I live my life by a simple rule: no boring movies. I spent a lot of time inside this year (shocking, I know), which I used to catch up on a lot of not-boring movies and a handful of yes-boring movies as well. What follows are my favorite films I watched for the first time in 2020; the highs and the lows I had a real blast experiencing. With any luck, you’ll have fun with them too.

(Honorable mentions to Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 and Freddy Got Fingered.)

10. UHF (1989)

Weird Al has always been a known quantity in my life, but I never got around to watching UHF, his sketch comedy tale of the little TV station that could, until just this year. I’m glad I finally did! Constantly ping-ponging between “sensible chuckle” and “hysterical cackle,” UHF is the post-modern feel-good goof I needed in 2020. Most of the movie floats on Al’s inherent charm, and much of the beat-by-beat narrative is simply okay, but UHF’s bevy of fake media and other consumerist lampoons prove consistently hilarious. I don’t think a single spoof commercial or TV show got by without a couple laughs, and sometimes that’s all you need.

9. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1994)

An attempt to follow the success of Francis Ford Coppola's Gary Oldman's Bram Stoker's Dracula, Kenneth Branagh's Robert De Niro's Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is a misguided adaptation that turns completely hysterical thanks to hammy performances and Branagh's overwrought direction. It's genuinely difficult to tell how much of the camp in this Hollywood Shakespeare Players production is intentional, but god, it's funny either way. Everything from the script to the camera angles to the editing frames this more as a comedy than drama or horror, and barely anyone seems to be aware of what kind of film they're in. Just the first ten minutes are cackle-inducing, but by the time De Niro shows up with his grumbly New York monster voice the movie is gone, gone, gone. It absolutely rules and I can't recommend it enough.

8. Chatroom (2010)

I spent the entire runtime of this movie with my jaw dropped firmly on the floor. Unleashed by Hideo Nakata of Ringu fame, Chatroom is an alleged horror-thriller which handles sensitive topics such as Internet bullying and teen depression with finesse and subtlety seldom seen outside the killdozer. It’s an after-school scare special with a budget; a movie presenting the Internet as a virtual hotel filled with shape-shifting sex perverts and Spanish teens who keep yelling at a kid tied to a chair. I should be pissed at how poorly the film treats mental illness and suicide, but frankly, Chatroom is so utterly bugfucking unbelievable and alien that it’s impossible for me to take it seriously. I hyena-cackled at just about every #tragic moment, including a small boy in a cowboy costume who is inexplicably abandoned at the zoo. If you’ve ever wanted to experience a dark #teen #angst movie made by people who exclusively watch the British equivalent of Fox News, Chatroom is your film.

7. Torque (2004)

Torque is a motorbike movie which defies traditional criticism; if I didn't know better I'd think it was an intentional Fast & Furious parody. While most of the minute-to-minute material is goofy enough, Torque really shines with some of the most brain-bustingly bonkers action direction in the history of cinema. There are about five hundred cuts every time someone blinks, and god help you if you try to parse what's happening during any given chase scene. The final confrontation in this film is so utterly and completely off the shits that I find myself totally unable to describe what physically occurs. If that doesn't sell you, there's a bit where two characters pop wheelies and slam their bikes into each other as if they’re dueling swords. The soundtrack sucks extreme ass and Ice T and Adam Scott are here for some reason. Please watch this movie.

6. Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion (1972)

Wow! A real film! I originally intended to watch a bunch of classic revenge movies this December, but got distracted and started the Saw franchise instead (not recommended). Before that, I squeezed in Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion, a sleazed-out slice of pinko pop-art pulp which proves Meiko Kaji might actually be the best to ever do it. While the movie falls into many expected tropes of a Japanese 1970s “women in prison” feature, it's Kaji’s steely performance and the film’s masterful stylization which break out Female Prisoner into being an absolute treat to watch. There’s a true cry of anger at the heart of this film, which makes me wish I knew enough about Japan to understand the exact societal bone being picked. That said, bastard cops, misogyny, nationalism, and the corruption of authority are fairly universal.

5. Freaked (1993)

Freaked grew on me, like a big, pus-filled wart. When I watched the movie a month or so back, I enjoyed the wacked-out concept and brilliant-stupid humor, even though not all the comedy hit for me. Now I'm willing to admit that I really do love Freaked, a dumb-as-dirt movie which is horrendously funny and unlike anything else I think I'll ever see. The freak designs and makeup are all top-notch, and bits like the milkman escape and the kid getting sucked out of a plane live in my head rent-free. It’s true kino, the heart of cinema; a wholly unique weirdo gross-out comedy made with no pretensions or aspirations to be anything beyond what it clearly is. They don't make movies like this anymore, but maybe they should. It's been 27 years - I think it's about time we had a Freaked renaissance.

4. Artemis Fowl (2020)

An incomprehensible boondoggle of tragic CGI, bad child acting, and trademark Kenneth Branagh ham, Artemis Fowl appeals to absolutely nobody except brain-poisoned moviegoers who love watching trainwrecks unfold. I've seen the film three times now, and so far it's lost none of the staggering potency which knocked me back on my ass at my first viewing. No good decisions are made anywhere in Artemis Fowl, not from anyone behind the camera or in front, and certainly not from Judi Dench, who starred in this nonsense back-to-back with Movie of the Year 2019, Cats. If you’ve read the book you'll be insulted, if you haven't you'll be lost, and either way you’ll be traumatized by Josh Gad unhinging his jaw and ass-blasting literal dirt at tremendous speeds. I truly hope they run this incredible turd through theaters when the world opens up again, because I'll go see it three more times.

3. Ricochet (1991)

Somewhere between Con Air and Cape Fear, Ricochet is a sublime slice of supercop schlock from Resident Evil: Extinction director Russel Mulcahy. All police movies are dumb as a rule, but Ricochet is so stunningly rock-headed and hacky that it proves a constant source of entertainment and hilarity. Denzel Washington plays a cop propelled into fame after apprehending John Lithgow - but watch out! Lithgow is out of prison and back for revenge in a fully loaded, off-rails performance rivaling the finer works of Nic Cage and Gary Busey. Even if you can take the Catwoman-esque basketball sequence and Denzel stripping down to arrest Lithgow seriously, I dare you not to cackle at the bit where Lithgow and Jesse Ventura hold a prison sword fight with phone book armor to determine "the true Aryan." That's only one of Ricochet's endless hilarious elements, along with Ice T's white stand-in, the prison escape, every single death, a bizarre strip club, a Hitler painting......the list goes on and on. This movie should be required viewing for any bananas action slop fan.

2. Assassin 33 A.D. (2020)

Absolute laugh riot. Assassin 33 A.D. is a mind-melting movie that's cloyingly earnest despite being totally unhinged in every possible way. Every single minute of this stunningly violent time-traveling Jesus assassination film (yes, really) blows the previous minute out of the water, and by the time it ends you're left so thoroughly brain-blasted that you barely comprehend what's just happened. A bunch of nerds create a time machine, which is hijacked by a racist caricature, who then sends a man struggling with his faith to biblical Jerusalem, so he can dome the Messiah point-blank with a handgun. This occurs in the first half of the film, and shit only gets weirder from there. I will not spoil anything else about the movie, but rest assured, you will howl when you discover the truth of who was crucified next to Caucasian Jesus - played by Jason Castro of American Idol fame. Assassin 33 A.D. is a must-see religious experience, but probably not how the filmmakers intended.

1. Death Race 2000 (1975)

Sometimes a film comes along to reaffirm your belief that cinema is the greatest thing on earth, and sometimes that film has a lot of vehicular manslaughter and features Sylvester Stallone as a pinstriped Wacky Races mobster. Everything about Roger Corman’s Death Race 2000 rules from top to bottom; it’s a movie that knows exactly what it needs to deliver and does so in a tight 78 minutes of constant entertainment. The sleazy, sardonic Looney Tunes vibe directly pings a hidden node in my brain, and I’ll go up to bat for any film which understands the hilarity of a well-timed head rupture. I knew I loved this movie in the first five minutes, but the reveal of David Carradine’s “hand grenade” cemented Death Race 2000 as both a stone-cold classic and my favorite film watched in 2020. Here’s hoping 2021 can top it.

Morgan's Top 10 Not-Boring Films of 2020