Bad Movies

Is it just me or are the movies lately really bad.

[jchance]

My wife is hooked on netflix which means that I watch a lot more movies than I should. Last night I watched the movie Mr. & Mrs. Smith with Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie (by the way, she is a looker).

Anyways, about an hour into the movie I was getting fidgety because this movie was just plain bad and that Brad and Angelina owed me an hour of my life back. So then I started thinking back on the tons of movies I have watched this year, and I think I have decided that all the movies this year stink.

Ok, maybe thats an exaggeration, I did watch a few indy movies that I liked, so maybe I should say, "all of the major studio movies stink".

Whats up with movies lately? Why are they all so bad?

[kevinpate]

because, regretably, far too many people do not care what they spend their money on, so long as they feel they will escape briefly from their everyday life.

Today's vast wasteland, once the entertainment industry, often seems to design with one goal - cheaply plopping many too rapidly expanding cabooses in seats without requiring excessive thought.

On the other hand, the potter movies haven't been too bad over the years, the LOTR trilogy was enjoyable enough to see more than once and the phantom of the opera was downright enjoyable. I haven't seen a great many others in recent years.

[Raymond]

I guess different people have different taste in movies. I enjoyed the Mr. & Mrs. Smith. I paid for a 2 hours of entertainment and this movie was doing a decent job at it. I never ask for much in terms of movie, I just hate those movies that try too hard to be artistic and turns out to be a complete waste of time.

I agree though, that I haven't seen a GOOD movie for quite some time. My personal favorite is still Gattaca.

[garyr_h]

I think it has to do with the lack of quality directors. Peter Jackson, Stephen Spielberg and the 6th Sense Guy (not even going to attempt to spell his name) are about the only ones out there.

Directing is an underrated part of any movie, but with a poor director the movie just looks cheap, hurried and poor acting.

1000 great actors can't make 1 director good, but 1 great director can make 1000 actors immortal.

[mona]

I see a ton of movies. I think there are plenty of good ones, you just need to weed through the garbage. Check out The March of the Penguins and a History of Violence. If you like 'em, get back to me and I'll send ya a list;-)

[moltar]

Yes, I agree. I think most movies in 2005 sucked. I watch pretty much all of the ones that come out (except for the ones I know 100% will suck). The only two good movies for 2005 (imo) are:

- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
- Be Cool

[Sarah Atkinson]

I've watched lots of great movies this year. And only paid my cable bill to see them. Got to love TCM. True some of the movies they show suck but most are the cream of the crop and have stood the test of time.

[Essex_boy]

I walked out of a showing of some film film based on teh Crusades, rubbish, no plot or anything.

[rocknbil]

I thought Mr. & Mrs. Smith was OK too. "Honey, I think I'm hit." :-)

But it has been a slow year. My wife and I say Hollywood has just run out of fresh ideas, that's why there's so many remakes - Herbie (ugh,) Bewitched (which was actually pretty funny) and the like.

Some keepers from 2005:

40 Year Old Virgin (watched last night, what a hoot lol)
Hitch (Single, married, bethrothed, every man must see this movie. :-) )
War of the Worlds (Remake! lol)
The Ring 2
The Grudge (Actually 2004, but got to states in 2005 I think)
Fantastic 4 (Great fun!)
Devil's Rejects (JUST KIDDING! Worst Movie Ever, got 3 minutes into it and **click**)
Coach Carter
White Noise
Alone in the Dark
Ong-Bak ("The Tai Warrior", actually 2003 but hit the states this year. The new Jackie Chan, this is terrible as a movie but the real stunts are awesome.)
Constantine
The Jacket (another weird travel through time and psyche)
Madagascar
Guess Who (ANOTHER remake, of Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, with the races swapped)
Serenity (Firefly) (Don't watch TV, never saw series, made for good experience)
Batman Begins
Skeleton Key
Red Eye (Haven't seen it, looks ok)

[akmac]

What about Cinderella Man, King Kong, War of the Worlds? I enjoyed all of those, for different reasons.

To each his own, I suppose-but I think we can all agree that watching a giant ape fight 3 t-rexes is thrilling.

Ok, maybe not. But I enjoyed it immensely.

[hannamyluv]

I just wonder when Hollywood ran out of original ideas. It seems every other frigging movie that comes out of Hollywood is a remake/twist on a previous movie. Most of the other ones left are just bad.

Some of the independants are good especially foriegn, but I will agree that there are quite a few that just made something vauge and awful in the hope that someone would mistake it for art.

[Broadway]

When I read the title on this thread I thought you were going to the movie theatre to see films. Last week I went to see Syriana. I couldn't follow it. I left thinking that going out to the movies runs a big risk of being a big waste of time.

I'm hooked on Netflix too, and I'm pretty happy with my selections there. They have their star rating of movies. Better yet IMDB has a rating system too. A google search of the epinion site and the search term "best movies" turns up some interesting lists.

I think you are right. Hollywood sucks, usually doesn't have a clue, etc... but using Netflix's inventory (foreign, anything existing on DVD) I find a ton of stuff to watch.

[PhraSEOlogy]

They just remade The Honeymooners and Bewitched (50s and 60s era tv shows). They already did Mr Ed and My Favourite Martian a few years back.

It wont be long before we get remakes of Dick Van Dyke and I love Lucy! I can see it now - Angelina J as Lucy and Larry the cable guy as Ricky Ricardo.

"Lucy, y'all gonna lotta splainin' t'do!

Now thats funny right there...

Hollywood is a sad and unimaginative place these days.

[httpwebwitch]

there have been lots of good movies. the new Harry Potter was excellent. Hitch is downright hilarious. Though Mr. & Mrs. Smith wasn't fantastic, it was entertaining enough not to begrudge the ticket price. The Corpse Bride: much anticipated but a litle disappointing, but like most Burton films they grow on you with repeated viewings, so I look forward to the DVD release. the Willy Wonka remake with Johnny Depp is fantastic. Batman Begins was unexpectedly enjoyable.

My pick for 2005 is Sin City

[httpwebwitch]

then there are other movies that were so bad, I felt like I was "tricked" into seeing them. I wish I could get those hours back...

Bewitched is high on that list.

Those wastes of my time were my fault for giving a chance to any movie with Will Farrell or Tim Allen or Hugh Grant. (Insert about 2 dozen other popular actors here). Lesson learned.

[GeorgeK]

I watched Mr. and Mrs. Smith last night too, and it really sucked. Too much focus on gunfire and car chases. I felt I was losing braincells by watching it.

I watch around 20 to 25 DVDs a month (using Zip.ca, the Canadian equivalent to Netflix). I've been systematically going through all the IMDB Top 250 movies, in addition to regular Hollywood movies:

[imdb.com...]

Some of the older movies are a lot better than current ones. I've now seen 97 out of the top 100 ranked movies, and hope to work through more of the list in 2006.

I've seen about 95 of the top 100 blockbusters too:

[imdb.com...]

so am not just into "artsy" flicks. :)

[Vlad]

For me the hit was a German movie DOWNFALL, about last days of Hitler.
Funny thing was that when me, my wife and a friend went to see it in a theater, there was only one other person there with us! Best movie ever in my book, highly recommend!

I thought Mr. & Mrs. Smith was cheap and cheezy.

[twist]

My kid and his friends, 4 and 5 year olds, love Episode III. They have toys and costumes and they light sabor fight and pretend to be Darth Vader to no end. They also love Yoda and General Grevious (spelling?). Kids, at least the ones I know, are mesmorized by the movie (except the padme/anikin scenes). Episode I and II do not have the same effect and they also aren't the least bit interested in the old Star Wars series.

[Rugles]

>>For me the hit was a German movie DOWNFALL

Yes, excellent movie. Follows the book The Bunker very closely.

Here is the problem with movies and the movie studios. It is one word.... Accountants. They are running the studios. They are all about reducing risk and maximizing returns. So therefore the big studios go for the formula movies because they can better predict sales. It is easier to remake a tv show, make part 3 of a successful movie, than take a chance on an origonal script.

It is the exact same problem with the music industry, which are usually run by the same companies.

Hey, how are getting 25 movies a month from ZIP. ca? We are lucky to see 15 in a month. At first they got the movies out real quick, but now we are finding a long delay.

[martinibuster]

Downfall was excellent. There was a Russian flick out this year in the states that was really good, about vampires. It was called Nightwatch. I'm watching more and more Asian movies, as well as the occasional European flick.

But if I see one more trailer for a European movie with the baritoned narrator intoning, "It's a story about the TRIUMPH OF THE HUMAN SPIRIT..." I swear I am going to hunt down the author of that trailer and kick him in the shin! lol

Hollywood flicks cost a lot of money and they have to appeal to a broad audience.

For instance, Mr. and Mrs. Smith opened to bad reviews in many places yet half the people in this thread think it's garbage and half think it was enjoyable. King Kong opened to bad reviews as well but some people here admitted enjoying it for the spectacle, if not the actual plot or acting.

It's also telling that the only directors mentioned in this thread are representative of Hollywood film making today. So Hollywood must be doing something right to appeal to so many people.

In my opinion M Night Shymalian (whatever, lol) makes the same movie over and over, and most of his latest movies have opened to negative or tepid reviews. Nevertheless he makes the list on this thread for good directors. Hollywood is doing it's job because it's appealing to some of the people, but not those on either side of the middle. And whether we like it or not, it works.

Let's take Peter Jackson. Have you seen his earlier flicks or does Peter Jackson just mean LOTR to you? Peter Jackson has a creepy and creepily subversive imagination and it is evident in his pre-LOTR movies (for which he is infamous).

As for directors being underrated, I would agree only so far as Mr. and Mrs. Joe Smith being interested in movies only because Jolie and Pitt are in them. But for many people who care about movies that doesn't hold true, and that includes Hollywood.

Many of today's biggest Hollywood movies are marketed on the strength of a director's name. Indeed, the idea of the director's importance to a film is a theory that came out of France around the 50s. It's called the Auteur Theory [en.wikipedia.org]. Consequently there are many retrospectives based on directors, and even down at the video store you will see films categorized by director.

Hollywood is currently discovering the power of DVD sales. There are some movies like Life Aquatic that have done huge DVD sales but didn't break box office. Nevertheless the DVD sales of movies that didn't bring in huge crowds are accounting for more and more of the bottom line at Hollywood. There is a huge demographic that prefers to stay home and watch decent movies with plots and good acting. So perhaps filmmaking today is, for a variety of reasons, less about the theater experience as it used to be.

Nevertheless, grandma is playing the role of babysitter during the holidays so I'm hoping to catch a flick at the local plex soon. ;)

[edited by: martinibuster at 8:55 pm (utc) on Dec. 24, 2005]

[Rugles]

>>There is a huge demographic that prefers to stay home and watch

Because of larger tv's, 5.1 sound and the ability to enjoy an adult beverage while watching. Plus you can eat all the popcorn you want for a fraction of the cost.

[rocknbil]

"It's a story about the TRIUMPH OF THE HUMAN SPIRIT..."

Amen to THAT! Or ". . . four lives intertwined in a sordid tale of lust, greed, and power . . . "

When it comes to No New Ideas in Hollywood, I chock it up to MacArthur's quote, "The only thing that's new is what you don't know about history." It's the creative twist that writers put on age-old tales that make them unique. Sadly, not many new twists this year.

[GeorgeK]

Rugles: On Zip.ca, I'm on the 6-DVD plan, instead of the 4-DVD plan, so I can see more movies that way (albeit it costs more). Also, since I've been a customer for so long, I'm eligible for their "ZipRefill". On the same day a DVD gets returned, I update the "Returned" checkbox on "My Ziplist", and they'll send me out a 7th DVD immediately. If one keeps doing that consistently, it's like being on a 7-DVD plan. :) Since I put a mixture of popular movies and older flicks and keep around 20 DVDs on my list all the time, there are rarely any delays for me. But, sometimes I'll have to wait a few weeks for the top movies, just like others (it's the luck of the draw who gets those ones first).

Zip.ca/Netflix really rule for catching up on old tv series, in addition to movies. I only got into the show "24" last season, and so I caught up by watching the early seasons through DVD rentals. Same for "Lost", "Desperate Housewives", "The Sopranos", etc. The new "24" begins in January, so I rented just the bonus DVD for last season's series, as it had a preview of the coming season. :) Almost no one rents the bonus DVDs, so it was sent immediately.

What's stupid is that Rogers Cable (and probably other cable tv systems) could totally put Zip.ca/Netflix out of business, if they simply lowered their prices on pay-per-view movies and video-on-demand. Create "all you can eat" plans, or create realistic limits. The inventories are almost exactly the same, but the DVD rental places are paying postage charges in two directions, having to physically send a DVD through the mail. Total nonsense! One can send "bits" through the cable a lot cheaper than through the mail.

Instead, Rogers has <snip> which is POWERED by Zip.ca! Ugh. If they instead improved the PPV and VOD packages, they'd lower their costs, make more money, and probably be able to send us HDTV versions of the movies, too! HDTV looks a lot better on the plasma than a DVD. Better for the environment, too, to be sending bits to my PVR through the digital cable, instead of shiny metal and plastic discs through the mail.

That's one reason I'm not buying many DVDs...eventually it'll make more sense to just watch them via PPV or VOD when one feels like it (unless one plans to watch the same movie 10 or 20 times). Plus with High-Definition DVDs coming in 2006, I don't want to get stuck with a library of poor resolution movies.

[edited by: lawman at 1:23 am (utc) on Dec. 25, 2005]
[edit reason] No URLs Please [/edit]

[twist]

>> There is a huge demographic that prefers to stay home and watch

Home,

My projector ($700) +
100" screen ($160) +
5.1 DTS ($140) +
Comfortable seats (included) +
Pause button

Theater,

Movie tickets for family ($26) +
Stale greasy popcorn and watered down drinks ($20) +
Crowded noisy theater with uncomfortable seats (agitating) +
Sound crackling or tinny, and a blurry picture (upsetting)
Missing part of $46 movie to go the bathroom (lowsy)

The last movie I saw at a theater was Episode III with my wife, some kids behind us were talking about the end of the movie before the movie started. I yelled at them and then later their own ******* parents because they couldn't stop talking. I then moved up four rows. Their parents talked throughout the entire movie. Worst experience ever. Last time I will ever go to a movie theater.

P.S. Speaking of Peter Jackson, I wonder how many know he has acted before in a dual role in his own movie "Bad Taste". Great movie by the way.

[adamxcl]

I love movies but the number that I love is going down. I'm getting frustrated more often. I can sit through a lot if there is a payoff or something big eventually in the film.

I was disappointed by Jarhead. Great director in earlier films, but I didn't want to watch soldiers being frustrated by not finding any action in a war. Just made for annoying.

And The Last Days, the Kurt Cobain inspired Gus Van Zant movie should have been good, but instead it's watching some guy walk in the woods, listen to sales pitches or eat cereal for 90 minutes.

[httpwebwitch]

I browse the trailers to see what movies are coming out. I also look for directors, not actors. I'm always anticipating the next feature from Tim Burton or Jean-Pierre Jeunet.

My favourite rental store organizes their movies alphabetically by director, not by title. It's great when you're browsing for some evening's entertainment to see all of a director's films together on the shelf.

[mona]

I agree, GeorgeK, imdb.com is an excellent source for choosing movies.

My advice is always the same: follow the actors. As a general rule great actors star in great films. Another one to add to my list is Pride & Prejudice - a good 'chick flick'.