Poorly done films (that should've known better)

TheReverend

TheReverend

Well-known member
It's one thing to have a bad film/piece of video. Nowadays, they abound and YouTube is the worst in continuing the flow of crap. But many times a film with a big budget, big name actors (that are good), and all the tools for success but straight up fail is another thing entirely. Now, I'm not talking about your "Transformers" block-busters necessarily because those are made to be EXACTLY the way they are for the reason of flashy and sales. I'm talking about films that aspire to be something and just fail. A great example of a "blockbuster" fail would be Hancock. It had actors, a huge budget, good CG, I mean what more could you ask for. And yet, uber-fail.

I watched one of these recently, and I'm having trouble getting over just how poorly executed cinematically, editted, and scripted/storied this movie was. "All The Pretty Horses," just a failure of a film. Matt Damon is not a poor actor, even in westerns. The shooting was done adequately with not poor shooting technique, but way overdone on the tight shots, very weak storyboarding. Too much talking in the script, and yet little with deep meaning was put forth. The way the script is written, the film should say something profound to make you think, but nothing is ever deeper than the flat love story that doesn't really begin or end. Shots and different story pieces are smushed together in a way that often strips them from giving context or pacing you from one point to the other. There are random cutaways to b-roll type footage or attempts at intriguing scenes (dead dream, Mexican guy dancing, guy that watches Damon but never speaks) that are never well developed or simply never payoff or make much sense.

Anyways, had to get that off my chest. Anyone else have a similar experience lately (with any movie old or new)?
 
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2...

The actors played their roles for 10 years and couldn't have executed it any worse. They should have there characters so amazingly well thought out, that it should of seemed to them like they're not even acting at all. Daniel Radcliffe is such a drab, boring, actor to watch and his delivery of lines just seem's half assed. Also, Bonnie Wright, show me a more bland actor/character, I am not sure which one it is, either way it is very much so poorly done. I know this has been picked on many times, but when Draco hugs Voldy, it's fairly self explanatory, I mean come on...
Another part which was poorly done (I think) is the sudden death of such major sub-characters (Reamus, Fred, Tunks, etc...), I know they may not have watched to drag out each detail, but when you have a few film build-ups with characters so intouch with the audience, you cannot simply kill them off without any reasoning what so ever, poor.
Going on, character build ups, there was a fairly subtle yet good build-up between Belatrix and Neville (as she killed his parents), yet, they have Molly Weasly kill her, for what I suspect, a rather annoying reason, to use the line she delivered.

Another thing I think that was poorly executed, this time, behind the camera, is no Bruno Delbonnel, which was just a major mistake in my eyes, the best cinematography out of all the film's was his work in the 6th film, without a doubt. I was annoyed how he didn't to work on it (it may have been his choice, I am not too sure?)

I am not normally a hater of any sort toward the Harry Potter franchise, in-fact I quite enjoy the series, but this one was (in my opinion) poorly done.
 
For every person you can find who hated a particular actor's performance in a film, you'll find another who absolutely enjoyed it. Everything about your posts are subjective and opinion only. Beyond technical problems (which aren't subjective) there isn't much to say that really matters.
 
It's and old one, but I am gonna throw Escape From L.A. under the bus.

Escape From New York is one of my favorite action/future dystopia flicks. It was smartly made on a very low budget, even for its time (1 million dollars in 1980). It was a film that took place in a dangerous and shadowy world spiced with some larger than life characters and some humor so as not to be just straight up depressing. EFNY was a film that understood what it was... mainly a film that had B-movie elements but done up with ambition and style to elevate from being just some silly low budget exploitation flick. It tied into the public distrust of the US government after the Watergate scandal of the mid 70's. It had satirical elements mixed with dark sci-fi concepts seven years before Paul Verhoeven unleashed his satiric sci-fi sucker punch known as Robocop upon the world. Not only that, but EFNY also influenced one of the seminal novels of the 1980's, William Gibson's Neuromancer. Gibson has stated that Escape From New York made an impression on him that made its way into his earlier cyberpunk novels.

Add in the minimalist synthesizer score that John Carpenter composed for EFNY, and you've got a genre defining 80's flick that still plays well today. EFLA threw most of this out and had a really silly "old western" sounding score that seemed to be saying that this is some future western or something. This was one of the most out of place scores I've ever had the displeasure of hearing in a film.

Photography wise EFNY had a dark, gritty, and cold look that obviously influenced a lot of 80's films (The Terminator, for example). EFLA was the exact opposite: an overly cheesy film that was overly lit like a lame third rate cable TV movie-of-the-week with horrible CGI effects and a lazy story, as well as a seemingly uninterested Kurt Russel and John Carpenter. Maybe that explains it, but it still doesn't excuse EFLA being one of the most disappointing films and sequels ever made IMO. It could have and should have been much better due to the people involved.
 
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Here are some:

Terminator III
The Spirit
The Last Airbender
The Happening
Batman and Robin
The Avengers (British)
 
Dude, Terminator 3 is the best in the series.

No one will ever agree with me on that, but that movie ended with balls. I think the Terminators and the action in 3 is the weakest of all the films, but I enjoyed the human characters more in T3 than I did in any of the others.

Like the man said -- Someone will like it!

:D
 
Terminator 2's ending was far better, but I get what you mean by it had guts.

Hmm, I would throw the Star Wars Prequels in here but add to the thread's title "and we should've known better too." So many went in with high hopes that shouldn't have, lol.
 
In my opinion movies that cost multiple millions of dollars should not have little errors, continuity, large plot holes, and inconsistencies. The only issue that should be involved is weather you liked the story and style in which it was told.

In general my feeling about just about every blockbuster made is "we deserve better" yes they were fun yes they were enjoyable, but they would be even more so without gaping plot holes horribly inaccurate depictions, and continuity errors. You should never have to defend a good movie it is or it isn't to you, we are all entitled to our opinions. It just seems most of us these days are desperately trying to prove that the movies we do or did idolize are perfect or good or the best or whatever, it's just sad.

to each their own, I in fact love the prequels though I will admit there are certain scene's that I have only been forced to watch through the whole way the first time I saw them in theaters, but I would never fight someone to prove they are the best or whatever. so it may be rash but in my opinion just about every studio movie put out for a while has erred in this way. Now I'm not saying it's possible to make a perfect movie but as I said earlier on the whole we deserve better films(those who work hard their whole lives building society and when they find the time to relax would like to have some fun and not yell at the screen for two hours).

I love movies and I really like a lot of recent movies, I just find certain aspects half assed or don't have as much thought put in as others, leaving what could have been an amazing movie only a mildly entertaining one.

Stay passionate!
 
Brian_Rice said:
Dude, Terminator 3 is the best in the series.

No one will ever agree with me on that, but that movie ended with balls. I think the Terminators and the action in 3 is the weakest of all the films, but I enjoyed the human characters more in T3 than I did in any of the others.

Like the man said -- Someone will like it!

:D
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I thought T3 sucked balls :)
 
Dragon Ball Evolution


Talk about a movie that got absolutely everything wrong and pretty much pissed off every follower of the anime.
 
why would people go see transformers series,

it's wrong on all levels
it does not have anything resembling a story of any kind
it does not have good cinematography
it does not have good action sequences due to composition, editing and camera movement and (i will call it the bay effect)
the teal and orange color correction

yet it's very successful, it's definitely not the action in the movie.

the best action coupled with the best cinematography in recent years in my opinion (if i'm not forgetting any recent movies) was '9', and that did not dent the box office.

it might be because of animation vs live action, maybe people can not get their heads around animation for grown-ups. maybe it would have done better in japan
but 'up' seemed to do good business, is it the pixar effect.
it might be because of the slightly more complicated than mash potatoes story, maybe it was above the average movie goer.

but what is the average iq for the movie goer, would they be offended if you offer them better cinematography, or a story structure. can a movie talk about something or have a message, or a reason, what about character development. can a movie have a sad ending, can the hero do anything bad in a movie.


on the pixar effect, i thought some recent non pixar animated films were quite good and much better than pixar films. but you can't tell that to the average movie goer with an iq of a monkey.
 
SPZ said:
The Spirit
The Happening
Ha, I was unfortunate to watch The Spirit a couple weeks ago. I know they were going for that old school kind of cheesey feel. Well cheese they got. Painful.

I remember thinking the trailer for The Happening was one of the worst I'd see but the movie surprised me, not that bad to me.
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Everything about your posts are subjective and opinion only. Beyond technical problems (which aren't subjective) there isn't much to say that really matters.
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umm, wasn't that the point of this thread. He specifically asked (op) if anyone else had an experience with a film they didn't like. Of course it's subjective. thats what he was asking for.
 
I thought 9 was one of those films. I would have preferred it with no dialog at all. Every time a character spoke it was the most poorly written thing. The story itself was also pretty poor.

Miracle at St Anna was pretty awful. Decent budget, Spike Lee at the helm, but overall just terrible. The acting was bad, and made worse by the terribly forced dialog. The musical cues were also really bad.

I'm watching The Conspitor now. Great actors all around, but more bad dialog that just tries to get the actors through the scene in the easiest way for everyone to understand. I think this is usually what can make an otherwise decent movie bad. Bad directing certainly doesn't help either. A director has to be aware of all the forced dialog.
 
On a side note, has anyone seen the new tv show Body of Proof. Bad, bad, corny writing coupled with bad delivery from the main actress. Or am I the only one?
 
tmnt said:
SPZ said:
The Spirit
The Happening
Ha, I was unfortunate to watch The Spirit a couple weeks ago. I know they were going for that old school kind of cheesey feel. Well cheese they got. Painful.

I remember thinking the trailer for The Happening was one of the worst I'd see but the movie surprised me, not that bad to me.
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"Come on! Toilet humor is always funny!"

Now, to Brian:

No, it sucks. :)

INSERT: magnanimous but completely out of context quotes from philosophers, political thinkers, opinion leaders, sport personalities, pop stars to illustrate how the film sucks balls.
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Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day

Needs no explaining. A crappy sequel to a film that definitely didn't need a sequel. I, for one, cannot wait for The Big Lebowski II: Little Lebowskis, in which the film centers around The Stranger as he babysits Maude and Jeffrey's child...
 
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