The Year in Review: The Worst Horror Films of 2015

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Animal, Area 51, Avenged, Bound to Vengeance, cinema, Da Sweet Blood of Jesus, Ejecta, film reviews, films, horror, horror films, horror movies, Movies, personal opinions, Preservation, Some Kind of Hate, The Blood Lands, Treehouse, Tremors 5: Bloodlines, worst films of the year

Before we get to the lists of what I consider to be the very best horror films of 2015, let me take a word (or 1000) to talk about those films that fell on the polar opposite of said extreme. It’s time to talk about the worst horror films (according to your humble host) of this soon-to-be-over calendar year.

I’ll be honest: this was a ridiculously good year for horror, a fact which will be amply extolled in the next post. Since there was so much coming out this year that I’d been waiting for, I tended to steer clear of any obvious turkeys: in other words, I wasn’t actively seeking out any “so-bad-they’re-good” clunkers this time around. The ten films below (listed in alphabetical order) represent the horror screenings that just fundamentally failed for me, for one reason or a hundred. Some of these had potential: others were practically D.O.A. from the jump. There is one important thing to note, however: these represent the worst films of this particular year. In a much weaker year, it’s quite possible that at least a few of these would have passed into my “just fine” column. When stacked up against so much pure wheat, however, the chaff is still easy to spot.

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Animal — From the generic title to the generic performances to the generic creature representation, everything about Animal was as generic, obvious and dull as possible. I certainly wasn’t asking for outrageous innovation in a basic “strangers trapped by a monster in the woods” film but this managed to lack anything substantial. In fact, I’d be hard-pressed to remember much about any of the characters except that there was a heart-broken boyfriend (I think), a really aggressive, shouty dude (I’m positive) and some kind of character played by Joey Lauren Adams. Fade to beige.

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Area 51 — I’m not sure if anyone expected Oren Peli’s Area 51 to be any good whatsoever: after all, this was supposed to be his follow-up to 2007’s Paranormal Activity and it only came out this year. Eight years to release a found-footage, micro-budget film about people poking around Area 51? With this kind of anticipation, one could be forgiven for suspecting that Peli was crafting the first-person-POV equivalent of Kubrick’s 2001.

Alas, he was actually crafting yet another identical found-footage film, with another identical, anonymous group of people exploring another, identical, anonymous location and pointing the camera into the background while we impatiently wait for yet another, identical creepy thing to pop up and make us drop our Twizzlers. While Paranormal Activity was far from a perfect film, it ends up looking like Citizen Kane when stacked next to this dull, event-less exercise in by-the-numbers filmmaking. At this rate, we’ll get the next film in 2025 and it will be a shot-for-shot remake of Ishtar.

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Avenged — This was certainly a strange one. On the outside, Avenged’s concept seems like something that screamed right out of the ultra-nasty late-’70s, early-’80s exploitation market: a sweet-natured deaf woman takes a solo drive through the Southwest when she runs afoul of a bunch of rednecks murdering a couple of innocent Native Americans. The woman is captured, gang-raped, tortured, repeatedly stabbed and left for dead in a shallow grave: a kindly, old medicine man happens to be passing by and digs her up before performing a ceremony that ends up imbuing her mutilated, broken body with the spirit of a centuries dead Apache chief. Once the young woman has been resurrected, she cuts a bloody swath to the rednecks, leaving the path behind her littered with body parts and blood.

Had it stuck to its guns, Avenged might have ended up as a thoroughly slimy but ruthlessly effective rape-revenge flick. Once the filmmakers introduce the heroine’s concerned boyfriend, however, the film’s tone swings queasily from sick thrills to mawkish, stereotypical indie romance and never really recovers. To compound this split tone, the film goes on to introduce silly magical/fantastical elements straight out of something like Big Trouble in Little China. This is a film where the truly terrible main villain describes the main character’s rape in exacting, sickening detail one minute, while the ghostly, green Apache chief somersaults out of her body, pounds the ground and produces ghostly weapons for her upcoming battle in the next minute. It’s a film that’s in bad taste, to be sure, but it’s also a confused film that lacks the courage of its determinedly antisocial outlook.

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Bound to Vengeance — Like Avenged, this was another film that started from a particularly disturbing place (a young woman is kidnapped and held captive in a dingy dungeon before fighting her way to freedom) but then tried to expand the concept past its obvious exploitation roots. Unlike Avenged, Bound to Vengeance has a much more consistent, gritty tone and feel, which suits the material much better.

The problem, as it turns out, is that Bound to Vengeance ends up being an incredibly dumb movie full of rather stupid people making the worst possible decisions at any given moment. Think of it like a slasher movie where the “final girl” trips and falls 35 times in a row and you have some idea of the frustration involved here. The film is actually full of some pretty solid performances, not the least of which is Tina Ivlev as the victim-turned-avenger. It’s a shame that the filmmakers waste her potential, however, by having her make an increasingly bad series of decisions, most likely in an effort to artificially increase the stakes. By the time the tired “twist” is revealed, I kind of felt like I’d been locked in a dungeon for 90 minutes. A solid concept and cast undone by a ludicrous script.

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Da Sweet Blood of Jesus — Since I never saw Spike’s take on Oldboy, his remake of the older Ganja & Hess was my introduction to his take on the horror genre, a move which I’d pretty much been anticipating my whole life. See, I like Spike Lee. I don’t always love his films, mind you, but I genuinely think he’s an auteur with something to say, even if the message is sometimes more interesting than the film that surrounds it.

That being said, Da Sweet Blood of Jesus is a pretty awful film. Incredibly slow (not measured, mind you: slow), way too long, ridiculously stagy (at times, it actually felt like a filmed play) and full of some truly off-putting amateur performances, nothing here really worked for me, aside from random visuals and some of the backstory. It’s not that I didn’t understand what Spike was trying to do: the lengthy dialogue scenes make that more than abundantly clear. It’s just that I thought he did it in the clunkiest, dullest and least cinematically appealing way possible, that’s all.

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Ejecta — While I’ve seen several less than stellar alien visitation films lately, few have been quite so irritating or obnoxious as Ejecta. Despite a typically solid performance from Julian Richings (few actors do “inherently creepy” as good as this guy), this is the film equivalent of the “sound volume wars” in modern music. Everything here is pushed straight into the red: everyone shouts, the score pounds, the audio effects scream, the editing is as fidgety as a Red Bull addict on a bender…it’s just one, loud, sustained but absolutely empty rush of chaos. With so many truly good alien visitation films, there’s absolutely no reason, whatsoever, to deal with crap like Ejecta. The definition of the title is “material that is forced or thrown out”: sounds about right.

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Preservation — I didn’t want to hate this film but I really wasn’t given much choice: within the first 20 minutes, we’re introduced to a trio of thoroughly repellent characters and given so much blatantly obvious foreshadowing that it was a foregone conclusion I’d sprain an eyeball with rigorous rolling. And that I did. Featuring Orange is the New Black’s Pornstache as a slightly less odious character is just about Preservation’s only ace in the hole: everything else is a strictly by-the-numbers “normal people must turn savage to fight the savages” flick…and not a particularly good one, at that. The fight scenes are poorly staged, the “twist” revelation is completely brain-dead (think about it for exactly one second and it totally collapses) and it feels like everyone involved just gives up and wings it during the chaotic third act. Man is the only animal that kills for fun…and makes terrible films about it, apparently.

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Some Kind of Hate — For the life of me, I’ll never understand all of the massed appreciation and love for Adam Egypt Mortimer’s Some Kind of Hate. Not only did the flick get all kinds of great festival buzz, it actually ended up on several “Best of Year” lists and was frequently hailed as the “next evolution of horror.” In fact, the only film that seemed to have as much sustained genre buzz as SKoH, this year, was It Follows, which was also credited with “saving” and “revitalizing” horror.

Actually, I lie: I know exactly why the film has received (and continues to receive) so much praise. You see, Some Kind of Hate is a perfect example of a film that taps into the popular zeitgeist and just happens to be “in the right place at the right time.” With its theme of bullied teenagers fighting back against their oppressors, it’s hard to think of a horror film that’s more relevant in 2015. Add in a genuinely unique method of killing for the antagonist (whatever she does to her body happens to her intended victims) and this seems like an easy shoe-in for modern classic status.

Except the film is an absolute stinker. Message and method aside, there’s absolutely nothing of value here: the performances are uniformly broad and unpleasant, the “rules” are so fluid as to be non-existent and the whole thing is shot with that seizure-inducing “in your face” style that’s so de rigeur in modern horror. We can talk about Some Kind of Hate’s good intentions all we want (and there are plenty of good intentions to discuss) but if we actually want to discuss the film, itself, we can only deal with what’s up on screen, not whatever was intended. One of these days, there will be a really incisive, hard-hitting horror film that addresses bullying in an appropriately focused manner: this ain’t it.

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Treehouse — Like Preservation, this one fell apart fairly quickly and never recovered. Part of the problem, to be honest, lies with the concept, itself: a pair of young brothers and a traumatized young woman must hide out from anonymous killers in a treehouse. It’s a simple concept that, unfortunately, runs out of gas way before the film does, leading to the addition of so many loose threads and additional storylines that any sense of simplicity is tossed out with the bathwater. This isn’t a poorly-made film, mind you: the treehouse ends up being a great location and there are a handful of well-executed scenes that wind up a reasonable amount of tension. This feels like a killer short that completely lost its shape when expanded out, similar to a distorted reflection in a fun house mirror.

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Tremors 5: Bloodlines — I didn’t go in to this expecting anything more than a fun, silly and brisk little monster movie: after all, this is Tremors 5 we’re talking about here, not Lawrence of Arabia. As a fan of the rest of the series (to one degree or another), this seemed like a perfectly fine way to kill some time.

Instead of a snappy little creature feature, however, I actually got a loud, dumb and completely numb exercise in collecting a paycheck, all underlined by a completely baffling need to humiliate and tear down Michael Gross’ protagonist at every possible turn. The action scenes, character-building, etc are strictly lowest-common-denominator, which certainly befits a film that feels one half-step above the usual ScyFy fare. What to make of the scene, however, where Gross’ Burt Gummer is trapped in the middle of the desert, in a cage, wearing only his tighty-whities, when a big lion comes up and pisses all over his face? Is it supposed to be funny? Ironic? Arousing? For me, it was really only one thing: massively depressing.

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Dishonorable Mention

The Blood Lands (aka White Settlers) — The Blood Lands ends up as my “Dishonorable Mention” for this year because it’s actually only half of a terrible film. The half that isn’t terrible (pretty much the first half) is actually pretty goddamn terrifying: it doesn’t reinvent the “home invasion” subgenre but it certainly gives it a nice kick in the rear.

The problem comes in when the filmmakers drop the other shoe and clue us in to what’s actually going on. From that point on, The Blood Lands is actually one of the very worst films of the year, culminating in a finale that made me want to throw a bottle at my TV. Add in a simpering performance from the normally ferocious Pollyanna McIntosh (of all the current performers you could get to run around screaming and acting defenseless, McIntosh is absolutely the last one that comes to mind) and this is one film that actually pissed me off. Word to the wise: if you end up watching this, stop the film just when it feels like you figured it out and save yourself some grief. Trust me: you did figure it out and it just gets worse from there.

The Year in Review: The Worst Films I Saw in 2014

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2014, cinema, film reviews, films, Movies, personal opinions, worst films of the year, year in review

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: 2014 was a helluva year for film. Sure, there was the same glut of mega-budget superhero flicks at the multiplexes but the under-card was ridiculously deep and varied, much more so than last year (in my humble little opinion, of course). As a matter of fact, I saw so many great-to-amazing films last year that putting together my Best of…lists has been harder than ever.

No matter how many amazing films I saw this year, however, it doesn’t change the fact that there was a fair amount of crap clogging the pipeline, as well. As someone who doesn’t intentionally seek out bad films (I was cured of that after Sharknado became 90 of the most tedious minutes I ever suffered through), I managed to avoid some of the most well-known stinkers this season: had I seen them, I have absolutely no doubt that I, Frankenstein, Ouija and Annabelle would have staked out prime real estate on my Worst of…list. While I might eventually see these clunkers (like Dirty Harry, I know my limitations), there’s obviously no hurry to rush to last place.

No, loyal readers, this list of the worst films I saw in 2014 was arrived at the honest way: no “obvious” ringers here, just a bunch of movies that coulda been contenders but ended up being dog shit. With very few exceptions, I went into all of these films hoping for the best (I will admit that a few of these smelled from the get-go but hope springs eternal) but ended up with the very worst.

Once additional caveat, before we get to the list: as the above title indicates, these were the worst films I saw in 2014, although most of them were actually older films (the oldest being from 2003). Of the 18 clunkers on this list, only three are “officially” 2014 films, although those three are also some of the worst…go figure. Without further ado and in no particular order (other than the ultimate loser, that is), I now present the very worst films that I watched in an otherwise very good year of cinema:

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Visitors (2003) — At first, this creepy little chiller set aboard an isolated sailboat has everything going for it. Once the film tips its hand too soon, however, we’re left sitting through the equivalent of a joke that’s already been spoiled in the set-up. By the midpoint, I just wanted to torch the whole thing and collect insurance money. Set adrift, indeed!

The Hamiltons (2006) — Utterly stupid rubbish about a killer family that stands as one of the most inept things I’ve ever seen. Imagine Dawson’s Creek crossbred with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and you’re close but oh so very far away. The filmmakers just announced a sequel, which gives me endless hope that Leonard Part 7 can’t be far behind.

The Last Rites of Ransom Pride (2010) — A film so dumb that I lost IQ points while suffering through it, I can find very little to recommend this insipid revenge Western. At first, the idea of Lizzy Caplan playing a tough-as-nails outlaw was appealing. Once the film turned into an Awesome Blossom of Awfulness, however, even poor Lizzy couldn’t keep me interested. On the plus side, the film is never boring, although neither is a forced colonoscopy.

Girl Walks Into a Bar (2011) — A gimmick film that manages to fail on each and every front. This is the kind of mess that you get when someone watches Three Days in the Valley and thinks: huh…I bet I could make that even more convoluted and dumb. Congratulations, buddy: hope you’re proud of yourself.

Stay Cool (2011) — Just look at that cast: Winona Ryder, Sean Astin, Josh Holloway, Jon Cryer, Chevy Chase, Dee Wallace, Michael Gross. Going in, I figured this would be, at the very least, an enjoyable romp. Staggering out of the other end, I wondered what the filmmakers were holding over the casts’ heads to make this happen. Blackmail isn’t nice, kids, and should never be used to cast your feature-length film. Always play nice.

Chillerama (2011) — I usually love horror anthologies and this one featured some very interesting directors but the whole mess was D.O.A. I’m absolutely no prude but suffice to say that this unfunny, crude, scatological and unpleasant “comedy” managed to repulse and dismay me in equal doses. Any filmmakers who wastes a national treasure like Ray Wise should be taken straight to the wall, final cigarettes optional.

The Comedy (2012) — I definitely wasn’t the target audience for this mean-spirited “hipster” fest, although I’m also not sure who was. Repetitive, filled with hateful characters and weirdly Dada, at times, The Comedy was the film that proved I’ll never really understand Tim and Eric, no matter how hard I try. The only moment that actually proved “enjoyable” was the ridiculous pew-shuffling scene involving LCD Soundsystem’s James Murphy. When irony attacks, indeed.

The Kitchen (2012) — Another massively irritating “comedy” about dopey-ass twentysomethings acting like teenagers, The Kitchen managed to earn my ire by completely squandering Laura Prepon. This film stretched credibility so much that it should have been called “Elastic”: just try to keep a straight face during the scene where the Lothario seduces a young woman into pleasuring him through an open window during a busy party. If the filmmakers can’t be bothered to take this shit seriously, why should I?

Butcher Boys (2012) — Once upon a time, Kim Henkel helped write a little film called The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. 38 years later, he collaborated with a couple of amateur filmmakers to create Butcher Boys, which attempts to jumpstart another cannibal clan ala the Sawyers. The only difference between the two films is that Texas Chainsaw Massacre is a bleak masterpiece of staggering power, whereas Butcher Boys is a brain-dead, tone-deaf, ridiculously shoddy, utterly worthless exercise in extreme fanboyism that floors the gas straight into irrelevancy.

Entity (2013) — This one managed to waste an awesome location on yet more asinine found-footage retreads. Along with the inherent sense of deja vu here, the film manages to be unnecessarily confusing, pouring on so many twists that the narrative becomes more than a little pretzel-shaped. Despite one or two convincing moments, this can’t shake the heavy aroma of direct-to-VOD crap.

Paranoia (2013) — Alright, look: there was no way this film was going to be amazing but it should have at least been entertaining, right? I mean, you have Harrison Ford, currently in the middle of his “I don’t give a shit, oh hey: pass the dutchie!” phase, along with Gary Oldman, who always plays a convincing badguy and Liam Hemsworth, that hunky dude from The Hunger Games. It’s set in a world of technological intrigue and features more criss-and double-crosses than you can shake a stick at. In reality, however, this is just another dull as dust, run-of-the-mill, action film that features one of the most tuned-out performances by Ford I’ve ever seen (was he even on-screen with the other actors or was this some LOTR-type CGI magic?). The biggest compliment I can give Paranoia is that it wasn’t the worst film I saw this year, just one of the most useless.

The Moleman of Belmont Avenue (2013) — I tend to love musical genre films, especially musical horror films, so this seemed like a sure-thing going in. Despite the presence of genre vet Robert Englund, however, everything about this feels Poverty Row: the production qualities are student-filmesque, the songs suck, the comedy is broad and stupid and none of the characters are likable. Worse yet, Englund is completely wasted as the aging apartment building Lothario: I threw up, a little, after being forced to listen to Freddy Krueger engage in disgusting phone sex…I’m betting you will, too.

After the Dark (2013) — While the rest of the film is clichéd and full of eye-rolling melodrama, the finale of After the Dark really marks this as something special: as one of the main characters kills himself, you can almost see the filmmakers cackling in glee and rubbing their hands together manically…”Got you, suckers!” In reality, it’s the equivalent of the kid who thinks he’s “winning” at hide-and-go-seek when, in truth, all of the other kids went home hours ago. The only thing truly surprising about the film is that anyone could deliver their lines with a straight face. Pray that none of these idiots ever need to lead us out of the end times.

Lizzie Borden Took an Axe (2014) — Here’s the thing: I didn’t realize this was a Lifetime film until I started it and my little rule about never (well, almost never) turning off a movie had kicked in. I don’t mind Ricci but this was a pretty astounding exercise in terrible filmmaking. Confusing, bombastic for no good reason (the stomping blues-rock that scored several slo-mo scenes was particularly eyebrow-raising) and absolutely ludicrous, this is pretty much good for only one thing: take a shot every time you see the repeated image of Lizzie caving in her dad’s head with an axe and you’ll be seeing stars before the midpoint. You’re welcome…I guess.

Gallowwalkers (2014) — Poor Wesley Snipes…all that time away and this is what we get…ugh…if it weren’t for a spectacularly terrible film on this list, Gallowwalkers might have been the worst film I saw all year. The film is terrible in so many ways but my favorite has to be the fact that all the vampires wear obviously fake, blonde wigs, for no apparent reason: that’s the kind of attention to awful that makes this stupid horror-Western one of the year’s very worst.

Goodbye World (2014) — Part of the way into watching this incredibly stupid film, I began to develop an antagonistic relationship with it: I kept daring it to get dumber, to insult my intelligence a little more and to keep ripping off better films with impunity. Like a true champion, Goodbye World kept calling my bluff and raising the stakes all the way to a phenomenally awful final revelation that basically amounts to some idiot on Facebook destroying the world. You win, Goodbye World…you win.

The Oxford Murders (2008) — I’m a huge fan of Spanish auteur Alex de la Iglesia: huge. In fact, up until I saw his English debut, The Oxford Murders, I had never seen a bad film by him. This, of course, all changed with one of the most insipid, Scoody Doo-esque mysteries of all time. Wasting Elijah Wood? That’s not nice but I’ll allow it. Wasting John Hurt? You’re killin’ me, smalls…you’re killin’ me.

And…drum roll, please…my pick for the very worst film that I had the misfortune of watching in 2014 is…

Jobs (2013) — While all of the aforementioned movies are absolutely terrible, there can be only one ring to rule them all and Jobs is that greasy, golden god. In the face of such organized, massive incompetence, it’s difficult to know where to look first: perhaps we should start with Ashton Kutcher’s “performance,” an acting feat that seems to consist entirely of self-satisfied smirks and raised eyebrows, ala a nerd version of The Rock. Perhaps we can look at the way in which the entire film feels like an extended SNL skit, as if the filmmakers sole goal was to craft the single most ludicrous, unbelievable biopic in the history of the medium. Maybe it’s all true…maybe none of it is…Jobs feels so utterly, completely inauthentic, however, that it’s impossible to take any of it seriously.

This is a film that can, perhaps, best be explained by paraphrasing Dr. Loomis’ famous assertion about Michael Myers: I spent the first 15 minutes trying to figure out if this was a joke and the last 113 minutes wishing it was a fever dream. I’m fully aware that all biopics weave in and around the historical record with impunity: rarely have I encountered a biopic that seems so heavily rooted in fantasy and opinion, however, as if the filmmakers gleaned all of their “facts” from a cursory glance at a Wikipedia page.

And there you have it: the worst film of the entire year, at least of the 350-something films that I managed to watch. Jobs is so bad, in fact, that I saw the movie at the beginning of April and my blood still boils when I think about it, nine months later. It’s a film that can handily join the ranks of such classic turkeys as Gigli or Mac and Me, the kind of thing that could (and should) inspire an entire cult of devoted worshippers: I’ll go ahead and coin the term “Jobbies” before someone else does…you can thank me later.

Coming up, we near the end of our year in review as we get to the big questions: I’ve talked about the films I missed, the ones that disappointed me and the ones I hated…all that’s left is to talk about are all of the amazing films that managed to wash the taste of these duds right out of my mouth.

4/26/14: Odd? No. Lame? Yes.

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Addison Timlin, Anton Yelchin, bad films, bad movies, based on a book, Bodachs, CGI, cinema, Clive Barker, Dean Koontz, diners, film adaptations, film reviews, films, Fungus Bob, Movies, Odd Thomas, Peter Straub, Phantoms, short-order cook, small town life, special-effects extravaganza, Stephen King, Stephen Sommers, terrible films, The Frighteners, The Mummy, The Sixth Sense, Van Helsing, Willem Dafoe, worst films of the year

We like to point to film adaptations of Stephen King novels/short stories as being prime examples of how difficult it is to translate the written page to the big screen but, if you think about it, none of the “old guard” horror authors have fared particularly well in Hollywood. King tends to be the most visible, due to the sheer number of his projects that have been filmed, but none of his peers have done much better. Peter Straub’s Ghost Story was turned into a decent slow-burner but the filmed version of Julia was kind of a mess. Clive Barker turned one of his best known shorts into the horror classic Hellraiser (1987) but follow-ups have been mixed bags, vacillating between so-so adaptations of Candyman (1992) and Lord of Illusions (1996) and unmitigated crap like Rawhead Rex (1986), Book of Blood (2009) and Dread (2009). And poor Dean Koontz…oh, Dean…

Of the established old-guard of horror writers, perhaps none have fared quite so poorly on the silver screen as Dean Koontz has. While King, Straub and Barker can at least claim a few successful adaptations of their best known work, there doesn’t seem to be much good that anyone can say about filmed versions of Koontz’s work. While Demon Seed (1977) may have functioned as a bit of histrionic, “so-bad-it’s-good” fluff, The Watchers (1988), The Servants of Twilight (1991), Hideaway (1995) and Phantoms (1998) all produced truly execrable films. In fact, Phantoms had the distinction of being one of the single worst films that I ever paid to see in a theater, as well as being one of the absolute worst films of 1988: quite an honor! Truth be told, I can’t really think of any filed adaptations of Koontz novels/stories that are anything better than “meh,” with most of them being dogfood. To this refuse pile, we can now add the smelly, bloated stupidity that is Odd Thomas (2013), a film that proudly continues the tradition of making unconditionally awful “product” out of Koontz’s decidedly low-brow page-turners. If anything, Odd Thomas is actually worse than most of the previous adaptations, resulting in something that’s akin to a Viceroy of Crap (nothing will ever unseat the howling, eye-gouging, terrible evil that is Phantoms, however, including that box of rocks Watchers).

As far as plot/story goes, consider this the drooling, inbred cousin to Peter Jackson’s far, far superior The Frighteners (1996) or a screwball retake on The Sixth Sense (1999), as envisioned by Pauly Shore. Odd Thomas (Anton Yelchin) is a short-order diner cook who also happens to be able to see dead people. He uses this ability to play “spiritual private eye,” as it were, or, as he eloquently puts it: “I may see dead people but by God…I do something about it!” Good for you, buddy. Odd has a spunky, pixie-girl girlfriend named Stormy (Addison Timlin), who’s basically a bored (and boring) Veronica Mars. He’s also got a long-suffering, overly patient police chief friend, Wyatt (Willem Dafoe), whose sole job is to sigh, shake his head and follow Odd’s lead. What’s this all spell, ladies and gentlemen? Fun, fun, fun in the sun, sun, sun, of course!

Odd has a tendency to see Bodachs, which are basically oily, CGI-critters that swarm invisibly around people who are about to engage in big-time violence. One day, Odd sees the creatures massing around a particularly strange customer, by the name of Fungus Bob (Shuler Hensley), a guy who looks like an unholy fusion of Tom Waits and Men in Black-era Vincent D’Onofrio. Since there are so many of the Bodachs hanging about, Odd figures that Fungus Bob must be one massively bad dude, maybe the baddest dude ever (so now the film is also ripping off The Prophecy (1995), which is miles better than anything found here). In order to prevent whatever tragedy is looming, as well as adding another notch to his “spiritual private detective” punch-card, Odd sets out to uncover the truth about Fungus Bob, with Stormy and Chief Wyatt in tow. Along the way, he’ll experience massive amounts of dramatic slo-mo, more CGI creations than you’re likely to see in an After Effects demo and a convoluted conspiracy that only goes undetected because it makes no sense whatsoever and the audience is provided with no clues to help figure it out along the way. Lucky for the main characters that they’ve read the script, otherwise they would be just as lost as us. The whole thing culminates in a shopping mall set-piece that was musty a decade ago before finishing up with a “tragic” twist that anyone who hasn’t fallen asleep by the film’s final twenty minutes will have had to see coming from a mile away. On the plus side, the film ends with an absolutely gorgeous shot of the city’s lightscape at night: my recommendation would be to forward to the final minute or so, check the shot out and call it a day.

Odd Thomas is one massive pile of glossy, CGI-soaked, over-produced, brainless crap. The editing is overly showy and obnoxious, full of needless quick cuts and so much cheesy slo-mo that it seems like every third shot is tinkered with. The acting is serviceable, although non of the principals look like they’re having a good time. While I’m not the biggest fan of Yelchin, I really enjoyed his performance in Charlie Bartlett (2007) and found him decent in another half-dozen films. He’s pretty much a non-entity here, however, possessing zero charisma and not much pizzazz. Addison Timlin, as Stormy, is consistently obnoxious, one of those “quirky” characters who would be repeatedly stomped into the dust in the real world. Poor Dafoe just looks sleepy and defeated, his performance carrying all of the gravitas of someone fulfilling their end of a losing best.

That Odd Thomas is a giant CGI-fest should come as no surprise, seeing as how Stephen Sommers wrote and directed the film. Sommers is a guy who’s practically synonymous with big CGI flicks: his resume, after all, includes such cinematic majesty as Deep Rising (1998), The Mummy (1999), The Mummy Returns (2001), Van Helsing (2004) and G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009). What is surprising, however, is how lifeless and boring Odd Thomas is. Sommers previous films may be many things – loud, juvenile, silly, weightless, glossy, slapstick – but they’re rarely boring, zipping from one zany special effects moment to another mugging character actor. Perhaps his previous films benefited from more charismatic leads, like The Mummy’s Brendan Fraser or Van Helsing’s Hugh Jackman. Perhaps Sommers had little interest in the source material. Whatever the reason, Odd Thomas plays like a particularly deflated TV movie, something to have on in the background while you’re making dinner for the kids. The film looks (and plays) so flat that I have a hard time believing it ever played an actual movie theater, although it did, briefly, hit the festival circuit.

At the end of the day, Odd Thomas is a tax write-off, a cheap-looking “product” that seems to exist only to move digits from one column to the other. There’s no sense of love or craft here, whether from the cast or behind-the-scenes talent. If you want to see this kind of story done right, check out either The Frighteners or The Sixth Sense. If you want to see a better Sommers flick, check out The Mummy. If you just want to kill 90 minutes and a few brain cells…aw, fuck it…it’s not even really good for that. If you wanna kill some time and brain cells, go watch a Troma film. At least Uncle Lloyd and his merry band of pranksters know that they’re serving up steaming crap: Odd Thomas can’t be bothered to care one way or the other.

4/6/14: This Mimic is an Ape

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Apple Computers, Ashton Kutcher, Atari, bad films, bad movies, based on a true story, Bill Gates, bio-pic, biographical films, cinema, Dermot Mulroney, Ed Wood, film reviews, films, impersonation, James Woods, jerks, Jobs, John Sculley, Josh Gad, Joshua Michael Stern, Lesley Ann Warren, Lukas Haas, Matt Whiteley, Matthew Modine, Mike Markkula, Movies, nonsense, Punk'd, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Swing Vote, terrible films, That '70s Show, unlikable protagonist, worst films of the year

There’s an old saying that goes, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” In certain cases, that’s definitely good advice…after all, our modern world is already stuffed to bursting with enough snark, sarcasm and extreme eye-rolling to last us for the next thousand years. Moreover, if someone (or something) really makes an effort and gives it all that they have, who are we to completely destroy their efforts? By all accounts, Ed Wood was an awful filmmaker but he seemed to be a pretty decent guy. Why needlessly pee in his Cheerios? We’re surrounded by the continual evidence that good intentions don’t always produce good results but we can’t always be successful: that just part of the human experience. For my money, if something is good-natured, honest and ambitious, but inherently crappy, I tend to cut it a little slack. After all, we all had to learn to walk before we ran, entertainers/content-creators included. I appreciate the nice guys, even if they aren’t always the best guys.

On the flip-side, however, there are certain bits of “entertainment” so devoid of quality, craft, individual thought or reason for existence that they become the equivalent of the gum-bedecked underside of a groody road-side-diner-counter. Whether they be “movies,” “albums,” “TV shows” or some unnamed, terrifying “other,” these lazy tax write-offs exist for one reason and one reason only: commerce. There is no “art” to these festering piles of elephant dung, merely the depressing notion that some office-bound bean-counter has determined “this” (whatever it may be) to be the next step in whatever corporate plan they’ve downloaded from the internet. Such “entertainment” tends to be overly glossy, empty-headed, obvious, lazy and, above all else, inherently bored with itself: this, after all, has nothing to do with art and everything to do with business. Audiences around the world may laugh at Tommy Wiseau’s ridiculous “film” The Room but at least the film was made with passion…inarticulate, wrong-headed, mumble-brained passion, but passion, nonetheless. The best that can be said for Jobs, the outrageously terrible, unbelievably obnoxious “biopic” about the titular Apple co-founder, is that the film eventually ends. Strong viewers will eventually make it out, albeit in a slightly damaged, shell-shocked manner. Those unlucky enough to have their brains melted by Ashton Kutcher’s highly-slappable sneer, however, will find themselves trapped in a cinematic purgatory that’s one part Visa commercial, one part litter box liner. Gentle readers: you’ve been warned.

Most biopics, particularly those which stick us with a character for decades worth of screen-time, live or die by the actor portraying said role. These performances can be iconic (who doesn’t think of George C. Scott when they think of General Patton?), meticulous (Meryl Streep as Thatcher, Jim Carey as Kaufman) or ridiculously over-the-top (Barry Bostwick may not be regarding as the best-ever FDR but he’s certainly the best-ever werewolf-killing FDR and I’ll rabbit-punch anyone who says otherwise). A good biopic will do something to get to the heart of its subject, try to make a (perhaps) overly legendary subject into something a little more palatable for the average Joe. Good biopics teach us a little history, of course, but they also teach a little something about the human condition.

Bad biopics, on the other hand, are like little kids playing dress-up in their parents’ clothes: it’s all stage-dressing, with no inherent understanding of the forces beneath, the tics, traits and beliefs that made Andy Kaufman more than just a tall, gawky guy or Ed Wood some guy wearing Angora sweaters. There needs to be a basic level of understanding, something that cuts deeper than makeup and wardrobe: it’s this basic understanding of the character that is completely missing from Ashton Kutcher’s tone-deaf portrayal of Steve Jobs the dead-on-delivery Jobs.

In most cases, I would begin one of these with some sort of synopsis of the plot. In the case of Jobs, however, this is pretty much unnecessary: there really isn’t a plot. In fact, Jobs seems to exist for two reasons, reasons which wouldn’t inherently seem to go together but which become the twin pillars which hold up this entire house of cards: to depict Steve Jobs as the biggest asshole in the history of the world and to revere him as a god. To that end, the film enlists the capable assistance of Kutcher: when one is attempting such a feat, one must go right to the top of the food-chain.

Full disclosure: I don’t dislike Kutcher by default, although I do find that he wears out his welcome in anything more than small doses. I always thought he was brilliant in That ’70s Show: perhaps my inability to see him as anything but Kelso has unfairly clouded my perception of his post-’70s Show output. That being said, I don’t think that Kutcher is a talented actor: more like an entertaining individual. Unlike a more capable rubber-faced “funny man” like Jim Carey, Kutcher is all surface-level mugging: if he can’t communicate the particular emotion with an upraised eyebrow, sneer or sense of privileged ennui, he just doesn’t bother. As such, Kutcher’s Jobs is never anything more than a one-sentence descriptor, perhaps something along the lines of “sneering, driven, egotistical idea-man.”

The main problem with this “acting choice,” among many, is that the audience never gets any kind of feel for why we’re supposed to stick with Jobs throughout the film, much less stick up for him. Unlike a film such as A Beautiful Mind, where we get to witness some of the abstract “thinking” in action, we never witness anything relating to Jobs that comes close to explaining how the real-life man was held in such high esteem. We’re told that Jobs has dropped out of school but still hangs around his college campus, thanks to the kindly attention of a dean that seems to see more in him than we do. Jobs walks around with an arrogant bearing, conducting himself in much the same way as a feudal king might. The problem, of course, is that we never get any sense as to why anyone would put up with this pompous jackass for more than a few minutes.

Even worse, the filmmakers shoot the whole elongated mess with all of the visual flair and glossy color scheme of a Visa commercial, right down to the silly, “serious” musical score which seems to portend something greater than the film ever delivers. At every available opportunity, the film seems to draw attention to the grandeur of its themes while missing out on one very important bit of information: it’s never about anything. Ever. Time and time again, the film seems to strain and burst at the seams, pushing outward to become as big as it thinks it is, something like those little foam pellets that grow in size once they’re introduced to water. Unlike those cheerful pellets, however, Jobs is formless and ugly, a strange little piece of nothing that never resembles anything, no matter how many times you turn it over.

I wish that I could say that there was something of value to be found here, anything worth justifying the over two-hour running time. Alas, there’s really not much to write home about, lest one is feeling in a particularly spiteful mood. As mentioned, the film’s look is overly slick and commercial, coming across as nothing more than one of those “feel-good-and-spend-money” television adverts to always seem to show someone else having a great time. The dialogue, thanks to first-time writer Matt Whiteley, is overly obvious and trite, leading to moments like the one where Jobs looks profoundly at Steve Wozniak (Josh Gad) and proclaims: “This is freedom to create…to build…” Build me a boat and sail me out of here, Ashton: I ain’t buying it. As an audience, we don’t get any new insights into the subject or those around him…if anything, I was more confused about Jobs after watching the film than I was before-hand. If this film was an accurate portrayal of Steve Jobs (which, I’m fairly sure, it wasn’t, due to the endless other problems with the production), I’m left with only one thought: how the hell did he keep from getting his teeth kicked in? Truly, if Jobs was anything like Kutcher’s portrayal in the film, he must have been one of the nastiest, most petty and down-right obnoxious individuals to walk the earth. Which, of course, seems a little strange when one considers that every other character in the film treats him like an earthbound god. It makes absolutely no sense, especially because we’ve never been shown Jobs being innovative: his normal default seems to be angry, smug and smelly for most of the film.

Are there bright spots here? Not really. The acting, once one gets past Kutcher, is decent, although everyone has the tendency to overact whenever real “emotion” is called for. In particular, one of the film’s many low points has to be the howlingly bad scene where Wozniak and Jobs, in effect, “break up”: Josh Gad’s tearful performance is so ridiculous, so cringingly bad, that I found myself embarrassed for him, as an actor, rather than even mildly invested in whatever silliness his character was going through. There’s not one moment of the film that rings even faintly true or authentic, save for one single example: the 1984 commercial.

If there is anything successful about Jobs, it would have to be the short scene that recreates the famous “1984” commercial. For some reason, this scene ends up with some real impact, although I’m not sure why. Perhaps, subconsciously, I was remembering the original commercial. Perhaps, for once in the film, the filmmakers allowed a little genuine emotion to invest the proceedings. Whatever the reason, the scene ends up being highly effective which, ironically, only goes to underscore how bad the rest of the film is.

Is Jobs a bad movie? Absolutely…perhaps one of the worst films I’ve seen in the last decade or so. The film manages to fail on nearly every single level: acting, script, cinematography, editing…it’s almost a greatest hits of ineptitude. At times, the film almost (note that I say “almost”) achieves a dada level of absurdity, something closer to a Sharknado than an Ishtar. Often, I was left wondering if this were some sort of ultra-high concept prank, a Sacha Baron Cohen-esque attempt to portray its subject in the worst, most banal light imaginable. By the tenth or twentieth “raised eyebrow/cocky smile” combo, I was still ready to give them the benefit of the doubt and settle in for some “American Badass” levels of stupidity. By the 100th “raised eyebrow/cocky smile” combo, however, I had effectively abandoned hope: this was no satire or parody, unfortunately…this was just bad filmmakers making a bad film.

If you’ve ever wondered if Ashton Kutcher could carry a “serious” film, Jobs is for you. If you’ve ever felt like equating the introduction of the Ipod with a saintly vision, complete with blinding white, ethereal light, Jobs is for you. If you’ve ever wanted to witness Kutcher stride boldly through a convention center wearing a suit-vest combo guaranteed to induce epilepsy, Jobs is for you. If you’ve ever wanted to see Kutcher, wearing a bad bald cap, pretend to work peacefully in the garden, Jobs is for you. If, however, you find that you have zero tolerance for poorly made, self-indulgent crap, I might offer one kind suggestion: steer far clear from the steaming pile of “product” that is Jobs. If there were any justice, all those involved with its creation, including Kutcher, would be required to wait ten years before attempting another production.

Now that would be innovation even I can get behind.