the author, but, let me go back and check my personal library, as I purchased a copy of the book and put it in my personal library.

[BoyScoutKevin]

The first movie is the Spanish "The Day of the Beast " from 1995.  The second movie is the Austrian/German "Funny Games" from 1997. And both movies are featured in "Fangoria's 101 Best Horror Movies You've Never Seen" by Adam Lukeman and Fangoria Magazine.. Indeed, there are a number of movies--"Cemetery Man," "Humanoids from the Deep," "Lair of the White Worm," "Motel Hell," "Ticks," and "Deep Rising," that are featured both at this site and in the book. And like this site has gotten me to see a number of films that I might not have seen, so has the book gotten me to see a number of films that I might not have seen,, such as "Session 9" w/ David Caruso. The author use to have a web site with a link back to this site, but, I can no longer find his site, so it may no longer be available.

[Fearless Freep]

Heck, I'm not much into horror but I've seen Deep Rising and Humanoids From The Deep and seen parts of Lair... this are not  that unkown