20 Movies from the Last 20 Years That Not Enough People Know About

by s.kelly-25 | created - 30 Sep 2010 | updated - 04 Oct 2010 | Public

Reasoning and reordering soon to follow

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1. Miller's Crossing (1990)

R | 115 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller

66 Metascore

Tom Reagan, an advisor to a Prohibition-era crime boss, tries to keep the peace between warring mobs but gets caught in divided loyalties.

Directors: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen | Stars: Gabriel Byrne, Albert Finney, John Turturro, Marcia Gay Harden

Votes: 142,191 | Gross: $5.08M

2. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005)

R | 103 min | Comedy, Crime, Mystery

73 Metascore

After being mistaken for an actor, a New York thief is sent to Hollywood to train under a private eye for a potential movie role, but the duo are thrown together with a struggling actress into a murder mystery.

Director: Shane Black | Stars: Robert Downey Jr., Val Kilmer, Michelle Monaghan, Corbin Bernsen

Votes: 237,484 | Gross: $4.24M

3. Brick (2005)

R | 110 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery

72 Metascore

A teenage loner pushes his way into the underworld of a high school crime ring to investigate the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend.

Director: Rian Johnson | Stars: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Lukas Haas, Emilie de Ravin, Meagan Good

Votes: 110,072 | Gross: $2.06M

4. Adaptation. (2002)

R | 115 min | Comedy, Drama

83 Metascore

A lovelorn screenwriter becomes desperate as he tries and fails to adapt 'The Orchid Thief' by Susan Orlean for the screen.

Director: Spike Jonze | Stars: Nicolas Cage, Meryl Streep, Chris Cooper, Tilda Swinton

Votes: 203,132 | Gross: $22.25M

5. 21 Grams (2003)

R | 124 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller

70 Metascore

A freak accident brings together a critically ill mathematician, a grieving mother, and a born-again ex-con.

Director: Alejandro G. Iñárritu | Stars: Sean Penn, Benicio Del Toro, Naomi Watts, Danny Huston

Votes: 245,912 | Gross: $16.29M

6. The Iron Giant (1999)

PG | 86 min | Animation, Action, Adventure

85 Metascore

A young boy befriends a giant robot from outer space that a paranoid government agent wants to destroy.

Director: Brad Bird | Stars: Eli Marienthal, Harry Connick Jr., Jennifer Aniston, Vin Diesel

Votes: 227,641 | Gross: $23.16M

7. Pi (1998)

R | 84 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery

72 Metascore

A paranoid mathematician searches for a key number that will unlock the universal patterns found in nature.

Director: Darren Aronofsky | Stars: Sean Gullette, Mark Margolis, Ben Shenkman, Pamela Hart

Votes: 186,495 | Gross: $3.22M

8. Solaris (2002)

PG-13 | 99 min | Drama, Mystery, Romance

67 Metascore

A troubled psychologist is sent to investigate the crew of an isolated research station orbiting a bizarre planet.

Director: Steven Soderbergh | Stars: George Clooney, Natascha McElhone, Ulrich Tukur, Viola Davis

Votes: 86,285 | Gross: $14.97M

9. The Insider (1999)

R | 157 min | Biography, Drama, Thriller

85 Metascore

A research chemist comes under personal and professional attack when he decides to appear in a 60 Minutes exposé on Big Tobacco.

Director: Michael Mann | Stars: Russell Crowe, Al Pacino, Christopher Plummer, Diane Venora

Votes: 180,295 | Gross: $28.97M

10. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)

PG-13 | 138 min | Action, Adventure, Drama

81 Metascore

During the Napoleonic Wars, a brash British captain pushes his ship and crew to their limits in pursuit of a formidable French war vessel around South America.

Director: Peter Weir | Stars: Russell Crowe, Paul Bettany, Billy Boyd, James D'Arcy

Votes: 238,046 | Gross: $93.93M

11. Good Night, and Good Luck. (2005)

PG | 93 min | Biography, Drama, History

80 Metascore

Broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow looks to bring down Senator Joseph McCarthy.

Director: George Clooney | Stars: David Strathairn, George Clooney, Patricia Clarkson, Jeff Daniels

Votes: 101,318 | Gross: $31.56M

12. Eastern Promises (2007)

R | 100 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller

83 Metascore

A teenager who dies during childbirth leaves clues in her journal that could tie her child to a rape involving a violent Russian mob family.

Director: David Cronenberg | Stars: Naomi Watts, Viggo Mortensen, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Josef Altin

Votes: 261,246 | Gross: $17.11M

13. Devil in a Blue Dress (1995)

R | 102 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery

78 Metascore

A Black war hero is hired to find a mysterious woman, and gets mixed up in a murderous political scandal in 1948 Los Angeles.

Director: Carl Franklin | Stars: Denzel Washington, Tom Sizemore, Jennifer Beals, Don Cheadle

Votes: 24,264 | Gross: $16.03M

14. Where the Wild Things Are (2009)

PG | 101 min | Adventure, Drama, Family

71 Metascore

Yearning for escape and adventure, a young boy runs away from home and sails to an island filled with creatures that take him in as their king.

Director: Spike Jonze | Stars: Max Records, Catherine O'Hara, Forest Whitaker, Pepita Emmerichs

Votes: 108,541 | Gross: $77.23M

15. The Constant Gardener (2005)

R | 129 min | Drama, Mystery, Romance

82 Metascore

A widower's transcontinental quest to find answers about his wife's death leads him to explosive secrets.

Director: Fernando Meirelles | Stars: Ralph Fiennes, Rachel Weisz, Danny Huston, Hubert Koundé

Votes: 148,508 | Gross: $33.58M

16. Moon (2009)

R | 97 min | Drama, Mystery, Sci-Fi

67 Metascore

Astronaut Sam Bell has a quintessentially personal encounter toward the end of his three-year stint on the Moon, where he, working alongside his computer, GERTY, sends back to Earth parcels of a resource that has helped diminish our planet's power problems.

Director: Duncan Jones | Stars: Sam Rockwell, Kevin Spacey, Dominique McElligott, Rosie Shaw

Votes: 376,816 | Gross: $5.01M

17. Bubba Ho-Tep (2002)

R | 92 min | Comedy, Fantasy, Horror

57 Metascore

When residents of their nursing home start dying of dubious causes, an aged Elvis and an African-American senior who claims to be President John F. Kennedy discover that the perpetrator is an Egyptian mummy with murderous intentions.

Director: Don Coscarelli | Stars: Bruce Campbell, Ossie Davis, Bob Ivy, Ella Joyce

Votes: 51,513 | Gross: $2.00M

18. Black Book (2006)

R | 145 min | Drama, Thriller, War

71 Metascore

In the Nazi-occupied Netherlands during World War II, a Jewish singer infiltrates the regional Gestapo headquarters for the Dutch resistance.

Director: Paul Verhoeven | Stars: Carice van Houten, Sebastian Koch, Thom Hoffman, Halina Reijn

Votes: 80,531 | Gross: $4.40M

19. The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (2005)

R | 121 min | Adventure, Crime, Drama

77 Metascore

Ranch foreman Pete Perkins looks to fulfill the promise to his recently deceased best friend by burying him in his hometown in Mexico.

Director: Tommy Lee Jones | Stars: Tommy Lee Jones, Barry Pepper, Dwight Yoakam, January Jones

Votes: 41,896 | Gross: $5.02M

20. Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)

PG | 87 min | Animation, Adventure, Comedy

83 Metascore

An urbane fox cannot resist returning to his farm raiding ways and then must help his community survive the farmers' retaliation.

Director: Wes Anderson | Stars: George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman

Votes: 270,554 | Gross: $21.00M



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