Special Report
This Is the Best Movie You've Never Seen
Published:
It’s hard to measure how many people have seen a given movie in the age of streaming. At one point, theater ticket sales were a good indication of audience size. Films that brought in over $100 million were considered highly successful, and obviously played to many thousands of viewers. Today, streaming services like Amazon Prime and Netflix have tens of millions of subscribers, and offer major studio movies, sometimes as soon as they’re released, in addition to making movies of their own. Viewership figures of those films are hard to come by. (These are the most successful R-rated movies of all time.)
While it’s hard to tell for sure, then, there’s a very good possibility that the best movie you’ve never seen is “Ink” (2009) — a sci-fi film about a mysterious creature that steals a little girl’s soul, and her father’s fight to save her from a world of supernatural beings. (You can be sure it’s not one of the worst sci-fi movies ever made.)
To determine the best movies you’ve probably never seen, 24/7 Tempo reviewed data on the number of audience ratings and popularity of a wide range of films from Rotten Tomatoes, an online movie and TV review aggregator, and IMDb, an online movie database owned by Amazon. Movies with between 10,000 and 50,000 IMDb audience votes — a small number compared with the hundreds of thousands of votes the most popular ones receive — were ranked based on their Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer score as of August 2021.
Audience ratings and number of votes are included for reference. Only films made in 1950 or later were included in the universe, and documentaries were excluded. Also excluded were new releases, which may have limited audience scores in their first few weeks but will go on to far exceed 50,000 votes. (Supplementary data on cast and director also come from IMDb.)
Click here to see the best movie you’ve never seen
25. Gods and Monsters (1998)
> Starring: Ian McKellen, Brendan Fraser, Lynn Redgrave
> Director: Bill Condon
> IMDb rating: 7.3/10 (29,463 votes)
> RT audience rating: 83% (13,114 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 95% (66 votes)
This is a movie about the last days of the famed “Frankenstein” director James Whale, who seems to form a relationship with a Korean War veteran after having many young gay lovers.
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24. House of Wax (1953)
> Starring: Vincent Price, Frank Lovejoy, Phyllis Kirk
> Director: André De Toth
> IMDb rating: 7.1/10 (16,448 votes)
> RT audience rating: 73% (41,380 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 95% (43 votes)
Horror classic “House of Wax” centers on a wax sculptor who survives a fire in his wax museum, set by his partner for the insurance money. Seeking revenge, he starts to commit murders to turn the bodies into wax figures for a new museum.
23. If Beale Street Could Talk (2018)
> Starring: KiKi Layne, Stephan James, Regina King
> Director: Barry Jenkins
> IMDb rating: 7.1/10 (43,745 votes)
> RT audience rating: 71% (2,601 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 95% (357 votes)
Oscar-nominated “If Beale Street Could Talk” tells the story of a pregnant woman in the 1970s in Harlem on a mission to prove that her fiancé is innocent of the crime he was arrested for.
22. The Diary of a Teenage Girl (2015)
> Starring: Bel Powley, Alexander Skarsgard, Kristen Wiig
> Director: Marielle Heller
> IMDb rating: 6.9/10 (30,074 votes)
> RT audience rating: 73% (12,008 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 95% (166 votes)
Set in 1970s San Francisco, this film tells the story of a 15-year-old girl who begins an affair with her mother’s boyfriend.
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21. Housebound (2014)
> Starring: Morgana O’Reilly, Rima Te Wiata, Glen-Paul Waru
> Director: Gerard Johnstone
> IMDb rating: 6.8/10 (32,351 votes)
> RT audience rating: 73% (8,263 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 95% (43 votes)
In this horror film, a young woman is placed under house arrest after being caught stealing. She is staying in the house of her estranged mother, where evil spirits are lurking about.
20. The Return (2003)
> Starring: Vladimir Garin, Ivan Dobronravov, Konstantin Lavronenko
> Director: Andrey Zvyagintsev
> IMDb rating: 8.0/10 (43,176 votes)
> RT audience rating: 93% (9,547 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 96% (89 votes)
“The Return” is a Russian drama about the emotional journey of two brothers who meet their father after only knowing him from one picture.
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19. What’s Love Got to Do with It (1993)
> Starring: Angela Bassett, Laurence Fishburne, RaéVen Kelly
> Director: Brian Gibson
> IMDb rating: 7.3/10 (17,455 votes)
> RT audience rating: 88% (52,278 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 96% (53 votes)
Angela Bassett and Laurence Fishburne received Oscar nominations for the roles of Tina and Ike Turner in this gripping biopic. It chronicles their torrid marriage and Tina’s struggle to break free as an independent woman and artist.
18. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958)
> Starring: Elizabeth Taylor, Paul Newman, Burl Ives
> Director: Richard Brooks
> IMDb rating: 8.0/10 (45,791 votes)
> RT audience rating: 92% (4,839 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (37 votes)
Based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Tennessee Williams, this film is about a dysfunctional Southern family. Despite this award-winning talent and six Oscar nominations, “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” failed to win any awards of its own.
17. Maria Full of Grace (2004)
> Starring: Catalina Sandino Moreno, Guilied Lopez, Orlando Tobon
> Director: Joshua Marston
> IMDb rating: 7.4/10 (34,131 votes)
> RT audience rating: 87% (39,733 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (146 votes)
“Maria Full of Grace” tells the story of a poor and pregnant teenager from Colombia who is fired from her job after a fight and finds herself becoming a drug mule to make money to support herself and her large family.
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16. Mudbound (2017)
> Starring: Jason Mitchell, Carey Mulligan, Jason Clarke
> Director: Dee Rees
> IMDb rating: 7.4/10 (43,863 votes)
> RT audience rating: 84% (5,884 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (199 votes)
Dee Rees’ story is about two men, one white and one African-American, who return to rural Mississippi after World War II to work on farms. The Oscar-nominated film deals with issues of racism and the struggles of those at the bottom of the economic ladder.
15. Bullets Over Broadway (1994)
> Starring: John Cusack, Dianne Wiest, Jennifer Tilly
> Director: Woody Allen
> IMDb rating: 7.4/10 (35,848 votes)
> RT audience rating: 83% (17,026 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (58 votes)
Set in the late 1920s in New York City, “Bullets Over Broadway” tells the story of a struggling playwright who must cast a mob boss’s talentless girlfriend in order for his play to make it on Broadway.
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14. Exotica (1994)
> Starring: Bruce Greenwood, Elias Koteas, Don McKellar
> Director: Atom Egoyan
> IMDb rating: 7.0/10 (18,434 votes)
> RT audience rating: 83% (8,092 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (32 votes)
A depressed tax auditor tries to escape his past and finds solace at a strip club where he becomes obsessed with the most popular dancer.
13. Columbus (2017)
> Starring: John Cho, Haley Lu Richardson, Parker Posey
> Director: Kogonada
> IMDb rating: 7.2/10 (14,814 votes)
> RT audience rating: 79% (5,589 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (127 votes)
“Columbus” tells the story of a Korean-born man who is stuck in Columbus, Indiana, after his father, a famous architect, is put into a hospital there. He meets an architecture enthusiast who has just moved there to help her mother instead of pursuing her own dreams.
12. The Misfits (1961)
> Starring: Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, Montgomery Clift
> Director: John Huston
> IMDb rating: 7.2/10 (17,521 votes)
> RT audience rating: 78% (9,412 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (30 votes)
“The Misfits” is about four unlikely friends — a recent divorcée, an aging cowboy-turned-gambler, a World War II veteran, and an ex-rodeo rider — who start a business together capturing wild horses. This was Gable’s last movie role — and during filming, Monroe split from her then-husband, playwright Arthur Miller, who wrote the movie’s script.
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11. Mr. Turner (2014)
> Starring: Timothy Spall, Paul Jesson, Dorothy Atkinson
> Director: Mike Leigh
> IMDb rating: 6.8/10 (24,534 votes)
> RT audience rating: 56% (16,303 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 97% (193 votes)
“Mr. Turner” is the story of the last 25 years of the life of the famous and eccentric British painter J.M.W. Turner.
10. Can You Ever Forgive Me? (2018)
> Starring: Melissa McCarthy, Richard E. Grant, Dolly Wells
> Director: Marielle Heller
> IMDb rating: 7.1/10 (47,899 votes)
> RT audience rating: 81% (3,151 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 98% (312 votes)
This is the story of struggling author Lee Israel. At a time when she is desperate for money, she starts forging letters by famous writers and sells them to bookstores and collectors.
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9. Repo Man (1984)
> Starring: Harry Dean Stanton, Emilio Estevez, Tracey Walter
> Director: Alex Cox
> IMDb rating: 6.9/10 (34,528 votes)
> RT audience rating: 78% (31,798 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 98% (46 votes)
“Repo Man” follows a young and lazy punk rocker from Los Angeles who gets a job as a car repossession man. He is after a car with a huge price tag and, unbeknownst to him, otherworldly contents in the trunk.
8. Don’t Think Twice (2016)
> Starring: Keegan-Michael Key, Gillian Jacobs, Mike Birbiglia
> Director: Mike Birbiglia
> IMDb rating: 6.7/10 (16,852 votes)
> RT audience rating: 69% (19,260 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 98% (136 votes)
This bittersweet comedy is about several best friends and members of an improv troupe. One of them gets a big break to star in a TV show, while the others begin to think they won’t succeed in their acting careers.
7. Le Havre (2011)
> Starring: André Wilms, Blondin Miguel, Jean-Pierre Darroussin
> Director: Aki Kaurismäki
> IMDb rating: 7.2/10 (20,582 votes)
> RT audience rating: 75% (7,334 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 99% (96 votes)
“Le Havre” depicts the story of an aging shoe shiner who tries to save a young refugee after his cargo ship drops him off in the French port city of Le Havre.
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6. Love and Death (1975)
> Starring: Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, Georges Adet
> Director: Woody Allen
> IMDb rating: 7.7/10 (36,487 votes)
> RT audience rating: 90% (19,067 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 100% (21 votes)
Woody Allen plays one of his trademark neurotic characters in 1975’s “Love and Death.” In this film, the character is a soldier in czarist 19th-century Russia, who hatches a plot to assassinate Napoleon.
5. The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974)
> Starring: Walter Matthau, Robert Shaw, Martin Balsam
> Director: Joseph Sargent
> IMDb rating: 7.7/10 (27,102 votes)
> RT audience rating: 88% (9,460 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 100% (41 votes)
A gang in New York City hijacks a subway car and threatens to start shooting a person every 10 minutes until they get $1 million cash.
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4. Henry V (1989)
> Starring: Kenneth Branagh, Derek Jacobi, Simon Shepherd
> Director: Kenneth Branagh
> IMDb rating: 7.5/10 (28,469 votes)
> RT audience rating: 89% (13,474 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 100% (40 votes)
One among a number of Shakespeare adaptations from Kenneth Branagh, “Henry V” plays it close to the source material. Tensions between England and France give way to all out warfare as the young king (Branagh) surmounts a sea of struggles. Citing top-notch performances and gritty battle sequences, critics were universal in their acclaim.
3. A Room with a View (1985)
> Starring: Maggie Smith, Helena Bonham Carter, Denholm Elliott
> Director: James Ivory
> IMDb rating: 7.3/10 (40,483 votes)
> RT audience rating: 85% (25,473 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 100% (32 votes)
“A Room with a View” is a romantic drama about a young woman who is engaged to one man but falls in love with another man while on vacation in Florence, Italy. Things are further complicated after he re-enters her life when she is already married.
2. Sleeper (1973)
> Starring: Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, John Beck
> Director: Woody Allen
> IMDb rating: 7.2/10 (40,085 votes)
> RT audience rating: 81% (30,606 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 100% (35 votes)
“Sleeper” is a comedy about a nerdish health store owner (Woody Allen) whose family cryogenically freezes him after he dies during surgery. He is revived two centuries later to help fight an oppressive government.
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1. Ink (2009)
> Starring: Christopher Soren Kelly, Quinn Hunchar, Jessica Duffy
> Director: Jamin Winans
> IMDb rating: 6.9/10 (21,167 votes)
> RT audience rating: 81% (6,147 votes)
> Tomatometer rating: 100% (06 votes)
“Ink” is a sci-fi movie about a mysterious creature that steals a little girl’s soul and her father’s fight to save her from a world of supernatural beings.
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