40 Best '90s Movies to Watch When You're Feeling Nostalgic

Julianne (Julia Roberts) and Michael (Dermot Mulroney) have been best friends for ages. But it isn't until he's about to walk down the aisle with Kimmy (Cameron Diaz) that Julianne realizes he's the one for her.

It's the last day of high school in 1976 and everyone is celebrating. This beloved film features a stacked cast of stars including Matthew McConaughey, Parker Posey, and Ben Affleck, plus one of the best soundtracks of the '90s!

When two college sweethearts get married, all of their old friends come together for a reunion so filled with drama and dark secrets that it could end in disaster for the bride and groom.

Which pill would you pick: the red pill or the blue pill? Neo's (Keanu Reeves) choice leads him into an underworld that reveals a dark and shocking truth about his own.

George Banks has a lot of objections to his daughter's wedding. But the show must go on in this beloved rom-com starring Steve Martin and Diane Keaton.

This critically acclaimed documentary follows the lives of two high school students, William Gates and Arthur Agee, as they shoot for their dreams of becoming professional basketball players.

Henry Hill has dreamed of being a mobster since he was a little boy growing up in a working class Italian-American neighborhood in Brooklyn. Although his dream comes true, it ultimately unravels into a nightmare.

Arnold Schwarzenegger promised he'd "be back" and in 1991 he delivered. This cult favorite follows the newly reprogrammed Terminator on a mission to save the future leader of the human resistance against machines.

“The first rule of fight club is...you don't talk about fight club." But we'll just say this: Fight Club is an essential, must-watch '90s movie!

A case of mistaken identity has The Dude, aka Jeffrey Lebowski, seeking vengeance in this hilarious comedy with an all-star cast including Jeff Bridges, John Goodman, Julianne Moore, and more.

The special effects of the doomed ship slowing sinking are nothing less than dazzling, but then so is the equally ill-fated relationship between Jack and Rose, winningly played by Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. The winner of 11 Academy Awards, Titanic was not just the highest grossing film of the '90s—it remains the third biggest movie moneymaker of all time.

An unflinching look at the horrors of the Holocaust, Schindler's List manages to inspire as well as educate by detailing the true tale of the titular businessman who saved 1,200 Jews by employing them in his factory during World War II. A seven-time Academy Award winner, the film snared Steven Spielberg his first Oscar for Best Director, an accomplishment he would repeat with 1998's Saving Private Ryan.

A Best Picture Oscar winner, Forrest Gump escorts us through a host of uniquely American events as seen through the eyes of a sweet-hearted Alabama man with an I.Q. of 75 (Tom Hanks, who won the Best Actor Academy Award for the role). From the JFK presidency on through the Vietnam War and Watergate, this sentimental film puts Forrest—and the film's audience—right in the middle of the action.

Buddies Matt Damon and Ben Affleck won an Oscar for their original screenplay about a math whiz (Damon) struggling with everything from mental health problems to unrealized potential. Robin Williams, who won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, steals the show as Damon's psychologist.

In these more socially-aware times, a story about a corporate raider rescuing a sex worker with a heart of gold might make us wince—but there's also no denying this rom-com's ability to delight. And it stars an absolutely incandescent Julia Roberts in the role that basically turned her into Hollywood's biggest female star for the next two decades.

The '90s were a superior decade for creepy movies, but none were creepier—or better, for that matter—than Silence of the Lambs. Directed by Jonathan Demme and starring an unforgettable Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster, the film won seven Oscars, including Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Actress. Foster plays an FBI cadet on the hunt for a serial killer; Hopkins is the cannibal she prevails upon to help her find him.

It may be hard to believe it now, but when Thelma and Louise was released back in '91, no one had ever seen anything quite like it. Part buddy movie, part crime thriller, part road-trip flick, this feminist drama from Ridley Scott followed two best friends on the run from a big mistake. Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis were both nominated for Oscars for their raw, gutsy, and powerfully honest performances, but lost out to Jodie Foster.

A charming comedy that gave birth to the phrase "as if!" this '90s movie is actually an update of Jane Austen's classic book, Emma. The plot concerns a pampered rich girl who decides to remake a frumpy new student at her school. Alicia Silverstone is absolutely adorable in the lead, while Paul Rudd, who plays her stepbrother, looks exactly the same as he does nowadays. Seriously, does the guy ever age?

Nora Ephron's beloved rom com is by far the most endearing of all the Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan match-ups, which also include 1998's You've Got Mail. In this smash, Hanks is a widower, Ryan is a reporter, and thanks to a radio call-in show, the two fall in love though they live at opposite ends of the country.

When eight-year-old Kevin McCallister (Macaulay Culkin) is accidentally left behind after his family heads off to Paris, he alone can protect their home from a pair of blundering burglars, played by Daniel Stern and Joe Pesci. Just how big was this movie? It spent more than two decades as the highest-grossing live-action comedy, until The Hangover Part II stole its crown in 2011.