Main Tropes Index

Troperville

Editing

Tools

Toys

Narrative

• Universal
• Applied Phlebotinum
• Characterization
• Characters
• Characters As Device
• Dialogue
• Motifs
• Narrative Devices
• Paratext
• Plots
• Settings
• Spectacle

Genre

• Action Adventure
• Comedy
• Commercials
• Crime And Punishment
• Drama
• Horror
• Love
• News
• Professional Wrestling
• Speculative Fiction
• Sports Story
• War

Media

• Animation (Western)
• Anime
• Comic Book
• Fan Fics
• Film
• Game
• Literature
• Music And Sound Effects
• New Media
• Print Media
• Radio
• Sequential Art
• Tabletop Games
• Television
• Theater
• Videogame
• Webcomics

Topical Tropes

• Betrayal
• Censorship
• Combat
• Death
• Family
• Fate And Prophecy
• Food
• Holiday
• Memory
• Money
• Morality
• Politics
• Religion
• School

Other Categories

• British Telly
• The Contributors
• Creator Speak
• Creators
• Derivative Works
• Did Not Do The Research
• Language
• Laws And Formulas
• Show Business
• Split Personality
• Stock Room
• Trope
• Truth And Lies
• Truth In Television
• Weirdness Isolation

There is a constant interchange of ideas between TV and film — hit movies getting Spin Off series, popular TV series getting big-screen outings — so many tropes have entered TV from film, and vice versa.

Silent Film established most of the basic Camera Tricks, and is the home to many a Discredited Trope.

Note: Do not italicize the titles; it prevents the indices from working properly.

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Really Old

• 1888 - Roundhay Garden Scene and Traffic Crossing Leeds Bridge - possibly the first movies ever, and certainly the oldest known to still exist, were shot by Louis Le Prince on experimental camera.
• 1893-1895 - William K.L. Dickson, working at Thomas Edison's studio, shot Blacksmith Scene, Fred Ott's Sneeze, Carmencita, The Great Sandow, and others - the first commercial movies ever. Dickson Experimental Sound Film, the first sound picture, and The Execution of Mary Stuart, the first cinematic special effects, were also produced at the studio. In 1897, it introduced the world to the first pornographic movie with The Dolorita Passion Dance or Dolorita in the Passion Dance. The film was removed from Atlantic City Kinetoscope parlors in 1895, this being perhaps the first instance of film Censorship.
• 1895-1896 - The Lumière brothers shot movies, including The Sprinkler Sprinkled, Employees Leaving the Factory, and Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat, establishing tropes such as the Practical Joke, Faux Documentary, and cinematic narrative in general.
• 1898-1905 - Georges Méliès shot pioneering movies such as The Four Troublesome Heads, The Man with the Rubber Head, The One Man Band, A Trip to the Moon, The Impossible Voyage, and The Black Imp, establishing many kinds of special effects and Special Effects and genres such as Science Fiction and Fantasy.
• 1903 - Edwin Porter directed The Great Train Robbery at Edison's studio.
• 1906 - The first ever feature-length film, The Story of the Kelly Gang, was filmed in Melbourne, Australia. Of course, in 1906, "feature-length" meant about forty-five minutes long, which was still many times longer than any other film made at that point. (Interestingly, The Story of the Kelly Gang was originally planned as a short film, but its runtime ballooned out as the filmmakers kept adding more and more footage.)
• 1908-1914 - D.W. Griffith directed lots of short films, inventing and/or popularizing more Camera Tricks and other film tropes like:
  • A Corner in Wheat, one of the first movies to use Camera Tricks to make social commentary points;
  • The Girl and Her Trust, an early suspense/action film with a climactic Chase Scene and a panic room scene that would make MacGyver proud;
  • The Musketeers of Pig Alley, the first gangster film; and
  • ''Judith of Bethulia.
• 1911-1914 - Winsor McCay makes the first animated films, including Little Nemo and Gertie the Dinosaur.
• 1912 - The Cameraman's Revenge, one of the first examples of stop-motion animation.

1915-1921

• D.W. Griffith directed some of the earliest feature films, including:
  • The Birth of a Nation - Groundbreaking cinematography, but horrendously racist plot.
  • Intolerance - Equally impressive cinematography, but with a much more palatable plot.
  • Broken Blossoms
  • Way Down East
  • Orphans of the Storm'

1916-1928

• Charlie Chaplin produced and starred in 20 pioneering Slapstick comedies at Mutual studios and First National studios, including:
  • The Rink
  • Easy Street
  • The Cure
  • The Immigrant
  • The Adventurer
  • A Dog's Life
  • Shoulder Arms
  • The Idle Class
  • Pay Day
  • The Pilgrim
• He also produces four feature-length movies, three of which are comedies.
  • The Kid
  • A Woman Of Paris (a drama that he only appears in as a cameo)
  • The Gold Rush
  • The Circus
• Fantomas (Serial, made over several years.)

1919

• The Master Mystery

1920-1928

• Buster Keaton starred in several short Slapstick comedies, including:
  • One Week
  • The Scarecrow
  • The Play House
  • The Boat
  • Cops
• He also starred in several feature comedies, including
  • Our Hospitality
  • Sherlock Jr
  • Seven Chances
  • The Navigator
  • The General
  • The Cameraman
  • Steamboat Bill, Jr. - famous for its By Wall That Is Holey gag

1920

• The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari - This is when film Grew The Beard
• The Golem

1921-1927

• Fritz Lang directed a number of trope making feature films, including
  • Destiny
  • Dr Mabuse The Gambler - invented gangster film tropes that would be used for many years
  • Die Nibelungen - film adaptation of Wagner's Ring opera cycle, and zillions of Fantasy tropes are seen on film for the first time here.
  • Metropolis - arguably responsible for nearly every Science Fiction trope we're familiar with in film today.

1922-1927

• F.W. Murnau directed several influential silent films including
  • Nosferatu
  • The Last Laugh
  • Faust
  • Sunrise

1922

• The Little Rascals
• Nanook Of The North - a pioneering Documentary and the template for all future ones.

1923

• Safety Last
• The Hunchback Of Notre Dame - the first feature film adaptation of the story, and Lon Chaney's Quasimoto is still the ugliest one yet.

1924

• Greed - a 9 1/2 hour epic by Erich von Stroheim, edited to 2 hours against his wishes, the cut footage Lost Forever.
• The Thief Of Baghdad - not the first to use special effects but probably the first "special-effect-driven" film.

1925

• The Big Parade - the first major World War One film, notable for realistically depicting combat
• Ben Hur - the first feature film adaptation of the story.
• The Battleship Potemkin establishes (among many others) the Baby Carriage trope.
• Strike
• The Phantom Of The Opera

1927

• The Jazz Singer - First "talkie".
• Wings - A World War One film, and the first film to win Best Picture at the Oscars.
• The Lodger - the first of many suspense thrillers directed by Alfred Hitchcock
• Napoleon - An epic five 1/2 hour drama about the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte. Might never be seen in its intact form again thanks to Executive Meddling.

1928

• The Burning Of Red Lotus Temple
• The Little Rascals
• The Passion Of Joan Of Arc

1929

• Un Chien Andalou - most remembered for its Eye Scream moment at the beginning.
• The Man With The Movie Camera - every Camera Trick in the book, and the fastest Montages ever attempted.
• Pandora's Box
• Blackmail, the first talkie directed by Alfred Hitchcock

1930-1935

• The Marx Brothers star in early sound comedies including
  • Animal Crackers
  • Monkey Business
  • Horse Feathers
  • Duck Soup
  • A Night At The Opera

1930

• All Quiet On The Western Front
• The Blue Angel

1931-1936

• Universal Studios produced archetypal monster movies, including
  • Dracula
  • Frankenstein
  • The Mummy
  • The Invisible Man
  • Bride Of Frankenstein

1931

• Ambassador Bill - starring Will Rogers
• City Lights
• M by Fritz Lang
• The Public Enemy - an early talkie gangster film.

1932

• Freaks
• Scarface
• Grand Hotel

1933

• Gabriel Over The White House
• King Kong - The second-most-famous "giant monster" movie after Godzilla

1934-1938

• Alfred Hitchcock directed influential suspense thrillers that become world-famous:
  • The Man Who Knew Too Much
  • The 39 Steps
  • The Lady Vanishes

1934-1939

• Frank Capra directed a number of feel-good movies, including:
  • It Happened One Night
  • Mr Deeds Goes To Town
  • Mr Smith Goes To Washington

1934

• The Thin Man

1935

• Mutiny On The Bounty
• Triumph Of The Will - Like The Birth Of A Nation, a landmark of cinematographic art...which was also propaganda for a hate group.

1936

• Modern Times
• Reefer Madness - Probably the original So Bad Its Good movie

1937

• The Dybbuk
• The Grand Illusion

1938

• The Adventures Of Robin Hood
• Bringing Up Baby

1939

• Gone With The Wind
• Stagecoach - Another good example of the typical western.
• The Wizard Of Oz

Other 1930s films

• The Little Rascals
• Tarzan

1940-1948

• Alfred Hitchcock moved to Hollywood and directs classic thrillers such as
  • Rebecca
  • Shadow Of A Doubt
  • Notorious
  • Rope

1940

• The Great Dictator
• His Girl Friday
• The Philadelphia Story
• The Grapes Of Wrath

1941

• Citizen Kane - "Rosebud!"
• The Devil And Daniel Webster
• The Maltese Falcon

1942

• Casablanca - Wartime romance, often considered one of the best romantic movies ever made.
• Mrs Miniver - An Oscar-winning World War II propaganda film.

1943

1944

• Arsenic And Old Lace
• Double Indemnity
• The Little Rascals (last classic film)
• Since You Went Away

1945

1946

• A Matter Of Life And Death - Called Stairway to Heaven in the US
• It's A Wonderful Life - Source of Wonderful Life.
• Song Of The South - Walt Disney's own personal Dis Continuity
• The Big Sleep

1948

• The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre
• Bicycle Thieves

1949

• The Fountainhead
• The Third Man

Other 1940s films

• The Little Rascals
• Tarzan

1950

• All About Eve
• Rashomon
• Sunset Boulevard

1951-1959

• The peak years of Alfred Hitchcock's career. Films directed include
  • Strangers On A Train
  • Rear Window
  • Vertigo
  • North By Northwest

1951

• The African Queen
• Los Olvidados - Also known as The Forgotten Ones and The Young and the Damned. A crude story about the tragic lives of the destitute children living in the slums of Mexico City.
• A Streetcar Named Desire
• The Day The Earth Stood Still

1952

• The Bad And The Beautiful
• High Noon - Possibly the most famous movie Western.
• Shane
• Singing In The Rain - Classic musical that calls back to the first "talkies."

1953

• Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
• It Came From Outer Space - Early subversion of the "alien invaders" genre.
• Roman Holiday

1954

• Creature From The Black Lagoon - Grandfather of Jaws.
• Godzilla - Created the "kaiju" genre of Japanese film."
• On The Waterfront
• Seven Samurai
• Them - Along with Godzilla, introduced the durable "rampaging mutant animals" genre.
• White Christmas

1955

• The Court Jester
• The Night Of The Hunter
• Rebel Without A Cause
• This Island Earth

1956

• An Affair To Remember
• Forbidden Planet
• Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
• Rodan - classic Toku film directed by Ishiro Honda
• The Searchers - If you have been to film school, you have seen this. And vice versa.

1957

• Beginning Of The End
• The Bridge On The River Kwai
• Old Yeller
• Paths Of Glory
• The Seventh Seal
• Twelve Angry Men

1958

• The Blob
• Plan 9 From Outer Space - the commonly cited "worst movie ever made".

1959

• Ben Hur - the most famous version of the story.
• The Day The Earth Froze
• The Mouse That Roared
• Prince Of Space
• Santa Claus
• Some Like It Hot
• Teenagers From Outer Space

Other 1950s

• Carry On . . .
  • . . . Sergeant
  • . . . Nurse
  • . . . Teacher

1960s

1960-1968

• Stanley Kubrick directed a number of highly acclaimed films, such as
  • Spartacus
  • Dr Strangelove
  • 2001: A Space Odyssey

1960

• The Little Shop Of Horrors
• The Magnificent Seven
• Make Mine Mink
• Psycho

1961

• Breakfast At Tiffanys
• Invasion Of The Neptune Men
• The Magic Sword
• Snow White And The Three Stooges

1962

• Carnival Of Souls
• Dr No - the first official James Bond film. Spawned 20 sequels, listed under Notably Long Film Series below.
• Gypsy
• Lawrence Of Arabia
• The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
• The Manchurian Candidate
• To Kill A Mocking Bird
• What Ever Happened To Baby Jane

1963

• The Birds
• The Great Escape
• It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
• The Pink Panther- The slapstick adventures of Inspector Clouseau.

1964

• A Fistful Of Dollars - One of the first spaghetti westerns, a remake of Yojimbo set in the Old West.
• A Hard Days Night - One of the greatest Mockumentaries ever.
• Mary Poppins - The Disney mega-musical fantasy.
• A Shot in the Dark - The Clouseau series formula is firmly established.
• Santa Claus Conquers The Martians
• The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Mixed-Up Zombies
• Zulu - A classic war film set in the Boer War.

1965

• Gamera
• The Sound Of Music - The monster hit of the decade.
• Monster A Go Go - Bad. Really, really bad.
• The Greatest Story Ever Told
• The Great Race

1966

• Batman The Movie
• The Battle Of Algiers
• The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly - Famously deconstructs and revises The Western.
• The Shooting - Another postmodern western.
• Manos The Hands Of Fate - Plan 9's rival for Worst Movie Ever.

1967

• The Graduate
• Point Blank

1968

• Danger Diabolik: famously the Grand Finale of MST 3 K
• Inspector Clouseau (or was it?)
• Once Upon A Time In The West
• Planet Of The Apes - The original.
• The Producers - Launched the career of Mel Brooks
• Night Of The Living Dead - Introduced the Zombie Apocalypse.

1969

• Battle Of Britain
• Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid
• The Girl In Gold Boots
• The Italian Job- where the aim was only the removal of the doors.
• The Magic Christian
• The Wild Bunch

Other 1960s

• Carry On - Fifteen films in the sixties alone.
• The Coleman Francis trilogy (The Beast of Yucca Flats, The Skydivers and Red Zone Cuba) - Rambling So Bad Its Horrible Shaggy Dog Stories, all featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000.
• The Parent Trap - Hayley Mills edition

1970s

1970

• Catch-22 - You'd be insane to watch it. Then again, trying to avoid it is a sign of rational thought and so you have no excuse not to watch it.
• Let It Be—the classic, lost Beatles documentary.
• Tora Tora Tora - Everything that Pearl Harbor should have been, but wasn't.
• Even Dwarfs Started Small - Exactly What It Says On The Tin. Surprisingly enough, not exploitative.
• The Boys In The Band - First mainstream gay film.

1971

• Bedknobs And Broomsticks
• A Clock Work Orange
• Dirty Harry
• Fiddler On The Roof
• Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory - It wasn't a hit at the time, but became the era's closest analogue to The Wizard of Oz for 1970s-80s kids.
• The Omega Man
• Touch Of Satan

1972

• Night of the Lepus (not lupus.)
• Black Mama White Mama
• Pink Flamingos

1972-1979

• Francis Ford Coppola directs:
  • The Godfather - The classic gangster epic, and the genesis for the modern media portrayal of The Mafia.
  • The Godfather Part II
  • Apocalypse Now - The most disturbing war movie ever. "The Horror...The Horror...The Horror..."
• Woyzeck

1973

• American Graffiti - "Where were you in '62?" (probably not born yet)
• The Exorcist
• Godspell
• Jesus Christ Superstar
• Live And Let Die
• Soylent Green
• The Sting - Everything about The Con that other films have since attempted to capture.
• The Wicker Man

1974

• Blazing Saddles - Spoof of The Western genre.
• Chinatown
• Dark Star
• Death Wish
• The Enigma Of Kaspar Hauser
• Foxy Brown
• The Parallax View
• The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three
• The Towering Inferno - The prototypical disaster-in-a-high-rise movie.
• Young Frankenstein - Mel Brooks does to Universal Horror what he did to the Western with Blazing Saddles.
• Zardoz

1975

• Dersu Uzala
• Dog Day Afternoon
• One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest
• Master Of The Flying Guillotine
• Mitchell
• Monty Python And The Holy Grail
• Return of the Pink Panther - The Clouseau comeback show.
• The Rocky Horror Picture Show - A Cult Classic musical with an undying and crossdressing fanbase.
• Rollerball
• Tommy
• Jaws - Introduced the "animals on a rampage" movie, pushed Steven Spielberg into the limelight, and effectively created the Summer Blockbuster.
• Picnic At Hanging Rock - A classic Australian mystery which helped to revive the Australian film industry.

1976

• Carrie
• King Kong - Ill-regarded remake.
• Logans Run
• Network - "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!"
• The Omen
• The Pink Panther Strikes Again
• Rocky - The film that made Sylvester Stallone famous.
• Taxi Driver - "Someday a real rain will come and wash the scum off the streets..."

1977

• Annie Hall - Woody Allen's most famous film. Sometimes derided by Star Wars fans for winning Best Picture.
• Close Encounters Of The Third Kind - The other big sci-fi/fantasy of 1977.
• Eraserhead - David Lynch's first film. Very hard to describe.
• The Kentucky Fried Movie - first work of the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker team.
• Pete's Dragon - a live-action film with a cel-animated dragon.
• Star Wars - spawned 2 sequels and inspired a prequel trilogy, listed under Notably Long Film Series below.
• Stroszek - Werner Herzog's last movie staring Bruno S.

1978

• Animal House - The quintessential "wacky college hijinks" comedy.
• Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes - Exactly What It Says On The Tin
• Dawn Of The Dead
• Halloween
• Invasion Of The Body Snatchers - A well-regarded update.
• Laserblast
• Revenge of the Pink Panther - Last entry most fans regard as canonical.
• Superman - "You'll believe a man can fly" with the first big comic book movie.
• Watership Down
• The Deer Hunter

1979

• Alien - Combined horror and Sci Fi with one of the first Action Girl heroines.
• Being There - The trope namer for Chance The Gardener.
• The Black Hole
• Clonus
• Escape From Alcatraz - Grants Truth In Television to the most unlikely tropes.
• Monty Python's Life Of Brian
• Mad Max
• The Muppet Movie - Film debut of everyone's favorite puppets from The Muppet Show, this family comedy shows how Kermit the Frog and his friends broke into showbiz.
• Starcrash
• The Warriors

Other 1970s

• Carry On - Twelve films in the seventies alone.
• Lone Wolf And Cub - Classic samurai film series Bowdlerised as Shogun Assassin in the United States.

1980

• Airplane! - Set the standard for Affectionate Parodies.
• Alligator - One of the better of the countless Jaws knockoffs.
• Altered States
• The Blues Brothers - "We're on a mission from God."
• The Castle Of Cagliostro
• Dune
• The Final Countdown
• Flash Gordon
• Hawk The Slayer
• The Jazz Singer
• Puma Man
• Raging Bull
• The Shining
• Somewhere In Time
• Xanadu

1981-1989

• Steven Spielberg directed the Indiana Jones trilogy.
  • Raiders Of The Lost Ark
  • Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
  • Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

1981

• An American Werewolf In London
• Arthur
• Chariots Of Fire
• Condorman
• Dragonslayer
• Escape From New York
• Evil Dead
• Excalibur
• The Great Muppet Caper
• The Road Warrior - sequel to Mad Max. Sparked the "post-apocalyptic" genre.
• Outland Lone honest cop vs. drug-dealers on Io.
• Race For The Yankee Zephyr
• Scanners - Psychic Powers + David Cronenberg = A very messy film.
• Time Bandits

1982

• The Beastmaster
• Blade Runner - A definitive, influential work of Cyber Punk.
• Caddyshack
• The Dark Crystal
• Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid
• E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
• Firefox - The Cool Plane.
• Forbidden Zone
• The Man Who Saves The World (aka Turkish Star Wars)
• Q The Winged Serpent
• Rocky III
• The Thing
• Trail of the Pink Panther - A Clip Show built around unused/recycled footage of Peter Sellers' Inspector Clouseau from previous installments.
• Tron
• The Wall (also known as Pink Floyd: The Wall)
• Victor Victoria

1983

• A Christmas Story
• Blue Thunder
• Brainstorm
• Bullshot
• Escape from the Bronx - a.k.a. Escape 2000
• Koyaanisqatsi
• Krull
• National Lampoon's Vacation
• Curse of the Pink Panther - Ted Wass becomes a Replacement Scrappy for Peter Sellers.
• Pod People
• Scarface - Ultra-violent gangster movie of the 1980s and favorite of hip-hop culture.
• Videodrome - People keep putting VHS cassettes in James Woods' vagina. Yes, you read that right.
• War Games
• Yor The Hunter From The Future

1984

• The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai Across The Eighth Dimension - regarded as a So Bad Its Good cult classic.
• Amadeus
• American Dreamer
• TheBladeMaster
• Brazil
• Footloose
• Ghostbusters - Who you gonna call?
• Give My Regards To Broad Street - Paul McCartney's live-action magnum opus.
• Gremlins
• The Ice Pirates
• Johnny Dangerously
• The Karate Kid
• The Last Starfighter - Trope maker for the Ascended Fanboy
• Night Of The Comet
• Once Upon A Time In America
• The Philadelphia Experiment
• Police Academy
• Purple Rain
• Red Dawn
• Rocky IV
• Starman
• Streets Of Fire
• The Terminator - The quintessential killer cyborg movie
• This Is Spinal Tap

1985

• After Hours
• Back To The Future - Fun with Time Travel.
• The Breakfast Club
• Clue
• Commando - So Bad Its Good Arnold Schwarzenegger film.
• The Goonies
• Gymkata
• Ladyhawke
• Out Of Africa
• Ran
• Re-Animator
• Real Genius
• Return To Oz
• Teen Wolf
• Weird Science

1986

• Aliens
• Big Trouble In Little China - John Carpenter's tribute to the Hong Kong action genre.
• Crocodile Dundee
• Ferris Buellers Day Off
• From Beyond
• Fugitive Alien
• Howard The Duck
• Labyrinth
• Little Shop Of Horrors
• The Manhattan Project
• Manhunter
• Night Of The Creeps
• Platoon
• Short Circuit
• Stand By Me
• Three Amigos
• Top Gun
• Twisted
• Withnail And I

1987

• Adventures In Babysitting
• Angel Heart
• Escape From Sobibor
• Fatal Attraction - Top-grossing thriller about a married man who has an affair with a psychotic woman.
• Full Metal Jacket
• Hellraiser
• Innerspace
• Lethal Weapon
• The Lost Boys
• The Monster Squad
• Near Dark
• Predator
• The Princess Bride - The best movie no one's heard of, it seems.
• Robo Cop
• Some Kind Of Wonderful
• Spaceballs - Parody of Space Opera and straight-up fairy tale.
• Time Of The Apes
• The Untouchables
• Planes, Trains and Automobiles

1988

• Beetlejuice - Burton's iconic horror comedy.
• Childs Play
• Die Hard
• Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
• A Fish Called Wanda
• Hobgoblins
• Naked Gun
• Space Mutiny
• Straight Up
• They Live
• Who Framed Roger Rabbit - The most famous fusion of live action and animation in a movie.
• Willow - A Tolkienesque fantasy.

1989

• The Abyss
• Bill And Teds Excellent Adventure
• Dead Poets Society
• Heathers
• Major League
• Meet The Feebles - Often described as Muppets on crack.
• National Lampoons Christmas Vacation
• Road House
• UHF
• The Wizard
• The Woman In Black

Other 1980s

• The Gods Must Be Crazy
• My Best Friend Is A Vampire
• The original Rambo/First Blood trilogy.

1990s

1990

• Dances With Wolves
• Edward Scissorhands
• The Final Sacrifice
• The Godfather Part III
• Goodfellas
• Ghost
• Gremlins 2: The New Batch
• Hardware
• HomeAlone
• The Hunt For Red October
• Miller's Crossing
• Misery
• Quigley Down Under
• Predator 2
• Pretty Woman
• Soultaker
• Troll 2 - In Name Only sequel to the 1986 B-Movie Troll. So Bad Its Good.
• The Witches
• Tremors

1991

• Dead Again - Mixes Crime And Punishment and Romance
• The Fisher King
• Hook
• Hudson Hawk
• If Looks Could Kill
• Impromptu
• King Ralph
• Once Upon A Time In China
• Point Break
• The Rocketeer
• The Silence Of The Lambs - Classic Serial Killer thriller and origin of the Hannibal Lecture.
• Zeiram

1992

• 3 Ninjas
• A Few Good Men
• Basic Instinct
• Bob Roberts
• Cool World
• Mom And Dad Save The World
• My Cousin Vinny
• Reservoir Dogs
• Sneakers
• The Story Of Ricky
• Unforgiven
• Wayne's World
• Stay Tuned

1993-1998

• Steven Spielberg Grew The Beard
  • Jurassic Park
  • Schindlers List
  • Saving Private Ryan

1993

• Demolition Man
• Falling Down
• Green Snake
• Groundhog Day
• BodySnatchers
• Last Action Hero - More Subverted Tropes than you can shake a stick at.
• Mrs Doubtfire
• Robin Hood Men In Tights
• Sleepless In Seattle - Who knew romance and geography could go together?
• Son of the Pink Panther
• Stalingrad
• Super Mario Bros - First videogame movie... maybe.
• True Romance
• Undercover Blues
• The Wedding Banquet

1994

• Chungking Express
• Clear And Present Danger
• Clerks
• The Crow
• Forrest Gump
• Four Weddings And A Funeral
• Interview With The Vampire
• The Little Rascals (Re Vision)
• On Deadly Ground
• Natural Born Killers
• North
• The Professional
• Pulp Fiction
• The Santa Clause - the original.
• The Shawshank Redemption
• Stargate - origin of the Stargate Verse.
• Time Cop
• Troy

1995

• Babe
• Backbeat —the most critically acclaimed post-Beatles film about The Beatles in Hamburg —Or Is It?
• Bad Boys
• Braveheart
• Casino
• Clueless - Influential 1990s Teen Movie.
• Crimson Tide
• Dead Man
• Empire Records
• Four Rooms
• Get Shorty
• Hackers
• Jumanji
• Now And Then
• Rob Roy
• Se7en
• Showgirls
• Species
• To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar
• Twelve Monkeys
• The Usual Suspects - Who is Keyser Soze?

1996

• The Birdcage
• Broken Arrow
• Bound
• The Cable Guy
• Dragonheart
• The English Patient
• Escape from LA
• Fargo
• From Dusk Till Dawn
• Independence Day
• Irma Vep
• Jack Frost - not to be confused with the one with Michael Keaton
• Jerry Maguire
• Man With A Plan - independent Mockumentary often confused with the real thing due to an unusual case of Defictionalization.
• Mars Attacks
• Merlins Shop Of Mystical Wonders - a horror movie hastily re-edited into a family film that competes closely with Manos for sheer Narmery.
• Muppet Treasure Island - Muppets and Pirates in a musical adventure.
• The Pillow Book
• The Rock
• Trainspotting
• Twister

1997

• Air Force One - "Get off my plane!"
• Batman And Robin - Batman Sequel often listed among the worst movies of all time
• Chasing Amy
• ConAir
• Event Horizon
• The Fifth Element
• Gattaca
• Grosse Pointe Blank - One of the best romantic comedies featuring the Hitman With A Heart.
• Hana Bi
• Lawn Dogs - A very original drama that has its own unique set of tropes.
• Liar Liar
• The Man Who Knew Too Little - starring Bill Murray.
• Titanic - The hit of the decade, love it or hate it.
• The Full Monty

1998

• After The Rain
• Armageddon — the winner in Dueling Movies vs. Deep Impact
• The Big Lebowski
• Dark City
• Deep Impact
• Doctor Akagi a.k.a. Kanzo Sensei
• The Faculty
• Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas - Surprisingly faithful adaptation of Hunter S. Thompson's magnum opus
• Flowers Of Shanghai
• Godzilla - Adaptation Decay wrought ugly.
• Half Baked — Very funny Stoner Flick with Dave Chappelle, Jim Breuer, Harland Williams and Guillermo Díaz.
• Lock Stock And Two Smoking Barrels
• Meet Joe Black
• Pi
• Pleasantville
• Practical Magic
• Ronin
• Run Lola Run
• Shakespeare In Love
• Six String Samurai — Buddy Holly and a Tagalong Kid take on Death and Communists in a Wizard Of Oz pastiche.
• Stepmom
• Velvet Goldmine
• Waking Ned Devine

1999

• American Beauty
• Being John Malkovich
• Bicentennial Man
• The Blair Witch Project
• The Boondock Saints - Cult independent crime flick about vigilantes on a Mission From God.
• Deep Blue Sea
• Dogma
• End Of Days
• Fight Club - Don't talk about it
• Galaxy Quest - Affectionate Parody of Star Trek.
• Ghost Dog The Way Of Samurai - independent Samurai meets Gangster movie
• The Matrix - Managed to add a veneer of philosophical thought to its action, and popularized Bullet Time.
• Mystery Men
• Office Space
• The Sixth Sense
• Sleepy Hollow

Other 1990s film

• Austin Powers trilogy - Spoofs of James Bond and the Spy Drama genre.
• Buffy The Vampire Slayer
• Die Hard 2 and 3
• Hocus Pocus
• In And Out - One of the few mainstream Hollywood comedies in the 90s to deal with homosexuality positively.
• The Little Rascals
• The Mask Of Zorro - Passing the Zorro Mark on to a new generation.
• Men In Black - Based on a comic book series by Lowell Cunningham, it cemented Will Smith's status as a big box-office draw.
• The Mighty Ducks
• The Mummy
• Scream - A Post Modern Deconstruction of slasher films.
• Sister Act
• Speed
• Spice World
• Starship Troopers - Adaptation Decay incarnate (or perhaps deliberate Adaptation Sabotage)

2000-present Notable Film Franchises, 2000-2008

• The Bourne Series - Loose (very, very loose) adaptation of the Robert Ludlum novels.
• Final Destination
• The ''Harold and Kumar'' films
• Hellboy and its sequel
• High School Musical
• Ju-on
• Kill Bill - Katanas Are Just Better in its purest form.
• National Treasure
• Pirates Of The Caribbean - Brought the pirate genre back into the mainstream.
• Riddick / Pitch Black
• Saw - Modern horror franchise.
• Scary Movie - This film franchise spoofs the tropes seen in most horror films.
• Spider-Man trilogy
• X-Men franchise - Seen as the first major hit of the comic book movie era

2000

• Almost Famous
• American Pie
• American Psycho - Christian Bale makes a homicidal maniac absolutely hilarious.
• Battlefield Earth - How egos, Scientology and bad writing have unwatchable results.
• Battle Royale - Ax Crazy high schoolers killing each other.
• The Broken Hearts Club
• Chicken Run
• Chunhyang
• Coyote Ugly
• Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
• Gladiator
• Gone In Sixty Seconds
• Hero
• How The Grinch Stole Christmas
• In The Mood For Love
• Me Myself And Irene
• Meet The Parents
• Miss Congeniality
• O Brother Where Art Thou
• Requiem For A Dream
• Shanghai Noon
• Snatch
• Space Cowboys
• The Specials
• Tanguy
• The Isle
• Unbreakable
• Yi Yi

2001-2003

• Peter Jackson directs The Lord Of The Rings trilogy
  • The Fellowship of the Ring
  • The Two Towers
  • The Return of the King
• The Spy Kids trilogy
• Underworld
• Osmosis Jones

2001

• Amelie
• Avalon
• Betelnut Beauty
• Enemy At The Gates
• Gosford Park
• Hedwig And The Angry Inch
• Jeepers Creepers
• Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter - aka ": The Movie".
• Kate And Leopold
• A Knight's Tale
• Lagaan
• Legally Blonde
• The Lost Skeleton Of Cadavra - Affectionate Parody of 1950s B movies
• Memento -Christopher Nolan's breakthrough film
• Mulholland Drive - Utter Mind Screw, even for David Lynch.
• Not Another Teen Movie
• Ocean's Eleven
• Pearl Harbor
• Planet Of The Apes: the Tim Burton remake
• The Quiet American
• Zoolander

2002

• Adaptation
• Balzac And The Little Chinese Seamstress
• Big Trouble
• Bubba Ho-Tep
• Catch Me If You Can
• Chicago
• Dog Soldiers
• Donnie Darko
• Drunk On Women And Poetry (a.k.a. Chihwaseon or Painted Fire)
• Equilibrium - Fahrenheit 451 meets lots and lots of gunplay. Introduced Gun Kata.
• The Eye (aka Gin Gwai) - Hong Kong supernatural horror film. Spawned two sequels and a 2008 US remake of the same name.
• Kukushka
• Kung Pow: Enter The Fist
• Minority Report
• The Mothman Prophecies
• The Ring
• Rollerball (the remake)
• The Scorpion King
• Secretary
• Shark Attack 3 Megalodon
• Signs
• Time Changer - a Christian Time Travel film. Must be seen to be believed.
• 28 days later
• Undercover Brother

2003

• Big Fish
• Bruce Almighty - Jim Carrey is God. Literally.
• The Core
• City Of God
• Game Over Control Alt Death
• Goodbye Lenin
• The Hebrew Hammer - The first (and so far only) Jewsploitation film.
• Kal Ho Naa Ho
• Lost In Translation
• Love Actually
• A Mighty Wind
• School Of Rock
• Shanghai Knights
• Shara
• A Tale Of Two Sisters (aka Janghwa, Hongryeon) - Korean horror film, remade in 2009 as a US film titled The Uninvited.
• A Mighty Wind

2004

• Anchorman The Legend Of Ron Burgundy
• The Butterfly Effect
• Catwoman
• Clean
• Collateral
• Crash - A Very Special Movie.
• CSA Confederate States of America
• The Day After Tomorrow — in which global warming causes an instant ice age.
• D.E.B.S.
• Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
• Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
• Eurotrip
• Fantastic Four
• Friday Night Lights - Sports Story Tropes done right.
• House Of Flying Daggers
• Mean Girls
• The Grudge
• Napoleon Dynamite
• Primer - Either a brilliant deconstruction and/or The Parody of Time Travel, or played it straight; if you can figure it out feel free to choose one.
• Raise Your Voice
• Samaritan Girl
• Saved
• Shaun Of The Dead - Affectionate Parody of the zombie film with some laughs for good measure.
• Shutter - Thai horror film, remade for US audiences in 2008.
• Sky Captain And The World Of Tomorrow - George Lucas Throwback to the Two Fisted Tales of the 1930's. Its extensive use of the "digital backlot" made it unprofitable, but paved the way for later works such as Sin City.
• Team America: World Police - The guys who made South Park use marionettes to lampoon US foreign policy and the war against terrorism.
• Van Helsing
• The Village

2005

• Brokeback Mountain - "I wish I knew how to quit you!"
• The Brothers Grimm
• The Constant Gardener
• Constantine
• Cry_Wolf - Only really here because Silent Hunter likes it.
• Danny The Dog
• Densha Otoko
• The Descent
• Elizabethtown
• Hard Candy
• Hide And Seek
• The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy
• House Of Harmony
• Imagine Me & You
• The Island - Unofficial Remake of Parts: The Clonus Horror.
• Kingdom Of Heaven
• King Kong - Well-regarded remake by Peter Jackson.
• Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
• Lord Of War
• MirrorMask - Picture Labyrinth, but with Neil Gaiman and no David Bowie
• Mr And Mrs Smith
• The Proposition
• Sin City
• Sky Blue
• Sky High
• Son Of The Mask
• Three Times

2006

• Accepted
• Babel
• The Barbie Diaries
• Bon Cop Bad Cop - A Canadian Buddy Cop Film.
• Borat - Sasha Cohen's magnum opus.
• Broken Trail
• Children Of Men
• Curse Of The Golden Flower - Chinese cinema taking place in the Forbidden City with much backstabbing.
• Date Movie
• The Departed
• The Devil Wears Prada
• Fearless
• Flags Of Our Fathers
  • Letters From Iwo Jima
• Idiocracy
• An Inconvenient Truth
• Inland Empire
• Lady In The Water
• Little Miss Sunshine
• The Lives Of Others
• Lucky Number Slevin
• Night At The Museum
• Night Watch
• Pan's Labyrinth - Alice in Wonderland meets The Brothers Grimm.
• Right At Your Door
• The Pink Panther (with Steve Martin as Inspector Clouseau)
• Shortbus
• Silent Hill
• Slither
• Snakes On A Plane - A film custom made for Memetic Mutation.
• Stranger Than Fiction
• Thank You For Smoking
• Ultraviolet
• Volver
• Zyzzyx Road - notable for grossing just $20.

2007

• 1408 - You only wish it was haunted...
• 300 - Only one quote may appear here: "Madness?! This Is SPARTA!"
• Across The Universe
• August Rush
• Beowulf - "I'm here to kill your monster."
• Die Hard 4.0, or Live Free Or Die Hard
• Enchanted - Disney's Affectionate Parody of... a Disney movie.
• Epic Movie
• Ghost Rider: A B-level adaptation of the Marvel Comics character.
• The Golden Compass: A... loose adaptation of the His Dark Materials series.
• Gone Baby Gone
• Good Luck Chuck
• Grindhouse
• Hot Fuzz
• The Invasion
• Juno
• Kickin It Old School
• The Kite Runner
• Ma-Mha
• The Mist
• Negative Happy Chainsaw Edge
• No Country For Old Men
• The Orphanage - Spanish horror film filled to the brim with Nightmare Fuel Unleaded
• Rambo - Johnny comes back for a forth time to help out against a horrible genocide in Burma. And shockingly, it's good.
• Shoot Em Up
• Sukiyaki Western Django
• Sunshine
• There Will Be Blood - "I drink your milkshake!"
• Transformers
• Walk Hard

2008

• The Ark Of Truth - See Stargate Verse.
• Australia
• The Bank Job
• Burn After Reading
• Camp Rock - Endless parade of pop music. *shudder*
• Chemical Wedding - Written by Bruce Dickinson, this 2008 British thriller deals with the reincarnation of Aleister Crowley through a virtual reality experiment gone wrong, and his effort to ensure his continued existence through an ancient rite called the "Chemical Wedding". Released in the US on DVD as Crowley in March 2009.
• Cloverfield - A modern monster film from the creator of Lost.
• Death Race
• Disaster Movie
• Doomsday
• The Forbidden Kingdom
• Gran Torino
• Gym Teacher The Movie
• Hancock
• The Happening
• I Am Legend
• In Bruges
• Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
• Iron Man
• Jumper
• Justice League The New Frontier
• Let The Right One In
• Lust Caution
• Mamma Mia!
• Max Manus
• Nick And Norahs Infinite Playlist
• Meet The Spartans
• Outlander
• Red Cliff
• Repo! The Genetic Opera
• Seven Pounds
• Slumdog Millionaire
• Son Of Rambow
• Stargate Continuum
• Traitor
• Tropic Thunder
• 21
• Valkyrie
• Wanted
• The Wrestler
• Zack And Miri Make A Porno

2009

• Antichrist
• Departures
• District 9
• Drag Me To Hell
• Dragonball Evolution
• Observe And Report
• Public Enemies
• Push
• Star Trek
• Street Fighter The Legend Of Chun Li
• Taken
• Up
• Watchmen

Live-action films not yet sorted:

• Apollo 13
• College Saga - Pastiche of Japanese Role Playing Games.
• Cube trilogy
• Evil Dead trilogy
• Friday The13th (a series of twelve films and counting)
• Glengarry Glen Ross
• Hammer Horror - Defined vampire and gothic horror cinema of the 1950s and 1960s.
• The Illusionist
• Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
• The Last Samurai
• The Parent Trap (Lindsey Lohan edition)
• The Prisoner Of Zenda (which one? There are at least six)
• Tarzan
• Under Siege

Animated films:

• Akira
• Aladdin
• All Dogs Go To Heaven
• An American Tail
• Anastasia
• Animalympics - "Sixteen Days of Glory" becomes "Sixteen Days of Furry" in this animated cult classic.
• The Ant Bully
• The Aristocats
• Balto
• Bambi
• The Barbie Diaries
• Beauty And The Beast
• The Bionicle Trillogy
• Bolt
• The Brave Little Toaster
• A Bugs Life
• Cars
• Cats Don't Dance
• Chicken Little
• Coraline
• Corpse Bride
• Disney's Dinosaur - In 2000, Disney tried it's hand at making a critically beloved CGI film without Pixar's help. The result is a prime cut of Snark Bait.
• The Emperors New Groove
• Fantasia
• The Fearless Four
• Fern Gully
• Finding Nemo
• Fire And Ice
• The Flight Of Dragons
• Flushed Away
• The Girl Who Leapt Through Time - 2006 animated adaptation of a novel released in the 1970s, now premiering in the United States.
• A Goofy Movie
• Happy Feet
• Heavy Metal - A surreal Animated Anthology from Canada.
• Hercules
• Horton Hears A Who
• Ice Age
• The Incredibles
• The Iron Giant
• James And The Giant Peach
• Journey To Saturn
• Kiki's Delivery Service
• Kung Fu Panda
• The Land Before Time
• The Last Unicorn
• The Lion King
• The Little Island
• The Little Mermaid
• Little Nemo
• Madagascar
• The Magic Voyage
• Meet The Robinsons
• Monster House
• Monsters Inc
• Monsters Vs Aliens
• Mulan
• My Neighbors The Yamadas
• The Mysterious Geographic Explorations Of Jasper Morello
• The Nightmare Before Christmas
• 101 Dalmatians
• Ozamu Tezuka's Metropolis
• The Pebble And The Penguin
• The Phantom Tollbooth
• Pinocchio
• Pocahontas
• The Point
• Ponyo On A Cliff By The Sea
• The Prince Of Egypt
• Princess Mononoke
• Quest For Camelot
• Raggedy Ann and Andy: A Musical Adventure - animated film famous for being "trippy".
• Ratatouille
• The Road To El Dorado
• Robots
• Rock A Doodle
• Rock And Rule
• The Secret Of NIMH
• Shrek - This CGI film series features wry parodies of European folklore and fairy tales.
• Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs - Disney's first feature length animated film.
• Spirit: Stallion Of The Cimmaron
• The Tale Of Despereaux
• Tarzan
• The Swan Princess
• The Thief And The Cobbler
• Thumbelina
• Titan AE
• Titanic: the Legend Goes On
• Toy Story
• Treasure Planet
• The Triplets Of Belleville
• A Troll In Central Park
• Up
• WALL-E
• Yellow Submarine

Animated Shorts

• Classic Disney Shorts
• Looney Tunes
• Pixar Shorts

Notably Long Film Series (five or more films)

• Batman - All in all the character's been to the theaters 8 times. One was based on the sixties TV series, and another was an animated theatrical release. Warner Brothers's live action films include:
  • Batman - Tim Burton's interpretation of Gotham City's protector, without the camp elements.
  • Batman Returns (1992) also, by Burton
  • Batman Forever (1995) and
  • Batman And Robin (1997) by Joel Schumacher
  • 2005 saw Christopher Nolan revive the franchise in a new continuity
  • Batman Begins (2005)
  • The Dark Knight (2008)
• The Falcon - a once famous, now rather obscure detective character who was the hero of sixteen different features made between 1940 and 1949.
• James Bond - 21 official films, with two "unofficial" films not produced by Eon/United Artists.
  • Dr No (1962) - Sean Connery is James Bond.
  • From Russia With Love (1963)
  • Goldfinger (1964)
  • Thunderball (1965)
  • You Only Live Twice (1967)
    • Casino Royale (1967) - Unofficial film.
  • On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) - George Lazenby is James Bond.
  • Diamonds Are Forever (1971) - Sean Connery returns.
  • Live And Let Die (1973) - Roger Moore is James Bond.
  • The Man With The Golden Gun (1974)
  • The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
  • Moonraker (1979)
  • For Your Eyes Only (1981)
  • Octopussy (1983)
    • Never Say Never Again (1983) - Unofficial film.
  • A View To A Kill (1985)
  • The Living Daylights (1987) - Timothy Dalton is James Bond.
  • Licence To Kill (1989)
  • GoldenEye (1995) - Pierce Brosnan is James Bond.
  • Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
  • The World Is Not Enough (1999)
  • Die Another Day (2002)
  • Casino Royale (2006) - The first Bond novel, but the 21st film. Actually filmed a total of three times, but only the most recent is official. Daniel Craig is James Bond.
  • Quantum Of Solace (2008)
• Harry Potter
• Olsen Banden - 14 movies, the first from 1968 and the last from 1998
• Star Trek - Eleven films
  • Star Trek The Motion Picture (1979) - Brought back the entire original cast (plus two more), ten years after the series ended.
  • Star Trek II The Wrath Of Khan (1982) - Basically entirely ignored the previous film except for the roman numeral in the title.
  • Star Trek III The Search For Spock (1984)
  • Star Trek IV The Voyage Home (1986)
  • Star Trek V The Final Frontier (1989)
  • Star Trek VI The Undiscovered Country (1991) - The final film starring the original cast.
  • Star Trek Generations (1994) - The first Next Generation film, with special guest star Kirk (plus cameos from Chekov & Scotty)
  • Star Trek First Contact (1996) - The first completely Next Generation film (and the best of the four).
  • Star Trek Insurrection (1998)
  • Star Trek Nemesis (2002) - The last Next Generation movie. Frequent target for [1].
  • Star Trek (2009) - A semi-sequel-Re Boot-Prequel-restart-whatever, recasting the Original Series characters. Sequel due circa 2011.
• Star Wars - Six live action films divided into two trilogies, one computer animated film.
  • A New Hope (1977) - Originally titled simply Star Wars.
    • The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978) - A two hour Made For TV Movie that George Lucas has killed off from the canon.
  • The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
  • Return Of The Jedi (1983) - Final film of the Original Trilogy.
  • The Phantom Menace (1999) - First film of the Prequel Trilogy.
  • Attack Of The Clones (2002)
  • Revenge Of The Sith (2005) - Final live-action Star Wars film.
  • Star Wars The Clone Wars (2008) - A CGI film set between Star Wars Episode II and Episode III. Ties in with the animated series of the same name.
• Star Wreck - A seven-part series of fan-made CGI and live action Star Trek spoof films. The last one, Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning was feature-length and had professional level special effects.
• Tales For All

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