Year by year: 1997
by cafg-0 | created - 18 Feb 2013 | updated - 11 months ago | PublicMy 50 favorite films of 1997
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1. L.A. Confidential (1997)
R | 138 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery
As corruption grows in 1950s Los Angeles, three policemen - one strait-laced, one brutal, and one sleazy - investigate a series of murders with their own brand of justice.
Director: Curtis Hanson | Stars: Kevin Spacey, Russell Crowe, Guy Pearce, Kim Basinger
Votes: 617,571 | Gross: $64.62M
2. Taste of Cherry (1997)
Not Rated | 95 min | Drama
An Iranian man drives his car in search of someone who will quietly bury him under a cherry tree after he commits suicide.
Director: Abbas Kiarostami | Stars: Homayoun Ershadi, Abdolhosein Bagheri, Afshin Khorshid Bakhtiari, Safar Ali Moradi
Votes: 36,728 | Gross: $0.31M
3. Martín (Hache) (1997)
123 min | Drama
19-year-old Argentina Martin has a nearly fatal drug overdose. After that his mother sends him to Madrid, where his film director father (also called Martin) lives with his new much younger lover Alicia and bisexual actor friend Dante.
Director: Adolfo Aristarain | Stars: Federico Luppi, Juan Diego Botto, Eusebio Poncela, Cecilia Roth
Votes: 4,751
4. The Sweet Hereafter (1997)
R | 112 min | Drama
A bus crash in a small town brings a lawyer to defend the families, but he discovers everything isn't what it seems.
Director: Atom Egoyan | Stars: Ian Holm, Sarah Polley, Caerthan Banks, Tom McCamus
Votes: 36,726 | Gross: $3.25M
5. Happy Together (1997)
Not Rated | 96 min | Drama, Romance
A couple take a trip to Argentina but both men find their lives drifting apart in opposite directions.
Director: Kar-Wai Wong | Stars: Leslie Cheung, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Chang Chen, Gregory Dayton
Votes: 34,014 | Gross: $0.19M
6. The Ice Storm (1997)
R | 112 min | Drama
In suburban New Canaan, Connecticut, 1973, middle-class families experimenting with casual sex and substance abuse find their lives beyond their control.
Director: Ang Lee | Stars: Kevin Kline, Joan Allen, Sigourney Weaver, Henry Czerny
Votes: 59,949 | Gross: $7.84M
7. Deconstructing Harry (1997)
R | 96 min | Comedy
Suffering from writer's block and eagerly awaiting his writing award, Harry Block remembers events from his past and scenes from his best-selling books as characters, real and fictional, come back to haunt him.
Director: Woody Allen | Stars: Woody Allen, Judy Davis, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Stephanie Roth Haberle
Votes: 47,800 | Gross: $10.69M
8. Lost Highway (1997)
R | 134 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Anonymous videotapes presage a musician's murder conviction, and a gangster's girlfriend leads a mechanic astray.
Director: David Lynch | Stars: Bill Pullman, Patricia Arquette, John Roselius, Louis Eppolito
Votes: 153,127 | Gross: $3.80M
9. Titanic (1997)
PG-13 | 194 min | Drama, Romance
A seventeen-year-old aristocrat falls in love with a kind but poor artist aboard the luxurious, ill-fated R.M.S. Titanic.
Director: James Cameron | Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Billy Zane, Kathy Bates
Votes: 1,279,620 | Gross: $659.33M
10. Funny Games (1997)
Not Rated | 108 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
Two violent young men take a mother, father, and son hostage in their vacation cabin and force them to play sadistic "games" with one another for their own amusement.
Director: Michael Haneke | Stars: Susanne Lothar, Ulrich Mühe, Arno Frisch, Frank Giering
Votes: 84,018
11. Princess Mononoke (1997)
PG-13 | 134 min | Animation, Action, Adventure
On a journey to find the cure for a Tatarigami's curse, Ashitaka finds himself in the middle of a war between the forest gods and Tatara, a mining colony. In this quest he also meets San, the Mononoke Hime.
Director: Hayao Miyazaki | Stars: Yôji Matsuda, Yuriko Ishida, Yûko Tanaka, Billy Crudup
Votes: 433,472 | Gross: $2.38M
12. Boogie Nights (1997)
R | 155 min | Drama
Back when sex was safe, pleasure was a business and business was booming, an idealistic porn producer aspires to elevate his craft to an art when he discovers a hot young talent.
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson | Stars: Mark Wahlberg, Julianne Moore, Burt Reynolds, Luis Guzmán
Votes: 281,942 | Gross: $26.40M
13. Men with Guns (II) (1997)
R | 127 min | Adventure, Drama
Humberto Fuentes is a wealthy doctor whose wife has recently died. In spite of the advice of his children, he takes a trip to visit his former students who now work in impoverished villages... See full summary »
Director: John Sayles | Stars: Federico Luppi, Damián Delgado, Dan Rivera González, Tania Cruz
Votes: 2,890 | Gross: $0.74M
14. Marius and Jeannette (1997)
105 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Marius is the keeper of an abandoned cement works staying high above the quarter of l'Estaque in Marseilles. Jeannette is bringing up her two children alone with her poor checkout operator ... See full summary »
Director: Robert Guédiguian | Stars: Ariane Ascaride, Gérard Meylan, Pascale Roberts, Jacques Boudet
Votes: 1,718 | Gross: $0.28M
15. The Wings of the Dove (1997)
R | 102 min | Drama, Romance
An impoverished woman who has been forced to choose between a privileged life with her wealthy aunt and her journalist lover, befriends an American heiress. When she discovers the heiress is attracted to her own lover and is dying, she sees a chance to have both the privileged life she cannot give up and the lover she cannot live without.
Director: Iain Softley | Stars: Helena Bonham Carter, Linus Roache, Alex Jennings, Charlotte Rampling
Votes: 13,049 | Gross: $13.72M
16. The Eel (1997)
Not Rated | 117 min | Drama
A businessman kills his adulterous wife and is sent to prison. After the release, he opens a barbershop and meets new people, talking almost to no one except an eel he befriended while in prison.
Director: Shôhei Imamura | Stars: Koji Yakusho, Misa Shimizu, Mitsuko Baishô, Akira Emoto
Votes: 6,397 | Gross: $0.41M
17. Mother and Son (1997)
73 min | Drama
A man goes for a walk through the countryside with his dying mother.
Director: Aleksandr Sokurov | Stars: Aleksei Ananishnov, Gudrun Geyer
Votes: 4,228
18. Open Your Eyes (1997)
R | 119 min | Drama, Mystery, Sci-Fi
A very handsome man finds the love of his life, but he suffers an accident and needs to have his face rebuilt by surgery after it is severely disfigured.
Director: Alejandro Amenábar | Stars: Eduardo Noriega, Penélope Cruz, Chete Lera, Fele Martínez
Votes: 73,216 | Gross: $0.37M
19. Posutoman burûsu (1997)
110 min | Action, Comedy, Crime
A postman is mistaken for a dangerous criminal by the police.
Director: Sabu | Stars: Shin'ichi Tsutsumi, Keisuke Horibe, Ren Ôsugi, Kyôko Tôyama
Votes: 1,889
20. Fireworks (1997)
103 min | Crime, Drama, Romance
Nishi leaves the police in the face of harrowing personal and professional difficulties. Spiraling into depression, he makes questionable decisions.
Director: Takeshi Kitano | Stars: Takeshi Kitano, Kayoko Kishimoto, Ren Ôsugi, Susumu Terajima
Votes: 33,157 | Gross: $0.23M
21. As Good as It Gets (1997)
PG-13 | 139 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
A single mother and waitress, a misanthropic author, and a gay artist form an unlikely friendship after the artist is assaulted in a robbery.
Director: James L. Brooks | Stars: Jack Nicholson, Helen Hunt, Greg Kinnear, Cuba Gooding Jr.
Votes: 318,310 | Gross: $148.48M
22. Jackie Brown (1997)
R | 154 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
A flight attendant with a criminal past gets nabbed by the ATF for smuggling. Under pressure to become an informant against the illegal arms dealer she works for, she must find a way to secure her future without getting killed.
Director: Quentin Tarantino | Stars: Pam Grier, Samuel L. Jackson, Robert Forster, Bridget Fonda
Votes: 374,819 | Gross: $39.67M
23. Good Will Hunting (1997)
R | 126 min | Drama, Romance
Will Hunting, a janitor at M.I.T., has a gift for mathematics, but needs help from a psychologist to find direction in his life.
Director: Gus Van Sant | Stars: Robin Williams, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Stellan Skarsgård
Votes: 1,067,277 | Gross: $138.43M
24. The Mirror (1997)
95 min | Drama
When a young girl becomes lost in the hustle and bustle of Tehran, her journey turns into a dazzling exercise on the nature of film itself.
Director: Jafar Panahi | Stars: Mina Mohammad Khani, Kazem Mojdehi, Naser Omuni, M. Shirzad
Votes: 3,138 | Gross: $0.04M
25. Live Flesh (1997)
R | 103 min | Drama
After leaving jail, Víctor is still in love with Elena, but she's married to the former cop -now basketball player- who became paralysed by a shot from Víctor's gun...
Director: Pedro Almodóvar | Stars: Liberto Rabal, Francesca Neri, Javier Bardem, Ángela Molina
Votes: 33,693 | Gross: $1.54M
26. Secrets of the Heart (1997)
105 min | Drama
Javi and his friend Carlos snoop around an old house on the way home from school. According to his brother Juan this is a haunted house and one can hear the voices of the dead. Later he is ... See full summary »
Director: Montxo Armendáriz | Stars: Carmelo Gómez, Charo López, Silvia Munt, Vicky Peña
Votes: 2,033
27. Face/Off (1997)
R | 138 min | Action, Crime, Sci-Fi
To foil a terrorist plot, FBI agent Sean Archer assumes the identity of the criminal Castor Troy who murdered his son through facial transplant surgery, but the crook wakes up prematurely and vows revenge.
Director: John Woo | Stars: John Travolta, Nicolas Cage, Joan Allen, Alessandro Nivola
Votes: 400,754 | Gross: $112.23M
28. Amistad (1997)
R | 155 min | Biography, Drama, History
In 1839, the revolt of Mende captives aboard a Spanish owned ship causes a major controversy in the United States when the ship is captured off the coast of Long Island. The courts must decide whether the Mende are slaves or legally free.
Director: Steven Spielberg | Stars: Djimon Hounsou, Matthew McConaughey, Anthony Hopkins, Morgan Freeman
Votes: 82,749 | Gross: $44.18M
29. The Butcher Boy (1997)
R | 110 min | Comedy, Drama
The antisocial son of an alcoholic father and a bipolar mother grows up in 1960s Ireland.
Director: Neil Jordan | Stars: Stephen Rea, Fiona Shaw, Eamonn Owens, Alan Boyle
Votes: 11,462 | Gross: $1.82M
30. Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)
R | 107 min | Action, Comedy, Crime
Martin Blank is a professional assassin. He is sent on a mission to a small Detroit suburb, Grosse Pointe, and, by coincidence, his ten-year high school reunion party is taking place there at the same time.
Director: George Armitage | Stars: John Cusack, Minnie Driver, Dan Aykroyd, Joan Cusack
Votes: 99,594 | Gross: $28.01M
31. Wag the Dog (1997)
R | 97 min | Comedy, Drama
Shortly before an election, a spin-doctor and a Hollywood producer join efforts to fabricate a war in order to cover up a Presidential sex scandal.
Director: Barry Levinson | Stars: Dustin Hoffman, Robert De Niro, Anne Heche, Woody Harrelson
Votes: 88,452 | Gross: $43.02M
32. The Chambermaid on the Titanic (1997)
101 min | Drama, Romance
An ordinary foundry worker fakes a love story between him and the chambermaid from RMS Titanic. When ship sinks and chambermaid probably dies, his story gains popularity. But lie always has its price.
Director: Bigas Luna | Stars: Olivier Martinez, Romane Bohringer, Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, Didier Bezace
Votes: 1,461 | Gross: $0.24M
33. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (1997)
R | 155 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery
A visiting city reporter's assignment suddenly revolves around the murder trial of a local millionaire, whom he befriends.
Director: Clint Eastwood | Stars: John Cusack, Kevin Spacey, Jack Thompson, Irma P. Hall
Votes: 41,452 | Gross: $25.08M
34. Ashes of Paradise (1997)
R | 116 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery
A judge falls from the roof of the Federal Courthouse. A woman is murdered. Between them and the three sons of the judge there is a connection that will be investigated by a woman judge who is determined to discover the truth.
Director: Marcelo Piñeyro | Stars: Héctor Alterio, Cecilia Roth, Leonardo Sbaraglia, Daniel Kuzniecka
Votes: 1,790
35. Insomnia (1997)
Not Rated | 96 min | Crime, Mystery, Thriller
In a Norwegian city with a 24-hour daylight cycle a Swedish murder investigator has been brought in on a special case. Sleep deprived, he makes a horrible mistake which is discovered by the killer he has been hunting.
Director: Erik Skjoldbjærg | Stars: Stellan Skarsgård, Sverre Anker Ousdal, Maria Mathiesen, Gisken Armand
Votes: 15,582 | Gross: $0.22M
36. The Boxer (1997)
R | 113 min | Drama, Romance, Sport
Young Danny Flynn is released from prison 14 years after "taking the rap" for the IRA and tries to rebuild his life in his old Belfast neighborhood.
Director: Jim Sheridan | Stars: Daniel Day-Lewis, Emily Watson, Daragh Donnelly, Frank Coughlan
Votes: 22,300 | Gross: $5.80M
37. The Thief (1997)
R | 96 min | Crime, Drama
A woman meets a man who isn't the right man for her - but she hasn't realised it yet...
Director: Pavel Chukhray | Stars: Vladimir Mashkov, Yekaterina Rednikova, Mikhail Filipchuk, Dima Chigaryov
Votes: 5,623 | Gross: $1.13M
38. Character (1997)
R | 122 min | Crime, Drama, Mystery
Jacob Katadreuffe lives mute with his mother, has no contact with his father who only works against him and wants to become a lawyer, at all costs.
Director: Mike van Diem | Stars: Pavlik Jansen op de Haar, Jan Decleir, Fedja van Huêt, Betty Schuurman
Votes: 11,299 | Gross: $0.71M
39. Donnie Brasco (1997)
R | 127 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
An FBI undercover agent infiltrates the mob and finds himself identifying more with the Mafia life--at the expense of his regular one.
Director: Mike Newell | Stars: Al Pacino, Johnny Depp, Michael Madsen, Bruno Kirby
Votes: 332,089 | Gross: $41.91M
40. 4 Little Girls (1997)
TV-14 | 102 min | Documentary, History
A documentary of the notorious racial terrorist bombing of an African American church during the Civil Rights Movement.
Director: Spike Lee | Stars: Maxine McNair, Walter Cronkite, Chris McNair, Fred Lee Shuttlesworth
Votes: 3,577 | Gross: $0.13M
41. The Island on Bird Street (1997)
PG-13 | 107 min | Biography, Drama, War
During World War II a Jewish boy is left on his own for months in a ruined house in the Warsaw Ghetto, where he must learn all the tricks of survival under constantly life-threatening conditions.
Director: Søren Kragh-Jacobsen | Stars: Patrick Bergin, Jordan Kiziuk, Jack Warden, James Bolam
Votes: 1,897
42. Absolute Power (1997)
R | 121 min | Action, Crime, Drama
Career thief Luther Whitney (Clint Eastwood) witnesses a horrific crime involving U.S. President Alan Richmond (Gene Hackman).
Director: Clint Eastwood | Stars: Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, Ed Harris, Laura Linney
Votes: 60,125 | Gross: $50.01M
43. Career Girls (1997)
R | 83 min | Comedy, Drama
2 young women reunite and rekindle their friendship after having said goodbye at their college graduation, six years earlier.
Director: Mike Leigh | Stars: Katrin Cartlidge, Lynda Steadman, Kate Byers, Mark Benton
Votes: 6,255 | Gross: $2.51M
44. Scream 2 (1997)
R | 120 min | Horror, Mystery
Two years after the first series of murders, as Sidney acclimates to college life, someone donning the Ghostface costume begins a new string of killings.
Director: Wes Craven | Stars: Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Jada Pinkett Smith
Votes: 209,641 | Gross: $101.36M
45. Mrs. Brown (1997)
PG | 101 min | Biography, Drama, History
When Queen Victoria's husband Prince Albert dies, she finds solace in her trusted servant, Mr. John Brown, but their relationship also brings scandal and turmoil.
Director: John Madden | Stars: Judi Dench, Billy Connolly, Geoffrey Palmer, Antony Sher
Votes: 15,579 | Gross: $9.22M
46. The Full Monty (1997)
R | 91 min | Comedy, Drama
Six unemployed steel workers form a male striptease act. The women cheer them on to go for "the full monty" - total nudity.
Director: Peter Cattaneo | Stars: Robert Carlyle, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Addy, Wim Snape
Votes: 114,091 | Gross: $45.95M
47. Genealogies of a Crime (1997)
103 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
At her son's funeral, Solange, a lawyer famous for losing hopeless cases, agrees to defend René, her son's age, accused of murdering his wealthy aunt, Jeanne, who's part of the ... See full summary »
Director: Raúl Ruiz | Stars: Catherine Deneuve, Michel Piccoli, Melvil Poupaud, Andrzej Seweryn
Votes: 948 | Gross: $0.08M
48. My Son the Fanatic (1997)
R | 87 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Pakistani taxi-driver Parvez and prostitute Bettina find themselves trapped in the middle when Islamic fundamentalists decide to clean up their local town.
Director: Udayan Prasad | Stars: Om Puri, Rachel Griffiths, Akbar Kurtha, Stellan Skarsgård
Votes: 1,664 | Gross: $0.41M
49. The Game (1997)
R | 129 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
After a wealthy San Francisco banker is given an opportunity to participate in a mysterious game, his life is turned upside down as he begins to question if it might really be a concealed conspiracy to destroy him.
Director: David Fincher | Stars: Michael Douglas, Deborah Kara Unger, Sean Penn, James Rebhorn
Votes: 429,077 | Gross: $48.32M
50. Gattaca (1997)
PG-13 | 106 min | Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller
A genetically inferior man assumes the identity of a superior one in order to pursue his lifelong dream of space travel.
Director: Andrew Niccol | Stars: Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, Jude Law, Gore Vidal
Votes: 323,095 | Gross: $12.34M
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