This low-budget Vancouver noir creeps like a cold call in the dead of night. We follow John Collins, a corporate repo man — sorry, “skip tracer” — whose job is to hunt down debt-dodgers and repossess their goods. But as the days grind on, he starts to crack under the weight of what his job reveals about capitalism, desperation, and alienation. It’s like Taxi Driver but if Travis Bickle wore a clip-on tie and worked for a bank.
Shot in chilly greys and browns, Skip Tracer turns the antiseptic surfaces of 1970s office culture into a kind of economic horror film. You can almost feel the plastic on the couch cushions. It's a quiet existential spiral, one that Canadian cinema rarely gets credit for executing with such subtlety.
Metal Messiah (1978, dir. Tibor Takács)
And then comes Metal Messiah, the polar opposite in tone and temperature — a gonzo rock opera shot like a fever dream on the backlot of a dystopian TV station. Directed by Tibor Takács (yes, the guy who’d later make The Gate), this is a glam rock religious satire about a space-faring messiah who lands in a decadent, post-apocalyptic world where corrupt record execs and android groupies try to co-opt his soul.
Think Jesus Christ Superstar by way of Mad Max and Canadian public access television, with a side of prog-funk. The music slaps in a sleazy, Jesus-of-Montreal-meets-Bowie's-Berlin-years kind of way. It’s messy, ridiculous, and totally hypnotic — the kind of film that makes you question whether you’re watching cinema or hallucinating it.
Together:
Paired, Skip Tracer and Metal Messiah showcase a wild spectrum of late-70s Canadian cinema — from bleakly realist to outlandishly surreal. The former makes you want to quit your day job; the latter makes you want to start a space cult. And maybe that’s the point: these films both scream that modern life is unsustainable, whether you're stuck in a cubicle or onstage preaching salvation through synthesizers.
Canada never felt colder. Or cooler.
*Far as I know, both of these flicks are still only available to the general public via YouTube rips. Strike another win for the streaming generation’s preservation and proliferation of past weirdo nut creep content.
Bonus Feature:
The Pyx (1973) is absolutely a horror gem—an obscure, Canadian Gothic masterpiece that deserves more love. Here's a deeper dive into it as a cult film:
The Pyx (1973)
Director: Harvey Hart
Starring: Karen Black, Christopher Plummer
Filmed in: Montreal, Quebec
Plot Summary
A Montreal detective investigates the apparent suicide of a woman who fell to her death from a high-rise. The woman, Elizabeth Lucy (played hauntingly by Karen Black), turns out to be a heroin-addicted call girl with connections to an underground Satanic cult. As Detective Henderson (Plummer) uncovers her life in reverse, he finds the trail leads into dark religious territory.
Why It’s a Cult Classic
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Atmosphere: Bleak, snowy Montreal streets, haunting Gregorian chant-infused soundtrack, and a fog of melancholy.
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Karen Black: She sings in the film—genuinely sad, raw, and spiritual songs that feel like ghostly lullabies.
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Structure: The dual timeline (past and present unfolding simultaneously) was radical for its time.
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Occult Themes: Gnostic/Satanic undertones, not in a flashy way—more mournful and philosophical, echoing Rosemary’s Baby or Don't Look Now.
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Spiritual Decay: The horror is subtle—heroin, isolation, faith lost in urban decay.
Noteworthy Elements
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The titular “pyx” is a real religious object: a small container used to carry the Eucharist. Its presence in the film suggests twisted sacraments and corrupted faith.
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There's little gore, but the psychological and metaphysical horror runs deep.
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It's deeply Canadian in tone—quiet, cold, socially observant, and emotionally restrained.
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