Film

Buster's Mal Heart

A fragmented, dreamy film about a man hiding in the mountains, flashing between his fugitive present and the unraveling events that got him there. It's elliptical and strange, structured like a fever dream, more interested in mood and mystery than plot clarity. For viewers who want cinema to feel unsettling rather than comforting.

TMDb rating3.1

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like slippery, dreamlike mysteries where the rules of the world bend a little more with every scene, and you enjoy following a damaged narrator who may not be entirely reliable.

Skip it if you want a clear plot that tidies itself up by the end; this one is murky, meandering and happy to leave you unsure what you have just watched.

What it asks of you: Ninety-six minutes of patient, drifting atmosphere with long quiet stretches, so settle in and let the odd logic and off-kilter mood do the work.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

A Ghost Story2017

Haunting meditation on time, loss, and what lingers. Like Buster's Mal Heart, it's formally daring and emotionally devastating, refusing to explain itself. Rami Malek's equally excellent here.

But Slow, deliberately obscure, and genuinely depressing. If you need plot momentum or clear answers, you will be frustrated.

A Ghost Story poster

Under the Silver Lake2018

Another mystery that deliberately doesn't solve itself, layering paranoia, obsession, and strange searching across Los Angeles. Same fractured, dream-logic approach to narrative. Hypnotic.

But Wildly long, pretentious in places, and the protagonist is often unlikeable. You need to be okay with not knowing what it all meant.

Under the Silver Lake poster

The Killing of a Sacred Deer2017

Yorgos Lanthimos creates mounting dread through flat affect and formal precision. Another film where something has gone terribly wrong and we're piecing it together sideways. Unsettling in the best way.

But Emotionally cold and deeply bleak. The pacing is deliberately artificial and distant. Not for anyone seeking warmth or catharsis.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Buster's Mal Heart

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Gerry2002

Both films use the wilderness and isolation as a space where male identity unravels completely. Both are more interested in atmosphere and time passing than in plot explanation.

Gus Van Sant's film of two men walking into wilderness and getting lost. Shot in long takes with almost no dialogue, it's a study in purposelessness and death. Pure cinema as mood and duration. Connects to Buster through its exploration of masculine aimlessness and dissolution in natural space.

But 110 minutes of men walking through forests. Almost nothing happens. If you need narrative, dialogue, or conventional cinema, this will feel like punishment.

Gerry poster
More like this (8)

It Comes at Night2017

Paranoid atmosphere suffocates this film. Two families, one house, everything fractured and suspicious. The dread builds through suggestion rather than action, much like Buster's fragmentary structure.

But Very slow burn with minimal plot. If you're watching for a horror payoff, you'll leave disappointed. Ends quietly.

It Comes at Night poster

The OA2016

A woman escapes captivity and tells an impossible story. Gloriously weird, structurally unorthodox, and genuinely strange. The narrative refuses to be straightforward or comfortable.

But Cancelled after two seasons, so unresolved. The weirdness can feel self-indulgent. Some people find the dialogue affected.

The OA poster

Twin Peaks1990

David Lynch at his most abstract and dreamlike. Three hours compressed into eighteen episodes of genuine strangeness. If you want cinema that feels like waking from a bad dream, this is it.

But Aggressively slow and deeply surreal. Long stretches of silence and strange repetition. The original show is essentially required viewing. Demands patience.

Twin Peaks poster

Certain Women2016

Three interconnected stories of small-town women in Montana, each formally beautiful and quietly devastating. Understated, precise acting. The Western landscape feels as much a character as the people.

But Essentially plotless. Nothing happens in the conventional sense. If you need dramatic incident or resolution, this will feel empty.

Certain Women poster

First Reformed2018

Paul Schrader's spiritual crisis disguised as a mystery. A priest investigates a suicide and spirals. Formally rigorous, morally complex, and genuinely strange in ways that build slowly.

But Bleak, frequently boring in its deliberateness, and the protagonist makes terrible decisions. It's a meditation on despair, not an uplifting film.

First Reformed poster

We Need to Talk About Kevin2011

A fractured narrative told in fragments, jumping between before and after a terrible act. Lynne Ramsay's visual language conveys dread and guilt without exposition. Formally innovative throughout.

But Genuinely difficult to watch, deeply misanthropic, and the mother-son relationship is profoundly uncomfortable. Not cathartic or kind.

We Need to Talk About Kevin poster

The Night of the Hunter1955

Both films use fragmented narrative and dreamlike logic to tell the story of a man whose grip on reality is slipping. Both use landscape as a repository of dread rather than beauty.

Charles Laughton's only directorial feature, a black-and-white nightmare about a con-man preacher hunting children for hidden money. Expressionist, Gothic, genuinely frightening. A masterpiece that predates its own genre by decades.

But Made in 1955 but looks like nothing else from that era—formally extreme. Black-and-white and slow. The sexual menace is palpable and uncomfortable. Not a cozy classic.

The Night of the Hunter poster

The Comedy2012

Both films are about men in states of dissolution, drifting through space with fragmentary consciousness. Both refuse to moralize or explain their subjects' actions. Both are formally interested in the texture of aimlessness itself.

Rick Alverson's film of a wealthy Manhattan man spending his days in aimless cruelty and petty transgression, going nowhere. Tim Heidecker's least funny performance, which is precisely the point. Savage about male entitlement and intellectual emptiness.

But Deeply unpleasant, protagonist is objectively terrible, and the 'joke' is that nothing pays off and nothing matters. Bleak to the point of nihilism. Easy to hate.

The Comedy poster

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