# Movies that made a big pop culture splash but are now disporportionately forgotten **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 16, 2014, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755 "2014-11-16T08:07:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/1 "2014-11-16T08:07:05Z")
I’m talking about movies that were quite popular and really seemed to capture the zeitgeist but which have now faded more than one might have expected. The fading is especially poignant if the movies were actually pretty original. Let me give some counter-examples before I give examples. _Star Wars_, _Back to the Future_, and _Pulp Fiction_ were huge in their day and, if anything, have only grown in stature over time (that is, they are more popular today than similarly popular movies from their time are today). So I’m talking about the opposite of that. I have two examples, one from the 80s and one from the 90s, both of which I saw in the theater, and both of which really seemed “in the air” at the time and seemed “important” in terms of pop culture. The first is _A Fish Called Wanda_ (1988) > **[A Fish Called Wanda (1988) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095159/?ref_=nv_sr_1)** > > A Fish Called Wanda: Directed by Charles Crichton, John Cleese. With John Cleese, Jamie Lee Curtis, Kevin Kline, Michael Palin. In London, four very different people team up on a jewel heist, then try to double-cross one another for the loot,... I don’t remember liking this movie. But it was everywhere. It had a wacky, edgy sense of humor (or so it tried to have, and people seemed to agree). It was as hip as anything was in 1988. It won an Oscar and got a bunch of nominations. It has a high 7.6 rating on IMDb, but does anyone talk or for that matter think about this movie any more? I see no evidence for it. The second is _There’s Something About Mary_ (1998) > **[There's Something About Mary (1998) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0129387/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1)** > > There's Something About Mary: Directed by Bobby Farrelly, Peter Farrelly. With Cameron Diaz, Matt Dillon, Ben Stiller, Lee Evans. A man gets a chance to meet up with his dream girl from high school, even though his date with her back then was a... Now this is a movie that I _did_ love. I saw it in the theater twice definitely, and it may have been three times (it was so funny that I enjoyed seeing how other people reacted to its outrageous humor). It was tremendously popular, got a lot of press, and seemed one of the It movies of the year, if not the entire decade of the 90s. But something happened to this movie; it has seemed to decay before my eyes in its reputation and between my eyes in its entertainment value. The 90s is a decade whose comedies have seemed to retain their appeal rather well: _Dumb and Dumber, American Pie_, etc. But this one just doesn’t seem that popular any more. At 7.1, its IMDb rating is healthy and would not seem to reflect its once stratospheric popularity. Now, I could be wrong about the above movies: I may be overestimating their former popularity or underestimating their current status. Feel free to weigh in. And what movies do you have in mind that have similarly decayed over the years? ---
**Author:** ![Tread](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/53a042/32.png) [@Tread](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tread)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 8:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/2 "2014-11-16T08:19:32Z")
St. Elmo’s Fire (1985) fits well into that category in my opinion ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/3 "2014-11-16T08:24:25Z")
> [@Tread](#): > > St. Elmo’s Fire (1985) fits well into that category in my opinion I agree. It got a big Brat Pack boost at the time but is not grouped with _The Breakfast Club_ at al. as an 80s classic, or even as a good watch. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 9:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/4 "2014-11-16T09:37:22Z")
_Crocodile Dundee_. Despite being the second-biggest hit of 1986, other than a few “That’s not a knife” jokes, it’s been largely forgotten. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 10:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/5 "2014-11-16T10:11:01Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > _Crocodile Dundee_. Despite being the second-biggest hit of 1986, other than a few “That’s not a knife” jokes, it’s been largely forgotten. Good one. Yeah, seems very dated now. ---
**Author:** ![campp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@campp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/campp)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/6 "2014-11-16T12:10:19Z")
_Big Chill_ was a huge hit with my group. ---
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/7 "2014-11-16T12:20:06Z")
Austin Powers, International Man of Mystery was huge. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/8 "2014-11-16T12:20:21Z")
Dark Crystal and Legend. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/9 "2014-11-16T12:29:05Z")
I’m having a tough time thinking of examples of my own, but I think the all ones already mentioned are good. Amazingly enough, I saw at least a decent chunk of every one of these (ETA: other than the two mentioned by **Shakes** ), and it doesn’t surprise me that most of them have faded. (ETA: My opinion of most of them at the time was that they weren’t very good. Especially _The Big Chill._) Even the two that I liked at the time - _Croc Dundee_ and _A Fish Called Wanda_ - I’ve practically forgotten. I remember that I tried to watch _St. Elmo’s Fire_ because it had that “if you liked _The Breakfast Club_, you’ll like this too” thing going for it. Despite being out of the target age group (I was already \>30 in 1985), I really liked _The Breakfast Club_, but got bored with _St. Elmo_ in the first half hour. ---
**Author:** ![Les\_Espaces\_Du\_Sommeil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/les_espaces_du_sommeil/32/308_2.png) [@Les\_Espaces\_Du\_Sommeil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Les_Espaces_Du_Sommeil)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/10 "2014-11-16T12:58:43Z")
The first that comes to mind is one I’ve mentioned here before: _Dead Poets Society_. It was one of the very few films that _everybody_ in my age group saw in the theatres when it came out. We were all talking about how it was the film for our generation, quoting it repeatedly. By the mid-90s, none of my friends mentioned it in their favourite movies lists. It sort of just vanished from our collective minds. Good call on _Crocodile Dundee_. It was the funniest thing ever then. It’s pretty much forgotten now. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/11 "2014-11-16T13:06:11Z")
Maybe it’s not quite the same thing because it’s more recent but it seems like everyone has quickly just decided The Dark Knight Rises was a bad movie and swept it under a rug. Note I am not a huge fan of it either but it seemed the public’s opinion of it just turned on a dime after it came out. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/12 "2014-11-16T13:06:17Z")
Freakin’ **American Beauty** - god, was that held up as an amazingly deep, insightful view of the desperate life of suburban Americans, or what? What a load of crap. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/13 "2014-11-16T13:20:52Z")
I see from IMDB that the most popular film released in the 1980s was… (wait for it) Beetlejuice. (Beetle-_what_? I hear the under-30’s cry) Not that that necessarily means it made a big pop-culture splash, but … I think (from memory) it did. Tim Burton! Winona Ryder! Talking of Winona Ryder … how about _Heathers_. Not that it wasn’t a good movie (it was) - but does anyone still remember it much? ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/14 "2014-11-16T13:40:59Z")
> [@Les\_Espaces\_Du\_Sommeil](#): > > The first that comes to mind is one I’ve mentioned here before: _Dead Poets Society_. It was one of the very few films that _everybody_ in my age group saw in the theatres when it came out. We were all talking about how it was the film for our generation, quoting it repeatedly. By the mid-90s, none of my friends mentioned it in their favourite movies lists. It sort of just vanished from our collective minds. Good example. I think like _The Big Chill_ mentioned above, there is a species of series and very boring movies that manage to get some attention but quickly fade. Crap like _On Golden Pond_, _The English Patient_, etc. But I think Dead Poets is a particularly good example of such “meaning-y” movies. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/15 "2014-11-16T13:43:25Z")
> [@WordMan](#): > > Freakin’ **American Beauty** - god, was that held up as an amazingly deep, insightful view of the desperate life of suburban Americans, or what? > > What a load of crap. Yeah, I saw this one mentioned on a list recently of movies that have faded. 1999 is an interesting year, a huge year for movies. A lot have not survived their initial hype. _Magnolia_ or _Eyes Wide Shut_, anyone? ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/16 "2014-11-16T13:53:36Z")
E.T. was a monstrously large cultural event when it came out, but almost none of that impact has lingered. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/17 "2014-11-16T13:54:15Z")
When I saw the thread title I thought of Splash before I even finished reading it (because I saw the word splash). Checking out wiki, it did almost 70 million at the box office and you’d probably have trouble finding people over 20 or 25 that have seen it, heard of it or even know who Daryl Hannah is. ---
**Author:** ![JKilez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e5b9ba/32.png) [@JKilez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKilez)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/18 "2014-11-16T14:04:24Z")
> [@Shakes](#): > > Dark Crystal and Legend. Add in _Willow_ for the trifecta. > [@Aeschines](#): > > _Magnolia_ or _Eyes Wide Shut_, anyone? I do not think that this thread is supposed to be about movies that absolutely, positively rock. 🙂 How about _Natural Born Killers_? It was shocking and had an edgy style. It was going to change the way movies were made. Whatever splash it made was overshadowed by _Pulp Fiction_ which was released a couple of months later and actually had that impact. ---
**Author:** ![kellner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c2a13f/32.png) [@kellner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kellner)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/19 "2014-11-16T14:10:26Z")
_Avatar_ was the biggest thing ever for a while, but for a movie with that kind of box office it seems to have gone downhill really fast. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755/20 "2014-11-16T14:29:30Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > I see from IMDB that the most popular film released in the 1980s was… > > (wait for it) > > Beetlejuice. > > (Beetle-_what_? I hear the under-30’s cry) > > Not that that necessarily means it made a big pop-culture splash, but … I think (from memory) it did. Tim Burton! Winona Ryder! Oh no, that one’s still awesome! _Pause_ _checks ID_ Oh. Officially not an under 30. Well, I hope someone’s schooling them in the wonderful-ness of this one. I for one love it! > [@](#): > > Talking of Winona Ryder … how about _Heathers_. Not that it wasn’t a good movie (it was) - but does anyone still remember it much? Doesn’t this one still get quoted and mentioned? I feel like it’s gotten a bit of pop culture love. They made it into a musical, too, didn’t they? (Granted, what isn’t a musical?) I don’t think it has the traction of, say, a Clueless, but I think it at least approaches cult classic status. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-that-made-a-big-pop-culture-splash-but-are-now-disporportionately-forgotten/704755.md?page=2)