3. Forrest Gump (1994)
Forrest Gump may have won six Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Actor in a Leading Role, Best Director, Best Visual Effects, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Film Editing), but is it really as good as all the hype?
Essentially, Forrest Gump‘s charm lies in nostalgia. It’s loaded with Americana from several decades of modern history, and it’s stuffed to the gills with various pop culture references that have delighted audiences for generations.
Despite that, it’s not as perfect as many would have you believe. In fact, it’s unabashedly cheesy, with some of the corniest lines and moments in all of cinema, and at times, it plays like propaganda for conservatism.
There’s a thinly veiled message about deviating from the norm and daring to question to the system, with Forrest always coming out ahead by simply going along with whatever he’s told to do. Moreover, Forrest Gump becomes less relevant with each passing year, making it more and more overrated as audiences cling to its quotable cheese out of a misguided sense of loyalty.