Small things you like in stuff you otherwise hate

The 2000-ish Time Machine (is that the one that Sage Rat referred to as “new”?) was mostly forgettable and seriously flawed, but I will give it credit that it’s the only cinematic portrayal of holography I’ve seen that gets it right (at least, given the assumption of more advanced technology than we have): You can see the holographic library-computer guy, but only when you’re looking through one of the “windows”. Look around the window, and he’s not there.

And there was a short scene in the relatively near future where the moon was breaking up… That scene was great. Should’ve made the whole movie about that.

I like the chex cereal in chex mix but dont really enjoy all the other bits…Same with trail mix, love the choco bits and dried banana chips but do not like peanuts/raisins mixed in. Love tomatoes, don’t enjoy cherry ones in salads.

Can of mixed nuts: I pick out the cashews and pecans (such a novelty to find them in the can of mixed nuts) - then the filberts and almonds. Peanuts, I leave, they are so mundane and only added to bulk it out.

I hate the hot, muggy, NYC summer weather, but I like women in short-shorts.

Robot Arm:. The hot mess of the original Casino Royale is the main reason I love it. Orson Welles and John Huston chew the scenery, David Niven plays Chopin, Woody Allen plays a mad scientist/evil supervillain, Peter Sellers drinks doped Champagne and gets to say “My GOODNESS, this is strong shampoo.”

And you are right about the theme music, which is even better when you listen to it while watching the GREAT 1960s opening credits.

Yep. And a nice alien world.
Plot and writing were bad.

Robin Hood- Alan Rickman. 'nuff said.

At Costco, there’s a mixed nuts that consists entirely of almonds, cashews, pecans, and pistachios. If you’re into that, which I am.

I eat the peanuts. :stuck_out_tongue:

I can’t stand the song “What’s Up” 4 Non Blondes. But the first little bit of the song, where it’s just guitar strumming, is pretty nice. And since it alerts me that a song I hate is coming up, it gives me time to switch the station without having to listen to anything bad.

The Blues Brothers is one of my all-time favorite Movies. It’s ridiculous, but it has a sort of internal logic that makes all the ridiculousness work. Thanks the the pairing of Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi, it’s funny as hell. And it has great music.

Its sequel, Blues Brothers 2000, is quite terrible. The script is a hot mess and makes zero sense, even within its own bizzare reality. The parts that are supposed to be funny are painfully unfunny. The absence of Belushi hangs over the whole film like a cloud.

But the musical numbers are just as good, if not better, than the original.

Battle of the Bulge (1965) is probably the worst of all the star-studded WW2 epic movies that were made in the 60’s and 70’s. Showcasing all the excesses of the time, it had dozens of stars but didn’t really give them much to do. Filmed with a big budget in Spain not only does Spain not look like the Ardennes it also lacks the snow which made the battle infamous. Lots of military vehicles and action sequences but they’re ruined by the fact that they’re all very obviously post-war tanks and the tanks are rarely seen working in concert with infantry so the tank battles just kind of look empty. It diverges very far from history and not in an entertaining manner, apparently the Battle of the Bulge was won because the German tanks ran out of gas 10 feet from a fuel depot.

The only thing I actually liked in the movie was a small-scene where a US Army Supply Sgt played by Telly Savalas and his French black marketeer girlfriend have to say their respective good byes before the Germans arrive at her town. It’s short and with not a lot of dialog, but does a lot to show their relationship and is one of the few times I thought a wartime romance actually improved one of these movies.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. I can’t really say I hated young Abe Lincoln doing axe-fu with vampires. But I did squeal with glee when bearded top-hat Lincoln brandished his axe.

Batman Forever. Four words “Holy Rusted Metal, Batman!”

Planet of the Apes with Mark Wahlberg. Forgettable movie, except I liked the almost-non-sequitor “twist” at the end.

No, the German Panzer troops singing the panzerlied song is the best part of the film.


Totally ruined in the Score CD that was released.

I hated most of what was done in Starship Troopers, but the CGI effects were truly awesome.

One of my favorite examples of “movies with one thing you like” is the 1959 movie Angry Red Planet, directed by Norman Maurer (Moe Howard’s son-in-law!) It’s about the First Trip to Mars. and much of it is typical pulp SF (although the “Cinemagic” scenes set on Mars – it looks as if it was solarized to hell and printed through a red filter – are interesting. It definitely gives you a weird feeling). But there’s a scene at the end that’s actually Good Science Fiction. One of the astronauts was attacked by the Giant Space Amoeba and a piece of Space Amoeba is on his arm, slowly digesting it. The same thing happened in the Italian film Caltiki, the Immortal Monster that came out the same year. In that film, they peel away the Space Amoeba to reveal that the poor guy’s arm was digested down to the bones. In Angry Red Planet, however, the lone female astronaut, Iris “Irish” Ryan, has the clever idea of putting a piece of animal tissue enticingly close to the afflicted guy’s arm, then giving the arm mild electrical shocks. The arm thus becomes a hostile environment, so the Space Amoeba moves over to the more inviting company of the animal tissue, leaving the arm altogether.

It’s such a clever, workable solution that I still marvel over it. The screenplay is by Ib Melchior and Sid Pink, a couple of B-movie hacks who I wouldn’t credit with such a piece of workable science fiction. Maybe one of them read about a similar experiment in Scientific American.
There’s a similar moment in the otherwise completely dreadful Tales from the Past, a Horror anthology that goes by multiple names. The movie is so bad that the best-looking parts are the ones lifted from 1960 Roger Corman movies. You can predict the “twist” endings long before the reveals. But in one of them a scientist is doing an animal behavior experiment that is actually legitimate - I recognize it from elsewhere. It’s of only marginal interest, so it feels badly shoehorned into place, but at least it’s a gleam of respectability in an awful film.

Same here, even bought the soundtrack for some reason. I’ll also add that the title sequence still grabs me even though I probably can’t sit through the movie anymore.