My family was never very far from the poverty line when I was a kid…and we were happy.
I suppose the reason that I’m the only one to mention Hereafter is that you all had the good sense to stay away.
But I can’t be faulted that much, can I? Like Matt Damon is pretty good, right, and Cécile de France, well, she’s amazing. And of course, Eastwood’s been on quite a streak. So, lots to look forward to, right?
Gawd it was bad. Sloooooooooooooow moving, and I’m not one of these guys who thinks a five minute hiatus without something blowing up is dull. But, Jesus, this was just cruel. Nothing happens after the first 15 minutes. Nothing.
Waterworld. I didn’t know it was going to be Mad Max on the open seas.
And Kevin Costner has gills. GILLS!!
“Batman Returns” was the first movie I ever felt like walking out and asking for my money back. I was young, but the power station draining power from Gotham didn’t sense at all. :dubious: Also, I wondered why Batman was even investigating the Penguin at first or as Alfred said, “Why are you now determined to prove that this Penguin is not what he seems? Must you be the only lonely man-beast in town?”
Contact. Loved the book, hated the movie. Couldn’t believe Carl Sagan approved of it. They fucked up the climax of the story and took out one of my favorite features – a female president – and substituted hacked-up CGI of Bill Clinton. Barf. Mr. S and I actually got into a pretty nasty argument about it as we left the theater because I was so disgusted. (He hadn’t read the book and couldn’t understand why I was pissed that the movie didn’t match the book and couldn’t enjoy it on its own merits. Because it had none, that’s why!)
Maybe someday when I can sufficiently suppress my gag reflex I’ll try to watch it again.
Hear, hear. Awful movie.
I had this exact same experience except that I rented it rather than see it in the theater. I blame the marketing of it.
This is a movie I’ve never seen, but I have to ask…if you hated it so much, why would you even consider trying to watch it again?
Surely there are dozens of movies out there that you’ve never seen that you might actually enjoy, no?
Probably, but perhaps with the passage of time I’ll see it differently. I’m just saying that I might be willing to give it another chance. There are plenty of movies that I didn’t like the first time that grew on me once I’d watched them a few times.
There have been so many.
As others have already mentioned:
- All three Star Wars prequels. For me, the disappointment got greater with each one. I looked at the previews for AotC, and said, “this can’t stink as bad as TPM did.” I was wrong. I looked at the previews for RotS, and said, “finally, maybe, this one won’t suck.” I was wrong.
- The Matrix sequels
- Aliens3
- Indiana Jones 4
Some others which I don’t think have been mentioned:
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Pirates of the Caribbean 2 and 3. My understanding is that they wrote the scripts on the fly. If so, it shows. My wife adored the first movie. She is now in denial that other movies were ever made.
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Highlander 2. I so loved the first one. The second one took everything good in the first one, and spent the first 10 minutes saying, “sorry, nope, didn’t happen that way. Special humans? No, they’re banished space aliens.” And then, it became clear that Connery got sick of it halfway through the filming, and said, “I’ll give you another scene, but that’s it. Just kill off my character.”
Escape from LA. I liked Escape from New York so I thought this would be good too. Holy crap it was bad.
I’ll also second the Simpsons Movie. Just a longer version of the show where Homer, once again, loses the trust and respect of his family and has to win it back. Gee, I never saw that plot a million times before.
The Forgotten. Actually, in the theater I was fine. It wasn’t until after my wife and I left, and I thought about what I watched that I realized there were a lot of plot holes and things that didn’t make sense.
What I’ve heard is that they designed all the special effects first. And then they called in a couple of writers, gave them the list of special effects scenes, and told them to write some kind of story that would link those scenes together.
Either way, it certainly explains the lack of a coherent story. And, they took a great character in Jack Sparrow (sorry, Captain Jack Sparrow 
), and utterly destroyed him.
Creepy stalker Superman is what killed it for me.
The Star Wars films that came after the first three. It seemed they were going for the 12-year old market with those.
I’ve seen it with a live orchestra and a live organist (the guy who played at the Boston Garden), but I was hoping for something great from Wakeman, for reasons I gave.
The Count of Monte Cristo. I was soooo looking forward to that. Blast and botheration! ! !
I heard really good things about Sin City and I loved the first scene, but the rest of the movie has horrible. I wish I had walked out, it just kept getting worse.
Return of the King and last year’s Star Trek are the first that come to mind. I thought about adding Matrix: Revolutions, which is far worse than the former and almost as bad as the latter, but I had to be dragged to see it so it doesn’t count.
I should have known better than to see it, though. When my friends and I arrived at the theatre, the showing we wanted to see was sold out, so I began to go home. Then a couple of young (i.e., high school) girls approached me and offered to give me a ticket. Not sell – give. They were apparently huge Matrix fans and had bought tickets early, intending to see it twice in a day; but their first showing had left them cold.
I concur. When the last 5 minutes were over, I so badly wanted to start yelling at the screen I scared myself.
It was horrible. Everything up to then was OK - I didn’t have a problem with them simplifying the stories (from 5 visitors to 1) or doing the Clinton thing, but I had a BIG problem with them completely changing the philosophical basis and conclusion of the original story!