Underrated Movies

[pogopossum]

Having started the "Worst or Verrry Bad" thread it seemed only fair to initiate an Underrated Movies thread. Some movies may have received fair acclaim, but still have gotten lost in the shuffle. Want to go against the grain? Please do. Fun.
As stated on the other thread, please do not take other opinion personally. Humor, as always, appreciated.
TV? Start that "Underrated" topic if you should so desire.
Me first.

Brilliantly executed, with character development, action and even pathos.
Is it possible that only Andy Serkis could inject character into a CGI creation of an ape?
The two sequels are also excellent, although the concentration on war is not what naturally attracts me.
The first 1968 Apes movie was original, but pretty cheesy, still an epic of its time. In addition to adventure and melodrama (I remember the soundtrack) it considered the nature of humanity.

The new series did that and more, as thought (particularly in movie #1), adventure, and well staged action were all there.

.

 

[mffanrodders]

I always felt that John Carter of Mars was very underrated. A well made film telling a good story with interesting characters.

Stealth didn’t deserve to bomb (ahem) as badly as it did. Yeah, it was very Hollywood in its execution, but still quite good fun and it did have something to say on the human condition.

Personally, I think the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, specifically The Phantom Menace and Revenge of the Sith, were very underrated, especially by Star Wars fans.

there are others, but i’ll need to think some more.

 

[Raf]

Nick Nolte in "Cannery Row" is highly underrated, imo. Loosely based on 2 novels by John Steinbeck (i.e. Cannery Row & Sweet Thursday)...though I think it draws more from the events in Sweet Thursday. Great soundtrack and personal favorite. Nolte made a great "Doc" & John Huston as the Steinbeck-ian narrator made it even better

 

[pogopossum]

Read the books in Jr. High. (60 years ago!) Sorta remember them. Have to look up the movie.
Read the Log of the Sea of Cortez at about the same time, the story of Doc & Steinbeck going sailing & marine biologing. Re-read it later.
I like Nolte, but it's hard to imagine him as Doc. even in a fictionalized version of a fiction.

 

[pogopossum]

Suggestion #5.

Earth Girls Are Easy.

I am going here for movies whch do not fit any stereotype. To the point that they get no respect.
Funny, silly, musical numbers, larded with sexual and slapstick jokes (my type) with little logic and less gravitas or message.
Came out 33 years ago. Starring Geena Davis, Julie Brown, Jeff Goldblum, Damon Wayans and Jim Carrey.
In decades of attendance at SF Movies Marathons, this was one of the few I showed to my (usually bored by SF) spouse. She loved it.

 

[JunkMonkey]

No! No No NOOOOO. I will not let you describe Earth Girls Are Easy as 'underrated'! It's AWFUL! It's the sort of film you inflict on people with sadistic delight. (I know. I've done it!) It's like Voyage of the Rock Aliens with a budget! Transylvania 65000 with songs! It is everything that was wrong with the Eighties rolled up in a ball and thrown at your face.

 

[Windshadow]

Outland (1981) ⭐ 6.6 | Action, Crime, Sci-Fi

1h 49m | R

www.imdb.com

Outland (1981)
Sean Connery in Outland (1981)
Rotten Tomatoes gives this a meta score in the 50s but for its date, I thought its effects stood up well it had an interesting plot if rather too obviously a recycled western script... I found most strange that it was hammered for it casting a Scotsman as the marshal... a recurring trope for almost any Sean Connery performance (see the reviews of "The Hunt for Red October" and "The Wind and the Lion" and "The Lion in Winter" to mention just a few but this strange criticism crops up even when he gives other excellent performances in films like "The Man Who Would Be King" another one of my favorites of his.

 

[JunkMonkey]

My nomination for vastly underrated film of the week (and most other weeks come to that) would be Hundra. A 1983 (the 80s weren't ALL s**t) Italian Spanish American barbarian movie with Laurene Hutton having a whale of a time as a proto-Xena kicking seven kinds of s**t out of everything that gets in her way. It's got a weirdly having your cake and eating it vibe, screens full of exploitative male gaze girl flesh while delivering a weirdly separatist pro feminist message. It's got rape, revenge, slapstick, chases, fights (a bit of character development) ritual humiliation, redemption, the triumph of good and the vanquishing of evil. It's got one of the bad guys getting killed when a fat girl sits on his face and smothers him to death. It's got a brilliant score by Enio Morricone (which he pretty much recycled for Red Sonja the year after). It's got EVERYTHING! What it HASN'T got is a decent Blu-ray or even DVD release. The only copies I've been able to find have been duped from tape and look really battered.

It's that or George of the Jungle.

 

[Raf]

Read the books in Jr. High. (60 years ago!) Sorta remember them. Have to look up the movie.
Read the Log of the Sea of Cortez at about the same time, the story of Doc & Steinbeck going sailing & marine biologing. Re-read it later.
I like Nolte, but it's hard to imagine him as Doc. even in a fictionalized version of a fiction.

I think you might be pleasantly surprised, Pogo. It has a great cast. Debra Winger, Audra Lindley, Frank McCrae as Hazel & M. Emmet Walsh as Mack.

 

[pogopossum]

Outland (1981) ⭐ 6.6 | Action, Crime, Sci-Fi

1h 49m | R

www.imdb.com

Outland (1981)
Sean Connery in Outland (1981)
Rotten Tomatoes gives this a meta score in the 50s but for its date, I thought its effects stood up well it had an interesting plot if rather too obviously a recycled western script... I found most strange that it was hammered for it casting a Scotsman as the marshal... a recurring trope for almost any Sean Connery performance (see the reviews of "The Hunt for Red October" and "The Wind and the Lion" and "The Lion in Winter" to mention just a few but this strange criticism crops up even when he gives other excellent performances in films like "The Man Who Would Be King" another one of my favorites of his.

Also liked it.
The accent thing is about as silly as is possible. And Connery is more than any other the target.
It's space fer heck's sake. No Scots need apply?
Earlier as noted, he was skewered for being a Russian sub commander who somehow is speaking perfect English with a Scots accent. He's RUSSIAN fer heck's sake. Other than replicating some speech pattern from the east of Leningrad anything makes sense!

I believe that Outland was a remake of High Noon, although the action scenes are not mere replications.

 

[pogopossum]

JunkMonkey,
You make me defensive about choosing Earth Girls. But not a whole lot. I deliberately picked the opposite of a classic.
I am glad to see that you have no comparable reservations about your "Underrated" choices, Hundra & George of the Bungle er J-----
I listed Girls because it's a deliberate romp which stomps all over "Everything that was wrong with the eighties" and does it with a lot of self deprecating humor. The two backup wookies are hilarious. A friend (female) commented that you know it's a fantasy because it presents Jeff Goldblum as a hunk. It makes fun of so many tropes that I would get writers' cramp listing them.
The bottom line is, however, personal taste. Dismiss any aspect of it and still it comes down for me whether you find it funny.
I do.
And your well stated outrage counterposed to mine on it certainly qualifies Girls for "mixed reactions".
if not mine of "underrated".
Probably we should all move on to another film. I think the extremes of opinion have already been stated.

Next?

 

[pogopossum]

If JM can list Hundra - - -

HULK (2003)
The Ang Lee version.
Moody and a box office failure, but still one of the better Marvels. Probably because it was not written to a formula.

 

[pogopossum]

(2009)
Sort of forgotten in the fooferaw over the television series, the original movie dealt with the contradictions between superhero vigilantism and democratic society. Other superhero movies mentioned the conundrum of taking "justice" into ones own hands and the psychology thereof, but nothing like Watchmen.
It also significantly developed more individual characters than any individual adventure movie that I can remember. Certainly more and better than the relatively plastic goody goodies in the Marvel epics. (Not a high mark to exceed.)

 

[Windshadow]

I did not care for Watchmen I found it grim and depressing and weird but I have never been a comic book fan after the Carl Banks Disney comics.... Gyro Gearloose was the favorite of my pre-teen years.... superhero stuff was never my thing.

 

[pogopossum]

"Grim and depressing and weird." Yup.
Not having read the graphic novel version I can consider Watchman as a unique creation. And contrast it to other superheroes and story lines. I did get into early Marvel comics back in college days. As a comical interest it hasn't lasted.

I also liked Uncle Scrooge, as well as the Beagle Boys, Hughie, Dewey & Louie , Gyro Gearloose, & (but not so much) Gladstone Gander.

 

[JunkMonkey]

The book is better.

 

[pogopossum]

It most often is.

I am on a roll of big nasty bruisers, so here's one that is a change of pace.
It's cute, sweet and probably everythng that JM hates . It also has a child actor so it provides something for everyone to dislike (I didn't want to leave you out Windy ). It did not lose money but was considered a moderate financial flop.
I really like both Mark Rylance and Roald Dahl so I was biased in its favor from the getgo.

THE BFG.

Note: I could not remember for the life of me what "BFG" actually stood for. So I looked it up.
It's "Big Friendly Giant."

 

[Windshadow]

I think I would have enjoyed if I had a kid to share it with... I did watch it and enjoyed the Digital effects... the BFG highlighted the improvements that have been made since the Polar Express a few years prior.... where I did have a neighbors kid to watch the creepy thing... she was totally creeped out by it.

 

[Vince W]

Outland (1981) ⭐ 6.6 | Action, Crime, Sci-Fi

1h 49m | R

www.imdb.com

Outland (1981)
Sean Connery in Outland (1981)
Rotten Tomatoes gives this a meta score in the 50s but for its date, I thought its effects stood up well it had an interesting plot if rather too obviously a recycled western script... I found most strange that it was hammered for it casting a Scotsman as the marshal... a recurring trope for almost any Sean Connery performance (see the reviews of "The Hunt for Red October" and "The Wind and the Lion" and "The Lion in Winter" to mention just a few but this strange criticism crops up even when he gives other excellent performances in films like "The Man Who Would Be King" another one of my favorites of his.

I love this film unabashedly. I put it in the same universe as Alien, just a competing company.

 

[JunkMonkey]

It's cute, sweet and probably everythng that JM hates .

It's got to be better than the book, that's all I'm saying.