The Mystical Movie Guide: Help

The Mystical Movie Guide is a database of information that is searchable in many ways, for movies that have interesting spiritual, psychological, or supernatural themes. Our specialty is unique movie reviews that provide film appreciation history with the deconstruction of metaphysical symbols. In 2002 our reviews yielded some detailed Film Analyses that make for great reading. In 2004 we returned to making just short reviews in the All Films List, where you can search for thousands of mystical movie titles with basic synopsis and commentary. We can provide advice on where to buy many obscure movies too. Please be aware that our reviews and information lists are personally researched and copyright protected.

Set filters to focus your search, optionally type in search terms, then hit the button for results. See below for explanations and a brief example movie entry for the 1988 romantic comedy "Vibes". But feel free to just experiment and have fun!

If your browser cannot handle the search forms (Netscape might have issues) then try this page of preset lists to see movie titles.

BUTTONS: Hit the blue button called "Show Matches From" to see matching movie titles. If the menu is set to "All Films List", you'll be searching our total list of Film Entries, otherwise you'll be searching from the smaller film "Analysis List". Choose on menu "w/synopsis" to display plot and comments. From the main page, the movie's title links to a pop-up for the basic Film Entry. From the pop-ups, the movie's title links to a fresh page for that movie (this is a good url if you want to email someone the link from the browser). There's a blue Analysis link if a Film Analysis was written (some Analyses are longer than others, look for the good ones!). To aid research, automatic links are made in the Film Entry comments for people's names and recommended similar movies. The links don't always get new information, but they can be very helpful and fun for clicking around.

FILTERS: Pull dropdown menus to filter for structured keywords and concepts, including Country, Rarity, Good rating, cinematic Genres, metaphysical Themes, type of Sort, and WhatsNew. See explanations for ratings below. You can combine Genres and Themes with Or, And, and Not. Or means any movie with this will match, Not means any with it will not match, And means the movie must have it. The presence of And will overshadow any Ors. Reviewed films have the most accurate information for filters, but the All Films List is always getting improved as well. A rare film in the All Films List will note unlocated if no English viewing copies have been found by us (the unsubtitled version may be limitedly available), and if you can help us track some down we would be most grateful!

BOXES: You can optionally refine your searches with the Search in and Year from/to. The Search in box works with the menu choice next to it, and when sensible you can also use wildcards * (more letters allowed) and ? (one more letter allowed), and booleans + for 'and' (the word must be present) and - for 'not' (the word must not be present). For example, 'Title, all words: man -god' would find titles with the word man but not the word god. Wildcards are good for including plurals or catching a name you're not sure how to spell. For example, 'Title, any words: soul? spirit*' would find titles with the words soul, souls, spirit, or spiritual. In the 'Title, chars from start' mode, commas and parentheses can choose character ranges. For example, 'Title, chars from start: (0-9)' finds movie titles that start with a numeral, and 'Title, chars from start: (a,c)' finds movies that begin with the letter a or letter c. Quotes can hold a phrase together, so that 'All Info: "heaven and hell"' would find movie entries that had the phrase "heaven and hell". Accented (foreign) characters will get treated as unaccented and shouldn't matter either way.

Vibes (1988, USA, 99 mins)
Movie Title (year of release, country, running time). Titles are listed alphabetically with the following conventions (these are sensible enough but unfortunately not standardized in movie directories).
  1. international articles for "the" and "a" come at the end (so under letter V we find "Visitors, The" and "Visiteurs, Les")
  2. numerals are retained and come first (so "12:01" comes before "Amelie")
  3. the spaces in a title make it alphabetize before non-spaces (so "Star Wars" precedes "Stargate")
  4. abbreviations are *not* treated as if spelled out (unlike some hard-to-follow lists), and most punctuation acts like it's not there with the space is closed. The goal is to make the visible letters count. An exception would be "&", which acts like the word "and" just because it would be too weird if it vanished altogether (usually it doesn't make much difference anyway). So for example, acronyms will alphabetize without the periods ("Da" comes before "D.A.R.Y.L" which acts like "DARYL", "ESP" and "E.S.P." are equivalent). Titles that may have an abbreviation could appear in two different places alphabetically depending on which spelling was most popular, so you might consider looking in both positions (the title "Dr. Strange" was usually abbreviated, so the "Dr" comes long after "Docter Mordrid", which was usually spelled out). Apostrophes also drop away, so contractions can act like little words in themselves ("I like bats" comes before "I'll Never Forget You", and next would come "Ill Wind" if there was such a title).
Many films are international, so country is mainly to imply language; a non-English speaking film will include genre "Foreign", see below. Some qualifiers, especially those that affect distribution, may appear before the running time, such as "Short" for short film (defined by the Guide as 50 minutes or less).
Yes YES
Goodness. This is our recommendation for the movie based on metaphysical merit combined with entertainment value. Mostly our guide serves to highlight good to great movies, with occasional clunkers thrown in for important commentary. We suggest that you must ultimately decide, using our descriptions and your own feelings, whether a movie is right for you and your soul to see together. Possible values are:
  • Yes YES: A MOVIE TO GET EXCITED ABOUT! Wow! This movie may not be perfect, but it's definitely on topic, and by some uniqueness and/or excellence could be considered a metaphysical entertainment classic.
  • Yes: A MOVIE TO ENJOY. This movie is solidly on topic and generally worth seeing.
  • Probably: A MOVIE TO KEEP IN MIND. This movie appears to be on topic and good for most people, but we haven't seen it yet to be sure.
  • Sometimes: A MOVIE TO CONSIDER WATCHING. This movie contains the topic if you are in the mood for the style.
  • Less Likely: A MOVIE TO HAVE HEARD OF. This movie might contain the topic and be acceptable for a limited audience, like a sometimes rating, but we haven't seen it yet to be sure.
  • Low: A MOVIE TO AVOID. This movie might appear to be on topic, but we think it has major problems that would make it unpleasant for most people.
  • reviewer likes: that's a Yes YES or Yes
  • reviewer has seen: that's a Yes YES, Yes, Sometimes, or Low
  • reviewer hasn't seen: that's a Probably or Less Likely
Common
Ease of finding. It's very helpful to have some idea of how difficult it may be to find a video. Possible values are:
  • Common: find at most good rental selections (has major stars or well known)
  • Uncommon: look for in really good rental selections (older or more obscure), if it's a short maybe find it online, or compare prices to buy on the internet
  • Rare: you'll be lucky to rent or buy, but maybe you can locate a collector's copy, or catch someday on cable or at a film festival. Lobby if you can for a wider distribution rerelease and/or more rental stores to request this title! Additionally, a rare film in the Master Ref will note unlocated if no English viewing copies have been found by us (the unsubtitled version may be limitedly available), and if you can help us track some down then we would be most grateful!
Comedy, Romance
Genres. These are fairly well-recognized categories for the stylistic and emotional content of movies. Any one movie can fall into more than one category. You may have to make a translation from our genres to those of your favorite movie store. Possible values are:
  • Animation: characters are drawn, computer generated, or made with puppetry
  • Anthology: a collection of stories, often connected by a thread story
  • Biographical: dramatic recreation based on or inspired by true events, uses actors
  • Camp/Cult: makes fun of itself or its genre using absurdity, exploitation, satire, or just plain weirdness
  • Children: suitable for children or youths, but remember that a good children's film is also for adults (ie. timeless)
  • Comedy: humor based, tries to make you laugh for entertainment value or social commentary
  • Drama: dramatically based, often analyzing relationships between characters and responses to situations
  • Documentary: reality footage often with interviews, an informative record of a place, person, or idea
  • Experimental: based on developing an artistic or creative concept, often self-conscious and non-commercial, not what most people would call entertaining
  • Fantasy/Sci-Fi: speculative imagination based, often using myth or science to extend a contemporary commentary
  • Foreign: mostly in a non-English language and/or culture, hopefully available subtitled
  • Horror: monstrous or nightmarish elements evoking fright or horror, often but not always gory
  • Musical: contains singing, not necessarily broadway style
  • Mystery/Thriller: solving a mystery or crime, usually featuring action or suspense
  • Romance: romantic love based, often depicting affection, sex, and happy endings
  • Series-related: connected with a series of films, either a TV series (possibly short-lived) or multiple theatre sequels. Bigger than just a one-shot miniseries or having one sequel.
  • Short: non-feature film length. The industry tends to call a short 60 minutes or less, but we define short as maximum 50 minutes so as to not capture so many older shorter feature films. One hour TV shows thus may or may not come up as short, depending on the commercials. The "Short" keyword is seen next to the running length in the film listing.
Comedy, Romance: An unlikely pair of psychics become soulmate adventurers when they are manipulated by bad guys to find a lost power pyramid in the Andes mountains.
Plot. A plot description follows the genre categories. If the description is detailed, a one-sentence summary comes first within asterisks - read only this if you don't want to know more. Notes like original foreign title or sequel titles will come last in parentheses.
Altered States, Higher Friends, Journeying, NDE/OBE, Negativity, Powers of Spirit, Soulmates
Themes. These are fairly well-recognized metaphysical phenomenona that we have arranged in overlapping categories so you can search for films that show these events. Any one story will combine more than one theme, so we will try to list all the major themes in each film and then you can search for combinations. The assigning of themes is open to some debate, especially if we haven't seen the movie yet. But the way themes combine will give you a sort of story fingerprint, for what metaphysical questions are being addressed in the movie and how. Possible values are:
  • Afterlife: what happens after death. depictions of heaven, purgatory, hell
  • Altered States: trances, meditation, entheogens, shamanism, channeling, mediumship
  • Artificial life: robots, created creatures
  • Contact: first communication experiences, contacts across worlds
  • Creativity: creative genius, sense appreciation, imagination
  • Dreaming: dreams and visions, glimpses into other worlds
  • Evolution: significant change of the invidual/society/species/eco-system. Symbiosis, utopian societies, major enlightenments, group destinies, human potentials. For more personal scale, see Healing/Growth.
  • Extraterrestrials: aliens, sentient nonhumans, unearthly creatures
  • God and Soul: images for highest benevolent power, personal creator, divine perfection
  • Growth/Healing: personal growth, progress in self-awareness, healing reconciliations, inspiring recoveries, individual life reviews, personal destinies. For larger scales see Evolution, for psychotherapy see Mind.
  • Higher Friends: saints, angels, guides, good aliens
  • Illness: bodily or psychic dysfunction, nightmares, hallucinations, schizophrenia, mental illnesses. For recoveries from, see Healing/Growth.
  • Immortality: the pursuit of living forever, life extension, literal resurrection, cheating death, continuing the same lifetime; sort of the opposite of an afterlife, and usually problematic
  • Incarnations: multiple identity issues including alter egos, reincarnation, past/future/parallel lives or selves, inner child/adolescent/elder, etc.
  • Innocence: noble savages, child minds, human innocence
  • Journeying: mythic journeys, exploration cycles, tours of otherworlds/underworlds/overworlds
  • Masculine/Feminine: gender issues, androgyny, anima/animus, god/goddess
  • Mind: consciousness, intelligence, reasoning, psychotherapy, archetypes of the psyche
  • Myth/Religion: religious structures and lifestyles, rituals, traditions, superheros, superstitions, god heirarchies
  • Nature: natural beauty, science studies, gaia and holism theories
  • NDE/OBE: Near-Death Experience, Out-of-Body Experience. Astral travel, realistic spirit body journeys
  • Negativity: monsters, negative ego, bad aliens, bad spirits, hauntings, devils, evil
  • Powers of Spirit: siddhis, spirit abilities, psychic powers such as telepathy, telekenesis, clairvoyance, precognition (often with dreaming), levitation (often with nde/obe)
  • Reality: how reality is constructed
  • Relationships: spiritual depths of relationship, emotions with others and self
  • Soulmates: destined partnerships
  • Space-travel: vehicles and methods for interspace travel
  • Spirits: realistic astral visitors, ghosts (that aren't just evil), spirit contact
  • Synchronicities: magical reality coordinations, evidence of higher powers
  • Time-travel: time travelling/communicating and consequences of
  • Transformations: morphing, shapeshifting, supernatural personal changes including shrinking/expanding, sprouting wings, becoming invisible, changing gender, becoming animals, changing age and appearance
Altered States, Higher Friends, Journeying, NDE/OBE, Negativity, Powers of Spirit, Soulmates: Indiana Jones for spiritualists, amazing! It's so refreshing to see a story where it is just natural for characters to use mediumship, astral travel, psychometry, and more to solve what is otherwise just another harmless Hollywood archeology adventure flick. There are even inside jokes, like a charicature of famous psychic Ingo Swann.
Comments. We give our opinions on major symbolism and spiritual purposes for the film.
dir. Ken Kwapis; writers Deborah Blum, Lowell Ganz, Babaloo Mandel; actors Cyndi Lauper, Jeff Goldblum, Julian Sands, Peter Falk
Directors, writers, and primary actors. So you can search for names and notice relationships between creative staffs. Details like "See website www.site.com" will come last.

Enjoy The Mystical Movie Guide!



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Copyright 2002 Carl J. Schroeder