40 Cult Movies: From Alice, Sweet Alice to Zombies of Mora Tau

by Jon Towlson

From devil child shocker Alice, Sweet Alice (1976) to Z-grade monochrome masterpiece Zombies of Mora Tau (1957), join acclaimed film critic and author Jon Towlson on a tour of 40 great cult movies. Experience afresh cult classics like Freaks (1932) and Night of the Living Dead (1968) and discover Euro art house rarities like Edge of Sanity (1989).

From punk classic Suburbia (1984) to Gasper Noe’s phantasmagoric Enter the Void (2009) to slasher oddity The Son of Satan (1978), this book is sure to bring you some of the strangest movies you will ever see. And it will make you rediscover films you thought you already knew!

Drawing on a lifetime of cult movie watching and over ten years of writing about cult movies for leading film magazines like Starburst, Scream and The Dark Side, Jon Towlson has put together the definitive A-Z guide to some of the best cult cinema around. With artwork by the legendary Graham Humphreys!

Acclaim for books by Jon Towlson

Subversive Horror Countercultural Messages of Films from Frankenstein to the Present (2014):
"Brain candy for the critical horror fan" - RUE MORGUE
"Fascinating and thought-provoking” - STARBURST
"Opens your eyes to films you thought you knew" - POPMATTERS
"If you're a serious horror fan, you need to read this book" - MOVIES MADE ME
"Spectacular... informative and engaging” - HORRORTALK

The Turn to Gruesomeness in American Horror Films, 1931-1936 (2016):
"The book on 'classic horror' to beat" - VIDEO WATCHDOG
"One of the best books on the golden age of horror ever written" - KILLER REVIEWS.

Candyman (2018):
"A brilliant analysis of the many layers that make Candyman a brilliant film” - JOSEPH MADDREY (AUTHOR OF NIGHTMARES IN RED, WHITE AND BLUE)
"One of the most impressive books the [Devil's Advocates] series has produced” - VIEWFINDER MAGAZINE

Global Horror Cinema 28 Representative Films from 17 Countries (2021):
"Towlson does a great job… an impressive piece of work” - HORRIFIED MAGAZINE.
“An excellent guide to some of the best in horror films from across the world" - WHAT SLEEPS BENEATH

Dawn of the Dead (2022):
“The definitive volume on Romero's Dawn of the Dead" - KENDALL R. PHILLIPS (AUTHOR OF DARK ROMERO, CARPENTER, CRAVEN AND THE MODERN HORROR FILM).

About the author

Jon Towlson writes regularly for Starburst, Scream and The Dark Side. He is the author of numerous books on cult movies, and has contributed extras to Blu-ray releases by Arrow, Second Sight, Eureka Video and 101 Films. His writing on horror movies has been nominated for five Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Awards.

Jon's obsession with cult movies started with the movie mags he collected as a kid, with titles like House of Hammer and World of Horror. It was here he first heard about Alice, Sweet Alice and The Son of Satan. His obsession grew with the dawn of VHS when he would gather his friends to marvel at bad movies like Night of the Demon (1980).

289 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 1, 2023

About the author

Jon Towlson is a film critic and the author of 40 CULT MOVIES: FROM ALICE, SWEET ALICE TO ZOMBIES OF MORA TAU (2023), MIDNIGHT COWBOY (McGill-Queen's University Press, 2023), DAWN OF THE DEAD (DEVIL'S ADVOCATES) (Auteur/ Liverpool University Press, 2022), GLOBAL HORROR CINEMA TODAY (McFarland, 2021), CANDYMAN (DEVIL'S ADVOCATES) (Auteur/Columbia University Press, 2018), THE TURN TO GRUESOMENESS IN AMERICAN HORROR FILMS, 1931-1936 (McFarland, 2016), CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (CONSTELLATIONS) (Auteur/Columbia University Press, 2016) and SUBVERSIVE HORROR CINEMA: COUNTERCULTURAL MESSAGES OF FILMS FROM FRANKENSTEIN TO THE PRESENT (McFarland, 2014). He is a regular contributor to STARBURST MAGAZINE, and has also written for the BFI, Scream, The Dark Side, Diabolique, Paracinema, Exquisite Terror, Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies, Shadowland Magazine, Bright Lights Film Journal, Offscreen, Cine Excess and Digital Film-Maker Magazine. Jon has contributed extras to Blu ray releases by Arrow, Second Sight, Eureka and 101 Films. Jon has been nominated several times for a Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Award 'honoring the best in classic horror research'.

Jon hosts the official STARBURST horror podcast
FRIDAY NIGHT FRIGHTS.

Reviews

[Darren-lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5...

[Charles A. · Rating 3 out of 5]

good but not as good as

Danny Peary wrote three volumes of Cult Movies that gave detailed plots of and behind the scenes details of over a hundred movies. These also featured reviews and modern implications from the era or eras that spawned such movies. This book in most entries does not do that and when it dies as with Suburbia, it does not do it as well. It is a bit rambling and most entries feel incomplete or about other films rather than the one they are an entry about. Not great but merely just okay.

[Andrew Neilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Majority of the films mentioned in here are horror which suited me fine. What I liked most about the book was that the author goes in depth and branches out into similar titles. For example The Blair Witch Project he talks about other found footage films or Braindead he mentions Peter Jacksons other earlier films. So overall I'd say this guy Jon really knows his movies

[Jeremy Espinoza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great overview of lesser known and some classic films (with a focus on horror). Added a lot of films on my watch list.

[James S. · Rating 2 out of 5]

Quite poorly written. It reads like someone printed out hastily-composed blog posts. Not recommended.