The Very Best MOVIES of the 1990’s

1990 Edition

We here at the PopFilter headquarters think both music and Jason are lame and stinky. (Just kidding – it’s just me that thinks that. But I’m right). So, to celebrate movies’ eternal domination over music, let’s steal Jason’s idea, but make it better, because he is stinky and I am not. Without further adieu, the ten greatest films of all time of 1990.

10. REVERSAL OF FORTUNE

I can imagine a trailer for Reversal of Fortune coming out in 1990 and looking like 20 other soap-operaish thrillers that came out that year. Rich, white people killing each other in rich, white ways for rich, white reasons. What the actual movie turns out to be is much different. It’s an odd mix of docudrama and melodrama, with some procedural sprinkled in, that comes off that much more fucked up because it’s all true. If you remember the van Bulows, this is a great way to see director Barbet Schroeder’s take on it. If you’ve never heard of them, here’s a completely incomplete look at the whole story.

9. EDWARD SCISSORHANDS

Once upon a time, it seemed like Tim Burton was going to be the person to give us fairy tales for the rest of our lives. Then came old age, or money, or whatever reason he decided it was more important to put Johnny Depp in weird costumes than tell good stories. It’s Edward Scissorhands that has the dubious honor of beginning that relationship. Nine years later, with Sleepy Hollow, the wheels would officially come off. But here we can see Tim Burton in the middle of his peak, a peak that included stories about Edward, Batman, Pee-Wee Herman, Ed Wood, and Beetlejuice.

8. QUICK CHANGE

Go ahead and quote Peter Venkman and Carl Spackler, or heap praise on Bob Harris, but if it was up to me, Bill Murray’s clown bank robber Grimm (yup) should be his most acclaimed, iconic performance. His persona is put to perfect use as he has no problem escaping from the bank he just robbed, but finds impossible to escape from New York. Co-stars Geena Davis and Randy Quaid make you miss 1990 that much more.

 

7. PUMP UP THE VOLUME

Yes, on the surface, this is a cheesedick mall movie starring Christian Slater. But look a little closer, and you actually have the movie Talk Radio wanted to be, and the reason why Christian Slater remained so popular for a little while, besides the Jack Nicholson Jr. schtick. Slater plays DJ Hard Harry, a high school kid who rigs up his own pirate radio station. Harry works the kids into a fervor about the usual things high school kids are in a fervor about, but Slater brings a precocious, smarmy edge to the role that makes you believe that actual kids would actually listen to him. Lame hair and clothes are the only thing that makes this movie not relevant today.

 

6. AWAKENINGS

I know, I know — this movie sounds fucking terrible. Robin Williams (strike 1) plays a doctor who helps (strike 2) Robert DeNiro adjust to life (STRIKE 3!!!!) after waking from a decades long coma (strike 4, 5, and 6). But all of the string pulling, believe it or not, is actually done surprisingly well. I haven’t seen this in a long time, so some of it could be a little creaky, particularly the performances. I kind of remember it being creaky the last time I watched it, though, and it still got to me.

 

5. THE GRIFTERS

Cool and funny on the surface, but horribly fucked up beneath it, The Grifters probably contains the greatest performance of each of its leads. John Cusack plays a loser con man trying to get by, Annette Bening plays his girlfriend, an enigma wrapped in a riddle wrapped in a dress, and Angelica Huston plays Cusack’s mother, a con woman that taught Cusack everything he knows. The script’s dialogue is near perfect, making you wish that this was a TV show where you could get an hour of this every week, but the underlying interplay between the three makes you thankful this is just one movie, and once it’s over, you never have to be subjected to these people again.

 

4. THE FRESHMAN

If I had to pick only one reason why Marlon Brando should be in the PopFilter Hall of Fame, it wouldn’t be that he created Vito Corleone, but because of his performance in this, as…well, Vito Corleone. I think this movie was written off at the time as a cash grab, and there’s no reason for you to not think that. But it actually turns out to be a great movie, with Brando making this TOTALLY ORIGINAL character fully realized, and also a deftly handled send-up of The Don.

 

3. DANCES WITH WOLVES

Look, just because it shouldn’t have won best picture doesn’t make it a bad movie. The How Green Was My Valley of the nineties, Dances With Wolves is an epic in every sense of the word, and most of it is done successfully. Costner’s voice still kind of grates, but this used to be a favorite Basic Cable Classic of mine.

 

2. HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER

Holy Guacamole! And you thought Merle from The Walking Dead was a creep. Thought to be a crappy, cheap little splattermovie by its producers, Henry sat on a shelf for five years, until someone sent it into some film festivals. People went nutso over it, and the producers decided to give it a quick theatrical run, which didn’t really resister, and release it on something called VHS, where it exploded. If you’ve only heard the legend, but never saw it, I assure you it’s much more than a novelty movie. Its bareboned lack-of-flash makes it seem like there’s nothing between you and Henry, a horrifying and awesome feeling.

NOW STREAMING ON NETFLIX!

1. GOODFELLAS

Robert DeNiro accomplishes the impossible: star in the best two movies that came out in 1990! They said it could never be done! I’m not going to try and figure out something new to say about GoodFellas. It’s one of the hundred greatest movies ever made, with this relentless energy that makes you think every movie should feel just like this, even though you know you wouldn’t be able to take it.  

 

-Ryan Haley