To be perfectly honest, although I know there are plenty of examples out there, I can’t seem to think of one at the moment. Not exactly a great way to kick off a thread!
I suppose I could start with Steven Spielberg’s “A.I. Artificial Intelligence.” I thought the movie was a hopeless misfire on just about every level…but there is no denying that, despite its many, many faults, a lot of artistry went into the finished product.
Any other examples?
Treasure Planet
The Frighteners. I remember leaving the movie thinking that it was the kind of movie that I would probably make if I went into the movie-making business – it’s got some great ideas and you can tell it was a neat concept, but they don’t come together well and the whole thing just feels muddled and “off”.
Music From The Elder, a concept album from KISS. A few passable songs, but man, what were they thinking?
The film Timecode from 2000 or 2001 I believe. The screen is broken up into four quadrants, each of which is filmed by a separate camera with no cuts at all for the entire film. Each camera loosely follows a different character in the same story, and the characters even meet each other and interact (and have sex), so that occasionally we’re seeing the same scene from different viewpoints.
Amazing and daring experiment, but unfortunately it just wasn’t a very good movie. Mainly, the script was uninteresting–most of the film was apparently improvised around a general story outline given to the actors.
Still it’s worth seeing just for the bravado of the attempt; four different camera crews following four groups of actors on different locations around Los Angeles for two hours or so at the same time, meeting up, parting ways, never showing the other camera crews, and so on. I just wish the story had been something other than yet another Hollywood insider flick.
The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations Millenium General Assembly
I don’t know if this is really worth seeing, so much as it’s worth knowing the story behind its creation. James Hampton was a janitor in Washington, D.C. who gathered junk (burned-out light bulbs, tin foil and such) for fifteen years and used it to furnish an entire throne room for the second coming of God. No one knew he was doing it. It was discovered after his death and is now in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American Art.
There’s a good recap and a picture here.
Dr. Seuss’ 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T