10 Underrated Movies By Great Directors

Martin Scorsese certainly likes to be consistent when it comes to choosing his leading men.

He came to prominence through several films that he made with Robert De Niro, beginning with Mean Streets, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull between 1973 and 1980 and continuing with Goodfellas, Cape Fear and Casino between 1990 and 1995. Having since moved on to partnering with Leonardo DiCaprio on five of his last seven films, he will reunite with De Niro for their first feature together in 23 years on this year's The Irishman.

Before that, their longest time apart was in the decade between the releases of Raging Bull and Goodfellas, where they worked together just once on The King Of Comedy. With the exception of 1977 musical New York, New York this stands as perhaps their least recalled collaboration. It is certainly not their best given the prestige of the aforementioned films, but it fits the definition of underrated to a tee.

The combination of the pair for a black comedy rather than a crime piece was seemingly off-putting to audiences and the film was a financial failure. It is nevertheless as dark as anything they did before or after, however, showcasing De Niro's failed stand-up comedian character descend into deranged obsession with Jerry Lewis' more successful counterpart.

If anything, The King Of Comedy was before its time. Its content is particularly poignant in today's fame and celebrity obsessed world for sure...