Speaking of “House”, the movie of that name, and also the totally unrelated “House II”, were both good mixtures of scary and absurd. I saw them both recently, and while they’re a bit dated, I still liked them.
I’m going to go out on a banyan limb here at say George of the Jungle.
It’s clear that someone in the writing process were people who genuinely cared about the original source material and brought it out. And casting Brendan Fraser as the perky, optimistic beefcake George was brilliant. Plus the breaking of the fourth wall really worked.
Curiously, its sister movie Dudley Dooright didn’t have this at all despite a similar production crew and Fraser in the lead. It was just small and weak in all respects.
Time After Time was not a success in the theatre. I mean, a movie about H.G. Wells following Jack the Ripper to modern day San Francisco? I saw it three times in the theatre, and in ten years I only met one other person who ever saw it in the theatre.
It has since become a staple for cable movie channels. It is is just unexpectedably GREAT.
I didn’t expect The Terminator to be very good. Nobody knew who the hell James Cameron was when it came out, and the ads made it look to me as if it was a low-budget sci-fi flick featuring people running around LA with rubber masks.
Then I saw it, and was blown away.
Other unexpected great flicks:
Creator – Peter O’Toole plays a Nobel Laureate trying to clone his dead wife. Jeremy Leven wittily adapts his own book. Utterly unlike any other “clone” movie
The Adventures of Mark Twain – Will Vinton studio’s only full-length Claymation* feature tells several of Twain’s lesser-known stories, with James Whimore doing Twain. Twain’s one of my favorite authors, and the combination of Vinton’s claymation and Twain’s wit is irresistable.
*“Claymation” doesn’t just mean clay animation – it’s a trademark of Vinton’s studio. I loved Vinton’s work, but they’ve pretty much folded. People have flocked to aardman for their plasticine animation, but Vinton was doing the same thi ng, earlier, and he and his incredibnly talented bunch deserve more recognition than they’ve received.
I really enjoyed this - the movie was so much better than the book. I thought the only weak link in the movie was Mariel Hemingway, who just didn’t work for me.
Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Blake Edwards’ S.O.B. It is most famous for Julie Andrew’s topless scene, but it is a surprisingly funny movie.
mack – I agree 10000% on Valley Girl. I read that they’re talking about re-doing it, I hope not. It just wouldn’t make sense now. But, yeh, that movie is what hooked me on Nic Cage. He is truly an amazing actor.
Funny enough, the movie that turned me onto Leo DiCaprio as an excellent (adult) actor was The Basketball Diaries. Totally did not expect that to be any good. I mean, hell, no one knows who Jim Carroll is/was, but me and the 5 guys that used to listen to his music with me!
The thing is, when I talk about unexpectedly good movies, I am thinking b-movies or movies with nothing but b-movie actors. Galaxy Quest? Yeh, I figured it’d be good, I lurve Alan Rickman. Same with Hitchhiker’s Guide – I pretty much expected it to be good.
I too went to see The Terminator when it first came out, knowing nothing about it, and expecting very little, other than a bit of groping with my g/f. The funny thing was, there was only about 8 people in the theatre, and I could have got away with anything, but 2 hrs later I was walking out of there in a daze, along with everyone else, blown away by what we had seen. Even my g/f seemed to enjoy it…she sat there silently, squeezed my hand at the appropriate moments, and didn’t sneak off to the loo once, I don’t think. I may have missed it, I was that absorbed with the movie!
A lot of films.
Off the top of my head, I find Robocop to be a great movie. It is not just a fun action film.
The In Crowd should be watched with the commentary track from the two lead actresses. (Rachel Ward and Lori Heuring) Freaking hysterical and strangely insightful, best commentary track ever.
Babe the Gallant Pig is one of my favorite films. Rock solid film making.
Here’s another vastly under-rated film if you like your futuristic fantasy stuff… “Spacehunter: Adventures Of The Forbidden Zone”! Like a cheapo cross between Star Wars and Mad Max, it’s nowhere near as bad as it sounds.
Was that by any chance a Full Moon Entertainment movie? I think I have heard of it. Another movie I just thought about that was a “flop” in theatres and everyone claimed sucked but is still one of my all-time favourites – Hudson Hawk. I donno, maybe because it got such bad reviews I just didn’t expect it to be any good, but I loved it.
I don’t think it was Full Moon – I think it predates them.
Spacehunter was another of the many 3-D movies that came out in the early 1980s. Its attraction was that it was a space movie with special effects in 3-D. It also had Michael Ironside playing the Bad Guy.
I have to respectfully disagree with the poster on this – I didn’t care much for Spacehunter even with 3D. I couldn’t imagine watching it it without its raison d-etre.
I do agree with Zebra about RoboCop. Even though I knew this was going to be big-budget, I wasn’y expecting much from it. I was astonished at how literate the script was and how well-done it was. again, I’d expected something cheesy and was pleasantly surprised.
I was unpleasantly surprised when much of the same team (director Veerhoeven, co-wrirer Neumeier, and others) took Starship Troopers and trashed it.
Thanks for the heads up, Derleth. I also read some intersting comments on the Twin Galaxies message board that Scott linked to. While I’ll still reccomend the movie, I’ll do so with a grain of salt. Or a million little pieces of salt.
“Space Hunter” was one of Molly Ringwald’s early roles. It was released in 3D, I saw it with a bunch of my college buddies. While I don’t agree that it was good, I do have fond memories of seeing it because there was drinking involved, and I got a good laugh from the crowd when I yelled something at the screen near the end of the movie.
Ahhhh, that’s why I recognised the title – I have seen it. I have to disagree with then, I didn’t like it. But that’s what this whole thing has been about – people’s opinions.
I’ve loved this movie ever since I was a kid, so it was never really unexpected for me, but I can see how someone would be inclined to pass it over when browsing Netflix: Undercover Blues. On the face of it, it’s a silly little family comedy about two married spies, and it almost comes off looking like a Police Academy or Look Who’s Talking-quality movie without the name recognition. What it is, though, is an entertaining spy action-comedy with brilliant performances by all the cast (especially Dennis Quaid and Stanley Tucci), clever writing, and a wonderful use of New Orleans as the setting. It’s just a really fun movie.
As for me, I have to go with GalaxyQuest too. I expected a goofy parody, but not something that was nearly so…affectionate toward its target as it was. It made fun of Star Trek and its fans without being mean about it, and is funny and watchable in doing so.
I love that movie!
I came in to cite this movie. It had every indication of being a complete dog, and turned out to be a hell of a movie. A remarkably strong ensemble performance.
The other I thought of was “Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle.” Stoner comedies aren’t generally funny and are not my cup of tea, but that movie was a terrific combination of smart and stupid.
The moviegoing crowd must be very different in Tennessee. I lived in Tucson when Shaun of the Dead came out and here in San Diego when Hot Fuzz came out, and both times, everyone and their mother was raving about them.
As for my own contribution to this thread: I normally pick more enlightened fare (I swear! I just finished watching Jean-Pierre Melville’s The Samourai, and the last DVD I bought was Noah Baumbach’s Kicking and Screaming–no, not the Will Ferrell one), but I was pleasantly surprised by Gotham Knight, the straight-to-DVD collection of six animated mini-films set between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. I avoided it before I saw The Dark Knight, because I thought it’d be just a way to rake in money on TDK’s back, but the animation is gorgeous, the stories are pretty cool and they’re all sincere efforts at badassery and pull it off well. I was also quite surprised that all of the animation directors (and most of the people involved in the creative side of the project, save the writers) were Japanese or Korean. DC Comics was not who I expected to go that route, but they pulled it off beautifully.
Also, I have to second The King of Kong.