Nourish Your Netflix

The '90s was a great decade for movies. So call your favorite take-out, put on those slippers and please turn off all cellphones and pagers - it's movie time.

By Daiana Feuer
Published: Dec 10, 2007

Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999)
Dir: Michael Patrick Jann
Stars: Kirsten Dunst, Kirstie Alley, Denise Richards, Ellen Barkin
The Teen Princess Pageant brings out the charm and evil of this Minnesota community. A documentary crew follows the action as dreams are made, lives are sabotaged, and pretty girls try to decide whether tap-dancing or murder is a better idea.

Live Flesh (Carne Tremula) (1997)
Dir: Pedro Almodovar
Stars: Javier Bardem, Francesca Neri, Liberto Rabal, Penelope Cruz (briefly)
No mere love triangle, this is more of a love/sex/betrayal/murder pentagon. Victor Plaza is born on a bus to a prostitute mother (Cruz). At 20 he becomes infatuated with a junkie (Neri) who rejects him. Enter two cops, one of them a drunk whose wife is cheating on him, then a gun goes off. And Almodovar’s just getting started.

The Professional (1994)
Dir: Luc Besson
Stars: Natalie Portman, Gary Oldman, Jean Reno
Portman is sensational in this one, about a friendship between a lone-hand assassin and a preteen who is looking for revenge against the sick and twisted cop that murdered her brother. Tears rating: moderate to high.

Henry Fool (1997)
Dir: Hal Hartley
Stars: Parker Posey, Thomas Jay Ryan, James Urbaniak
This unsung hero of existential comedies is I Heart Huckabees meets the Royal Tenenbaums. The Grims are a family of misfits who lash out at each other -- Parker Posey’s character even hurls a pot of boiling water at her brother. A new tenant in their basement shakes things up, and reminds you that the weirdo at your corner deli might be a Pulitzer-worthy genius.

The Matchmaker (1997)
Dir: Andrew Fleming
Stars: Janeane Garofalo, David O'Hara
Election campaigner Marcy (Garofalo) is sent to trace Senator McGlory's ancestry in Ireland, just as the village Ballinagra is holding its Matchmaking festival. Cue a fish-out-of-water rom-com. It’s got that opposites-fall-in-love, girl leaves, guy chases, happily-ever-after structure that lets you know everything is right in the world.