I hoping that the new Battlestar Galactica will fall into this category. It won’t be true to the original of course, but I’m praying it’ll be good enough on it’s own terms not to disgrace the name.
Anyway, what things were you surprised to find weren’t nearly as bad as you had feared?
Pirates of the Caribbean
Jake 2.0
The Postman
Deuce Bigalow: Male Giggalo
Orange County
That movie with Bruce Willis, the guy from Frinds & Amanda Peete.
Remember, you said not as bad as I feared.
Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring! It could have gone SO wrong, in so many different ways. Yet it came out near-perfect. Whew!!
Let the naysayers squeal, but Titanic. I heard about all the on-set problems and horrific budget overruns and then the release date was pushed back months (usually a very bad sign) and I, everybody, feared the worst. And yet, IT WAS A GOOD MOVIE! (lalalala…I’m not listening to the haters…)
Elf was pretty cute. I’ve never seen Will Farrell in anything (not even SNL) but everybody I know hates his guts, so I went to see it by my lonesome, and only then because it was directed by Jon Favreau. I liked it! It’s very sweet.
I also agree with Pirates of the Caribbean.
That would be The Whole Nine Yards which I enjoyed too.
I was hoping for a bit more from Orange County, because it was directed by Jake Kasdan, whose first film was the wonderful Zero Effect. I liked Orange County, but it didn’t, for me, live up to the promise of his debut feature. (whine, I want a sequel! More Daryl Zero! More Daryl Zero!)
Pirates of the Caribbean, definitely. The previews made it look like crap, and the whole idea seemed pretty stupid. A movie based on a theme park ride? How can that work? But, somehow, they pulled it off. Now with Haunted Mansion coming out, we can see what a trainwreck Pirates could’ve been.
Rat Race. The trailers made this movie look horrible, but I quite enjoyed it (and I know I’m not the only one).
A while ago, my sister and I rented The Glass House we had a freebie rental of a moldy oldie, so we rented it.
When it was over, we both looked at each other and said “Well, that didn’t suck.” It’s not the best movie ever, but also was not the worst by a long shot.
Brendan Fraser’s George of the Jungle.
I want to know how the hell a musical television special about a young woman named “Buffy” who kills vampires managed to be so good. The mind boggles.
The turkey that I cooked for Thanksgiving didn’t suck, in fact it was pretty darn good for a first timer.
Cats don’t dance… I love that disney movie… Oh and the extreme Goffy movie…
That wasn’t a Disney movie, Omikawaii.
I was surprised that a band with a WTF??? name like Porcupine Tree wasn’t lame at all. In fact I now think Steven Wilson is a genius.
Terminator 3. It looked soooo bad in commercials I watched it and even though the end was a downer (on hindsight I realized it matched the bummer ending of T1 though) I thought it was quite good. I also found it had a lot more ideas then T2 did.
The hand gun thing on the TX was still stupid though.
Strangely I find if I go to a movie with a bad expectation I usually enjoy it far more then a movie I go to with high expecations. I guess that’s the difference between being pleasantly surprised vs. being disappointed.
Let me just say that I am not a Charlie Sheen fan. Also, I absolutely dread each new season of sitcoms since they get worse every year. And yet, I like Two and a Half Men. I don’t know why. It’s likely to suck by the end of the season–the writers will run out of plot ideas or the kid will start to get annoying–but, for now, I’m still watching.
Spice World
: D&R :
Justin Timberlake on SNL was actually very funny. Not at all what I expected.
Showgirls. It made me laugh a lot.
James Cameron’s The Abyss, released in 1989. There were a couple of other movies released shortly before this movie came out with similar themes (underwater setting, possible monsters, etc.), and had gotten poor reviews, so I was not looking forward to seeing The Abyss at all. I got roped into it by some friends, and I went into the theater expecting to perfectly loathe the movie.
Imagine my surprise when I found it to be a truly excellent film (in my opinion).