Tuesday, July 1, 2008

10 Overrated Movies

Oh, come on... you had to have seen this coming. Haven't you ever seen a movie that, maybe you liked it and maybe you didn't, definitely didn't deserve the accolades it got? Well, I have (usually once a week). Or a movie that you felt was so utterly stupid, it darkened your already dim view in humanity because everyone you know liked it? Yeah, don't get me started (new Star Wars trilogy... ahem).

And now, the list:

1. Bad Boys II - seriously, what the fuck was Jerry Bruckheimer thinking? I mean, this even before those two rather bland Pirates of the Carribean sequels. Better yet, what the fuck was Will Smith thinking? I get Martin Lawrence, struggling to find work and all, but c'mon, Smith. Stupid plot, over-the-top plot, weak plot, crap plot, shit plot. And TNT? Tactical Narcotics Team? Give me a fucking break. Cuba? Agh!

2. The Boondock Saints - a cult classic that has no business being a cult classic. Well, no, I take that back. I actually kind of like this movie, but it's no wonder it didn't get a theatrical release. Never mind the fact that writer/director Troy Duffy is apparently a putz, but the ending is quite possibly the worst ending a "cult classic" could have. I'd say "agh" again, but I did that already.

3. Brokeback Mountain - bad movie? No. Well-shot, well-acted, well-written movie? Yes. Good movie? Obviously. Great movie? Oh, HELL no. Sorry, but everyone with half-a-brain knows that the only reason this film got accolades was because of its subject matter. Yes, I get it. And, yes, I think a movie like this needed to be made. But it's no better a love story than, well, Love Story.

4. Flags of Our Fathers - eh, I'm actually on the fence with this one, but it certainly wasn't a very streamlined movie. Sure, war is chaos, but we still need a better character to latch on to than Ryan Phillippe's. And that ending? COME ON. Saving Private Ryan almost ruined itself with the "old-guy-in-the-future" schtick; Clint should've learned a lesson. Ah, well. At least he totally blew the top off with Letters from Iwo Jima. Now THAT was a great film.

5. The Lost World: Jurassic Park - um... um... Mr. Spielberg? Do I really need to get into this? Probably, seeing as how it grossed around $230 million the United States alone. People are idiots.

6. The Matrix - now, don't get me wrong, I absolutely love this movie. However, we all know that despite the fact that it broke technological ground in Hollywood, was a kick-ass action flick, and just all-around rocked, it was its so-called pop-culturization of philosophy that really made this film a hit. Yeah, right. Or so we all thought until the next two films came out... and proved the Wachowski brothers were merely high on the right combination of drugs when they wrote The Matrix.

7. Mission: Impossible 2 - hmm... does anyone else think that John Woo just really, really wanted to make a James Bond movie? And a really, really bad James Bond movie at that. Let's see... Anthony Hopkins as M? Check. Thandie Newton as wannabe Bond girl? Check. Tom Cruise as James Bond? Almost check. And that endo on the bike? Yikes. Too bad Tom Cruise went nuts prior to the third film being released (a decent film, I might add). People might still respect the franchise.

8. The Searchers - Steven Spielberg once mentioned that The Searchers is one of the films he watches before directing a movie. For fuck's sake, why? This movie sucks! Of all the great films John Wayne and John Ford did together, The Searchers enters the lexicon as their greatest? It sucks! Cliche after fucking cliche. And it sucked at it! It sucks! What is wrong with you people?

9. The Sixth Sense - I've often claimed that M. Night Shyamalan has only made one really good movie. And, dudes, this ain't it. You call that a twist? Maybe, had he not given it away in the first 10 minutes... oh, and in the fucking marketing. Sure, it wasn't bad, but ask yourself this: how many times have you watched it since the first time? Maybe once, after which you realized, "man, this movie ain't all that."

10. Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith - Oh. my. fuck. By this time, George Lucas had so effectively trained everyone not to expect much, that even many critics were claiming that Revenge of the Sith is one of the better Star Wars movies. Um, not. Hayden Christensen sucks. George Lucas can't direct. The Jedi "cleansing" was anti-climactic. Hell, everything was anti-climactic. Luke and Leia's birth? I'm surprised I was still awake. I think everyone needs to come to their senses and just start pretending that Lucas quit with Return of the Jedi.

Oh, this list could be much, much longer, but the interest of my sanity, I shall stop.

Anyone feel like arguing?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree, more or less, with most of this.

I would mention that in college film classes, The Searchers is also considered a great movie worthy of study. I wonder why? There's got to be some reason people keep saying it, right?

MI:2 was built around three stunts that Woo wanted to do...and it shows. There's no plot. It's John Woo and Tom Cruise. It is related to MI:1 and the TV show in name only.

Seriously, MI was about the TEAM working together to do spy stuff. The movies became Tom Cruise superhero flicks, and they sucked after the first one.

Posted by Geoffry on July 20, 2008 - Sunday - 7:16 PM

Anonymous said...

Not sure why The Searches is studied. I've never been able to figure that one out.

As far as the third M:I movie, it was actually pretty good... just suffered from "Tom Cruise went nuts at the wrong time" syndrome.

Posted by JeffScape on July 20, 2008 - Sunday - 9:22 PM

Anonymous said...

MI3 was half and half. Halfway to being a GOOD MI possible, MUCH closer to the 1st than MI2...but still had its drawbacks. For the most part, it was still all-Tom-Cruise-all-the-time, and had a few realism gaffs.

Seriously, a terrorist group stages a massive LONG shootout on a D.C. bridge, and the Army and Air National Guard are no where to be found?? Those bad guy helicopters would never have made it out of U.S. airspace.

Posted by Geoffry on July 20, 2008 - Sunday - 10:11 PM

Anonymous said...

my brokeback rebuttal

You like HEAT so I am under the presumption that you are a fan of other Mann pictures, generally speaking. This is not only because you are a man's man, or a Mann's man as the case may be, but because you understand that there is more to film than just the words spoken and the actions taken. COLLATERAL and BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN both use the same device: environment as a third character. The films' settings are sort of like a dramatic chorus that wordlessly comment on the characters' motivations and the narrative at large. I think it's an all around, concise, emotional film with some outstanding performances. Unfortunately I haven't seen too many love story films that don't also involve lightsabers or six-shooters so perhaps I have a lot more to learn about romance.

Posted by Charles on July 22, 2008 - Tuesday - 6:57 PM

Anonymous said...

Sure, although I think Collateral relied on its being in Los Angeles more than Brokeback Mountain relied on its being at, well, Brokeback Mountain.

But, this is about overrated films. Brokeback Mountain is certainly a very good movie, but was it "great" as it was hyped? No.

Posted by JeffScape on July 23, 2008 - Wednesday - 10:17 AM

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