Bad Movie-thon
Saturday, February 14, 2015 at 12:00PM Jose here. Ah, it’s Oscar season and all movie lovers can talk about is who was snubbed or who will and should win. While basking in the glow of acclaimed movies and conversations about the merits of sound editing and screenwriting is nothing to frown upon, most people forget that new movies are released each week, yes, even during Oscar season. And yes, most of these releases are of dubious quality, but sometimes you can only watch your favorite Best Foreign Language Film nominee so many times before you want to go see something new, right?
But what to choose among the pile of critically lambasted offerings that 2015 has brought us so far? I saw a bunch of them, to bring you this concise report.
Project Almanac
Premise: A group of high school seniors discover a time machine. Chaos ensues when they discover that the more they travel back in time, the more they mess things up in the present.
You Might Like It If: You can’t get enough of found footage movies, even when it makes absolutely no sense that people would record every.single.thing.that.happens.to.them, or that GoPros and HandyCams would survive “magnetic fields” that make cars explode.
MVP: Amy Landecker of the Golden Globe-winning Transparent plays the hero’s (Jonny Weston) mom, and with very few lines makes us wish the kids would forget about recording their ridiculous lives and make the mom the star of a Cassavetes-like indie.
LVP: Jonny Weston. With killer abs and a smile to die for, not even he seems to buy the fact that he’s supposed to be this geeky loser no one would ever bother to notice. No one is opposed to killer abs and smiles to die for, but the writers should have found a way to make him more than a collection of 80s rom-com tropes.
The Boy Next Door
Premise: A sexy-but-she-doesn’t-know it high school literature teacher (Jennifer Lopez) has a fling with her psychotic 19-year-old (Ryan Guzman) neighbor, who becomes the Glenn Close to her Michael Douglas.
You Might Like It If: You just had two tequila shots, three beers and just went to see Naked Boys Singing, no wait, that’s just what I did. You might like it if you're in the mood for camp that knows it's camp.
MVP: J.Lo! She's no Meryl Streep, but she knows how to seduce the camera. Interestingly, as terrible and cheesy as the movie is, there is an undeniable pro-female element to it. Perhaps it came with JLo's contract. The film features one of the most interesting sex scenes in recent mainstream movies, because for once, it’s the woman who is in control. Without getting into too much detail, the film is concerned with giving J.Lo pleasure, so that when things go wrong for her, the tired Victorian idea that she must be punished for having sex, is at least mitigated by the notion that “hey, at least it was mind blowing sex, and her orgasm came before his!”, something that movies rarely, if ever, allow women to have.
LVP: Kristin Chenoweth doing her best Julianne Moore in The Hand That Rocks the Cradle. She doesn’t give a bad performance, but she is a Tony and Emmy winner for crying out loud. Why waste her in crappy movies.
Blackhat
Premise: Chris Hemsworth hacks computers while shirtless.
You Might Like It If: You like the idea of Chris Hemsworth hacking computers while shirtless.
MVP: Viola Davis, because duh.
LVP: Ironically, Chris Hemsworth. His ridiculously long, sinfully smooth, perfectly sculpted torso is a beauty to behold but put a shirt on him for computer talk, bank transactions and whatnot and you'll wonder how he ever got this lead role. Can Hemsworth only shine when he’s playing off stronger, more charismatic performers? Think Portman in Thor, RDJ in The Avengers, Bruhl in Rush...
Mortdecai
Premise: Even the screenwriters aren't sure! It has something to do with Johnny Depp playing an art dealer and both Gwyneth Paltrow and Olivia Munn finding him more attractive than Ewan McGregor. So: a stretch. Also, a mustache.
You Might Like It If: You haven’t lost faith in Johnny Depp. You’re a fan of Gwynnie’s British accent. You have a mustache fetish. Also, Paul Bettany plays a manservant called Jock Strapp, so there’s that.
MVP: Gwynnie. Why she does so few movies is tragic enough, but then she goes and reminds us how sexy and funny she can be, which makes one wish she chose better parts to play! As Lady Johanna Mortdecai she brings her best Grace Kelly in To Catch a Thief game, and lights the screen up. Somehow she's the only movie star in this that seems to be aware that even farce can use a little subtlety.
LVP: Depp. The reasons would warrant a post of their own.
The Loft
Premise: What if Fred McMurray’s character from Billy Wilder’s The Apartment got multiplied by five, each version more despicable than the others, and then one day they all got together to try and dispose of Shirley MacLaine’s corpse? Also, there’s no C.C. Baxter.
You Might Like It If: You understand why Karl Urban is still headlining movies.
MVP: Matthias Schoenaerts. He's playing the same part he played in the Belgian original (made by the same director in 2008), which makes sense in the limited context of making this film, but no sense at all when you remember how brilliant he was in Bullhead and Rust and Bone. This man should be fielding lead offers 24/7. Instead Hollywood hands him unimaginative supporting parts that riff on the aggressive traits he displayed in his biggest roles.
LVP: Isabel Lucas is a beautiful model. Isabel Lucas is not a actress.
Reader Comments (19)
I've seen the loft because of Schoenaerts. I don't regret it.
"Have you seen any of these or any bad movies of late?"
No, but thanks for doing it for us, Jose. I only wish you could have seen Fifty Shades of Grey for us yesterday, too.
"What do you do during the desolate winter months to satiate your moviegoing needs?"
I watch the Oscar docs, foreign flicks and shorts...and a boatload of television. Recommended: Black Mirror, Togetherness, Looking, Justified, Better Call Saul, The Americans, Archer, Empire, Agent Carter...
TBND is like a mash up of all those 90's intruder in the home movies,i loved it.
I'd say the MVP of The Boy Next Door is Ryan Guzman, whose charisma, casual masculinity and gorgeousness are deployed to make HIM the object of sexual attraction, rather than the woman for a change. And YES on that sex scene flipping the script for male/female roles.
To be fair, I think Schoenaerts made this BEFORE Bullhead. Certainly before Rust & Bone, I think. It's been sitting on the shelf for quite some time.
Agreed that the sex scene in The Boy Next Door is curiously exciting. For once she gets the pleasure. And, ya know, watching Ryan Guzman get his butt groped on a big screen is fine by me. I was surprised it was made by a heterosexual male.
May I say it loud? Michael Mann's Blackhat is a masterpiece, mayve even his best work after Miami Vice and Heat, and is better than every single movie nominated for Oscars this year. This is is clearly a work of one the five best American directors of the last 30 years.
I am still incredibly behind on Oscar nominees, yet made time for "Jupiter Ascending" this week. Favorite moments include: any of the weird romance scenes, the horde of bees, when Mila Kunis says "Please, call me Joop," even though no one does in the entire movie, and the moment shockingly late in the runtime when 'Joop' admits she still doesn't really know what being queen of the universe even means.
MVP: Jose, for sitting through these movies so the rest of us don't have to.
Completely agree on The Boy Next Door. I had a great, trashy time watching it. Has J.Lo ever been racier in another movie? That sex scene was pretty steamy! ;)
LOL I googled The Loft, and found out that Cam from Modern Family played one of the guys, but he barely even exists in the trailer.
Blackhat really has no business being included with these stinkers, but oh well. I might not be quite as high on it as Cal, but it is a major auteurist triumph for Mann. Look beyond the easy snark about Hemsworth playing a hacker. There's a lot more the movie, and his performance, than that!
Look at all the two lone Mann-fans defending BLACKHAT when it's indefensibly bad. It looks downright awful, the dialogue is macho and mucho dumb, and the storytelling is muddled.
Wei Teng (who was so great in Lust Caution) is terrible. She has zero chemistry with Hemsworth, all their scenes fall flat.
And Mann's music taste fails him once again. Thank goodness there was no Chris Cornell or Audioslave this time, but the awful alt-rock on the soundtrack was still hard to stomach.
Even the shootouts missed their marks.
So yes, BLACKHAT (30 percent on Rotten Tomatoes) DOES deserve to be on this list.
Bhuray, U-TURN?
Schoenaerts is amazing. I agree 1000%.
HEllo,
the idea of some movies being broad to life like it is. Is awesome and no one wants it more with time but the best ideas of some things like that were gonna make the change and the ida ot today's movies will go them.
And ever the movie cos and http://youtu.be/xagB5Y_XV3E would been sayn the same.
Cheers.
Chris Hemsworth should only do roles where he can flex his muscles....all these movies sound terrible but only JLo's sounds like it might be fun....
Love this. I know that bad movies are never so abundant as in the first month of the year, but I would love recurring badmoviethons on TFE.
Glenn, I have not seen U-Turn. Have definitely been meaning to though! It's actually one of her better performances right?
@Bhuray:
Jennifer Lopez is phenomenal in U-Turn. That turn in U-Turn
and her turn in Out Of Sight the following year suggested one hell of an actress.
It's too bad she since took the road more traveled, the generic romantic comedy route.
She coulda been a contender. She coulda been somebody, instead of a bum-shaking dancer
slash mediocre singer slash "actress".