Hidden gems: 40 underappreciated movies to stream these Easter holidays
Choice paralysis is a common malady during the Easter break: you’ve got the time for a movie, the couch is calling, but you can’t actually decide what to watch. Instead of succumbing to frustrated scrolling, here are 40 great movies that the algorithm doesn’t pay enough attention to. These are the underseen and the misjudged, the obscure and the ripe for rediscovery.
ACTION
The Assassin The revered Taiwanese arthouse filmmaker Hou Hsiao-hsien bestowed contemplative grace upon the wuxia martial arts genre with this tale of intrigue centered on Shu Qi’s icy swordswoman. SBS On Demand
Athena Beginning with an audacious 11-minute action sequence, drenched in righteous fury and shot in one take, director Romain Gavras turns the conflict at a Parisian housing estate into a bloody sibling tragedy. Netflix
Duel Steven Spielberg announced himself with his debut feature, a gripping 1971 B-movie where a nondescript salesman driving through rural California is pursued by a menacing semi-trailer. Skilful, precise, suspenseful. Binge
Monkey Man Forged by his protagonist’s desire for vengeance and a deep technical mastery, Dev Patel’s fight scenes in this 2024 revenge epic set in India are bruising and monumental. Paramount+
U-571 A young Matthew McConaughey plays a World War II American naval officer whose mission to hijack to German submarine becomes a tense survival thriller. For good reason, this won the Oscar for Best Sound Editing. Stan*
COMEDY
After Hours Martin Scorsese was in career-recovery mode when he made this 1985 black comedy about a meek New Yorker (Griffin Dunne) whose journey to Soho becomes an absurdist trek, both funny and paranoid. SBS On Demand
The Ballad of Wallis Island The melodies are pure, but the melancholy is persistent in this entertaining comedy, starring Carey Mulligan, about a former folk duo sneakily reunited by their biggest fan. Binge/Netflix
Death in Brunswick Blessed with a deliciously dry sense of humour and the late, great John Clarke stealing every scene he’s in, this twisted Melbourne romantic-comedy starring Sam Neill remains a top Australian movie. Amazon Prime Video/ABC iview/SBS On Demand
Idiocracy Twenty years after it bombed at the box office, this hilarious satire of an everyman (Luke Wilson) who wakes up in a future America run by morons has become a prescient cult classic. HBO Max
Midnight Run Forget the Fockers. This 1988 action-comedy is the funniest performance of Robert De Niro’s career, as his weary bounty-hunter tries to handle Charles Grodin’s exasperating mob accountant. 7plus
DOCUMENTARY
All the Beauty and the Bloodshed In a wrenching personal portrait and a study of activism’s demands, celebrated photographer Nan Goldin fights the art world’s acceptance of tarnished billionaire philanthropists. DocPlay/Stan
Burden of Dreams In the late 1970s, German director Werner Herzog tried to shoot a period epic deep in the Amazon jungle. Everything went wrong, and documentarian Les Blank makes it revelatory. DocPlay/SBS On Demand
Free Solo Free climber Alex Honnold recently scaled a Taiwanese skyscraper for Netflix, but this 2018 documentary is the true, heart-stopping distillation of his rare talents as he ascends a legendary peak without ropes. Disney+
Hearts of Darkness Another jaw-dropping behind-the-scenes portrait of Hollywood excess, as production on Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 epic Apocalypse Now runs amok. Capturing it all? Coppola’s wife, Eleanor. DocPlay/HBO Max/Mubi
Martha Professional celebrity/convicted criminal Martha Stewart publicly dissed R.J. Cutler’s biographical documentary on release, which is a terrific endorsement. It’s a fascinating portrait of a woman who’s lived multiple lives. Netflix
DRAMA
’71 Sinners villain Jack O’Connell is a lone British soldier running for his life amid Belfast’s sectarian divide in this breathless 2014 tale where the system invariably betrays the individual. 7plus
Barry Lyndon No film in Stanley Kubrick’s incredible catalogue has been reappraised more than this 1975 historical drama about a rogue’s rise. It’s spectacularly lit and coolly enthralling. HBO Max
A Dangerous Method Hands down Keira Knightley’s best performance – playing the tortured young patient at the birth of psychoanalysis alongside Freud (Viggo Mortensen) and Jung (Michael Fassbender). SBS On Demand
One Fine Morning A romantic drama with deeply held demands of love and loss, this French feature stars a compelling Léa Seydoux as a widowed mother at a personal crossroads. Stan
Radiance The debut feature of leading Indigenous director Rachel Perkins, this 1998 feature is an in intimate study of family as three sisters reunite to bury their mother. Yes, that’s a young Deborah Mailman in her film debut. SBS On Demand
HORROR
Birdeater A contemporary Australian take on psychological horror, rife with unnerving technical skills, as a bucks’ party weekend with the bride-to-be in attendance grows unhinged. Amazon Prime Video/Netflix
Drag Me to Hell After making three Tobey Maguire Spider-man movies, Evil Dead supremo Sam Raimi cut loose with this gloriously gruesome supernatural tale. Paramount+
Men Alex Garland’s take on British folk horror divided critics and audiences, but it was a showcase for Hamnet Oscar winner Jessie Buckley as a woman whose country retreat turns nightmarish. Netflix/SBS On Demand/Stan
The Perfection Since Girls concluded in 2017, Allison Williams has been majoring in horror films, and this 2018 effort, in which she plays a former cello prodigy reconnecting with her mentor, is rife with torment. Netflix
Let the Right One In This is the original 2008 Swedish feature, not the surprisingly good American remake. It’s a deeply absorbing tale of first love, uncontrollable hunger, and blood on the Scandinavian snow. Stan
ROMANCE
A Room with a View Merchant-Ivory’s masterful 1985 period joined stars Helena Bonham Carter, alongside Maggie Smith and Daniel Day-Lewis, as a young woman whose chaperoned visit to Italy uncovers emotional freedom. Amazon Prime Video/SBS On Demand
Brooklyn Saoirse Ronan has been remarkable on screen since she was 13, but her turn as a young Irish immigrant in 1950s New York in this 2015 tale of exile and discovery is extraordinarily moving. ABC iview
Emma Anya Taylor-Joy is in her sci-fi blockbuster era now, but there’s much to be said for her headline role in this incisive, witty take on Jane Austen’s novel. Amazon Prime Video/Binge/Paramount+
The Incredible Jessica James The structure of this romantic-comedy can veer towards the formulaic, but Shrinking star Jessica Williams is authentically vibrant as a single woman wrestling with her vexing relationship issues. Netflix
Enough Said Pairing James Gandolfini, in one of his final roles, and Julia Louis-Dreyfuss in this bittersweet, yearning romantic drama was a masterstroke. Disney+
THRILLER
Body Heat Hot in every way, this 1981 neo-noir update about a Florida lawyer whose pursuit of an increasingly willing trophy wife crosses a line, made stars of William Hurt and Kathleen Turner. SBS On Demand
The Day of the Jackal Before the Bruce Willis and then Eddie Redmayne remakes, there was the original 1973 procedural, as a policeman pursues a meticulous assassin targeting France’s President. Clockwork expertise throughout. Binge
The East Morally complicated, this 2013 entanglement between an undercover operative (Brit Marling) and a charismatic anarchist (Alexander Skarsgård) is even more relevant today. Disney+
How to Blow up a Pipeline A nail-biter for the coming era of climate crises, this sparse thriller is set in west Texas, where a group of activists target oil infrastructure. The urgency is palpable. Amazon Prime Video/SBS On Demand
Spartan Lean, mean, and for good reason paranoid, David Mamet’s 2004 thriller stars Val Kilmer as a US Army operative whose attempts to find the president’s missing daughter go too well. 7plus
SCIENCE FICTION
Alphaville Iconic French filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard never met a genre he couldn’t reassemble in unexpected new ways. In this 1965 trenchcoat mystery, he did it to sci-fi. SBS On Demand
Companion A reverse Terminator, a nightmarish rom-com, and textbook misogyny for the tech era, this weekend away for a group of young friends is twisted and telling. HBO Max
Looper Before he unsheathed the Knives Out movies, Rian Johnson made this 2012 time-travel puzzle-box, where a young hitman (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) must hunt his older self (Bruce Willis). Knotty, evocative, tragic. Amazon Prime Video/Stan
Synchronic After making some outstanding no-budget nightmares that bent reality, American filmmakers Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead recruited Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan for this 2019 designer-drug horror. Amazon Prime Video
They Cloned Tyrone A smidge of Jordan Peele, some 1980s Spike Lee, this exuberantly cynical comedy is funny and insightful, as John Boyega and Jamie Foxx play Blaxploitation sleuths gone conspiratorial. Netflix
*Stan is owned by Nine, the owner of this masthead.
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