Tried watching The Holy Mountain on a whim last night and felt like my brain melted

A buddy recommended it saying it was just a weird art film... three hours later I'd seen a toad wizard, Jesus getting crucified by robots, and a bunch of monks climbing a giant tower made of skulls. The ending where they break the fourth wall and say 'we are the movie' really threw me, like what was the point of all that if it wasn't real? Has anyone else sat through a movie that made you question if you actually understood the plot or if the director was just messing with you?

2 comments

2 Comments

john4305d ago

Yeah that ending part got me too, like wait so none of that actually happened? I remember the first time I watched something similar with Eraserhead, I kept waiting for some big explanation and then it just ended with the guy's head turning into a planet or something. Idk maybe it's just me but those kinds of movies feel like the director is having a private joke at your expense. I tried explaining the lizard jesus scene to my roommate the next day and she just stared at me like I was having a breakdown.

lane.drew5d ago

john430 said it feels like the director is having a private joke, and I get that. But honestly I think the joke is ON us for expecting a normal plot in the first place. The Holy Mountain was never meant to be something you "get" in a traditional way. It's more like a fever dream where the director is just throwing symbols at you to make you feel something, not explain something. The whole robot Jesus and skull tower stuff is there to shock you into realizing you're watching a movie, not to tell a story with a beginning, middle, and end. That fourth wall break at the end is basically Jodorowsky saying "look I just spent two hours messing with your head and now I'm telling you it was all fake, deal with it." I've come to love movies like that because they're the only ones that actually stick in your brain instead of just being forgettable entertainment.