The Greatest Satires
Every satire reviewed on this site, ranked. Brooks, Verhoeven, Altman, Ashby and the Zuckers, and a run of films that turned out to be documentaries.
Genre: Satire
Comedy with a target. Satire takes aim at institutions, fashions, and human folly, then exaggerates until the truth becomes impossible to ignore.
ComedyMan Bites Dog (1992) Review
Man Bites Dog (1992) rates 8 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. A Belgian film crew follows a serial killer, films his work, and gradually starts helping. Made by three film students for almost nothing, and it is the…
HorrorDead Set (2008) Review
Dead Set (2008) rates 8 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Charlie Brooker locked the Big Brother house against a zombie apocalypse, cast the real presenter as herself, shot it in the actual studio, and then refused to let…
ActionLast Action Hero (1993) Review
Last Action Hero (1993) rates 6 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Columbia made a deconstruction of the action film starring the biggest action star alive, marketed it to children, and opened it one week after Jurassic Park. The…
Black ComedySouthland Tales (2006) Review
Southland Tales (2006) rates 5 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Richard Kelly took an unfinished cut to Cannes because nobody turns down a competition slot, was booed, recut it, and watched it earn under four hundred thousand dollars.…
Black ComedyNatural Born Killers (1994) Review
Natural Born Killers (1994) rates 6 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Oliver Stone made a satire about media appetite for violence that is itself a two-hour delivery system for violence. Tarantino wrote the story, disowned it, and asked…
DramaThe Manchurian Candidate (1962) Review
The Manchurian Candidate (1962) rates 10 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Frankenheimer made a political thriller that is also a comedy, a nightmare and a story about a mother, released it thirteen months before Dallas, and Angela Lansbury…
ActionDistrict 9 (2009) Review
District 9 (2009) rates 9 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. A first-time director shot an alien occupation film in a real Soweto township for thirty million dollars, cast his friend who had never acted, and got a Best…
ComedyBlazing Saddles (1974) Review
Blazing Saddles (1974) rates 9 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Mel Brooks made an anti-racist film by putting the ugliest language available in the mouths of idiots and letting the sheriff outthink them. Made for two point six…
Black ComedyAmerican Psycho (2000) Review
American Psycho (2000) rates 8 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Mary Harron read a novel everybody called unfilmable and found the comedy in it. Made for seven million dollars, mostly in Toronto, and it is far funnier and…
Black ComedyParasite (2019) Review
Parasite (2019) rates 9 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. A house built on a vertical axis, a family climbing it, and a genre change at the midpoint that almost no film survives. The first non-English winner of Best…
DramaAll About Eve (1950) Review
All About Eve (1950) rates 9 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. The best script ever written about ambition, in a film where everybody is intelligent and nobody has to be dim for the schemer to win. Fourteen nominations,…