Criminy, how can you take so many good actors (I do not count Kevin costner among them), that kind of budget, and a great sweeping saga and make such a gawdawful, boring, lifeless, colorless, downright irritataing movie like this one? Even the scenary was dull.
There are probably films I would have despised more in recent years, but that was the last one that I hated that much yet sat all the way through. Since then, if I feel that kind of boredom/hatred stealing over me during a movie, I just leave. I’m too jaded to sit and hope it gets better.
Yes, yes, oh God, yes! I hated this movie. It was such an obvious, see-through attempt to make an American Beauty. And the ending just made me laugh out loud. Ridiculous. And the length - it felt like about 6 hours.
I went to a midnight showing of this movie. I prayed for sleep, but sleep didn’t come. Then I prayed for death.
Tabby, you must be mistaken. There was only one Matrix film. There were plans for another two, but the Wachowski brothers resisted all money-making temptation to rush out two poorly written scripts full of boring, ham-fisted Christian and Pagan allusions, deciding that the original had the strength to stand alone.
Ugh, imagine how awful it would have been if they had made two sequels.
There was only one Matrix. There was only one Matrix. There was only one Matrix. There was only one Matrix. There was only one Matrix.
I’m ambivalent about this one. As a film, it’s a bit lacking. The buzz about it was that this was actual footage taken by actual people who actually disappeared. In other words, a hoax. But the marketing was brilliant! I’ll bet at least half of the people who went to see it bought into the hoax. If it were real, then it would have been absolutely amazing.
But I went into it A) knowing that it was a hoax, and B) with some filmmaking experience. I found it unbelievable that someone would run expensive film through a camera (as I write this, Eastman 7231 Plus-C negative film costs $70.24 for a four hundred – 10.5 minutes – roll, for example; plus processing) without an obvious shot, or at least a potential shot. Let alone that film cameras do not record sound.
I really did like the film. There were a few chills, and there was some humour for people who knew how personalities sometimes clash on a film set. But knowing that it was a mockumentary, it wasn’t especially scary. There are a couple of techniques (e.g., a slight reflection of a pair of staring eyes just outside the range of the lights, that disappear into the woods before the crew can make out what they’re attached to) that would have made it scarier without taking away from its style. The makers of Blair Witch had a good idea, but they needed to realize that with the type of film they were making, things half-seen would be more terrifying than mere sounds in the night.
The really cool thing about it though was the marketing. These guys took a good concept and came up with a brilliant marketing campaign, turning a low-budget film into a multi-million dollar success. But they should have made it so that it would have ‘that little extra’ for people who knew it was not a true story.
Punch Drunk Love. It was fucking horrible from start to finish, with even Emily Watson (who I usually really like) embarrassing herself over the idiotic “plot” and dialogue. If there was any justice, everyone involved with this useless piece of celluloid garbage would have been hounded out of the movie business forever.
Moulin Rouge nauseated me. The visuals were overwhelming, the acting and writing were cheesy and the songs - god! the songs! Syrupy, saccharine versions of (mostly) good songs. I can never bleach my brain of the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” scene. I remember the summer the soundtrack was enormously popular and I could never escape it. Apparently I was the only one to despise the film with such vitriol.
Oh yeah, hate that one too. Thanks for reminding me.
And let’s not forget Batman and Robin. Had to sit through this to see a sneak preview of Contact. Knew it was gonna be shitty when the opening credits started rolling.
Bruce Almighty is the worst film I’ve ever been to see at the cinema. I loved The Truman Show, and that seemed to a good enough reason that this one’d be funny too.
OK, for the first half-hour it was alright. The rest was a pile of sentimental tosh.
I’m sure I’ll get flamed for this one, but I was forced to watch A Clockwork Orange in high school. I hated that movie, probably because I was being sexually abused around the general time I watched it, but I thought it was absolutely vile, and I couldn’t and don’t understand how the movie was considered “art.” But different strokes for different folks and all that.
Hardly! Where’ve you been? I can’t think of any other movie that polarizes people as much as that one; everybody either loves it or despises it. I loved it, but I’ve talked to just as many people who think it was absolutely horrible as those who liked it.
My most hated movies:
Dancer in the Dark: I can write, and have written, pages and pages about how much I hate this movie. So I’ll just say that I hold Lars von Trier personally responsible for the awfulness of it and will never see another movie of his.
Alien 3: I’ve heard many times that it wouldn’t be such a bad movie if it weren’t for the fact that it was a sequel. Maybe; if it weren’t supposed to be a sequel, I’d just think it was a self-indulgent drag like so many other early 90’s movies. But it was a sequel, to one of my favorite movies, and it shit on everything that came before it and showed tremendous arrogance on the part of the director. (Who only partially redeemed himself with Fight Club).
The Avengers: I don’t want to talk about it.
Happiness: The best example I can think of whenever I rail against simple-minded people who think that “earnest” is the same as “shallow” and “dark” is the same as “deep.” What a stupid, pointless, grandstanding display of “Hey! Look how dark and edgy I can be!” (On the other hand, I think Welcome to the Dollhouse is a great movie, that I never, ever want to see again.)
