Best of the Blogs: Dominic Corry: 10 films you might have missed

Herald online

2 Jan, 2015 09:00 PM3 mins to read

Adam Sandler stars in one of the films you may have missed.

It’s been a busy year so we can’t blame you if you missed some of our blogs. Over the next two weeks, we’ll bring you the best of our blogs from across entertainment.

Dominic Corry reckons some of the best films recently have been completely overlooked.

The highly ephemeral nature of contemporary film releases means many movies are often out of theatres before word-of-mouth gets a chance to take hold. So it can be easy to miss a good one.

Despite this highly corporate, pump-and-dump theatrical model, the lasting legacy of a film is still determined in the old-fashioned way - it slowly seeping out to the masses in the years following its release.

It's reassuring that despite all the huff and bluster surrounding movies these days, the final assessment remains as democratic as it always was. That said it's very easy for films to slip through the cracks of public opinion.

In today's blog, I'm going to cite some films from the last few years that were perhaps somewhat overlooked initially, but very much deserve to be sought out and watched. If they sound like your bag.

The first film I'm citing should've really been included in my recent discussion of bad-ass cinema - Joe Carnahan's 2012 thriller The Grey.

It's a modern Jack London-ish tale of some oil workers who are stalked by a pack of wolves after their plane crashes in the Alaskan tundra.

Liam Neeson heads an incredibly solid cast that features some of the coolest actors currently working: Dermot Mulroney (New Girl; Lovely and Amazing), Frank Grillo (on screens at the moment in Captain America: The Winter Soldier), Dallas Roberts (The Walking Dead; Rubicon) and James Badge Dale (Iron Man III).

The story may be rather simplistic, but it plays out with a sense of vivid fatalism lacking in most modern cinema. The film's exploration of the unspoken "measure-of-a-man" motif evokes some of '70s cinema's best male-centric movies like Emperor of the North Pole and Hard Times.

When it was released, The Grey seemed a little out of place amongst the bigger and sunnier blockbusters that tend to dominate these days, but that's only more reason to seek it out. The film wasn't a total flop, but I find far too few people I encounter have seen it.

Last year's dark thriller The Counselor perplexed audiences when it was released, and I admit to not knowing quite what to make of it. But my view of it has only increased in the time since, and it really does demand to be seen. The long slow re-assessment of this film begins now.

Most of my friends think I am joking when I say that I think 2012's Battleship is underrated, but I really do. ...