10 Great Midnight Movies You Need To Watch

10. Freaks

Due to 1930s legendary release Freaks' startling premise centred around a group of real life carnival acts, it was deemed at the time to be too controversial for audiences and was soon banned in a number of countries across the world for a good old time.

Partly thanks to the censorship laws of 1932, when it was initially slated for release it also saw over-zealous edits cut out of it too. The film was cut from a 90 minute runtime to around 70 minutes. Most of the cut scenes were later sadly lost, never to be seen again.

Unsurprisingly, critics and audiences savaged Freaks upon its release and not only did it lose a lot of money, but it was also then banned in countries such as England for more than 30 years. Most tragic however, was the fate of its director Browning; a one time respected filmmaker whose career after the film's release was never the same again.

The film and its subject were clearly ahead of its time. It wasn’t until the mid-70s that it started to gain cult status thanks to midnight screenings of the movie across America. It is now thankfully considered to be a classic, though it’s a shame that Browning could never enjoy its belated success.