Movies like What Is It?
If you like "What Is It?" you are looking for surreal, atmospheric and serious movies about / with surrealism, down syndrome, obsession, mental illness, society, social misfits and controversy themes of Drama genre shot in USA.
Find your next favorite and similar movies in two steps:
1. Identify all themes of interest from this film (block below).
2. Look for them in the presented list.
What Is It? (2005)
923

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 72 min.
Story:
What Is It? is the name of a 2005 experimental film written, starring, funded and directed by Crispin Glover. As of 2008, the film has only been shown at independent theaters, typically accompanied by a question and answer session, slideshow and meet-and-greet/autograph signing with Glover.
Style:
surreal, atmospheric, serious, avant garde, controversial, psychotronic, realistic, experimental, weird, offbeat ...
Plot:
surrealism, down syndrome, obsession, mental illness, society, social misfits, controversy, experiment, strong sexual content, dark humor, racism, misfit, getting home, figment, against the rules, nazi, female nudity, murder, handicapped, male nudity, masturbation, sadism, vengeance, killing an animal, praying mantis ...
Most similar movies to What Is It?
The list contains related movies ordered by similarity. Recommendation engine sorted out serious, realistic, atmospheric and surreal films with plots about society, misfit, surrealism, female nudity, social misfits, obsession and female full frontal nudity mostly in Drama, Mystery and Comedy genres. Some movies like What Is It?: Something in the Way (2013), Violent Blue (2011), Porcile (1969), Helen (2008), The Memory Thief (2007). The matching attributes are highlighted in bold.
Subscribe for new and better recommendations:

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 74 min.
Story:
Tells the story of Paul (Steven C. Stewart), a man suffering from Cerebal Palsy, who spends his days wasting away in a nursing home. To pass his time, he fantasizes about the man he should be despite his twisted body. People are able to understand ...
Style:
experimental, serious, surreal, atmospheric, controversial ...
Audience:
adult
Plot:
disability, retirement home, introspection, love affair, writer's life, lifestyle, human spirit, love and romance, hopes, dangerous attraction, voyeurism, sexual relations ...
Time:
21st century
⇓ similarity ⇓
95%

Genre: Drama
Country: Indonesia
Duration: 89 min.
Story:
Ahmad, a porn obsessed taxi driver from Jakarta, falls for the beautiful young prostitute Kinar and struggles with sexual frustration and misguided piety.
Style:
atmospheric, serious, touching, bleak, sincere ...
Plot:
obsession, dull life, social misfits, misfit, strong sexual content, society, prostitution, prostitute, religions or cults, unfulfillment, taxi, urban
Time:
21st century
Place:
indonesia, asia
⇓ similarity ⇓
88%

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 129 min.
Story:
Katarina is a music teacher obsessed with an unfinished symphony. She worries about her brother, Ondrej an introverted inventor whose financiers are reputedly shady and dangerous. Then one day, her ex-husband Pietro shows up in her house and locks ...
Style:
serious, realistic, surreal, cynical, psychological ...
Plot:
obsession, murder, sexual relations, dishonesty, losing-it hero, captivity, confined, female nudity, misfit, disorder, mute or deaf, social misfits ...
Place:
usa, los angeles
⇓ similarity ⇓
75%

Genre: Drama
Country: Italy, France
Duration: 99 min.
Story:
Two dramatic stories. In an undetermined past, a young cannibal (who killed his own father) is condemned to be torn to pieces by some wild beasts. In the second story, Julian, the young son of a post-war German industrialist, is on the way to lie ...
Style:
controversial, disturbing, experimental, art film, erotic ...
Plot:
zoophilia, cannibal, cannibalism, social decay, female nudity, surrealism, death, murder, exploitation, sex crime, porn, mythology ...
Time:
20th century, 60s, post world war two, middle ages
Place:
germany, europe
⇓ similarity ⇓
74%
Movie in collections
435

Genre: Drama
Country: UK, Ireland
Duration: 79 min.
Story:
An 18 year old girl called Joy has gone missing. Another girl called Helen is a few weeks away from leaving her care home. Helen is asked to 'play' Joy in a police reconstruction that will retrace Joy's last known movements. Joy had ...
Style:
realistic, psychological, atmospheric, touching, serious ...
Plot:
hidden identity, kidnapping, obsession, society, mental illness, haunted by the past, missing girl, police investigation, impersonation, teenager, girl, autumn ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
ireland
⇓ similarity ⇓
66%
Also search:
Fight Club related movies

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min.
Story:
A Los Angeles tollbooth clerk becomes obsessed with the Holocaust after meeting a survivor.
Style:
psychological, serious, realistic, disturbing, mind bending ...
Plot:
holocaust, mental illness, obsession, losing-it hero, haunted by the past, dull life, society, human nature, elderly, life is a bitch, friendship, parents and children ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
usa
⇓ similarity ⇓
62%

Genre: Drama
Country: Switzerland, UK, France, Italy, USA
Duration: 107 min.
Story:
In the bourgeois circles of Europe after the Great War, can anything save the modern man? Harry Haller, a solitary intellectual, has all his life feared his dual nature of being human and being a beast. He's decided to die on his 50th birthday, ...
Style:
surreal, philosophical, experimental, stylized, atmospheric ...
Plot:
existentialism, misanthropic man, mental disorder, mysticism, spirituality, buddhism, midlife crisis, mental illness, jazz, couple relations, introspection, redemption ...
⇓ similarity ⇓
60%

Genre: Drama
Country: France
Duration: 100 min.
Story:
Running away from the police, Aden goes to the desert where he meets an uncivilized man who has a special link with Mother-Earth. He ends up by convincing the hermit to come along with him into another desert... the big town!
Style:
surreal, disturbing, psychotronic, experimental, art house ...
Plot:
surrealism, desert, oedipus complex, magic realism, peeping, incest, epilepsy, police, murder, cannibal, breast feeding, fall in love ...
Time:
70s
⇓ similarity ⇓
60%
Movie in collections

Genre: Drama
Country: Poland, USA
Duration: 100 min.
Story:
This dialog-free film, originally presented as 33 short films, is an experimental, bizarre set of meditations and flashbacks of the grotesque.
Style:
surreal, disturbing, atmospheric, realistic, serious ...
Plot:
mental institution, mental illness, child abuse, estrangement, life is a bitch, haunted by the past, dull life, mentally unstable, doctors and patients, dysfunctional family, homecoming, wrongfully committed ...
Time:
21st century
⇓ similarity ⇓
53%

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 83 min.
Story:
NANCY, PLEASE tells the story of Paul Brawley, a gifted PhD candidate at Yale University. Paul has just moved into an apartment with his pragmatic girlfriend, Jen, and is struggling to complete his dissertation before embarking on a career in ...
Style:
realistic, serious, psychological, captivating, tense ...
Plot:
roommate, university, obsession, boyfriend girlfriend relationship, moving, career, society, college, dark humor, youth, social misfits, misfit ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
usa, connecticut
⇓ similarity ⇓
53%
Also search:
Movies similar to Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom

Genre: Drama
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 116 min.
Story:
A compilation of erotic films intended to illuminate the points where art meets sexuality.
Style:
erotic, thought provoking, serious, avant garde, controversial ...
Plot:
exhibitionist, erection, sexual promiscuity, sexual abuse, coitus, couple relations, lifestyle, sex addict, society, destructive relationship, sexual relations, sex scene ...
Time:
70s
⇓ similarity ⇓
52%

Genre: Drama
Country: Israel
Duration: 87 min.
Story:
After suffering an emotional breakdown in a public place, a young man vows to quit the chaotic city life and never leave his apartment. He quickly discovers that in todays world all his needs can be easily met: sexual satisfaction via the internet, ...
Style:
psychological, realistic, serious, emotional, gloomy ...
Plot:
confined, losing-it hero, opposites attract, misfit, love and romance, isolation, mental illness, impossible love, estrangement, couples, social misfits, society ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
israel
⇓ similarity ⇓
51%

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min.
Story:
Having lived his entire life under the watchful eye of his overbearing mother, Albert must fend for himself when an unidentified automobile suddenly kills her. Free for the first time, Albert quickly responds to the bait dangling in front of him, ...
Style:
serious, realistic, offbeat
Plot:
family relations, mentally challenged, social misfits, misfit, dysfunctional family, parents and children, small town, death of mother, suspense, con artists, mental illness, inheritance ...
Place:
wisconsin, milwaukee wisconsin, minnesota, usa
⇓ similarity ⇓
50%

Genre: Drama
Country: Hungary
Duration: 70 min.
Story:
Reminiscent of the latter works of Bela Tarr, Miklos Jancso's "Beloved Electra" is comprised of a series of extremely slow and extremely long takes (there are just eight principal shots, each lasting an entire reel of film). More ...
Style:
captivating, atmospheric, stylized, realistic, serious
Plot:
ancient history, female nudity, revenge, surrealism, murder, obsession, state affairs, vengeance, rivalry, legends and myths, parents and children, curses spells and rituals ...
Place:
ancient greece
⇓ similarity ⇓
47%

Genre: Drama
Country: Austria
Duration: 93 min.
Story:
A series of snapshots from the life of a fictional actress named Shirley serves to weave together thirteen paintings by Edward Hopper (e.g. "Office at Night", "Western Motel", "Usherette", "A Woman in the ...
Style:
serious, realistic, atmospheric, experimental, stylized ...
Plot:
relationship vs career, art, idealism, couple relations, ambition, actor's life, repression, hopes, americana, workplace, couples, society ...
Time:
1940s, 50s, 1930s, 20th century, 60s
Place:
usa
⇓ similarity ⇓
47%
Also search:
Requiem for a Dream similar movies

Genre: Drama
Country: Morocco, France, United Arab Emirates, Lebanon
Duration: 88 min.
Story:
Tarik lives in a land without colour, a land where water is contaminated by a strange phenomenon of “water bugs”. Tarik wears make-up and dresses up as a woman. He dances on a cart that is drawn by a dying horse and his father has practically ...
Style:
serious, realistic, atmospheric, disturbing, bleak ...
Plot:
performer's life, transvestism, social misfits, family relations, family in crisis, misfit, gays and lesbians, society, bittersweet, gender, lgbt
Time:
21st century
Place:
morocco
⇓ similarity ⇓
47%

Genre: Drama
Country: France, Tunisia
Duration: 77 min.
Story:
In this French tour-de-force a young student decides to have no more interaction with the world than is needed to minimally sustain life. His increasingly automaton-like behavior is coupled with a strange clarity of insight about the world around ...
Style:
art house, experimental, surreal, depressing, philosophical ...
Plot:
existentialism, nihilism, depression, introspection, loneliness, psychology, mental disorder, intimacy, social outcast, melancholy, time travel, alienation ...
Time:
20th century, 70s
Place:
paris france, france
⇓ similarity ⇓
46%
3K

Genre: Drama
Country: India
Duration: 85 min.
Story:
Gandu hates his life. He hates his mother. Gandu raps out his hate, anger, dirt and filth of his existence. He and his rickshawpuller friend enter the world of smack, rap, porn and horror. Reality and fiction, surreal and bizarre come together. Can ...
Style:
surreal, tense, atmospheric, disturbing, psychological ...
Plot:
depression, rapper, explicit sex, male masturbation, unsimulated sex, masturbation, escape from reality, drug abuse, friendship, friends, human nature, penetration ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
india, asia
⇓ similarity ⇓
45%
Movie in collections
10K

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 123 min.
Story:
A down-on-his-luck American Indian recently released from jail is offered the chance to "star" as the victim of a snuff film, the resulting pay of which could greatly help his poverty stricken family.
Style:
serious, realistic, disturbing, suspenseful, controversial ...
Plot:
family relations, alcohol abuse, life is a bitch, injustice, social decay, americana, misfit, unemployment, gang, society, male female relationship, self sacrifice ...
Time:
90s
⇓ similarity ⇓
45%

Genre: Drama
Country: Hungary
Duration: 130 min.
Story:
In an impressive follow up to his debut film Forest, Benedek Fliegauf tells the uncompromising story of a day in the life of a drug dealer. His clients include the leader of a religious sect, a friend who needs a final fix, a former lover who has ...
Style:
psychological, stylized, serious, atmospheric, experimental ...
Plot:
drug abuse, life is a bitch, addiction, estrangement, misfit, social misfits, drug dealing, society, overdose, nihilism, criminal heroes, friend ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
europe, hungary
⇓ similarity ⇓
42%
Also search:
Ken Park similar movies

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 83 min.
Story:
Warren Oates plays a world-weary gambler trying to make big money cockfighting. Always on the road, he works inside and outside the rules to try to work up to the biggest fight of the year.
Style:
cynical, psychotronic, serious, realistic, cult film ...
Audience:
manly, boys' night
Plot:
gambling, cult, female nudity, hicksploitation, exploitation, animal abuse, small town, friendship, comeback, cockfight, chicken, rivalry ...
Time:
70s
Place:
georgia, usa
⇓ similarity ⇓
40%

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 79 min.
Story:
CREMASTER 2 (1999) is rendered as a gothic Western that introduces conflict into the system. On the biological level it corresponds to the phase of fetal development during which sexual division begins. In Matthew Barney's abstraction of this ...
Style:
experimental, sexy, serious, gothic, surreal ...
Plot:
murder, bee, avant-garde, mormon, heavy metal culture, modern art, rodeo, nude, graphic violence, psychopath, gender, introspection ...
Time:
19th century, 20th century, 70s
Place:
usa, utah, chicago illinois
⇓ similarity ⇓
39%

Genre: Drama
Country: France, Czechoslovakia, Tunisia
Duration: 93 min.
Story:
A group of French students are drawn into the psychological and sexual games of a mysterious Dutchman. Once they sample his "fear powder" the students experience a series of hallucinations.
Style:
allegory, disturbing, enigmatic, surreal, controversial ...
Plot:
surrealism, torture, modernism, fetish, parallel universe, painting, death, desert, nihilism, eroticism, avant-garde, female nudity ...
⇓ similarity ⇓
39%
Movie in collections

Genre: Drama, Mystery
Country: France, Italy, Turkey
Duration: 101 min.
Story:
A sad man meets a beautiful, secretive woman who may or may not be involved in some conspiracy ring dealing in kidnapped women used as prostitutes. After several days of their sadly passionate relationship she disappears. The sad man is unable to ...
Style:
surreal, mind bending, psychedelic, experimental, avant garde ...
Plot:
obsession, fetish, parallel universe, alternate reality, surrealism, power relations, dealing with death, femme fatale, love and romance, mysterious character, love affair, car accident ...
Time:
20th century, 60s
Place:
middle east, istanbul turkey, turkey
⇓ similarity ⇓
38%

Genre: Drama
Country: Iran
Duration: 106 min.
Story:
A man, his dog, a young woman and a filmmaker in a house by the Caspian Sea. All three are wanted, but they are also in search of each other. Thus begins an absurd game in which reality and fiction merge.
Style:
atmospheric, serious, surreal, realistic, disturbing ...
Plot:
on the run, against the rules, writer's life, dishonesty, disorder, isolation, existentialism, confinement indoors, filmmaking, postmodernism, confined, artists and showbiz ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
middle east, iran
⇓ similarity ⇓
38%
Also search:
Films like The Brown Bunny

Genre: Drama
Country: Switzerland, Austria
Duration: 80 min.
Story:
Pepperminta is an anarchist of the imagination. She lives in a futuristic rainbow villa and according to her own rules. Colors are the young woman's best friends and strawberries are her pets. She knows the most amazing remedies to free people ...
Style:
stylized, atmospheric, surreal, inspirational, semi serious ...
Plot:
idealism, peaceful mission, optimism, against the rules, rebelliousness, human spirit, youth, fall in love, hopes, rebellion, society, friendship ...
Place:
europe, switzerland
⇓ similarity ⇓
37%

Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min.
Story:
Jim is a shy, withdrawn loner, pervert, and virgin. Lana is a friendly and outgoing born again Christian who has renounced her promiscuous drug filled past. They have never met until they step into an elevator together one day. The elevator gets ...
Style:
psychotronic, serious, suspenseful, disturbing, mind bending ...
Plot:
trapped in an elevator, surrealism, transformation, introvert, sex maniac, obsession, isolation, pervert, irony, controversy, virgin, elevator ...
⇓ similarity ⇓
37%
228

Genre: Drama
Country: Israel
Duration: 89 min.
Story:
Self Made tells the story of two women - one Israeli, the other Palestinian- who are trapped within their respective worlds. After a mix-up at a checkpoint, they find themselves living the life of the other on the opposite side of the border.
Style:
humorous, surreal, semi serious, realistic, feminist film ...
Plot:
couples, self discovery, society, impossible love, disorder, introspection, memory loss, mistaken identity, love and romance, performer's life, crumbling marriage, artists and showbiz ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
israel, palestinian authority, middle east
⇓ similarity ⇓
37%

Genre: Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 105 min.
Story:
In the massive city of Tokyo, Kumiko, a twenty-nine year old, lives in utter solitude. She works a dreadful, dead-end job under an awful boss, is intimidated by her well-off peers, and nagged incessantly by her overbearing mother who is exasperated ...
Style:
depressing, surreal, melancholic, emotional, atmospheric ...
Plot:
language barrier, treasure, rabbit, mental illness, character study, survival, self discovery, obsession, alone in the world, female protagonist, map, escapades ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
japan, minnesota, tokyo, north dakota, usa
⇓ similarity ⇓
36%

Genre: Drama
Country: Thailand, UK
Duration: 117 min.
Story:
This film concerns a Scandinavian gentleman who works in film, perhaps as a sort of financier/director/producer. He lives in Thailand with his Thai girlfriend, and most of the film is an exploration of that relationship. We also see her brother, and ...
Style:
realistic, serious, suspenseful, atmospheric, experimental ...
Plot:
starting over, gangsters, prostitute, murder, lifestyle, couples, juvenile delinquency, hopes, society, unlikely couple, couple relations, youth ...
Time:
21st century
Place:
thailand, asia, bangkok thailand
⇓ similarity ⇓
36%
Subscribe for new and better recommendations:
Related movie lists