MAMMA MIA — watch Meryl Streep work harder than she’s ever worked before trying to make you believe that she’s having FUN! Choosing between the kids at Auschwitz was a walk in the park compared to her efforts to put this crap over. A nightmare.
SEX AND THE CITY — the first girly sci-fi horror film: 4 predatory beasts whose lives bear no resemblance to life as it is lived by 98% of the population since the beginning of time destroy any male unlucky enough to fall under their fiendish succubotic spells. One intrepid explorer comes to his senses and flees, but finds himself ensnared again by Carrie Bradshaw’s Labyrinth of Closets.
Hey, I love Burn After Reading. I thought the humor was similar to Fargo- but they took it even further since it isn’t based on a true story. It was absolutely absurd that it was hilarious. (The part when Brad Pitt hides in the closet? I couldn’t stop laughing.) I also liked Pineapple Express and The Dark Knight.
(edit: I thought Burn After Reading was a great parody of stupid, empty comedies in general. Wasn’t taking itself seriously at all! Obv.)
I didn’t like No Country for Old Men. Hated Cloverfield (Absurd in a bad way- and I usually like when the world ends in movies. Disappointing, predictable ending. I still think the batteries should have run out.)
Everything else was probably a bad movie- I didn’t even bother.
Blake said: “2. “A Girl Cut in Two”
- So pretentious. So miserable. So… French…”
Well Blake, considering that Chabrol adapted this story from the life of AMERICAN Evelyn Nesbit, I’m not sure you should diss it bc it’s French. It made my top10, but then again I’m seeing Slumdog Millionaire tomorrow so that might change.
There were many terrible films this year, including an all new low for everyone’s favourite genre, the “Rom-Com”. For reasons of emphasis, however, I’ll only mention the one film that truly deserves the accolade of worst film of the year.
Repo! The Genetic Opera
Hey, I’m not only going to disagree with the shocking amount of people here who have chosen “Burn After Reading”, I’m going to take a bullet for “The Happening”.
While I didn’t think “The Happening” came anywhere near restoring M. Night Shyamalan’s tattered reputation, I do believe it was a step up from “The Lady in the Water” and “The Village”. If you look at “The Happening” within the context of Shyamalan’s complete works, you will notice “The Happening” is the first film in which Shyamalan finally moves away from his contrived, worn-out Spirituality construct; creating a flawed, but admirable Political parable.
And as far as “Burn After Reading”: really? All I know is, I laughed, a lot. I thought Clooney was hilarious. “Burn After Reading” was a great parody of action/spy movies like the “Bourne” series. And you guys may remember that the first movie The Coens made after their masterpiece “Fargo” was “The Big Lebowski”, which also received a less than warm reception, but is now considered a cult classic.
Worst movie of 2008? Even though I didn’t see “Australia” or “Fool’s Gold”, I’d be willing to bet they’re much more deserving than “Burn After Reading” or “The Happening”.
Quantum of Solace is by far the worse movie I’ve seen all year, followed by The Fall and Indiana Jones. Seriously, it hasn’t been a good year for movies when The Dark Knight and Iron Man seemed to deliver on what’s expected, and crossed genres to become good movies.
Jumper was pretty bad too, as well as Hancock. I enjoyed Vicky, Christina, Barcelona a lot, and think it slipped under the radar. That was a terrific movie, and a surprise by the ever prolific Woody Allen.
Hooray for Alanedit! Simply for praising Woody’s “Vicky…”. Even though, again, I believe I’m in the minority; I actually liked “Quantum of Solace”.
Diary of the Dead
Zack and Miri Make a Porno
You Don’t Mess with the Zohan
Tropic Thunder
The Secret Life of Bees
The Happening
Indiana Jones IV
Another Gay Movie
The Ruins
Made of Honor
Untraceable
Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay
27 Dresses
Vantage Point
Get Smart
This is just a list of bad movies that I actually watched. Somehow I was conscious of avoiding the rest of the schlock that was released in ‘08. If Ithink about it, 99% of Hollywood releases were bad. It’s just a matter of what degree of sucky they were.
Semi-Pro
The Day The Earth Stood Still
Hotel For Dogs
The Love Guru
Midnight Meat Train
Wanted
The Happening
Bangkok Dangerous
Why is it so easy to think of bad films and so bloody difficult to think of a good film? Is nothing good made these days?
Mamma Mia – I thought it was a parody, as such it is quite amusing but i wouldnt suggest watching it sober…
Harold and Kumar Escape from Guatanamo Bay – Disappointing sequal, why bother??
Tropic Thunder – How can you make a comedy parody of an action film which isnt funny and just turns into an action film itself?
The Wackness – The shitness, so poorly made its unbelievable
Donkey Punch – One word -shit
Hancock – But no suprises there
Burn After Reading – an empty farce, never has 90 min felt so long!!
Baader Meinhoff Complex – a serious of events with a missing narrative.
I feel bad writing this:
The silence of lorna – it was just so disappointing… I wanted to love it, but they let me down :(
I wont go on.
Anything good…
Los Bastardos – look out for it!
The Class – Prepare for dullness but fight though it, its good.
For people listing films like “The Dark Knight” or “The Happening” (which was terrible) or even bloody “Synecdoche, New York”; get the fuck out of here wit that shit. Take that pseudo-intellectual crap and toss it out the window because those three films were way better than over 30+ movies released this year. Don’t hate just because your expectations were let down.
It has been a rather weak year as far as American indie and studio cinema is concerned. I’ve been developing my best list all year, it’s not final but below is what I consider to be the top 10 worst of 08’ thus far…
01: Jumper – The worst holy war analogy ever put on screen.
02: 21 – An ace, a three of diamonds, and a ten of clubs. Don’t bother another hit.
03: Strange Wilderness – Best part was the pot smoking and Justin Lin sleeping with eyes pained over the lids.
04: Doomsday – Remember when they go into that warehouse and get the Audi?
05: Appaloosa – The most boring time you will have at the cinema all year. If you hate Renee Zellweger’s, don’t watch this movie, you’ll hate her even more. It is a sad, waste of talented actors in a cheesy western.
06: You Don’t Mess with the Zohan! – Oh I did mess with the Zohan, aside from fun T&A; nothingness…
07: Zombie Strippers – Once again, aside from fun T&A, nothingness… eh, a little gore.
08: Cloverfield – “WTF!? A giant preying mantis?” I punched a dude in the face after that movie, then drunkenly went ahead and talked mad shit to the city he was from.
09: Star Wars: The Clone Wars – The force is gone.
10: Hell Ride – Yeah… Someone stop Larry Bishop now. Lets keep him as a supporting role these days, please. Eric Balfour as a lead? He actually has a career after Nispel’s Texas Chainsaw?
Rotting Celluloid of the Year: Happy-Go-Lucky
Before you start bashing me – let me explain…. I LOVE Mike Leigh. But I fucking hated Juno. To the point where I could not comprehend with her wit and demeanor. So I turned off the movie roughly 30 min in and never will dare venture into her world again. I’m a young guy. I party, I meet ladies, I know my generation from book cover to book end. I’ve met girls like Juno and Poppy; and you know what? I cannot stand how perky and dumbfounded they truly are. Big, beautiful hearts maybe; but dumb, ignorant, overly optimistic, and way too witty for my liking. So I just don’t deal with girls like that unless there is a reward. I started watching “Happy-Go-Lucky” today and I got the same feeling I got from Juno, except more British and the most annoying laughter carrying throughout the film. So I turned it off 30 min in. Nothing was remotely interesting, nor was there any sort of conflict to keep me interested. Her good deeds fulfills her and she manages to brush the dirt off her shoulders with an ease that we all could learn from, but that bitch was hella annoying. I am sorry if I have offended anyone, but sometimes chick flicks just don’t work for me. I love a good romance, I loved “Mean Girls”, but I do not dig “cute shit time”.
That said, I wish more girls have seen “Amelie”. She is awesome.
Wow, this post went way off…
Other shitty films of 2008:
32. Seven Pounds
33. Tropic Thunder
34. Zach and Miri Make a Porno
35: Step Brothers
36: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
37. X-Files: I Want to Believe, The
38: In Bruges
39: Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay
40: Postal
41: Battle in Seattle
42: Wackness, The
43: Max Payne
44: Love Guru, The
45: Incredible Hulk, The
46: Wanted
47: Hancock
Wanted- Worst movie of the year – and i love bad action movies. This Was just 100 pounds of polished dog shit.
THE DARK KNIGHT & TWILIGHT are the worst because of how terrible and overrated they are.
Australia
Indiana Jones
The Hulk
Mamma Mia
Thanks Akash, for a little bit of perspective.
If you guys really think THE DARK KNIGHT and QUANTUM OF SOLACE were the worst.
Go see PUNISHER:WAR ZONE, alright, then come talk to me.
I don’t think “The Happening” is a great or even good picture but I think the insane backlash against it is unwarranted and unfair and is quite frankly a continuation of educated film critics to hate Shymalan for his success and the nightmare that was “Lady in the Water.” He has made one great picture (“The Sixth Sense”), one very good one (“Unbreakable”), three mediocre ones (“Signs,” “The Village,” “The Happening”) and one colossal failure (guess the picture).
“The Happening” is certainly not as bad as, say, “The Hottie and the Nottie,” or any of the “_____ Movie” pictures.
Of the movies I saw in 2008, I think these were the ones I didn’t like the most:
10,000 B.C.
Righteous Kill
Nobel Son
The problem with lists like these is that a steward of serious film criticism wouldn’t go see any of these pictures unless he was getting paid per word to write about them.
I just don’t get people saying “The Dark Knight” is a bad film — unless, perhaps, they say it because it’s enormously expensive and popular and a superior example of its genre, the kind of things that really get on the tits of the indy crowd. Try taking the long view for once in your life. Ask yourself how it will look in, say, 20 years, when people will still be talking about it and you may not be able to remember why you hated it or what you thought was so much better.
And so-called “stewards of serious film criticism” see a LOT of films, even the ones they’re NOT paid to see, because they like films, they want to know what’s out there, and they don’t want to stay holed up in the Criterion Collection tower, which can turn into a real ghetto if you don’t get out of the house once in a fucking while.
The Spirit
I avoided most of the cinematic dogs listed here. Of the movies listed here, I’ve only seen Dark Knight (****), Iron Man (*), Inbanana Jones And The Whatever That Was With The Russians And The Aliens (), and Quarantine (*1/2). Oh, yeah. And Atonement (**)
I don’t suppose I’ll feel much love on this site for formerly incredibly serious horror jones that’s only recently gone down to a merely serious horror film jones. I’m not talking either about the (hack)Saw variety. Lets put it this way. Children Of The Corn would probably be in my top 10 horror list for any given year since its release. Let me put it more plainly. I like Children of the Corn.
I’m surprised no one here listed Uwe Boll’s offerings this year. What were they — Postal and that one with Jason Statham. Not seen ‘em and don’t care for Uwe.
The Happening was the worst movie I saw in 2008, and this is coming from someone who actually liked Signs. The whole strained relationship subplot was introduced so clumsily, I felt like three or so scenes had just been accidentally left in the final cut. And the performances were dialed-in and seemed almost unrehearsed. Just… bad.
I saw the Crystal Skull, but I have such low expectations for that genre, it didn’t even really bother me. Why fuss over your meal if you’re eating at McDonalds?
that last post came out all bug-ffff.
Atonement: ****
Inbanana Jones *
Quarantine **
Iron Man *
It’s still coming out all bugffff. Atonement — four stars. Inbanana Jones two stars, Quarantine three stars, Iron Man three stars.
Was Atonement this year?
Also, Tropic Thunder, while plenty stupid, is also hilarious. It had great performances and even pretty good effects. Also, the whole third act was pretty much a parody, so we don’t have to feel too guilty watching the main characters carry out a stupid plan.
My firends hated, too. I just don’t get it. Where else have we heard lines like these:
Mama, I’ll see you again tonight in my head movies. But this head movies makes my eyes rain!
Nick and Norah.
In the category of worst movie that a lot of people liked, and that I really expected to like, I’d put “Rachel Getting Married.” A nice performance by Anne Hathaway is ruined by those endless, self-indulgent music and dance sequences. Hurl-worthy.
Also “Slumdog Millionaire,” which managed to outwear its welcome for me on about the fifteenth flashback sequence.
In the category of worst movie that I should have known I wouldn’t have liked but paid good money for anyway, the prize goes to “Four Christmases.”
No, Atonement wasn’t this year.
You can go ahead and add “The Spirit” to this list. One of the worst films I have seen in forever!
Michael Vincent Dow
QUANTUM OF SOLACE destroyed the most miraculous resuscitation of any film franchise in history. The best Bond film ever (CASINO ROYALE) was followed by the worst. Someone needs to be fired.
Beyond that, there are plenty of runners-up for “worst” (or at least “most overrated”), beginning with THE DARK KNIGHT. Surprisingly, I found PERSEPOLIS entirely underwhelming (okay, so it came out in 2007, whatever).
While it’s far superior taken on its own to perhaps any other comedy of the year (which is saying what, exactly?), BURN AFTER READING was undeniably disappointing as a Coen brothers film. It may be their worst. That said, their two previous comedies, INTOLERABLE CRUELTY and THE LADYKILLERS are way underrated.
Like it or lump it, I thought THE X-FILES: I WANT TO BELIEVE was the best film I’ve seen all year.