dhmac

An article ( LINK ) listing 11 underappreciated films released in 2014, based on getting great reviews yet having poor box office receipts.

The list from the article:

(1) Force Majeure (Metacritic: 86 | Box Office: $841,201)


(2) The Babadook (Metacritic: 86 | Box Office: $123,926)


(3) Ernest & Celestine (Metacritic: 86 | Box Office: $262,075)


(4) Stranger by the Lake (Metacritic: 82 | Box Office: $325,196)


(5) Starred Up (Metacritic: 81 | Box Office: $54,915)


(6) Jodorowsky's Dune (Metacritic: 79 | Box Office: $647,280)


(7) Fifi Howls from Happiness (Metacritic: 78 | Box Office: $13,614)


(8) Blue Ruin (Metacritic: 77 | Box Office: $258,384)


(9) Child's Pose (Metacritic: 77 | Box Office: $97,170)


(10) Abuse of Weakness (Metacritic: 77 | Box Office: $31,611)


(11) The Dance of Reality (Metacritic: 76 | Box Office: $293,680)


January 1st EDIT: 2 additional lists showed up online, so I'll post them too here (note that there are some repeats between the lists):

LINK TO 2ND LIST: 20 Most Overlooked Movies Of 2014

(1) Enemy

(2) The Raid 2

(3) Under The Skin

(4) Joe

(5) Only Lovers Left Alive

(6) Manakamana

(7) Locke

(8) Ida

(9) Palo Alto

(10) The Immigrant

(11) Edge of Tomorrow (aka Live Die Repeat: Edge of Tomorrow)

(12) Obvious Child

(13) Snowpiercer

(14) Begin Again

(15) Love Is Strange

(16) The One I Love

(17) Starred Up

(18) The Skeleton Twins

(19) Citizenfour

(20) A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night


LINK TO 3RD LIST: 24 Movies You Probably Missed This Year But Should Totally See

(1) Actress

(2) Blue Ruin

(3) Calvary

(4) Citizenfour

(5) Dear White People

(6) Elaine Stritch: Shoot Me

(7) Enemy

(8) Force Majeure

(9) A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night

(10) The Guest

(11) The Immigrant

(12) Jodorowsky’s Dune

(13) Locke

(14) Love Is Strange

(15) Obvious Child

(16) The One I Love

(17) Only Lovers Left Alive

(18) Pride

(19) The Skeleton Twins

(20) Snowpiercer

(21) Starred Up

(22) We Are the Best!

(23) What If

(24) Whiplash


Did you see any of these movies? If so, what did you think?

And which other underappreciated 2014 movies do you think should've been on this list?

RichC2

Kind of a silly way to derive a list. Force Majeure actually wound up with over $1m in the US despite peaking at 68 theaters, they also didn't really advertise it. Jodorowsky's Dune had a very targeted audience. Stranger By The Lake is chock full of very graphic gay sex which isn't really a selling point for many people. Starred Up was released in a grand total of 6 theaters at its peak.

Side note: Child's Pose, Blue Ruin, Stranger By The Lake, and Abuse of Weakness are available on Netflix Streaming. Ernest & Celestine is on Amazon Prime.

Groucho

Agreed. These were all in limited release.

Mike86

A Walk Among the Tombstones- It seems to me like it was largely overlooked as just another Neeson thriller but it was damn good and honestly probably in my top ten films of the year. Very atmospheric with good performances. A great slow burning crime drama.

dhmac

Yeah, I'm utterly baffled by the high rating that so many critics gave Stranger by a Lake given that it's pretty much a gay porn movie with a murderer lazily mixed in. The characters in it spend more time investigating each other's penises than investigating the death that happened.

PatD

Jodorowsky's Dune--one of the best movies and most delightful movies of the year. I rarely buy Blu rays of present day releases, this was an exception.

[EDIT: I just noticed that's in your list. Good on you. I agree.]

Shannon Nutt

Edge of Tomorrow immediately came to mind. Maybe the best movie of the summer most people skipped (although it still managed to make it to $100 million domestically...but should have made three times that - it's a really fun flick).

dhmac

Agree about Edge of Tomorrow - not sure why it didn't do well at the box office. A bad title? A Tom Cruise backlash? No superheroes in spandex in it?

And I'll add Oculus to the list as underappreciated (although it is mislabeled as a 2013 film on the web when it only had one showing at the Toronto Film Festival in 2013 but actually had its theatrical release in April 2014).

I think Oculus is easily one of the best horror movies of the year, although it's more in the psychological realm, but it only made $12 million at the box office. (For comparison, the crappy horror movie Ouija has made $75+ million at the box office.) Although not well rated by critics, I think it will gradually find its fans, though, just as the better horror movies eventually do over the years.

Norm de Plume

It's a movie that's confused about its identity, I agree, but marvellously directed. With a more focused script it could have been great.

Babadook is overpraised, if anything. I found it lacklustre.

DaveyJoe

The Raid 2!

Solid Snake

Yeah... that list doesn't really show underappreciation in comparison to what it was able to be released in.

Raid 2 is interesting though. It made less than the previous one.

Ash Ketchum

In a just world, this would be up for Best Animated Feature of 2014:

Dan

I think everyone should have seen Force Majeure and Blue Ruin. Those that saw them, appreciated them, though.

Underseen? The most underseen but goddammit-you-should-have-motherfucking-saw-them-you-have-no-excuse-I-hate-you movies of 2014? I'd get behind that list.

RocShemp

I never even heard of any of those movies.

Shannon Nutt

If the OP had suggested movies that were both panned AND ignored by the public, but actually pretty good, I would have gone back to January of 2014 and picked JACK RYAN. I think that's a solid film. Not in my top 10 of the year, but not deserving of its fate. I've always wondered what would have happened if Paramount had kept that release at Christmas (or held it off until summer).

dugan

I still say: Turtles Forever and The Internet's Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Schwartz

Solid Snake

I'm guessing Dredd was part of that list for 2012?

Edge of Tomorrow for sure was this year. Even Xbox Live calls Live.Die.Repeat. Is WB still denying the "name change" for EoT?

Dan

Another one for 2014, personally, was The Sacrament. One of the better found-footage (I know...) horror (I know, I know) flicks out there. Yes, there's a moment near the end that's kind of dumb, but otherwise, a great movie, IMO.

Drexl

Cold in July.

Fist of Doom

It opened at $12M, but made $44M overall.

Perkinsun Dzees

RichC2

^ Now on Amazon Prime Instant (free), everybody with Prime should watch it.

dhmac

D'oh! Looking now at Box Office Mojo, it grossed $27.7 million in the U.S. (the number I was looking for) and an additional $16.3 million in foreign markets for a $44 million worldwide total.