There are degrees of manipulative and formulaic. A Hallmark card is not a Shakespeare sonnet. The Pixar/Disney movies fall on the Hallmark end of the scale to me.
Films I like? Sure. Miller’s Crossing, Revanche, Mystery Train, Schizopolis, Ghost World, Ikiru, The Big Lebowski, Brazil, Chungking Express, Airplane!…Spit away. Strangers’ opinions on my taste don’t mean jack shit to me.
Gene Siskel used to say that a bad movie is one where you check your watch, and a REALLY bad movie is one where you check your watch to see if it’s stopped.
Halfway through “The Phantom Menace,” I was starting to believe that the passage of time in our universe had come to a halt.
Actually, the Dillon/Applegate one came out two years earlier than the Cook/Simpson one. (And apparently there was also a porno movie titled Employee of the Month back in 1994.) Personally, I haven’t seen any of them so I can’t offer an opinion.
I love it. It may have something to do with the fact that Rifftrax was on during it, so I was mostly laughing at the commentary and at (not with) the film. Do they make a version that only has the dialog, no commentary?
Edit: Scooped by Sakuma Drops
Amazingly, it was better than the book.
I don’t know if I thought it would be a lot better, but I certainly expected it to be a lot different. One assassination attempt centered around a movie theater? Really? I certainly didn’t get the impression from the trailers that it’d be about that.
I’m with you. I don’t think it’s the medium exactly. It’s more the attitude that being pretty should make up for lack of originality. Avatar shows that attitude in spades too, and it’s not even a kids’ movie.
I did come to a realization, recently, though. I’ve never been a big fan of animated movies. You know how little kids watch their favorite movies over and over? I never liked a single cartoon enough to watch more than half a dozen times my entire childhood. So I guess it stands to reason I like 2-3 animated movies a decade these days.
Anyway, I didn’t expect ink to suck nearly as much as it did. It’s the same “look how surreal and weird this is…what do you mean plot? you’re supposed to be distracted by this shiny over here, not thinking about how pointless this all is!” crap as MirrorMask. How do movies that don’t have even minimal plot cohesiveness get produced?
No I got it from Netflix. My disappointment would have been outright anger had I paid $10+ to see it.
Huh. While I agree that Avatar’s plot has been done and re-done before (Dances With Wolves being only one of its “inspirations”), I’ve always though of most of Pixar’s movies being quite original, at least when compared with the usual slate of popular movies which is rife with sequels, prequels, remakes, and remakes of remakes. A rat who loves to cook? Monsters who collect kids’ screams for energy? And old man who ties some balloons to his house so he can go to South America? I mean, whether or not you dislike the animated aspect of those movies, can you at least agree that originality WRT story elements is not one of Pixar’s problems?
OMFG how I hate this movie. I have never had such a visceral reaction to anything before or since this thing, and I hope I never do.
Yeah, second on Tripplets of Belleville. A friend bought me a copy because he thought it was the greatest thing ever. WTF?
I’m going to add Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland. I kind of had an idea what I was in for, which would be, Tim Burton (love him or hate him and I like him) visuals plastered all over Alice in Wonderland. Now, if you’re not into that, of course you’d want to stay away, but I’m into it.
But for crying out loud. You really need to shoehorn in a shopworn “Chosen One” and “Coming of Age” plot onto Alice in Wonderland? Seriously?
I’ve got a fucking idea for you Tim. You pull out your fucking copy of Alice in Wonderland, and you fucking turn that book into a fucking movie, and you put your patented fucking twee emo goth visuals on it. Is that so fucking hard?
The plot of Alice in Wonderland does not need to be improved. You know what the plot of Alice in Wonderland is? Alice wanders around Wonderland meeting crazy fucked up characters, the end. And guess what, Tim? That’s you all over. This is WHAT YOU FUCKING DO. This is the Tim Burton feeling you provide with your movies by Tim Burton. You know it. I know it. The American people know it.
I don’t go into Tokyo Sushi House and bitch and whine about how they can’t make a decent hambuger. I’m perfectly happy when I get a plate full of California rolls and edamame when I go to Tokyo House. I know better than the walk into a Tim Burton movie and complain because I don’t like twee emo goth shit, or Johnny Depp in 500 layers of makeup. That ain’t the problem here, Tim. I don’t need you to make me a hamburger. I need you to get out there and do your fucking job.
Haha. Very good post. I laughed a lot during this.
I’m not going to be original and post Lost in Translation this was the first movie I can remember that actually bored me to praying it was over. What did he say to her at the end? Who gives a rat’s…
I’m also gonna do a bit of a off topic on this and say that anything with Johnny Depp or Ben Stiller I refuse to watch now because of how horrendously bad their movies are. I never thought that every movie with these two I see would be so bad.
Edit: Scratch that kinda sorta…I love the Pirates movies…so I will watch them. Anything else? Screw it
Of movies I’ve seen recently (last couple of years), that I really expected being good based on reviews and recommendations, Inglorious Basterds (great first minutes, great evil guy, otherwise boring and slightly dumb) and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (boring, also I don’t believe in the characters), win this contest in my book.
“The Departed.” Oscar for Best Picture? Really? Cause to me it was, well, kinda … boring. And uninspired. A routine cop melodrama. Law & Order turns out better episodes routinely. I only watched it because of “No Country For Old Men.” It had won Best Picture and I thought it sounded dull and stupid (serial killer themes generally are stupid and boring, IMHO) so I didn’t watch it, but then it was on cable one day and I thought I’d sample it, and damn, that opening scene where the hunter finds the aftermath of the drug trade shootout … damn … so bleak and barren and yet somehow beautiful … turned out to be a great movie, apart from the invulnerable psycho killer (yawn). So I tried out “The Departed” since it was another Best Picture winner that sounded kinda dull. And it was! It was like 'You’re not really a cop!" “I am so a cop!” You’ll be a secret cop and we’ll disavow everything we know just on general principles!" “Hey the bad scary bad guy is insane! He might kill me!” “Suck it up, kid!” and I’m all … ‘Bwuh … wha? did something happen? guess not. Back to sleep.’
Have you all forgotten about Star Trek: The Motion Picture? Kirk, Spock and the bald-headed chick in a 3 hour movie with a 15 minute recycled plot.
Woody Allen’s Hannah and Her Sisters. I like his movies, and not just the early funny ones. But this was boring beyond belief, and had no characters that were likeable or interesting. Mama Zappa and I walked out of it.
My only regret is that everyone else we knew at the time LUURRRRVED the movie 
We felt like we were surrounded by pod people (to reference a flick with better acting … ).
I actually fell fully asleep during that, and I was so excited going in! :eek:
Any original SyFy TV movie. I go into them expecting them to suck, and every time they surpass my expectations. The black hole of suck that was “John Carter of Mars” was beyond my worst nightmares.
I so wanted to like Where The Wild Things Are (being a rather big Spike Jonze fan) But as someone above mentioned, when you take a book that has maybe 10 lines in it, meant for kindergartners, and try to stretch it into a feature film… well, it just fell incredibly flat for me. Boooooring.
I thought the trailer for it was brilliant, and I think that’s all that was really needed to be seen to that extent. Even that was longer than it takes to read the book.
So they actually made the one with Tracy Lords?