Underrated

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Day of the Dead- Underrated by everyone, including horror fans. It's the most blatantly allegorical of George Romero's zombie films (and thus, the weakest), but a very good movie nonetheless.

City of Hope- I thought this movie would have been a major contender at Oscar time, but a lot of people overlooked it. It's not even available on DVD. It's a shame, cause this is one of the best films by one of America's most talented indie filmmakers.

Three Kings- Hands-down, one of the best films of the 90's. It's all-star cast might mislead one into thinking this is just another
Hollywood shoot-em-up. It is really one of the smartest, unconventional, and most-humane war films of recent memory.

Fireworks (Hana-bi)- A near-masterpiece. I think its juxtaposition of serene beauty and brutal violence turned a lot of people off, but this is a great piece of work that deserves some reevaluation.

Sergio Leone- His work is generally respected, but I think he deserves to be recognized as one of the greatest stylists in the history of filmmaking. It's a shame that his work carries the negative reputation of spaghetti westerns, cause he deserves so much more credit than that.

James Foley- He's made a lot of pretty crappy movies, but in terms of pure filmmaking talent, this guy's got it. Now if he'd only choose some better material to work with, we'd have a serious filmmaker on our hands.

Christopher Doyle- A fantastic cinematographer who's better-known in Asia than he is here in the States. Check out his work in Chungking Express, Temptress Moon, In the Mood for Love, The Quiet American, Hero....

He is better than us.

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i saw year of the devil earlier in the year, and found it pretty dull. a few mildly funny moments but that was about all.

*high fives*

How are these two underrated? Mostly everyone who's seen them has praised them (including me). Besides, "Year of the Devil" is apparently the most watched movie in the Czech Republic ever.

btw, is it true that there is a tradition of Finnish logging films, the bulk of then based on the trials and tribulations of errrrr, logging?

I always thought "underrated" meant "unjustly criticized", not just "unknown".

btw, is it true that there is a tradition of Finnish logging films, the bulk of then based on the trials and tribulations of errrrr, logging?

Yes, it's true, it's a whole genre which includes books as well. It's called "Logger Romanticism", and it's heyday was in the early 20th century (1940s and 1950s, mainly); it doesn't exist anymore. Unfortunately, my interest with the Finnish culture is pretty limited, so I haven't seen any of these flicks. From what I've heard they're pretty cheesy.

You'll have to know that forestry was Finland's main source of export revenue from the 19th century to the early 20th century, and it employed a lot of Finns too, so it was quite natural that there was much fiction based around it.