Posts Tagged ‘bad movies’

“Why couldn’t you put the bunny back in the box?”

It’s one of the more poorly delivered lines in an otherwise enjoyable film. Devoid of emotion, uttered with all the enthusiasm of a character that is more than half asleep, that bit of dialogue typified the overall performance of the lead character in the 1997 action flick.

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It’s not always simple to narrow down the worst movies of any given year as, hopefully, one has enough restraint to not watch every bad movie that has been released. There was a time  – before I worked 50 to 60 hours a week at my day job – where I did watch just about every movie that come out in a year, but I’ve shown more restraint lately: if I know a movie is going to be really, really bad, I just won’t watch it.

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I love a good movie as much as the next person. In fact, my favorite hobby hinges on the fact that there are good movies out there. But, as a self-proclaimed critic, the best movies for writing reviews are the bad ones. What can one say about Schindler’s List without going into a fluffy tirade of prose about how good it is, when the reader, for the most part, just wants to hear, “This movie rocks?” No, it’s the bad movies where the real meat is, where the reviewer can unlock his deepest, pent-up aggressions toward sloppy filmmaking and unleash, narrowing in on the direct causes that contributed to a picture’s downfall.

And in 2008, just like any year, there were a fair amount of movies that allowed me to play mean. At the same time, 2008 marks a continuing improvement on my part to avoid the movies I know are bad. One summer, way back when I was in high school, I went and saw just about every movie that came out – in theaters, no less – even if I knew they were going to be horrible. I was obsessed. I even backtracked to 1995 to see just about anything that had been released, just so that my database could be complete. When I could have been watching the classics of the century, I was instead watching some crappy movie from ’97 that I knew was going to be bad.

One should not pay too close attention to reviews, because everyone has their own tastes and the more movies a critic watches, the more cynical he or she becomes. Nevertheless, there are movies that you don’t need a critic to tell you that they’re going to suck. And those are the movies I’m starting to weed out of my obsession, so I can focus on other important things, like my day job, friends, family and perhaps finding a girlfriend one of these days.

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Every year, there are movies that we just really want to see, that promise to be explosive or intriguing or captivating. Or just plain fun. And every year, there are movies that you expected great things from that just fail to deliver. They may not be terrible, but they weren’t as good as you were hoping or knew that they could be; they may be movies that you didn’t expect to be great but should have been decent – but were just plain bad. These are those movies: the most disappointing movies of 2008.

Note that “disappointing” is different from “bad” or “worst.” Some of the movies on this list are just plain bad (The Happening), and most of them aren’t that great, but there are a few on here that I would watch again – they just simply didn’t live up to expectations. The higher up the list they are, though, the more they disappointed.

Without further ado…

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I like Johnny Depp. He’s a fun, dynamic actor. But ever since Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl put him back on the map, critics and audiences alike have kissed his butt like he is the ruler of the world. Has everyone failed to notice that he has only done two good movies since Blow in 2001?

That’s right, you heard me! Sure, some of his bad movies weren’t THAT bad, but they sure as hell weren’t that good, and some have been downright awful. Here are the good ones:

• Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black
  The idea sounded dreadful from the start, but somehow Disney and Johnny Depp managed to make an entertaining, funny and dark “family” film. A surprisingly good film, especially considering it’s based on a theme park ride.
• Finding Neverland
  This award-winning drama wasn’t particularly memorable, but was still entrancing while you were watching it.

And that’s it! Two good movies in the last seven years, yet Depp is still as popular as ever. That’s all fine and good, but acknowledge his failures, people!

The bad ones:

• Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003)
  This follow-up to one of my favorite action films of all time – Desperado – was supposed to kick ass, but instead it was one of the worst movies ever to grace the silver screen. Depp was dreadful in it, too.
• Secret Window (2004)
  This movie was good for a while, until the final act killed any chance of it being any good. The final minutes are particularly bad, especially when Depp dons braces.
• The Libertine (2004)
  Not as dreadful as it was boring, most people probably don’t even know Depp starred in this film – if they even heard of it in the first place.
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)
  Another Tim Burton collaboration, this one had the makings of being awesome, except Depp’s portrayal of Willy Wonka came off more like a creepy Michael Jackson than anything else. Again, not horrible, but not very goo, either.
• Corpse Bride (2005)
  Probably his best of the bad, the only thing wrong with Corpse Bride is that it is no Nightmare Before Christmas. It was mildly entertaining but never very engaging.
• Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (2006)
  They should have left it as a sequel. This movie sucked balls.
• Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (2007)
  Not quite as bad as #2, this one still also sucked balls.
• Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)
  Quite possibly the worst musical I have seen in a long while. Depp isn’t bad as the title character, and Tim Burton tries, but the story is surprisingly dull and the musical, presumably derived from the play, is terrible and often cringe-inducing.