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Some great films never get the love they deserve. In this video, we’re counting down 9 underrated movies that had all the makings of cult classics, but somehow missed their chance.
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00:00Not every largely underrated piece of cinema has been lucky enough to receive the prestigious
00:05cult classic treatment, but as seen in one particularly brilliant Reddit thread this
00:09list was inspired by, that still hasn't stopped certain fans of these hilarious, ridiculous
00:14or jaw-dropping gems from banging the drum for their under-the-radar darlings.
00:19So from the undervalued superhero flicks that were bringing joy before the MCU era, to those
00:24black comedy gifs that keep on giving with every revisit.
00:28These are those films that were so very close to becoming an absolute cult classic.
00:33Gareth here from WhatCulture.com and here are the movies that deserve to become cult classics
00:37but didn't.
00:38Logan Lucky Gathering together an embarrassment of acting
00:41riches in the form of a Daniel Craig having the time of his life away from all things 007,
00:46Adam Driver delivering the goods as usual, and Channing Tatum once again showing off his
00:51unexpectedly brilliant comedic chops, Steven Soderbergh's 2017 heist comedy felt like it
00:56held all the tools to become a serious cult hit for the ages, even if the titular Logan
01:01Brothers were a little less well equipped.
01:03In the time since it actually picked up some widely positive reviews upon its release however,
01:07perhaps the director's most underrated entry to date has largely found itself being unfortunately
01:12forgotten and underappreciated for the well-constructed dose of laugh-out-loud joy Logan Lucky routinely
01:18is.
01:18Everyone involved clearly put their all into producing one of the most gloriously entertaining
01:22robbery attempts ever committed to the big screen, with Craig in particular showing off
01:26his ability to effortlessly slip into the more eccentric characters out there as Joe
01:30Bang, long before his Benoit Blanc days, but that still couldn't keep this star-studded
01:35showing from also being hit with the Logan family curse in the end.
01:38Upgrade
01:39Arriving on the scene in the same year as another flick involving a central figure being hijacked
01:44from within, Upgrade very much felt like the film Sony's Venom wanted to be at one point or
01:48another, before it ultimately decided to play it a little safer in the PG-13 realm.
01:53And while the often shockingly violent but regularly side-splitting outing force stem
01:58and Logan Marshall Green's grey trace actually brought home an impressive $70 million on a
02:03$3 million budget, the fact that Lee Whannell's little body-controlling outing popped up on the
02:07scene around the same time as Marshall Green lookalike Tom Hardy's symbiote box office monster
02:12has ultimately overshadowed many a memory of yet another Blumhouse success.
02:16In Upgrade, there's definitely the right amount of glorious silliness and genuinely
02:20outstanding action and one-liners to leave horror, sci-fi and comedy lovers with a massive
02:24smile on their face throughout the 100-minute runtime. Instead of becoming another lovable
02:29B-movie to add to the cult classic list though, this 2018 feature hasn't exactly been ignored
02:34altogether in the time since its release, but it's nowhere near as celebrated or adored by a
02:38corner of the cinema fandom as many felt it potentially would be. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang!
02:43In another case of looking at the folks involved and wondering how in the holy hell this particular
02:47project hasn't gone on to become a cherished player in the cult classic world, Shane Black's
02:51black comedy crime picture by the name of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is undoubtedly adored by some,
02:56but nowhere near as much as it should be, or even some of the director's other once underrated showings
03:01like The Nice Guys for example. Combining a pre-Iron Man Robert Downey Jr. with a Val Kilmer who was
03:06clearly loving every second of delivering Black's excellent dialogue and dropping the odd improvised gem into the
03:12mix, what definitely ranks as one of all three talented figures most overlooked performances,
03:16sadly didn't exactly gobble up the millions at the box office. And while the reviews were strong
03:21at the time of its arrival, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang just hasn't ever grown into the all-round cult classic
03:26it definitely had the makings to be for a time. If you haven't had the pleasure of watching RDJ and
03:31Kilmer's Harry and Gay Perry respectively, bickering and showing off some of the finest on-screen
03:35chemistry of the noughties in this neo-noir should-be classic though, then do go and treat yourself.
03:40Sky High While the superhero genre wasn't exactly
03:43non-existent at the time of Sky High's debut back in 2005, this was still a time pre-MCU,
03:49and the average movie fan simply wasn't as hot on all things capes and spandex back when Disney first
03:54decided to dabble in the live-action supersphere with this Kurt Russell in a super suit boasting
03:58adventure. Admittedly, many of the youngsters who grew up with Will Stronghold's attempts to live up to
04:03his world-famous super parents are quick to salute this coming-of-age journey with additional super
04:08shenanigans. That being said, despite there being the odd group who confessed to being Sky High
04:12supporters through and through, this attempt to navigate both the struggles of high school and
04:16being the next generation of superheroes still hasn't quite graduated to the point of being a
04:20full-blown cult classic yet. Much like Will, this one is most definitely a late bloomer though,
04:25so there's every chance this sidekick of a feature, showcasing outstanding work from the
04:30likes of Russell, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and Bruce Campbell will continue to gain popularity
04:35on Disney Plus and get the hero support it deserves in the coming years.
04:387 Psychopaths When the name Martin McDonagh enters the
04:42average movie conversation, most folks would be all too happy to point to a number of his simply
04:46magnificent creations as one-off, if not their outright favourite feature. Yet while many would
04:51be quick to heap praise on the likes of In Bruges, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, and even his
04:55most recent offering of The Banshees of Inner Sheeran, 2012's Seven Psychopaths doesn't quite
05:00get the same level of appreciation from McDonagh diehards and film fans in general. Again bringing
05:05with it a collection of superb heavy hitters in the form of Christopher Walken, Colin Farrell,
05:09Sam Rockwell, and Woody Harrelson, this tale of dognapping gone even more wrong became yet another
05:14critically praised release for the eventual Academy Award nominated director. And with it possessing the
05:19same sort of riotous dark wit and colourful characters seen in McDonagh's other more celebrated works,
05:24Seven Psychopaths definitely seem destined to become a source of eternally memorable one-liners
05:29and go-to satirical classic for generations to come. As of recording though, this collection of
05:34nutjobs are still yet to really steal the hearts of more than a select few of McDonagh lovers.
05:39Election Taking its spot here is yet another film
05:42that has unquestionably been appreciated by a decent amount of fans over the years. Without ever
05:46fully becoming an out-and-out cult classic, The Reese Witherspoon starring 1999 black comedy
05:51known as Election feels like the sort of film tailor-made for cult hit status.
05:55Despite not exactly succeeding at the box office, the satirical flick centred around a high school
06:00student body election, and one particularly driven student president candidate by the name of Tracy
06:04Flick earned a ton of critical praise when it dropped at the end of the century. Yet in the wake
06:08of picking up an Academy Award nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay, the film largely went under the
06:13radar for the decades that followed. With Election's razor-sharp script and top-class performances from
06:18Witherspoon and Matthew Broderick only being revisited by a particularly small class of supporters.
06:23That being said, the fact the adaptation of the 1998 Tom Perotter novel of the same name has since
06:28earned itself a sequel adaptation of the author's 2022 follow-up novel Tracy Flick Can't Win may help
06:34shed some more light on the cherished by some high school picture in the coming years.
06:38Welcome to the Jungle of The Rundown
06:41Kicking off a jungle trend that would ultimately make itself known throughout a great many of Dwayne
06:45Johnson's big-screen adventures. 2003's Welcome to the Jungle, also known as The Rundown and not
06:50to be mistaken with his Jumanji sequel outing, offered yet another early glimpse at the movie
06:54star potential within this one-time WWE sensation. But even with that being the case,
06:59and the story of a bounty hunter named Beck trying to get his hands on Sean William Scott's Travis,
07:04showing off some unexpectedly tremendous chemistry between the starring duo,
07:08this particularly bombastic action explosion just hasn't quite grown into a home video and streaming cult
07:13favorite in the way you might have expected on the back of an unquestionably poor box office
07:17performance. Absolutely crazy fight sequences, just the right amount of cheese-stuffed quotes,
07:22and brilliant supporting performances courtesy of Rosario Dawson and a Christopher Walken going full
07:28ham. The rundown absolutely deserves to be talked about as one of the most enjoyable dumb chunks of
07:33action one could ever hope to consume when on the lookout for a quick hit of a shotgun-wielding
07:37Johnson. And who knows, if a much-discussed sequel does actually become a thing down the road,
07:42perhaps the first rundown will finally be given the cult classic action reappraisal the surreal
07:46visual of the rock being attacked by a monkey deserves. Evolution Another Sean William Scott
07:51outing that often slips through the cracks when discussing those pictures that contain
07:55all the ingredients necessary to potentially cement themselves as eventual cult classics.
07:592001's Evolution is honestly one of the early 2000's greatest overlooked comedy gems.
08:04This is a film that spits out what should have been instantly iconic exchanges such as
08:08Orlando Jones Harry requesting some ice cream for his ass after a particularly nasty extraterrestrial
08:14insect, err, invasion. And yet the Ivan Reitman flick about a meteor crashing into earth and the
08:19inhabitants within quickly and hilariously evolving to our atmosphere still hasn't managed to evolve
08:24into a genuine cult comedy classic over the last 20 years. Sure, the CGI is a bit dated and not
08:29every laugh lands as well as the last, but there's still a lot of fun to be had in this David
08:33Duchovny and Julianne Moore starring monster movie, even if it's not quite as adored as Reitman's
08:38Ghostbuster Tales. Simply put, any film boasting William Scott caught cawing into a microphone to
08:43an alien dragon terrorising a shopping mall deserves its flowers dammit. Mystery Men,
08:48the real superhero movie that started it all. Long before the Avengers were trying to keep Thanos
08:53from snapping his purple sausages, or the Justice League did whatever the hell that was back in 2017,
08:58a super ensemble epic for the ages was unleashed onto the scene back in 1999 by the name of Mystery
09:04Men. There were no pitiful Captain Americas or Supermen to be found here folks, instead it was
09:08down to the likes of Ben Stiller's Mr. Furious, Hank Azaria's Blue Raja, and William H. Macy's The
09:14Shoveler to save the day. And the end result is the most ridiculous of times. Though it's justifiably
09:19classed as something of a box office dud, the Mystery Men's farcical mission to take down Casanova
09:24Frankenstein would eventually go on to become a household favourite for some. However, utter that
09:29title to the average film fan, and it's not uncommon to be met with a rather puzzled look.
09:33Trust me, I've been there. And said confusion only increases with the unleashing of a few shiny forks,
09:37and immortal pieces of wisdom such as I don't need a compass to tell me which way the wind shines.
09:42And so, Mystery Men unfortunately finds itself in that frustrating middle ground of not quite
09:46being popular enough within a corner of the movie fandom to earn the title of cult classic,
09:50but still being a largely ignored super spoof by much of the mainstream audience.
09:55And what a damn shame that is, eh?
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