From Seven to The Matrix – why the 1990s is my favourite film decade

The 90s was a decade that saw the rebirth of the American indie and thrilling blockbusters that weren’t reliant on superheroes

After the daring American new wave film-making of the 70s and the glittery excess of the 80s, the following decade played out like something of a compromise, with a rise in both audacious indie auteurs and flashy big-budget blockbusters. In the 90s, Hollywood grew in confidence and income, allowing for a broader spectrum of entertainment, and in 1999 it hit a new peak with a year commonly looked back on as one of the best ever, a greatest hits of what the decade had to offer. But the secret to many of the biggest 90s successes are embedded in some of the hits that concluded the decade before.

The pop phenomenon that was 1987’s Fatal Attraction – which, adjusted for ticket price inflation, made a staggering $364m (£258m) in the US – led to a subgenre of insidious thrillers that planted a nefarious outsider into a seemingly perfect vision of domesticity and then let them wreak pet-killing havoc for our entertainment. While the formula became rusty by the mid-90s, it was big business as the decade began; and some sharply crafted, highly suspenseful examples – including Cape Fear, Pacific Heights, The Hand That Rocks the Cradle and Single White Female – played on recession-era fears of losing a carefully constructed middle-class lifestyle.

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/2IwgLO2