Atlas Shrugged - A classic adaptation of a classic (and prescient) book.
Koyaanisqatsi - 1982, truly a visual feast with not a spoken word in the entire film & a score by Phillip Glass to boot.
Heaven and Earth or “Ten to Chi to” in Japanese, (not to be confused with other films of the same title) this is a Samurai epic from 1990 that, according to Wikipedia “was the number one Japanese film on the domestic market in 1990” It features some of the best historical battle recreations short of Gettysburg (another must see, now out in Blu-ray). The battle scenes were filmed in Alberta Canada. According to IMBD the film “Set a world record for the most number of saddled horses ever used in one sequence for a motion picture... It took four months to film all the battle scenes for the film, each day using 500 crew, 80 wranglers, 95 Assistant Directors, seven full camera crews (two Japanese and five American), 40 tons of wardrobe, 3000 extras, 800 horses with riders.
Dark Star - 1974, a very low budget first film from John Carpenter and Dan O’Bannon that is proof you don't need to spend millions of dollars on special effects when hundreds will do. Lots ‘o laughs.
I nearly bust a gut on that film! The first "smart bomb"! The beach ball alien!!! I even bought that one though it was hard to find.