4. Sky Captain And The World Of Tomorrow (2004)
If any movie is truly deserving of cult status, it's Sky Captain And The World Of Tomorrow. And I don't just mean for fans of Dieselpunk. The movie is a fun visual treat from beginning to end, and is criminally under-seen. It's also one of the few movies to really use the 30's movie serial template and get it right (though of course, not as well as Star Wars or Raiders Of The Lost Ark). I know, it might be a bit of a stretch to call this a superhero movie, but the fact that Sky Captain is referred to as
Sky Captain is enough to make it one. Set in an alternate 1939, the story concerns reporter Polly Perkins (Gwenyth Paltrow) who is close to finding out the reasons for the disappearances of a group of scientists. Soon, giant robots attack and Sky Captain (Jude Law), who is a former lover of Polly's, is called in to save the day. Together they team up to solve the mystery behind the missing scientists and see who's behind the giant robots. While the movie may not be an achievement in the story department, it's definitely an achievement technically. It was one of the first movies to be made using a completely digital backdrop (actors filmed in front of a blue screen and the backgrounds added digitally). One wonders if Sin City or 300 could've been made had Sky Captain not proved the technology.