 josh 
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The Five Worst Films I saw in 2004
Saw
Billed as being a taut thriller in the 'Seven' mold about a crazed serial killer who chains two men up in a room with just a saw and a gun, this movie actually does everything it can to take you out of the room, including flashbacks, flashsideways, and even a flashback within a flashback. The plot, or what passes for it, is ridiculous, the setpiece traps the killer constructs would have been worth the admission... if the film didn't shift into rap-metal music video mode during each one of those sequences. Terrible.
Secret Window
Johnny Depp can almost always carry a movie, but here he was saddled with a corny (and very well-trod) concept, a bad script, and the most obvious 'twist' ending in recent memory. The entire theater laughed their asses off at the "frightening" realization near the end of the film... just bad.
the Grudge
HOO BOY. This Japanese horror adaptation starts all Americans, who are for some reason in Japan and only associate with other Americans. The plot is threadbare, the ghosts are rarely scary or even creepy, and it's attempts at a measured pace end up just being slow and plodding. Probably the most boring movie I saw this year.
Taking Lives
I knew this wasn't going to be a good film going in, and it does get some points for using the savvy audience member's trick of paying attention to the casting to figure out who the villian is against us... But I never really bought any of the characters. Angelina Jolie was never believable as a FBI agent, nor did the sissy actor who plays the killer have any presence. The (suprisingly graphic) sex scene comes out of nowhere, but not as much as the laughable ending... which, really, is just too much to take.
Now... these movies I mention above were bad... Like... real bad. But equally so, and nothing, nothing compared to:
Exorcist: The Beginning
This is one of the worst movies I have ever seen. Even divorced from the original, there is little to nothing good about this. Shoestring budget, a cast of 3-4 people, terrible CGI, even worse script. The only slightly interesting things about this movie were the allusions to the original, which most of the audience wouldn't get anyway. Add to this simply terrible touches like reoccuring flashbacks of the terror of war that explain to us the main characters inner emotional turmoil throughout the movie... except that the filmmakers decided to put the most gripping and pivotal one FIRST instead of building up to it, so that the rest of the film we are basically watching rerun flashbacks every 10 minutes. Another great moment is when a baby is stillborn and is shown... covered in maggots. HOW DID THE FLIES GET UP THERE TO LAY THEIR EGGS?
Beyond nitpicking, this movie is the opposite of the original in every way - instead of slowly building tension, let's just jump right in! Instead of using subtly counterbalanced with moments of extremes, let's just make the whole movie a bland CGI cocktail! I'm somewhat looking forward to seeing the alternate version, but honestly it could not be any worse than this piece of excrement was.
[ posted by josh at 12/16/2004 12:45:35 AM ] [ trackback ]
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