Almost Famous is a 2000 dramedy film that stars Kate Hudson and Billy Crudup and tells the tale of a promising young journalist, played by Patrick Fugit, who’s working for Rolling Stone in the 1970s. Roger Ebert called the production, “funny and touching in so many ways.” The film is based on the childhood of the director of the film, Cameron Crowe.
Writer and director Cameron Crowe pulled inspiration from several actual musicians and groupies in the ‘70s to create the film, which was ranked the 79th greatest of all time in a 2014 list put out by the Hollywood Reporter.
Born On The Fourth Of July (1989)
Ron Kovic was a young man who served with the U.S Marines in Vietnam. Played by Tom Cruise in the film, his duty turns into a disaster when he accidentally kills his fellow Marine and is later paralyzed from the middle of his chest and down. After writing his book, Kovic became well a known anti-war activist. His memoir published in 1976, Born on the Fourth of July, because the book on which the film is based.
The film was praised by critics, and hit at the box office, cruising over $160 million dollars around the world. It won four Golden Globe Awards, including all of the majors: Best Actor, Best Screenplay, and Best Director for Oliver Stone’s efforts on the picture.
Girl, Interrupted (1999)
This 1999 psychological drama stars Wynona Rider and Angelina Jolie as fellow patients in a mental hospital in the late 1960s. Rider plays an 18-year-old who suffers a nervous breakdown and winds up in a facility meant for serious mental illness, where she winds up making friends with a lot of the other girls. The film is based on Susanna Kaysen who relates her experiences as a young woman in a psychiatric hospital in the 1960s.
Brittany Murphy and Elisabeth Moss also make appearances in the film, which opened the mixed reviews, but won several awards. Jolie won the Academy Award, Critics’ Choice Award, and Golden Globe Award for best-supporting actress.
Party Monster (2003)
Macaulay Culkin stars in this 2003 biographical drama, about infamous NYC party boy and club promoter, Michael Alig. Alig was known as “king of the Club Kids,” and rose to fame in the underground scene after James St. James (played by Seth Green,) showed him the wonderful and wild world of clubbing. The famed clubber was convicted of killing his roommate and served 17 years in prison.
Unfortunately, the film was a box office flop, grossing less than $750,000, against a $5 million budget. It is based on the memoir of James St. James, titled Disco Bloodbath, which details the relationship between the two men after Alig moved to the city when he was young.
My Left Foot (1989)
This 1989 biographical drama tells the story of a man named Christy Brown, played by Daniel Day-Lewis, who was born into an incredibly large family with a disease that only allowed him to control his left foot, rendering him unable to walk or talk. Christy Brown was in 1932 into working-class Irish. Doctors discovered that he had severe cerebral palsy, a neurological disorder that left him almost entirely spastic in his limbs. His autobiography My Left Foot became a literary sensation and inspired the movie.
The film opened to mostly positive reviews, including from Roger Ebert, who gave it a four out of four-star rating. Both Daniel Day-Lewis and Brenda Fricker, who played Christy’s mother, won an Oscar for their performances. The Hollywood Reporter put out a story in 2015, claiming that My Left Foot should’ve won for Best Picture over Driving Miss Daisy.