2019 was a really great year for movies with some highly acclaimed ones releasing but in all this buzz there are some which got buried and didn’t receive as much attention as was due to them. All of them may not necessarily be flawless and have issues but they do need to be talked about more. So, alphabetically laid down are ten such underrated and underseen movies that I feel more people should watch.
FAMILY ROMANCE, LLC (Directed by Werner Herzog)
The world of Family Rental Services in Japan. A father who is no longer there, a partner who has passed away, a parent who doesn’t have enough time for you. This is a service that can provide you a fake family member to give you company. And their services can be even more than that as shown in the movie. Taking inspiration from this rising trend in Japan and casting one of the actual persons involved in such a business, the docudrama creates an interesting exploration of what actually a relationship means as we sometimes see the fake characters may end up becoming more relatable than the actual family members. The lines between reality and fiction are blurred as the movie makes us question the nature of humanity and how we interact with the people around us.
FIGHTING WITH MY FAMILY (Directed by Stephen Merchant)
Florence Pugh definitely had an amazing 2019, with three stellar performances. But this one hasn’t garnered as much attention as Midsommar or Little Women. Inspired by the story of Paige a WWE star and her journey from England to International fame in WWE, she is every bit as amazing here too. To complement her we have the Vince Vaughn as the no-nonsense coach with his brand of humor. Even Dwayne Johnson makes a minor appearance as himself. This is a delightful movie and an immense fun experience. Stephen Merchant’s writing uplifts the movie to create a fleshed-out family and their interpersonal dynamics.
MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN (Directed by Edward Norton)
This is not necessarily a flawless movie, esp. the first half being way longer than expected but I still quite like it. We follow a detective with Tourette’s trying to solve the case of the murder of his mentor in New York of the 1950s. I love my share of detective stuff, a genre that is being barely explored now. And in such a scenario, a competently made movie with great production design and well-acted with a compelling mystery is always a delight. Norton and Willem Dafoe are both a delight to watch. Alec Baldwin comes in relatively late into the movie, but once he does he is a scene-stealer.
THE VAST OF NIGHT (Directed by Andrew Patterson)
The simple joys of watching a Sci-Fi movie, one that strips the big explosions of blockbuster Sci-fi to give a simple story but looks at the genre with wonder and curiosity. Set in a small town in the US of the ’50s when the space age was just ready to dawn and the radio still a thing to wonder at, we find two characters trying to decode a mysterious signal interfering with their radio setup. The movie never falls for its rather low budgetary constraints and always keeps you hooked. There are two stunning long takes in the movie, one on a switchboard and the other where the camera pans across the entire town in a take will leave your jaw on the floor. You might guess where the movie is leading before it happens but that still doesn’t affect your experience.
TO LET (Directed by Chezhian Ra)
Focussing the trials of a family during the IT sector boom led housing crisis in Chennai, the movie is an exploration of the wider world through the perspective of the family of three. When their landlady demands that they vacate their house in only a month’s time, the lower-middle-class family at the center of it is sent into a struggle for a new house within their budget which is worth living. With some realistic performances, To Let excels at its minimalist approach to storytelling to effectively bring the point home of how demand for real estate driving up the rental prices adversely affected families such as the one at the center of this story.
AAMIS (Directed by Bhaskar Hazarika)
An Assamese movie that starts off with a married doctor who becomes acquainted with a Ph.D. student researching the food habits in North-Eastern India and what starts off as a bond over shared taste for food, begins to grow darker as feelings start developing between them and their love for food goes down unexpected paths. A brilliant surrealist head trip Aamis is an engrossing experience and a wickedly unique story brought to life.
BACURAU (Directed by Juliano Dornelles, Kleber Mendoca Filho)
Set in Bacurau, a village in Brazil lacking basic amenities, sometimes in a near future, this is a genre-defying experience about a woman who is visiting to attend her grandmother’s funeral. But things start going out of hand when one day some of the residents find Bacurau is no longer on their map. The place and it’s residents are immensely fleshed out so that by the time you get to the action parts of the movie you will be really rooting and caring for them all the while the movie successfully balances multiple genres, having some sharp socio-political commentary beautifully weaved it with it.
BAD EDUCATION (Directed by Cory Finley)
Based on the true story of the Roslyn High School Scandal and the massive impact stemming from it, this movie takes certain artistic liberties and gives us a compelling take on it. This is an actor’s movie, with a cast that is firing on all cylinders. Allison Janney deserves a special mention, but the scene-stealer is Hugh Jackman. He is simply phenomenal and at the top of his game here. It is a simple story but one that had a major impact in real life, and the movie is a brilliant examination of the trust we place in individuals and the repercussions of that.
BEANPOLE (Directed by Kantemir Balagov)
I will warn from the beginning. Beanpole isn’t a movie for a casual watch. You have to sit through the entire movie in order to understand what it is about. But the journey to the end is fully worth it, as just in a flash every single thing clicks in place and you understand the character motivations that were in place. Set a year after World War II in Leningrad, the movie explores a nation reeling from the devastating effects of the war through two women Masha and Iya as they work in a hospital treating wounded soldiers. The production design and the performances are both stunning. This is a slow burn and you need to be right mood. But if you are willing to invest yourself, a rich cinematic treat is waiting for you.
BLOW THE MAN DOWN (Directed by Bridget Savage Cole, Danielle Krudy)
Just want to watch a bunch of experienced and underseen actresses light up the screen and paired with two equally well acted younger actresses. This movie is the right choice for you. Having mild inspiration from Fargo with its themes but telling an entirely new story the movie explores the lives of two sisters in a remote fishing village and their experiences after an unsavory incident and how it ties them up to with a group of elderly ladies as we see that they may not necessarily be as simple looking as we initially thought them to be. The actress ensemble in this movie is stunning with Margo Martindale at the peak hitting it out of the park. An incredibly well-told story and a fun experience, this is a movie that definitely deserves more attention.
