Personally I’d go with Independence Day if I had to pick a movie that felt the most 90s.
The fifth element
Yeah, the 90s were a good time for movies that could not have been mainstream in any other decade. I’d place Judge Dredd, Demolition Man and Total Recall in the same “corny, but excellent” league as the 5th Element.
Then you had unofficial double features of sorts: Smoke/ Blue In The Face, Casino/ Goodfellas.
12 Monkeys needs to be mentioned as well, it’s probably the most palatable movie on my list.
In the “disconcerting, but unforgettable” league, I’d place As Good As It Gets, The Crossing Guard and, of course, the grisly “8 mm.”
Home Alone. It’s a movie that really couldn’t take place today due to cell phones and the Internet making easier to communicate with someone if the landlines are down. Also, the family wouldn’t have been able to get through the airport like they did back then thanks to 9/11.
How will you have internet without landlines (DSL) or coax? Satellite?? IN THIS ECONOMY??!!
Angry upvote. It fits.
Interesting that Point Break (1991) and The Matrix (1999) book ended the decade. Point Break focuses on white 20 something kids that dropped out and started surfing, the The Matrix focuses on a 30ish white guy going through an existential crisis. At the beginning of the 90s there was still some hope, that a person could find a small counter-culture and create if not a wealthy life, of something satisfying. By 1999 all hope was gone.
Point Break would be my pick too despite the fact the early 90s had many sensibilities that look more like the 1980s to us now.
Definitely The Mummy starring Brenden Fraiser and Rachel Weisz
HACKERS
Last Action Hero https://youtu.be/ShBw43KJoLk?si=m8U5c_65a8BXU5je
Its so self aware of its genre and all the tropes up to that point.
For me and my friend group: trainspotting
The trainspotting and the Jackie Brown soundtrack were the only CDs people wanted to hear at parties for a time. I learned to hate them both. The only boy who could ever teach me… And: I got a lust for life… Really annoy me now because of that.
The only boy… is from Pulp Fiction.
I’ll toss in Empire Records - the store set, the costumes, the music, the actors, the meandering listlessness… all scream “this is a 90’s movie about the 90’s”. Plus the whole Rex Manning plot is absolutely what happened to so many 70’s and 80’s artists. Not perfect by any means, but a great encapsulation of the decade.
That was a throw back to the 1980s Brat Pack, so you can group in the late 80s.
This isn’t the most quintessential 90’s movie, or even a good movie, but the fever dream of Romeo+Juliet (1996) is the most 90’s thing I’ve ever seen in my life.
Point Break or Speed
Yep! I’m going for something like those two, stuff like Con Air or The Rock.
You mean to tell me The Rock is a tourisht attraction?
Second post, but I realized the answer might actually be Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2: The Secret of the Ooze.
Gremlins 2. Not sure any other movie quote captures the absolute cocaine fuelled Hollywood of the early 90s.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=x01l_jMhjVM
There’s also a terrible John Leguizamo movie called The Pest, that I’m genuinely amazed didn’t end his career right there. The wife was suprised I hadn’t seen it, and as we started she just went “you’re going to hate it”.
She was not wrong.
See, that’s cocaine fuelled Hollywood done right.
What the question is asking is “what’s the most 90s movie of all time” and the answer can only be Kazaam, starring Shaquille O’Neil himself, and the Mars corporation products.
It’s exactly as peak 90s as Space Jam without any of the charm or personality, which makes Kazaam precisely as soulless as that entire decade. It’s perfect
Space Jam?
Mallrats
Con Air is the most 90’s movie that ever 90’s its way through the 90’s.
