The very concept of being trapped on a mostly or entirely unoccupied island is frightening enough. Toss in some other threat and the isolation becomes even less bearable. For that reason, it’s actually pretty shocking how few excellent desert island movies there are. Sweetheart is a fun monster movie and The Island of Dr. Moreau with Marlon Brando is a cult favorite, but very few would call even those genuine classics. The only ones that have crossed into greatness or very goodness are those that take place on an island chock full of people, so they hardly count. For instance, The Wicker Man, Shutter Island, King Kong, the Jurassic Park films…none of them really count as desert island movies.
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What follows are small cast desert island movies that do work, even if it’s just in a so-bad-it’s-good capacity. Like Sam Raimi’s thoroughly fantastic Send Help, they have a tint of humor and take place on an island that isn’t occupied by people 365 days a year.
5) I Still Know What You Did Last Summer
Raimi’s Send Help has a deliberate coating of comedy. I Still Know What You Did Last Summer is more of an unintentionally funny misadventure. It makes the viewer laugh even if it does provide at least a dusting of that claustrophobic chill that comes with being stranded on a single locale with water on all sides.
I Still Know What You Did Last Summer is so illogical even its title doesn’t make sense. This is one of the worst Scream-esque movies to come out in the wake of Ghostface’s massive success. It can’t even be half as genuinely frightening as its predecessor which, frankly, wasn’t all that scary to begin with. But if you get joy out of having a total cash grab of a script read out for you, not to mention a reefer-toking Jack Black, this is your movie.
Stream I Still Know What You Did Last Summer on Netflix.
4) Matango
Matango is the most bizarre movie to come from Toho’s Shลwa era output. And that’s really saying something considering it was also the era of Godzilla vs. Hedorah and a talking Minilla in Godzilla’s Revenge.
Much to its credit, for a movie that came out over 60 years ago and has people in mushroom tree costumes, Matango is actually pretty frightening. Its tone conveys dread successfully, the performances convince us that the group of characters are turning upon one another, and the antagonists definitely don’t look like something one would want to contend with.
Stream Matango on The Criterion Channel.
3) Club Dread
You might be thinking “Club Dread? Isn’t that the comedy from the guys who made Super Troopers?” It is, but it’s actually more horror-focused than one might expect.
Broken Lizard’s output outside of Super Troopers and its sequels hasn’t been great (Beerfest has its fans), but one really must give it to them on Club Dread. They took the blueprints of ’80s slashers and made a pretty creepy homage to the subgenre’s greats. Plus, you get the late Bill Paxton playing an ill-fated Jimmy Buffett knock-off. Slasher fans and comedy fans alike should give this early aughts cult classic a shot.
2) Mindhunters
Renny Harlin’s Mindhunters shouldn’t be confused with David Fincher’s iconic Netflix show, but they aren’t so dissimilar. Both have grim tones and a focus on insanity.
Granted, this Mindhunters occasionally plays like other 2000s movies starring Christian Slater and Val Kilmer, when their careers weren’t in particularly healthy places. But on the whole, it does rise above all of those direct to video turkeys. This is actually a pretty tense single locale slasher, with elaborate Rube Goldbergian death sequences that bring to mind Saw, which just so happened to be released the same year. The offing of Slater’s character is particularly inspired. Not to mention the setting, an island being used as an FBI training facility, is pretty unique.
Stream Mindhunters for free on Kanopy.
1) Influencer
A takedown of social media influencer culture, Influencer (and its sequel, Influencers) is a smatly-scripted thriller with a phenomenal lead performance by Cassandra Naud. And, as anyone who has seen it knows, an island locale is what allows its plot to really kick into gear.
Naud plays CW, who pretends to befriend Madison (Emily Tennant), who is bemoaning the death of her romantic relationship while vacationing in Thailand. CW promises her to show her around the country’s most beautiful spots. Instead, she abandons Madison on an island and takes over her successful social media account. That is, until things grow more complicated via the arrival of Madison’s boyfriend.
Stream Influencer on Netflix.
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