Favorite Sleeper Movies

[GreekGeek]

I'm defining a "favorite sleeper" as a movie that was not a big box office hit, but which you happened to hear or read about somewhere, decided to see, and very much enjoyed. In recent months, I have ordered the following via Netflix and loved them:

 

The Big Year: Owen Wilson, Jack Black, and Steve Martin as "birders" (don't call them bird watchers!) competing to see who can spot the most birds within a year. The comic actors subdue their usual zaniness to great effect, and the nature photography is excellent also.

 

The Amateurs: A small town bands together to help a local sad sack by making a porn movie. It lends a new meaning to "It takes a village!" Features Ted Danson as a closeted gay man. 

 

Outsourced: It has some Indian and American stereotypes, but it's still good fun when an American in charge of telephone orders at a company selling patriotic tchotchkes gets transferred to India.

 

The Station Agent: Game of Thrones's Peter Dinklage as a man who inherits a rundown railroad station.

 

Eve's Bayou: Coming of age in the African-American community of 1960's Louisiana.

 

Backbeat: The story of the Beatles before they were stars, focusing on Stu Sutcliffe, their original bassist who stayed in Germany when the others went on to international superstardom, and died young of an aneurysm.

 

The Daytrippers. A family makes a day trip to New York City to confront the daughter's husband, who has been cheating on her. I saw this shortly after Anne Meara died; it made her performance as the family matriarch even more bittersweet.

 

When Comedy Went to School: A documentary about the heyday of the Catskills "Borscht Belt" and the comedians who honed their craft there. 

 

What are your recommendations?

 

 

[Demented Daisy]

Cradle Will Rock:  A fictional account of Orson Welles' musical of the same name with a ridiculously good cast.  I absolutely adore it.  (And frequently quote Cary Elwes as John Houseman: "As the producer, I can fire whomever I please.  And I am fucking fired!")

[Jeebus Cripes]

The Amateurs: A small town bands together to help a local sad sack by making a porn movie. It lends a new meaning to "It takes a village!" Features Ted Danson as a closeted gay man. 

 

This movie is hilarious! I watch the crap out of it whenever it's on.

[cpcathy]

I had never heard of The Amateurs! I checked for clips on Youtube, and instantly found out that Ted Danson gets naked in it!

[Shannon L.]

The first two  that come to mind are older, but there was something about them that I liked, in spite of the fact that there are probably some good reasons for people thinking they were awful:

 

Beautiful Girls:  Timothy Hutton, Matt Dillon, Uma Thurman, Natalie Portman, Rosie O'Donnell....just to name a few.  The description on imdb is:  "A piano player at a crossroads in his life returns home to his friends and their own problems with life and love".  They wrote in all of the stereotypes, male and female, but there was something about it that I really liked.  Uma's character was beautiful, smart, flirty and wouldn't succumb to fawning that some of the guys did when she was around.  She had a boyfriend, she loved him and that was that.  She was full of wisdom for a few of the guys, too, when it came to their relationships.  Natalie Portman played a pretty, smart, witty teenager who was an old soul.  I loved her character.  And Rosie O'Donnell played a woman who was completely comfortable in her own skin, wasn't going to take crap from anyone and wasn't afraid to put any of her male friends in their place.  She also has one of my favorite movie monologues ever!

 

Creator:  Peter O'Toole, Amy Madigan, Mariel Hemingway  "An eccentric scientist teaches a student in his own manner while he looks for a way to clone his deceased wife."  Sounds morbid right?  It was a silly comedy, but it was more about being able to let go and allowing yourself to love again.  Peter O'Toole was completely charming and Mariel Hemingway was great as the zany young woman who saw the world as it was and was able to teach the scientist a thing or two about life.  If I saw it again on Netflix or Amazon Prime, I'd watch it again. 

[Spartan Girl]

Continental Divide starring John Belushi and Blair Brown. While its a shame this movie didn't get as much attention as it should have, I think more people have come to appreciate it now.

[Rick Kitchen]

The Stunt Man.  Another Peter O'Toole movie.  He's the over-the-top director of a movie being filmed at the beautiful Hotel Del Coronado (which is as much a star of the movie as the cast), and Steve Railsback is a fugitive running from the law who stumbles on the set and immediately gets cast as a stunt man.  It's a great, funny, over-the-top movie.

[Schweedie]

The Big Year: Owen Wilson, Jack Black, and Steve Martin as "birders" (don't call them bird watchers!) competing to see who can spot the most birds within a year. The comic actors subdue their usual zaniness to great effect, and the nature photography is excellent also.

 

I caught that one a while back - agree, it's a terrific little film!

 

First that comes to mind for me is Boy A, with Andrew Garfield, about a young man released from prison under a new identity after having been sentenced for murder when he was a child. Loosely based on, or more inspired by, the events around the murder of James Bulger. It's a real punch-you-in-the-gut kind of film, and Andrew Garfield is completely heartbreaking - this film is what made me take note of him and why I'm actually happy he's out of the Spiderman franchise now.

 

More recently, Pride. I think it snuck under a lot of people's radar, but it's one of my most favourite films in a really long time. Gay and lesbian activists from London band together to support the locals of a Welsh village during the miner's strike in the 80s. Has Imelda Staunton, Dominic West, Bill Nighy and a whole bunch of less well known but wonderful actors.

[proserpina65]

More recently, Pride. I think it snuck under a lot of people's radar, but it's one of my most favourite films in a really long time. Gay and lesbian activists from London band together to support the locals of a Welsh village during the miner's strike in the 80s. Has Imelda Staunton, Dominic West, Bill Nighy and a whole bunch of less well known but wonderful actors.

 

Given the subject matter, I really didn't expect Pride to be as bloody funny as it was.  And I'll never look at Dominic West the same way again - who knew he could move like that?

 

My own submission: Truly, Madly, Deeply starring Alan Rickman and Juliet Stevenson.  It's been described as the thinking woman's Ghost, but that doesn't even begin to do the film justice.  It's a beautiful, low-key and incredibly moving story of a woman still in mourning for the recently deceased love of her life, and her slow but steady path to moving on with life.

[Rick Kitchen]

My own submission: Truly, Madly, Deeply starring Alan Rickman and Juliet Stevenson.  It's been described as the thinking woman's Ghost, but that doesn't even begin to do the film justice.  It's a beautiful, low-key and incredibly moving story of a woman still in mourning for the recently deceased love of her life, and her slow but steady path to moving on with life.

 

I adore Truly, Madly, Deeply.

[methodwriter85]

Sleepers are also defined as movies that weren't expected to be big, but turned out to be.

 

Dirty Dancing wasn't expected to be much, and its opening weekend wasn't much. But somehow, it managed to hang in there and it slowly became a hit.

[Archery]

I remember Roger Ebert reviewed Eve's Bayou, and said it was so good that as soon as it was over, he immediately bought a ticket for the next show, and watched it again.  It is outstanding. 

[xls]

I'm defining a "favorite sleeper" as a movie that was not a big box office hit, but which you happened to hear or read about somewhere, decided to see, and very much enjoyed. In recent months, I have ordered the following via Netflix and loved them:

 

The Big Year: Owen Wilson, Jack Black, and Steve Martin as "birders" (don't call them bird watchers!) competing to see who can spot the most birds within a year. The comic actors subdue their usual zaniness to great effect, and the nature photography is excellent also.

 

The Amateurs: A small town bands together to help a local sad sack by making a porn movie. It lends a new meaning to "It takes a village!" Features Ted Danson as a closeted gay man. 

 

Outsourced: It has some Indian and American stereotypes, but it's still good fun when an American in charge of telephone orders at a company selling patriotic tchotchkes gets transferred to India.

 

The Station Agent: Game of Thrones's Peter Dinklage as a man who inherits a rundown railroad station.

 

Eve's Bayou: Coming of age in the African-American community of 1960's Louisiana.

 

Backbeat: The story of the Beatles before they were stars, focusing on Stu Sutcliffe, their original bassist who stayed in Germany when the others went on to international superstardom, and died young of an aneurysm.

 

The Daytrippers. A family makes a day trip to New York City to confront the daughter's husband, who has been cheating on her. I saw this shortly after Anne Meara died; it made her performance as the family matriarch even more bittersweet.

 

When Comedy Went to School: A documentary about the heyday of the Catskills "Borscht Belt" and the comedians who honed their craft there. 

 

What are your recommendations?

I second Outsourced, what a sweet charming movie!

[Danny Franks]

The Last of the High Kings: A 1970s set comedy/drama in Ireland. Starring a young Jared Leto as a lad who is just trying to fill up the summer after taking his O-levels, while waiting for the inevitable news that he hasn't got the grades to get into university. He deals with his first real forays into dating (one of the girls, shock horror! is a protestant!), organising a big beach party, his crazy family and the death of Elvis Presley. Co-starring Christina Ricci, Emily Mortimer and Gabriel Byrne.

 

It was called Summer Fling, for its American release. Not exactly the most inspiring title, really.

[Demented Daisy]

Saving Grace: Brenda Blethyn and Craig Ferguson.  What happens when a widow discovers her husband left her in mountains of debt?  Why, she uses her exceptional gardening skills!  ;-)

 

I'm glad I still have it on disc because I can't find it to stream anywhere.

[SmithW6079]

I loved "Truly, Madly, Deeply" too.

I would also include "Enchanted April" here. It came out in the '90s, at the height of the Merchant-Ivory period pieces, so I first thought of it as a poor man's version of those films, but then I was delighted with it and enjoyed it on its own merits.

[Sharpie66]

Two films that very few people have heard of, but that I really loved, are:

 

Map of the Human Heart (1993) - Beginning in the 1920s in the Arctic Canadian wilderness, this centers around an Inuit boy, Avik (played as an adult by Jason Scott Lee), who contract tuberculosis, is taken by a cartographer (Patrick Bergin) to Montreal to recover, where he falls for a French-Canadian girl Albertine (Anne Parillaud) who is at the same sanitarium also with TB. Years pass, they both end up in WWII London, along with the cartographer. Relationships develop, people get frisky on top of military blimps, Dresden is fire-bombed...oh, and John Cusack is the framing device. Just a lot of eye candy going on here.

 

A Thousand Pieces of Gold (1991) - Set in the Old West, but it's about the Chinese immigrants who come to the mining towns. Specifically, the lead character is a woman who is sold by her impoverished family to a successful Chinese merchant in Idaho. Played by Rosalind Chao before she was in Star Trek, and co-starring Chris Cooper before he hit it big, it's really a fascinating look at an aspect of American history that is barely heard about anywhere.

[Shannon L.]

I was just flipping through the channels and came across She's Having a Baby.  It didn't do too well, but I really liked it.  It starred Elizabeth McGovern and Kevin Bacon and it followed a young couple from their wedding to the birth of their first baby.  I thought it was funny and quite charming.

Edited November 11, 2018 by Shannon L.

[Constant Viewer]

On 10/25/2015 at 5:16 PM, Demented Daisy said:

Cradle Will Rock:  A fictional account of Orson Welles' musical of the same name with a ridiculously good cast.  I absolutely adore it.  (And frequently quote Cary Elwes as John Houseman: "As the producer, I can fire whomever I please.  And I am fucking fired!")

I love this movie! I got to recommend it years ago to some students when our Academic Decathlon team was studying the 1930s. some of the music they had to know was from the original musical.

[krankydoodle]

Cairo Time: A romantic drama set in Egypt with Alexander Siddig and Patricia Clarkson, who have intense chemistry in a relationship that's slow to build but believable. The actors and the setting are gorgeous and it's refreshing to see adults in a love story that's both complicated and grounded.

[AimingforYoko]

Miracle Mile: A horn player oversleeps for a date and accidentally takes a phone call warning about the possible end of the world. He finally connects with her and tries to escape LA along with a bunch of disparate characters. Starring Anthony Edwards, Mare Winningham, Mykelti Williamson and Denise Crosby.

ETA: Added bonus of score by Tangerine Dream.

Edited November 18, 2018 by AimingforYoko

[Snow Apple]

The Wedding Banquet directed by Ang Lee. A Taiwanese man is living in New York with his boyfriend. To please his parents who doesn't know he's gay, he tells them he's marrying a Chinese woman (she needs a green card). The parents fly to America for the wedding and the story goes from there.

[proserpina65]

On ‎11‎/‎17‎/‎2018 at 3:34 PM, krankydoodle said:

Cairo Time: A romantic drama set in Egypt with Alexander Siddig and Patricia Clarkson, who have intense chemistry in a relationship that's slow to build but believable. The actors and the setting are gorgeous and it's refreshing to see adults in a love story that's both complicated and grounded.

The ending of that movie is just devastating, in a small, quiet, very human way.

Once - I just saw it recently, but absolutely loved it.  Every time it seemed like it was heading in a predictable direction, it went somewhere else instead.  It was bittersweet in a way, but lovely.

[Phebemarie]

I still love Breaking Away.  My summer obsession with the Tour de France had its genesis in that sweet little movie.  

[Silver Raven]

40 minutes ago, Phebemarie said:

I still love Breaking Away.  My summer obsession with the Tour de France had its genesis in that sweet little movie.  

Great movie.

I nominate Truly, Madly, Deeply, a sweet romance with an amazing cast.

[Spartan Girl]

I found Stuart Saves His Family on Movieplex and I was surprised by how poignant it was. And I never even liked Stuart Smolley on SNL!

[Browncoat]

21 hours ago, Silver Raven said:

Great movie.

I nominate Truly, Madly, Deeply, a sweet romance with an amazing cast.

That is the movie that ignited my mad crush on Alan Rickman.  I second the nomination!

[topanga]

Things To Do in Denver When You're Dead is one of Andy Garcia's best movies. Even Christopher Walken gave a great performance. Subtle, even!  And most people I talk to have never heard of it. 

On 11/17/2018 at 9:00 PM, Snow Apple said:

The Wedding Banquet directed by Ang Lee. A Taiwanese man is living in New York with his boyfriend. To please his parents who doesn't know he's gay, he tells them he's marrying a Chinese woman (she needs a green card). The parents fly to America for the wedding and the story goes from there.

Loved this movie!