The 1990s (pronounced "nineteen-nineties"; shortened to "the '90s") was a decade of the Gregorian calendar that began on 1 January 1990, and ended on 31 December 1999.
In the absence of world communism, which collapsed in the first two years of the decade, the 1990s was politically defined by a movement towards the right-wing, including increase in support for far-right parties in Europe[1] as well as the advent of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party[2] and cuts in social spending in the United States,[3] Canada,[4] New Zealand,[5] and the UK.[6] The United States also saw a massive revival in the use of the death penalty in the 1990s, which reversed in the early 21st century.[7] During the 1990s the character of the European Union and Euro were formed and codified in treaties.
A combination of factors, including the continued mass mobilization of capital markets through neo-liberalism, the thawing of the decades-long Cold War, the beginning of the widespread proliferation of new media such as the Internet from the middle of the decade onwards, increasing skepticism towards government, and the dissolution of the Soviet Union led to a realignment and reconsolidation of economic and political power across the world and within countries. The dot-com bubble of 1997–2000 brought wealth to some entrepreneurs before its crash between 2000 and 2001.
The 1990s saw extreme advances in technology, with the World Wide Web, the first gene therapy trial, and the first designer babies[8] all emerging in 1990 and being improved and built upon throughout the decade.
... that just four days before his death in 2004, David B. McCall received a presidential pardon from George W. Bush for fraud charges dating from the 1990s?
Seal Henry Olusegun Olumide Adeola Samuel (born 19 February 1963) is a British musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He has sold over 20 million records worldwide. These include hit songs "Crazy" and "Killer", the latter of which went to number one in the UK, and his most celebrated song, "Kiss from a Rose", which was released in 1994.
Image 22The compact disc reached its peak in popularity in the 1990s, and not once did another audio format surpass the CD in music sales from 1991 throughout the remainder of the decade. By 2000, the CD accounted for 92.3% of the entire market share in regard to music sales. (from 1990s)
Image 25The Nasdaq Composite displaying the dot-com bubble, which ballooned between 1997 and 2000. The bubble peaked on Friday, 10 March 2000. (from 1990s)
Image 27Nelson Mandela voting in 1994, after thirty years of imprisonment. (from 1990s)
Image 28Go-go boots became fashionable again in 1995. They were worn by women of the hip-hop, alternative, and dance subcultures. (from 1990s in fashion)
Image 29Example of 1990s men's and women's fashion, 1994 (from 1990s in fashion)
Image 42The federal building that was bombed in the Oklahoma City bombing two days after the bombing, viewed from across the adjacent parking lot. (from 1990s)
Image 54The catsuit became a trend in the late 1990s. Normally made of latex, PVC, or spandex, it was often worn with high-heeled boots. (from 1990s in fashion)
Image 92Rwandan genocide: Genocide victims in Murambi Technical School. Estimates put the death toll of the Rwandan genocide as high as 800,000 people. (from 1990s)
Several studios and producers fought to secure the film rights one year before the novel was published. Producers Sydney Pollack and Mark Rosenberg acquired the rights in December 1986 and hired Pierson to write the script. After an unsuccessful pre-production development at United Artists, the project moved to Warner Bros., and Pakula was brought in to rewrite the script with Pierson before signing on as the film's director in January 1989. Principal photography commenced in July 1989 and concluded in October of that year, with a budget of $20 million. Filming took place on locations in Detroit, Windsor, Ontario, and New Jersey, and on soundstages at Kaufman Astoria Studios in New York. (Full article...)
Disney initially envisioned Toy Story 2 as a direct-to-video sequel. The film began production in a building separated from Pixar, on a small scale, as most of the main Pixar staff were busy working on A Bug's Life (1998). When story reels proved promising, Disney upgraded the film to a theatrical release, but Pixar was unhappy with the film's quality. Lasseter and the story team redeveloped the entire plot in one weekend. Although most Pixar features take years to develop, the established release date could not be moved and the production schedule for Toy Story 2 was compressed into nine months. (Full article...)
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An Unforgettable Summer (French: Un été inoubliable; Romanian: O vară de neuitat) is a 1994 drama film directed and produced by Lucian Pintilie. A Romanian-French co-production based on a chapter from a novel by Petru Dumitriu, it stars Kristin Scott Thomas as Hungarian-born aristocrat Marie-Thérèse Von Debretsy. Her marriage with Romanian Land Forces captain Petre Dumitriu brings her to Southern Dobruja (present-day northeastern Bulgaria), where they settle in 1925. There, she witnesses first-hand the violent clashes between, on one hand, the Greater Romanian administration, and, on the other, komitadji brigands of Macedonian origin and ethnic Bulgarian locals. The film shows her failed attempt to rescue Bulgarians held hostage by the Romanian soldiers, and who are destined for execution. An Unforgettable Summer also stars Claudiu Bleonț as Captain Dumitriu and Marcel Iureș as Ipsilanti, a general whose unsuccessful attempt to seduce Von Debretsy and the resulting grudge he holds against the couple account for Dumitriu's reassignment.
Completed in the context of the Yugoslav wars, the film constitutes an investigation into the consequences of xenophobia and state-sanctioned repression, as well as an indictment of a failure in reaching out. It is thus often described as a verdict on the history of Romania, as well as on problems facing the Balkans at large, and occasionally described as a warning that violence could also erupt in a purely Romanian context. (Full article...)
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Leprechaun is a 1993 American comedy horror film written and directed by Mark Jones, and starring Warwick Davis in the title role, with Jennifer Aniston supporting. Davis plays a vengeful leprechaun who believes a family has stolen his pot of gold. As he hunts them, they attempt to locate his gold to mollify him.
Originally intended as straight horror, Davis injected humor into his role, and reshoots added increased gore to appeal to older audiences. Leprechaun was the first in-house production at Trimark Pictures for theatrical exhibition; it earned a domestic gross of $8.6 million against a budget of roughly $1 million and became a cult film. While initial reviews were negative, the commercial success prompted a series of films. (Full article...)
McKenna wrote the script based on his own childhood and experiences of growing up in San Diego. He sold the script to New Line Cinema, which was impressed by the writing. American History X was Kaye's first directorial role in a feature film. Budgeted at $20 million, filming took place in 1997. Before the film's release, Kaye and the film studio were in disagreements about the final cut of the film, which Norton had played a pivotal role in conceiving. The final version was longer than Kaye intended, which resulted in him publicly disowning the film, thus negatively affecting his directing career. (Full article...)
Madonna: Truth or Dare (also known as In Bed with Madonna internationally) is a 1991 American documentary film by director Alek Keshishian chronicling the life of entertainer Madonna during her 1990 Blond Ambition World Tour. Madonna approached Keshishian to do an HBO special on the tour after watching his Harvard senior project. Initially planned to be a traditional concert film, Keshishian was so impressed with the backstage life that he persuaded Madonna to make it the focus of the film. Madonna funded the project and served as executive producer. The film was edited to be in black-and-white, in order to emulate cinéma vérité, while the performance scenes are in color.
Madonna: Truth or Dare was screened out of competition at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival and was given a limited release on May 10, 1991; two weeks later, it had its worldwide release. It opened to positive reviews although certain scenes, such as one where Madonna visits her mother's grave, were criticized. Madonna was nominated for a Razzie Award for Worst Actress. With a worldwide gross of $29 million, it was the highest-grossing documentary of all time, until Bowling for Columbine surpassed it in 2002. Truth or Dare has been noted as a groundbreaking film for its casual portrayal of homosexuality, and was compared to Paris Is Burning (1990). It has also had an impact on reality television and celebrity culture, inspiring parodies and other music-related documentaries. (Full article...)
GoldenEye is a 1995 spy film, the seventeenth in the James Bond Series produced by Eon Productions, and the first to star Pierce Brosnan as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. Directed by Martin Campbell, it was the first in the series not to utilize any story elements from the works of novelist Ian Fleming. GoldenEye was also the first James Bond film not produced by Albert R. Broccoli, following his stepping down from Eon Productions and replacement by his daughter, Barbara Broccoli (along with Michael G. Wilson, although Albert was still involved as a consultant producer; it was his final film project before his death in 1996). Its story was conceived and written by Michael France, with later collaboration by other writers. In the film, Bond fights to prevent a rogue ex-MI6 agent (Sean Bean) from using a satellite weapon against London to cause a global financial meltdown.
Production on A Bug's Life began shortly after the release of Toy Story in 1995. The ants in the film were redesigned to be more appealing, and Pixar's animation unit employed technical innovations in computer animation. Randy Newman composed the music for the film. During production, a controversial public feud erupted between Steve Jobs and Lasseter of Pixar and DreamWorks co-founder Jeffrey Katzenberg due to the parallel production of his similar film Antz, which was released the month prior. (Full article...)
While promoting Stargate in Europe, Emmerich conceived the film while answering a question about his belief in the existence of alien life. Devlin and Emmerich decided to incorporate a large-scale attack having noticed that aliens in most invasion films travel long distances in outer space only to remain hidden when reaching Earth. Shooting began on July 28, 1995, in New York City, and the film was completed on October 8, 1995. (Full article...)
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Audition (オーディション, Ōdishon) is a 1999 horror film directed by Takashi Miike and adapted by Daisuke Tengan, based on the 1997 novel by Ryu Murakami. Starring Ryo Ishibashi and Eihi Shiina, the film is about a widower, Shigeharu Aoyama (Ishibashi), who stages a phony audition to meet a potential new romantic partner. After interviewing several women, Aoyama becomes interested in Asami (Shiina), whose dark past affects their relationship.
Audition was originally a project of the Japanese company Omega Project, who wanted to make a horror film after the massive financial success of their previous production Ring. The company purchased the rights to Murakami's book and sought Tengan and Miike for an adaptation. The cast and crew consisted primarily of previous Miike collaborators, with the exception of Shiina, who had worked as a model prior to her career in film. The film was shot in about three weeks in Tokyo. (Full article...)
Hard Target was Woo's first U.S. film and was also the first major Hollywood film made by a Chinese director. Universal Pictures was nervous about having Woo direct a feature and sent in director Sam Raimi to look over the film's production and to take Woo's place as director if he were to fail. Woo went through several scripts finding mostly martial arts films with which he was not interested. After deciding on Pfarrer's script for Hard Target, Woo wanted to have actor Kurt Russell in the lead role, but found Russell too busy with other projects. Woo then went with Universal's initial choice of having Van Damme star. Woo got along with Van Damme during filming and raised the amount of action in the film as he knew that the actor was up for it. (Full article...)
Development of the film began in 1993 before the novel was published. Mike Nichols purchased the film rights, and the project was picked up by Savoy Pictures. After Nichols stepped down, the film adaptation became mired in development hell, with Ben Stiller and John Dahl turning down opportunities to direct it. After Savoy closed in November 1997, the project was sold to Paramount Pictures. John Boorman was hired to direct, but scheduling conflicts led to his replacement by Raimi. An international co-production between the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France and Japan, the film was financed by Mutual Film Company, its investors and Newmarket Capital Group, which allocated a budget of $17 million. Principal photography began in January 1998 and concluded in March after 55 days of filming in Wisconsin and Minnesota. The score was produced and composed by Danny Elfman. (Full article...)
Producers Lynda Myles and Roger Randall-Cutler acquired the film rights to the novel in 1988, and commissioned Doyle, a first-time screenwriter, to write an adaptation. Doyle spent one year working on the script before Myles brought in veteran screenwriters Clement and La Frenais to help complete it. Upon reading the novel, Parker signed on as the film's director in 1989. An international co-production between Ireland, the United States and the United Kingdom, The Commitments was the first film produced by Beacon Pictures, which provided an estimated budget of $12–15 million. The film's young lead actors were mostly inexperienced, and were cast because of their musical backgrounds and resemblance to the characters in the novel. Principal photography took place in Dublin, from late August to October, 1990. (Full article...)
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