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Biggest Cinematic Let Downs

Started by Barberism, May 19, 2010, 11:37:42 AM

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Whug Baspin

Reservoir Dogs for the age I watched it at, I saw the poster of these cool guys in suits and shades, I heard it had been banned because it was so shocking and violent, then I got to watch a pirate video someone had bought from Pakistan and.... it had it's moments, but I had to hide the fact that I secretly found it a bit boring.

I'd also like to add the 2 Scream sequels. The first was just fantasticly written and left me with a massive grin on my face at all the self knowing convention busting/obeying, then during the sequel I was waiting for the same sense of subversion and it just felt like a straight teen slasher with a few gags, and a bit of throw away irony, then the third delivered the same in diminishing returns, really wish they hadn't made those sequels. Mind you I haven't watched the first one since, it sould be that I just didn't fall for the same trick twice.

Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth

Quote from: Artemis on May 19, 2010, 04:39:57 PM
I'd say The Exorcist as well. I didn't see it at the cinema admittedly, and I watched it at home with the lights on and the radio on in the background in case I grew scared beyond my ability to cope, but even so I don't think the movie was remotely scary really, and actually pretty funny in places. A let down? Well ok, maybe not for me - I didn't want to be scared, but I did want it to live up to it's hype more, like Reservoir Dogs. Now there's a great movie.
Ah yes, The Exorcist. I guess it could never have lived up to the hype that had built up around it in the years since it had been banned. The mere fact that it was banned in the first place was probably too much for it to overcome. Even so, it was a a real disappointment. Not frightening and, as you say, downright funny at points. What's worse is that I'd seen Exorcist 3 which genuinely was scary.

Similarly, The Blair Witch Project. I'd seen The Curse of the Blair Witch mockumentary, which had whetted my appetite for the main film, but when the time finally came to see what all the fuss was about, I was so pissed off with what I got. My attitude towards it has softened somewhat since then - I think it's actually better watched at home by yourself - but even though it has some effective bits, much of the duration is still pretty boring.

madhair60

Sin City, the fifth or so time I watched it, having insisted fervently to a friend that it was ace.

Treguard of Dunshelm

Quote from: Whug Baspin on May 19, 2010, 05:00:29 PM
Reservoir Dogs

Yeah, it didn't live up to the hype for me either, some great moments separated by long stretches of tediousness. The Usual Suspects is boring as well.

I probably should point out I find most films boring, but these especially so.

Johnny Townmouse

I would put Reservoir Dogs up there as one of my favourite cinematic experiences ever. I was caught with time on my hands before a gig started at the Camden Palace, so I thought I would pop along and see a film with a couple of mates. Reservoir Dogs was playing, but this was before it got proper distribution and marketing - in fact it had a completely different, rather awful poster. I think I had seen one mention of the film in Time Out and as it was starting in 10mins I thought I would give it a go. Completely blown away I was by it too. I paid the same to see it as I did the band, but I don't even remember who the band were.

I do wonder what I would have made of it, had I seen the film at home on video 6 months or so after all the praise heaped onto it. That's probably a subject in its own right - whilst a film is a static piece of art (unless you are Ridley Scott and you endlessly fuck around with it), it seems our enjoyment of it can be completely different based on our expectations. I watched the Aviator on TV a few months ago after avoiding it, and only really because I was ill and didn't have the energy to turn it off. I found it the most entertaining Scorsese film I have seen since Casino - I found rather a lot to like in it. However, I'm not sure it is necessarily a better film than Gangs of New York, but my expectations were at completely different ends of the spectrum for each.

An tSaoi

Aguirre, The Wrath of God (Er, obviously I didn't see it at the cinema). I'd heard how good it was, that Kinski gave a really unhinged performance, that it was visually breathtaking, highly atmospheric etc. All signs pointed to me liking it, but when I finally saw it I thought it was pretty disappointing.

Maybe it was my high expectations, but it just didn't do it for me, or at least it wasn't nearly as good as I had hoped. It started off well; the opening scenes are breathtaking, as the conquistadors traverse that narrow mountain path. The mood is set almost immediately, and the film certainly has a great deal of atmosphere. But for some reason it never seemed to go anywhere, and after a while I found myself somewhat bored - I just wasn't enjoying it. The plot started to plod (there's a lot of sitting about on the riverbank looking dishevelled), and Kinski was surprisingly reserved (I later found out that he wanted to act like a madman, whereas Herzog wanted a more restrained performance). You never really get to know any of the characters, not even Aguirre, so there's no emotional connection when they die off. On top of that, the supporting actors aren't particularly strong.

There some great moments alright; I particularly
Spoiler alert
liked Aguirre firing a cannon at the corpses of his companions, the murder of two non-believing natives, and the hanging of Aguirre's superior.
[close]
But in between the highlights were many monotonous scenes. I suppose that's the point, to show the tedium of their journey to nowhere. But it's hard to maintain interest in such an expedition. I'd hate to call a film boring because that usually indicates a poor attention span on the part of the reviewer, but it certainly started to drag.

To make matters worse, the general grimness was punctured by some totally out-of-place slapstick moments, such as one of the men (or rather the head of one of the men) continuing to talk after he has been beheaded, and another breaking the fourth wall with a comedic one-liner once he's been hit with a spear. These moments only served to take me out of the film even more. The spear and arrow wounds were pretty badly done too, very unconvincing effects; but I suppose that's nit-picking.

Before I knew it,
Spoiler alert
everyone but Aguirre had been dispatched by the natives, at which point monkeys overtake the raft.
[close]
The end. To say it concludes (if you could call that a conclusion) on an unsatisfactory note is an understatement, and it feels as if the preceding hundred minutes have been for nothing. Which I suppose is the point. Doesn't make it any less of a let-down.

Peru

Anything by Terry Gilliam since 1996. Especially Tideland, which he had claimed was an 'uninterfered-with' film and represented pure Gilliam. After having seen it, I was praying that he went back to the studios!

It sounds weird, but I still can't believe they made Transformers so shit. I wasn't expecting it to be great, but...jesus.


Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Artemis on May 19, 2010, 03:46:40 PM
Controversial, and bit weird because in many ways I really like it, but Back To The Future 3 let me down a bit. The first one was, and still is, the best time-travel movie ever made, and rightly regarded by many as a genuinely classic movie. The second managed to weave it's way into the first brilliantly and was creative, clever, imaginative and pioneering. The third lost something; there was a magic to the first two that was often spell-binding. You felt like you were watching something never seen and never attempted before, and in many ways you were. The third felt more like a love-in, more self-regarding and pointless than the first two. Oh sure, you get 'You're my, you're my [mom]', Biff covered in manure and so on, but it had been done before - twice. I just felt like they'd run out of juice so they did as many in-jokes as they could.

If I remember rightly, parts two and three were filmed back to back, so I'm not sure if that made any difference, but yes. My submission: Back To The Future 3.

You're literally the first person I've ever seen criticise BTTF 3, but I couldn't agree more. To use a horrible phrase, it brought nothing new to the table, and I was bored of seeing the same things done over and over again. There's the odd nice sequence, but for me it's lacking the charm, intelligence and wit of the first two.

QuoteThat's so often a problem when a decent novel is translated to the screen, one that you have your own vivid ideas about. I read Starter for 10 a few weeks back, which I thought was a great yarn, then sat down to watch the film not long after, pleased that it appeared to have impressed many critics. I thought it was bloody awful and couldn't quite worked out what they'd seen that made them fawn so much. It had none of the heart of the book and the feisty, passionate scottish goth girl had been sort of dumbed down into this lanky english drip. Crap.

Completely agree with this too. Everyone I know raves about this film but I found it to be a formulaic and tiresome romantic comedy that completely wastes the premise.

Phil_A

Quote from: gatchamandave on May 19, 2010, 03:13:37 PM
I had that recently when I finally got a hold of a dvd of Knightriders.

I had read for years that this was considered by most fans the warmest and most human of George Romero's films, a complete change of pace and style from his zombie films. I had no problem with that since I consider Romero's Dead movies to have been on a downward trend since he started making them again, and wanted so desperately to believe that the old man had indeed once been a major talent.


You've just reminded me what a crushing disappointment Land Of The Dead was. It wasn't just the dull action movie cliches, terrible dialogue and paper thin characters, the worst thing about it was it was just so generic. It felt like something any two bit hack director could've made. Zak Snyder's 2004 remake of "Dawn" managed to be a better film than this in just about every respect.

SavageHedgehog

At the time critics seemed to greatly prefer BTTFIII over II, but public opinion (as far as people I know and comments I've read tells me) seems to have gone the opposite way in recent years, which does not displease me.  BTTFIII is fine but I think it's easily the least entertaining and least interesting of the three. This may be because, Eastwood aside, I'm not all that into Westerns (conversely I suspect many 80s/90s critics found Westerns to be a much easier point of access than II's time paradox shenanigans). The Lloyd/Steenburgen romance is sweet and nicely done, but outside of that I think it's mostly just kind of there.

Glebe

Quote from: Subtle Mocking on May 19, 2010, 04:09:44 PMSpiderman 3. It's amazing how one terrifically shit scene can do it's best to nearly destroy any credibility a franchise has. And that's just one scene, I haven't mentioned the rest of the film.

Indeed. I really enjoyed 2 (plenty of action and sly humour -
Spoiler alert
not to mention the nod to Raimi's Evil Dead past with the kinetic Doc-in-the-hospital scene
[close]
), 3 was just a totally contrived and heartless mess,
Spoiler alert
with some annoying, cartoony gung-ho stuff thrown in for bad measure in the final scrap
[close]
. Raimi admitted he gave in to studio exec interference, and was all set to redress the balance with Spidey 4 - until the suits attempted to mess him around again and he put his foot down and walked.

mobias

A very obvious film would be Star Wars episode I The Phantom Menace. Never before or since has there been such huge hype surrounding a movie. Obviously it was an up hill battle for the film right from the start but how dreadful a movie it was. It was funny reading round various forums at the time looking at people desperately trying to persuade themselves to like it. The second one was if anything worse. If you had told me as a youngster in the 80's that one day George Lucas would make a Star Wars prequel that has Boba Fett's dad coming out of the shower with a bath robe on I would have laughed and then cried. Yet our George somehow managed to do just that.

But the film(s) that for me top the Star Wars prequels for sheer gob smacking crapness that did genuinely upset me with their sheer shitness were the two Matrix sequels. Basically because I really like the first Matrix, I thought it was bold, original and clever when it appeared out of nowhere in the same week funnily enough as the Phantom Menace in the summer of 99. I should have known that the sequels couldn't possibly live up to the first movie but I guess I thought I trusted the Wachowski Brothers with them having been so clever the first time round. The two sequels were so bad it was as if someone else had come along and written and directed them. I couldn't believe they were actually done by the same people. They're the best example I can think of of a sequel or sequels ruining the reputation of the original movie. Had the Matrix not had its reputation tarnished by them then I'm sure it would have gone down in history as a si-fi classic in the same league as Blade Runner.         

SavageHedgehog

I seem to remember The Phantom Menace and Matrix: Reloaded getting good, even ecstatic at times reviews from critics when it was assumed they were going to be everyone's new favourite movies. Mysteriously, the reviews for Attack of the Clones and Revolutions were a lot worse...

Quote from: mobias on May 19, 2010, 07:08:16 PM
A very obvious film would be Star Wars episode I The Phantom Menace. Never before or since has there been such huge hype surrounding a movie. Obviously it was an up hill battle for the film right from the start but how dreadful a movie it was. It was funny reading round various forums at the time looking at people desperately trying to persuade themselves to like it. The second one was if anything worse. If you had told me as a youngster in the 80's that one day George Lucas would make a Star Wars prequel that has Boba Fett's dad coming out of the shower with a bath robe on I would have laughed and then cried. Yet our George somehow managed to do just that.

But the film(s) that for me top the Star Wars prequels for sheer gob smacking crapness that did genuinely upset me with their sheer shitness were the two Matrix sequels. Basically because I really like the first Matrix, I thought it was bold, original and clever when it appeared out of nowhere in the same week funnily enough as the Phantom Menace in the summer of 99. I should have known that the sequels couldn't possibly live up to the first movie but I guess I thought I trusted the Wachowski Brothers with them having been so clever the first time around. The two sequels were so bad it was as if someone else had come along and written and directed them. I couldn't believe they were actually done by the same people. They're the best example I can think of of a sequel or sequels ruining the reputation of the original movie. Had the Matrix not had its reputation tarnished by them then I'm sure it would have gone down in history as si-fi classic in the same league as Blade Runner.       
I knew the sequals were gonna be crap to the matrix, because at the end of the first film  Neo flys off the fucking planet, totally ruins the movie.

Ginyard

Quote from: SavageHedgehog on May 19, 2010, 06:45:34 PM
At the time critics seemed to greatly prefer BTTFIII over II, but public opinion (as far as people I know and comments I've read tells me) seems to have gone the opposite way in recent years, which does not displease me. 

The way the trilogy episodes mirror and interlink eachother so adeptly would suggest in theory an eveness in quality throughout. I love certain aspects about it, like seeing the clock photo taken, Biff's rhetorical question about the name Clint Eastwood, the train bit....there's plenty 'nough there to keep me entertained. But there is something slightly off-centre about it and I'm not sure if its because of the era as Fred suggested, the (what feels to me) slightly dubious and contrived geographical relocation, or wether Michael J Fox seems like his heart isn't in it.

What is certain to me is that it does have a rather colourless ending to it. After the fresh Fonzian 50s and the wild plains of the wild west, the blandness of 80s american suburbia is never more pronounced than it is here. Combined with the rather forced, speedy adios to Doc and his steam-age flying family, it kind of dampens the impact of the ending. I feel like a wet towel has been flung over my head.


Quote from: mobias on May 19, 2010, 07:08:16 PM
If you had told me as a youngster in the 80's that one day George Lucas would make a Star Wars prequel that has Boba Fett's dad coming out of the shower with a bath robe on I would have laughed and then cried.         

Man, that made me laugh.

JPA

Quote from: Delete Delete Delete on May 19, 2010, 07:15:54 PM
I knew the sequals were gonna be crap to the matrix, because at the end of the first film  Neo flys off the fucking planet, totally ruins the movie.

Yeah I always hated that bit (though not to the point of ruining the entire film). God, that fucking rave scene in Reloaded that goes on for an eternity...

Gulftastic

Quote from: JPA on May 19, 2010, 08:05:15 PM
Yeah I always hated that bit (though not to the point of ruining the entire film). God, that fucking rave scene in Reloaded that goes on for an eternity...

And when K D Lang gets speared and she's dying. STFU and die already, you boring cow!

alan nagsworth

FOUR LIONS OMG SHOCK

Seriously the only reason I'll be buying it is to give it a second chance because I really felt like I missed something, despite walking into the cinema with no preconceptions of wackiness or seriousness. The juxtaposition of the two just diluted the whole thing for me.

mobias

Quote from: Delete Delete Delete on May 19, 2010, 07:15:54 PM
I knew the sequals were gonna be crap to the matrix, because at the end of the first film  Neo flys off the fucking planet, totally ruins the movie.

Its maybe slightly over the top but it does some up his new found state of awakened consciousness in a virtual world. Why not fly into the heavens? I don't understand why it ruins the movie? It only lasted a brief moment and coupled with the Rage Against the Machine track I thought that whole scene made for quite a good ending.

It was the sequels that utterly laboured the superman thing plus all the other good ideas from the first film that made it naff I think.

Quote from: mobias on May 19, 2010, 08:25:24 PM
Its maybe slightly over the top but it does some up his new found state of awakened consciousness in a virtual world. Why not fly into the heavens? I don't understand why it ruins the movie? It only lasted a brief moment and coupled with the Rage Against the Machine track I thought that whole scene made for quite a good ending.

It was the sequels that utterly laboured the superman thing plus all the other good ideas from the first film that made it naff I think.
For a film with amazing special effects why have that lame effect at the end for a scene that didn't need to be there.

mobias

Quote from: Delete Delete Delete on May 19, 2010, 08:55:50 PM
For a film with amazing special effects why have that lame effect at the end for a scene that didn't need to be there.

Was it that lame? The camera pans out of the city into the sky and then Neo flies up towards the camera. The bit with him flying lasts less than a second. I haven't watched the film in a couple of years but I can't say that bit has ever struck me as a particularly bad bit of special effects. As for the whole scene not needing to be there. I disagree. They had to make the point they made at the end and ok there may well have been other ways of making it but surely being able to fly is one of the most common fantasies people have. They may as well have tapped into that and err.... they did.   

Johnny Townmouse

Flying implied that he was the total master of his domain, something they conveniently left out of the second and third films. There were many instances in those sequels when flying would have saved his and everyone else's lives. I remember thinking "he can fly? how are they going to deal with that in the next few films?".

neo flying

Go on tell me that dosn't look lame, espcially with the RATM build up for the climax. I understand the symbolism, but its carried off so crudely. I really really hate that scene.

madhair60

Just want to second the Spidey 3 mention.  Piece of shit.

Oh, and X-Men 3.

mobias

Quote from: Johnny Townmouse on May 19, 2010, 09:40:33 PM
Flying implied that he was the total master of his domain, something they conveniently left out of the second and third films. There were many instances in those sequels when flying would have saved his and everyone else's lives. I remember thinking "he can fly? how are they going to deal with that in the next few films?".

Exactly, that's why they should have left the first film alone. The first film did a good job at just hinting at things enough for you to use your imagination. The second and third did away with that and as a result you just ended up questioning everything about them. Improbability didn't really come into the first film, they cleverly steered the film on a course where you just didn't feel the need to question what was going on too much. The sequels disappeared up their own conceptual backside as much as anything else.

rjd2

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Fincher, Pitt and Blanchett on board, the premise was interesting but instead what we got was an incredibly tedious film which was 60 minutes to long.


The Hurt Locker didn't do much for me either, in fact I would say that Up In The Air deserved to clear up at the Oscars instead of it, but I am pretty sure I am alone thinking that.

An tSaoi

Quote from: Johnny Townmouse on May 19, 2010, 09:40:33 PM
Flying implied that he was the total master of his domain, something they conveniently left out of the second and third films. There were many instances in those sequels when flying would have saved his and everyone else's lives. I remember thinking "he can fly? how are they going to deal with that in the next few films?".

He flies to the rescue on a few occassions in the sequels. He whisks Morpheus and the Keymaker to safety in the second one, and uses flight to 'outrun' an explosion in the third one.

mobias

Quote from: Delete Delete Delete on May 19, 2010, 09:45:48 PM
neo flying

Go on tell me that dosn't look lame, espcially with the RATM build up for the climax. I understand the symbolism, but its carried off so crudely. I really really hate that scene.

The effect looks a bit flat but it still doesn't look that bad, its maybe a bit Dr Who-ish. Its too short for me to have much of an opinion on it to be honest. I went to see the Matrix two or three times at the cinema when it came out I can't remember ever walking out thinking that was a naff bit of special effects at the end. I've seen way worse put it that way.

Quote from: mobias on May 19, 2010, 09:57:57 PM
The effect looks a bit flat but it still doesn't look that bad, its maybe a bit Dr Who-ish. Its too short for me to have much of an opinion on it to be honest. I went to see the Matrix two or three times at the cinema when it came out I can't remember ever walking out thinking that was a naff bit of special effects at the end. I've seen way worse put it that way.
But I bet now i've pointed it out you'll always look at that scene in a funny way. I do however rate the lobby scene quite highly, if your gonna have a shoot out thats the way to do it, or do i like the bar shoot out in Despardo.

Johnny Townmouse

Quote from: An tSaoi on May 19, 2010, 09:54:15 PM
He flies to the rescue on a few occassions in the sequels. He whisks Morpheus and the Keymaker to safety in the second one, and uses flight to 'outrun' an explosion in the third one.

You are wrong*

Spoiler alert
*Except for when you were probably right, which was most likely the entire post.
[close]

I have trouble with omnipotence in films because for me it breaks the sense of danger. When I saw Superman could go back in time by flying around the earth as a kid I felt annoyed. It was just TOO powerful. With the flying to me it just means he is master of this whole dominion, which he patently is not otherwise he wouldn't be getting nearly beaten at Kung Fu.

OK, I'm just still sore about The Invisibles.