"Indie" pictures.

By the final decades of the twentieth century, independent, or "indie," movies were no longer just low-budget pictures with unusual subject matter that were usually shown in small, so-called art-house theaters because of their lack of appeal to the general public. Instead, an "indie" picture became defined as any movie that was funded by sources other than a major studio, and some of them cost just as much to make as movies made by the studios. Some critics have pointed out that this trend tends to discourage experimentation and risk taking among movie makers. Faced with high production costs, they need to attract wider audiences or risk losing money.

Award Winners.

Two of the best independent movies of the 1990s were Sling Blade (1996), written and directed by Billy Bob Thornton, who also starred in his movie, and Fargo (1996), written by...