Best & Worst Movies you have ever seen [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Aedilred

2016-09-21, 01:53 AM

The Matrix? Really? Well, ok.

It's hard to distinguish "best films" from "films I really like an awful lot". For instance, The Wicker Man is a seriously flawed film, but I love it. South Park: Bigger Longer and Uncut is hardly a brilliant example cinematography, given its incredibly basic animation style, but it might just be my favourite comedy film of all time, and would make a strong case to be picked as my desert island film.

But anyway. Once Upon a Time in the West is one of my favourite films, and also a masterpiece. Amélie and The Lord of the Rings are good if not great films which I also happen to love. I think Chinatown deserves a mention too, and, while I don't think it's Scorsese's best film (that'd be The King of Comedy, imo), I have a lot of affection for The Departed.

When it comes to worst films, that's a little easier, albeit still with a degree of subjectivity. Probably the worst film I've ever seen was Rumble in Hong Kong, a film that's so badly shot it really makes you appreciate the craftmsanship that goes into a turkey like Jurassic Park 3, which was the first film I actively regretted watching. Unlike you, I thought The Matrix was good, and the second was pretty cool if the third could just make sense of it. But Matrix: Revolutions was such a complete pile of toss that it retrospectively ruined the second film, quite an accomplishment. I felt for a while that The Golden Compass might be the worst film I'd ever seen when its budget and source material were taken into account, and after seeing some of it on TV one day I remarked on that to my housemate. Fate conspired so that the next film to be shown was Transformers 2, which was such unspeakable garbage it redefined my idea of what a bad blockbuster looks like.

Ultimately, though, the prize has to go to the original 1960s version of Casino Royale. This is a film starring Peter Sellers, David Niven, Orson Welles, and Woody Allen, amongst a host of other smaller parts going to well-known movie stars, and when filmed was the longest and most expensive "Bond film" to date. It is almost unwatchably terrible: a plot so disjointed and nonsensical that it would almost qualify as dadaist if it had been in any way intentional rather than a reaction to circumstances; criminally badly-written with fewer laughs than the average "straight" Bond film; looking like it was shot on a potato and cut in a garden shed. Utter trash.

Jan Mattys

2016-09-21, 03:26 AM

I was about to reply "Best film? Once upon a time in the west", but Aedilred beat me to it.

So, best fil? Once upon a time in the West.
:D

Worst film? Probably Showgirls. It had titties and STILL managed to be utterly unwatchable. That requires some effort.

As fot the category "Films that had it all to be good but still managed to be bad", my vote goes to Peter Jackson's King Kong. Cut more or less an hour of useless action, and it could actually be very good. Pity.

Murk

2016-09-21, 06:07 AM

Aladdin is of course the best movie ever. No explanation needed.
Kingdom of Heaven is probably my biggest guilty pleasure - I know it is a silly action movie with Orlando Bloom, but somehow I still immensely enjoy it.
More recently, Spotlight was one of the few movies I've ever seen that I couldn't find any faults with - it was just all round decent and deserves an honorable mention for it.

As for worst, hm, that's tough, because I've seen a lot of bad movies recently.
I feel that I should take expectations and pretensions into account here. I mean, 50 shades of grey, Twilight, empty-headed action movies, etc., those are all horrible movies, but at least they do not claim to be anything else. They set out to be horrible movies for a specific audience, and they delivered. There's nothing really wrong with that, I think.
So, I'll list movies that did try to be something more, and failed horribly.
Emmanuelle was probably the most scarring movie I've ever seen. It hides manipulation, rape and abuse behind "female sexual liberty" and was actually praised for it in its time. It was horrible. (Also, very NSFW, which was horrible too.)
The Passion of the Christ deserves to be here, because this too hides a lot of blood and gore behind spirituality. If you want to watch at blood and gore, that's fine, but don't pretend it's anything more than that. If you do pretend, at least give it more of a story than "this dude is getting tortured".
I'm going to mention Jupiter Ascending too. Once again, it's much worse than every other young adult movie ever because it tried to be deep, interesting and thought-provoking, and was neither.
(Also, I very much dislike every Quentin Tarantino movie, but I think I should limit this list to 3 movies.)

Brother Oni

2016-09-21, 07:05 AM

My general metric for 'good movie' is something I want to watch more than once (I have a generally good memory for stories).

Best:
Hero - historically inspired film based on the attempted assassination of the Qin Emperor back in the 3nd century BC. Gorgeous cinematography, use of colour and a strong message of duty (although I would agree that it's very controversial). Just be aware that the western dub/subtitled version makes a critical translation error (in my opinion) than significantly alters the tone of the film - tianxia (天下) does NOT translate to 'Our Land'.

Once Upon A Time in China - martial arts film featuring Chinese folk lore hero, Wong Fei Hung. Covers a virtually unremembered period of history in the west (the exploitation of China by various Western powers and Japan, known as the Unequal Treaties) and the struggle of ancient traditions trying to survive in a rapidly modernising world.

Hard Boiled - classic 'Heroic Bloodshed' genre movie by John Woo. Although renown for its actions scenes, the single scene that sticks in my mind is the impromptu ceasefire between the antagonist's lieutenant and the second male lead to let civilians escape their frantic gun battle.

Worst:
A Serbian Movie
120 Days of Sodom

I couldn't finish either of these films, so they're only technically the worst films I've ever seen. There's an interesting political message and allegory behind A Serbian Movie, which makes it of (debatable) merit, but can't be discussed on this board.

Human Centipede franchise - again technically I haven't watched any of these films, but simply reading the synopses on Wikipedia made me ill (HC2 made me lose my appetite for 3 days).

thompur

2016-09-21, 08:58 AM

Best Movie: Casablanca. The incomparable Humphrey Bogart, the mesmerizing Ingrid Bergman, and an amazing supporting cast, with a brilliant screenplay! I've seen it a dozen times, and could watch it a dozen more!

Worst movie: Pluto Nash. Nothing else comes close for me. I had just seen The 13th Warrior at my local multiplex and had nothing else to do, so I snuck in to see the latest Eddie Murphy offering. I had enjoyed a lot of his films. He'd always been entertaining, so what the heck. After 10 minutes I was so pissed about the time I had wasted on this drivel that I was prepared to demand a refund! :smallfurious:

TurboGhast

2016-09-21, 09:41 AM

Best: Iron Man 2

Lost track of time during movie because it was so good, and was surprised when the credits started rolling because I thought that was just half of the movie. The rest of the MCU is also extremely good, I just noted this one because I have a specific memory relating to how good it is.

Worst: Fant4stic

I was bored by this movie. It kept seeming like it had plans to go somewhere, and then petered out before doing interesting things with them, resulting in two hours of buildup without payoff.

Dienekes

2016-09-21, 09:57 AM

Best would be Godfather 2, Duck Soup, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly and at the risk of a bunch of guys telling me how wrong I am TDK.

The worst is ABCs of Death. No question there are maybe 2 shorts of any merit the rest is some of the stupidest, pointless, crap I've ever seen. Not even in a shocking or gross way (though they certainly tried) just bad.

norival1992

2016-09-21, 11:37 AM

Worst: Son of the Mask
Best: Terminator 2

Hunter Noventa

2016-09-21, 11:48 AM

Hrmm..some of the best movies I've seen? The LEGO Movie, Castle of Cogliostro, Ghostbusters (1984), Toy Story 1-3 I like a lot of movies, but those are some of my all-time favorites.

I haven't seen as many outright bad movies. Mediocre ones, sure, but I think the only outright BAD movie I've watched is Battlefield Earth.

DoctorFaust

2016-09-21, 12:21 PM

Best would be Godfather 2, Duck Soup, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly and at the risk of a bunch of guys telling me how wrong I am TDK.

Is TDK supposed to be The Dark Knight? Because I might not think it's the best movie ever, but it is a damn good one, and probably the best Nolan Batman movie.

And it's really hard to say one individual best movie, but it would probably either be Star Wars IV, Terminator, or Duck Soup for me. And maybe Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory as well. And The Seven Samurai.

Worst is a lot harder to think of, as I can't actually remember any out-and-out had movies. Plenty of mediocre ones,but nothing I could in good conscience call the worst ever.

Ruslan

2016-09-21, 12:47 PM

Best, Schinder's List. Worst, Pixels .

Leewei

2016-09-21, 01:00 PM

Best: Blade Runner
Worst: Pink Flamingos (it passes right through "so bad its good" territory, then laps itself into "truly horrible")

Eldan

2016-09-21, 01:39 PM

Best:
Hero - historically inspired film based on the attempted assassination of the Qin Emperor back in the 3nd century BC. Gorgeous cinematography, use of colour and a strong message of duty (although I would agree that it's very controversial). Just be aware that the western dub/subtitled version makes a critical translation error (in my opinion) than significantly alters the tone of the film - tianxia (天下) does NOT translate to 'Our Land.

The Version I saw translated it as "All under Heaven". One of my favourites too.

Aedilred

2016-09-21, 02:19 PM

Worst film? Probably Showgirls. It had titties and STILL managed to be utterly unwatchable. That requires some effort.

Oh god, Showgirls. I have no idea what was supposed to be going on with that. It took me two sittings to get through it and at no point that I could identify was it any better than ridiculously terrible. Terrible acting, terrible dialogue, a disjointed plot that goes nowhere, gratuitous boobage everywhere, it's far too long... what was Verhoeven thinking? Apparently he still reckons it was pretty good and everyone missed the point.

Emmanuelle was probably the most scarring movie I've ever seen. It hides manipulation, rape and abuse behind "female sexual liberty" and was actually praised for it in its time. It was horrible. (Also, very NSFW, which was horrible too.)

Well, Emmanuelle is basically porn. That's not to say that the plot is any less a ridiculous, sleazy, unpleasant male fantasy, but once you recalibrate your expectations to take account of genre, it becomes a lot less shocking.

Velaryon

2016-09-21, 03:57 PM

I have a feeling I may pop in a few more times with more best and worst movies, but here are a few in each category that come to mind:

Best:

Terminator 2: The perfect action film, as far as I'm concerned. Also one of the few times a sequel greatly improved upon an already good first movie. I would change literally nothing about this film, not even obnoxious-brat-trying-way-too-hard-to-be-edgy-cool-kid Eddie Furlong as John Connor. You have Arnold Schwarzenegger delivering the best acting performance I've seen from him, while firmly within his comfort zone as stone-cold badass that throws wisecracks in between his awesome but still believable action scenes. You have Linda Hamilton as one of the most badass moms in cinematic history who stays strong even when nobody believes in her. You have Robert Patrick as the perfectly passionless and nearly invincible terrifying villain. And everything else came together just right as well.

The Princess Bride: I cannot believe I'm the first one to mention this. Action, comedy, romance, and drama all wrapped up in one, with simple fairy-tale characters who nonetheless play the heartstrings like an expert harpist. I don't have a lot to say about this movie because so little needs to be said. Even the side characters have memorable lines and scenes. There's a reason this movie continues to be beloved even by people who weren't born yet when it came out.

Worst:

Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter: This could have been awesome in a B-movie kind of way, but the execution fails terribly, partially due to obviously having less than no budget, partly due to terrible acting by everyone involved, and partly due to an odd mix of trying too hard and not trying hard enough. For those who haven't seen it, the plot is something like this: vampires are hatching some kind of crazy plot involving harvesting skin from lesbians in order to walk in the daylight. God is not cool with this, so he sends his son Jesus back to Earth to stop them, via martial arts. Jesus fails to get the job done at first, so he enlists legendary Mexican wrestler El Santo (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santo) to get the job done. There's even a musical number in there somewhere.
Sounds like a great way to spend a Friday night, right? It would be, except that everything is just unbelievably awful and amateurish, to the point where it's too bad even to laugh at.

Thankskilling: Another one that deliberately tried to be "so bad it's good" but missed the mark completely. It's a slasher movie in which the killer is a Thanksgiving turkey. Yeah. Throw in the most obnoxious cast of teens ever to grace a slasher film, one-liners so cringeworthy that even Schwarzenegger would balk at saying them aloud, and unbelievably stupid and contrived death scenes, and there's literally nothing good I can say about this film except that I'm glad it was short. They were clearly going for a Nightmare on Elm Street kind of thing where you root for the villain because of his witty lines and such, but it just didn't work.

Fargo: I fully expect to be the only one who hated this movie, and for others to tell me how wrong I am. It certainly wouldn't be the first time. I have absolutely no idea how this movie won awards. It's supposed to be a dark comedy, but pretty much all the "humor" seems to revolve around the idea that "Gosh, people from Minnesota are so cheerful and quirky!" Not even Steve Buscemi could save this turd.

BiblioRook

2016-09-21, 04:00 PM

I honestly have no clue how I would go about picking a 'Best' movie. Personal enjoyment? I don't know, even through my own tastes I'm well aware that most kinds of movies I get enjoyment out of wouldn't hold up much under scrutiny (even my own if I just stopped to think about them a bit).

Naming 'Bad' movies can be tricky too for the same reasons, but not necessarily as difficult. One easy criteria is just holding it up to expectation, and for that 'The Last Airbender' quickly comes to mind. I mean it's bad for other reasons too, it's one thing to take something people were looking forward to and not come close to doing it justice but it's another thing altogether the go around and accuse the very people who were looking forward to it but didn't enjoy it as 'not getting it' and try to instead pat yourself on the back for the scope of your artistic vision. No, I doubt there are many that would argue against 'The Last Airbender' being anything but a truly horrible example of a film.

Murk

2016-09-22, 02:21 AM

Well, Emmanuelle is basically porn. That's not to say that the plot is any less a ridiculous, sleazy, unpleasant male fantasy, but once you recalibrate your expectations to take account of genre, it becomes a lot less shocking.

That is true, but I was working on a "classics" list in the time (a long list of classic films that were highly praised in their days) and somehow it slipped past my defenses. Probably because of all the feminist praise it got.

Y'know, Seinfeld always made Rochelle Rochelle seem somehow interesting. Now I wish I could have seen that one instead.

One easy criteria is just holding it up to expectation, and for that 'The Last Airbender' quickly comes to mind. I mean it's bad for other reasons too, it's one thing to take something people were looking forward to and not come close to doing it justice but it's another thing altogether the go around and accuse the very people who were looking forward to it but didn't enjoy it as 'not getting it' and try to instead pat yourself on the back for the scope of your artistic vision. No, I doubt there are many that would argue against 'The Last Airbender' being anything but a truly horrible example of a film.

This one would probably be number four on my list. I think there's only three movies ever that I did not watch to the end, and this is one of them (the other two being the Scorch Trials and Movie 43, which would probably be number five and six, respectively)

Aedilred

2016-09-22, 02:21 AM

The Princess Bride

Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter

Fargo

I enjoyed JCVH in a "so bad it's good" way, but didn't like The Princess Bride at all. I didn't dislike Fargo but I found it hard to see what all the fuss was about.

Yora

2016-09-22, 02:24 AM

Best movie might well have been Inception.

Worst quite certainly Dungeons & Dragons.

TeChameleon

2016-09-22, 07:50 AM

Heh- Castle of Cagliostro, Princess Bride, Duck Soup (that mirror sequence remains hands down one of the most brilliant pieces of physical comedy in the history of cinema) and Terminator 2 are all up there for me, along with Jackie Chan's Who Am I, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (I'd hold it up as the best Batman movie, full stop), and RED (the Bruce Willis vehicle- it was just fun), but the movie I'd say is my personal 'best movie'?

The Blues Brothers. With its amazing cast, brilliant soundtrack, and hilarious script, it's one of the only movies I can watch repeatedly and enjoy every time.

As for worst?

Hrm. I've probably sat through some serious clunkers, but I don't tend to retain them very well. Probably Event Horizon- I watched about ten minutes, predicted the rest of the film, and wandered off to play Total Annihilation in another room >.O Granted, I generally can't stand horror movies, so there's that.

Of course, there's always Fantasy Mission Force, but that one's more... well, not just 'so bad it's good', but more 'gloriously incomprehensible trainwreck of amazingness with occasional very young Jackie Chan cameos'.

Given that the 'plot' (and I use the term advisedly) involves a sort of Chinese Dirty Dozen being rounded up and sent to rescue 'the Allied Generals' during World War II... said generals including Abraham Lincoln in a vaguely-WWII-ish uniform for some insane reason... and travelling from what appears to be Victoria Island in the extreme North of Canada to... someplace in China, I think..? by Jeep (entirely over land, naturally) to where the (extremely Japanese-looking) Germans have taken the Generals... there's also a treasure of some description involved, a very young, pre-stardom Jackie Chan keeps wandering in and out of the film for no readily apparent reason, and the big showdown in the climax involves the Germans(?) attacking while driving a wave of Mad-Max-esque be-swastikaed 1970s-vintage American muscle cars (one of which has a huge Star of David painted on the roof!!), and that's barely even the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the sheer disjointed weird of this movie.

It's the cinematic equivalent of an out-of-body experience. If you are a fan of bad movies, insane movies, or movies where Jackie Chan randomly turns up every once in a while to beat the hell out of everyone else, this is one to watch. Just don't blame me for any PTSD flashbacks of it afterwards :smallamused:

Murk

2016-09-22, 12:47 PM

Given that the 'plot' (and I use the term advisedly) involves a sort of Chinese Dirty Dozen being rounded up and sent to rescue 'the Allied Generals' during World War II... said generals including Abraham Lincoln in a vaguely-WWII-ish uniform for some insane reason... and travelling from what appears to be Victoria Island in the extreme North of Canada to... someplace in China, I think..? by Jeep (entirely over land, naturally) to where the (extremely Japanese-looking) Germans have taken the Generals... there's also a treasure of some description involved, a very young, pre-stardom Jackie Chan keeps wandering in and out of the film for no readily apparent reason, and the big showdown in the climax involves the Germans(?) attacking while driving a wave of Mad-Max-esque be-swastikaed 1970s-vintage American muscle cars (one of which has a huge Star of David painted on the roof!!), and that's barely even the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the sheer disjointed weird of this movie.

This sounds like a piece of art.

Knaight

2016-09-22, 04:19 PM

I've spaced the titles for most of the movies that might qualify for best, but I'm going to second Hero and add Persepolis. I also deeply enjoyed Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels as well as In Bruges, but that's clearly an idiosyncratic taste thing more than anything. There's also some Coen Brother's movies, most notably Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?.

As for worst, I've seen some real dross. The absolute worst was a bit of political propaganda that got mailed out during a presidential campaign by some third party and was immediately disavowed by the person it was in support of - for whatever reason my family was on the small list of people targeted. I can't give details because of forum rules, but it was hilariously bad. Other dross that I've seen was another "documentary" that was poorly made propoganda, an entirely too large chunk of the Adam Sandler catalog, and a fascinating little gem called Kangaroo Jack.

The Passion of the Christ deserves to be here, because this too hides a lot of blood and gore behind spirituality. If you want to watch at blood and gore, that's fine, but don't pretend it's anything more than that. If you do pretend, at least give it more of a story than "this dude is getting tortured".
Back in my missionary-homeschool-coop days, the school decided that it would be a good idea to show this movie to the student body. I was 12, and a good four years older than the youngest person in the room.

Yeah.

tomandtish

2016-09-22, 04:49 PM

Of course, there's always Fantasy Mission Force, but that one's more... well, not just 'so bad it's good', but more 'gloriously incomprehensible trainwreck of amazingness with occasional very young Jackie Chan cameos'.

Given that the 'plot' (and I use the term advisedly) involves a sort of Chinese Dirty Dozen being rounded up and sent to rescue 'the Allied Generals' during World War II... said generals including Abraham Lincoln in a vaguely-WWII-ish uniform for some insane reason... and travelling from what appears to be Victoria Island in the extreme North of Canada to... someplace in China, I think..? by Jeep (entirely over land, naturally) to where the (extremely Japanese-looking) Germans have taken the Generals... there's also a treasure of some description involved, a very young, pre-stardom Jackie Chan keeps wandering in and out of the film for no readily apparent reason, and the big showdown in the climax involves the Germans(?) attacking while driving a wave of Mad-Max-esque be-swastikaed 1970s-vintage American muscle cars (one of which has a huge Star of David painted on the roof!!), and that's barely even the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the sheer disjointed weird of this movie.

It's the cinematic equivalent of an out-of-body experience. If you are a fan of bad movies, insane movies, or movies where Jackie Chan randomly turns up every once in a while to beat the hell out of everyone else, this is one to watch. Just don't blame me for any PTSD flashbacks of it afterwards :smallamused:

This sounds like a piece of art.

This actually sounds awesome.... :smallbiggrin: Or at least like Kung Fury with more than a Kick Starter Budget.

Aran Thule

2016-09-23, 05:27 AM

I haven't seen as many outright bad movies. Mediocre ones, sure, but I think the only outright BAD movie I've watched is Battlefield Earth.

That gets my vote for worst movie.

Best Films for me:
Aliens
Brazil (Bob Hoskins has the best death scene ever)
Guilty pleasure can't decide between Mortal Kombat and Transformers the Movie

Cheesegear

2016-09-23, 06:14 AM

Best:
Aliens, Die Hard, Malcolm X, Toy Story, Casablanca, Blade Runner, A Clockwork Orange, The French Connection, Apocalypse Now, The Shining, and of course...The Wild Bunch...Of course, no 'best films' list would ever be complete without The Shawshank Redemption. It really is a very, very well made film.

I'll throw in an honorable mention to The Maltese Falcon. In fact, just throw in an honourable mention to all of Humphrey Bogart's major roles.

Worst:
I'm just going to discount indie films and vanity projects. Its far, far, far easier to make a bad movie than it is to make a good movie, and the list of 'worst movies I've ever seen' could very well be endless.

However, the only one of note that I feel is fair, is the only movie that I've ever felt the need to walk out on (I don't walk out of movies at the cinema on general principle); The Host (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1517260/). I have to link it, because some people have confused it before, with the good one (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0468492/?ref_=nv_sr_2).

MikelaC1

2016-09-23, 07:40 AM

I can watch Oceans 11 any number of times and still enjoy it.

But Clooney also starred in one of the bigger clunkers out there, The American. I cant believe I paid money to see that one.

Rysto

2016-09-23, 12:44 PM

I'm not sure what the best movie I ever saw was, but the worst was, hands-down, Nurse Betty. It's supposedly a comedy, but the opening scene involved a grisly murder via scalping, which was shown rather graphically. Way to set the tone for your movie, guys.

2D8HP

2016-09-24, 12:47 PM

First the "guilty pleasure" movies:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a6/Seventh_voyage_of_sinbad.jpg/220px-Seventh_voyage_of_sinbad.jpg

Seventh Yoyage of Sinbad

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/60/Excalibur_movie_poster.jpg/220px-Excalibur_movie_poster.jpg

Excalibur

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/74/FirstMenontheMoon.jpg/225px-FirstMenontheMoon.jpg

First Men in the Moon

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3d/Brown%2Cr_time_macine60.jpg/220px-Brown%2Cr_time_macine60.jpg

The Time Machine

Next, films that got me to cry or cheer:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/9f/Wrathposters141.jpg/220px-Wrathposters141.jpg

The Grapes of Wrath

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b3/CasablancaPoster-Gold.jpg/220px-CasablancaPoster-Gold.jpg

Casablanca

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/99/Falconm.JPG/220px-Falconm.JPG

The Maltese Falcon (http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=boZoLR17If8)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/35/Double_indemnity.jpg/220px-Double_indemnity.jpg

Double Indemity (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=S3wjJcuGsVE)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/21/ThirdManUSPoster.jpg/220px-ThirdManUSPoster.jpg

The Third Man (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M7d9VpSdGhA)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/75/Vertigomovie_restoration.jpg/220px-Vertigomovie_restoration.jpg

Vertigo (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5jvQwwHQNY)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/29/Johnny_Got_His_Gun_poster.jpg/250px-Johnny_Got_His_Gun_poster.jpg

Johnny Got His Gun

I used to work at a video rental store, and I was able to get in free at the old UC Theatre, so I've sat through a lot of good and bad films, and picking a "worst" is hard, but I'll settle on a movie that I couldn't even watch 10 minutes of, as (despite having at least two good actors) it was both boring and disgusting:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/d/d1/Caligulaposter.jpg/220px-Caligulaposter.jpg

Caligula

*shudder*

Aedilred

2016-09-24, 01:16 PM

Vertigo (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5jvQwwHQNY)
While I can acknowledge Vertigo as an accomplished film, I have been unable to see why it's so highly rated. Among Hitchcock's own films I rather prefer both North by Northwest and Rear Window, and I'd be tempted to put Rebecca up there too.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/d/d1/Caligulaposter.jpg/220px-Caligulaposter.jpg

Caligula

*shudder*
Oh boy. I watched this a couple of years ago and did a fairly extensive review on another forum. Some excerpts:

It should make for compelling viewing. It's a good story, and the film leaves itself plenty of room to tell it, a full two and a half hours. But it's a disaster. The film's a sprawling behemoth which is narratively and cinematographically all over the place, the whole thing overlaid with a background of writhing naked flesh regularly veering into the outright pornographic, which makes the entire production feel distasteful and slightly sticky. The opening gives the sense that while what follows is likely to be trashy, it's probably going to be fun. If anything, it's almost the reverse: the narrative seems to be aiming for "high art" even if it falls well short of that, while the elements apparently inserted to liven things up serve to make the experience unpleasant rather than entertaining.

...

It's [an] absence of restraint from a genuine director and editor in good faith that really kills the film. The narrative is messy, but that's largely because it keeps losing focus and is surrounded by flab. The star performances are actually pretty good: Gielgud is forgettable, but O'Toole and Mirren are clearly enjoying themselves, and McDowell takes things seriously; he's just as good as in A Clockwork Orange. Apparently DiCaprio used McDowell here as a reference point for his Jordan Belfort in Wolf of Wall Street. But those performances are all lost in the sea of gratuitous boobs and genitals.

A few critics talk of Caligula as a good film fighting to escape from a bad one, and I can see their point. With a really ruthless edit, and cutting almost all the really gratuitous sex shots - which wouldn't be hard as thanks to Brass's stubbornness they're almost entirely separated from the actually important material - it could be made respectable. There is a 105-minute version which attempts exactly that, and maybe one day I'll watch it, but I'm not minded to endure another 100 minutes of this stuff any time soon. A lot of the erotic material is fundamentally uncuttable since it's in the background of otherwise important shots (how the lead actors kept their composure I will never know) but with the close-ups and intercut scenes removed, it would be enough to bring it down (or up) to the level of, say, Eyes Wide Shut. And also thanks to Brass's sensibilities, the film fails on the level of titillation or erotica. There's sex all over the place, but it's overlaid with such violence and nastiness and general squick that I can't imagine anyone but the worst people would actually find it arousing if viewed in context.

...

So is it worth watching? Ultimately, no. I think, unless you're interested in an academic sense to see a moment in cinematic history and a particularly unpleasant example of how executive meddling can destroy films, there's really nothing here: certainly nothing in the way of enjoyment. McDowell does his best to save the film, but he can't and doesn't. A good performance in isolation is still ultimately just that and the rest of the film is so horrible that it's just not worth it.

I'm not in the habit of giving out "star ratings", but just so we're clear, it gets one. Out of ten, out of five, it doesn't really matter. And that star is entirely for the lead actors' performances. Yeah.

...

The film is kind of an assault on the eyeballs - not so much on the stomach, as with other contemporary exploitation films, but nevertheless enough I think to make it a gruelling experience.

kind of ironic and funny, I think, that [I]Game of Thrones (and other similar shows) feel the need to insert sex scenes to keep the viewers from getting bored, including the notorious "sexposition" where important plot points are relayed over bouncing nudity. The snooty among us sniff at this, but it does seem to work even on people who should know better. But in Caligula I think it's almost the other way round: the sex gets in the way of the plot, and rather than keeping us interested it makes us want to turn it off. Maybe it's because the sex is so explicit, and/or because the film's atmosphere is so generally seedy. I don't know.

Avilan the Grey

2016-09-24, 01:21 PM

Disclaimer: I care where little about "good" as in "Critically acclaimed" or "Artistic" or whatever.

Best movies (Just picking 10 of my favorites, can't really pick):
Ghostbusters
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Guns Of Navarrone
The Lion King
Frozen
Rango
For a Fistful Of Dollars
The Good, The Bad and the Ugly
Back To The Future (the entire trilogy)
The Lord Of The Rings (the entire trilogy).

This leaves out for example Star Wars (the original trilogy) that are JUUUUST outside the top 10.
About worst movies: I tend to have pretty good radar; I tend to actually avoid movies I really hate. This leaves out movies that are obviously bad, but so bad they are good btw, like say Puma Man or Dr Goldfoot & The Bikini Machine.

Worst movies that I have actually watched:
Matrix II and III
Any jaws after II
Any Alien after II
All Aliens vs Predator movies
War of the Worlds (Tom Cruise one)
Blade Trinity
The Room
Mars Needs Moms
The Fantastic Four: Silver Surfer

factotum

2016-09-24, 02:05 PM

Best: most of Pixar's output, especially Toy Story, the original Star Wars trilogy, Lord of the Rings movies, the good non-Abrams Star Treks (especially Wrath of Khan). These are the movies that, despite me having watched them before, I would be perfectly happy to sit down and watch again, and given how few movies I watch, that's sufficient grounds for calling them the best.

Worst: the only movie which I ever paid to see and walked out before the end because I decided wasting my time was worse than wasting the money for the ticket: Inspector Gadget. A wretched, wretched film that ought to be expunged from existence.

Wardog

2016-09-24, 02:28 PM

Guilty pleasure can't decide between Mortal Kombat and Transformers the Movie

No need to feel guilty about liking Transformers the Movie.

On the other hand, Bayformers II: Revenge of the Racist Stereotypes has to rank pretty high on my list of worst movies.

Its not the worst I've ever seen (not quite sure what is), but for bad movies I'll also nominate Barb Wire (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barb_Wire_(film)). Not least for the unbelievable ability of the creators to take the premise "Leather-clad biker-babechick fighting Nazis in a post-apoacalyptic future" and make a bad movie out of it. (At the very least, they should have managed a good bad movie, but its just bad).

Mister Tom

2016-09-24, 03:02 PM

There's so many ways a film -could- be the best one... But one that you would unhesitatingly watch again is a good criterion. in no particular order:

LA Confidential
Spirited Away
Cidade de deus (City of God)
Blade runner, again
Stardust (one for all you princess bride fans)
Delicatessen
Pan's Labyrinth

Really want to see some of the others mentioned now, especially hero, which is occasionally shown in the uk but always too late at night...

Worst film - spoilered to avoid stabbing over any unpleasant memories - would be Superman IV which even as a young child I remember clearly sucking. Dishonourable mention to Sharknado 3: Oh hell no, 5 minutes of which I felt strangely compelled to watch.

2D8HP

2016-09-24, 04:33 PM

I want to give a shout out to a haunting film:
King of Hearts (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_of_Hearts_(1966_film))

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/8/8d/Kingofhearts2.JPG/220px-Kingofhearts2.JPG

Which is neither a best or a worst. I could have listed it in my previous post as one "that made me cry", but it's a "flawed" movie, as it drags, and at times seems contrived and artificial, but I recommend seeing it if your in the right mood.

A First World War British soldier is sent to disarm a bomb the Germans have left that will destroy a French village. He tries to convince the strangely childlike few remaining villagers to evacuate without success.
The "villagers" are the escaped inmates of a local insane asylum, who took over when the village was evacuated, which the Scot comes to realize.
Later, after witnessing a group of French and a group of German soldiers march past each other, at first obliviously, and then when almost past each other, realizing each others presence, they shoot each other dead, the British soldier strips off all his clothing except for his helmet, and with his rifle slung on his back, and carrying a birdcage and otherwise naked, he knocks on the door of the re-occupied insane asylum, presumably to be admitted.

WaerXO

2016-09-25, 03:00 PM

Favorites are easy
Grosse Pointe Blank, Empire Strikes Back, Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly), 13th Warrior, Kelly's Heroes (Donald Sutherland was absolutely fantastic as Oddball)

Worst
The Piano, 2001, Pulp Fiction, are my top 3. I have never been able to comprehend how these are acclaimed at all.

Kato

2016-09-26, 01:39 AM

Worst
The Piano, 2001, Pulp Fiction, are my top 3. I have never been able to comprehend how these are acclaimed at all.

Really? I'm not the biggest fan of 2001 either but Pulp Fiction? Though I guess it's a movie that somewhat requires the right mind set to enjoy.

Oh boy, I'm terrible at these things... Because I like most things about equally well. I guess my favorite would have to be something comedic, a Mel Brooks piece, or maybe something by Simon Pegg. I do like other movies, too, but generally much less so.

Worst movies... Well, I guess the most clichee answer I can think of is Twilight. :smallfrown:
But in general, I enjoy many movies other consider terrible, and I can enjoy a bad movie for how bad it is. Something that really turns me off though, are movies which claim to be great cinema or deep or such a thing but come off as merely... beh.
Melancholia would be one such example...
Oh, and of course then there is Last Airbender........

moossabi

2016-09-26, 01:37 PM

The best movie that I've seen would have to be Monty Python and the Holy Grail, despite its current meme status.

As for worst... Well, objectively, it has to be either Manos: the Hands of Fate or the Star Wars Holiday Special. However, they just end up as guilty pleasures for me (alongside Cool Cat Saves the Kids and the animated Titanic trilogy). The only movie that I have ever stopped watching because of how awful it is would have to be Conan the Destroyer. The first movie is one of my favorites for its balance of epicness and cheese, but the sequel just really pissed me off. The supporting characters' acting was atrocious without being goofy, the plot made no sense without going over the edge of insanity, and in the end it was just so bland that I couldn't bring myself to finish it.

I really need to check out that Jackie Chan movie though...

Peelee

2016-09-26, 02:38 PM

TeChameleon

2016-09-26, 05:57 PM

Oh man, we have incredibly similar taste, it seems. Though if you've seen Fantasy Mission Force, have you been able to check out some of his other old stuff? None are really as weird as FMF, but some like Spiritual Kung Fu and Half a Loaf of Kung Fu match it for badness (which, considering they at least have coherent plots, may well speak even worse for them). I own more Jackie Chan DVDs than most people even know exist. It's a terrible, glorious thing. May he never stop making movies.

Anyway. As for best (that haven't been mentioned so far), Life Is Beautiful is pretty much near the top of my list, and I absolutely loved Stardust. Was one of the movies I had to watch while working as a projectionist to make sure it was built right, and about the only movie I ever had to screen that I eventually didn't even see the damn cues.
After a quick scan of Jackie's filmography, looks like the oldest one I can recall seeing after Fantasy Mission Force is Project A, which, while entertaining vintage Jackie Chan, is nowhere near the bizarre lunacy and wonderful awfulness of Fantasy Mission Force.

... and mention of 'movies you've walked out on' triggered a memory I would rather have left buried. I gave up on Constantine a fairly short way in, deciding that I would rather sit in the lobby and stare into space for another couple of hours (as my ride was still watching the movie -_-;) than have any further braincells killed by Keanu Reaves' "acting". Argleblargle :smallyuk:

Peelee

2016-09-27, 07:10 AM

After a quick scan of Jackie's filmography, looks like the oldest one I can recall seeing after Fantasy Mission Force is Project A, which, while entertaining vintage Jackie Chan, is nowhere near the bizarre lunacy and wonderful awfulness of Fantasy Mission Force.

... and mention of 'movies you've walked out on' triggered a memory I would rather have left buried. I gave up on Constantine a fairly short way in, deciding that I would rather sit in the lobby and stare into space for another couple of hours (as my ride was still watching the movie -_-;) than have any further braincells killed by Keanu Reaves' "acting". Argleblargle :smallyuk:

Fun little bit of Jackie CHAN movie weirdness that is entirely US's fault: you can own both DVDS of the different films Operation Condor 2: The Armour of God, and Armour of God 2: Operation Condor. That's right, we let him have an infinitely repeating series in just 2 movies.

And I didn't mean I walked out on Stardust; no seeing the cues means I didn't notice the markings that denoted reel changes, so that you know what reel you're in if a problem pops up. Fight Club made note of it in a pretty effective way, actually. Once you're trained to look for em, it's almost impossible to not see them anymore; i was just trying to say how engrossed I was in the movie.

Though I did end up walking out of Twilight, which I regret to this day. I had go idea what it was, but had a former coworker friend who wanted to see it. No biggie, i could get a couple people in free before the official release, so why not; only thing is, i had to watch it as well. Another coworker friend (who likewise had no idea what it was) sat in on it with me, and we end up making fun of how bad it is and eventually walk out like half an hour in. What makes me regret this is, I didn't know the whiny wooden plank would freaking glitter in the sunlight, which i would have loved see. It just sounds so bad. Alas, my lack of knowledge made me walk before we hit that scene, and I refuse to slog through it again just for that (and I've been told YouTube videos on it didn't do it justice, and we're really washed out). Ah, the folly of youth.

Cheesegear

2016-09-27, 07:37 AM

Though I did end up walking out of Twilight, which I regret to this day.

As a story first, Twilight has a lot of problems. The plot sucks, the characters suck (and the ones who actually are interesting, don't get screen/page time) and the story just...Sucks.

As a movie, well, it's very competently done. The wire-fu on the forest-running scene is LOLsobad, but there are some actual good, individual scenes. It's by far from one of the worst movies I've seen. Did I enjoy it? Not really. Actually...No. Definitely no. But, I'm not the target audience, and I understand that. I know why people who do like it, like it. But I will never be one of those people - and that's okay. But it is...Competent, at what it does, and, at least achieves a moderate amount of accuracy to its source material - probably why its bad, though - which, at least appeals to fans of the books.

Drascin

2016-09-27, 07:50 AM

Hrm. Hard question. I can rave endlessly about good movies, but bad movies I tend to just... forget entirely. I have been thinking for the last ten minutes trying to remember which could be the worst movie I've ever seen, and it's being really damn hard to even put names and titles to the vague snippets in my head.

For my favorite movies, though... I think the first How To Train Your Dragon is pretty high up there, as are Pacific Rim, Blade Runner, or Jurassic Park (which had an incredible impact in me as a little kid and shaped what I would expect of movies forevermore. It was my first real big non-animated movie, and I love it to this day, though I find it hard to separate how much is nostalgia and how much is the movie genuinely being pretty cool), just off the top of my head.

DustyBottoms

2016-09-27, 07:53 AM

Best movies: Hot Fuzz, Star Wars, and Shrek & Shrek 2 are all easy choices for me, but the under-the-radar pick of mine and definite #1 is Three Amigos. Chevy Chase, Martin Short, and Steve Martin - one of those almost-cult films that anyone who has seen it can quote half the movie's scenes. Highly recommended.

Worst movies? Zombeavers, I think was the name - found it on Netflix, was so beyond bad it went past the "so bad it's good" territory. The live action The Last Airbender movie was also atrocious, as has been pointed out before.

Eldan

2016-09-27, 08:31 AM

Movies I've walked out of is an interesting one. I usually only see, three, four movies a year in cinema, and only when I'm pretty convinced I might like them. I've never walked out of one. There were three were the entire movie-going group debated walking out on, though: Cowboy vs. Aliens, Taken 3and Ant-Man. The first two were just dull and boring, with unengaged actors and uninteresting action, but the third I thought was terrible in every way. Every "joke" made me cringe, the story was a mess, the action wasn't particularly engaging, I wanted to punch the lead actor in his face every time he opened his mouth he was so annoying and a lot of it just plain made no sense.

That said, none of them are the worst. Those are usually movies I download on a whim and watch at home.

Somensjev

2016-09-27, 08:37 AM

best movies: probably the star wars movies, deadpool, and maybe captain america: civil war (which, although laughably bad in some parts, was an over all enjoyable film)

worst movies? well, i had the displeasure of watching both The Last Airbender (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Airbender) and (slightly older than that) Dragonball Evolution (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonball_Evolution), both in the first week or two of their runs in the cinemas. Those two movies, within about a year of each other, put me off live-action movies for quite a while :smallyuk:

Worst movies? Zombeavers, I think was the name - found it on Netflix, was so beyond bad it went past the "so bad it's good" territory.

i'm actually going to see this on Halloween, because some of my friends are running a horror movie marathon that night, and wanted a "so bad it's good" movie as a break in the middle, for something to laugh at, this was the recommendation, after reading the plot synopsis, i question that decision :smalleek:

DustyBottoms

2016-09-27, 09:54 AM

i'm actually going to see this on Halloween, because some of my friends are running a horror movie marathon that night, and wanted a "so bad it's good" movie as a break in the middle, for something to laugh at, this was the recommendation, after reading the plot synopsis, i question that decision :smalleek:

It can definitely still be a "so bad it's good" movie, if only just.

As far as movies I've walked out of... never actually done it, but considered it a few times. Wish I had for The Last Airbender. :smallmad:

Peelee

2016-09-27, 10:10 AM

As a story first, Twilight has a lot of problems. The plot sucks, the characters suck (and the ones who actually are interesting, don't get screen/page time) and the story just...Sucks.

As a movie, well, it's very competently done. The wire-fu on the forest-running scene is LOLsobad, but there are some actual good, individual scenes. It's by far from one of the worst movies I've seen. Did I enjoy it? Not really. Actually...No. Definitely no. But, I'm not the target audience, and I understand that. I know why people who do like it, like it. But I will never be one of those people - and that's okay. But it is...Competent, at what it does, and, at least achieves a moderate amount of accuracy to its source material - probably why its bad, though - which, at least appeals to fans of the books.

I can understand that, but keep in mind, I knew nothing of it when I went to see it. As you point out, the story is bad and the characters are forgettable. At the time, I thought the acting was stale, but i have since learned that they were effectively representing the characters very well.... which didn't matter much, since boring is boring regardless of why it's boring.

Also, it's much easier to walk out of a movie when it's free.

Rodin

2016-09-27, 10:33 AM

Wing Commander wins a prize for me as the only movie so bad it gave me a migraine. The only movie I've ever walked out of, and that was to go throw up in the bushes outside the cinema due to the splitting headache.

To give you an idea of how bad a movie has to be before I don't like it, I legitimately enjoyed Batman & Robin. Okay, I was 15 at the time so my judgement was questionable, but I still remember liking it. I also enjoyed Super Mario Bros., although that one at least was a rental.

factotum

2016-09-27, 10:39 AM

Movies I've walked out of is an interesting one. I usually only see, three, four movies a year in cinema, and only when I'm pretty convinced I might like them.

I'm the same, which is why walking out of a movie sticks in the mind for me--for it to be so irredeemably bad that I chose to do that in the first place!

Kato

2016-09-27, 11:45 AM

To give you an idea of how bad a movie has to be before I don't like it, I legitimately enjoyed Batman & Robin. Okay, I was 15 at the time so my judgement was questionable, but I still remember liking it. I also enjoyed Super Mario Bros., although that one at least was a rental.

I was even younger back then and I am not ashamed to say I liked them back then. Even now while certainly bad movies... tey're not "as" bad as some people claim. They're mostly... very stupid and insulting to the source material. But SMB as a stand alone sci-fi movie wouldn't be horrible and B&R is just way, way more Adam West than it should be.

As for walking out on a movie... there is ONE I remember almost doing it. (I really rarely go see movies but there was a time when I went to a sneak preview about once a week with no idea what would come. This was one of those times.) I have no idea anymore what the title was, I feel like one main character was kind of famous... but the thing is, it was just one of those movies I just have no interest in, that is a sappy story about suffering people, in this case children with... cancer? I think it was cancer. And it was like 90 minutes non-stop trying to get you to cry and I was caught between laughing and smacking my head against something hard...

norival1992

2016-09-27, 11:54 AM

worst: Cyberbully
best: Goodfellas.

Kitten Champion

2016-09-27, 12:08 PM

I can't really think of a "best" even in subjective terms there are a few films I've seen which accomplished something worth preserving for future generations as an example of the cinematic medium. That jockeying for number one among them is ultimately pointless. However, my favourite movie which also intersects with being among the best ever made is The Seven Samurai. A masterfully produced, compelling epic that lived up to it's reputation in a way I don't often experience when dealing with noteworthy classics I've been confronted with.

As to the worst, I genuinely can't say. I could trot out a cinematic scapegoat to slaughter it for you all among the purest dreck I've seen and hold some antipathy towards, but I kind of prefer having a negative reaction to a work - or any kind of emotional reaction - to simply being bored and forgetting it as I'm experiencing it. If I could recall the title of such a movie, it would then be enough to discount it from contention in the first place, sort of a Catch-22.

Cristo Meyers

2016-09-27, 01:36 PM

Movies I've walked out of is an interesting one. I usually only see, three, four movies a year in cinema, and only when I'm pretty convinced I might like them.

Same here. If I'm seeing a move in-theatre, then it's already been pretty well vetted. I just don't have enough interest in most films to see something on a whim.

Thinking of any particular best and worst is difficult. There's no one movie, or even set of movies, that I'll just come back to over and over and if one is so bad that I'll avoid it like the plague, well then I haven't seen it. I'm fond of Jacob's Ladder, and Focus had one of the better 'this is how you pickpocket' sequences I've seen, but it's also been a while since I've watched either. Years in the case of Ladder.

Jurassic World and Jason Bourne are the two that we've come closest to walking out of. World just failed to grab on just about any level and actively repelled on others (what, did the secretary personally punch the writer's dog or something?) and Bourne was an almost scene-for-scene reshoot of the first three Bourne films. Once they got to London I realized I was just watching the train station scene from Ultimatum again and they weren't even particularly subtle about it. The only thing that saved the last bit was that since it was set in Las Vegas with Matt Damon and Vincent Cassel we were imaging it as an alternate ending for Ocean's 13...

Avilan the Grey

2016-09-27, 01:56 PM

Really? I'm not the biggest fan of 2001 either but Pulp Fiction? Though I guess it's a movie that somewhat requires the right mind set to enjoy.

Personally I think Tarantino is the most overrated man in Hollywood. Ever. Still, none of his movies is on my "worst" list.

Velaryon

2016-09-27, 03:35 PM

Personally I think Tarantino is the most overrated man in Hollywood. Ever. Still, none of his movies is on my "worst" list.

Personally, I reserve that dubious accolade for Kubrick.

Tarantino is very hit and miss for me - I absolutely love Reservoir Dogs but I turned the first Kill Bill less than halfway through. Most of his other films fall somewhere in between for me.

I've never walked out of a movie in the theater, but there are a few I probably should have. Prometheus is a very pretty movie, but that's all I have to say in its defense. The plot is garbled and nonsensical, the characters are bloody awful, and the storytelling is given a backseat to some sort of incoherent attempt to be profound or artistic or whatever. All in all, a pretty pathetic effort and a complete failure as a new film in the Alien franchise.

I had a friend drag me (and a bunch of other friends) to see Pathfinder, the one where Karl Urban is a viking that is adopted by Native Americans. There's no one element that makes it bad, but it's just irredeemably dull and forgettable. My friend literally turned to the rest of us and said "I'm so sorry guys" as soon as the credits started, it was so bad.

TeChameleon

2016-09-27, 05:35 PM

And I didn't mean I walked out on Stardust; no seeing the cues means I didn't notice the markings that denoted reel changes, so that you know what reel you're in if a problem pops up. Fight Club made note of it in a pretty effective way, actually. Once you're trained to look for em, it's almost impossible to not see them anymore; i was just trying to say how engrossed I was in the movie.

Whoop, sorry- poor segue on my part- didn't mean I'd thought you walked out on Stardust (which, while I didn't find it amazing, still found quite enjoyable, which is more than I can say about... roughly 95% of the movies out there), just was transitioning to a new thought, as a few other people had mentioned walking out on movies.

DuctTapeKatar

2016-09-27, 10:08 PM

The best I have seen is Lucky Number Slevin. My guilty pleasure has to be the Phantom Menace (But I always only watched it for Darth Maul... I barely remember anything about the story itself. I just watched for that red-skinned bad ass).

My worst movie... It has got to be the live action Avatar the Last Airbender. Not because Shamalan got all the things wrong (but that definately didn't help) it was so incredibly boring I left it before any permanent damage was done. The new Clash of the Titans was also pretty bad, shoehorning Hades for no reason at all and a lot more things which made zero sense in the context of the original mythology.

The_Snark

2016-09-27, 11:17 PM

Worst movie that I've actually sat through is probably Prometheus. It was an experiment in going out of my comfort zone (I normally avoid horror and anything likely to be graphic), and while it wasn't too bad in that respect, it wasn't worth the effort. I just... couldn't take it seriously. About halfway through I'd stopped cringing in anticipation of scary things in favor of cringing because the characters were being so stupid. Didn't help that I kept being reminded of scenes from Galaxy Quest (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcPouxFqUFA)...

(I'm pretty sure all of the disasters in that movie could have been averted if they'd just had Guy along.)

Others... I don't actually watch that many movies. Red Riding Hood was bad but in a sort of charming way, combining Twilight-style paranormal romance for teenage girls with that fairy-tale-adapted-for-the-big-screen craze Hollywood went through a couple years back. And it was so earnestly serious about it! I can't really explain why I'm fond of it, I don't normally enjoy laughing at bad movies.

Best is trickier. More competition, and I care more about the subject matter. Um. Galaxy Quest and Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure for comedy, probably. Star Wars and Lord of the Rings are both very well-crafted adventure films. Miyazaki's Castle in the Sky. I feel like I ought to have a Disney movie on here but the ones with my favorite songs don't overlap much with the ones that I like plot-wise.

2001 is a strange movie and parts of it are somewhat tedious, but it had some very evocative parts too, and the whole thing is pretty firmly stuck in my memory.

Edit - someone mentioned Rango, which I think deserves honorable mention. I went into it without knowing anything other than "Johnny Depp plays an animated gecko"; the first fifteen minutes were nothing special, then it took a hard right into classic Western territory and never looked back. I don't know what I'd expected, exactly, but not that.

The new Clash of the Titans was also pretty bad, shoehorning Hades for no reason at all and a lot more things which made zero sense in the context of the original mythology.

In fairness, the original Clash of the Titans was also a bizarre mishmash of several Greek myths and some made-up stuff. Though it didn't vilify Hades, I'll give it that much.

Aedilred

2016-09-28, 06:06 AM

Ant-Man... I thought was terrible in every way. Every "joke" made me cringe, the story was a mess, the action wasn't particularly engaging, I wanted to punch the lead actor in his face every time he opened his mouth he was so annoying and a lot of it just plain made no sense.

I guess we've finally found the one guy who doesn't like Paul Rudd.

I can understand that, but keep in mind, I knew nothing of it when I went to see it. As you point out, the story is bad and the characters are forgettable. At the time, I thought the acting was stale, but i have since learned that they were effectively representing the characters very well.... which didn't matter much, since boring is boring regardless of why it's boring.

Also, it's much easier to walk out of a movie when it's free.
The philosophy of walking out on movies is an interesting one. The common idea seems to be that, having paid for the film, you should stay to get your money's worth. I would however argue that, having already spent the money, if the film is truly that bad or that unenjoyable, spending your time on it as well is to throw good resources after bad.

Having said that I can't remember ever having walked out on a film, but that's partly because I don't tend to go to see films these days I don't think I'll enjoy, and partly because my tolerance for terrible films is sufficiently good I can watch to the end to see how terrible it's going to be. Films most at risk are boring or pretentious films I'm watching at home where my focus of attention is already reduced relative to the cinema. Even so it's rare for me to give up on a film entirely: I took advantage of the act break in Nymphomaniac to bail out, but that's the only recent example I can recall.

Tarantino is very hit and miss for me - I absolutely love Reservoir Dogs but I turned the first Kill Bill less than halfway through. Most of his other films fall somewhere in between for me.
I think critical opinion has begun to turn against Tarantino. He's frustrating because he has an undeniably artistic sensibility and and unusual appreciation and veneration of film history, combined with an almost undimmed imagination and willingness to be shocking and provocative. He should by rights be one of the greatest directors of all time; he certainly has the ability. However he also has the biggest ego this side of Bono, undoubtedly fuelled by his early success, which has led him into a creative ghetto where he's both megalomaniacal about the filmmaking process and kind of lazy about it. That we still see glimpses of his true ability from time to time - the opening scene in Inglourious Basterds, and indeed the restaurant scene from the same film, are truly remarkable - only makes his refusal to impose any sense of discipline on himself all the more aggravating. He's like the Axl Rose of cinema.

Peelee

2016-09-28, 09:32 AM

The philosophy of walking out on movies is an interesting one. The common idea seems to be that, having paid for the film, you should stay to get your money's worth. I would however argue that, having already spent the money, if the film is truly that bad or that unenjoyable, spending your time on it as well is to throw good resources after bad.

Having said that I can't remember ever having walked out on a film, but that's partly because I don't tend to go to see films these days I don't think I'll enjoy, and partly because my tolerance for terrible films is sufficiently good I can watch to the end to see how terrible it's going to be. Films most at risk are boring or pretentious films I'm watching at home where my focus of attention is already reduced relative to the cinema. Even so it's rare for me to give up on a film entirely: I took advantage of the act break in Nymphomaniac to bail out, but that's the only recent example I can recall.

As a corollary to me previous statement, it's also a lot easier to see a movie when it's free. After I stopped working there, not only do I rarely, if ever, go see a movie in the theater, I barely even know what's out. I caught a lucky break hearing about the new Shane Black movie a few months ago, and even that was by the time it was already in the dollar theater.

Also, if anyone ever decides to walk out of a movie, absolutely go to the box office and ask for your money back. If it's less than half over, chances are good they'll refund your ticket. Ain't no harm in asking, regardless.

Cheesegear

2016-09-28, 05:06 PM

Also, if anyone ever decides to walk out of a movie, absolutely go to the box office and ask for your money back. If it's less than half over, chances are good they'll refund your ticket. Ain't no harm in asking, regardless.

My cinema has the policy of only the first half-hour. You should realise pretty quickly if you've walked into the wrong movie, and the first fifteen minutes should give you an indication of the movie you're about to watch. I think that by the time that most people realise that they want to walk out of a movie, they've waived their right to get their money back. You walk out of a movie, basically immediately, or don't walk out at all.

The only reason I didn't walk out of The Host, was because I was with someone, and the only reason she didn't walk out of the movie was because she was with me, and neither of us talked during the movie (because that's Bad Form), so we didn't know that we both wanted to leave.

Posted from phone.

BeerMug Paladin

2016-09-29, 06:36 AM

I'll toss a few of my choices out. First, for some of my favorites. These are just the best I can recall at the moment.

"Up", "Saved!", "Sunset Boulevard", "Memento", "The Big Lebowski", "Terminator 2".

Worst movies is a very hard list to pick. Not only for the fact that I have seen movies with severe technical problems, bad actors and forgettable writing before, but as someone else stated earlier in the thread, movies I forget even having seen before can easily qualify as "worst". But I can't exactly name those movies.

I choose to interpret worst here as "worst movie viewing experiences". I chose this interpretation because it's what I thought of first, and it also brings three particular things to mind.

#3) "The Master of Disguise". I started watching this with other people as a rental. It was so obnoxious that within 10 minutes, everyone present decided it was best turned off. This is the only time I can recall where that's ever happened.

#2) "Chronicles of Riddick". Within the first few seconds this movie started, I knew it was going to be bad. Something about the opening scene, the narration or the cinematography just telegraphed out how much of an awful mess this was going to be. Viewed in a theater with other people; I had to wait it out.

#1) "The Avengers". Something about this movie felt like it was repeatedly assaulting me with snide condescension. I kept thinking about the RT score while viewing it and being utterly baffled. Shown to me by someone who thought it was one of the best movies in recent history. Couldn't exactly say, "Excuse me, but this is awful. I really don't want to see more", so I toughed it out. It's also worth mentioning that I never followed the whole MCU thing, so maybe not watching all the movies in the sequelitis chain played some part in that experience.

Winter_Wolf

2016-09-29, 07:35 AM

That I've seen? Worst ever was Walk Hard: the Dewey Cox Story. Because I actually got up and walked out of the theater. In January in Wisconsin. That's right, a film so bad I'd rather risk frostbite than sit in a warm theater. Wait, wait, I can recall a worse one: The Raid 2. Or maybe it was the first one; the one with Hammer Girl and Baseball psycho. The basis of which is feeling physically ill because of the sheer amount of graphic violence. And I was drunk enough to be in that callous numbed state that people sometimes reach. And then the guy who shared that film with me later gifted me a damn karambit knife. So I'll always have a reminder of that film (though his intention was friendship and not malicious).

I don't really have a "best" because I like a lot of movies but my current favorite depends on a lot of changing factors, not least of which is what I'm able to watch guilt free with two small children around. The only two things o can even recall watching recently are LEGO Movie and some Chinese film that was surprisingly better than I'd typically expect of mainland films. It might have been a recent Hong Kong film, but the glory days of HK film are long gone.

Thialfi

2016-09-29, 10:27 AM

For worst movie I could pick on poor movies that are universally reviled, like Highlander 2, but I'm not going to do that. I'm going with two movies that I absolutely despised that surprise people when I tell them how much I hated them.

Terrance Malick's Thin Red Line is in my opinion the most overrated movie ever made. His "why can't we all just get along" war movie with it's high school level symbolism, "yeah, thanks for the close up of the trampled flower in the middle of the battle field, I get it", distracting cameos from major stars, and one dimensional characters left me cold. I understand that there are a lot of people that liked this movie, I'm not one of them. I'd rather watch a Michael Bay movie than see this thing again and I hate Michael Bay.

My second choice is what I feel is the worst offering from a director that I just don't get. Quentin Tarantino's Hitler snuff fantasy, Inglourious Basterds. His "too cool for school" bar scene where everyone talks for what felt like an hour and a half before everyone killed each other seemed pointless. The violence was over the top distracting, even by Tarantino standards, with the payoff being downright campy, only I wasn't bemused by the spectacle. I have since sworn off all things Tarantino as I realized that he is just not for me. I didn't even like Pulp Fiction or Kill Bill.

I would add a third movie with Alien 3, but I refuse to recognize that movie's existence. I've head cannoned a different future for the cast and wiped that depressing piece of junk out of my mind. As far as favorite movies go, I have a really hard time choosing those. Aliens would certainly be among my very favorite as would Terminator 2, The Matrix, The Incredibles, The Empire Strikes back, Up, Ghostbusters, I could go on.

As a parting shot, I will say something that gets me strange looks in certain crowds as well. I don't understand why people find Monty Python funny.

Dill Raulnor

2016-09-29, 12:17 PM

Best : Don't Think Twice

Worst: The Intern (recently)

Knaight

2016-09-29, 12:46 PM

Adding a worst: The Adventures of Food Boy. This was recommended to me as a bad movie, and even there it's just so alternately terrible and revolting that it makes a worst.

Murk

2016-09-30, 02:50 AM

Worst: The Intern (recently)

Can I ask what was so bad about The Intern?
I can see that it was an easy, simple, not very original or inspiring movie, but that puts it firmly in the enormous group of "meh" movies. What was it for you that made it so terrible?

NecroDancer

2016-09-30, 06:32 AM

An Enemy Spy

2016-10-02, 11:52 AM

Me and my friends are bad movie connoisseur, and three of the worst are "in search of the Titanic", "national lampoon's christmas vacation 2" and "the Christmas tree".

As for good movies "scooby doo on zombie island" will always hold a special place in my heart.

You don't like The Christmas Tree? But it's so well made! The animation, incredible. The voice acting, impeccable. The moral, timeless. Sigh, true genius is never appreciated in its own time.

NecroDancer

2016-10-02, 12:36 PM

We're planning on watching "the room" on holloween night, or if we decide to watch s GOOD movie we will watch "Scooby doo on zombie island"

Velaryon

2016-10-02, 01:00 PM

Wait, wait, I can recall a worse one: The Raid 2. Or maybe it was the first one; the one with Hammer Girl and Baseball psycho. The basis of which is feeling physically ill because of the sheer amount of graphic violence. And I was drunk enough to be in that callous numbed state that people sometimes reach. And then the guy who shared that film with me later gifted me a damn karambit knife. So I'll always have a reminder of that film (though his intention was friendship and not malicious).

I had a similar reaction to Tokyo Gore Police. Well, minus the being drunk or having someone gift me a knife afterward. I'm not normally bothered much by gore, but that film turned me off. It wasn't purely the gore, it was the seeming pointlessness of it all. There wasn't anything to it except the gore, which is not in and of itself interesting to me.

Peelee

2016-10-03, 09:30 AM

Me and my friends are bad movie connoisseur, and three of the worst are "in search of the Titanic", "national lampoon's christmas vacation 2" and "the Christmas tree".

You even picked a Titanic movie, and didn't pick the worst Titanic movie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Legend_of_the_Titanic)?

moossabi

2016-10-03, 10:04 AM

You even picked a Titanic movie, and didn't pick the worst Titanic movie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Legend_of_the_Titanic)?

In Search of Titanic/Tentacolino (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eL8EF1h-kL8&t=351s) is the sequel to The Legend of the Titanic, and it's far (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x8mx-aIhnQ) worse.

Peelee

2016-10-03, 10:16 AM

In Search of Titanic/Tentacolino (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eL8EF1h-kL8&t=351s) is the sequel to The Legend of the Titanic, and it's far (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x8mx-aIhnQ) worse.

Aha. I'd only heard of it as Tentacolino, but haven't had a chance to watch it yet.

Mightymosy

2016-10-03, 01:29 PM

Worst viewing experience would probably go to Kill Bill I.

Best movie would probably be Matrix II.

Just off the top of my head, but that's maybe a good way to choose favourites, isn't it? ;-)

Keltest

2016-10-03, 05:32 PM

The worst would probably have to be "The Knowing." I am very, very good at latching on to one or two small things in a movie and coming out entertained. I have struggled to find a professionally made movie that is so irredeemably uninteresting as this one. There isn't anything about it I could come out of the theater and say "At least the X was cool", and it even had a giant planet engulfing fireball.

The best movie on the other hand... Guardians of the Galaxy. It appeals to me in all the different ways I can be appealed to. Even when theyre contradictory. ESPECIALLY when theyre contradictory.

Aedilred

2016-10-03, 07:02 PM

Best movie would probably be Matrix II.

I have no words.

Peelee

2016-10-03, 11:13 PM

I have no words.

Oh, I have more than enough for the both of us, I think.

Murk

2016-10-04, 04:23 AM

I have no words.

Eh, I never understood all the hatred for the second Matrix. The first Matrix had over-the-top kung fu fights, unsubtle spiritualism, futuristic (digital) philosophy and a mountain of symbolism. The second movie had all of that, but more.
I can understand people disliking the entire franchise, but if you really liked the first movie, the second only gave more and bigger, right?

Kitten Champion

2016-10-04, 04:40 AM

I liked the second Matrix. The more-ambitious-then CGI is pretty dated now in ways the first Matrix generally avoids - particularly watching the big Agent Smith-palooza fight scene and seeing Keanu Reeves morph into a video game character - and the first movie had an open-ended but still relatively satisfying conclusion as opposed to a to-be-continued... but aside from that I agree with Murk. It did what sequels generally do, the same thing as the first but slightly bigger in scope and ending at a low point for the Heroes. It has the same strengths and weaknesses of the first movie, I think it just makes the weaknesses more visible.

Aedilred

2016-10-04, 06:43 AM

I enjoyed the second Matrix the first time I saw it, probably at least in part because I was young and impressionable and was riding the hype train. When I came to rewatch it, especially after the third one, it became much more glaringly obvious how bad it was.

The first Matrix is a cool movie. It includes an introduction to solipsism, some impressive fight scenes (with innovative shooting techniques), deals well with the limited acting capabilities of its leading man, and is functionally self-contained. Despite 17 years of imitators it still, I think, stands up.

The second, by contrast, is a sprawling mess. Where the first raised interesting, if basic, philosophical questions, the second rams its own rambling, garbled mythology down our throats. More emotional weight is left for the main characters to carry (especially the charisma vacuum of the Keanu-CAM pairing) which they're not equipped to do. There are entire sequences which serve no function whatsoever (the club/sex scene, most notably). And perhaps most egregiously, pretty much every fight scene in the movie is narratively pointless.

I do still believe that the second film could have been salvaged - though it was never going to be as good as the first - if the third film had been good enough. But the third film was terrible, so that never happened, and the second was left exposed as a franchise vehicle made by creators who were out of (good) ideas and were trying too hard, a film which goes nowhere for no reason.

I think all that can be said in favour of the second film is the fight scenes, which are indeed pretty impressive, at least by the standards of 2003. But their interaction with the rest of the film in terms of context is so minimal that they could be lifted and shown as a sequence of shorts and would be just as effective. Structurally, narratively and thematically the film is all over the place; the plot only makes sense if you buy into the hogwash infodumped by the designated plot-explicators (where it even makes sense; the Architect's long speech is pretty much nonsense) in a way which the audience shouldn't be expected to do and the first film didn't. Terminator Genisys makes more sense. The Island, a Michael Bay film for heaven's sake, handles its moral and philosophical themes more sensitively and with a lighter touch.

It's just complete tosh. Now, I won't judge anyone for enjoying it as a kind of guilty pleasure for the fight scenes alone (even if I think the waffle:fighting ratio is too great for it even to work well on that basis) but if people actually think it's a good film... that makes me sad.

Murk

2016-10-04, 08:07 AM

Oh dear I had completely forgotten that dance/sex scene.

I feel stupid now. You are right. That scene alone is enough to get it labeled as bad movie.

Winter_Wolf

2016-10-04, 08:51 AM

I don't really get the whole Keanu Reeves can't act thing. He's not terrible; I mean I've seen much worse. I don't know if he's got a big range in his acting, but people say that like focus and specialization are bad things. Johnny Depp has like three or four characters, just with the names changed. And I watch most of his movies. Okay maybe only about half by now. It's not like I ever watched Ahnold for his brilliant comedic value. He has his moments but mainly he's about the action film. But yeah, Matrix the second wasn't a high point of the franchise.

Kato

2016-10-04, 12:09 PM

I have to agree, I never got why people dislike Reeves like that. Sure, he's not amazing but fine.

That said, Matrix 2 is really only enjoyable as an Action movie... though, even as a late teen back then I cannot agree with the people complaining about the confusing ending. Dumb? Sure. That complicated? Nah.

The_Snark

2016-10-04, 12:19 PM

I like Keanu Reeves. He was okay in Speed and The Matrix, not great but not dragging the movie down, but more importantly he was genuinely funny in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure.

It's not like I ever watched Ahnold for his brilliant comedic value.

Your loss. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCVc5TaPpe8)

(The movie that's taken from is a comedy/action movie parody starring Schwarzenegger; I haven't seen it for a while but I remember enjoying it.)

Winter_Wolf

2016-10-04, 01:52 PM

Oh, I'm aware he can be quite humorous, but I find I enjoy it more when he uses it to punctuate his action flicks. And yes, that was my loss, I've never seen that before.

Aedilred

2016-10-04, 05:02 PM

I don't particularly dislike Keanu Reeves, and there are certainly worse actors out there without a fraction of his integrity. But I also don't think it's controversial that his range is pretty limited. A good director will work around that either by not giving him material that falls too far outside it, or by turning it into a feature. (If spaced-out dull bewilderment is a character's overriding feature, Keanu's your guy!) He also doesn't quite have the square-jawed charisma to pull off a straight action role in the way that, well, any actor in any of the Expendables films does. He has made some good dramatic films where he hasn't let down the part and some quirky action films where he's worked well, but it's also not like he's the second coming of Al Pacino, and whenever anyone tries to treat him like he is, it usually ends badly.

On the other hand, I have quite a lot of affection for the Governator. His emotionless, stilted delivery, at once both over-and-under-indicated, somehow transcends the laws of reason and becomes genius, a style of acting so bad it's brilliant. I don't think anyone's delivered action one-liners better since the heyday of Roger Moore. He pretty much singlehandedly makes films like Commando, without him a blandly generic 80s action flick, watchable. I'm prepared to mark up Terminator Genisys solely for his performance, and even his comedy outings, Kindergarten Cop and Jingle All the Way, while terrible, somehow just about hang together by the sheer incongruous force of his presence.

Winter_Wolf

2016-10-04, 07:08 PM