If you’ve only ever seen a handful of Peter Jackson movies, there’s a good chance it’s the ones set in Middle-earth. He was a prolific director before helming The Lord of the Rings trilogy, sure, but it was bringing J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy world to life that made him a household name. Not far off popularity-wise (albeit noticeably weaker critically) was The Hobbit trilogy, with Jackson also directing all three of them about a decade on from The Lord of the Rings.
If you want to get technical and refer to things Tolkien said in letters, then sure, Middle-earth is sort of the real Earth, but set long before the history of Earth was recorded. But it’s also a distinctive fantasy world, and the most fantastical setting for any of Jackson’s films. So, looking at his non-Tolkien/Middle-earth movies is interesting, because many are underrated and worth digging out. Not included in the following ranking is his work as a documentary filmmaker though, for the record, his World War I documentary, They Shall Not Grow Old, and his The Beatles documentary miniseries, Get Back, are both very compelling.
8 'The Lovely Bones' (2009)
Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz
Image via Paramount Pictures
If every Peter Jackson movie was to be ranked at once, there might be an argument to be made that the film in last place should be a Hobbit movie, or perhaps The Lovely Bones. At least the latter can be singled out as Jackson’s worst of the non-Middle-earth movies, and an overall rare misfire for the filmmaker; something that comes close to working infrequently, but in the end doesn’t exactly satisfy or feel very coherent.
It is also a fantasy movie, albeit a more grounded one that also functions as a drama about grief, trauma, and the afterlife. It handles heavy themes in ways that don’t entirely hit as hard as they should, with “uneven” being the best word to describe The Lovely Bones. A young Saoirse Ronan gives a solid performance, Stanley Tucci is undeniably creepy in his villainous role, and the film, as a whole, isn't terrible-looking, but it is a bit slow and awkward on the storytelling side of things.
It's a particularly nasty and spectacularly violent take on an alien invasion kind of storyline, with bumbling aliens arriving on Earth with the goal of turning the human population into a food source, but then finding that some humans won’t go down without a fight. Bad Taste is flawed for sure, but in ways that are more often than not kind of fun, making it wholly satisfying as a B-movie.
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Bad Taste
Release Date December 1, 1987
Cast Pete O'Herne , Terry Potter , Craig Smith , Mike Minett , Peter Jackson , Doug Wren , Peter Vere-Jones , Ken Hammon , Robin Griggs , Michael Gooch , Peter Gooch , Laurie Yarrall , Shane Yarrall , Dean Lawrie , Philip Lamey , Costa Botes , Graham Butcher , Bob Haliburton , Andrew McKay , Clive Haywood , John McTavish , John Nelson , Graham Nesbitt , Steven Smith , John Logan Jr.
Runtime 92 minutes
6 'Meet the Feebles' (1989)
Starring: Donna Akersten, Stuart Devenie, Mark Hadlow
Image via Kerridge Odeon
Doing for puppetry what Bad Taste did for science fiction, Meet the Feebles is Peter Jackson at just about his most bizarre and unrestrained. Nothing he’s directed could be called an acquired taste quite as much as this one, given it’s a darkly funny satirical musical featuring puppet characters who are tied to the world of showbiz, and generally do abhorrent things to each other for the better part of 97 minutes.
Sure, Meet the Feebles is kind of sick and even stomach-churning quite a lot of the time, but that is the point. Those with a particular sense of humor will likely connect with what’s trying to be achieved here, while others might well be too mortified to finish the thing. Honestly, props to Jackson and the rest of the people behind this one for even getting it made; you kind of have to respect the (refuge in) audacity.
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Meet the Feebles
Release Date August 12, 1989
Director Peter Jackson
Cast Donna Akersten , Stuart Devenie , Mark Hadlow , Ross Jolly , Brian Sergent , Peter Vere-Jones
Starring: Jeffrey Thomas, Peter Jackson, Costa Botes
Image via WingNut Films
Don’t forget about Forgotten Silver, when it comes to talking about everything Peter Jackson made before his time in Middle-earth, because this is undeniably one of the most interesting things he’s ever had his name attached to. Jackson co-directed this 53-minute-long mockumentary with Costa Botes, and it’s now well-regarded for the fact that it genuinely fooled people into believing it was a real documentary back in 1995.
It covers the “life” of a man named Colin McKenzie, “documenting” how he actually pioneered various cinematic techniques before being forgotten by history. Forgotten Silver is still somewhat obscure outside New Zealand, but it’s worth a watch for anyone who finds silent-era filmmaking interesting because, while it’s all make-believe, the film does a remarkably good job at replicating the way cinema looked during its earliest days.
Following the success of The Lord of the Rings, Peter Jackson had free rein to do pretty much whatever he desired, and so he set his sights on finally remaking King Kong, and doing it as a true epic. It runs for more than three hours, which is perhaps a bit much (with a first act that takes a while to get to the good stuff), but when this thing’s working, it really soars.
In the end, King Kong delivers a ton of spectacle, and so even if you have to wait a while, you still get perhaps even more action, bombast, and technical things to marvel at than you need. It’s all about going big and sweeping, so even if it can’t quite match the beautiful simplicity of 1933’s King Kong, it is still a more-than-worthy update of a classic, and worth spending time on if you're a fan of giant monster movies.
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King Kong
Release Date December 14, 2005
Runtime 187 minutes
3 'Heavenly Creatures' (1994)
Starring: Melanie Lynskey, Kate Winslet, Sarah Peirse
Image via Miramax Films
After making three wild and oftentimes comedic B-movies in a row, Peter Jackson proved himself to have some surprising versatility as a filmmaker by being behind Heavenly Creatures. In contrast to what he’d made in the late 1980s and early 1990s, this film is largely a drama, lacking the sort of goofy B-grade comedy that had defined his earlier work.
There are still other genres Heavenly Creatures dips into, working as something of a fantasy movie (at times), telling a story based on true events, and also featuring certain crime/romance genre elements all the while. It’s ambitious and overall strikingly unique, helping to establish Jackson’s credibility as a “serious filmmaker” while also getting him his first Oscar nomination – shared with Fran Walsh – for Best Original Screenplay.
Release Date September 12, 1994
CastMelanie Lynskey , Kate Winslet , Sarah Peirse , Diana Kent , Clive Merrison , Simon O'Connor
Starring: Michael J. Fox, Trini Alvarado, Peter Dobson
Image via Universal Pictures
Perfectly bridging the gap between his smaller and (usually) B-grade movies and his later works like The Lord of the Rings and King Kong, The Frighteners was the movie that helped demonstrate Peter Jackson’s knack for directing movies with tons of moving parts. There is a lot going on in The Frighteners, with its central ghost-related story necessitating elaborate special effects, all the while having to strike a tonal balance between mild horror and rather broad comedy.
It's also a movie that benefits from a perfectly cast Michael J. Fox in what might be his best non-Back to the Future film role, playing an ex-architect and current exorcist who starts to uncover a mystery behind some unusual murders in a small town. It’s very underrated overall, and stands as one of Jackson’s most purely enjoyable movies, Middle-earth-related or otherwise.
Release Date July 19, 1996
Runtime 110 minutes
1 'Braindead' (1992)
Starring: Timothy Balme, Diana Peñalver, Elizabeth Moody
Image via WingNut Films
You can call it Braindead, or you can call it Dead Alive, but either way, you have to call this one of Peter Jackson’s very best movies. This is absolutely gonzo stuff, as far as zombie films go, taking a familiar premise about a virus causing havoc in a small town, but pushing everything to some kind of extreme. Comedically, it’s ridiculous and wonderfully juvenile, and as far as the bloodshed is concerned, it’s exaggerated to a ludicrous extent.
Even though it’s a largely silly movie, the level of violence was still enough to have Braindead/Dead Alive banned in some countries, which might well be an inevitability when it’s this easy to lose track of how many body parts get hacked off in the one movie. Gooey, disgusting, obscene, and hugely entertaining, B-movies simply don’t get much better than this.
Release Date August 13, 1992
Cast Timothy Balme , Diana Peñalver , Elizabeth Moody , Ian Watkin , Brenda Kendall , Stuart Devenie
Image via Trimark Pictures
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English (US) ·