Last week, I gave you all my list of the top 10 films of 2003, here’s my list of the worst flicks of 2003. Now when I say worst, some of my selections are indeed at the bottom of the barrel, but other choices are on the list purely because they were major disappointments for one reason or another. Keep in mind I normally don’t see films that I know will be crap, so I haven’t seen “”From Justin To Kelly,”” “”Dumb and Dumberer,”” “”Gigli”” and several others.
WORST FILMS OF 20031) THE HULKThis is one of the worst films that I’ve ever seen, and to top it off it was probably one of the worst movie going experiences that I ever had. It’s so bad that it doesn’t even fall into the “”it’s so bad its good”” category – like “”Postman.”” I at least went into hysterical fits of laughter at that movie’s badness. Even “”Fight Club”” put a smile on my face because of its retardedness. Hell for me would be if someone strapped me into a chair and forced me to watch this trash (along with “”Anything Else””) on a 24 hr loop. What in Ann Lee’s directorial past made the producers think he would even be suitable for doing “”The Hulk.”” Yeah he did Crappy Tiger, but so what? He clearly had no grasp of the character, or even what the concept of a comic book based film should be. He didn’t even do a good job on the CGI hulk. Everything about this film was just hideous; the acting, the directing, the writing, I hated EVERY FRAME of this film.2) ANYTHING ELSEThere is nothing worse than hating a movie within the first 10 minutes and being forced to sit through it for another two hours. There wasn’t a single likeable or realistic character or situation in this movie. And do they not have black people or other minorities in NY?I will say the acting and direction was ok and competent. The problem with the film was the piss poor script, incredibly lame dialog and flat, stale, “”jokes.”” If you like Woody Allen, you may find this tolerable, I don’t. Is this the worst film of the year? Heck no. Is it the most irritating movie of the year? Heck, yes.3) CABIN FEVER I know Horror films are not supposed to make any sense, and that we’re supposed to shut our minds off and just go with it. But come on!!! This film was so poorly written, directed, and shot that it amazes me that some studio executive actually released this crap fest. I mean really, what the hell was the point of the goofy kid? What the hell was that ending??????? Or should I say the six or seven endings! It’s bad enough the main movie was pure crap, but then the director didn’t even know how to end our pain. It just kept going on, and on…. 4) MATRIX RELODADEDWhat’s wrong with “”Matrix Reloaded”” you ask? Almost everything. Let’s start with the script. After sitting there watching this thing for 2 – 2 1/2 hours I didn’t feel like I was watching a movie, where logic matters. I was watching a film that was nothing more than an excuse to get from one fight scene to another. It felt disjointed, fruitless (hey there’s a word I’ve never used in a review before), lifeless, ponderous, and most of all – just goddamn pretentious!! Every word uttered was spoken as if it was coming from God himself, but delivered by some half asleep midnight baker.[pagebreak]5) View From The Top I really have nothing to say about this Gwyneth Paltrow and Christina Applegate crapfest. 6) Just MarriedI used to really like Ashton Kutcher’s “”Punk’d”” now he just irritates me. He strikes me as being one of these fake, pseudo, hip white guys, and his stick has gotten old reallyquick.7) MYSTIC RIVERI really adored, and loved the first half of Mystic River. The acting, the story, everything just clicked for me. It’s one of the only films of the past few years to actually get me to cry. What the hell happened???? The last 1/2 of MR, the story totally falls apart. All the supposed “”twists”” with the Sean Penn character absolutely destroys any sympathy and connection that I had with him. The film takes such time and care in setting up their friendship, the kidnapping, etc. And then it seems to totally abandon everything that it sets up to focus on Sean Penn’s “”mysterious past.”” While I absolutely love Tim Robbins, he seemed to be in a totally different movie. It was also another one of those films that didn’t know how to end. The final speech given by Penn’s wife, played by Laura Linney, came completely out of left field and put a nail in the coffin on this film. It was totally against her character (hell, she didn’t even say much for most of the film), stupid, and seemed to be added simply for “”shock”” value8) MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLDThis film was going to be my savior. The shining light and beacon in an otherwise dismal year of pure mediocrity. I dearly love swashbucklers and pirate films. When I saw the trailer, I was like, yeah baby, this is it. The film features EM Favorite Paul Bettany, but it also has Russell Crowe (someone who I can’t stand!), but again it had Pirates and Swashbuckling. In the opening moments of the film, I was engrossed, and really into it, and then NOTHING happens for another 2 hours. I’ll be honest this is the only film from last year that was so god awful boring that I fell asleep for about 20 minutes – and missed NOTHING, they were still in the cabin talking. It’s a complete bore. Just yak, yak, yak, and lame jokes in the Captain’s Quarters. This film may work better on television, but I highly doubt it. This movie was all “”Swash without the Buckle.””9) CHARLIE’S ANGELS: FULL THROTTLEI really liked the first Charlie’s Angels movie, it fell into that hard to define category of “”It was so bad, that it was good.”” So unlike most folks I was looking forward to CA2. What I saw wasn’t a movie, it was just an excuse for three ditzy woman to get million dollar paydays and literally laugh in the audience’s face while doing it. The film’s plot was inane, the acting horrible, directing atrocious, music bad, etc. With all of that said, I would actually see a CA3, if they somehow managed to get back to the kitschy badness that was CA1.