15 Underrated 2010s Movies From Master Directors
Greatness comes with elevated expectations, which is an idea you’ve heard expressed a million different ways. When someone’s output remains consistently excellent across several years or projects, any sort of dip in quality or difference in expectations is met with a swift, harsh reaction. This is true for any number of fields, directing included. Legitimately great movies can fall through the cracks of history very easily if for some reason they don’t align with an auteur’s previous body of work.
Or maybe the movie is not as successful right off the bat as one would expect (whether because of a lack of acclaim, awards, box office, cultural relevance, or all of the above), but is re-discovered or re-evaluated to be a masterwork at a later date. We’re familiar with history’s most prominent examples: The King of Comedy, Eyes Wide Shut, Ace in the Hole, all of Steven Spielberg’s 2000s output, and on and on. I don’t know which, if any, of the movies on this list will one day be considered among the best of their respective director’s output, but I think they all deserve further reconsideration in that discussion.
Detroit
Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal extended their exploration of American history into a trilogy with their first true period piece, Detroit. Set in late the 60s instead of the immediate past of The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty, Detroit continues the journalistic storytelling with a cinematic flair of the previous two films in the Bigelow-Boal partnership. And while The Hurt Locker won six Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director, and Zero Dark Thirty was a lightning rod for controversy¹ and discussion, Detroit was a box office bomb and was nominated for zero Oscars. And while it’s not quite as seamless as the other two movies in the trilogy, Detroit packs a powerful punch thanks to a strong, deep ensemble (led by Will Poulter’s all-time infuriating corrupt cop and a breakout performance from Algee Smith). The middle section chamber piece set in the house is riveting. You can’t look away even though it makes your stomach churn.
[1] Perhaps a topic for another day, but I don’t quite understand the uproar over ZDT, it was told pretty apolitically in my opinion, and it’s a shame the politics became such a focus because the movie itself is the finest work of everyone involved, including Bigelow and Jessica Chastain.
Mistress America
I’m considering this a joint entry from the Noah Baumbach-Greta Gerwig creative partnership. This movie was (rightly) acclaimed when it came out, but it’s already started to fall out of any discussions about this duo. In Baumbach’s filmography, it’s overshadowed by what came before (the beloved Frances Ha) and after (the jump to a Netflix-aided Baumbach version of the mainstream). Meanwhile, Gerwig has only become one of the most sought-after creative forces in Hollywood thanks to the perfect one-two directing debut punch of Lady Bird and Little Women. I just hope people don’t eventually forget about this zany, biting collaboration that turns into a modern-day screwball comedy for a huge chunk of the movie.
First Man
Damien Chazelle, Hollywood’s wunderkind, fresh off Whiplash and the runaway success of La La Land, had all the momentum in the world. Instead of turning the story of Neil Armstrong into an overwrought, saccharine, by-the-numbers triumphant biopic, Chazelle and star Ryan Gosling internalized everything — the pain, the stress — onto Gosling’s face. And how did audiences respond to this personal take on a pivotal American moment? With lukewarm enthusiasm. The movie, long thought to be a guaranteed dominant force at the Oscars, garnered just four nominations, none of which came in a major category, and one win. And despite the highly personal approach to telling the story, the film was still an absolute technical marvel. The rattling bolts and shaking walls and spinning training devices and the huge sounds and the soaring score all made viewers feel as if they were there with Armstrong and company.
Widows
I’ve ranted on this subject enough, so I’m just going to plagiarize myself.
I’ll never forgive all of you for not going to see this in theaters. A diverse, deep, and talented cast filled with stars, Steve McQueen following up a best picture winner, a Gillian Flynn-penned script, timely themes, heists. What more can you want?
Seriously though, what more could anyone have asked for besides maybe two more scenes from Daniel Kaluuya? One thing that really frustrated me about some of the reactions to this movie, which was mostly acclaimed for what it’s worth, is that a lot of reviews mentioned the “popcorn-ness” of the movie. There is a lot on this movie’s mind, maybe too much at times. A crowd-pleaser can have timely themes. Perhaps that bias toward genre movies, combined with the tepid box office, led to the absurd zero Oscar nominations.
If Beale Street Could Talk
To round out our trilogy of 2018 films from directors following up their big breakthrough that inexplicably struggled to connect, here we have Barry Jenkins’ beautiful adaptation of James Baldwin’s If Beale Street Could Talk. This is another movie where the muted box office response makes little sense to me. A release date during the crowded awards season didn’t help, neither did the fact that it starred a relative unknown and a legit unknown (Stephan James and KiKi Layne, respectively, both of whom were mesmerizing. The entire cast was great, with Regina King and Brian Tyree Henry’s 10-minute iso ball scene being the highlights.) But this movie, like Widows, had a little bit of everything. The story of Tish and Fonny’s love is fairly devastating, but it’s also electric. And the movie is legit funny in its early scenes involving the family gatherings. Plus, the themes are unfortunately timeless. As for the Oscars, it had nearly the opposite problem of First Man — it showed up in two major categories (with a deserved win for Regina King) but no picture or director nominations.
Shutter Island
Yes, the story, adapted from the king of Boston Crime himself Dennis Lehane’s novel, is as pulp as pulp can be. But what beautiful pulp! Martin Scorsese set loose with a fully-budgeted homage to all his favorite crime and horror movies, Originally slated for an October 2009 release with awards season in mind, it was pushed back to February 2010 where it was still a box office success (thanks Leo!), but largely forgotten come awards season. It was also overshadowed by 2010’s other major movie where Leonardo DiCaprio deals with existential crises and what may or may not be real due to the death of his wife. This movie is just drenched in atmosphere. It’s one of the most rewatchable Scorsese movies for me, somewhere after Goodfellas and The Departed (accepted masterpieces), but certainly ahead of Raging Bull and Silence (also accepted masterpieces).
Inherent Vice
Go ahead and grab your pitchforks, because this is my favorite Paul Thomas Anderson movie of the decade. I think The Master is one of those rare movies that has genuinely gotten better every time I have watched it, and Phantom Thread is a saucy treat, but Inherent Vice’s melding of Chinatown and The Big Lebowski was perfect for this crime fiction fan. Yes, it doesn’t always make sense, and the inevitable frustrations from a Thomas Pynchon adaptation show up, but I could watch Doc Sportello interact with this cast of oddballs, dirtbags, and regular people just doing their job for hours.
The Hateful Eight
I hope you didn’t put those pitchforks away, because they’ll be right back out after this — The Hateful Eight is my favorite Quentin Tarantino movie of the decade. Yes, even over Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Tarantino is my favorite director so take this with a grain of salt, but The Hateful Eight gets the edge for me over Hollywood and Django Unchained for reasons both personal (Tarantino doing a snow-trapped murder mystery was almost too much for me) and not (this movie just looks and sounds amazing, especially the roadshow version). I could watch this movie on a loop. Like Shutter Island, the atmosphere nearly suffocates you while watching this movie. It was criticized at the time, and still is, for its brutality, among other things. But the brutality is purposeful. They’re all vile, dare I say Hateful, people. It was also a pretty prophetic look at some of the major events that followed in its wake.
The Bling Ring
I’m going to plagiarize myself again.
Bemoan style over substance all you want, I’ll be chilling with Sofia Coppola watching Emma Watson rob mansions as Sleigh Bells blares in the background.
There’s also more to this movie than surface beauty. It’s not just pretty to look at. It’s not as deep as, say, Lost in Translation, but it’s certainly just as thoughtful as The Beguiled or Somewhere. It and Spring Breakers make for a great mini-marathon of A24’s sun-drenched, Day-Glo, stylish-yet-deceptively-thoughtful millennial crime pictures.
The Dark Knight Rises
It’s not The Dark Knight. No superhero has ever been, and with the way the industry is changing will probably ever be, The Dark Knight. But this sprawling, ambitious, messy cap to the best superhero trilogy has a whole lot more on its mind than your average tentpole superhero movie does eight years later. And if nothing else, like Nolan’s other, more highly-regarded films from this decade, the scope of this movie is staggering on the big screen, whether it’s the opening IMAX prologue in the airplane or Hines Ward as the last man standing on a destroyed football field.
Mother!
Is Darren Aronofsky even considered a top tier director anymore? Black Swan was only 10(!) years ago. It’s honestly a miracle this movie even exists. It was released by a major studio! They gave Aronofsky 30 million dollars to make this! Thanks to a misleading trailer, audiences went in expecting a conventional horror outing elevated by the involvement of Jennifer Lawrence and company and left straight up BOTHERED and OFFENDED and other all caps, exclamation mark words that the “F” Cinemascore grade loves to point out. The freakouts might have been a bit much, but this is a truly unique, thought-provoking, disturbing horror movie the likes of which we may not see again for a while.
The Counselor
This movie is the definition of not for everyone. Has a studio release from a major director with a star-studded cast ever been so bleak, so utterly devoid of hope? You’d be hard-pressed to find a contender. Dismissed as messy and talky upon release, Ridley Scott’s decision to let Cormac McCarthy adapt his own work led to a literary script infused with violence, wild choices (Javier Bardem’s look, Cameron Diaz’s everything), and a Shakespearean sense of tragedy.
You Were Never Really Here
After making one film for nine years, Lynne Ramsay roared back with a deranged pair of movies this decade. Between this and We Need to Talk About Kevin, Ramsay re-inserted herself into the must-watch club. You Were Never Really Here is the best she’s ever been, and the hulking, bloody image of a bear-esque Joaquin Phoenix is seared into my brain. It’s also the best Taxi Driver homage starring Phoenix as a tortured loner who goes on a violent rampage. It definitely has more to say underneath all the blood and suppression than that other movie.
The Front Runner
Like Aronofsky, Jason Reitman has somewhat fallen off the tier of highly-respected auteurs. His partnership with Charlize Theron has produced good results (Tully and Young Adult are two of many killer Theron performances), but everything else this decade hasn’t. The Front Runner was unfairly lumped in with the rest of those non-Charlize movies. The movie was criticized for not truly exploring any of the ethical issues it brings up. Yes, it doesn’t analyze the sociopolitical issues as well as the American New Wave movies of the 70s, but it has a similar energy, focus, and storytelling verve to those films.
Contagion
The final entry in this list may soon not qualify. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this movie has seen a huge upturn not only in popularity but in the discussion of its prescience. The movie was well-received and pretty good business at the box office when it came out, but Steven Soderbergh simply made too many good movies this decade (eight by my count, seven by anyone else worth talking to) that this star-studded medical thriller had fallen by the wayside. Now, with it camping out at the top of all the rental charts and inspiring one thought-provoking article after another, it may need to be replaced with something else. Luckily, Soderbergh has a lot of candidates from the last 10 years: Haywire, Side Effects, Logan Lucky, Unsane, High-Flying Bird, The Laundromat all qualify. (Magic Mike seems to be safely in the canon).
