It is nothing new for a film to be released, find no audience, no critical favor, and disappear to be discovered by a new generation and raised to the level of masterpiece. In fact, this has been going on since the silents.
Charlie Chaplin’s masterpiece “City Lights” was released four years after the advent of sound, and though popular at the time with both audiences and critics, it was some years later that it was finally hailed as Chaplin’s finest work. “The Wizard of Oz,” one of the most beloved films of all time that celebrates a 70th anniversary this month, was a dismal box office flop when released in 1939. It wasn’t terribly popular with the critics either, but years later it was finally championed as a work of art and, of course, now the film is considered one of the greatest films of all time and perhaps a more worthy Best Picture choice than the eventual winner that year, “Gone with the Wind.”
The “Citizen Kane” tale is so well documented I need not continue, and John Ford’s magnificent “The Searchers,” written off as just another John Wayne western, was discovered by film school professors who taught its brilliance to such young minds as Martin Scorsese, John Milius and Francis Coppola. Even Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” failed out of the gate with both audiences and critics, but within a year of its release, many of those same critics had changed their minds about the film. Within 10 years it was being declared as important a film as “Citizen Kane.”
When “Gandhi” won eight Academy Awards in 1982, no one was terribly surprised. Yet within a year there were rumblings within the Academy that a mistake had been made and the rightful winner should have been “E.T. : The Extra-Terrestrial,” now recognized as a sublime work of art. And that same year, “Blade Runner” began its life as a major flop, only to re-discovered on home video over the years and become a cult classic.
Looking back over the last decade or so, which films released since will be recognized 50 years from now? Which films that were passed over by audiences, critics and/or the Oscars will be hailed as masterpieces in the years to come? I took a stab as choosing a group of films I believe could fall under this label.
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