unexpectedly good movies

[Interrobang]

One of my all-time favorite movies is Jonathan Demme’s Something Wild. Melanie Griffith has never been anywhere close to this good again, and Jeff Daniels and Ray Liotta are excellent as well. The structure of the film rewards re-viewing – it’s amazing how closely the second half of the film, when the tone shifts, mirrors and inverts the first half.

Great, great, movie that doesn’t get enough credit.

[Max_Torque]

@Merkwurdigliebe

Okay, here’s a good one. LA Story. This is by and large just a stupid chick flick from outward appearances, but I really feel like it’s a good movie. It really parodies wacky LA culture which is really even wackier now considering how it seems dated. But it really has a lot of heart and is very whimsical and romantic.

I’ll second that one. I was working in a movie theater when it came out, so I got to see it quite a bit. Still love it, still one of my favorite movies. I love the little jokes that you can miss on the first viewing, like the “Slow-Mo” setting on his shower, and the trendy restaurant named “L’Idiot” (pronounced like “liddy-o”), and the “Pollo del Mar” hotel (“Chicken of the Sea”).

[Robot_Arm]

@Max Torque

I’ll second that one. I was working in a movie theater when it came out, so I got to see it quite a bit. Still love it, still one of my favorite movies. I love the little jokes that you can miss on the first viewing, like the “Slow-Mo” setting on his shower, and the trendy restaurant named “L’Idiot” (pronounced like “liddy-o”), and the “Pollo del Mar” hotel (“Chicken of the Sea”).

It’s one of my favorites, too; I think I counted six Shakespeare references. And that’s Terry Jones doing the voice of Sara’s mother. I saw a great outtake once. There are references in the movie to agent Harry Zell (“I hear he’s nice.” “Yeah, he’d only stab you in the back in self defence.”) In the outtake Harris does lunch with Zell after he loses his job as a weatherman (meteorologist). Zell arrives by jetpack, pitches the most appalling project ideas, and sings profanity at the top of his lungs in the restaurant. He’s played by John Lithgow.

It’s one of the few romances that doesn’t try to make its characters generically perfect, just perfect for each other.

[Litoris]

Ahhh, another one I thought of is Magnolia. Everyone I know hated it, but me, my husband, my ex and our daughter. It’s just so…I donno, but I loved it. Totally unexpected that it would be so good.

[vetbridge]

@Litoris

Ahhh, another one I thought of is Magnolia. Everyone I know hated it, but me, my husband, my ex and our daughter. It’s just so…I donno, but I loved it. Totally unexpected that it would be so good.

Add me to the loved it list. I like it a little more each time I see it.

[uncle_squeegee]

@Merkwurdigliebe

Love the username:
“Kittens give Morbo gas…”

Ha! Lemme Guess

When Stephen Segal gets killed?

As for mine? I feel that my inputs won’t really count. Mainly because I underestimate them going in, and I appreciate them more for other reasons.

Take Commando, for example. By all means a thoroughly bad movie, but there are so many classic Arnie moments to make up for it. And let’s not forget the part where he jumps out of a plane going 100+ MPH from a height of at least 200 feet and lands in a marsh.

Okay, here’s a good one. LA Story. This is by and large just a stupid chick flick from outward appearances, but I really feel like it’s a good movie. It really parodies wacky LA culture which is really even wackier now considering how it seems dated. But it really has a lot of heart and is very whimsical and romantic

Then there’s always a movie like Point Break. There’s no objective reason to like it at all, but for some reason it simply works for me.

<hijack> I think that Commando is the ne plus ultra of Arnie movies. For fun, try and count the number of people he kills (just those visible on screen) in the climax. I always lose count.</hijack>

[Elendil_s_Heir]

Aww, everybody already named my favorite unexpectedly-good movies…

Time After Time was on over and over again on HBO in the late 1970s, and I watched it every chance I got. A great time-travel story, thriller and romance rolled into one.

I first caught The Hidden * in a drafty New Hampshire theater when it first came out, and I was hooked. An outstanding SF thriller, buddy movie and tragicomedy.
*
Executive Decision was much better than I expected, with some twists and turns (including the one spoilered above) that really drew me in.

More recently, Hancock was much better than I thought it would be, given the mixed reviews. I really liked it - even more than The Dark Knight, truth be told. By no means a perfect movie, but in turn funny, thrilling, romantic and tragic.

[MrSquishy]

I expected to despise Hot Rod. Instead, I loved it.

[Terminus_Est]

The trailers for Fight Club made it out to be about Brad Pitt beating other people up and getting beaten in turn. There is that in the movie, but much more. So much more.

[Rattlehead02]

@Robot Arm

It’s one of my favorites, too; I think I counted six Shakespeare references. And that’s Terry Jones doing the voice of Sara’s mother. I saw a great outtake once. There are references in the movie to agent Harry Zell (“I hear he’s nice.” “Yeah, he’d only stab you in the back in self defence.”) In the outtake Harris does lunch with Zell after he loses his job as a weatherman (meteorologist). Zell arrives by jetpack, pitches the most appalling project ideas, and sings profanity at the top of his lungs in the restaurant. He’s played by John Lithgow.

It’s one of the few romances that doesn’t try to make its characters generically perfect, just perfect for each other.

I’ll chime in for my love of this movie.

1. I loved SJP in it. Only time that’s happened
2. Steve Martin can never do wrong in oddball indie type drama/comedies
3. The version of Amazing Grace on bagpipes was my dad’s favorite version and a similar sounding version was played at his funeral. 10 years later and the movie still chokes me up. Massive bonus points for that.

Back on topic:

I really thought The Matador was going to kinda suck just be cause I think Pierce Brosnan kinda sucks. He’s not awful by any means, I’ve just never liked any of his other movies, including the Bond films.

But holy crap, him playing a fucked up contract killer who befriends Greg Kinnear at a hotel bar in Mexico? It was fantastic! He nailed the character, and I’m a big Kinnear fan so I’m a happy camper.

Jeff

[cactus_waltz]

@Oy!

I just watched Lars and the Real Girl this weekend, and was shocked at how good it was, and that I would actually recommend it to my 88 year old mother.

The Terminator totally surprised me, like so many here. I watched it on tape, and in the first three minutes am going “Wait a minute. This is actual science fiction!”

The Forty Year Old Virgin surprised me. I don’t know what I expected, but I didn’t expect a rather sweet and romantic, although thoroughly profanity-laced movie about relationships, and in which said virgin was the least screwed up and most interesting of his small band of brothers even before he started dating. Considering that movie was made by and for men, don’t ever try to tell me guys aren’t interested in gossip and relationships!

I can definitely agree with all three of them.

Mean girls surprised me. A high-school movie featuring Lindsey Lohan? Well, it turned out to be hillarious. Of course, it is written by Tina Fey and also features Don Cheadle – though, I didn’t know that at the time I started watching.

[Gatopescado]

I have a bad habit of watching really bad movies when I can’t sleep. **Ulee’s Gold ** was a welcome surprise. Pretty good movie. So was Affliction.

[Lochdale]

@3acresandatruck

Runaway Train. Perhaps I’m the only person for whom it was unexpected, but I never saw it during its release due to the way it was promoted. When I saw commercials and posters like this, all I could think was “how can you make a car chase movie with a train?” Maybe I’ve got it all wrong, but to me, that’s not what’s about at all. The first time I saw it was on broadcast TV when I was too lazy to do anything else, and I was stunned. I’m unable to describe what Manny and the train, moving inexorably through that amazingly bleak, frozen landscape mean to me, but it’s something that really reaches deep inside and shakes me to the core.

Excellent choice. Blew me away as well and what an ending. Eric Roberts was fantastic in it as well. Great movie.

I’d have to say Lonesome Dove. Didn’t thinkthey could do the book any justice. It had Ricky Schroeder in it for pete’s sake. Man was I wrong. What a brilliant movie (I know it was a mini-series but it’s still just top class. The secene with Anjelica Houston and Tommy Lee Jones is just class).

[Ponch8]

@Litoris

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.

Hudson Hawk is also one of my favorites. What’s not to like about a movie featuring an accidental decapitation, followed by a joke about the victim missing a hat convention?

While it wasn’t one of my favorites, Road Trip with Tom Green was also a lot better than I thought it would be.

[vetbridge]

I was pleasantly surprised by Weirdsville. Think Trainspotting, done for laughs.

[Elendil_s_Heir]

I took my family to Enchanted expecting to see a run-of-the-mill Disney flick about princesses in Fairyland, yadda yadda yadda, and was surprised and pleased to find a very witty, fun, subversive take of all of the usual tropes about princesses in Fairyland, led by the delectable and very talented Amy Adams.

[divemaster]

@Mojo Pin

I mentioned this movie in a another thread recently, but I’m still kinda excited about it. The Chaser, a somewhat recent hidden gem from korea. … Actually I just realized that there probably isn’t a way for people outside of Korea to get a copy of the movie without downloading. It’s getting remade by Leo DiCaprio and WB, so I really hope they don’t dumb it down or something.

This has been on my radar screen for a few weeks. Heard all sorts of good stuff about it. The DVD can be bought from online retailers such as DVDAsian.com and YesAsia.com. A really sharp-looking 2 DVD SE. I ordered mine from YesAsia and expect to get it in a few days.

The movie I thought was going to suck, and which I purposely avoided, was Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. From what I could see it looked really lame. Some dudes doing a third-rate Jeff Spicoli imitation. When I finally watched it at a party I was amazed at just how clever and outright hilarious it was. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

[CalMeacham]

I have to admit that I’m surprised by some of the choices here, but only because people didn’t expect them to be good. I fully expected Runaway Train to be excellent – it’s based on an Akira Kurasawa screenplay! And has Jon Voigt! The only suggestion that it might not be good was that it came from that schlock factory, Golan-Globus. Just proves that a good film can come from anywhere.
But I guess the thread’s nature IS highly personal – this is movies that the person writing in didn’t expect to be good, and learned otherwise.

[WormTheRed]

Ditto on Harold & Kumar. Thought it was going to be a typical stoner-movie but I liked it so much I actually watched again the day after first watching it.

And here I go out on a limb to suggest Alien vs Predator 2. Went to the movies (yes, I was **very **bored) expecting the same suckfest as the first one was, but it turns out it was actually a really cool and creepy action flick!

[simply_cats]

@abbeytxs

I agree with many of the already named movies, but my most recent “didn’t expect it to be good movie” was Lars and the Real Girl.

I had no idea what to expect. A movie about a guy who falls for a life sized sex doll?!
It was a really well done, captivating, movie.

I wasn’t going to chime in on this thread, just lurk and make a list of things to see But I do agree with this one. I was touched by the townspeople’s affection for Lars, and the lengths they took it. Good movie. Makes me feel good about people and friendships.