10 Greatest Exploitation Movies of All Time, Ranked

1 week ago 14

Published Jan 26, 2026, 5:20 PM EST

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A good definition of the term “exploitation film” is: “a film designed by its producers to ‘exploit’, via clever marketing and promotion, the notoriety of certain sensational current events and trends.” But there is a bit more to it beyond that, because exploitation movies often have intense or otherwise shocking content done to highlight the sensational stuff further, usually of a violent or sexual nature. Sometimes, it does a bit of both.

They're boundary-pushing movies, but not always in a very classy way. Filmmakers with big budgets can push cinema forward in terms of spectacle, and that’s nice and all, but if you’ve got a little less money to work with, then you can surprise people with something down-and-dirty, nasty, and unapologetically shocking. Certain exploitation movies are also quite bad (see The Human Centipede and arguably I Spit on Your Grave), but if you're after exploitation films that are actually good, or with some level of artistic merit, at the very least, then the following titles might be worth checking out.

10 'Dirty Mary Crazy Larry' (1974)

Fitting for a movie where people are basically driving the whole time, Dirty Mary Crazy Larry moves at a fast pace and seldom runs the risk of ever getting boring. Two guys steal a car, and then a woman tags along with them as they try to make their getaway, and then the whole thing becomes a road/chase movie that’s also something of a comedy.

As far as exploitation movies go, it’s one of the milder ones, to the point where some might not consider it definitively part of the genre/movement, but there’s just enough by way of B-grade thrills here to make it qualify. Dirty Mary Crazy Larry is also pretty unapologetic about how weird and unexpected it’s willing to get, with the way it chooses to conclude being especially gutsy and hard not to admire at least a little bit.

9 'Guinea Pig: Mermaid in the Manhole' (1988)

The Guinea Pig series is notorious for being gruesome and made up of a whole bunch of mortifying films that highlight body horror over anything else, all the while existing in an odd no man’s land between short films and feature-length movies. Guinea Pig: Mermaid in the Manhole is one of the longer ones, at just under an hour, and it’s also maybe the best of the bunch? Or at least it’s got a bit more by way of artistic value.

It’s not a tearjerker in the traditional sense, and it’s still gross, but Guinea Pig: Mermaid in the Manhole has a bit more to offer than just bloodshed and gruesome special effects.

It’s still focused on being gory and unpleasant, but there’s also a sadness to this one, involving a grieving artist finding – and trying to paint – a mermaid who’s dying and falling apart, quite literally. It’s not a tearjerker in the traditional sense, and it’s still gross, but Guinea Pig: Mermaid in the Manhole has a bit more to offer than just bloodshed and gruesome special effects. There’s still a lot by way of those things, but there’s also more, and that makes it honestly kind of good.

8 'Pink Flamingos' (1972)

Divine aiming a gun at something off-camera in Pink Flamingos.

Intentionally one of the most sickening movies of its time, and maybe even of all time, Pink Flamingos has a reputation that precedes it, since you probably know it as the movie where the person consumes [REDACTED], and there’s also a scene with a chicken where [REDACTED], and then that part when one character [REDACTED] with another. Don’t watch that part if you don’t want to see [REDACTED] on top of a [REDACTED]. Also, [REDACTED].

The lack of taste is the point. With Pink Flamingos, John Waters seemed keen to work out what he could get away with, and as it turned out, it was quite a lot. There are things in Pink Flamingos that, once seen, cannot be unseen, and so for a movie this old to still be this shocking… it’s honestly pretty impressive.

7 'The Boxer's Omen' (1983)

If you think you’ve seen it all when it comes to sports movies, but you’ve not experienced The Boxer’s Omen, then maybe you haven’t. Truth be told, it’s more of a martial arts/horror film than it is a sports one in anything even slightly close to the traditional sense, but there’s still a quest for revenge here (common ground for martial arts movies) that’s tied to a boxer dying in the ring.

That quest for revenge gets dark fast, and there’s a good deal of fantastical elements and intensely gruesome imagery to be found throughout The Boxer’s Omen, too. Even compared to other exploitation movies of its era (the golden age of exploitation cinema, really), The Boxer’s Omen is truly quite nasty, and it’s best avoided if you get queasy when you see gross-out and/or very violent imagery on screen.

6 'Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion' (1972)

It might not quite be a traditional martial arts movie, but Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion sort of scratches that itch, albeit with quite a bit more sleaze than most martial arts movies (well, except for the aforementioned The Boxer’s Omen). It’s about a woman who’s betrayed and sent to a horrible prison that’s filled with abuse and very rough prisoners, so she has to try and survive the environment while working out how to escape and get revenge on those who wronged her.

The whole thing is simple, and it would be almost juvenile if it weren’t also very extreme with its content, and therefore very much not for actual juveniles. Still, Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion is kind of really good. It has a bit more to it that makes it feel up there among the better exploitation movies of its time; one that almost rises above the label of “exploitation cinema,” really. It had several sequels, too, but those ones weren’t quite as good.

5 'Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril' (1972)

Lone Wolf and Cub- Baby Cart in Peril still

Speaking of movies with sequels, Lone Wolf and Cub was a series that had six entries that came out between 1972 and 1974, comprising the main series overall. They're the ones that matter, in other words, and as samurai films, they're all incredibly satisfying. Picking one out as the best is hard, but it could be the fourth, Baby Cart in Peril, just because it’s particularly relentless with all the action and bloodshed that’s indeed still very much present in the other movies.

If it’s not the best, then Baby Cart in Peril is probably the movie in the series that most fits the exploitation label, and so that’s the main reason for putting it here. There’s quite a bit of raciness here alongside all the violence, and it just delivers all the stuff you'd expect to see in a film like this with an especially ruthless attitude toward anything that could be considered filler, or not exciting enough. It’s just 81 minutes long, and all 81 of those minutes are a blast to watch.

4 'Revenge' (2017)

A woman in the desert aiming a gun in Revenge

Before she directed The Substance, Coralie Fargeat directed Revenge, which is probably even nastier and more in line with classic exploitation/grindhouse sensibilities than the also gonzo The Substance. Both are gory, but the violence in Revenge is more visceral, since even though it’s heightened, everything does look painful, and the story is small-scale and personal enough that you can buy into much of what happens.

Granted, of the small number of characters here, there’s only one – the protagonist – who doesn’t deserve the painful things that happen to them, but the suffering on screen is still squirm-inducing at times, even when happening to people who had it coming. You know, the subjects of the titular revenge. As long as you’ve got a decently strong stomach, Revenge is a must-watch, and probably the best exploitation (or exploitation-adjacent) release of the last decade.

3 'Death Race 2000' (1975)

A woman and a man inside a racing car weaing helmets in Death Race 2000 - 1975

With its title, poster, and premise, Death Race 2000 looks like it’s probably going to be just another B-movie, at least on the surface, but there’s more under the hood and all, so to speak. It’s about a bunch of unusual people taking part in an unusual event; one that involves a high-stakes cross-country race where participants can score points by running down pedestrians.

It’s like Grand Theft Auto before that video game series was a thing, and it’s also got that dystopian competition angle that’s been popular a little more recently, with Battle Royale and The Hunger Games. But there’s also more comedy (or maybe dark satire) here than you might expect, with the whole thing not taking itself ultra seriously, though still having things to say about society and how people are drawn to violence. And some other things. Main thing is, it’s all better than you might expect.

2 'Grindhouse' (2007)

Some might want to disqualify Grindhouse from appearing in a ranking like this, because it’s more of a homage to exploitation cinema than a true exploitation movie, but also, it’s a good enough homage to function as both. It’s also not outright a parody, even if there is some humor here alongside all the gore, bluntly told stories, simple characters, and undeniable chaos.

Also, it’s a double feature, so it has a particularly large amount of stuff to offer. The first film, Planet Terror, is a relentless and very over-the-top zombie film (of sorts), and then Death Proof slows things down, apart from the moments when it wants to shock you, and those moments – though infrequent – are impactful. Both films homage and gently make fun of different kinds of exploitation films, as do the fake trailers featured here (with some of those trailers actually becoming full-on movies some years later, like Hobo with a Shotgun, Machete, and Thanksgiving).

1 'Cannibal Holocaust' (1980)

Luca Barbareschi and Perry Pirkanen as Mark Tomaso and Jack Anders, standing in the woods and recording on a video camera in Cannibal Holocaust

Cannibal Holocaust is even more notorious than the aforementioned Pink Flamingos. That one is made ever so slightly less shocking because it’s intended to be a comedy (of sorts), while Cannibal Holocaust is focused on being a horror film. It’s an infamously heavy and challenging one, owing to how violent it gets, and also because of how some of the violent content here (the stuff involving animals) wasn’t staged.

There’s so much here that’s all a bit much, to put it mildly, but then again, it is an exploitation movie and stuff. Also, Cannibal Holocaust has a good deal it wants to say, social commentary-wise, and it was also ahead of its time as an early found footage horror movie, too. It’s hard to like this movie 100%, but for what it does right, and for how uncompromising it was, there’s ultimately a whole lot here to respect and be impressed by, so long as you're not even just a little bit squeamish.