Cinematic Throwbacks: March 1995/2015

1995:

Hey, remember when new, deadly viruses were the stuff of fiction? That was nice.

Outbreak is about a lethal new virus that finds its way into America, and the team that works to find a cure before it spreads to the whole country.

When COVID hit, the movie that really got brought into discussion was Contagion. And yeah, that's the more realistic depiction of this kind of scenario. Outbreak is much more of a classic big budget Hollywood thriller. It's actually kind of unusual that this came out in early March 1995, long before studios started regularly putting big films all over the calendar on a regular basis.

You have director Wolfgang Petersen, in the middle of his prime run of big productions. You have big stars in Dustin Hoffman, Morgan Freeman, and because it's the 90s, Rene Russo. You also have rising stars in Kevin Spacey and Ciba Gooding Jr., who both are not the least bit problematic 😟

The film kind of goes into over the top action thriller mode in its last act, with helicopter chases and Donald Sutherland scarfing the scenery as a military general practically aroused at the notion of firebombing a small town. 

This stuff is fine, but it's the earlier parts of the film that are really effective and scary. The storytelling is really top-notch, showing step by step how this virus makes its way to America and how everybody works to put the pieces together to figure out what to do. Everyone in the cast is great. Hoffman is just in full movie star mode here, and really outstanding. Terrific chemistry with Russo, as they play that standard 90s era couple who were together but then broke up and will obviously get back together by the end of the film (see also Twister). 

It's a particularly chilling film when you understand that the story as presented here is wildly optimistic for what would happen if this actually happened. What if COVID had the lethality of this film's virus? We didn't START getting a vaccine for almost a year. In the movie, they have a cure within a matter of days, one that completely cures someone for good. Hell, in reality, you'd actually have tons of people refuse the cure for political reasons.

The golden age of idiot comedy continued with Tommy Boy, the leading debut for another SNL star, Chris Farley. 

Dumb and Dumber and Billy Madison both felt like a newer 90s-style approach to movie comedy. Tommy Boy, however, is a major throwback to 90s comedy. 

It's a road movie, with Farley and David Spade hitting the road to try to save Farley's late father's auto parts company. It owes a huge debt to classics like Plains, Trains, and Automobiles, and even with all the silly comedy, it has a lot of heart to it.

Credit Farley, who never again found such a perfect fit for his comedic persona. He gets to do all his trademark physical comedy and yelling, but he's lovable and brings a lot of warmth to the movie. 

And Spade is the ideal sarcastic straight man foil, firing off tons of great one-liners. He not surprisingly never clicked as a lead (no, Joe Dirt is not good), but he and Farley were a great match. Their follow-up Black Sheep wasn't nearly as good, but their chemistry still worked great.

Plot itself here is a whatever. There's a whole sideplot involving Rob Lowe as Farley's new brother in law. Lowe gets the crap beat out of him a few times. 90s relic Julie Warner is sweet as Farley's love interest.

This was definitely Farley's peak. His starring roles after this just didn't click the same. I still think if he had lived, he would have found his groove. He was the original choice for Shrek, and he easily could have done any of the roles that someone like Jack Black did. 

2015:

I'm far more friendly towards the Divergent series than most people seem to be. I think its first part is at least as good as any Hunger Games entry, or really any of the other YA stuff from the 2010s.

That movie ended with Shailene Woodley and some others breaking free from the control of Kate Winslet. But Winslet is still after the divergents, and this time, there is also this macguffin box that can only be opened by one of them.

Yeah, there isn't a whole lot of real story to this. Divergent had a whole world to build and had a whole story. Insurgent is a lot more meandering. There are some chase sequences that are pretty good. The cast gets upgraded with Naomi Watts and Octavia Spencer. Miles Teller is pretty amusing, as you can tell he has no actual interest in being there, so he just kind of goofs around. We get to see Jai Courtney shot in the head, so that's good. 

The whole last act of Insurgent involves this box, and Woodley trying to open it up. And it involves her going through all these simulations. Drinking game: Drink every time someone says "sim" and you'll be done in 5 minutes. But we know all these sims are sims, so while they are neat to look at, they carry no dramatic weight. It's a strange way to climax your film. 

It's the worst of the 3 films we got, but it's still pretty watchable due to the total commitment of Woodley. Half the letterboxed reviews are about her hair, but she looks great with that hair, and she is still in her total prime here. I still don't get why things fell off so dramatically for her soon after. 

Horror was always a genre I rarely liked. Some things like Scream and Final Destination broke through, but in general, if it was horror, I either wasn't interested at all, or if I did see something, I didn't like it. 

That's no longer the case. Horror movies are often films I really like now. Some of the best I have seen in 2025 so far are horror, and many have appeared on my best lists in recent years.

I think that started to turn for me around the mid-2010s. And while I maybe should do a little more investigating first, I think It Follows might have been the movie that did it. 

Many horror movies before and since have been done more like It Follows than a more mainstream horror film. But it's like this was the film that got me to appreciate them.

It Follows is very clearly inspired by Halloween. Suburbia. Long shots of people walking. A creepy synth score. Instead of a slasher killer, though, there is some mysterious entity. It is always a person, and it always follows you, and if it catches you, well, you're dying horribly.

The lead is Maika Monroe, now kind of an established horror star, but then a fresh face. She's the current target of the entity, after having it passed to her by having sex with a guy who was the previous target. So yeah, it's a pretty clear STD metaphor. It just makes the trope of horror movies punishing characters who have sex more literal.

This movie is consistently creepy and unsettling. It's a movie of mood, not jump scares, which I always prefer. They do the thing where characters try to figure out how to defeat the bad guy. But it has a sense of dread that never breaks.

I really feel like this movie opened up the whole indie horror realm to a bigger audience.

They're finally going to be making a sequel to this, which will presumably involve more following. 

Other non-deep dive flicks:

1985:

-The Care Bears Movie: Why is this here? Well, because I am reasonably sure that this was the very first movie I ever saw in a theater. 

-The Purple Rose Of Cairo: Very good Woody Allen movie about a movie character coming into the real world. 

-Police Academy 2: I know I watched this a lot back in the day, cause I watched all these. 

-Desperately Seeking Susan: Madonna's 1st big movie role. 

1995:

-Hideaway: A very 90s thriller where Jeff Goldblum becomes psychic or something. Kind of a big deal at the time cause Alicia Silverstone was in it. 

-Man Of The House: Saw this in theaters. Chevy Chase clashes with his would-be son-in-law Jonathan Taylor Thomas.

-Bye Bye Love: Ensemble comedy with a bunch of single dads and, most importantly, Eliza Dushku. 

-Major Payne: Damon Wayans starring career never quite took off, cause he did a lot of mediocre stuff like this. 

-Losing Isaiah: One of Halle Berry's best early performances as a woman trying to get back her adopted son. 

-Tank Girl: A notorious flop that basically ended Lori Petty's career instantly. 

2005:

-Hostage: Really cool, pulpy Bruce Willis thriller. 

-Be Cool: The very late sequel to Get Shorty, with a truly wild supporting cast. 

-The Pacifier: Vin Diesel tried to follow the Schwarzenegger path by doing a kids' movie, and wow, did it not work. 

-Miss Congeniality 2: I am honestly not sure I ever watched this, even though I liked the original. 

-Guess Who: Sure, remake Guess Who's Coming To Dinner as a big screen sitcom with Bernie Mac and Ashton Kutcher.

-Beauty Shop: The Barbershop spinoff with Queen Latifah. 

2015:

-Chappie: Chappie's got stories. Chappie's got a book. 

-Run All Night: Forgettable Liam Neeson thriller. 

-Danny Collins: Pretty fun Al Pacino performance as an old lounge singer. 

-Get Hard: Will Ferrell learning from Kevin Hart how to be a badass. Movie comedy is near extinct cause movies like this kept not working. 

Coming in April...

Some bigger deal movies this time. 

Furious 7 and Ex Machina turn 10. 

The great Sin City turns 20.

And the first and best Bad Boys and Friday turn 30.