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THE ARCHIVE — It’s hard to believe at times, but it’s 2019.
In my mind, 2020 was always the future and now it’s less than a year away. It likely seems strange to many of us that it’s already 2019 and my guess is some of our bones creak more than they use to and we make really unattractive noises when we get up out of a chair.
This is a part of getting older, but one thing makes me feel older than just about anything else and that’s finding out what movies turn 20 in a given year.
That’s what I’m here to do today — make you feel old.
Get ready to feel that pain in your hip and realize more of your hair is gone than you realized when I tell you about these five movies that are turning 20 in 2019.
That’s right, the film that changed action and sci-fi movies forever is now 20 years old.
When trailers for “The Matrix” debuted, people started getting excited with the new take on visuals and the goth vibe. But when we actually got into the theater and watched it all unfurl, none of us could have been ready for what we actually saw.
It’s not that often that a film will change the history of movies, but one of those was definitely “The Matrix” and it’s now two decades old.
"The Matrix" is rated R for sci-fi violence and brief language.
"The Sixth Sense" =================
Say what you will about M. Night Shyamalan, but 20 years ago he released one of the most iconic movies to ever grace the silver screen.
The acting is pinpoint, the screenplay brilliant, the scares genuine and the twist epic. In fact, the twist melted brains so much back in 1999 that getting “Shyamalaned” became a verb.
“The Sixth Sense” carries the ultimate spoiler alert, but you would either have to have been born yesterday or have been living under a rock to not know about it.
Even if Shyamalan's track record has been up and down since 1999, there is no denying that this movie is a part of Hollywood history.
"Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace" ===========================================
“Return of the Jedi” was released in 1983, which means audiences were waiting 16 years for another addition to the "Star Wars" canon.
What they finally got wasn’t exactly what they’d been hoping for, but love it or hate it "The Phantom Menace" kicked off the prequel trilogy 20 years ago.
It's fitting that “Star Wars: Episode IX” will release this year and mark the end of a new trilogy 20 years after a previous trilogy started.
1999 was a good year for movies and my guess is “The Mummy” wasn’t seen as one of the best films of the year, but it was one of the most entertaining.
The film stars 90s leading man Brendan Fraser and Academy Award-winner Rachel Weisz in a mash-up of Indiana Jones and classic Universal movie monsters.
The film is downright silly at times and the CGI hasn’t aged incredibly well, but the movie still offers loads of entertainment and is far superior to the Tom Cruise reboot from 2017.
1995 gave us the “Toy Story” and the animation landscape was never the same.
The movie is much like the aforementioned “Matrix” in that it changed film forever. Now, Disney doesn’t even make hand-drawn films anymore, sticking exclusively to 3-D animated films.
The “Toy Story” franchise is also still going strong as the fourth entry of the series is headed to theaters this summer.
While 1995 offered us “Toy Story,” it was 1999 that gave us the sequel, which some have dubbed the best of the series.
“Toy Story 2” wowed audiences just like its predecessor and also managed to make a fortune at the box office. Now wrap your head around the fact that it was 20 years ago that you sat in a theater to watch “Toy Story 2” and 24 years since you sat down to enjoy “Toy Story” for the first time.
What other movies are turning 20 this year that are making you feel old? Let us know in the comments.
