Movies that are under rated.....
 

What movies do you guys think were really under-rated?
I want to get opinions on "different" movies, ones that were not that popular but were good.

My under-rated movie is Sleepers(1997).
If you like the movie, the book is even better!

Thanks guys!

O Brother, Where Art Thou?, while reasonably commercially successful, was never highly popular (but it's soundtrack sure was)...at least not among most of the people I've talked to. The Apostle didn't make much dough, I don't think, but I thought it was excellent. Ditto for Rounders. Cabin Boy is sort of a cult favorite around our house...very funny movie, but I think it only took in $2-3 million domestically.

Second O Brother, Where Art Thou?, very funny movie.

Unbreakable is another one. Some people just don't like it.

Instinct.

Great acting, great writing. Too bad most people didn't understand the main message of the movie.

I second The Apostle. It's a shame so many people didn't see it.

Mind explaining the main message of Instinct, firegod? I thought it stunk. Enlighten me.

My choice is A.I., one of the most haunting, profoundly disturbing movies I can think of, and one that has been roundly ignored by the general public, who usually embrace Spielberg's work with open arms. I sincerely believe that, along with 2001, A.I. is the greatest sci-fi film ever made, and one of the most provacative, fascinating, and emotionally resonant movies ever made.

...To be honest, I haven't met a single person that didn't enjoy O Brother Where Art Thou?

There is an existing thread that asked for underrated movies, actors and actresses. It can be found HERE.

As for some of my very favorite movies that are underrated critically as well as in a broader popular sense, here are ten I love unabashedly...

After Hours (1985 - Marty Scorsese)
Quick Change (1990 - Franklin & Murray)
Joe versus the Volcano (1990 - John Patrick Shanley)
Pennies From Heaven (1981 - Herbert Ross)
White Hunter, Black Heart (1990 - Clint Eastwood)
Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974 - Sam Peckinpah)
The Life & Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972 - John Huston)
Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas (1998 - Terry Gilliam)
The Long Goodbye (1973 - Robert Altman)
They All Laughed (1981 - Peter Bogdanovich)

I've met some that just went, that movie is stupid. So they're not very bright, but...

Hackers
Most Kung fu films
The Musketeer
The Mask of Zorro

I agree with Mecurdius... pretty much anything that comes out of HK is ignored by most 'critics'...

Joe vs. the Volcano is a great choice.

How about GO. I had never heard a lot about it until it came out on video and was pretty impressed.

Doug Liman's Go (1999) got generally good reviews, just nobody went to see it in the theater for some reason. It came out in April and very quietly only made about $4-million its opening weekend. It wound up with close to $17-million domestically, which did manage to more than cover its budget (around $7-million).

It wasn't underrated really, it was just terribly underseen. When I saw it opening day there were only three or four other people in the entire theater. But at least it found its audience on video.

Amen Holden. I haven't seen Pennies from Heaven or They All Laughed, but your other choices are spot-on. They're all criminally underrated movies.

I'd have to say:

Raising Arizona
Pi
The Kids in the Hall : Brain Candy
Hard Eight
Man on the Moon
Bad Taste
and of course, hence my sig...Say Anything

I could go and on and on...but I won't.

I agree somewhat...though I think it's getting more of the respect it deserved. I think it was something like 34th on the AFI Top 100 Funniest Movies of All Time list...which is a pretty big deal, IMO.

Yeah but it still one of those movies people don't know a lot of the time. Plus, most people don't understand the Coen Brothers' genius.

I'd certainly agree with that. :) Some of the gags are blatant...but what really blows my mind is that they seem to run alongside some incredibly subtle jokes. I dig it...I get a weird kick out of laughing at something that wouldn't really be funny on paper, or told as a joke.

Movies That Are Underrated
 

Pups - I don't kow of many people that have seen this film, but it is very cool.

Dawn Of The Dead - This is the best out of the great horror series. (Of course, I haven't seen Day Of The Dead yet)

A Man Called Hero - This is truly a HK epic. Full of action, comedy & romance.
Deffinetly, THE ONE... until Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon knocked it off the throne.

A man called hero was complete and udder sh|t it wasnt underrated... it just sucked.

Memento , Falling Down.

Man on the Moon - I personally think that Andy Kaufman(if the movie is accurate) is a comedic genius; his stuff is so much more creative than standard stand-up, too bad people are easily offended.

Unbreakable - It came out too close to Sixth Sense and relied too much on the success of Sixth Sense for its marketing. If you look at the movie objectively/independently and not in relation to Sixth Sense, it will be a much better movie. I particularly enjoyed the use of color, the dark atmosphere, and the use of music to convey mood. The cinemography during the weight lifting was also creative.

I disagree, I think too many people were expecting a Sixth Sense repeat and were dissapointed.

It didn't rely on anything and I don't think M. Night really wanted it to. Is Signs going to rely on Unbreakable?

Hackers? Good lord, I hated that movie. =)

My favorite underrated movie? In and Out. Kevin Kline is hysterical.

Hackers is a great movie. Anyone that knows anything about a computer would enjoy it. :) Plus, you get to see Angelina Jolie..:D

I know a lot of Jack about computers, and I still liked it. It's one of those guilty pleasures, I think.

Here's a couple I've just watched lately that I consider to be very underrated.


"Soldier Blue"
Directed by Ralph Nelson
starring Candice Bergen, Peter Strauss and Donald Pleasence

Hell is for Heroes
Directed by Don Siegel
starring Bobby Darin, Fess Parker, Harry Guardino, James Coburn, Mike Kellin, Joseph Hoover, Bill Mullikin and L.Q. Jones

The Black Bird
Directed by David Giler
starring George Segal, Stéphane Audran and Lionel Stander

Alien³
Directed by David Fincher
starring Sigourney Weaver, Charles Dutton, Charles Dance, Paul McGann, Brian Glover, Ralph Brown, Daniel Webb, Holt McCallany, Lance Henriksen, Vincenzo Nicoli and Pete Postlethwaite

Battle Circus
Directed by Richard Brooks
Humphrey Bogart, June Allyson and Keenan Wynn

Moulin Rouge is another underrated. I hear too many people say, "I didn't like it cause it was a musical".

They were afraid that it would get a negative response if they told everyone it would be a musical. Personally, if you can't handle a different flavor now and then, you don't deserve to judge what others like.

Honestly, I didn't like Moulin Rouge because of how it was directed. I actually like musicals (I may be one of the few straight men who will say that out loud....Uh, I like FOOTBALL too....Yeah, football!:D ).

Underrated movies:

The Cable Guy
Popeye
Man on the Moon
People Vs. Larry Flint

:laugh: Well you're not alone. Personally, I don't mind a good musical (was in one in high school, playing a football player) and some don't really bother me. I was in choir all four years of high school as well as our select group (we got to wear tuxes :D ), and so I liked the music in Moulin Rouge, as well as the acting. As far as how it was directed, have you ever been in a musical? All the things you have to go through and all that stuff when doing a musical is fast-paced and hectic. So I really didn't mind all the fast actions and all that stuff.

I was going to say all your choices are really dull, but to be honest - they ARE COMPLETE ****$HTRHTIREHT
Here are some better films that should have done better:
The Sword in The Stone
Bad Taste
Bedknobs+Broomsticks
Taxi 1+2
Labyrinth
Journey to the Far Side of the Sun
Sphere
Snake in Eagle's Shadow
Brotherhood of the Wolf
Theatre of Blood
well my sister has pissed me off - so ignore that list, she was adding to it - and that's why it's blah

Yeah, I would consider this one underrated. List wasn't total Blah.

One of the best movies out there that a lot of people have never heard of:
Heavenly Creatures – Peter Jackson – 1994

Mystery Men - so funny, but I think a lot of people have the impression that it's a kids' movie.

Damn straight. I can't believe that movie was anything less than a huge hit. I laughed my a** off. Great concept, and well executed.

It was thought of as a kids movie?

I liked it too.:)

One movie that didn't do too well at the box office but I absolutely loved was Galaxy Quest.

This movie has some funny moments, but overall, I'd say it could've been a little better. Sigourney Weaver did look good in it though. :D

I agree--Galaxy Quest was pretty funny.

About four years ago I saw Imposters written by and starring Stanley Tucci, about stowaways on a cruise ship in the 40's, who try to hide from the ship's steward, and end up discovering a terrorist plot to blow up the ship. It's terrificly funny. A little Vaudevillian slap-sticky and very silly.

Also by Tucci was The Big Night with Tuccy again, Minni Driver, Tony Shaloub and Isabella Rossellini, about an Italian Restaurant which is about to go out of business, but they prepare a private party for Louis Prima as one last attempt to save the restaurant. Really funny, with a great final scene with Tucci and Shaloub, and they are completely silent. Surprisingly compelling.

I loved that movie. You're right...a lot of people have never even heard of it. I thought Tucci was adorable. I first started liking him, when he was on that T.V. show, Murder One.

Some people I talked to were just annoyed by the movie, though, but I loved it. I think I'll do a Stanley Tucci block today!

im probably gonna get reamed for this, but I think Ishtar was underrated. I thought it was a quirky little movie. It definately wasnt as bad as everyone made it out to be.

I liked the end...when they danced through the set...that was classic.:D

Oh--yeah! It's the kind of thing you replay.

What's that woman's name that was in it? She was also in High Fidelity?

Lily Taylor?--I didnt' see High Fidelity

Indeed, 'twas Lili Taylor, who played Sarah in High Fidelity, which I haven't seen, either.

Lily Taylor...yeah. That's her. I like her. My mom said she's been around awhile...making movies since the early 80's. I looked her up on IMDb and I was surprised at all she had done:

Mystic Pizza
Say Anything
Rudy
Short Cuts
Mrs. Parker & the Vicious Circle
Pret-a-Porter
Four Rooms
I Shot Andy Warhol
The Imposters
Pecker
The Haunting
High Fidelity

And those are just the ones I saw...:)

Tucci also directed The Impostors and co-directed Big Night (with actor Campbell Scott, who appears in both films). Tucci's next directorial effort was a different flavor than those comedies, Joe Gould's Secret (2000), a good re-telling of that rather famous New York story. I thought Ian Holm had a real shot at an Oscar nomination for his performance as Gould, but I guess not enough Academy members saw the flick. Their loss.

Tucci is three for three behind the lens, and his movies are modestly enough budgeted and do so well critically that he can continue to find independent financing, so I'm sure they'll be more from him in the future.

I loved Big Night. It made me flat-out feel good. Very amusing, too, I thought. Tucci's under-rated, IMO. I never saw all of The Impostors, but I'm going to soon enough...what I did see of it was hilarious.

Oh yeah!! The Haunting!!! That's where else I saw her! But I don't remember her in Pret-a-Porter--who was she?

I agree with a lot of what's been mentioned so far, especially Mystery Men and Galaxy Quest.

A few more:

Cannibal! The Musical - hysterically funny stuff from the South Park gods Trey Parker and Matt Stone. If you watch the DVD, you must also watch it with the drunken commentary track :laugh: .

Psycho Beach Party - great spoof of fifties teen slasher-surf movies.

61* - I don't really like baseball movies, but this one was interesting and well done, v. v. good. I didn't think Billy Crystal had it in him.

Heathers - One of the best movies to come out of the late eighties.

Strictly Ballroom - Baz Luhrmann's (of aforementioned Moulin Rouge! fame) first movie--kooky and crazy, lots of fun, but virtually no one has seen it here in the U.S. of A. If you didn't like Moulin Rouge!, you might like this one.

Waiting for Guffman - Aside from Spinal Tap, the best mockumentary ever made, and one of my ten favorites of all time. Honorable mention goes to Drop Dead Gorgeous and (not quite mockumentary, but really great) American Movie.

What are you waiting for? Go rent these gems! Go! :D

I Know I'm Gonna Go,
Mary Lo

Yup--Lili's great. Aside from all the movies Sades listed, she was also in the most excellent (and underrated, so still on topic) Dogfight, with River Phoenix. That was the first movie of hers I ever saw. You should check it out, Sades and all other Lili fans :) .

Mary Lo

Hell Yes! Heathers is an all time favorite of mine, I want to squeeze you and invite you to a slumber party! We'll eat Ho-Ho's and Popcorn! :p

Strictly Ballroom is another fav...one of the best love stories.

Nices reccomendations Mary Lo. Indeed.
**I'll check out Dogfight; for River as much as for Lili.:yup:

I'm always up for Hostess products, Sades--you can eat my share of the popcorn! :D

Another underrated movie:

American Psycho.

Did anyone mention Cabin Boy in this thread? I've watched it a dozen times at least.
"Would you like to buy a monkey?":laugh: :laugh:

Dinner Rush.

Saw this last night despite its criminally small release in this country. Very enjoyable. Dont really know why this hasnt been picked up on. Apart from the lack of high profile actors anyway.

:eek: First time I watched that movie I was like...well...:eek:

I put it out of my mind and was going along fine, then I was over at my sister's one night and their watching it. So I sat down and gave it another try, I have to say that it's a creepy a*s movie, but it's not the typical run of the mill creepy a*s movie. :D

An understatement :) . It's a creepy, funny, brutal, intelligent satire, and the satiric nature was lost on most viewers, who were so pissed that they didn't know for sure if the things Patrick Bateman did were real (and not his imagination) that they automatically condemned it.

:D Sorry about my little rant. I just think it was a very good movie that got a bad rap. Or rep. Both.

Mary Lo

Isn't that the movie where the guys compare their business cards and try to outdo each other with paper quality and embossing, etc.? So funny!!!:laugh:

Kingpin is severely, severely underrated.

Yes! That scene is great--so absurd, so painfully shallow. My favorite parts are when Bateman philosophizes about the 80's pop bands, especially Genesis and Huey Lewis and the News.

"I think Invisible Touch was the group's undisputed masterpiece. It's an epic meditation on intangibility. At the same time, it deepens and enriches the meaning of the preceding three albums."

"In Too Deep is the most moving pop song of the 1980s, about monogamy and commitment. The song is extremely uplifting. Their lyrics are as positive and affirmative as anything I've heard in rock."

All delivered in Christian Bale's dead-on slickster voice in situations that are otherwise tense and disturbing. Brilliant! :laugh:

Mary Loquacious, I really like your taste in movies.

Christian Bale's performance in American Psycho is one of the best performances in the last 10 years and he didn't win a single award for it. Shame! I can't believe people dismissed this for its ending. I guarantee you that the film's conclusion was a lot more satisfying than the book's which hardly ended at all.

In fact, I rate American Psycho as the best adaptation of a source material ever filmed. Usually Hollywood messes it up. But in this case they definitely improved on the source.

Does anyone agree with me that only a woman could have directed this film as well as it was directed? A man would have made the violence much too sickly. Harron left the violence in the audience's minds more than on the film and it worked. Thumbs up to Mary Harron. Hope she does more in the future.

Loved that movie! I don't know why...it's an odd movie to love. It sure was smart, wasn't it? Speaking of Hostess products, who likes Snowballs?

Anyhoo...
I think I liked the part when he was listening to music and talking about his taste in music...
Christian Bale has come a long way from Swing Kids...I wonder what he was doing that whole time, and what he's doing now.

Right back at ya :D .

Yes! I have been telling people this ever since the movie came out. The book... well, it was good, but it got lost in the gore--Ellis got too caught up in it--so the satire in the book got almost lost in the shuffle. People weren't getting it. The film corrects that problem, and does it well, allowing the satire to come out in the forefront. It's definitely a better telling of the story, and I agree, it's one of the very few cases where Hollywood got it right :) . Not the least because of Harron, whose I Shot Andy Warhol was great, too, and Bale. He's a chameleon. And hey, he did get at least one award: Fangoria named him their best actor. Small consolation, I know... and yes, I do read Fangoria. Stop looking at me like that.

About the female director thing... It's an interesting theory, one I hadn't thought of. I know she co-wrote the screenplay with Guinevere Turner (who also wrote Go Fish), so there's two women adapting the novel, as well as a female director... You know, I think you're right. Not that violence is limited to the male perspective, but so much of it in the novel was a macho thing on Bateman's part. It's much more interesting to not know every graphic detail--but did you notice, near the end when the secretary finds his sketchbook, that some of the pictures show killings that were in the novel and not the film? That was a nice touch, a subtle one, that maybe only a female director would've thought of as an alternative to buckets o' blood onscreen...

Whew. That was a long one. :babbling:

I thought American Psycho was a very good, very funny comedy when I first saw it.

I second Kingpin.

I nominate Vanilla Sky to this thread. The second best movie of last year is hated, hated, hated by everyone.

the book was so much better (American Psycho)

Hiss. Boo.

It was a good book, I can't deny that... but it's a better movie.

I'd have to say Memento. I thuroughly enjoyed that movie. I love mind benders, and this one twisted my brain into a knot.
Half the people I saw it with hated it because they couldn't follow it. "Why is it backwards?" :confused:
It didn't play down to the IQ threshold of a 14 year old movie rat, so I think it lost a big chunk of the movie-going-population.

*remembers dreamily... * Kind of reminds me of Jacob's Ladder...

-GTB

Me too. We call them 'puzzle movies' in our family. Cube is another one. I can't think of any others off-hand besides Memento, which you mentioned.

I really enjoyed Cube, but I have a hard time reccommending it to people because it gets so crazy towards the end. If you broke the movie into three acts...act one and two are excellent; act three is the weakest part of the movie, save the last two minutes.

I'll have to give it a long overdue second watching, and see if I see what you mean.

I was particularly annoyed with the pissed-off social-worker-type lady.

Yeah...I agree, she's was just as over-the-top as the guy I disliked.

Cube is a movie people have been telling me to see for a few years now, and I just never got around to it.

I thought that Nurse Betty was a great movie--it got good reviews, too, but many people haven't seen it, or Neil LaBute's first film, In the Company of Men. That one is just brutal, mesmerizing. Good stuff.

Mary Lo

I thought The Iron Giant was a great movie. It's a really good story about trust and friendship. It's too bad, I think that peole avoided it because it was a cartoon. Definately underrated.

-GTB

I agree Greg, I have a soft spot for The Iron Giant. I always bring it up and someone has to say, "Isn't that a cartoon?" To which I reply, "well, yeah". And then they do the pft remark and we move on.

I really wish more people would watch it, it has a lot of good messages in it. :)

Dare I say, The Iron Giant was the last great piece of traditional animation that we'll ever get to see in cinemas. I thought it was a beautiful film.

Underrated gems. The Bill & Ted Saga. Classic. They're better than Wayne's World and I'm a Mike Myers nut. Those Bill & Ted films had such lofty ambitions. The first dealt with history, the second with religion. What other teenage comedies can say they dealt with such themes. Granted, it didn't always work, but I'll always applaud effort. And Bill & Ted was a great work of effort, if nothing else.

"Wild Stallyns"

I somewhat agree val. Better than Wayne's World? I don't think so. The good thing about the two different "franchises" is that what you don't get in one, you get in the other. So I'd say they even out. :)

Multiplicity, I've always felt, is highly underrated. Didn't do particularly well at the box office, and I rarely hear anyone talk about it...but I loved it. Cracked up through the whole thing.

Standard Average Fair for me not great but not incredibly awful either.

Keaton served better in Mr. Mom and I don't really consider that to be great either.

I agree with many of the choices so far, especially Man on the Moon.

I would like to point out one terribly unseen film: Office Space Not that people don't like it, they just haven't seen it. I have forced all of my friends to see this flick, and most of them really enjoed it

Swimming With Sharks

Kevin Spacey is just so dope in this film...
:yup:

Now I wish I would have watched it when my old boss loaned it to me. I've heard a lot about it and caught part of it on TV one time. Spacey defines hard-a*s in this movie.

I loved this movie--so good, so dark. Frank Whalley did a great job, as did Spacey. And it's about the film industry, like The Player (awesome flick), and that's always a plus.

I thought Barton Fink was excellent, but many other viewers did not. Another lesser-known but superior Coen brothers flick--Miller's Crossing. It's one of their best.

Underrated Gems:

The Big Lebowski
Grosse Point Blank
American History X
The Iron Giant
The Ghost & the Darkness
Election
The Frighteners

I'll agree that those were all good movies, but can you really claim that the Big Lebowski is underrated?

Outside the movie community...Yes!
Hardly any of my mates have heard of it.
It never got the exposure and acclaim it deserved.

the cube is an amazing film. right from the beggining where that man gets er..... 'cubed' it had me hooked.


also unintentional comedy lines like "everythings going to be ok!.....as long as we have our boot!" just add to it.

he he

Repo Man ....an all time cult classic. I find something new and funny with every viewing. I'll never grow weary of this punk genre gem. Yet I know very few people that have ever heard of this flick let alone seen it. If you haven't seen Repo Man, definitely check it out.

Movies that are underrated...
 

Here are the movies that I think are underrated...

Man On The Moon
Pups
Fly By Night
O' Brother Where Art Thou
Orgazmo
Cannibal! The Musical
:love: :love: :love: :love: :love:

drugstore cowboy
A I
Grosse Point Blank
The Big Lewbowski
Falling Down
Unbreakable
The Cable Guy
Brotherhood of the wolf
The count of Monte Cristo
and The Crow

Underrated Movies
 

Pups
Man On The Moon
O' Brother Where Art Thou
Kalifornia
Run Lola Run
Fly By Night
Gamera
A.I. - Artificial Intelligence
Mad Max II
The Exorcist III
Kiss Of The Dragon
Orgazmo
Cannibal The Musical
Naked Killer
Police Story
Erotic Ghost Story
A Man Calle Hero


And so on, and so forth

Re: Movies That Are Underrated.....
 

Re: Movies That Are Underrated.....
 

There's a lot of underrated films out there, have to agree with most that are posted.
I do have to add:

The Man From Earth (2007)

Intelligent sci-fi without any special effects...pure win!

Re: Movies That Are Underrated.....
 

office space
shawshank redemption
barton fink
the big lebowski
hotel rwanda
godfather part 3 (Only Kidding!)

Re: Movies That Are Underrated.....
 

Office Space
American History X
The Chumscrubber (I don't know why, but I love this.)

Re: Movies That Are Underrated.....
 

1) A cult classic. Highly rated amongst people.
2) #43 on IMDB's top 250, which is a pretty big honor, and nominated for an Oscar.
3)never heard of it.

Re: Movies That Are Underrated.....
 

Dang...I forgot to add:

Once Were Warriors (1994)

Re: Movies That Are Underrated.....
 

I think Death to Smoochy was vastly underrated.