At once subversive, strange, and wondrous, the world of cult cinema is a wildly popular culture that blurs genres, crosses boundaries, and defies easy categorization. So what exactly do we mean, then, by the term "cult cinema"? Cult Cinema presents the first in-depth academic examination of all aspects of the field of cult cinema, including its primary audiences, myriad genres, and the theoretical perspectives that inform a film's "cult" status. Cult Cinema addresses the well-known aspects of cult cinema -- midnight movies, exploitation films, fans of various cult sub-genres, issues of censorship, cult-film festivals, and fanzines #x13; but it also unravels many of cult cinema's deeper mysteries, tackling such issues as representations of gender, transgression, subcultures, religious cultism, music, and meta-cults (cult movies about cult movies). Topics are presented in sections that are organized thematically around issues relating to reception, aesthetics, and theories. Among the films discussed are such cult classics as The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Donnie Darko, Blade Runner, Plan 9 From Outer Space, El Topo, Eraserhead, Freaks, Casablanca, Suspiria, The Room, and many others. For cinephiles and scholars alike, Cult Cinema is the ticket to the most complete source of information about a fascinating phenomenon in the history of film.