Out of Sight came out in 1998, back when George Clooney was just kind of famous, back when Jennifer Lopez was only mildly annoying, and back when the most relevant thing Steven Soderbergh had directed was Sex, Lies, and Videotapes (a flick our parents wouldn’t let us see that we later watched with great disappointment).

Out of Sight is based on an Elmore Leonard novel (that we haven’t read). It’s quirky and dark and clever. The dialogue is tremendously deadpan, and the supporting cast of soon-to-be relevant actors brings the whole thing home. It’s Get Shorty meets Ocean’s Eleven with a dash of thugged out Don Cheadle. Pretty awesome stuff.

Additional points we’d like to make:

• If you can put your brain in a mental time machine and block out everything you learned post-1998 this movie will remind you what all the Jennifer Lopez fuss was about.

• As far as we’re concerned Maurice Miller is Don Cheadle’s all-time greatest role. Every line that comes out of his mouth is repeatable.

• Pretty much every George Clooney movie before Out of Sight sucked ass (From Dusk til Down is debatable) and just about every George Clooney movie after Out of Sight has been solid.

• Sam Jackson cameos are the best.

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Drowning Mona came out in 2000. It was no critical darling, no box office wonder, and we’re willing to bet less than half of your friends have ever heard of it. The good news is that all of these negatives are actually positives since A) Critics don’t know shit about comedy, B) From the research we’ve done box office success has exactly zero correlation to quality, and C) Face it, just about all of your friends are idiots.

Like most of our favorite comedies, Drowning Mona is dark, nuanced, edgy, and gets exponentially better with each viewing. The latter is especially true when you watch it with friends and you can later repeat lines like, “Dude, she’s like 13,” and have your buddy automatically respond, “Yeah. Finally!”

Additional points we’d like to make:

• As much as it pains us to recommend a movie with Bette Midler, Neve Campbell, and Jamie Lee Curtis on the cover, that’s just what we’re doing. None of them suck in this flick, because none of them get too much screen time.

• Casey Affleck is AWE-some in this movie. Dude should really get more street cred for his performance.

• Just about all the really money comedy is dished out by people not on the cover (Affleck, this dude that you’ve seen a lot but don’t know his name, the guy who plays Jeff Dearly, and Will Ferrell as Cubby the funeral director). Needless to say this thing was poorly marketed.

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