Movies Like
Movies Like Poor Things: Visually Imaginative Films
By Jordan A. · · 7 min read
If Poor Things blew your mind with its maximalist weird beauty and uncompromising weirdness, you've discovered the magic of cinema that refuses to apologize for its strangeness. Yorgos Lanthimos created something visually audacious and narratively fearless - a film about a woman exploring sexuality and autonomy through a deliberately artificial aesthetic that makes you feel like you're watching a living painting or fever dream. It's ambitious art film cinema that respects your intelligence while daring you to surrender to its vision. Here are films that share that commitment to distinctive aesthetics, bold storytelling, and the kind of visual imagination that announces "this is not like anything else you're watching."
These recommendations celebrate filmmakers with singular visions who refuse to make things easy for audiences. They're beautiful, strange, and completely themselves - films that create worlds with their own internal logic and visual language.
Yorgos Lanthimos and Provocative Vision
The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017) is Lanthimos at his most sinister and ritualistic. A surgeon's life is invaded by a mysterious young man, and everything becomes increasingly formal, stilted, and horrifying. The aesthetic is deliberately artificial - weird line deliveries, strange camera angles, graphic violence - all serving the film's cold emotional core about guilt and punishment.
The Favourite (2018) is Lanthimos exploring female desire and power dynamics in 18th century England. It's exuberant and darkly funny, with characters whispering period dialogue before suddenly yelling it. Emma Stone, Olivia Colman, and Rachel Weisz create something sensual and competitive, supported by Lanthimos' distinctive visual language - hip-hop beats under period drama, fish-eye lenses, anachronistic vulgarity.
Dogtooth (2009) is deeply unsettling - a filmmaker's first feature about a family that raises their children in isolation. It's grotesque and absurdist, with family rituals that are deeply wrong and a camera that observes with almost sociological distance. The film trusts you to find it disturbing without explaining why.
A Cure for Wellness - actually, let me keep it to Lanthimos. Alps (2011) is about a group of nurses who perform the lives of deceased patients for their grieving families. It's haunting and deeply strange, with that same Lanthimos deadpan delivery applied to profoundly weird subject matter.
Visually Baroque and Maximalist Cinema
Suspiria (2018) is Luca Guadagnino's operatic reimagining of the 1977 film about a dance academy hiding a coven. It's gorgeously shot in muted colors with dance sequences that are disturbing and beautiful. The film treats movement and color as its primary language, with narrative secondary to atmosphere.
The Shape of Water (2017) is Guillermo del Toro creating a fairy tale about a mute woman and an amphibious creature in Cold War America. It's gorgeously designed with practical effects that make everything feel tactile and real. Del Toro's visual imagination transforms genre into art.
In Fabric (2020) is Peter Strickland's film about a cursed dress that destroys anyone who wears it. It's deliberately artificial with neon lighting, repetitive dialogue, and an aesthetic that feels like a fever dream designed by someone who understands fashion and psychology. It's bizarre and absolutely committed to its strangeness.
The Wailing (2016) - already mentioned but worth repeating - uses color and composition as a character itself. The cinematography is absolutely extraordinary, and the visual language communicates information that dialogue doesn't.
Surrealism and Dream Logic
The Night House (2020) is about a widow exploring her late husband's secrets in their dream-like seaside home. It's disorienting and architectural, with sound design that's unsettling and intimate. The film uses negative space and geometry to communicate unease.
Annihilation (2018) is Alex Garland's science fiction film about a shimmer zone where the laws of nature distort. It's visually stunning with creature designs that feel wrong in fundamental ways. The film's aesthetic creates dread through strangeness that doesn't follow conventional logic.
Under the Skin (2013) is oblique sci-fi about an alien seducing men in Scotland. It's minimalist and unsettling, with long sequences of Scarlett Johansson driving around and conversations with men who don't know they're talking to something inhuman. The abstraction creates genuine unease.
Mulholland Drive (2001) - already mentioned but David Lynch's fractured narrative about Hollywood and dreams uses surrealism to explore genuine psychological and professional horror. The illogic feels significant even when you don't understand what you're seeing.
Distinctive Character and Narrative Style
The Lighthouse (2019) is a two-hander between Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe as lighthouse keepers slowly going mad. It's shot in black and white in a claustrophobic aspect ratio, with a script full of period nautical dialogue that feels both authentic and alien. The film creates atmosphere through strangeness and commitment to its own logic.
Come True (2020) is a sci-fi horror about a young woman volunteering for a sleep study that reveals increasingly disturbing things. It's stylish and eerie, with practical effects and cinematography that feels tactile. The film prioritizes mood and visual storytelling.
Climax (2018) is Gaspar Noe's film about dancers whose sangria is poisoned with LSD. It's a descent into chaos told with fractured chronology and visual intensity. The aesthetic is deliberately artificial with primary colors and dance sequences that are visually stunning and horrifying.
A Ghost Story (2017) is David Lowery using a ghost in a sheet to explore time, obsession, and meaning. It's deliberately artificial - slow, philosophical, with long static shots of a haunted house. The simplicity of the concept contrasts with the complexity of what it's trying to say.
Fairytale Aesthetics and Constructed Worlds
Crimson Peak (2015) is Guillermo del Toro creating a gothic romance about a writer seduced by a mysterious stranger. It's gorgeous and artificial, with practical sets and effects that look beautiful rather than realistic. The film celebrates excess and operatic emotion.
Suspirium - already mentioned as Suspiria 2018, but it's worth highlighting del Toro's commitment to building worlds that feel completely distinct from reality while remaining visually coherent.
The Taste of Things (2023) is a French film about a master chef and his relationship with his cook. It's gorgeously shot in warm colors with food sequences that are practically pornographic. The aesthetic is lush and sensual, prioritizing beauty and tactile experience.
A Monster with a Thousand Heads - actually, let me go with Three Colors Blue (1993), Krzysztof Kieslowski's meditation on freedom after tragedy. It's structurally audacious with color as a primary theme, using minimalist framing and symbolic objects to explore grief.
Experimental Narrative and Form
Burning (2018) is Lee Chang-dong's adaptation of a Murakami short story about a writer, a woman, and a mysterious wealthy man. It's deliberately paced and obtuse, refusing to explain its narrative or character motivations. The film trusts you to sit with ambiguity and suggests meaning through subtext and visual detail.
The Holy Mountain (1973) is Alejandro Jodorowsky's surrealist journey about a man guided toward spiritual enlightenment. It's bizarre and maximalist, with practical effects that are disgusting and beautiful. The film is interested in sensation and symbolism more than conventional narrative.
Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (2021) is Radu Jude's provocative film about a teacher whose private explicit video is leaked. It uses found footage, animation, and live action, jumping between styles and forms. The film is formally ambitious and thematically enraged about privacy and judgment.
Seeking more visually imaginative art films with singular directorial vision? Explore our collection of visionary cinema and distinctive aesthetic storytelling.
Poor Things confirms that the most interesting cinema comes from filmmakers willing to impose their complete vision onto the world and trust that audiences will surrender to strangeness. These films share that commitment - they're not interested in comfort or conventional beauty. They want to transport you to worlds governed by their own rules, guided by directors with something specific to say and a visual language completely their own. If you're hungry for cinema that refuses to apologize for its weirdness, you're in exactly the right place.
Topics covered: fantasy, drama, art-film, visually-distinctive, contemporary, indie
Stream visually imaginative films
About the author
Jordan A., Founder, BingeNext
Jordan A. is the founder of BingeNext and writes every guide on this site. He built the recommendation engine after one too many nights lost to the streaming menu, and he still tests every pick the hard way: by watching it.