Movies One Must CROAK before seeing

Birdemic Shock and Terror:

http://daclips.in/kkso6vip2qp6

Folks... I spent DAYS finding this link...

I now see how just how thoroughly my time had been wasted.

Granted, it's badness is HILARIOUS at parts but other parts are just insufferable...

They didn't even have the money to make realistic attacking birds....

Drive


This movie falls victim to false advertising on an unprecedented scale. In my entire life I've never been more misled by a movie then this one. 

To fully understand this movie you have to watch the trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWX34ShfcsE&feature=kp

So I know what you're thinking. 'This is going to be an action movie! A lot of car chases and maybe a romantic element thrown in with gun fights!'

And my reply to you is, "Oh don't you wish!"

It's slow. It's boring. I hate the soundtrack they used, I know lots of people loved it but they're wrong. I couldn't get out of the theater fast enough. By the time the white of the lettering for the credits even showed up on the bottom of the screen, I was already out. 

I think the lead guy was about as bland as styrofoam on white bread. There were maybe two car chases in the whole thing and neither of them were very impressive. 

However, in the interest of not dwelling on the negative, you can tell a lot of people put hard work into it. The effects were good and it had a stylised look that worked with the tone they were setting. 

I however didn't care for it because I was so misled by the trailer. I'm not alone either! People have filed lawsuits because of it! My only hope is they won.

Transformers Age of Extinction

While not as bad as the previous one in the series, it still isn't that good. Granted the removal of Shia Lebeouff was a very welcomed change (teaches you for ruining Indiana Jones...) the rest of it was exactly what you'd come to expect in a Transformers movie:
1. A Racist steretoype-Check
2. Oversexualizing a teenage girl- Check
3. Lame-ass humans you don't care about- Check
4. Dialogue of an Adam West Batman episode- Check
5. Explosions- CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK CHECK
6. Starting the movie good but then slowly but surely making it insufferable- BIG check
7. Convoluted Logic- Check
8. Just too much going on and too many loose ends- Check

But to add some positive points, the action scenes (while long) still were good, Bumblebee was funny and the fucking Dinobots were awesome (albeit short lived).

So yeah...

Couple's Retreat.

First thing you got to know about me, I can't stand romantic comedies.
Second, I can't stand Vince Vaughn. His comedic style is just this: 'I'm going to make a smart ass comment with a dry tone and a blank lifeless expression.' Tell me I'm wrong.
Third, I hate when the two are together. A Vince Vaughn romantic comedy is just the definition of insufferable to me. 

But that's not all. Granted those are the biggest hangups I have with it, but the rest of the problems fall into subdivisions of those three categories.

So the premise is this group of couples arrive at this island. All but one of the couples is under the impression that this island is meant to be for fun and excitement from their otherwise mundane lives. But it turns out they all have to go through couples therapy before they can enjoy that. Yeah, fucking rivetting right? -_-

It's cliched as all hell (see problem 1). Vince Vaughn is not funny but neither are the other cast. (See problem 2). All the characters just kind of felt like assholes and none of them I cared about. Honestly a madman could've gone to the shore and shot everyone and it would've had the impact of spilling a glass of water to me. Lastly, and I can't stress this one enough... it's a Vince Vaughn romantic comedy... (see problem 3)

The Fourth Kind

Okay, so this was supposed to be a horror movie. Nope. Not even slightly scary.

Spoiler: it's a movie about aliens.

My sister and I decided to give it a shot and it was the most boring movie ever. The pacing was terrible, the plot wasn't interesting in the slightest. The filming/movie style was just weird... They kept trying to put it out that this was a true story with certain parts reenacted by the actors/actresses (not sure if it's legitimately real or not...but my gut says it's bull). Seriously, 40 minutes into it and I was tuning out and reading fanfiction on my phone.

I didn't like it. I don't think any of y'all would like it. So yeah.

I think I remember seeing this, is that that one movie that with that really pale girl at the beginning who I swear to god is not human with how fricken large her eyes are?

It starts off with footage from an interview with someone at Harvard... Not sure if that's what you're thinking of

Oh yeah! I have seen that! I don't remember if I liked it or not but I trust your taste in movies!

I know these are two television shows, but I can't just silently seethe about these two festering piles of shit.

A to Z:
So I got roped into watching this show because it has an actress who I find very talented, Cristin Miloti. She was in How I Met Your Mother and has a definite charm to her. 
By god did this show squander her. 
Okay so the only way I can describe this is imagine you're watching a romance between a board of wood and an ashtray with a straw being the comic relief. Enjoy folks. 

Not one joke made me laugh or even crack a smile. There's nothing to enjoy. It's a TV fart: it's unpleasant, it happens, but luckily you forget about it ten seconds later.


Selfie:
Don't even ask me how I considered watching this show. I thought it was going to be some kind of satire about modern trends and how they're creating a stupid generation. I was partially right but the problem is both main characters (the Online socialite and realistic cynic) are too unlikable for any sort of connection. Not to mention I can already see how the series finale is going to go, they're going to fall in love and get married. The end. Trouble saved.
An idea like this CAN work, but you have to make at least one side more attractive than the other. Like have the online socialite (yeah I know she has a name but she's so bland I don't remember it) be an impatient woman-child and the realistic cynic be understanding to her but also points out her flaws in a nurturing way she learns from. 
By god was it stupid, even worse than the last one. The last one at least had semi decent camera work. This one had looks like it was shot by a fucking teenager who just discovered his cellphone had a camera.
Not to mention the effects were clearly fake. There's a rain scene where the rain doesn't even take up the whole shot. It looks like some jerk just left a sprinkler on and the camera guy was too lazy to bring the camera closer. 

Conclusion:
Don't watch these shows. They SUCK!!!!

This is a very tentative entry as this movie is extremely difficult to judge on the regular standard of bad and good.

Dracula Untold

What this movie gets right is amazing and grand, but what it gets wrong are phenomenal too.

So to best understand this I'm going to separate both qualities:

The Good:
Visual style and effects were splendid! I loved watching all of Dracula's powers, those were definitely the best parts of the whole movie. I almost wanted the whole movie to be just a visual effects experiment to showcase all these inventive ways Dracula can kick ass! 

I liked the camera work, it wasn't avant garde but definitely really good. 

Luke Evans was a good actor and good casting choice for Dracula... But.. (refer to The Bad)

The Bad:
But if you were looking for a dark, romantic, sophisticated, charming blood sucker that's reverent to the original Bram Stoker novel as well as film adaptations with Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee, prepare to be VERY disappointed. Like I said, the guy who plays Dracula in this does a good job with the material he's given. Sadly the material he's given is nothing like the original source material save the name, some of the mythos and basis of his powers. 

Plot holes aplenty! (Can't say much here without spoiling)

Worst final fight I've seen in a long time. 

You all pretty much know my contempt for adaptations-to-war movies so I'll leave that alone.

The Result:
It repairs vampire's images a good bit from when Twilight destroyed it, but not enough to be vampire's saving grace.

Joel Schumacher's Batman movies

PFFFTTTT...subtlety?! Complex character development?! Realism?! Schumacher doesn't need that horseshit! No, old Schumacher trades all that in for Bat nipples and bat asses. -_-

While Burton's films were definitely more adult orientated, Schumacher devolves this novel approach to comic book movies back to the childish antics of a saturday morning cartoon.

So I'm going to go through what goes wrong with these movies... assuming I can find the proper place to start.

Well just to get a footnote out of the way, the only good thing about these movies was Jim Carrey as the Riddler. He just gave too much of an over-the-top performance to not burst into hilarity over.

But it's all downhill from there.

I guess I'll start with Batsy himself. He's played by dead lifeless puppets... oh wait I mean Val Kilmer and George Clooney. Sorry, it's easy to mistake the two. Neither of them even touch the shadows of Michael Keaton's performance as the dark knight. There was no attempt to show that Batman was a tortured soul. Batman was more like Superman ironically enough, and that's not good. Superman is the ultimate boy scout, always doing the right thing no matter what. Batman is a tough vigilante who does what's necessary no matter the cost, even going into moral gray areas at times. So clearly these two should not be interchangeable molds. Batman should be heroic but should above all else be dark and brooding, not a happy poster boy.

Next the villains. While the origins were much more relevant to the comic books for the most part they were still not that good. Carrey aside, let's look at them all.
Two Face: Joker clone. Not anywhere like his character personality wise. Next.

Mr. Freeze: Have to admit, the freeze suit looked cool (NOT A PUN I SWEAR) and they try to dive into the tragedy of the character, all well and good, but this tragedy isn't helped with his HORRIBLE puns and... wearing fucking polar bear slippers and making his minions sing songs, ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!


Bane: Oh good god what have you done to him?! You turned the Man Who Broke the Bat's Back into a god damn Pokemon! I mean it! All he says is his name and grunts throughout the movie! When the fuck was Bane just a mindless minion in the movies?!

Poison Ivy: While I'll admit that the costuming and makeup was spot on for her at parts and her using men as her slaves, the rest was just stupidly handled. Riddle me this, why does she want to work with Mr. Freeze? Isn't frost kind of the number one KILLER OF PLANTS?! You'd think they'd be natural enemies. That would've been interesting! But nope! They work together for -insert logical reason here-. Also she's supposed to have the power to control plants. So why is it a giant venus flytrap is what stops her?  Not to mention she was every cliched villain ever written. 

Oh yeah, and Robin's a whiny useless bastard. All the words I'm going to waste there.

The stories were lame, the action was lame, the effects made no sense too. I know that's a hard one to get but why do Two Face's machine guns have neon lights on them!? And why is the entire criminal underground like a really bad drug trip?! Did Schumacher just have a neon fetish or something?! In the comics, the criminal underworld was like one you'd find in any city. Granted the supervillains spiced things up but the criminal element was still very grounded in reality. But like I said earlier 'Subtlety? What's that?" 

Just an all around negative experience. If you want to have some laughs and save yourself a lot of mental pain, I recommend you look up Jim Carrey as the Riddler on Youtube. Or if you're a poor soul who has seen this movie like me, here's a clip that will make you feel better:


Thank you Mr. Nolan for bringing Batman back from the deep, neon lighted grave that Schumacher dug it into it...

Hunger Games Mockingjay Part 1

So this film I think has the dubious honor of being the worst in the Hunger Game series for me so far. Hunger Games 1 was technically not good, but the story still enough to keep me watching. Catching Fire was AMAZING! Absolutely loved it! 

And now this one comes around. Following the masterpiece of Catching Fire, this odd little addition to the series seemed to take every wrong step. 

Just to get the few positive points out of the way, Jennifer Lawrence's acting was as splendid as always (she's quickly becoming one of my favorite actresses btw), and the camera work was great! But the biggest killer for me was the story. It was such a bore. I understand why it's going to be important for Part 2 (again, 2 parts, real original -_-) but to just watch it was so dull.

The action was nonexistent. Katniss fired maybe 2 arrows the whole time. The political undertones threatened to become overtones at times, even if they were still as intelligent as ever. I don't know, just after all the goodness of Catching Fire, this just seemed like a real downgrade.

DOUBLE FEATURE TIME!


Apollo 18
Think Paranormal Activity, put it on the moon, replace a creepy atmosphere with a vortex of boredom, and ghost with spiders that by some magical luck happen to live on the moon and eat meat even though we see no other life on the moon besides them and you got Apollo 18. It's completely devoid of logic and doesn't offer anything close to a scare. Mildly unnerve doubtfully, but not scare. It's also no secret that I hate shaky cam. It's just a 90 minute waste of time that has nothing to offer. Luckily, forgetting about it is pretty easy.

Night at the Museum 3
While the first two offered some good family friendly entertainment, this one didn't in my opinion. To me, what killed it were the following problems. 
1. Addition of unnecessary characters: Answer me this, if a character has little to no bearing on the outcome of the story, why are we bothering writing them? It just made the movie cluttered!
2. Little to no chaos: I know that's weird to say, but part of the reason I liked Night at the Museum 1-2 is the chaos of all the exhibits running loose. We got a small dose of that in this one, but it wasn't nearly as frantic or out of control.
3. Emotional flatline: Plain and simple, the emotional scenes were far too rushed and had more of a feeling of 'Let's get this over with.' 

But to be fair, it did have a funny scene here or there. Yeah, that's it.

im going to counteract the mockingjay one.

ok, so I love the series. One of my fav series.

SO when I heard they were going to be films, I was so happy. 
Out I ran to see Hunger Games and...
crap.

So back I never actualy say Catching Fire . I watched it two weeks before going to see Mockingjay.
And actually, the only reason I went to see mockingja was because the book disapointed me and I planned to take the mick out of it.

But i was silenced. It seems the filmy people (so technical,me) finally listened to the fans and realised we wanted the book, not 'based on the book'
By the book, this film is fantstic. It is not meant to be about action. The point was that district 13 didnt want the Mockingjay near anything, so she could not be hurt, so she was hidden away.
Katniss had, in essence PTSD and it was cleverly done;
unlike in the other films, where problems were hidden so romance could shine (WHERES THE MISSING LEG) this showed what actually happened. 
The mockingjay felt broken, and who could blame her? Finnick, I was so happy when they left his story in. they could have missed it and then missed a huge part of what else happens in that world.

Also (Feminist in me coming out) THE MOCKINGJAY SUIT. 
I, like many others, were expecting this to be one of those stupid suits that shw more flesh than it protects, but it doesnt. Its feminie but so practical and OH MY GOD  It was so good.


Its not the storline you need o watch for in this, its the underlying work, and that what makes it so good. 

(also, I love Jennifer. She is fantastic.)

Firstly, yes I absolutely agree about the Kat-suit. I was worried they were going to pointlessly sex her up too. Leave that to the Capitol, that's their job. 

Secondly, yes, Jennifer Lawrence is a wonderful actress! Couldn't say a wrong thing about her! 

Third, I think the reason for our vastly different opinions is because I never read the books and you did. You're looking at this as a fan of the series and I'm seeing it purely as a movie. Maybe it was good from a fan standpoint, I don't know. I just know what I saw. I understand why everything they did in there is going to BE important later on but to me it seemed a tad unnecessary to make a whole movie about it. It's not like Harry Potter which had a lot to squeeze in. Honestly I think a good chunk of this movie should've just been a montage in one large movie.

2014's Godzilla

These movie has the same problems as Iron Man 3 and a lot of the Transformer movies, the titular character barely makes an appearance and they focus way too heavily on the human characters.

Be honest with me, in a monster fighting movie do you really give two craps about the people? For me personally, I say HELL NO! I paid to see monsters fighting and making cities their punching bags, dammit! YOU DELIVER!! 

So after waiting nearly 98 minutes of zero monster fighting, For the love of everything holy and otherwise, the monster fighting actually starts and... IT KICKS ASS! The entire theater bursts into an uproar of excitement when Godzilla finally started beating the crap out of the MUTOs, myself included. Why couldn't the whole movie just be that?! That would've been amazing! 

But nope, pesky humans had to be the main stars. -_- wonderful.

If you want to save a lot of time but still fulfill your need for monster related destruction that all of us secretly (or not so much) have, enjoy this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YsnZ4bYIjs

But until then, one line perfectly sums up what was going through the audience's heads during this:

Foodfight

My friends, I have stared into the abyss... 
In this film, illogic rules and only few survive a viewing. I am one such survivor, but the scars run deep...

$65 million dollars... that was the price tag on this film. But even with all that money, it still looks like a first year animation students rough draft. But the awful doesn't stop there. Granted the animation is awful but the writing makes it look magnificent. 

For a children's movie, it's oddly sexual. Yes a movie with Mr. Clean and Charlie the Tuna is actually sexual!! O.O 

But worse than that, it was a massive, BEYOND massive product placement. Think if Wreck it Ralph became about grocery store mascots and you'd get the idea. 

My friends, this is without a semblance of a doubt the worst animated movie of all time.
If you dare to watch it, here's the link:
http://www.solarmovie.ws/watch-foodfight-2012-online.html

I'm not responsible for the consequences. 

Hot Pursuit

Time to kill this film. I couldn't let it escape my rage. So I got dragged (quite literally) to see this piece of shit and got exactly what I knew it would be.

The comedy is so horrendously unfunny that a documentary about WW2 is actually a riot by comparison. The key flaw with the comedy as I see it is neither of the main characters are relatable. When it comes to clashing characters, they can be extreme but there has to be something to relate to. For example, I saw this movie called 1941 which was a comedy about WW2. In it, two men were assigned to sit atop this ferris wheel to spy for Japanese planes. The one guy was scared of heights but otherwise a normal guy. The other guy was a whackjob who kept mentioning the height and did all these antics that drove the man insane. That to me was funny because I know how it feels to work with someone who gets under your skin and they brought it to the next level. There's a connection. 

However both main characters were too set in their extremes with no ground for the audience to get connected to. Not to mention each line of dialogue was like getting a mini cheese grater rubbed in my ears because it was so shrill and terribly written. I didn't expect a masterpiece (at all) but how about... just competence? 

I ended up rooting for the villains about 10 minutes in just so i didn't have to hear them anymore.

It's just an overall waste of time with nothing to offer. If you do watch it though, watch it facing backwards with your ears plugged. You'll suffer less.

It's sad most films with women protagonists nowadays are annoying or unrelatable. They always have to stick females in cliches that make them obnoxious and flat. Is that how the film industry sees us? I mean come on...have some decency movie makers...

Yeah, good female characters exist! Sarah Connor, Katniss Everdeen, Clarice Starling, Catwoman (excluding Haley Barries), Annie Wilkes. These are all great characters! More of them please!

Exactly! They exist! Dynamic, emotional, strong, loyal, funny, snarky, heroic, why can't they/won't they make more?!
Oh that's right because only guys could ever be any of those -_- I don't get society, I really don't

I think the greatest trouble comes from them TRYING to do it but failing miserably (IE Electra, Hallie Barries Catwoman, Twilight) that just do more damage than good for female based movies. 

I'm really hoping for future films they break away from this. I know Harley isn't going to be the center star but for the Suicide Squad movie, PLEASE make Harley Quinn more than just a sex object! PLEASE for the love of everything sacred capture her complexity and intrigue that made us fall in love with her in the first place!

Couldn't have said it better! There's so much more to Harley, that's part of what made me like her so much! She actually got closer to getting rid of batman than the joker did! Essentially making HER the bigger genius

Yeah! Fun fact, did you know that Harley was actually created namely for the Animated Series but her fan popularity was so large she got her own comic and became a regular character in the Batman Rogues Gallery?

Now THAT'S a strong female character! Sure she loves Joker, but there's a lot more too her. She was a psychiatrist that fell for Joker's mind games, she has a friendship with Ivy and even Batman admits she's formidable!