Too much Spleen, but Macy was great.
Talk about damning with faint praise…
Well, it wasn’t really Howard the Duck, was it? It was some very different duck with the same name and a similar (but a little off) appearance. And then the movie turns into a sort of warmed-over *Ghostbusters *without the humor.
I really, really wanted to like that movie. But face it, it was just bad.
Nailed it.
And even by the standard of a generic action movie, there’s some stuff that sucks. For instance, the scene with Costner and Tom Petty grates on me. “I’ve heard of you!” “I’ve heard of you too.” That just seemed to take us right out of the world of the movie, and into the world where Tom Petty is a celebrity - that is, our world. I may not be at all representative here, but to me, it felt like watching two celebrities high-fiving each other in a movie over their both having made the big time IRL. Spare me, please.
Never saw the remake, but like you say, the original was nearly flawless, and really, how can you beat Peter Cook as Beelzebub, and Dudley Moore as his mark, with the great chemistry between them.
I think we’ve pretty much covered all of them.
I’ll toss in “Die Another Day” if it hasn’t been mentioned yet. It receives criticism for the invisible car (Shows up late in the film) Madonna and her accent (the fencing sequence was fine as was her accent).
Personally I liked that:
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We’re 30 minutes into the film, and I still had no idea what the hell this film was supposed to be about. He’s captured, traded, escapes MI6…and goes to lay on a beach? Is it just a simple revenge film? Okayyyyyy
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They fooled me with the baddie. I didn’t catch on before the reveal that he was the guy at the beginning of the film.
Annnd I see “Die Another Day” was covered.
Yup. We’ve done all of them unless someone wants to stick his neck out for “Encino Man” No? No takers?
I liked that movie and thought it was a great bit of storytelling (albeit with some Hollywood shortcuts). The big thing have a hard time getting around every time I see the movie is:
Gothic plate? How did the Viking get Renn-era Gothic fucking plate armor?
Tends to take me out of the movie.
In short–one of the better adaptations of Beowulf.
Liz Hurley in a schoolgirl outfit while holding a whip doesn’t beat that? 
There is definitely another filmed version of The Elephant Man. Strictly speaking it was not a theatrical release (i.e. movie theatre) but an American TV movie first screened on the ABC on January the 4th, 1982. It is a filmed stage production adapted from a stage play written by Bernard Pomerance, which debuted on Broadway in 1977.
For some reason critics seem to bag the hell out of this movie. There is no denying that the sequels were awful but I love the original movie. Great story. Masterful direction. Awesome soundtrack. Superb visuals. Memorable characters. What is there to dislike? Ok so you have a Frenchman as a Scot and a Scot being a Spaniard. The accents aren’t convincing but so what!
Not going there, but I think Biodome deserves better than its 5%. It brought us Tenacious D and a good Futurama reference.
Oh, I focused on Rosamund Pike, believe me.
Anyway… I think that the backlash against the movie wasn’t so much a backlash against that movie, so much as a backlash against Brosnan’s sort of neo-Moore portrayal of James Bond, with the wink and nod toward the audience about hte silliness of the plots, scenes, names, etc… Die Another Day was just sort of the apotheosis of this style of Bond films, and had the backlash as a result.
If you liked that kind of Bond, it was a fine movie- possibly even one of the better ones. But if you were looking for a more book-faithful Bond, then you had to wait a few years for Casino Royale.
The fact that only 3/5 of those points are even arguably true.
The story is virtually non-existent, and the direction is blah.
Some of the visuals are nice, but generally those are beautiful-but-pointless scenery porn that stalls the progress of the story and points out the listlessness of the direction. Characters…the Kurgan is inherently memorable, but MacLeod and Ramirez are only memorable as archetypes (to the point that when I started watching the TV series (having missed the pilot, where Connor appeared) I didn’t realize that Duncan wasn’t Connor for quite a while - and in the end, Duncan was a much stronger character than Connor was).
The soundtrack, on the other hand, is undeniably excellent.
If you pretend the released version doesnt exist and only watch the Directors cut, Highland II really isnt awful.
I enjoyed it because every one looked like they had a lot of fun making it. And it was directed by Ramis after all.
I don’t know if this counts as “story” but the concept is what made the movie. There Can Be Only One. Immortals coming together to chop off each others heads and absorb their power? Bad acting, weird casting, you just ignore it to see more sword fighting.
Oh, yes, it had a great premise, which deserved a much better (or at least meatier) movie.
I’m another one who thinks Signs was a good movie.
One that hasn’t been mentioned is She’s Having a Baby. It generally got poor reviews but I think it’s a classic.