It’s hard to think that Leo craze gripped the globe following the release of the box-office smash Titanic over 25 years ago. James Cameron’s historical epic was the film that catapulted Leonardo DiCaprio’s career, grossing over $2 billion worldwide. While Jack Dawson will always have a special place in fans’ hearts, some of DiCaprio’s best performances and most difficult characters came before him. In his collection, he mentions a “pre-Titanic age.” There are a number of performances on this list that would have been deserving of a nomination, if not a win.
Leo became a famous after his appearance on Titanic, but it was his previous work that first put him on the map.
1. This Boy’s Life (1993)
Director- Michael Caton- Jones
A son and mother flee the East and an abusive boyfriend in 1957 in search of a fresh life. They wind themselves in Seattle, where the mother meets a courteous garage mechanic. Because he hangs out with the wrong set, the child is constantly in problems. The mother marries the mechanic. But they quickly discover that he is an aggressive and irrational alcoholic. They try to keep hope alive in an impossible circumstance. As the youngster grows up with plans to flee the small village by any means necessary. Tobias Wolff’s genuine storey inspired the film.
2. What’s Eating Gilbert Grape (1993)
Director- Lasse Hallstrom
The storey revolves around Ellen and Amy Grape, as well as their two brothers Arnie and Gilbert. Also, their morbidly obese widowed mother Bonnie Grape. They are attempting to survive and cohabit with the loss of a father figure. A low-wage work, and seventeen-year-old Arnie’s serious mental illness. Gilbert, who works at the town’s slowly fading convenience store, is forced to continuously look after his younger brother Arnie in this awkward and exceedingly one-sided relationship. Gilbert’s life, his future, is jeopardised. But it is in this guardian angel that his love and link with Arnie can’t and won’t be broken. That is, until Becky, a free spirit, arrives in town and finds herself stranded for a week. While waiting for components for her vehicle. Something new is devouring Gilbert Grape. This understanding brings with it new feelings, thoughts, and hope for the beleaguered Gibert.
3. The Basketball Diaries (1995)
Director- Scott Kalvert
Rough in the streets Jim Carroll’s kaleidoscopic free fall into the terrible realm of drug addiction is chronicled in this letter. Jim’s existence revolves around the basketball court as a member of a seemingly unstoppable high school basketball team. The court becomes a metaphor for the world in his view. A dying best friend, a coach who takes unacceptable liberties with his team’s boys, adolescent sexual anguish, and an unhealthy hunger for heroin all begin to encroach on young Jim’s ambition of becoming a basketball star. The nighttime streets of New York soon become a haven for him, away from his mother’s growing concern for her son.
4. The Quick and The Dead (1995)
Director- Sam Raimi
Ellen, a mysterious female gunslinger, rides into a small, dingy, and dreary prairie town with a secret as to why she’s there. A local preacher, Cort, is tossed through the saloon doors shortly after she arrives, as townfolk are signing up for a shooting competition. The prize is a large quantity of money, and the only need is that you obey the regulations put down by Herod, the man who organised the competition. Herod is also the town’s owner, leader, and “ruler.” He appears to have staged this gunfight so that the preacher will have to fight once again. Cort refuses to use a gun to murder anyone again, and Herod, who considers Cort to be one of the best, is determined to change his mind, even if it means killing someone.
5. Total Eclipse (1995)
Director- Agnieszka Holland
In 1871, famous poet Paul Verlaine (1844-1896) asks youthful genius Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891) to live with him and his young pregnant wife, Mathilde, in her father’s mansion in Paris. Rimbaud’s impolite behaviour causes havoc in the household and in the closed circle of French poets, yet Verlaine finds the youth energising. Verlaine abuses Mathilde when engrossed in absinthe and wrath; he and Rimbaud fall in love and forsake her. There are reconciliations and partings with Mathilde, as well as partings and reconciliations with Rimbaud, until one of them is sent to prison in 1873 after an incident with a firearm. The poets’ final meeting and illnesses are dramatised in codas.
6. Romeo + Juliet (1996)
Director- Baz Luhrmann
The classic Romeo and Juliet storey is reimagined in the modern-day city of Verona Beach. Two fighting families, the Montagues and Capulets, have children who meet and fall in love. Because they know their parents will not allow them to be together, they must hide their love from the rest of the world. Obstacles abound, including Juliet’s cousin Tybalt and Romeo’s buddy Mercutio, as well as numerous conflicts. Despite the fact that it is set in modern times, the storey of the “star-crossed lovers” remains ageless.
