10 Psychological Thrillers That Totally Messed With Your Head

Very often when we think of the Coen Brothers and their tendencies toward outlandish and quasi-surreal content, this tends to be utilised to comedic effect, as on such beloved films as The Hudsucker Proxy and The Big Lebowski.

However, the Coens are equally adept at taking such an approach for a considerably more sinister effect, as demonstrated by this dark and disturbing 1991 film which won them the Palmes D'Or at that year's Cannes Film Festival, as well as the Best Director award and Best Actor for John Turturro.

Set in 1941, Barton Fink casts Turturro in the title role as an ambitious, high-minded New York playwright who moves out to Hollywood to take on screenwriting work, only to find himself assigned a low-brow wrestling film.

Fink's struggles to get to grips with the material, plus the awkward relationship that builds between himself and his boorish neighbour (a brilliant, and at times uncharacteristically scary John Goodman), leads him into a downward spiral of madness.