I recently saw Dracula 2000. Yes, I’d read reviews about how bad it was, but I can enjoy a bad movie sometimes, and this was one of those times.
I was surprised at first - the first 30 minutes or so were really good. Not Academy Award material, but better than 90% of the genre. It threw lots of neat ideas and plot twists at me, and it was genuinely suspenseful…and then it fell apart. I got the impression that they ran out of money partway into filming and replaced the original script with something written by a music video director - I know they don’t usually shoot movies like that, but the difference between the first 1/3 and the rest of the movie is BIG.
The thing is, I’d like to watch the first part again. It was that good.
Can anyone think of other movies that pull this trick on you?
First it displays the big ol’ Fox logo, then the Lucasfilm logo. The movie is good at this point.
Then it says “A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…” The movie is good at this point.
Then we get the opening fanfare and the big “Star Wars” title drifting back away from the screen. The movie is good at this point.
Then the words “Episode 1: The Phantom Menace” drift into view, and the movie starts to suck. And it keeps sucking. And sucking. Somehow, even when you think it couldn’t possibly suck even more, we’re introduced to Jar Jar Binks, and it sucks even more. After this, you’re sure that the worst is past, but no… we’re introduced to midichlorians, and the suckiness reaches new levels of suck. Finally, we’re subjected to a 9-year-old cardboard cutout of Anakin Skywalker saying “Let’s try spinning! That’s a good trick!” and somehow saving the day, and the depths of suckiness open wide to introduce us to a level of supersuck that wasn’t even present in Manos, the Hands of Fate. In short, the movie quickly becomes the suckiest piece of suck to ever suck across the suckscape of suck.
But it’s Star Wars, so if Episode II is decent, I will forgive it. But I’m not holding my breath.
Natural Born Killers. Starts out good and quickly degenerates into a ‘look how wild and crazy we are’ oliver-stone-o-rama.
When people compare NBK to Pulp Fiction, I just have to laugh. In pulp fiction you sympathized with the killers. In NBK . . . well, in NBK you asked for a full refund on your money.
Not just NBK, you can say that about pretty much all Stone films, with the possible exception of Platoon, which remains entertaining, if one can somehow block out the annoying religious imagery that’s being used to hammer the viewer over the head through the whole flick.
Private Benjamin. So long as it’s the story about the spoiled jewish princess who joins the military because she can’t think of anything to do with her life, it’s pretty good. Once she gets some spine and starts actually, you know, doing stuff, it bombs.
SPOOFE: One of my favorite comments I’ve seen about Phantom Menace was something along the lines of, it’s a bad sign for the writing of a movie if the writers feel compelled to have two different characters yell “yippee!” in order to get their message across.
Hollow Man was one of the best movies of 2000. That’s what I would be saying if it wasn’t for the last half-hour or so. It started out good, but the scientists turned stupid and the movie became a crappy explosion-fest. Really, the story derailed so much towards the end I’m convinced it wasn’t written by the same people who wrote the first 2/3 of the script.
Fight Club. I liked the beginning of it as this guy has to somehow take control of his life and his identity. I liked the concept of the actual fight clubs. But then when it got into its Deep Message and the cult started up it just went over the bend. By the end I think they were saying, “Hell, let’s just do whatever we want and then we can call it an allegory.”
Stripes. I like the boot camp stuff, but the “mission” part of it is just dumb. I thought that part was a lot weaker than the first half and really dragged it down.
The Matrix is very high on this list for me. It’s a dmaned good movie right up until Morpheus explains what’s going on. At this point, the film-makers have completely run out of plot, but feel compelled to continue for some reason.
Logan’s Run is a superb movie for about three quarters of the way. Then it just begins to drag and drag; the last half hour feels longer than the first 80 minutes. There’s nothing more tiring than the Enlightened Shepherd running around screaming at the Sheep to see things his way, especially when he ought to know better.
I really enjoyed From Dusk Till Dawn for about the first 45 minutes or so, and then everyone started turning into vampires. At this point, the movie just got plain stupid.
I have to second the mention of Hollow Man. The last third of the movie was your typical slasher-type thing. Only instead of dumb teenagers, you have supposedly brilliant scientists who act like dumb teenagers.
For example, if you’re trying to find an invisible man who wants to kill you, and you have a pair of infrared goggles that allow you to pick up body heat signatures, the correct place for them is:
a. On your face
b. In your hand
If you said a, congratulations. You’re smarter than a scientist working on a top secret governmental project involving quantum physics (as a Hollywood script writer understands it).
X-Files: Fight the Future. I expected it to translate a whole lot better on the big screen. The opening was interesting in its trademark X-File-ish way. Then came explosions, a whole lot of running through fields, a near kiss and bees. I don’t remember anything after the bees. They kind of lost me there.
The film is pretty decent up to the point where Mel Gibson’s character has completed his personal revenge and agrees to fight a guerilla-style campaign to slow the British Army’s northward march. After that it unravels, and unravels very quickly.
The raids are carried out without any context. How are they helping the cause? Where are the British? The son is given a love interest for no apparent reason. The slaves form some type of Gullah utopia on a sea island, but it’s totally implausible. Etc., etc.
A classic that I felt definitely fall into this category: The Manchurian Candidate
The first two-thirds were great. Interesting ideas, well acted, suspensful. But the final third was just sooo contrived. I won’t go into details (to avoid spoilers), but I saw that “surprise ending” coming a mile away.
Good Will Hunting. I lost all respect for the main character when he slapped his girlfriend out of the blue for no good reason. I never wanted to see the protagonist die in a movie before. This guy was supposed to be smart? He had the temper of an adolescent chimp! I would have bought it if he had an ounce of self control. There’s just something rotten about abusive people, and they never even tried to redeem him.
Wolf, the movie in which Jack Nicholson is a werewolf. Starts off somber and metaphorical and eerie. When a competitor gets a sense of what’s going on and becomes a werewolf himself, it degenerates to DC Comics quality entertainment (except without the good artwork).