Where are the great classics of the 90s?

[Yora]

It seems when people are talking about new works coming out these days, the comparions that are being made almost entirely reference works that came out in recent years, or from way back in the late 70s and 80s. I rarely see any mention from works of the 90s and those are generally not very praising.

When it comes to movies, I can't really think of anything that is still regarded as a must see classic that is relevant today. Princess Mononoke perhaps, but that also seems to be fading from memories as a single movie. In TV there were a couple of shows that were big, but does X-Files and Buffy still matter in any way? Babylon 5 and Deep Space Nine still keep getting lots of praise when they are getting mentioned, but I can't think of many more except for The Simpsons, which had their best time during the 90s.
In music I am drawing a total blank.

Video games seem to have really kicked off at the very end of the 90s, but the types of games that appear to have been directly influential for the coming decades all seem to be from 98 or 99. Or are Nintendo games, which is it's own isolated market.

I grew up in the 90s. I was exposed to all of it while it was coming out, so nostalgia should make me remember media of that time as disproportionally important. But instead the opposite seeems to be the case. What's going on there? Why does it seem that popular culture of the last years doesn't care about the 90s?

[BeerMug Paladin]

Animaniacs, Seinfeld, Terminator 2, Jurassic Park? Off the top of my head...

Anyway, I would guess that the driving force behind this (seeming) phenomenon would probably be related to the developing access of the Internet in the 90s. Hypercritism or hypermania over various franchises seems to be a given on message board communities, which tends to drive opinion of all things to one extreme or the other.

We are most susceptible to becoming obsessed with things when we are children and unable to see its flaws clearly even into adulthood. That said, I would suspect a lot of early Internet message board culture revolved around what the young adults at the time thought was top quality. Which would have been those things that came out when they were kids, about 10 years before.

The reputation built up around those early, nucleic communities just got codified as a baseline for participation, so a lot of people refer to a given, essentially-canon list of what is awesome. Based on what previous participation was like, new visitors may feel that love of certain media is required as obligatory for participation.

Also, I would suspect a distinctly growing and diverse list of media (movies, games, shows, etc) to consume over the years makes it harder for people to all be familiar with the waves of new media coming out year after year.

[Cheesegear]

'90
Ghost
Home Alone
Pretty Woman
Dances with Wolves
Total Recall
Back to the Future 3
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

'91
Terminator 2
Hook
Silence of the Lambs

'92
Aladdin
Basic Instinct
Batman Returns
Wayne's World

'93
Jurassic Park
Schindler's List
Indecent Proposal
Sleepless in Seattle
Philadelphia
The Pelican Brief

'94
The Lion King
Forrest Gump
The Mask
Speed
Four Weddings and a Funeral
Interview with the Vampire

'95
Toy Story
GoldenEye
Batman Forever
Se7en
Waterworld
Jumanji

'96
Independence Day
The Rock
Jerry Maguire

'97
Titanic
Men in Black
Tomorrow Never Dies
The Fifth Element
The Full Monty

'98
Saving Private Ryan
Mulan

'99
Sixth Sense
Toy Story 2
Blair Witch Project

That was literally two Google searches (highest rated, most popular)...And I've actually seen every single one. Most of them hold up pretty well. However that would be totally subjective.

[Bavarian itP]

As far as movies go,

Jurassic Park, Forrest Gump, Matrix, Scream

are probably the big ones that influenced the decade and beyond.

And I've actually seen every single one.

Wow, somebody actually admitting they've seen Titanic ...

[tensai_oni]

Wow, somebody actually admitting they've seen Titanic ...

What? Titanic is a good movie. Even back in the day the only people who disliked it tended to be the immature (pre)teen boys going "eww it has romance that means it's for girls and has cooties".

Now, Waterworld, Independence Day and Fifth Element, these are classics only in that they're classic examples of putting spectacle over writing, acting, or being good movies in general.

[Yora]

There have been plenty of very successful movies from the 90s, some of which were really quite good. But did they leave much of a lasting impression or influence? Do they remain relevant in the discourse of movies or are they in the process of getting forgotten.

Titanic and Forest Gump are two prime examples. I remember quite well that these were huge back in the days, and at least Forest Gump was seen as a masterpiece classic. But it seems to me that any impact they may have had has completely faded away by now. I never see anyone saying that hopefully somebody will make movies of that style again, or any calls for remakes or reboots. Which is very much in contrast to movies from the 80s.

[Sian]

Now, Waterworld, Independence Day and Fifth Element, these are classics only in that they're classic examples of putting spectacle over writing, acting, or being good movies in general.

I’d say that Waterworld was great in it’s core plot idea (humanity surviving on a flooded planet that might/might not be Earth) but they blew just about everything else, and it was argubly made 15-20 years too early for the CGI needed to pull it off

[ben-zayb]

Adding to Cheesegear's exhaustive list, I've considered Nightmare Before Christmas, The Lion King, Jumanji, Fight Club, The Usual Suspects, and Pulp Fiction to be cult classics.

What? Titanic is a good movie. Even back in the day the only people who disliked it tended to be the immature (pre)teen boys going "eww it has romance that means it's for girls and has cooties".

Now, Waterworld, Independence Day and Fifth Element, these are classics only in that they're classic examples of putting spectacle over writing, acting, or being good movies in general.

Not supergreen of you, my man.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

I’d say that Waterworld was great in it’s core plot idea (humanity surviving on a flooded planet that might/might not be Earth) but they blew just about everything else, and it was argubly made 15-20 years too early for the CGI needed to pull it off

They definitely wasted money on something. There are maybe 5 important characters (the good guy, the bad guy, the girl, the kid, the silly guy), a few dozen extras at the best of times, one semi-bankable star and a handful of elaborate sets (the boat, the fort, the tanker, the island). It should have been made for a maybe twenty million dollar budget, preferably cheaper, and it would have been a perfectly serviceable B-movie. As in, a proper B-movie like Runaway ('84), Outland, Moon, most good horror movies, anything starring Steven Seagal or even Alien or The Terminator, not the kind of super cheap movies that often get grouped under the banner. The effects for that completely unnecessary sea monster as well as the diving scene contributed to that a lot, but apparently the biggest sink was filming at sea. The fort set even actually sank in a storm and had to be rebuild. If they had filmed it in a Hollywood swimming pool like Jaws the movie might actually have worked, not become one of the most famous flops ever and would have lost very little in the process. I like Waterworld, I just can't see where all the money went.

Kevin Costner even did the same thing again. "The Postman" feels like a direct to DVD way to make a little extra money off of Waterworld, this time filming on land, but they still managed to lose lots of money on that one, having an 80 million dollar budget. That's almost as much as Starship troopers, a movie famous for not being about a few people walking through a desert with a few letters. Sometimes you just have to be realistic about the scope of your project, both of these movies were perfectly fine projects to be made on a tighter budget, putting in eight times what the project actually warrants is not going to make it an eight times better movie. Had Costner had as much business sense as Seagal he could have become a household name in the adventure genre.

[Kitten Champion]

Hmm...

Groundhog Day, Fight Club, The Sixth Sense, Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs, The Big Lebowski, Fargo, The Blair Witch Project, Starship Troopers, The Usual Suspects, Ghost in the Shell, Neon Genesis Evangelion - and an actual lot of anime I could list - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Being John Malkovich, Babe, South Park, Crash, Trainspotting, Magnolia, Hoop Dreams -- others that have been mentioned.

Oh, Mulan, The Lion King, and Aladdin are all getting live-action remakes -- Beauty and the Beast just had one.

Also, they're literally bringing back X-Files, so presumably it's still relevant to someone. Let's not forget Roseanne just came into being via ABC only to be stabbed through the heart almost instantly. Murphy Brown's coming back too, apparently.

Power Rangers had a reboot movie people here liked, though not enough to keep the series alive. Jurassic Park is already a sequel deep into its reboot. Independence Day... tried too. Baywatch got into theatres somehow. There are sooooo many more remakes planned for the future or in development now. Generally though, nostalgia works in 20-ish year cycles and, yeah, a 90's surge is coming.

Edit: Also should point out that the recent adaptation of Fargo is pretty great.

[AMFV]

There have been plenty of very successful movies from the 90s, some of which were really quite good. But did they leave much of a lasting impression or influence? Do they remain relevant in the discourse of movies or are they in the process of getting forgotten.

Titanic and Forest Gump are two prime examples. I remember quite well that these were huge back in the days, and at least Forest Gump was seen as a masterpiece classic. But it seems to me that any impact they may have had has completely faded away by now. I never see anyone saying that hopefully somebody will make movies of that style again, or any calls for remakes or reboots. Which is very much in contrast to movies from the 80s.

I don't know we still see "life is like a box of chocolates" and "king of the world" parodied to this day. Family Guy did a large portion of an episode spoofing Titanic. I still hear "seats taken" and "You got magic legs" referenced in casual conversation as well as "draw me like one of your French girls". That's a pretty significant impact for something that's almost 30 years old.

[Cheesegear]

But it seems to me that any impact [Forrest Gump and Titanic] may have had has completely faded away by now.

Is that because they're gotten worse, somehow? Hell no.
Or it is, maybe, because they've been copied, parodied, referenced and built on so much over the last 20 years that it now seems cliché? Do you not even recognise when they're being referenced anymore? Seriously, the hand-on-a-car-window shot, is a near-universal sign of sexy times.

Also, what is 'impact'? Please define.
Or, on the other hand, certain movies are done so well, that they're impossible to replicate (e.g; Titanic and Forrest Gump). You're never going to see their like again. Because you never see them 'again', surely they've faded, right?

I'm also going to point out that while Batman Forever and Batman Returns lie on completely opposite ends of the spectrum, both are classics.

[Aedilred]

I don't know we still see "life is like a box of chocolates" and "king of the world" parodied to this day. Family Guy did a large portion of an episode spoofing Titanic. I still hear "seats taken" and "You got magic legs" referenced in casual conversation as well as "draw me like one of your French girls". That's a pretty significant impact for something that's almost 30 years old.

Titanic is only 21 years old! Let's not wish our lives away...

But yeah, "admitting you've seen Titanic" is a ridiculous accusation. It's one of the most popular films of all time and was at the time critically acclaimed to the point it's one of only three films to have won thirteen Oscars.

With the benefit of some hindsight, maybe it wasn't as good as it was thought to be at the time. The same can be said for a couple of other instant 90s classics like American Beauty. A bit like Gone with the Wind, it's one of those classic films that has such an intimidating running time and reputation that it might not be something that the youth of today feel the need to sit down and watch it in full.

But it was still a cinematic phenomenon and trying to deny that just makes you look foolish.

In other media, in TV there's The Sopranos, Twin Peaks, X Files, Buffy, Sex and the City and The West Wing. Most of those are from the end of the 90s but they are all massively influential. Then we move over to comedy. Leaving aside The Simpsons and Seinfeld (which debuted in the 80s) we have South Park and Friends. Family Guy started out in the 90s and was much better then than it is now. The Fresh Prince of Bel Air is still widely referenced. . On this side of the pond, Father Ted. Ab Fab and One Foot in the Grave are all classics.

In video games, obviously they tend to have shorter impacts because of the game systems. But Goldeneye, Super Mario 64, Half-Life, Doom, Final Fantasy VII and Ocarina of Time are among the most well-regarded and influential games of all time. Sonic the Hedgehog was pretty much an entirely 90s phenomenon. Grand Theft Auto started out in the 90s, as did the Smash Bros, Medal of Honour, Civilisation, Command and Conquer and Elder Scrolls series.

I'm not even going to get into literature or music.

[Traab]

They definitely wasted money on something. There are maybe 5 important characters (the good guy, the bad guy, the girl, the kid, the silly guy), a few dozen extras at the best of times, one semi-bankable star and a handful of elaborate sets (the boat, the fort, the tanker, the island). It should have been made for a maybe twenty million dollar budget, preferably cheaper, and it would have been a perfectly serviceable B-movie. As in, a proper B-movie like Runaway ('84), Outland, Moon, most good horror movies, anything starring Steven Seagal or even Alien or The Terminator, not the kind of super cheap movies that often get grouped under the banner. The effects for that completely unnecessary sea monster as well as the diving scene contributed to that a lot, but apparently the biggest sink was filming at sea. The fort set even actually sank in a storm and had to be rebuild. If they had filmed it in a Hollywood swimming pool like Jaws the movie might actually have worked, not become one of the most famous flops ever and would have lost very little in the process. I like Waterworld, I just can't see where all the money went.

Kevin Costner even did the same thing again. "The Postman" feels like a direct to DVD way to make a little extra money off of Waterworld, this time filming on land, but they still managed to lose lots of money on that one, having an 80 million dollar budget. That's almost as much as Starship troopers, a movie famous for not being about a few people walking through a desert with a few letters. Sometimes you just have to be realistic about the scope of your project, both of these movies were perfectly fine projects to be made on a tighter budget, putting in eight times what the project actually warrants is not going to make it an eight times better movie. Had Costner had as much business sense as Seagal he could have become a household name in the adventure genre.

Long term waterworld made a profit, it was a fairly decent movie, just too expensive to make it back fast. As for segal, meh, he became a household joke. His movies are the action equivalent of adam sandler films. Cheap garbage with a low enough budget to turn a profit anyways.

[Malimar]

My first thoughts were Aladdin (Disney's first truly great movie) and Jurassic Park, which together pretty much kicked off the age of movies that I really liked. The '80s and late '70s had a handful of decent movies, but nothing like the '90s, when the formula for really good movies was established.

As far as movies go,

Jurassic Park, Forrest Gump, Matrix, Scream

are probably the big ones that influenced the decade and beyond.

The Matrix was huge and was a huge influence on sci-fi for the next decade or even to this day. And now only one person in this thread has even mentioned it. Is it because the sequels made it retroactively suck? Or is it that its influence has become so all-pervasive that it seems derivative despite having originated all the things?

[Some Android]

When it comes to movies, I can't really think of anything that is still regarded as a must see classic that is relevant today.

Animation. Animation in the 90s was amazing. Maybe the best decade for the medium unless you go back to like the 30s and 40s:

-Most of the Disney Renaissance
-Nicktoons
-Batman the Animated series
-Animaniacs
-Tiny Toons

Just to name a few.

[Cheesegear]

With the benefit of some hindsight, maybe it wasn't as good as it was thought to be at the time.

IMO, the only thing wrong with Titanic today, is probably Billy Zane's performance...And Rose having plenty of room on that door.

In other media, in TV there's The Sopranos, Twin Peaks, X Files, Buffy, Sex and the City and The West Wing. Most of those are from the end of the 90s but they are all massively influential.

Ally McBeal revolutionised the 'single white female' genre (and someone thought my watching Titanic was bad, and I still think if you were going to rag on me for any of the movies in that list, it would've been Sleepless in Seattle...Whatever.).
Home Improvement is still referenced today.

[JoshL]

Movies and TV are well covered, so let's talk about music and literature.

In music, I'm not much of a grunge fan, but Nirvana absolutely changed the world. 90s hip-hop was huge, Tupac is still echoed. Radiohead are still huge, and OK Computer is an amazing album (even if I haven't liked anything after). 90s shoegaze is coming back, great new albums by Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine. Tindersticks didn't get the US cred they deserved, but their work in the 90s was amazing and was huge in Europe. The Prodigy brought rave and big beat to the mainstream and then Fatboy Slim took that to critical mass. Post-rock became a thing, and that first Godspeed You Black Emperor album is hard to deny. The "problem" is that such a diverse and wide variety of music became popular, that there are a myriad of influential and we'll regarded albums from the era, depending on who you talk to. For those who like everything, that's awesome, and I could go on forever about great albums from the 90s.

As far as literature, Salman Rushdie published some of his best work in the 90s (The Ground Beneath Her Feet), great works from Barbara Gowdy and Katherine Dunn, Harukai Murakami came into his own. A.S. Byatt put out two of her most defining works (Possession and Angels & Insects). On the pop end, King and Grisham dominated, and I don't think anyone here would argue against Robert Jordan and George RR Martin's work having an impact. And anyone deep in the horror weeds, Clive Barker put out some of his best, and Thomas Ligotti is a personal favorite. Whatever you like, there are classics from the 90s!

[Cheesegear]

Whatever you like, there are classics from the 90s!

If people don't see them, they assume they don't exist.

[Darth Ultron]

There have been plenty of very successful movies from the 90s, some of which were really quite good. But did they leave much of a lasting impression or influence? Do they remain relevant in the discourse of movies or are they in the process of getting forgotten.

It is simply an age generational thing.

Hollywood makes things for the big 18-34 block...and a bit of nostalgia for 'old stuff' for people older then that.

And there is a nice nostalgic sweet spot of like 30-40. This is where the parent likes to see the things they remembered from their childhood AND have kids old enough to share and watch them together. So like a 30 ish year old dad(who grew up in the '80s), with an 10 ish year old son, they both got a huge kick out of seeing Transformers back in 2007.

So right now, 2018, the average 40 ish parent has kids 18+, so they are out of the notch. And coming up behind them are the 30 ish parents(that grew up in the 90s) with the 10 ish year old kids.

And you might note...that right on time Aladdin and The Lion King will be out soon. Jumanji 2 was like last year. And Jurassic Park.

But you also need to keep in mind that there are less popular older things...and way, way, way too many newer ones. The amount of TV shows and movies made has gone up every year, and not just in volume, but in verity.

A kid in the 80's saw all the 80's stuff, as there was nothing else to see and watch. But starting in the 90's there was much much more to attract peoples attention.

It does also matter what you think a 'classic' is....


Also, for Music:

You have the rise of Country Music, as that got a huge boost in the 90's. Garth Brooks alone did a lot of this, but also Randy Travis, Shania Twain, Brooks and Dunn, Dixie Chicks, and Sammy Kershaw. Shania Twain and Sammy Kershaw, together brought a lot of 'non country fans' to the music (paving the way for Carrie Underwood and Taylor Swift).

[Malimar]

In other news:

A Game of Thrones came out in 1996, and the first two sequels followed in 1999 and 2000. People don't think of that as a '90s property because it only got big in the '10s, but it basically is.

The golden decade of webcomics was the '00s, but some pioneering ones (Kevin and Kell, Sluggy Freelance, Roomies!, User Friendly, Ozy and Millie, PvP, Penny Arcade, etc) started to come out in the later part of the '90s. Brunching Shuttlecocks, pioneer of Internet humor, came to be in 1997.

The first animated series of X-Men, Spider-Man, Batman, and Superman were all in the '90s. Even Batman Beyond squeaked in, starting in 1999. It was the golden age of TV animation.

Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess were extremely '90s. The West Wing debuted in 1999. The three actually good Star Trek series were mostly in the '90s. Stargate: SG-1 debuted in 1997.

[Traab]

Ah hercules and xena, two awesome series that I can no longer bring myself to watch for some reason. You know I actually enjoyed andromeda? I thought it was an AWESOME concept. Vast space empire, our hero is frozen in time and comes out of it to discover the federation he was a staunch member of is gone and sets out to rebuild it in the chaos? Yes please! And I think sorbo did a pretty good job, as did most of the cast

[Some Android]

'91
Terminator 2
Hook
Silence of the Lambs

'92
Aladdin
Basic Instinct
Batman Returns
Wayne's World

'94
The Lion King
Forrest Gump
The Mask
Speed
Four Weddings and a Funeral
Interview with the Vampire

You make Belle cry.

[ben-zayb]

You make Belle cry.

BatB should really know its place in the Disney animation hierarchy.

[Kitten Champion]

Ah hercules and xena, two awesome series that I can no longer bring myself to watch for some reason. You know I actually enjoyed andromeda? I thought it was an AWESOME concept. Vast space empire, our hero is frozen in time and comes out of it to discover the federation he was a staunch member of is gone and sets out to rebuild it in the chaos? Yes please! And I think sorbo did a pretty good job, as did most of the cast

As much as I can appreciate Sorbo's screen presence, his presence on the show is kind of the reason it increasingly sucked as it went. Similarly to Charmed, the concept is good, they had interesting and diverse characters with some capable actors portraying them, there was some quality ensemble work there... but a lot of the series just got consumed utterly by the lead's/leads' egos.

Sure, Andromeda was going to be screwed anyways with their production company going bankrupt, but the final 2 seasons especially weren't just bad but were actively painful to watch at times. A lot of that is on him, sadly.

[Some Android]

BatB should really know its place in the Disney animation hierarchy.

A timeless classic that has aged wonderfully with animation so good it can be classified as a masterpiece and also unforgettable songs plus a good moral, good character arches, and a very entertaining villain one is ultimately happy to see meet his demise?

[2D8HP]

I simply just saw fewer movies after the 1980's, and I don't remember them as well, but from what has been previously mentioned in this thread, I remember that I saw (though many I barely remember) in no particular order:

Ghost

Home Alone

Pretty Woman

Dances with Wolves

Total Recall

Back to the Future 3

Terminator 2

Hook

Silence of the Lambs

Aladdin

Basic Instinct

Saving Private Ryan

Wayne's World

Schindler's List

The Pelican Brief

Forrest Gump

Independence Day

Men in Black

The Fifth Element

The Full Monty

The Matrix

The Usual Suspects

Pulp Fiction

The Postman

Starship troopers

Groundhog Day

Reservoir Dogs

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

X Files

Of those, the one I'd most like to watch again would be The Usual Suspects, and Saving Private Ryan would be the one that most impressed me.

Not mentioned before in the thread is one film from 1997 that really impressed me:

Gattaca

For comparasion, the '80's films I best remember are Excalibur and Raiders of the Lost Ark, one a "guilty pleasure", the other I'd recommend to my sons, and I remember many pre''80"s films as well or better than those two, many I recommend (too long to list).

Of 21st century films that have titles that I can remember, off the top of my head, I enjoyed or was impressed by

Locke

Stardust

Tropic Thunder

Hot Fuzz

'71

Gladiator

I enjoyed television in the 1990's more than in the 21st century, of books the authors I've most re-read are Susanna Clarke, Fritz Leiber, and Michael Moorcock.

[Cheesegear]

You make Belle cry.

As I said, by no means is it an exhaustive list.
The premise of the Thread is "Where are they?"

Well, if you use your brain, even a little bit, they're really easy to find, especially with the internet.

I used two metrics to generate my list; Highest rated, and highest grossing. While my list is far from perfect (e.g; The Mask, lol no), and certainly misses out on some really important ones (e.g; Gattaca, just mentioned). My point was that 'classic' movies from any decade are really, really easy to find. If you know what you're looking for.

However, during the course of Thread, Yora apparently changed the rules, to mean what mediums were 'impactful', that 'changed popular culture' for the next decade or something. In which case the list gets a whole lot smaller. But, if it was highly rated and/or highly popular, you can bet that it had some pop culture significance...In which case everything quickly becomes extremely hyper-subjective, and your ability to see '90s pop-culture references in 20xx mediums, is entirely dependent on
a) Your ability to access mediums that reference - or are influenced by - '90s pop culture, and
b) To recognise when '90s references are being made when you're looking right at them.

If a TV Show or movie made a reference to American History X (which would greatly influence Oz, in a few years), would you even know? Are you even the kind of person who would even watch a movie influenced by AHX? Why does everyone keep referencing Trainspotting?

An episode of 30 Rock name-drops The Pelican Brief several times in a single episode. What is that? Why does it matter? In the context of the episode, is it even funny?

[Mando Knight]

Video games seem to have really kicked off at the very end of the 90s, but the types of games that appear to have been directly influential for the coming decades all seem to be from 98 or 99.

Doom ('93)? Street Fighter II ('92)? GoldenEye and Final Fantasy VII were both released in '97.

[gooddragon1]

Right here: Xmen Apocalypse: The Cure (Cartoon TV Episode)

There is an old Jaffa proverb: They are not constructed as they once were.