15 Dumb Movies Which Are Secretly Smart

15. Demolition Man

Demolition Man has been largely dismissed by the mainstream as yet another of Sly Stallone's naff mid-90s action thrillers (among the likes of The Specialist, Judge Dredd, Assassins and Daylight), but it's actually so much more.

The sci-fi actioner stars Stallone as LAPD sergeant John Spartan, who is put in cryogenic storage after a showdown with the villainous Simon Phoenix (Wesley Snipes) goes wrong, killing numerous hostages.

In 2023, Phoenix is thawed out for a parole hearing and escapes, prompting the hapless authorities - who live in a dubious "utopia" where violence has been largely suppressed - to also un-freeze Spartan, hoping that his 90s brand of brutality will be able to bring Phoenix to justice.

Though on the surface Demolition Man might seem like genre schlock, it doesn't take much reading into the narrative to appreciate its satirical qualities.

The "idyllic" future world, where people engage in sex via VR headsets and no longer eat red meat, is a clear jab at excessive political correctness weeding out humanity's survival instinct.

But the film also gleefully pokes fun at notions of masculinity and that, no matter how evolved we might feel as a contemporary society, we're never more than a few decades away from being seen as primitive.

Some critics have argued that the film fails to reconcile its commitment to bonkers action with its smarter speculation on the future of humanity, but the end result is nevertheless decidedly more ambitious - and yes, smarter - than many are prepared to give it credit for.