diff --git a/src/flake8/main/application.py b/src/flake8/main/application.py
index 0f86844..2354425 100644
--- a/src/flake8/main/application.py
+++ b/src/flake8/main/application.py
@@ -138,10 +138,7 @@ class Application(object):
         except ValueError:
             pass
 
-        opts, args = self.prelim_arg_parser.parse_known_args(args)
-        # parse_known_args includes unknown options as args
-        args = [a for a in args if not a.startswith("-")]
-        return opts, args
+        return self.prelim_arg_parser.parse_known_args(args)
 
     def exit(self):
         # type: () -> None
diff --git a/tests/unit/test_application.py b/tests/unit/test_application.py
index 15bc54d..edf853b 100644
--- a/tests/unit/test_application.py
+++ b/tests/unit/test_application.py
@@ -95,10 +95,8 @@ def test_prelim_opts_args(application):
     opts, args = application.parse_preliminary_options_and_args(
         ['--foo', '--verbose', 'src', 'setup.py', '--statistics'])
 
-    assert not hasattr(opts, 'foo')
-    assert not hasattr(opts, 'statistics')
     assert opts.verbose
-    assert args == ['src', 'setup.py']
+    assert args == ['--foo', 'src', 'setup.py', '--statistics']
 
 
 def test_prelim_opts_handles_empty(application):