Pulp Fiction to Magnolia: the best films of the 90s

September 28, 2017 12:03 PM

Five Guardian critics choose their favourite film of the decade, from Charlie Kaufman’s surreal journey into John Malkovich’s mind to Baz Lurhmann’s Shakespearean tragedy with guns and Hawaiian shirts.

For once, it is safe to read the comments!

Peter Bradshaw - Pulp Fiction (1994)
Ellen E Jones - Romeo + Juliet (1996)
Xan Brooks - Magnolia (1999)
Danny Leigh - Gummo (1997)
Steve Rose - Being John Malkovich (1999)

posted by ellieBOA (170 comments total)

TIL that Harmony Korine is a man, and not a woman as I'd assumed from his first name.
posted by Johnny Assay at 12:11 PM on September 28, 2017

I maybe would have put in something else other than Romeo + Juliet, but that's only if I were supreme Empress Of Everything. I others don't have any objection to anything on this list which is the first time that's ever happened. Huh.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 12:14 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Here's an interview with Harmony Korine that is one of the Best Things Ever
posted by chappell, ambrose at 12:20 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Swap out Romeo + Juliet for Trainspotting, and I'm in.
posted by Capt. Renault at 12:24 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

TIL that Harmony Korine is a man, and not a woman as I'd assumed from his first name.

He would have to be, or this list would not be the ode specifically to then-brash, then-young straight white guys that it is.

These films are fine, I guess. Well, Romeo + Juliet is questionable. But this was the decade of Princess Mononoke, Chungking Express, and Hard Boiled, among non-White, non-Western filmmakers, and The Piano, Clueless, Europa, Europa, Gas Food Lodging, Orlando, and Boys Don't Cry for films by women directors. Additionally, the 90s were a golden age of queer cinema, with movies including My Own Private Idaho, Paris is Burning, Priscilla, High Art, My Life in Pink, and Velvet Goldmine.

I mean, you have to really try to make a film list this white, this straight, this exclusive. I'd like it if critics started trying to be a little more inclusive, especially when they know the list is going to be this small.
posted by maxsparber at 12:31 PM on September 28, 2017 [62 favorites]

You see, Kosner's character is on a world covered entirely in water. It really just flows from there.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 12:42 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Magnolia? That was trite, infantile crap.
posted by Jessica Savitch's Coke Spoon at 12:45 PM on September 28, 2017 [13 favorites]

Post title is misleading - came in to fight about obvious omissions ( I mean just off the top of my head both The Big Lebowski and Fargo are 1990s films) but apparently this is just five people's favorites.
posted by Dr Dracator at 12:51 PM on September 28, 2017

Magnolia? That was trite, infantile crap.

well I wouldn't go that far but it was sure no Boogie Nights. A whole lotta scenery chewing (from both director and actors), but not much in the way of useful story to hang it all on.

SPOILER ALERT:

But I did love the frogs sequence.
posted by philip-random at 12:51 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Romeo + Juliet?

Would have been better if the ending (for once) showed the real violence of their deaths. Vomit-gaggin, eye-rolling, convulsing poisoning, and bloody brain-splattering gunshot.
posted by Kabanos at 12:51 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Romeo + Juliet was awesome WHY DO YOU PEOPLE HATE SHAKESPEARE???
posted by Cookiebastard at 12:52 PM on September 28, 2017 [17 favorites]

These are definitely very nineties movies, and very famous movies.

I would prefer Crooklyn, Slacker or Princess Mononoke.
posted by Frowner at 12:53 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

... and any best of 90s discussion that doesn't include some Coen Brothers is rather missing the point.
posted by philip-random at 12:53 PM on September 28, 2017 [16 favorites]

I think Gummo is an excellent choice. Something that maybe not a lot of people have seen, but leans hard in the style and concerns that characterized cinema at the time.

The others are all indeed movies I also like, which is nice, but not particularly illuminating. I would hope film critics would take the opportunity to highlight something less visible, rather than take yet another opportunity to heap praise on Charlie Kaufman.

But it's probably honest. Your favorite movie's your favorite movie, right? Fair 'nuff.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 12:55 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Before getting too worked up about this, it's worth remembering that this is a list produced by the Guardian film critics, who mostly have terrible taste in film (Bradshaw especially).
posted by chappell, ambrose at 12:56 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

Romeo + Juliet was also Peak Claire Danes Crying

Which is really saying something after My So Called Life
posted by Kabanos at 12:57 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

The only movie on that list I liked (and by "liked" I mean "LOVED") is Romeo + Juliet. Though I've never seen Gummo, and it sounds like it might be up my alley.
posted by banjo_and_the_pork at 12:59 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Your favorite movie's your favorite movie, right? Fair 'nuff.

But it isn't. I've been a professional critic for a quarter century and could not name a single critic who could nail down their absolute favorite movie. In my instance, there are all sorts of favorites, dependent on all sorts of circumstances.

Picking a favorite like this is often an exercise in picking how you represent yourself. Do you want to seem edgy? Honest? Offbeat? What does "favorite" mean anyway? I respect "Gummo," but if this critic is using favorite the way I do, as a film I watch again and again and take pleasure from, well, I worry about the critic. "Showdown in Little Tokyo" is more watchable and repeat enjoyable than "Gummo."

So there is this elaborate selection process that goes on when you are asked to choose your favorite. And, honestly, if you've got five critics, and every single one of them comes back with vaguely edgy films made by white, straight, male Western filmmakers, you don't have a diverse enough stable of writers, or they aren't digging hard enough.
posted by maxsparber at 1:01 PM on September 28, 2017 [13 favorites]

Clair Danes narrates the audiobook version of The Handmaid's Tale. That's peak tear-claire. She's really good, I recommend it.

He just wanted to play SCRABBLE?
posted by adept256 at 1:03 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Crooklyn? Slacker? Really? Um...

By the way, I like to point to the film "Slacker" as 100% evidence that Gen X (me!) was portrayed as shiftless, lazy and aimless, out to destroy social fabric and cultural institutions -- just as Millennials are described today, except Slacker was before this whole Internets popularity thing.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 1:05 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Magnolia? That was trite, infantile crap.

Hands down one of my fav movies of the 90s.
posted by not_the_water at 1:05 PM on September 28, 2017 [6 favorites]

Mine too. Frogs!
posted by maxsparber at 1:05 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Magnolia? That was trite, infantile crap.

Probably one of the worst cinema experiences of my life (and I saw Highlander 2 at the cinema).

I went to see it with two friends. It was so bad I wanted to walk out but since we were going to the pub afterwards I stayed because I thought my friends were enjoying it.
Turns out that my friends were thinking exactly the same thing. If one of had just whispered "this is crap" we could have been in the pub hours earlier.

Eighteen years and I still resent the existence of that damned movie.
posted by antiwiggle at 1:06 PM on September 28, 2017 [6 favorites]

If one were to describe a sort of "Big Nineties" film aesthetic, how would one go about it? Like, to me it seems that there's a way that these movies are all "very nineties", but it would be hard for me to articulate what that is.

A sort of outsizedness of characterization, saturated colors, orange, being very impressed by "alternative" music, thinking that one is very tough because one makes a movie that is "trashy" or violent, a kind of naivete masquerading as irony, a sort of "oppositional" sensibility that is none the less completely bought up...I mean, I miss the nineties, but honestly, the "message" of some of those movies! All that pseudo-profound blather in Pulp Fiction and and Trainspotting, those Very Serious Alternative Soundtracks for Very Serious Male Feelings. I have fond memories of the times that I saw these movies because I was young and with friends and had fewer responsibilities and my family was healthy, but when I think of movies that I really, really, really like, almost none of them are from the nineties.
posted by Frowner at 1:11 PM on September 28, 2017 [12 favorites]

Magnolia had particularly good music.
posted by Bee'sWing at 1:12 PM on September 28, 2017 [12 favorites]

I mean, you have to really try to make a film list this white, this straight, this exclusive.

Yeah, those are all great movies and I'm not knocking anyone who claims any one of them as a favorite, but it seems a little pointless to devote the space to a decade and then pick 5 of the most lauded and written about movies of that decade. It's like a conversation about fave books of 1920s: The Great Gatsby, The Sun Also Rises, or The Sound And The Fury?
posted by octobersurprise at 1:12 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

My favourite 90s movie is Out of Sight. It had Jennifer Lopez and George Clooney for Pete's sake. How much more 90s can it get? And it's brilliant.
posted by fshgrl at 1:12 PM on September 28, 2017 [24 favorites]

A sort of outsizedness of characterization, saturated colors, orange, being very impressed by "alternative" music, thinking that one is very tough because one makes a movie that is "trashy" or violent, a kind of naivete masquerading as irony, a sort of "oppositional" sensibility that is none the less completely bought up...

So what you're saying is what we all know.

Empire Records was robbed.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 1:14 PM on September 28, 2017 [20 favorites]

Magnolia was a big boring let-down after Boogie Nights, which fills me with joy and warms my heart every time I see it. The soundtrack is a million times better, too.
posted by Brain Sturgeon at 1:15 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

I mean, you have to really try to make a film list this white, this straight, this exclusive.

We're talking about the 90s! Must See TV!

Sure this is a list of mainstream "art-house-ish" films... but FFS, there may be another thread about underground, low-budget obscure films of the 90s featuring oppressed minorities. I seriously don't mean that in a negative way, but this was the 1990s when certain popular things were popular. Best-of lists don't always have to pull obscure, hard to find material.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 1:17 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

I couldn't begin to come up with single favorite movie of the '90s and the one that I'd probably choose if I had to—Until The End Of The World—I by no means think is the best or the most representative.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:19 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

I'll give you Pulp Fiction but the rest are just too twee... give me Trainspotting, Goodfellas, Silence of the Lambs, True Romance

As the man said: All those assholes make are unwatchable movies from unreadable books. Mad Max, that's a movie. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, that's a movie. Rio Bravo, that's a movie. And Coming Home in a Body Bag, that was a fuckin' movie.

posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:19 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Not only is The Big Lebowski one of the better films from the 90s, it's also one of the better films about the 90s. Its absence seems particularly glaring.

And that's not even touching maxsparber's extremely apt observations about the whiteness and maleness of the list. The 90s were a decade where "foreign films" received a lot mainstream attention in the US, so not including any is a terrible admission no matter how you look at it.
posted by tobascodagama at 1:20 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

I still think fondly of Magnolia because it introduced me to Aimee Mann who is amazing. (I highly recommend Lost in Space, which has songs like Pavlov's Bell, but most of her stuff is good)

Slacker was basically the entire 90s in one movie, but I don't know if I like it more than Fifth Element.
posted by emjaybee at 1:21 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Best-of lists don't always have to pull obscure, hard to find material.

Literally nothing on my list was obscure or hard-to-find, and you could probably stand to ask yourself why you use that as a synonym for films from other countries, women, non-whites, or the LGBT community.
posted by maxsparber at 1:21 PM on September 28, 2017 [14 favorites]

Me, if asked by The Guardian: HACKERS
posted by Artw at 1:22 PM on September 28, 2017 [19 favorites]

I would have no idea how to answer this, but I don't think I would have picked any of these films. I'm astonished to think that Gummo could really be someone's favorite movie from the entire '90s. Maybe if the critic is like 25 and hasn't seen many films from the '90s. I'd probably have to second Trainspotting, although Audition is very tempting.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 1:22 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

And the ending of Out of Sight? To tease a sequel like that? Cheadle and Brooks! And the innovative editing of Clooney and Lopez' seduction scene, and Lopez' dismissal of the bar assholes...Keaton returned with an asshole edge he's revisited ever since...and Zahn because, I don't need a reason, and Keener and Rhames...date movie perfection!
posted by lazycomputerkids at 1:22 PM on September 28, 2017 [6 favorites]

If you're gonna go tweecore pick Rushmore at least.
posted by Artw at 1:23 PM on September 28, 2017 [15 favorites]

Some of the films you list were awesome. But c'mon... Velvet Goldmine? Best of the 90s? I enjoyed it for several reasons. "Clueless"? Really? It's a retread of Fast Times At Ridgement High with a glossy Hallmark-card Spice Girls veneer. Again, not a bad movie, and sort of amusing and cute but... really?

Boys Don't Cry is an excellent film. No argument.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 1:26 PM on September 28, 2017

If you're gonna go tweecore pick Rushmore at least.

And there goes the thread...hatin' on both Andersons is hatin' on it all.
posted by lazycomputerkids at 1:26 PM on September 28, 2017

fuck, I forgot Guzman
posted by lazycomputerkids at 1:29 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Best-of lists don't always have to pull obscure, hard to find material.

From that same comment:

Princess Mononoke, Chungking Express, and Hard Boiled, among non-White, non-Western filmmakers, and The Piano, Clueless, Europa, Europa, Gas Food Lodging, Orlando, and Boys Don't Cry for films by women directors. Additionally, the 90s were a golden age of queer cinema, with movies including My Own Private Idaho, Paris is Burning, Priscilla, High Art, My Life in Pink, and Velvet Goldmine.

I lived half of the 1990s on other continents and I've seen all but one of these movies. We don't need to excuse professional film critics for failing to mention anything but movies by and for white dudes (with one that's by a white dude and for white dudes on dates with white women).
posted by Etrigan at 1:30 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Some of the films you list were awesome. But c'mon... Velvet Goldmine? Best of the 90s? I enjoyed it for several reasons. "Clueless"? Really? It's a retread of Fast Times At Ridgement High with a glossy Hallmark-card Spice Girls veneer. Again, not a bad movie, and sort of amusing and cute but... really?

You are welcome to your wrong opinion, but these films regularly show up on lists of the best films of the 90s, and they are on mine.
posted by maxsparber at 1:31 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

I'd pick Jackie Brown over Out of Sight if forced to at gunpoint, but I can see the argument both ways. Get Shorty isn't as good as either, but the 1990s were definitely a peak for the Elmore Leonard movie. Touch was pretty decent as well.

I'd also point out the The Fifth Element (1997) and Terminator 2 (1991) were both of that era too. If your constructing a feel of the decade, both of those need to be in the mix.
posted by bonehead at 1:31 PM on September 28, 2017 [6 favorites]

For me, definitely:
Mann's Heat,
Haynes's Safe.
posted by sapagan at 1:33 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Heh, well imagine that! Sometimes "Best Of" lists that are written by different people don't always agree!

I have affection for those films you list, (though a couple I have not seen) I guess I was jumping on the attitude of "you didn't include MY favorites because you have a white-straight agenda" which isn't necessarily the case.

Velvet Goldmine is a snooze-fest.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 1:33 PM on September 28, 2017

Fargo came out in 1996, mooting any debate about what the best film of the 90s was.
posted by the phlegmatic king at 1:34 PM on September 28, 2017 [13 favorites]

Sometimes "Best Of" lists that are written by different people don't always agree!


You know something, the fact that you don't give a shit about representation doesn't mean other people don't. If you don't care about something, there is always the option to leave it be, rather than jump in and defend the status quo, which, trust me, never actually needs a defender.
posted by maxsparber at 1:35 PM on September 28, 2017 [7 favorites]

Not only is The Big Lebowski one of the better films from the 90s, it's also one of the better films about the 90s. Its absence seems particularly glaring.

yeah, Lewbowski was the answer that immediately struck me -- and it's personally true. I've certainly seen it more than any other 90s movie.

And the thing is, it really is THAT good. I'd go into it at length, but I don't need to ...
posted by philip-random at 1:36 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

This isn't a top five list, it's five top one lists.
posted by rocket88 at 1:37 PM on September 28, 2017 [19 favorites]

Let me restate: We are discussing an article wherein some people state opinions about old movies.

We are not discussing an article about representation, or fairness in media, or any of those other things. I do in fact "give a shit" about representation. I'm just pointing out that the article linked is NOT ABOUT THAT.

So anyway, we all have favorites. Being charitable, IMO this article should have been labeled as "mainstream movies that define the 90s" and that would explain the white/straight majority.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 1:39 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Velvet Goldmine is a snooze-fest.

oh no it isn't
posted by philip-random at 1:40 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

It's bizarre that anyone could look at a piece of high energy vapidity like Pulp Fiction, which is tremendous to watch but has nothing to say and says it at horrible, weighty length, and object to Clueless. Pulp Fiction is a movie of teenage ideas that is aimed at adults and ostensibly about adults; Clueless is a movie about teenage experiences aimed at and about teenagers. Neither are what you'd call profound, but only Pulp Fiction thinks it's telling it like it is, man. Clueless does its thing perfectly - it is funny, delightful, cleverly art-directed and costumed and compassionate It's a perfect ice cream soda - sure, it's not a protein bar or a 12 course meal served a la Russe, but don't tell me that a perfect ice cream soda is somehow worse than a lukewarm hamburger doused in donkey sauce.

The more I think about nineties movies, the more I think that the nineties Big Arthouse aesthetic is basically "meanness". Just an awful lot of the popular movies - many of them pretty good - that were around at the time have this refusal of self-reflection and empathy, this annoying "look how clever I am to see what awful hypocrites or pathetic, gently risible fools these people are; of course, I'm not a fool myself" sensibility - Election, for instance, is a great movie qua movie, but it's mean-spirited and dumb about people in important ways. It's one I actually saw when it came out and have watched a couple of times at intervals since, and it has grown on me as a movie - I appreciate how it works a lot more - but has shrunk as a depiction of people.
posted by Frowner at 1:40 PM on September 28, 2017 [28 favorites]

And there goes the thread...hatin' on both Andersons is hatin' on it all.

Wait, has someone been dissing Event Horizon?!
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:41 PM on September 28, 2017 [7 favorites]

Enemy of the State would be on there if we'd realized at the time it was a documentary.
posted by Room 641-A at 1:41 PM on September 28, 2017 [6 favorites]

Event Horizon is 2/3rds of an excellent movie, old WS hasn't ever bettered it.
posted by Artw at 1:45 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Me, if asked by The Guardian: HACKERS

HACK THE PLANET, MAN! THEY'RE TRASHING THE FLOW OF DATA!
posted by Samizdata at 1:45 PM on September 28, 2017 [8 favorites]

We are not discussing an article about representation, or fairness in media, or any of those other things. I do in fact "give a shit" about representation. I'm just pointing out that the article linked is NOT ABOUT THAT.

Privilege is saying that something isn't about representation, therefore representation doesn't matter.

Dickheadness is insisting on that, after people point out that it does matter to a lot of people that they get to see themselves represented in media that are acclaimed as the Greatest Of A Decade.
posted by Etrigan at 1:45 PM on September 28, 2017 [10 favorites]

I'm pretty sure I've not watch Gummo all the way through... I've seen clips and I kind of balk at films that make me feel nauseous.. give me a nice gory horror flick any day of the week.

If you're going to go all show-off art house pretentious at least choose a genuinely good and interesting film like Fire Walk With Me (I would have gone for the almighty Tetsuo The Iron Man but that was 89)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:48 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Pulp Fiction thinks it's telling it like it is, man

I completely disagree with this interpretation. It's a very self-conscious movie. It knows it's referencing dreck---it's in the title for Christ's sake---it just aims to do the dreck very well.

It's a genre escapism piece, true crime, and no more an attempt at "realism" than say, The Fifth Element or Tombstone (1993).
posted by bonehead at 1:48 PM on September 28, 2017 [17 favorites]

Best-of lists don't always have to pull obscure, hard to find material.

Oh sure. None of those movies are bad. But even among popular movies of the 90s, even among blockbuster movies, that's a pretty anemic list, unless it literally means nothing but "this is my favorite for personal reasons." And if that's all that it means, then, well ... ok ...

Just a few of my favorites that had US releases:
The Nasty Girl (1990)
Barton Fink (1991)
The Double Life of Veronique (1991)
My Own Private Idaho (1991)
Bob Roberts (1992)
El Mariachi (1992)
Howards End (1992)
Eat Drink Man Woman (1994)
The "Three Colors" movies

That's all off the top of my head and ends there because I've leaving shortly.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:50 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

I'm hearing a lot of talk but not very much LA Confidential.
posted by belarius at 1:52 PM on September 28, 2017 [10 favorites]

It's a genre escapism piece, true crime, and no more an attempt at "realism" than say, The Fifth Element or Tombstone (1993).

Really? You really think all that bloviating dialogue - that I heard quoted like it was real, real deep and perceptive all the time in the nineties - isn't intended to be all, like, bro philosophy? It's not a "realistic" film, but it has that authentic "my cussing and general assholeishness is authenticity quality to it that so much had in the nineties.
posted by Frowner at 1:55 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

I'm pretty sure I've not watch Gummo all the way through...

From a previous thread:

I remember when it was new (in the local video store), renting it, starting to watch it, realizing that it had no interest in being what I'd call a normal cinematic experience (working an easily definable narrative spine, good guys and bad guys, clear conflict etc). So I started doing some much needed cleaning in the TV room, just left it on in the background. And when it was over, I just started it again, continued with the cleaning etc, looking up every now and then when things just got too weird not to (I was probably alphabetizing my record collection by this point). And then I started it again, because I was really starting to love the experience, the weird empathy I was feeling for these mostly young people (mostly children actually), and the chaos of their lives.

Interesting that it came out in 1997, the same year as Titantic, Good Will Hunting, Life Is Beautiful -- I'd take Gummo any day in terms of what I got from it, learned from it, felt.
posted by philip-random at 1:56 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

No Jarman, no Almodóvar, no Sally Potter, not even any Priscilla, Queen of the Desert for Heavens sakes!
posted by octobersurprise at 1:57 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

I don't think it's going to make any of these lists, but one of my personal favorite 90s movies is 1999's But I'm a Cheerleader. It's campy (but offers genuinely interesting shots and visual design), has an amazing soundtrack, and came out at exactly the right time for me, a closeted queer teen whose parents fortunately happened to like renting weird indie comedies.

It's also a great portrait of a certain kind of homophobia that anyone alive in the 90s should immediately recognize. I grew up in a very progressive family, but that also meant we were actively working against that stuff. One of my earliest memories is of being on a parent's shoulders at a No On 9 rally (measure 9 would make any discussion about homosexuality illegal in schools), and hearing a protest song that still pops into my head to this day:

The OCA, they'll get you if you're gay
and if you're not? Well they'll get you anyway

These groups have had to change their tactics a lot in the last 25 years as society has changed, and the details in movies like But I'm a Cheerleader can come off as a bit hamfisted because of that. Things haven't changed that much, though, and it's a great movie both as a period piece and as something much more timeless. I'm not saying But I'm a Cheerleader should be the best movie of the 90s, but it sure speaks to my experience of the 90s better than anything on this list.
posted by OverlappingElvis at 1:58 PM on September 28, 2017 [11 favorites]

the rest are just too twee

Twee? Gummo? Twee, you say?
posted by kenko at 1:59 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Frowner -- Samuel Jackson would disagree with you ...
posted by philip-random at 2:00 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

[Pulp Fiction] a genre escapism piece, true crime...

In a greater context of his other movies employing violence while openly confronting racism and the fear that sustains it as in the Hopper & Walken's scene in True Romance...

We hear many complaints about the prevalence of violence in modern fiction, and it is always assumed that this violence is a bad thing and meant to be an end in itself. With the serious writer, violence is never an end in itself. It is the extreme situation that best reveals what we are essentially, and I believe these are times when writers are more interested in what we are essentially than in the tenor or our daily lives.
--Flannery O'Connor
posted by lazycomputerkids at 2:01 PM on September 28, 2017

But it's probably honest. Your favorite movie's your favorite movie, right? Fair 'nuff.

Yeah, sure, they're not even saying these are the best movies of the 90s in their opinions, or even particularly good movies; all they're saying, at bottom, is that these are five people's favorite movies. Perhaps these same critics if asked to name one really standout film of the 90s, not necessarily their "favorite" (an inane concept anyway; what does that mean? Most comforting to watch again? Best? One you're fondest of for sentimental reasons?), the list would have been much more varied.

But if this is the list you get when you ask five people what their favorites are, why publish it? It's not interesting! It reveals nothing particularly interesting about the tastes of the respondents! Ok, the inclusion of Gummo is kind of interesting since it's not remotely as famous as the others, but really, Being John Malkovich? Pulp Fiction? (And I really like Being John Malkovich, it's just not a very interesting choice.)
posted by kenko at 2:03 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

The 90's movie that made the biggest impression on me was Farewell My Concubine.

And I'm on team Magnolia. It may be overwrought and pretentious, but it really earned that frog scene.
posted by grumpybear69 at 2:04 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

I'm a fairly big Tarantino fan but have never warmed up to Pulp Fiction. It just seems too cute for its own good.
posted by octothorpe at 2:04 PM on September 28, 2017

Julianne Moore's gums should have won an Oscar.
posted by grumpybear69 at 2:04 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Mod note: Comment removed, "I'm done with the thread but also here's a parting shot" is basically never a good way to go. If you're done with a thread, close the tab and move on.
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:09 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

All I can think when someone says Gummo was their favorite movie of the 90s is that someone really, really doesn't like cats.

Not that I can't imagine that it has other stuff to recommend it, but I don't know how it's watchable by anybody who likes cats even a little bit.
posted by Sequence at 2:12 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Topsy Turvey is a phenomenal film and should be on any 90s list. So should The Sweet Hereafter.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 2:13 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Baz Lurhmann

Every time I see that name I wonder if he has older siblings named Foo and Bar.
posted by Greg_Ace at 2:15 PM on September 28, 2017 [9 favorites]

Hong Kong's amazing 90s seems a little under represented here.

I'd pick Once Upon A time in China, Bullet in the Head, Fong Sai Yuk, Hard Boiled, Chungking Express for you Tweecore guys (only good), Hard Boiled...
posted by Artw at 2:20 PM on September 28, 2017 [7 favorites]

All those J-Horror films that got big and got remade in the 00s were 90s films.
posted by Artw at 2:21 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

I've said it before, I'll say it again: Groundhog Day.
posted by Kabanos at 2:22 PM on September 28, 2017 [24 favorites]

For once, it is safe to read the comments!

Thanks--I found the pointer there to Film Comment's Best of the 90s poll especially enjoyable: 1, 2, 3, and 4.
posted by Wobbuffet at 2:24 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

You really think all that bloviating dialogue - ...- isn't intended to be all, like, bro philosophy?

It's interesting (to me at least) to see Pulp Fiction in the context of, say, Jackie Brown or Out of Sight or Fargo. These later three movies contain character studies of idiots doing completely idiotic things. The three all have hyper-sane viewpoint characters for the idiots to contrast against. As genre films they offer a break between immoral, generally stupid criminals and heroes smart enough to understand society and morality is generally a good idea and that the world need not be an amoral jungle.

Pulp Fiction is a little more radical. It's viewpoint characters are all idiots and assholes as well. There is no sane reference, everyone is in the soup with no shore to be found. It doesn't change the fact that Jules and Vincent are both assholes, and even Jules, arguably the least dim of the pair, has an utterly unrealistic dream---to wander the earth like Kung-Fu, being the biggest asshole he can be.

(The Coen's tried their own versions of this concept too. Burn after Reading was one, but probably most successfully in O Brother Where Art Thou. I think the Coens could only make this work as comedies.)

It's fun to watch because it's such a fully drawn study of these repulsive people and their language is indeed highly stylized. But no, I don't think the film intends itself to be a model for behaviour. It's a study of the evil men and women can do. That's what the true crime genre is.
posted by bonehead at 2:26 PM on September 28, 2017 [9 favorites]

Hong Kong's amazing 90s seems a little under represented here.

My pick would be Swordsman II, though ideally not dubbed.
posted by Wobbuffet at 2:29 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Pulp Fiction, Malkovich, and Magnolia, have the quality of a moving painting, and a certain raw engaging, creativity. Magnolia pulled on my emotions, Malkovich on my credulity, and Pulp Fiction my sense of comfortable reality. I didn't see Gummo or R&J, though I know R&J pretty much by heart. After seeing the interviews with Korine I will find a copy of Gummo to watch.

Paris is Burning, absolutely changed my entire world view. There was something universal in the efforts of the drag clubbers, that struck a note with me, a descriptive, an archetypal narrative of those all over the world who seek a place to be, live by their own definition, find rapport, safety and acceptance.

We can all think of films from that era, Fargo, oh yeah, Fargo, dang! Fight Club, Shawshank, The Usual Suspects, Edward Scissorhands, Thelma and Louise, Last of the Mohichans, (so beautiful, the carriage over a bridge scene.) Oh hell man, Wild at Heart! Contact also a great film.

That decade has a lot of gold to enjoy.
posted by Oyéah at 2:30 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

If I had to pick favorites, I'd go with (in no particular order) Strange Days, Matrix, Clerks, Pulp Fiction, The Big Lebowski, Trainspotting, GitS, Princess Mononoke, Lola Rennt and maybe Scream. These are movies I'm always game to rewatch if I caught them on cable.

If I had to pick best, i'm not qualified for that.
posted by lmfsilva at 2:31 PM on September 28, 2017 [6 favorites]

Favourite American films or favourite films?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯
posted by standardasparagus at 2:34 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Contact also a great film.

I grew up on Cosmos, so I was primed, but we're a deeply dismissed minority. On the Pensacola beach at the end, the tide only recedes, like the expansion of the universe. In front of the Ellie's fallen father is a pattern of popcorn that is repeated in the sparkling grains of sand in Ellie's palm as she sits by the canyon.

Small moves.

On the other hand, the fantastic opening is not to scale, but its drama could not have been in the vast spaces beyond our solar system.
posted by lazycomputerkids at 2:35 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

The waves only recede...sorry
posted by lazycomputerkids at 2:44 PM on September 28, 2017

I'd pick Jackie Brown over Out of Sight

Two movies both based on books by Elmore Leonard, both released the same year, both with Michael Keaton in a tiny role as Ray Nicolette. A dozen years before Iron Man, we nearly had a first crack at a cinematic universe, with Nicolette as the Nick Fury of the Leonardverse. If only.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 2:47 PM on September 28, 2017 [6 favorites]

I've said it before, I'll say it again: Groundhog Day.

I've said it before, I'll say it again: Groundhog Day.
posted by Artw at 2:48 PM on September 28, 2017 [24 favorites]

lmfsilva

Strange Days is a great film, glad someone else mentioned it.
posted by AzraelBrown at 2:53 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

For this teenager The Matrix was the film of the 90s. Only film I've intentionally seen twice in the cinema.
posted by 92_elements at 2:58 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

Us adults* all saw Pulp Fiction Fiction, like, five times. I put it on the closing music being very good for swaggering out of a theatre to.

* to the extent that being in your 20s made you an adult.
posted by Artw at 3:07 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Geeze, I can't even pick a fav movie from the 90's, but nowadays I'd probably pick Trainspotting. A big part of not being able to pick is that I grew up in the 90's watching all of the 80's movies, so my favorite then ends up leaning toward Robocop. I remember those movies more than 90's stuff.

I definitely like Boogie Nights over Magnolia, but they occupy two different feelings for me. Magnolia feels more depressing for me, almost like Requiem for a Dream, in a way.

Pulp Fiction never did it for me, it's like what every 12-year-old's first "serious" movie is. That and Clerks, although I have a soft spot for Clerks.

Harmony Korine is for disaffected, fucked up skater kids, which I definitely enjoyed being for a period in the early-00's. I got into a lot of Harmony Korine stuff (Kids, Gummo) because I hung out with skaters, and a lot of my movie and music tastes evolved quickly due to that. Out of his 90's films, I remember Julien Donkey-Boy affecting me the most, but I think that's because Werner Herzog is in it and then I got into him, and that's sort of how my whole taste with "artsy" movies started.

But then there's The Matrix, which I feel may be my favorite 90's movie, but it's hard because The Matrix makes me feel a different way than Trainspotting.
posted by gucci mane at 3:09 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Armageddon came out in '98, 'nuff said.
posted by billsaysthis at 3:10 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

Ah, Clerks... and KS in general. You really can't go back.

Chasing Amy would be the one that aged the worst.
posted by Artw at 3:11 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Armageddon came out in '98, 'nuff said.

It's no Con Air.
posted by Artw at 3:11 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

Bradshaw: The Americans get Tarantino; we got Guy Ritchie.

Yeah, Lock Stock has not aged at all well (except, possibly bar the soundtrack)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:17 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

I know Hartley is an acquired taste, but I'm still disappointed that Trust isn't on this list. I also love Archangel by Guy Maddin, but I wouldn't expect to see that on this list or any 90s film lists. Sadly.
posted by pxe2000 at 3:17 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Yeah, Lock Stock has not aged at all

Troublesome since he made that one about five times.
posted by Artw at 3:18 PM on September 28, 2017 [7 favorites]

I guess by my "favorite movie, whatevs" comment up above I kind of meant to agree that the list being kind of dumb and safe is a result of the topic itself being a little bland and informal, and probably just meant as nostalgia clickbait, which would bounce people if the movies weren't quickly recognizable. It's not to be taken seriously.

The only thing I do take seriously about these lists is the MetaFilter commentary, which tends to fill out my Netflix DVD queue with a couple months worth of good stuff. So thanks to everybody for that.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 3:22 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Also the Rocketeer is from the 90s and is the best movie so there.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 3:24 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

As mentioned upthread...Fight Club is still my favorite movie of the 90's. It completely blew me away when I saw it in the theater with little to no expectations of it being great.

I don't understand how anyone can watch Gummo more than once. The bathtub scene where the kid is eating in that disgusting bath water still haunts me. (I just watched it again on Youtube...I wish I hadn't)
posted by Benway at 3:26 PM on September 28, 2017

Not motioned yet, in no particular order:

Three Kings
Se7en
12 Monkeys
Dazed and Confused
Groundhog Day

And, you know, for kids, The Hudsucker Proxy
posted by Room 641-A at 4:04 PM on September 28, 2017 [8 favorites]

I find it interesting that I have huge nostalgia for 90s music but little to none for 90s cinema.

Anyway!

Army of Darkness
Total Recall
Terminator 2
Out of Sight
and uh Tremors
posted by Existential Dread at 4:09 PM on September 28, 2017 [7 favorites]

I'll say a word in defense of 'Romeo + Juliet'. In my view, Baz is an auteur who brings an exuberant flair to everything he does, R+J is a unique dazzling interpretation of The Bard, one of his best films, and I'd like to think that future film critics will give it more due than I see here now. (I don't love everything Baz does, but I did feel that 'The Great Gatsby' deserved the Oscar for Best Film.)

Also, I could take another stretch on my film crit cred here, but Verhoven's 'Starship Troopers' (1997) is an enduring (and violent) deconstruction of epic sci-fi extravaganzas, with ironic political subtexts. Your mileage will vary as to how deep you wade into the pop culture smush of it, but if you can view it as a multilayered artifact, then it has at least more than one or so layers.

In my personal opinion, 'Akira Kurosawa's Dreams' (1990) is the best film of the 90's. I think I'm in a minority here, as always.
posted by ovvl at 4:10 PM on September 28, 2017 [10 favorites]

Starship Troopers is okay but it's no Showgirls.
posted by Artw at 4:11 PM on September 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

The only thing I do take seriously about these lists is the MetaFilter commentary, which tends to fill out my Netflix DVD queue with a couple months worth of good stuff.

oh yeah! (speaking of movies nobody's mentioned yet), a few that come to mind:

Office Space, Dead Man, Matinee, Freeway, Go, Dark City, South Park [Bigger Longer Uncut], Nixon, Ed Wood, City of Lost Children, and Tombstone (whenever Val Kilmer's onscreen)
posted by philip-random at 4:11 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

Some of the best of the 90s in no order:

Toy Story
Red or maybe White
Eyes Wide Shut
Goodfellas
Terminator 2
The Player
Unforgiven
Crumb
Ed Wood
Babe
Heat
Fargo
PI
Election
Three Kings
A Simple Plan
posted by octothorpe at 4:15 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Drop Dead Gorgeous too. Which is perfection and really needs to be picked up by a major streaming service so I can make my nieces watch it

And of course no one has mentioned Spice World which was 100% brilliant if you were it's target audience of "grew up on Roger Moore bond movies, had older siblings who listened to Meatloaf on repeat and attended at least one proper rave prior to 1990".
posted by fshgrl at 4:30 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Natural Born Killers...which makes a great 90s double feature with Serial Mom (IMO John Waters' best film)...but of course comedies NEVER seem to make these lists, otherwise Galaxy Quest would probably be on all of the lists...Ok, I gotta get outta here before one of those things kills Guy...
posted by sexyrobot at 4:42 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

I went to my Netflix list to get the answer without fudging to look edgier than I am, and the answer is: Goodfellas. After that, Fargo, The Sweet hereafter, Topsy-Turvy, Princess Mononoke.
posted by acrasis at 5:16 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

In my head, Morgan Freeman's voice is narrating the series of tragic life circumstances and regrettable choices that led these reviewers to neglect The Shawshank Redemption, one of the greatest movies of all time.

His solemn baritone somehow reminds us, without it having to be spelled out, that even journalistic hacks are never merely perpetrators of such an injustice. They are also, inescapably, victims of it as well.
posted by roystgnr at 5:19 PM on September 28, 2017

200 Cigarettes is my go-to NYE movie, as Cemetery Man was my go-to Halloween movie before my group of friends diversified some and now it's Hocus Pocus. None of these are contenders for best film of the 90s, but all personal favorites, and seem to be crowd pleasers.

On that note, I once inflicted Super Mario Brothers and Tank Girl on some friends as a double-feature, for which they still haven't forgiven me and I regret nothing. Nothing.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 5:26 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

I feel like the fact that no one mentioned Jurassic Park means this thread has been hacked.
posted by Room 641-A at 5:38 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Three Colours trilogy
posted by Mr. Yuck at 5:45 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

Many of these films are staggeringly good, but everyone knows the best film from the 90s is Rob Roy. You can't deny that the last scene (no spoilers!) was one of the most satisfying you've ever watched.
posted by Beholder at 5:48 PM on September 28, 2017

I feel obligated as a former Animation student to mention that, in those circles, the 90s are referred to as The Disney Renaissance during which a number of films were released that convinced American studios that feature animated films were a thing worth investing in, and opened the door for Pixar.

Also The Iron Giant, if you're interested in weeping openly at a children's film.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 6:15 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

everyone knows the best film from the 90s is Rob Roy.

It's pretty good. I saw it with some friends from a Scottish lit class and on the way back we nitpicked historical inaccuracies and shouted lines in braid Scots.
posted by octobersurprise at 7:00 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

spice wirld
the warriors of virtue
cssper the fiendly ghoat
happiness 1998
mighting morphing power rangangers movie
the pagemaster
we're back! a dinosore movie


^my lust of best flims of he ninties
posted by LeviQayin at 7:07 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

I mean, you have to really try to make a film list this white, this straight, this exclusive. I'd like it if critics started trying to be a little more inclusive, especially when they know the list is going to be this small.

I understand where you're coming from, but 5 critics were simply asked to choose their favorite film of the 90's. You're suggesting they should have lied to appease a wider spectrum of readers? That's pretty much the opposite of what I want from a film critic.
posted by davebush at 7:08 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

and on the way back we nitpicked historical inaccuracies and shouted lines in braid Scots.

my favorite historical inaccuracy nitpick will always be an old filmmaker friend who hated Gladiator, because "they did not have CGI in Ancient Imperial Rome."
posted by philip-random at 7:10 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

I think it calls into question the diversity of the Guardian's stable of film critics, if nothing else.
posted by tobascodagama at 7:10 PM on September 28, 2017 [5 favorites]

Surprised to see no love for Malcolm X in this thread? It wouldn't be my #1 but definitely in the top 5-10...

Malkovich is a good choice, I think I would have to pick either that or Goodfellas or Election.

Agree with the article re: Malkovich's amazingly weird tone. It reminds me a lot of Infinite Jest--characters dealing with deadly serious stuff, but in a completely ludicrous setting. And John Malkovich didn't get enough attention for his performance, especially the segment where he's doing an absolutely perfect imitation of John Cusack's character controlling him.
posted by equalpants at 7:32 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

Life Is Beautiful was beautiful.
posted by alex_skazat at 7:43 PM on September 28, 2017

No Goodfellas, no Fargo? Go home Guardian, you're drunk.
posted by photoslob at 7:52 PM on September 28, 2017 [2 favorites]

There are a lot of great movies from the nineties, and I won't bother to list all of my personal favorites, as most of them have already appeared in this thread; I will, however, call out at least one movie that's hugely overrated, Velvet Goldmine, because my feelings haven't changed one iota.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:53 PM on September 28, 2017

I think it calls into question the diversity of the Guardian's stable of film critics, if nothing else.

Sorry to question the logic of this, but the idea is that a gay critic would have likely chosen a gay-centric film as his favorite of the decade? Isn't that exactly the problem you're calling out?
posted by davebush at 7:56 PM on September 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

You can't deny that the last scene (no spoilers!) was one of the most satisfying you've ever watched.

Hollywood typically goes to great lengths to even out differences in height between people onscreen. One of the many delights of the scene is seeing the 6'4" Liam Neeson looming like a tree over the prancing Tim Roth, who is nine inches shorter and looks it. A decade or so earlier we saw Tim Robbins playing second to Tom Cruise in Top Gun: an even larger gap in altitude separates these two guys, but you could scarcely tell that on screen.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 8:59 PM on September 28, 2017

Sorry to question the logic of this, but the idea is that a gay critic would have likely chosen a gay-centric film as his favorite of the decade?

No, I think the issue is more that the paucity of diverse perspectives among critics makes it easier for white cis centric films to be accepted without question. It's more the line of thought that diversity in positions of even nominal authority like film criticism can lead to different perceptual models that may provide a needed alternative point of view to the proceedings.

It isn't that a gay critic necessarily will prefer a gay-centric film, but they certainly would be likely to be more aware of them, to see value or problems in things straight critics may not, and come to a different judgment on merit based on those perceptions.

There is no real standard for jobs like film criticism that have much to do with either knowing much about the history of film or about representation outside conventions. In fact film reviewers are often rewarded for being conventional on the theory that such views better "suit the interests of the readership". Film reviewers are columnists first. Their value lies in providing copy on time and that the publication believes will align to the interests of the readers. This, by default, tends to be white-cis-centric because that's who makes the decisions for most publications and how they see their readers, as being like them.

It is true, as can be witnessed in any number of threads here that readers often will get bent out of shape if you question the values of movies they like. The belief in "enjoyment for enjoyment's sake" somehow is supposed to trump other concerns people might bring up that could "ruin" the pleasure of the film. So the interests of the publication often run counter to the interests of diversity in the attempt to align the reviewer with the reader so to avoid such dissonance.

Enjoyment is seen as requiring no justification outside one's self. If I laugh at a comedy that's good, no matter what it is I might be laughing at. This is a deep failure in the review structure as it is since movies carry meaning beyond simple pleasure measured by automatic response of an individual. People might not want to deal with that, but there is certainly a place in making note of the absence in diversity and values and asking for something more representative and thoughtful instead.
posted by gusottertrout at 11:41 PM on September 28, 2017 [4 favorites]

The diversity of the film critics obviously isn't ideological or aesthetic, since they pick basically "five of the most famous slightly 'alternative' mainstream movies of the decade". One need not have a gay critic pick a gay-centric film, but I just...it's a really surprising hook for an article if your critics are all going to be like "yeah, these blockbusters (with the exception of Gummo, but Gummo is still a film by a white dude that prioritizes a white dude alterna-view and frankly jesus god one talked about Harmony Korine until one was sick of it back then) are our favorites" you just feel like it's an oddly boring critlcal view. Like, why do we need critics if it's just to tell us that yes, Pulp Fiction was a very influential film?

It's like if they got their music critics to write about their favorite nineties albums and the result was Nevermind, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Vitology, OK Computer and, as an outlier, a Soundgarden album - you just wonder what the point of the article is, and you wonder why the Guardian has five critics whose tastes are all so squarely in the middle of "albums by white people". You would ask "why does the Guardian have a writerly stable who aren't interested in hip-hop", too, and you would ask why only American albums were selected, and why there was nothing by women.

I mean, if this were a "Mefites! What is your favorite 1990s movie?" and a lot of people were all "Pulp Fiction! Followed by Being John Malkovich", that's fine because we're not acting as professional critics, so it's not like we need to say anything particularly subtle or original. But when it's the Guardian being all "let's publish some nostalgia-bait about nineties movies by our film critics" and once again it replicates the old "all artists of note are white straight men" trope you start to wonder what's the point.

Note that at least some of the response on here has been "what kind of PC thuggery expects that movie critics would talk about incredibly obscure movies by women and people of color, that's bizarre". It's straight out of Joanna Russ's early-eighties How To Suppress Women's Writing - as soon as a famous, successful non-straight white male artist is in the past, they are written out of history and the narrative becomes "well, obviously there may have been a few good writers who weren't white straight guys, but their work is so obscure! How can anyone be expected to know about or remember it?" so every time we talk about non-straight white male artists, it's with this constant need to insist on rediscovery.

Films like The Piano or My Own Private Idaho or Malcolm X were not in fact incredibly obscure, non-influential or difficult to see when they came out. They were widely discussed in, for instance, the Chicago Tribune, where I read several articles about each, published over weeks. It was easy to see them in theaters, particularly the first and last, and people talked about them in casual conversation.

To return to the music analogy, it's like if someone said, "you can't expect music critics to notice incredibly obscure albums like Tragic Kingdom, Fear of A Black Planet or Different Class, much less remember them 20 years later as favorites, hardly anyone heard those and you can't really expect music critics to care".

It's not that you need your gay film critic to like, gay up the joint, but if you have zero film critics who are naturally drawn to work by women, POC and gay people, you need to diversify in terms of people's backgrounds and interests.
posted by Frowner at 12:04 AM on September 29, 2017 [12 favorites]

I mean, my father, who though an excellent person is not incredibly likely to seek out films with queer themes and in fact back in the nineties was much less comfortable with queer people/issues than he became later in life, had an opinion about My Own Private Idaho, because it was so widely discussed.
posted by Frowner at 12:10 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

It's not that you need your gay film critic to like, gay up the joint, but if you have zero film critics who are naturally drawn to work by women, POC and gay people, you need to diversify in terms of people's backgrounds and interests.

Yes, there are some things even a reviewer sensitive to diversity and representation can't provide if they are not a member of the group being portrayed, or not portrayed. That simply isn't in their experience and it can't be replaced by knowledge alone. In the same way, there are perspectives on movies that come from interest in certain values and knowledge of history that can't easily be replaced if there is no interest in them.

The important thing isn't the ultimate judgment of any one reviewer, but the conversation that develops between critics invested in thinking about the films. Currently reviews are more often like buyer guides, helping the reader decide where to spend their money. As such they take as a given that the Hollywood model is one that requires their attention since those movies make the most money.

That sets up a circularity to the reviewer/film industry relationship where the reviewer is as much as secondary source of advertising for Hollywood as they are a unbiased source of thought. The reviewer may tell the reader to not see this Hollywood movie and see that one instead, but they've accepted the terms Hollywood has provided and continue to build its importance overall by just helping shuffle the money from one Hollywood product to another.

If one thinks Hollywood is providing adequate representation and perspectives on the world, I'm sure that model works fine, but I gotta say it's an awfully shortsighted one that ignores a hell of a lot for the fun of cheap thrills. Not everyone has to have a deep interest in movies of course, but some interest in society I'd think would suggest caring a little about a broader perspective on these matters.
posted by gusottertrout at 12:36 AM on September 29, 2017

Isn't this list a bit like asking a group of friends what their favourite comfort meal is and then noticing that all the answers are basically gasto-pub food?
posted by 92_elements at 1:02 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Sure it is, if your friends have a national audience that influences a global industry worth billions of dollars every year.
posted by Etrigan at 3:11 AM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]

Each critic only gets to name one single movie?!? Holy cats, I can't even narrow it down to like... the best 5 cop movies from the 90's. That decade was amazing for film. So now that I'm thinking about it, here are my favorite cop movies from the 90's not yet mentioned:
The Indian Runner
Insomnia
One False Move
Cop Land
Romeo is Bleeding
Deep Cover
posted by heatvision at 4:01 AM on September 29, 2017

Incidentally, the OP missed the sixth critic's choice Cath Clarke's picking Life is Sweet as her selection.

For what it's worth, my argument above wasn't so much about this particular piece, since its limits don't lend it much more than a fill piece for the group, but was meant more generally in response to the disagreement.
posted by gusottertrout at 4:20 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Another major director of the 90s not yet mentioned—I'm chagrined to have forgotten him yesterday—is Zhang Yimou. Dude had tremendous buzz in the 90s: Ju Dou, Raise The Red Lantern, The Story of Qiu Ju, To Live, Shanghai Triad, Keep Cool. I never saw Keep Cool and I haven't watched any of the others in 20 years or so, but I recall Ju Dou as being the one of the most visually stunning movies I've ever seen.
posted by octobersurprise at 7:09 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Yeah, Zhang Yimou was a huge deal, at least in the US. People who never really saw any foreign films, either through lack of access or lack of inclination, would have seen Raise The Red Lantern or one of the others.

(Gong Li is fifty-one! Good lord, how did so much time pass?)

It just feels like the narrative of Anglophone nineties film has become "white men did a bunch of influential rock 'em sock 'em stuff, that's what was important" and people have apparently totally forgotten the looming presence of a number of people of color and women. But seriously, I remember the mainstream film discourse that appeared in the Chicago Tribune and other non-specialist print sources (because that was what I had access to in the suburbs as a teen), and Spike Lee, Zhang Yimou, Jane Campion, Gas Food Lodging, My Own Private Idaho and Chunking Express were big, big deals. Pulp Fiction and Natural Born Killers loomed largest, in my recollection, but that was mostly the controversy over how violent they were - they were big deal films, but blew up into Biggest Deal films because of controversy as much as anything else.
posted by Frowner at 7:28 AM on September 29, 2017 [5 favorites]

Since I shot off my mouth without dealing with the question of films of the nineties, here are 25 of my favorites from the decade so it isn't all negativity.

Irma Vep
Household Saints
The Little Girl Who Sold the Sun
Through the Olive Trees
To Sleep with Anger
Maborosi
The Story of Qui Ju
Flowers of Shanghai
Latcho Drom
Angels and Insects
Calendar
Dr. Akagi
Mo' Better Blues
The Reflecting Skin
Larks on a String
Safe
Orlando
Nang Nak
The Apple
Careful
Charisma
The Field
Tuvalu
The Secret of Roan Inish
Khuda Gawah
posted by gusottertrout at 8:01 AM on September 29, 2017 [7 favorites]

I remember the mainstream film discourse that appeared in the Chicago Tribune and other non-specialist print sources (because that was what I had access to in the suburbs as a teen), and Spike Lee, Zhang Yimou, Jane Campion, Gas Food Lodging, My Own Private Idaho and Chunking Express were big, big deals.

The whole indy/art house/foreign film industry was a bigger deal in the 90s. In my then urban but definitely non-megalopolitan southeastern US city, one of the mainstream theaters ran "art house"/foreign fare in the evenings for a few years. I saw The Piano, My Own Private Idaho, and Chunking Express in a big, commercial theater. I saw the Three Colors movies at a local art house first and then on a bigger screen in a mainstream theater later on. I bought Sight and Sound, Film Threat, and Film Comment on the newsstand. In retrospect, the 90s looks a lot like the 70s: a period of remarkable confluence between the ideas of film as entertainment and film as serious art.

I feel like another big movie of the 90s, Bonfire of the Vanities, deserves some kind of recognition, if only for being the biggest flightless turkey of the decade.
posted by octobersurprise at 8:13 AM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]

Am I the only one who goes the to the movies almost exclusively as escapism? I spent most of the 90s working in the civil rights and political advocacy sector. Growing up, even the best days had a cloud of sadness hanging over us. I don't pay to cry, or get mad. I pay to laugh, be thrilled and for 90 minutes, forget the shitty world out there.
posted by Room 641-A at 8:14 AM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]

People who never really saw any foreign films, either through lack of access or lack of inclination, would have seen Raise The Red Lantern or one of the others.

Yes, exactly. That's precisely what I was trying to reference above. Everybody was going to the theater to watch these movies with *gasp* subtitles and stuff. And then talking about them at home or in school the next day. Even "low-brow" white guys were all really excited about John Woo's Hong Kong movies in the 90s. ("Broken Arrow was pretty badass, but have you seen Hard Boiled?")

So, yeah. I know it's just a list of six people's favourite 90s films, but it still feels like white-washing -- if not deliberate revisionism -- when you compare what these six people found interesting about 90s films against what was actually going on in that decade.
posted by tobascodagama at 8:19 AM on September 29, 2017

Can't take issue with someone's favorite movie; it's a personal choice based on opinion. But the people the Guardian selected to voice their favorites made this article boring. With the exception of Gummo, almost everyone knows these movies. My guess is that most film critics are straight white males, so why not select other people to voice their favorites? This would make for an interesting article. What's Zadie Smith's favorite '90s movie? Or Roxanne Gay's? John Waters'? Salmon Rushdie's? Tim Gunn's? Kate Bush's?

As is often the case, the mefite comments are the best part of linked article. Holy shit gusottertrout! Haven't seen one of those movies you listed. Thank you!
posted by blairsyprofane at 8:36 AM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]

Am I the only one who goes the to the movies almost exclusively as escapism?

No, not at all. There's nothing wrong with just wanting to be entertained as such, and certainly no great talent involved in seeing any kind of movie, mainstream or otherwise. The difference of opinion comes down more to how people react to criticism about those movies and the claims over looking at what is being enjoyed as "ruining" the pleasures.

No one can keep anyone else from liking what they like. It's just that some of us find what is being liked problematic in its conventions all too frequently. There seems to be this idea that movies made outside the mainstream can't be escapist, that they're serious and glum or something. That isn't the case or alternative being pushed.

It's more akin to the idea of people saying after a long day I just want to sit and listen to Andrew Dice Clay and get a laugh. Anyone can do that, but there will be others who might point out that the jokes in his routine can cause offense and, in a way, harm. Pointing that out is part of the process that causes many to see things they once liked in a new light over time as their sensibilities change and suddenly see all the problematic elements they missed by simply enjoying it in context of its time where the norms were themselves more troubling than remembered.

On the other side then is encouraging people to find whatever kind of pleasure they seek from a more diverse set of sources. I guarantee there are comedies and action movies from all over the world that can provide escapism just as well as the mainstream movies can.

Again though, that isn't to place a premium importance on movie or tv watching, the other things people do instead are at the minimum as important or likely even more so, it's just to say movie watching isn't any more a "free" escape than any other part of life. There are values being communicated and, writ large, they matter too.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:56 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

I think I could have been clearer in saying that I use movies as escapism as a general rule, not as an excuse for liking certain movies. Ie, I never saw Schindler's List, not becaue I don't think it's good or important, but that's the sad cloud that hung over my family. But I totally agree that as critical lists go, this one is predictable and bland.

That said, I do think that invoking Andre Dice Clay is pretty extreme, because no one here is defending watching outwardly hateful movies, either as escapism or becaue they think they're important.
posted by Room 641-A at 9:16 AM on September 29, 2017

I mean, saying you come home and relax with Lebowski or Groundhog Day is not really the same as Andrew Dice Clay.
posted by Room 641-A at 9:18 AM on September 29, 2017

Also, one can watch entertaining movies which are by women and people of color - just because you're, for instance, a Black filmmaker doesn't mean that your every movie is a very heavy-duty and tragic tale full of challenging techniques, for instance.

Spike Lee made a number of comedies and there's endless Asian comedies to choose from. I think that because it's harder for women and GLBTQ people to get funded, there are fewer 90s comedies or light movies to choose from, but I remember enjoying Bhaji On The Beach, there's Clueless, etc. The queer comedies I remember from the nineties were often pretty terrible, to be totally honest, but there were John Waters movies.

Hanif Kureshi made a couple of funny movies in the nineties - not his strongest work always, but certainly enjoyable.

I think that we are socialized to a line of thinking that is "'Normal' movies are by white straight men and center white straight men, that's sad but the way it is, and normal movies are the fun ones. So while it's laudable to watch movies by people who aren't white straight men or that do not center white straight men, it really isn't very relaxing or enjoyable, it's sort of a chore. If I want to relax, I just naturally am going to watch 'normal' movies by white straight men about white straight men."
posted by Frowner at 9:25 AM on September 29, 2017 [5 favorites]

That said, I do think that invoking Andre Dice Clay is pretty extreme

Sure, the use was for explaining the nature of the complaints through an obvious example, not to suggest a strict parallel necessarily. (Though there is room for debate around some movies, Tarantino, for example, is viewed by some as being not too far from Dice level.)
posted by gusottertrout at 9:25 AM on September 29, 2017

It turns out there were no movies made in languages other than English in the 1990s! WHO KNEW
posted by zeusianfog at 9:27 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

"Broken Arrow was pretty badass, but have you seen Hard Boiled?"

In my shcool, it was Rumble In The Bronx, which led to a sort of highschool Jackie Chan awakening, and the to Woo.

Also, there was a subgenre of hood films in the 90s that felt important but I don't see discussed so much; New Jack City, Blood In Blood Out, Menace II Society, and Boyz N The Hood come to mind. I keep wanting to mention Do The Right Thing, but I know that was '89.

Growing up in Oakland at the time, those movies coming out was like a bomb going off. They were a Big Deal.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 9:34 AM on September 29, 2017 [7 favorites]

Of course it's not just white people or white men that make purely entertaining films. I was asking about how and why people watch movies in general, but I guess that's really a derail.
posted by Room 641-A at 9:37 AM on September 29, 2017

Picking Western Woo over real Woo is... odd. Though there is always a place in my heart for Face/Off.

That's the one where John Travolta and Nicholas Cage take each others faces.... off.

/does face/off hand motion.
posted by Artw at 9:44 AM on September 29, 2017 [5 favorites]

I wonder if the first Woo anyone sees is the Woo they'll end up stuck with on their proverbial desert island. For me, it was Hardboiled ... and that never really got any better than the first five or ten minutes.
posted by philip-random at 10:24 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Hospital fight!
posted by Artw at 10:33 AM on September 29, 2017

Of course it's not just white people or white men that make purely entertaining films. I was asking about how and why people watch movies in general, but I guess that's really a derail.

The pacing of the thread made it read to me like you were saying "but I don't want to watch all these non-mainstream-white-guy movies because they're not escapist, and I need to take a break". I'm sorry I misunderstood you.

My mother always used to say she didn't want to watch upsetting movies because life was upsetting enough. When I was young and carefree, I thought of this as intellectually lazy - because I was, like, a teenager and a snob - but honestly, I don't watch a lot of really depressing movies anymore myself. I wouldn't say that I seek out super light-weight ones, but I tend to watch a lot of older movies (so there's some distance on any political issues) and movies that aren't totally sad. We watch a lot of Miyazaki movies around here, actually, and probably my favorite movie is La Dolce Vita (speaking of movie choices that are kind of banal - everyone likes Dolce Vita, because it is the most beautiful movie in the world).
posted by Frowner at 11:08 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

The pacing of the thread made it read to me like you were saying "but I don't want to watch all these non-mainstream-white-guy movies because they're not escapist, and I need to take a break". I'm sorry I misunderstood you.

No worries! I was really just typing out loud and it confused everything. That said, even though I blame brain fog and finances for not seeing many movies at all in the last 15 years or so, I could do more than just swiping at the low-hanging fruit.
posted by Room 641-A at 11:35 AM on September 29, 2017

But I totally agree that as critical lists go, this one is predictable and bland.

Predictable it surely isn't because if last week someone said the Guardian would be asking five critics to pick their favourites of the 90s, Gummo and Romeo + Juliet would be mentioned by exactly 0 people. I mean, to me, Romeo + Juliet at this point is just an alternate video to The Cardigans' Lovefool and Gummo is something Korine did somewhere between Kids and Spring Breakers.

It's in all likelihood bland because "pick one" is a terrible sample. If you asked everyone here to pick their one favourite movie of the 90s, you'd also end up with a list dominated by "predictable and bland" titles. There would be a gazillion Gummos in there, but the most popular movies of the decade - the Lebowskis, Pulp Fictions and Matrixes would pile up votes and edge out the rest, even if they wouldn't get maybe more than a handful of votes.
posted by lmfsilva at 11:36 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Ooh, Tykho Moon is great 90s sci-fi. Directed/written by Enki Bilal, and it has Julie Delpy, Michel Piccoli, Jean-Louis Trintignant ...

Not perhaps the best of 90s but I do prefer it to The Fifth Element, and I feel it deserves a wider audience.
posted by sapagan at 12:44 PM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]

Earth Star Voyager (1988)
Dead Poets Society (1989)
Point Break (1991)
In the Name of the Father (1993)
The Craft (1996)
Crazy Six (1997)
My Dog Vincent (1997)
Gattaca (1997)
Pi (1998)
The Matrix (1999)
posted by pftoet at 1:16 PM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Scream is the one that's gonna hold up in its category for years and years, Empire Records is the one that has Rex Manning Day so [shrug emoji]
posted by threetwentytwo at 2:34 PM on September 29, 2017

Also, The Minority Report, because of the overall and the prescience.
posted by Oyéah at 3:32 PM on September 29, 2017

Enemy of the State would be on there if we'd realized at the time it was a documentary.

Be sure to watch Enemy of the State and The Siege as a depressing double feature of 90s near-future dystopias and see how plausible they seem now.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 6:49 PM on September 29, 2017 [5 favorites]

Starship Troopers
Starship Troopers
Starship Troopers
Ravenous
Starship Troopers
posted by brundlefly at 4:02 PM on September 30, 2017 [2 favorites]

Oyéah, Minority Report was 2002.
posted by brundlefly at 4:03 PM on September 30, 2017

Since ActingTheGoat already called out Ebenmy of the State, I'll take a moment to draw attention to Three Kings, which a lot of people don't realize is a powerful anti-war film. I saw it opening weekend because my BF was excited to see it. I didn't know anything about it and it seemed like such a weird choice, but it's really a great movie.
posted by Room 641-A at 4:05 PM on September 30, 2017 [4 favorites]

Three Kings is great, and yeah. I've run into a shocking number of people who believe it "glorifies" war.
posted by brundlefly at 4:40 PM on September 30, 2017

Lone Scherfig has a nineties' sensibility across her oeuvre:

Their Finest (2017)
The Riot Club (2015)
One Day (2011)
An Education (2009)
Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself(2004)
Italian For Beginners (2002)

I hazard she made movies before 2002 as well?
posted by pftoet at 9:33 AM on October 2, 2017

Space Jam
Space Jam
Space Jam
Space Jam
Space Jam
posted by Cookiebastard at 9:51 AM on October 5, 2017 [1 favorite]