Writer's Block: Rotten tomatoes
Jan. 19th, 2010 06:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Well, my answer's going to be skewed because the worst movies I've seen are probably a lot better than the worst movies that exist. I just don't see that many movies as it is, and I'm usually pretty good at screening out what's going to be a bad movie before I even bother to see it. I've never seen such notorious gold as Freddy Got Fingered or Howard the Duck, and why would I when I've heard they're so bad? And I tend not to put myself through the pain of watching a movie whose trailer already disgusts or bores me. So my pool is pretty small to begin with.
I know at least one person who likes each of these films, so I'm not saying they're crap on an objective standard-- I just really hated them. So take my thoughts with a grain of salt.
I've certainly changed channels on movies showing on TV, but usually because I didn't even see the beginning anyway or I was only curious to see part of it as it was. Usually if I explicitly sit down to watch a movie, I commit to watching all the way to the end for the sake of giving it a chance. However, while I've never walked out of a theater (but I see films in the theater so infrequently anyway), I did once turn off a DVD mid-film. Liz and I did a series of movie nights in late high school, trying to get caught up on good/well-known films since neither one of us had ever been very with-it in that regard. One night we watched Closer. I know a lot of people who like Closer-- and like it a lot-- and maybe I should give it another shot now that I'm older and perhaps can better relate to people's self-destructive impulses, but I just found myself disgusted with the selfishness of all the characters. I stopped liking them and I didn't care what happened to them. Liz felt the same way, and so about 2/3rds of the way in we turned it off and started another movie. I've been told that the ending makes all the difference and should redeem it for me, but out of curiosity I read the spoilers and I really don't see how that fixes anything. In fact, I thought it made it kind of dumber. But *shrug.* I'd be willing to watch it all the way through to give it another shot if anybody really wants me to (and shows up with the DVD so I don't have to rent it myself :-P).
The other films on my Worst list I did finish, but begrudgingly-- or at least out of a desperate hope that maybe there was something that made all that time and money worthwhile. I know Lisa is waiting for me to rant about The Lake House (which I have ranted about here before-- deus ex machina and breaches in timeline logic!), but I've seen enough romantic comedies to know that The Lake House is merely average in a category of mediocrity. I kind of feel like I have to give it a break because it is what it is. It'd be like holding it against a kid with a 60 IQ that they can't pass the standardized test for their age group. (Though, yes, I did just compare The Lake House to a retard :-P). I could just as easily put a few of the other romances and romantic comedies I've seen with messages I balk at or premises that make me pull strange faces while sucking air through my teeth.
Similarly, I feel like I can't hold it against The Bourne Supremacy that I hated it, either. I'm not much of an action-film person to begin with and I also lacked some context for the storyline, since I didn't see The Bourne Identity. Still, I thought that he was ultimately being really selfish. I know it's tempting to know why these people are after you, and you're pissed they needlessly went after your girlfriend, but regardless of whatever badass secret agent history you could turn out to have, your life is not worth the lives of the gazillions of innocent people getting mowed down all around you in all those fight and car-chase scenes. (Robert informs me he only kills two people, but I dunno-- I feel like there were an awful lot of deadly car crashes and shit going on. But maybe it was just to choppy for me to know what was going on. And Robert informs me there's an unspoken rule in action movies that if you don't see someone-- who isn't a "bad guy"-- die, they don't die, but I would like to cry "bullshit!" because I would like to know how anyone would survive some of the shit you see happening to innocent bystanders' cars, etc, on screen. I love you, baby, but this is one we're going to have to disagree on ;-P). I know what Bourne would answer on those "Would you give your life to save the lives of 10,000 others?" ethics questions. Jeez. But if you like revenge storylines, I can see how it'd be fun times.
And anyway, I've seen much worse since then. A VHS of Drop Dead Fred was left in my apartment, and back during my month without Internet it was one of the many I watched to occupy my time. This is supposedly a kids' movie, but there are swear words every ten seconds and quite a bit of implied sex. The protagonist is totally spineless, which is apparently the result of emotional abuse by both her mother and her husband-- and her imaginary friend emotionally abuses her just as badly as everyone else but apparently is justified because everyone else doesn't *really* love her and he does, or something. The scenarios in which Drop Dead Fred manipulates the girl (WHO WON'T JUST FREAKING IGNORE HIM) are embarrassing and hard-to-watch rather than amusing, and the ultimate message seems to be that straightlaced adulthood is borne of abusive parenting and we should all revert to a childhood of frankly destructive pranks that include destroying property and legitimately hurting people.
I am also horrified to discover that they are remaking this. I hope to dear God they can fix it.
There should be more to this list, I know there is, but I'm feeling sick-ish and irritable and getting irritated about old films isn't helping, lol. So I'm gonna go make some soup.
Well, my answer's going to be skewed because the worst movies I've seen are probably a lot better than the worst movies that exist. I just don't see that many movies as it is, and I'm usually pretty good at screening out what's going to be a bad movie before I even bother to see it. I've never seen such notorious gold as Freddy Got Fingered or Howard the Duck, and why would I when I've heard they're so bad? And I tend not to put myself through the pain of watching a movie whose trailer already disgusts or bores me. So my pool is pretty small to begin with.
I know at least one person who likes each of these films, so I'm not saying they're crap on an objective standard-- I just really hated them. So take my thoughts with a grain of salt.
I've certainly changed channels on movies showing on TV, but usually because I didn't even see the beginning anyway or I was only curious to see part of it as it was. Usually if I explicitly sit down to watch a movie, I commit to watching all the way to the end for the sake of giving it a chance. However, while I've never walked out of a theater (but I see films in the theater so infrequently anyway), I did once turn off a DVD mid-film. Liz and I did a series of movie nights in late high school, trying to get caught up on good/well-known films since neither one of us had ever been very with-it in that regard. One night we watched Closer. I know a lot of people who like Closer-- and like it a lot-- and maybe I should give it another shot now that I'm older and perhaps can better relate to people's self-destructive impulses, but I just found myself disgusted with the selfishness of all the characters. I stopped liking them and I didn't care what happened to them. Liz felt the same way, and so about 2/3rds of the way in we turned it off and started another movie. I've been told that the ending makes all the difference and should redeem it for me, but out of curiosity I read the spoilers and I really don't see how that fixes anything. In fact, I thought it made it kind of dumber. But *shrug.* I'd be willing to watch it all the way through to give it another shot if anybody really wants me to (and shows up with the DVD so I don't have to rent it myself :-P).
The other films on my Worst list I did finish, but begrudgingly-- or at least out of a desperate hope that maybe there was something that made all that time and money worthwhile. I know Lisa is waiting for me to rant about The Lake House (which I have ranted about here before-- deus ex machina and breaches in timeline logic!), but I've seen enough romantic comedies to know that The Lake House is merely average in a category of mediocrity. I kind of feel like I have to give it a break because it is what it is. It'd be like holding it against a kid with a 60 IQ that they can't pass the standardized test for their age group. (Though, yes, I did just compare The Lake House to a retard :-P). I could just as easily put a few of the other romances and romantic comedies I've seen with messages I balk at or premises that make me pull strange faces while sucking air through my teeth.
Similarly, I feel like I can't hold it against The Bourne Supremacy that I hated it, either. I'm not much of an action-film person to begin with and I also lacked some context for the storyline, since I didn't see The Bourne Identity. Still, I thought that he was ultimately being really selfish. I know it's tempting to know why these people are after you, and you're pissed they needlessly went after your girlfriend, but regardless of whatever badass secret agent history you could turn out to have, your life is not worth the lives of the gazillions of innocent people getting mowed down all around you in all those fight and car-chase scenes. (Robert informs me he only kills two people, but I dunno-- I feel like there were an awful lot of deadly car crashes and shit going on. But maybe it was just to choppy for me to know what was going on. And Robert informs me there's an unspoken rule in action movies that if you don't see someone-- who isn't a "bad guy"-- die, they don't die, but I would like to cry "bullshit!" because I would like to know how anyone would survive some of the shit you see happening to innocent bystanders' cars, etc, on screen. I love you, baby, but this is one we're going to have to disagree on ;-P). I know what Bourne would answer on those "Would you give your life to save the lives of 10,000 others?" ethics questions. Jeez. But if you like revenge storylines, I can see how it'd be fun times.
And anyway, I've seen much worse since then. A VHS of Drop Dead Fred was left in my apartment, and back during my month without Internet it was one of the many I watched to occupy my time. This is supposedly a kids' movie, but there are swear words every ten seconds and quite a bit of implied sex. The protagonist is totally spineless, which is apparently the result of emotional abuse by both her mother and her husband-- and her imaginary friend emotionally abuses her just as badly as everyone else but apparently is justified because everyone else doesn't *really* love her and he does, or something. The scenarios in which Drop Dead Fred manipulates the girl (WHO WON'T JUST FREAKING IGNORE HIM) are embarrassing and hard-to-watch rather than amusing, and the ultimate message seems to be that straightlaced adulthood is borne of abusive parenting and we should all revert to a childhood of frankly destructive pranks that include destroying property and legitimately hurting people.
I am also horrified to discover that they are remaking this. I hope to dear God they can fix it.
There should be more to this list, I know there is, but I'm feeling sick-ish and irritable and getting irritated about old films isn't helping, lol. So I'm gonna go make some soup.
