Monday, January 23, 2006

PEOPLE NEED TO BE SHOT FOR MAKING THESE FLICKS...

Readers of this blog can easily check my ratings by looking at the Review Index, listed in order of merit, on the right hand side of this blog. However, I want to take a moment to put shit on Hollywood for being so freakin' unoriginal that not just one, but SEVEN OUT OF TEN of 2005's worst movies were - to coin a new genre - "Piss-poor 70s remakes". Please DO NOT check out the following, in ascending order of crappiness:

10th worst movie of the year: THE BAD NEWS BEARS. Originally a 1976 kids-playing-baseball family comedy starring Walter Matthau. The 2005 version is a horrible mis-fire, especially given that it stars the usually wonderful Billy-Bob Thornton and was directed by Richard Linklater. How f*cking ironic that the guy who captured the 1970s spirit perfectly in Dazed and Confused should mess up so spectacularly with this cinematic fart. The only vaguely saving grace are the jokes about the fat kid on the Atkins diet, but these jokes are gonna date horribly, in stark contrast to the 1970s original.

9th worst movie of the year: THE LONGEST YARD. Originally a 1974 prisoners-playing-american-football comedy starring Burt Reynolds (pre-op). The 2005 version is a piss-poor alleged comedy starring Adam Sandler & Chris Rock. From Punch-Drunk Love to this - how sad for Sandler. And check out the pic of post-op. Reynolds on the left - this is less a failed comedy than a bloody scary horror flick.

8th worst movie of the year: FUN WITH DICK AND JANE. The original is a 1977 suburban Bonnie and Clyde flick starring George Segal and Jane Fonda. It wasn't great to start off with, but the 2005 version is even less entertaining. Jim Carrey, like Sandler, seems to alternate superb art-house flicks with formulaic Hollywood crap, and this flick is definitely in the second category. As with Elizabethtown, a fantastic greedy-capitalist-bastard cameo by Alec Baldwin cannot save this flick from its own crappiness. It aspires to comment on the Enron scandal, to which I respond, "Slow down! How about sorting out the basics, like making us laugh?"

7th worst movie of the year: CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY. The 1971 original, starrying Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka, is one of my all time favourite flicks. You get the feeling that Wonka is eccentric, but a normal, caring guy underneath it all - just a little disappointed with how mean people are. In the 2005 re-make, directed by Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp, Willy Wonka is a child-hating, spooky-ass weirdo. Dear Lord, why would any right-thinking parent leave their kid with this guy for a second? And why oh why do we need a back-story for Wonka? What kind of dirt does Christopher Lee have on Tim Burton that Burton has to finance his pensionable years? CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY. The 1971 original, starrying Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka, is one of my all time favourite flicks. You get the feeling that Wonka is eccentric, but a normal, caring guy underneath it all - just a little disappointed with how mean people are. In the 2005 re-make, directed by Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp, Willy Wonka is a child-hating, spooky-ass weirdo. Dear Lord, why would any right-thinking parent leave their kid with this guy for a second? And why oh why do we need a back-story for Wonka? What kind of dirt does Christopher Lee have on Tim Burton that Burton has to finance his pensionable years?

6th worst movie of the year: THE DUKES OF HAZZARD. The original 1979 TV show was mindless and kitsch. Fans may try to convince us that it was deliberately tongue-in-cheek, but we know better. The 2005 remake was not just unfunny but was also offensive. That racist "black-face" gags can still get through the Hollywood system makes me sick. Literally. The only thing we learn from the 2005 remake is that Jessica Simpson is actually marginally more annoying than Paris Hilton. (BTW, I don't recommed you rent House of Wax to verify that fact.)

5th worst movie of the year: STAR WARS. Just to prove that I am not out to get the studio system, here's an example of an independent film-maker committing artistic suicide. The original 1977 Star Wars flick kicked off one of the most technologically innovative, narratively consistent and beloved trilogies in movie history. Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith broke all the rules: technology was used as a cool toy rather than to advance the story and the story itself was inconsistent and implausible. Perhaps, the most anger-inducing flick of the year, and, if one could rewind time and change history, the one movie I would commit murder to erase.: STAR WARS. Just to prove that I am not out to get the studio system, here's an example of an independent film-maker committing artistic suicide. The original 1977 Star Wars flick kicked off one of the most technologically innovative, narratively consistent and beloved trilogies in movie history. Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith broke all the rules: technology was used as a cool toy rather than to advance the story and the story itself was inconsistent and implausible. Perhaps, the most anger-inducing flick of the year, and, if one could rewind time and change history, the one movie I would commit murder to erase.

4th worst movie of the year, and by far the most pretentious, is MANDERLAY, in which Lars von Trier finally disappears up his own arse. A movie so awed by its own alleged profundity and supposed startling insight into American race relations that it feels confident enough to dispense with: plot, characterisation, photographic skill....The only movie so bad I walked out half way through.

3rd worst movie of the year: BUBBLE, a movie so far up itself that it has come out of its own nose as snot. Roger Ebert, one of the most respected reviewers in the world, has just declared this a work of genius. To which I respond, "pay 10 quid out of your own pocket and then look me in the eye and tell me you liked it."

The 2nd worst movie of the year: ELIZABETHTOWN. Absolute shite. The genius that is Alec Baldwin cannot save it. I felt physically ill. When Susan Sarandon tap dances a million angels die.

The ABSOLUTE worst movie of the year: DEUCE BIGALOW: EUROPEAN GIGOLO. That this movie is not a 70s remake is the best thing that can be said about it. A completely unfunny movie that is also homophobic and misogynistic and stars Rob Schneider - a serial offender. This was Mike Bigelow - the director's - first film, and dear Lord, if there is any justice, that man is claiming social security and living off food stamps. Whoever green-lit this project should be shot.

2 comments:

  1. I agree with your list but I am amazed you did not include Revolver. The movie was incoherent and Guy Ritchie's smugness even more repellant. I can only assume you blanked the painful memory of the screening?

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  2. I also forgot about BEWITCHED. So many crappy seventies remakes, so little time. But I agree on REVOLVER. Poor Ray Liotta. Did you see Lucky Number Slevin - looks a bit like a rip-off of SNATCH....

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