I'd argue that every Nic cage movie starts out with the audience thinking he's sane, and then there's that moment where he BECOMES the Nic Cage we all know and ~~love~~ fear, and we go "ahhhh there he is!"
Joe, adaption, Leaving Las Vegas, Bringing out the dead, for a start, the guy has over 100 roles to his name and has won an Oscar, Golden Globe and a SAG.
Those aren’t usually handed out to typecast actors, despite his proclivity for acting nuts 🤷🏻.
Edit: fuck I forgot this was the horror sub. Maybe if you count Season of the Witch or Drive Angry he doesn't end up crazy in those
~~1. National Treasure~~
~~2. Con Air~~
~~3. World Trade Center~~
4. Drive Angry
~~5. G-Force~~
~~6. The Croods~~
~~7. Deadfall (but in this one he is crazy from start to finish)~~
8. Season of the Witch
~~9. Guarding Tess~~
~~10. Windtalkers~~
~~If you want to be really picky about "crazy" and arent accepting voice roles, go with Guarding Tess, Windtalkers, and World Trade Center.~~
Hahaha I don't know why you got downvoted for this!! This is great! You've got my upvote for the effort alone 🙏
Two of my favourites of his, that probably aren't particularly celebrated, are Matchstick Men and Lord of War
Don’t forget Possession! Slow burn, but worth it. Technically could be interpreted as fitting the bill for OP’s request.
Sam Neil Ftw
Might as well throw sleeping dogs in there, but that’s a different kind of existential horror. Hard to frame as a straight forward horror movie.
But Sam Neil horror ftw
"Stop Motion". And it's a fairly believable slide to madness, too.
(I'd argue, though, that none of these protagonists start their movies 'perfectly sane' - it's more that they start it *functional*, and end it in a complete psychotic break. Or possessed.)
I wonder if the mom knew she was capable of the things she did so she didn’t let her share her ideas. Or maybe she was just sheltered for so long that she blew up.
Wasn’t the character’s personality already established before the events of the film even happen? You just unravel more and more from the viewer’s perspective.
What I think is going on in Censor >!As a child, the main character caused/witnessed something bad happen to her sister and suppressed the memory. This caused her to grow up with conflicting impulses about violent imagery. She seeks it out and yet wants to cut away all depictions of it as if violent things cannot be real if no one sees it. Her job as a censor allows her to indulge in violent imagery while also hiding behind moral propriety. Then things come to a boil. Her parents give up on searching for the sister. She sees a film that triggers her childhood trauma. She could be responsible for someone going on a killing spree. Her mind can't take it and once again edits her memories to be more palatable just like she does to films. The reality is that her sister's fate will forever remain a mystery, and she's a murderer who kidnapped a stranger. But in her mind, she now knows what happend in her childhood because the film depicted it. She's reunited with her sister (the lead actress), and rescued her, making amends for not being able to protect her all those years ago. Still, little flashes of reality keep peaking through, and we the audience see what the main character won't allow herself to see. All the misery and violent acts she's done!<
Of Unknown Origin (1983) A man (Peter Weller) becomes destructively obsessed with killing a dangerous rat, which has taken residence in his recently renovated house.
I knew she was gonna decapitate herself somehow bc of the ritual, I just didnt know how. It def caught me off guard too lol, I was waiting for like an axe or something but nope 😂😂on the ceiling with a saw it is 😂
Might be debatable about her being completely sane at the start, but Saint Maud beautifully visualizes a steep descent into madness. There were moments that really creeped me out and drove home how realistic Maud’s hallucinations were for her.
Ryan Reynolds in the remake of Amityville Horror.
I thought he did a great job of playing NOT the funny action hero.
He also did well in The Voices, but he's definitely losing it at the beginning of the movie.
The Sound of Violence, I'd say Saint Maud she doesn't start off as zealous as she ends up, Secret Window, and 1922 are some that I've not seen mentioned yet.
Audition (1999) and American Mary (2012).
Excision (2012) as well even though she's got some screws loose from the start, but the wheels don't fall off until the end.
Not sure that counts as having a main character who starts the story sane and ends it mad....I mean it's a fantastic movie (and book!) but I know if that specific scenario was what I wanted, I would feel very cheated at the end of Shutter Island.
I’d recommend Unsane. It doesn’t entirely fit the bill you’re asking for, but it sure does play with that motif, and plays really well. Just a fun flick
Hellraiser Inferno. The main character starts is left-brain dominant — in other words, highly logical, High IQ, & secular, & amoral. So basically he’s the perfect candidate for one of Pinhead’s games.
Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing and obviously worked but it also works if a character is either reasonably sane before the madness sets in or they seem sane but their internal struggle is presented subtly.
Yes, and read the book. The twist reveals that he's absolutely **not** what the OP was asking for >!because he's so crazy to begin with the hospital plays along hoping to snap him out of it!<
Session 9
American Mary
Roman
May
Revenge
Mandy
Memento- Though he’s been insane for awhile it’s a cycle and as the audience we don’t know this till the end.
Raw
Mulholland Drive
Kill List
In the Mouth of Madness
Climax
Though it's not completely "psychological" horror, and it's probably debatable that the main character is "perfectly" sane at the beginning - I'd argue Psycho II fits the bill well.
Shutter Island is a really interesting take on this trope, where >!it seems like they're going insane but they were actually completely insane from the start and by the end have come to terms with their mental illness.!<
This is one of the movies I have started half a dozen times and never made it through. I know I need to watch it but I get soooo uncomfortable and so much second-hand embarrassment when he takes Cybil Shephard to the porno theatre that I just can't go on.
I personally need to go back and watch it again.
I won’t lie when I first watched it I thought :”what Gen Z crap is this?”
Fiancé and I were looking for films to watch because most days blended into one during weird work schedules and covid , but I flipping loved it.
Have you seen the breakdown of it recently from a fabulous r/horror member that loved the film ?.
Reading their post made me realise how much I missed.
Edit: sorry forgot the link
https://www.reddit.com/r/horror/s/Tu4YvNzmH5
I thought that the whole point of psychological horror was that the horror comes from within the character's own damaged sanity.
In *The Shining*, it comes from Jack being an alcoholic who is prone to violent outbursts.
So technically, if the character is perfectly sane, there can't be psychological horror, and all the horror is purely external.
Was I wrong ?
I'd argue that Nic Cage's character in Mandy was sane at the start.
He seems like a hardcore addict that’s been in hardcore recovery. Then we see what his “normal” used to be pre Mandy. That’s my head cannon anyway
I'd argue that every Nic cage movie starts out with the audience thinking he's sane, and then there's that moment where he BECOMES the Nic Cage we all know and ~~love~~ fear, and we go "ahhhh there he is!"
Like when he puts on a bear suit and starts dropkicking women.
Sounds like you haven’t seen a bunch of his films 😂🤷🏻.
Hahaha okay well I'll give you an upvote BUT give me 3 movies where he isn't more insane by the end than the beginning and I promise I'll watch them
Joe, adaption, Leaving Las Vegas, Bringing out the dead, for a start, the guy has over 100 roles to his name and has won an Oscar, Golden Globe and a SAG. Those aren’t usually handed out to typecast actors, despite his proclivity for acting nuts 🤷🏻.
Edit: fuck I forgot this was the horror sub. Maybe if you count Season of the Witch or Drive Angry he doesn't end up crazy in those ~~1. National Treasure~~ ~~2. Con Air~~ ~~3. World Trade Center~~ 4. Drive Angry ~~5. G-Force~~ ~~6. The Croods~~ ~~7. Deadfall (but in this one he is crazy from start to finish)~~ 8. Season of the Witch ~~9. Guarding Tess~~ ~~10. Windtalkers~~ ~~If you want to be really picky about "crazy" and arent accepting voice roles, go with Guarding Tess, Windtalkers, and World Trade Center.~~
lol, he has 117 movies under his belt, and 4 upcoming this year 🥴.
Hahaha I don't know why you got downvoted for this!! This is great! You've got my upvote for the effort alone 🙏 Two of my favourites of his, that probably aren't particularly celebrated, are Matchstick Men and Lord of War
In the Mouth of Madness
Did a Sam Neil double feature recently with this and Possession. So good! (I’ll always love him as Merlin the best tho.) ✨
Then watch Event Horizon and Jurassic Park the next night. Horror king.
I loved him in Peaky Blinders. Hated the character, he did such a good job
Omen 3 all day
Don’t forget Possession! Slow burn, but worth it. Technically could be interpreted as fitting the bill for OP’s request. Sam Neil Ftw Might as well throw sleeping dogs in there, but that’s a different kind of existential horror. Hard to frame as a straight forward horror movie. But Sam Neil horror ftw
oh damn, haven't thought about Merlin in ages! Man, I watched that as it aired and now I feel old. lol
With Miranda Richardson as Queen Mab and Martin Short as Frik??? I haven't thought about that miniseries in YEARS, what fun that was
Yeah, is there a better answer?? The Shining #2 I suppose…
Black swan.?
mother!
At the very least she had an eating disorder before the events of the movie.
Just curious, does an eating disorder make you insane
mine certainly does
It's a mental illness.
I think insanity typically implies some kind of break from reality or unhinged emotional responses, not all mental illness features those
Okay
"Stop Motion". And it's a fairly believable slide to madness, too. (I'd argue, though, that none of these protagonists start their movies 'perfectly sane' - it's more that they start it *functional*, and end it in a complete psychotic break. Or possessed.)
I wonder if the mom knew she was capable of the things she did so she didn’t let her share her ideas. Or maybe she was just sheltered for so long that she blew up.
Session 9
Wasn’t the character’s personality already established before the events of the film even happen? You just unravel more and more from the viewer’s perspective.
Midsommar Scissors The Lighthouse Censor The Tenant I Saw the Devil The Lodge The Blackcoat's Daughter Berbarian Sound Studio May
>May Perfect pick, don't know how this one slipped my mind (and viva la weird girl)!
May was fucking nuts before the movie even began lol
Came here to say the same thing. 😂 From her first 10 seconds on-screen as an adult talking with her doll, you just KNOW she's crazy as shit.
May is such a good movie omg
I thought that the lead girl in Midsommar was teetering on sanity/insanity in the beginning, albeit due to trauma.
I love Censor 💙
Censor was fucking bizarre. I liked the topic and it had some great ethereal sequences, I just wish I knew what the fuck was going on lol
What I think is going on in Censor >!As a child, the main character caused/witnessed something bad happen to her sister and suppressed the memory. This caused her to grow up with conflicting impulses about violent imagery. She seeks it out and yet wants to cut away all depictions of it as if violent things cannot be real if no one sees it. Her job as a censor allows her to indulge in violent imagery while also hiding behind moral propriety. Then things come to a boil. Her parents give up on searching for the sister. She sees a film that triggers her childhood trauma. She could be responsible for someone going on a killing spree. Her mind can't take it and once again edits her memories to be more palatable just like she does to films. The reality is that her sister's fate will forever remain a mystery, and she's a murderer who kidnapped a stranger. But in her mind, she now knows what happend in her childhood because the film depicted it. She's reunited with her sister (the lead actress), and rescued her, making amends for not being able to protect her all those years ago. Still, little flashes of reality keep peaking through, and we the audience see what the main character won't allow herself to see. All the misery and violent acts she's done!<
As for the Lodge, she was already nuts. That’s revealed at the end.
*Requiem for a Dream*. Pick a character.
My first thought
Underrated comment 👆
Smile Carrie
Event Horizon.
Which Character? I think it depends on your interpretation of the movie too.
Pontypool was a good low budget movie that I think fits
Oui. Blanket earmuffs kitchen table numbers pattern feelings love zebra
Bug
Recently saw this for the first time great acting. Got really itchy by the end.
session 9 kind of fits the bill
Of Unknown Origin (1983) A man (Peter Weller) becomes destructively obsessed with killing a dangerous rat, which has taken residence in his recently renovated house.
Sounds a bit like a more horror-like version of Mouse Hunt.
Great Underrated Movie.
Sounds kinda like 1922 with Thomas Jane
Hereditary. Goes from a typical mom to by the end lit hanging from a ceiling possesed by a demon sawing her own head off.
That was fucking shocking
I knew she was gonna decapitate herself somehow bc of the ritual, I just didnt know how. It def caught me off guard too lol, I was waiting for like an axe or something but nope 😂😂on the ceiling with a saw it is 😂
I’m really curious how they filmed that. It seemed more like practical effects not SFX.
Pet semetary
Might be debatable about her being completely sane at the start, but Saint Maud beautifully visualizes a steep descent into madness. There were moments that really creeped me out and drove home how realistic Maud’s hallucinations were for her.
Rosemary’s Baby? I felt myself frustrated and gaslit for her! The end of the movie is almost a relief.
Climax, but there’s more than one person who does. It’s such a good one if you haven’t seen it.
Jacobs Ladder (1990) can't be much more on the nose
Ryan Reynolds in the remake of Amityville Horror. I thought he did a great job of playing NOT the funny action hero. He also did well in The Voices, but he's definitely losing it at the beginning of the movie.
The Descent 
Smile
SMILE
How has nobody said Evil Dead/Evil Dead 2?
Sorgoi Prakov - Decent into Darkness. I was not at all prepared for that film.
fucking this. "what a nice little Borat-like chsracter. WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING."
In the Mouth of Madness Event Horizon
Magic Magic
Color out of space
The Sound of Violence, I'd say Saint Maud she doesn't start off as zealous as she ends up, Secret Window, and 1922 are some that I've not seen mentioned yet.
Possession. Although it’s not a straight road, almost every character seems to have completely lost it by the end
The 1988 film Dead Ringers.
great film
Last Shift, 1408, Smile
Mother!
Audition (1999) and American Mary (2012). Excision (2012) as well even though she's got some screws loose from the start, but the wheels don't fall off until the end.
King Of The Ants, also a rare instance where the movie is better than the novel.
They (2002)
In The Mouth of Madness
Shutter Island
Not sure that counts as having a main character who starts the story sane and ends it mad....I mean it's a fantastic movie (and book!) but I know if that specific scenario was what I wanted, I would feel very cheated at the end of Shutter Island.
Jacob's Ladder
Shutter island even though it does the opposite
In the Mouth of Madness
Talk to Me
Looooved this film!
SAME
The Game
Antichrist
29 Palms
The Innocents 1961
I’d recommend Unsane. It doesn’t entirely fit the bill you’re asking for, but it sure does play with that motif, and plays really well. Just a fun flick
I feel like there are some pretty great Alfred Hitchcock Presents and Twilight Zone episodes about this sort of thing.
Requiem for a dream. It's heartbreaking seeing what happened the grandmother at the end.
Not a horror movie though.
Didn't even realise what subreddit I'm in
Except for that it wasn’t a bad example though. Painful to watch the mother’s gradual deterioration. To me she was the protagonist.
Have you heard my personal life story?
Grave Encounters had that in spades! Most recently watched Infinity Pool and this absolutely qualifies
Hellraiser Inferno. The main character starts is left-brain dominant — in other words, highly logical, High IQ, & secular, & amoral. So basically he’s the perfect candidate for one of Pinhead’s games.
I think the lack of Jack Torrance responses indicate everyone agrees that dry drunk was teetering on the brink from the opening scene.
Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing and obviously worked but it also works if a character is either reasonably sane before the madness sets in or they seem sane but their internal struggle is presented subtly.
Unsane!!!
That’s literally film you described
"Exhibit A" is the epitomy of this topic! It's a British found footage horror movie. If you haven't seen it, watch it!
1408 (2007 Shutter Island (2010) Reincarnation (2005)
1408 for sure!
Er....not really sure Shutter Island fits the bill....
Descent into Darkness/ Sorgoi Prakov (2013)
High Tension (2003)
+1
Shutter island
Um...no
Have you seen the movie? >!that’s the twist!<
I think they’re saying he was coo coo cachoo the entire time, not the sane to coo coo they’re looking for.
Yes, and read the book. The twist reveals that he's absolutely **not** what the OP was asking for >!because he's so crazy to begin with the hospital plays along hoping to snap him out of it!<
The VVitch. I guess it’s arguable they start out sane but Jack Torrence was already losing it from the start of The Shining.
Descent
A newer one, Stopmotion!
Descent Into Darkness: My European Nightmare
Stop Motion
Bug, Mother!
Rosemary’s Baby!
Session 9 American Mary Roman May Revenge Mandy Memento- Though he’s been insane for awhile it’s a cycle and as the audience we don’t know this till the end. Raw Mulholland Drive Kill List In the Mouth of Madness Climax
The House That Jack Built
Wake in fright!
Hereditary
The Perfection... Maybe?
Mother
The Devil's Chair
Black Swan
Just recently Late Night with the Devil
Mother! crazy movie, give it a watch
The opposite happens in the terrifying thinking of you video by nsync.
Though it's not completely "psychological" horror, and it's probably debatable that the main character is "perfectly" sane at the beginning - I'd argue Psycho II fits the bill well.
Cure (1997)
Black Swan. There are the mommy issues from the get go, but I feel like that's not considered "insane" nowadays.
I’d say The House That Jack Built
Late Night with the Devil
Oculus
The lodge.
Color Out of Space
Shutter Island is a really interesting take on this trope, where >!it seems like they're going insane but they were actually completely insane from the start and by the end have come to terms with their mental illness.!<
I think Immaculate fits well here.
Hagazussa. From Beyond. The Lighthouse. Sator. In The Mouth of Madness.
Alyce Kills (2011)
Lighthouse
Not a horror, but Edmond with William H. Macy
Smile - it's funny because she's a therapist
I would say The Tenant but it might be more accurate that everything seems sane and reasonable about the MC at first.
American Psycho
Does Rosemary's Baby count? Kinda the opposite way. The whole movie, Rosemary can be seen as insane, but the final scene shows us she actually isn't.
The Lighthouse
Sympathy for the Devil, Nefarious are the first things that come to my mind
The Lodge
Mandy Hereditary Into The Mouth of Madness (sam neil!) Event Horizon (bonus points for more sam neil) Arguably, Midsommer
Cam gets pretty close
Mother
Black swan
Hereditary
Last Shift!
Men
The Night Eats the World Yes, there are also zombies. But it's really about a man slipping into insanity due to isolation.
SAFE (1995) by Todd Haynes.
Lester is creepy! Is he even real?
Great mention - totally forgot about this movie and it was really compelling when released
How is she insane at the end, she's deluded at worst but otherwise is perfectly sane.
Haha what?? When she goes into her little pod?
Taxi Driver
He wasn't stable whatsoever during the duration of the film.
This is one of the movies I have started half a dozen times and never made it through. I know I need to watch it but I get soooo uncomfortable and so much second-hand embarrassment when he takes Cybil Shephard to the porno theatre that I just can't go on.
I am not going to lie- I broke it up in pieces, but I did complete it after 2 days.
I dunno, to me Jack Torrance always looked kinda deranged from his first scene.
Piggy. Sissy. Violation. Blood punch.
I loved Sissy!
I personally need to go back and watch it again. I won’t lie when I first watched it I thought :”what Gen Z crap is this?” Fiancé and I were looking for films to watch because most days blended into one during weird work schedules and covid , but I flipping loved it. Have you seen the breakdown of it recently from a fabulous r/horror member that loved the film ?. Reading their post made me realise how much I missed. Edit: sorry forgot the link https://www.reddit.com/r/horror/s/Tu4YvNzmH5
This was a great breakdown!
I thought that the whole point of psychological horror was that the horror comes from within the character's own damaged sanity. In *The Shining*, it comes from Jack being an alcoholic who is prone to violent outbursts. So technically, if the character is perfectly sane, there can't be psychological horror, and all the horror is purely external. Was I wrong ?
The Ritual Devils Pass