YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE...MAYBE TWICE!
By Trace Thurman on April 6, 2016
If you’re a regular reader of my posts, you know that I’m not one to bash a film unless I really, really hated it. Even in films I don’t like, I’ll try to find the positive in them. Hell, I even defend plenty of films that many people don’t think are defendable. All of that being said, there are some films that simply infuriate me. These are films that take an interesting premise (or maybe a twist on a familiar one) and totally botch it. They may not be the worst quality films (though a couple are), but sometimes a disappointing film is worse than just being outright terrible. You probably have a few of these yourself. Here are mine!
Remember when the trailer for The Happening was released, and everyone forgot Lady in the Water for a moment? It was fairly great marketing that didn’t reveal too much about the plot, which is a rarity nowadays. Unfortunately, it turned out that 20th Century Fox knew they couldn’t do that because it was so silly. People are killing themselves because of plants! While the suicide scenes are executed well, nothing else about the movie is. From Wahlberg’s laughable performance to the scene where the characters try to outrun the wind, the film is a failure on every level. You can’t say the premise, about a wave of mass suicides taking over the country, isn’t intriguing though!
Alright, maybe this is too obvious of a choice, and I really do like most of High Tension! I just can’t stand that ending. The premise of a woman with dissociative identity disorder killing everyone around the woman she is in love with is compelling. If only Aja hadn’t tried to make it a twist in a film whose plot, as Roger Ebert put it “has a hole that is not only large enough to drive a truck through, but in fact does have a truck driven right through it.” I’m able to suspend quite a bit of disbelief, but High Tension was too much.
Truth be told, I actually don’t hate [REC] 3 as a movie, but I do hate it as a part of the [REC]franchise. After the superb [REC] 2, directors Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza split up to each direct the third and fourth entries in the franchise. Plaza took over for [REC] 3, which tells a story parallel to the timeline of the first film. While the film starts out in the series’ trademark found footage filming style, it quickly abandons it in a sly wink to the audience when a character asks the cameraman why he is still filming during a zombie attack. It’s a nice bit of meta humor in a film and it would have been find had the humor stopped there. Unfortunately [REC] 3 becomes a horror comedy, and barely feels like a part of the series that birthed it.
The Human Centipede did little with it’s gross-out premise, and it turned out to be a one-trick pony. The sequel didn’t fare much better, and to add insult to injury it pulls the “it was all a dream” twist on the audience. Again, the meta premise, about a man obsessed with Tom Six’s first film who decides to make his own, is quite intriguing, but it becomes botched in an asinine twist that makes the whole movie feel like a waste of time.
It sounded like a great idea on paper. What if Freddy Krueger was actually innocent? What if his revenge spree started because he was burned alive an innocent man? It’s a fairly interesting, albeit drastically different, take on our favorite nightmare bogeyman. Unfortunately, the film decides to puss out and say “Just kidding!” Turns out there was nothing about this remake sets it apart from the original at all. It is just a hollow imitation of Wes Craven’s masterpiece. There wasn’t even a decent dream sequence (or kill) in the whole movie! Wasted potential, if you ask me.
What are some films that you thought had a lot of potential that disappointed you?
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SUPERMAN v. BATMAN (I'm a huge fan of both characters, but who ever thought of filing a movie with special effects and no real story plot was wrong. Now I loved the special effects, but as for a story line, there was none. I mean, Batman chasing criminals then Superman landing in front of the Batmobile and then Superman telling not to do his hero thing or else and then fly off...What kind of story line was that...Come on...And I had to sit through this movie twice...And still never seen any reason why these two were fighting...At least in the comic it game a pretty good reason and thoughtout story line...)
10 Cloverfield Lane (The movie had very strong potential but missed the mark when they decided to turn the main character into a mad, murdering perpper...Now it wasn't bad, but it really gave me the feeling that it was trying to say that all preppers are crazy and murderers...The alien thing in the movie really wasn't a surprise, because I think and feel they were trying to cash in on the Cloverfield movie...)
Dead 7 (This was just some really terrible attempt for the Backstreet Boys and SyFy to cash in on their fame and the zombie craze. Hell, even when LJ is able to rip the movie apart on just about ever concept in which they tried to throw in, that's pretty bad.)
yeah i figured bat man v superman was going to suck. they just didn't have enough guts to go the comic route. the story line there was so much darker.
haven't seen cloverfield lane yet but yeah i think people have a negative impression of preppers and stuff like thats doesn't help. wish they got the route that the guy was right all along but no.
and i wont even give dead seven he time of day.
You know it's bad when my 11 year old rips it apart from start to finish...The only good character they had was Whiskey Joe...You could tell they used a real actor, (The drunk guy who flew the plan in Independence Day), Because he did a pretty good job for what he most likely didn't get paid...The acting was horrorible and I've never seen so many tough guys cry...You're supposed to be a loner and a tough guy, which means no emotional ties to anything or anyone, except for Whiskey Joe, every damn one of them cried because someone died...I always thought the BackStreet Boys were wimps and crybaby's, but damn...
This movie reached the bottom of the barrel in the zombie genre...It would have been a good movie if they would have just took the cameras and filmed a fireplace and filmed them throwing the money into it...I feel sorry for the actor that played Whiskey Joe...A real actor...Poor guy....
yeah but what did any of us expect from the moment i saw it i was like thsi is going to be shit. just the concept alone was garbage.
I kinda liked the concept behind the movie, it was just very poorly executed....I kinda like the Voodoo, virus mash-up thing...It would have been better throwing wrestlers into the parts...(LOL)
They could have done better on that point...But look who produced and put the project out...SyFy used to be one of those channels that would bring out good movies and now they are just putting anything out and don't care who is in it...But, they do hit the nail on the head 7 out of 10 SyFy originals they put out...(LOL) They just failed on this one...
And just FYI, it's like a fungus, but Z-Nation has grown on me...I actually like it...(LOL)
i told you it was good man, way to come around to the fold brother.
Its mostly Murphy's attitude...Cause he's the way I am now...Screw everything and lets have fun....(LOL)
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