stoli, I’ll third that nomination for Cube. Saw it a few weeks ago – neat movie! I was really surprised that they could keep a 90-minute movie with only six or seven characters, and a limited set, that interesting. I understand a sequel is in the works right now (titled Cube: Tesseract).
Another vote for Cube. Easily the greatest single-set (a 17 foot cube) movie ever made.
A few reccommendations:
Whit Stillman:
Metropolitan
Barcelona
The Last Days of Disco
Atom Egoyan:
The Adjuster
Exotica
The Sweet Hereafter
Random Picks:
Blind Fury: Rutger Hauer as a blind master swordsman.
A Chinese Ghost Story: The Greatest Hong Kong martial arts fantasy movie.
Gates of Heaven: Documentary about pet cemetaries and the people who run them.
Silent Running: SF about the caretaker of a space station with Earth’s last natural habitats.
Killer Klowns from Outer Space: Better than it sounds.
Zanshin:
Get! Out!
::Races off to google::
So in the sequel we can expect multi-dimensional characterizations?
An Australian film called Bliss. One of the neatestmovies I have ever seen.
Actually, slight mispost on my part – the subtitle of the sequel is ‘Hypercube’, not ‘Tesseract’. I found this information at http://www.corona.bc.ca/films/main.html.
Among recent films: Kirikou
An animated flick, good for the whole family, based on West African legends. Absolutely fantastic.
Less than recent (1969): Putney Swope
The token Black guy on the board of directors of an ad agency winds up as chairman. Hilarity ensues. Directed by Robert Downey (a prince).
The Year My Voice Broke is a beautifully rendered Australian film about coming of age in small-town Australia. Its sequel, Flirting is also very good.
I will chime in on Lone Star (one of the best films in recent years), which is a murder mystery that winds up exploring cultural/racial relationships and tensions along the Texas/Mexican border. It was directed by John Sayles,w ho also did Eight Men Out. I also highly recommend Men with Guns, another of his films, about a Central American doctor/teacher who goes looking for some of his old students and gets some hard lessons.
I will also give an “amen” to the previously-mentioned Cube, The Sweet Hereafter, and Bottle Rocket.
Oh yeah, and I also recommend the brilliant but under-appreciated Restoration featuring Robert Downey, Jr.
I recommend Killer Klownz from Outer Space, too. It’s a weird and silly but now a cult movie, once called my personal guilty pleasure.
Now that I’ve grown up, still not ashamed by enjoying it.
David Lynch has a strange film named Lost Highway. Not very coherent or consistent, but he polished his weird-directing concept later with Mulholland Drive.
I’ll chip in with “Shallow Grave”, its a British thriller about three flat mates who find a corpse with a suitcase full of money and decide to keep it. It gets very creepy as the tension builds up and stars Ewan McGreggar.
I’ll add Session 9 (IMDB page), a very creepy low budget horror film set in probably the scariest building ever made.
Damn… some good ones here already. I recently saw Session 9 myself, and suffice to say I never want to see it again. That scary. I’ll also chip in a second for Shallow Grave, especially for a great ending, and add yet another recommendation for Cube (though it’s starting to sound like its pretty well-known now).
A couple of my own favorites, new to the list:
Miracle Mile - Finally coming out on DVD in a week or so (fullscreen only, blah), this is a very cool movie starring a very young Anthony Edwards. It’s about the end of the world. Maybe. A very tight thriller.
Closet Land - A strange little set piece of a film, starring the always-wonderful Madeline Stowe, playing against Alan Rickman in what has to be his finest and most challenging film role. The vast majority of the film takes place in a single room. Somewhat disturbing, but powerful.
Matewan, by John Sales, is a great story about the battle of coal miners trying to form a union versus the evil company and the prejudices of other townsfolk. with Chris Cooper, David Strathairn and James Earl Jones.
And
Miller’s Crossing by the Coen Brothers. Just released on DVD, a very stylized gangster/love story/morality play. With Gabrial Byrne, John Tuturro, Albert Finney and Marcia Gay Harden.
Gotcha! = I don’t think this was overly popular except on VHS but it was a great ‘college-kid suddenly chased across Europe by Soviet Bloc spies’ movie.
Enjoyed many posted choices, esp Lone Star, Voice Broke, and Miller’s Crossing.
King of the Hill directed by Steve Soderbergh, based on A.E. Hotchner’s memoirs. Sepia-toned Depression-era coming-of-age story. Works on many levels. One of my favorite films.
Local Hero
The oil business approaches small Scottish coastal town; so many quirky scenes, so many poignant ones as well. And a Mark Knopfler soundtrack.
You Can Count On Me
Slice of life movie, brother-sister relationship, but this is no dreary domestic drama. Good stuff, but not exciting enough for the box office.
Mute Witness - low-budget independent movie (with Steve Buscemi in a cameo) that was marketed wrongly, and as a consequence didn’t get the kudos I feel it should have. It was promoted as a horror movie (with a really schlocky poster and video box), but it isn’t, it’s a thriller, and a pretty good one at that.
Taking notes here–
Wolfman, I’m trying to figure out what your first suggestion was because I liked The Tao of Steve and I’m always on the lookout for a good movie. I couldn’t find it on IMDB. Any more info on it?
I’m enthusiastically seconding Lone Star and The Last of Sheila.
Try The House of Yes, Swimming with Sharks, or, if you managed not to see it, The Last Seduction. Also, Beautiful Girls is kind of like The Tao of Steve – everyday guys and their troubles with women.
Go
And I definately second ** You Can Count on Me**
Paperhouse - moody, disturbing British sort-of horror film