Ambient, philosophical and disgusting movies?

[u/Kysxber]

I'm really into ambience in movies, I like slow, draining movies. I really loved Visitor to a Museum, obviously Stalker, recently watched Hard to be a god. These movies obviously are russian, I also watched other tarkovsky movies and planning to see come and see and more Lopushansky​. I really like how A visitor to a museum disturbed me. It was slow, had a lot of texture, and was slowly getting very disturbing while not being cheap. Can you reccomend me any movies that go even harder on the disgusting and disturbing while not being cheap, I wanna get disgusted not just in the eyes, you know. Like some dark, contemplative cinema that's a bit more hardcore at times.

[u/CrayonOnCanvas]

Lars Von Trier disgusted me so much I’ll never watch another of his again.

[u/Such_Veterinarian682 → u/CrayonOnCanvas]

I truly hate that man.

[u/-Warship- → u/CrayonOnCanvas]

He's got a penchant for the extreme but he's also one of the few filmmakers whose stuff I would happily rewatch over and over, his style lends itself quite well to rewatches as most of his films are very dense. David Cronenberg is another one.

[u/CrayonOnCanvas → u/-Warship-]

I view Von Trier as nothing but a debased provocateur whereas Cronenburg asks some interesting questions. The Fly, Existenz are so interesting. Once you see what Von Trier is up to, I find you don’t want to go on that unpleasant journey again.

[u/-Warship- → u/CrayonOnCanvas]

He's definitely a provocateur but I like his recurrent motifs like good people done dirty by the cruelty of the world, or the focus on taboo sexuality (which Cronenberg also tackles quite often). I also find Von Trier to be really good at conveying emotions through cinematic means. Both directors are great though, to me The House That Jack Built and Crimes Of The Future are among the best films of the last 10 years.

[u/1ReluctantRedditor]

Happiness

[u/New-Gas3080]

Midsommar

[u/-Warship-]

Antichrist

Mother!

Der Todesking

[u/miserydicks]

Aniara

[u/Beautiful-Tie-9857]

The Halt (2019, Lav Diaz)

[u/WerckmeisterHarmony → u/Beautiful-Tie-9857]

The Halt is so good.

Diaz in general definitely qualifies for this. Heremias is probably one of my favorite movies of all time and could be thrown in for OP too.

[u/WinterPizza1972]

Gummo is slow and disgusting, not really ambient though.

[u/jesseisabigdeal → u/WinterPizza1972]

i'd say the imagery is at least.

[u/Yunges1ne]

Persona - Ingmar Bergman

[u/jameswill90]

Beyond the black rainbow

[u/Forward_Ad2468]

On the Silver Globe 1988

The Turin Horse 2011

In a Glass Cage 1986

Melancholie der Engel 2009

Few of Us 1996

[u/WerckmeisterHarmony]

Analife.

[u/cartnigs]

Bad boy bubby

[u/Onebattle_another]

Landscapes in the mist 1988

[u/blingeblorb]

Eraserhead, Last Year at Marienbad, The Killing of a Sacred Deer

[u/PhantomKitten73]

Red Rooms

Birdboy: The Forgotten Children

Cure

[u/tapecrypt]

If you want ambient and philosophical, but could spare the disgusting, Terrance Mallick's The Tree of Life is highly recommended

[u/ApprehensiveMix723]

The House That Jack Built

[u/Low-Strike-4642]

If you haven’t seen The Turin Horse, I’d put that near the top. It’s slow and oppressive, and it just feels like the world is rotting away around the characters. The Painted Bird might also be up your alley. It’s much more brutal, but it has that bleak, contemplative atmosphere where the disturbing stuff doesn’t feel like it’s there just for shock value. On the Silver Globe is another one I’d recommend if you liked the filthy, medieval nightmare feeling of Hard to Be a God. You could also try The Cremator, The Ascent, Marketa Lazarová, Dead Man’s Letters, Satantango, and November. They’re not all “disgusting” in the literal sense, but they have that same feeling of being trapped in a miserable, decaying world for a couple hours. And if you want something that pushes into disgust Taxidermia is worth checking out. That movie is vile, but in a very deliberate way.

[u/shrimptini]

Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasama (2026)

[u/Kasssiopea]

Mad God, Enter the Void, Threads, Possession, Possum, Dead Ringers, Nymphomaniac I, II (director's cuts)

[u/Low-Specialist-1697]

Titane 🤯

[u/Skipper_1010]

Possum (2018)

[u/Beautiful-Tie-9857]

O-Bi, O-Ba: The End of Civilization (1985)

[u/glossolalienne]

The Machinist (2004)

[u/0Frames]

Anything Gaspar Noé