BOTTLE ROCKET
THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS
ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND
PULP FICTION
LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE
L’AVVENTURA
THERE WILL BE BLOOD
ANNIE (the musical)
CHAPLIN
GIGI
MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS
L’ECLISSE
LAST TANGO IN PARIS
THE STING
AU HASARD BALTHASAR
IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE
A CHRISTMAS STORY
BREAKING THE WAVES
SYNECHDOCHE, NY
COLD MOUNTAIN
SEX AND THE CITY
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST (1940’s French version)
CITIZEN KANE
CASABLANCA
THE RED SHOES (now I’m ducking for cover here!)
BLAZING SADDLES
THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY
REAR WINDOW
SPACEBALLS
PRINCESS BRIDE
STAR WARS—- all of ‘em
STAR TREK— all of ’em
MYSTIC RIVER
MOULIN ROUGE
SCHINDLER’S LIST
POLTERGEIST
The Jacques Tati Hulot comedies
The Cassavetes oeuvre
The John Hughes oeuvre
Any martial arts or samurai film (OK, now I’m REALLY ducking for cover here)
I could mention NASHVILLE, but my feelings are more complex regarding this….
Most Godard makes me want to climb the walls, but the original question is “that everyone likes”, and I know I’m not alone in finding Godard (often, though not always) tedious.
Field of Dreams- i would’ve sold the farm
Philadelphia- depressing for the sake of being depressed
Blow Up- incomplete, no substance nor feeling, just bland
Unforgiven- overrated, though Gene Hackman did deserve his Oscar
Man With the Golden Arm- Sinatra should stick to singing
Performance- what the HELL
In the Heat of the Night- though it was well acted, it was unrealilistic
Do the Right Thing- spike lee is a joke
Thomas Crown Affair- didn’t understand character’s goals
Platoon-it was just battle after battle, plus Charlie Sheen pisses me off
Wall Street- (see Platoon)
Spy Who Came in From the Cold- i love the cast, but didn’t get the stiry
Sally Field-Whines like there is no tomorrow
Laurence Harvey- he ruined so many fine cinematic roles
Jane Fonda- if she wasn’t a Fonda, she’d be nothing
Lana Turner- her sweater is nice though
Off the top of my head: Juno, Magnolia, All Von Trier (except Dancer in the Dark), Teorema, Last Tango in Paris
What all of these films don’t have: subtlety
JULES….ET…….JIM!!!!!
Quoi?
JUULLLEESSSS……ET…..JIMMMMMMA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Quoi?
AH, CASSE-TOI!!!!!
Sorry, went a little overboard. =]
seriously what is with all the Lost in Translation listings
that movie is incredible, I LITERALLY wanted to turn around and walk back in the theater and see it again after it was over
I can understand if it’s not your favorte move ever made, but to say that you HATED it, I just don’t understand
this thread makes me want to vomit
so many good films
going over the heads of so many smart people
The Housemaid (1960)
Things by and/or involving:
Steven Spielberg
Judd Apatow
Ron Howard
Adam Sandler
Tom Hanks
Jonah Hill
Russell Brand
Jason Siegel
Robert Pattinson
Just about anything that’s been aimed at deceiving and misleading my generation (I am 19 going on 20 and quite disgusted with many of my contemporaries and their lack of sense of cinema).
Steven Spielberg has made some excellent films. And Adam Sandler is great in Punch Drunk Love.
The Breakfast Club
Steven Spielberg seriously? Some of his movies have fallen flat but to say that you hate him as a director? Probably half the directors you do like were inspired by him
I mean have you ever seen “Duel”, “Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind”, “Saving Private Ryan”, “Schindler’s List”, “E.T.” “Munich”, “The Color Purple”
I mean are we ever talking about the same person? The guy’s a fuckin genius
If we’re going to get worked up, let’s focus on DLB’s list. Aside from 3-4 actual stinkers, his list would make a very respectable greatest films of all time compilation.
David, with respect and the understanding that we’re all entitled to our opinion, what makes you dismiss so many of the most loved and acclaimed films? If these are films you hate, what qualities are you looking for?
Alex, if you count David Fincher, then yes, at least one direct influence. However, I think Jaws may be his only film worth watching for that said effect.
But other than that, I’m afraid he’s nothing more than a marketing tool with very little enlightenment and too much money to play with and too high of notoriety to be esteemed with, especially with the quality of his films. To think that he believes the outer universe would be benefitted by sending a man who’d want to open up a McDonald’s on another planet. This is not genius, at least not a lasting genius, for my taste at least. Sure, I was impressed with Jurassic Park and Indiana Jones as a kid, but in growing up my sensibilities expanded, and I saw his films as they were intended to be, commercial.
People say they have a humanism, but I disagree. They lack sense, they reject exploration and enlightenment for the sake of approval, his characters are cut outs of characters that were more genuine when used by his predecessors, they play on preconceived expectations and don’t really offer anything new or original. Nothing truly groundbreaking or beneficial either. No improvement, garbage in, garbage out, cuddling to the status quo of whoever backs him and his projects. He has talent, sure, but to what extent he uses it, merely for show. That’s my opinion.
And as for Adam Sandler, I’ve yet to see Punch Drunk Love, but all the while, everything else he’s been in just might overshadow that anyway. Though, I’ll have to see to know for sure.
I don’t believe that there is a single film in existence that isn’t hated by at least one person. The real question would be “Is there a film out there that is actually universally liked??”
I think you hate Steven Spielberg as a producer (when they attach his name to projects for no good reason) rather than as a director
@ BRAD S.
Some of the films I listed will indeed display filmic virtue and finesse, the stuff that college film courses will take note of.
But as entertainments , I cannot bear them. Usually it’s because something strikes me a false, or begged; I’m not too big on lugubrious syrup, either. Sometimes there will just be the presence of a particular actor I can’t bear (for whatever reason…. they may even remind me,. displeasingly, of someone from my own life… y’see… Totally unfair on my part, I’ll grant you.). I don’t like to feel like I’m being “snowed”, either by spurious “depth” or sophistry…. There is a certain straightforward, cards-on-the-table quality I tend to like in cinema.
My favorite Bergmans, for example, are not his symbolic ones, but rather his more straightforward, realistic ones.
I’m big on plot , I must confess. For example, SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION and the Mamet movies catch a lot of flak on this website… but I think they spin a marvelous plot… I like plot.
Again, I’m speaking as a private individual…. not as someone attempting to speak or recommend for any group.
Now Charles why all this hate-on for Speilberg??
Looking at your Top 10 films list including Heat, Dark Knight, Matrix 1 & 2 and Platoon anyone would believe that Speilberg is right up your alley. I’m quite sure that all of these director’s would not agree with your views! And you say that you are 19 goin on 20??WTF In my books you ARE still a kid. I am almost twice your age and I grew up with Speilberg’s films and I still to this day love all of his old work as well as all his new stuff and I look forward to seeing what else he will direct in the years to come
Let’s agree that I totally disagree with your whole statement
I think I may have said this earlier in this thread but, I hate David Mamet films its all bullshit that is annoying and reminds me a two-bit hack doing the same jazz-soundtrack over and over and over again.
but back to the topic
definitly “Into the Wild” and I spell it out in my new review:
http://dorkosphere.com/2010/07/26/review-into-the-wild/
Pulp Fiction, Pulp Fiction, Pulp Fiction. And the more people talk about it like it’s a masterpiece, the more I dislike it. Sam Jackson was brilliant in it, that, I feel, is a given, but aside from that it just isn’t that interesting.
Thurman and Travolta were stale in the first contrived full story that really wanted to be more, it wanted to be hip, just like Travolta did and it failed on many levels. Even Uma getting stabbed with the needle was boring.
Willis and Rhames were nothing special in the second part, which was actually the end part, but so flippin’ bad they put it in the middle to hold Jackson for the end to save the film. Willis did his Willis thing which he has done better countless other times.
Then Jackson thankfully comes back, puts the whole film on his shoulders and tries to convince the audience that His Greatness as Jules proves the Greatness of Pulp Fiction. But all he proves with his great performance is just how uninteresting everyone else was around him.
Pulp Fiction is no masterpiece, it is more like the Sumatran Century Flower, this big thing, but when it finally blossoms, people find that it reeks.
Well i’m not gonna say anything to Uli Cain since I already put my 2 cents in earlier but I AM eager to hear some other Pulp Fiction fans comments. Cannot wait for the roasting
Wow. Sorry Uli but I’m gonna have to disagree with you. I loved Pulp Fiction. And I do agree that Samuel Jackson was the shining star of the whole production but I honeslty just loved every minute of that movie, and I thought every actor was great and every charector was amazing.
I will admit it is put up as a masterpiece a bit too much. I won’t go so far as to call it a “masterpiece”…To me Tarentino’s masterpiece so far is Inglorious Basterds. But I did enjoy Pulp Fiction a hell of a lot.
A big sin in my book is…. being pandered to. Or being flattered (in a calculated fashion).
The moment—- the instant - it becomes clear that a director is deliberately targeting and pandering to a specific niche audience? I am turned off.
So there are “cutesy” and “trendy” things that automatically win my disfavor.
A film, and its characters, need to be interesting purely in their own right; they must earn the viewer’s love and respect. Moreover, a truly good film can reach, and speak to, an audience of all ages and backgrounds.
Nowadays, computer technology have enabled marketers to zero-in with a fair degree of precision on the tastes of certain “pet” target or niche audiences. “Preach to the choir.” Tell target audiences EXACTLY what they want to hear…. and flatter them. Movies are no exception.
Paul Schrader (Dir. Light Sleeper) despises him on the Close Encounters deal because of his narrow-minded Hollywood approach to his original spiritually based “Kingdom Come”. Lars von Trier (Dir. Antichrist) declined to direct a film for him, mostly due to his fear of flying but due also to his own disgust towards Hollywood. Godard (Dir. Pierrot le fou) has openly criticized his type of filmmaking for being inauthentic and merely for profit. John Ford (Dir. The Searchers) cursed him out of his office. Sure, maybe guys like Eastwood and Scorsese enjoy his support, but I can’t speak for them nor for everyone else on my list. I’m sure if Pasolini were still alive he’d probably not have any nice words about his filmmaking.
But personally, I don’t hate HIM. Just his films. I don’t agree with them, I find it hard to enjoy them, and maybe it might be because I’m a tight-ass about their degrees of substantiality but if it weren’t for that I’m afraid I’d not be as enlightened about other things as I currently am. I grew up with them and I matured, in my opinion I outgrew them. That’s just how I view it. I find it hard to agree with Spielberg’s mindset through his work because I sense he doesn’t have much of one to hold water with.
500 days of summer
juno
husbands
green zone
baghead
hannah takes the stairs
benjamin button. i lost 3 hours of my life. and inception
so i lost about 5 and a half hours of my life.
Movies I hate that everyone else seems to love:
THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION
THE DARK KNIGHT
UP
AVATAR
INCEPTION
Anything that I have seen from Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger like Life & Death Of Colonel Blimp (deathly boring) and The Red Shoes (Vastly overrated)
Anything that David Lynch has done since Mulholland Dr and before Mulholland Dr..except for Twin Peaks the series and film which were quite good..everything else just did not work for me
And anything that Terry Gilliam has got his hands on since 12 Monkeys (great film, everything after just should not have been made). I do like all of his older 70’s, early 80’s work…I USED to be a fan but now his career is just over
Pan’s Labyrinth – I really hated that film
RachelLeigh
Blow Up – incomplete story, can’t believe it won the Palm d’or
Performance – didn’t see what the big deal was, & it was painful to watch Mick Jagger act
Forest Gump – overrated, although Gary Sinise was good
Into The Wild – watched 40 min of some spoiled kid complain & rebel. I just watched it for Hal Holbrook but had to shut it
Norma Rae – again, shut it halfway
Fight Club – disappointing considering all the hype
Crash – trash
The Last Picture Show – very bland, not a big Peter Bogdonovich fan
Do The Right Thing – unrealistic
Schindler’s List & The Color Purple – way too depressing
Ghost – never cared for it
Clint Eastwood – overrated
Sean Penn – not a good actor, or person