Movies you regret watching

[DomaDoma]

The first to come to mind is Napoleon Dynamite, because I did this to myself recently. It looked unbearably stupid when it was out in theaters, so I didn't bother with it. A few weeks ago I decided "eh, it seems to have cult classic status, so maybe there's something good about it after all." Nope - complete waste of time. It was even dumber than I had originally thought it was.

Basically, if anything is classified as an object of indie acclaim, it's because it decides not to culminate in triumph, tragedy, catharsis, warmth, melancholy - generally, anything meaningful and conclusive is right out - but instead dithers away into a vague sense of dissatisfaction, the better to fuel the core fanbase's impending quarter-life crisis. (Except Little Miss Sunshine. Totally recommend that one.)

On the other side of the brow spectrum: Not Another Teen Movie. Only film that has ever compelled me to march out of the theatre for sheer concentration of mindless gross-out humor. I guess I can count myself fortunate never to have seen a parody film by those two guys who get the real flak.

Really unpopular opinion in this crowd: Interstellar is going to be acclaimed as the definitive classic of the 2010s. The spectacle, the Nolan touch, the twist, and above all its look all round the zeitgeist of the decade... it'll be immemorial. You mark my words.

[Aedilred]

On the other side of the brow spectrum: Not Another Teen Movie. Only film that has ever compelled me to march out of the theatre for sheer concentration of mindless gross-out humor. I guess I can count myself fortunate never to have seen a parody film by those two guys who get the real flak.

I haven't watched it in years, but that film was always something of a guilty pleasure for me back when I actually was a teen. And as far as gross-out humour goes, that's got nothing on even some of the teen flicks it's parodying.

Really unpopular opinion in this crowd: Interstellar is going to be acclaimed as the definitive classic of the 2010s. The spectacle, the Nolan touch, the twist, and above all its look all round the zeitgeist of the decade... it'll be immemorial. You mark my words.

Hard to say. Like Gravity, Interstellar seems to be one of those films that provoked a lot of talk at the time but has left relatively few ripples since. Compare Inception which people are still talking about and has worked its way into everyday conversation.

I don't care about the science (much) but I think as a film Interstellar is seriously flawed. Its pacing and structure is off, there's a lot of waffle, very little subtlety*, the plot twists are highly predictable and there are elements of it that seemed risible even at the time. ("Dramatic moment? Here's some DRAMATIC ORGAN MUSIC!")

It's always hard to say what's going to become a classic in any case. Many now-classic films were overlooked at the time, both critically and commercially. And the decade isn't even nearly over yet.


*I used to like Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night but the film hammered me over the head with it so hard I can't read/hear it any more without rolling my eyes.

[Peelee]

Forrest Gump. ****ing Gump...alright, here's a drinking game for you:

1) Take a shot every time the movie props up blind obedience or puts down intellectualism.

Wait, what? Blind obedience is at no point glorified, just used as justification for many of Gump's interactions, and any anti-intellectualism is played for laughs. For example:

Drill Sergeant: Gump! What's your sole purpose in this army?
Forrest Gump: To do whatever you tell me, drill sergeant?
Drill Sergeant: ********, Gump! You're a ******* genius! This is the most outstanding answer I have ever heard. You must have a ******* I.Q. of 160. You are ******* gifted, Private Gump.

Yeah. Take that, academia!

2) Take a shot every time the movie presents a left-leaning person or group in a negative light.

What about every time the movie presents a right-leaning person or group in a negative light? This isn't exactly a propaganda reel we're talking about here.

5) Take a shot every time Gump does something that should make him a household name, and you remember that basically nobody recognizes him while he's telling this story.

OK, let's see here. Dude plays football for Alabama. So maybe mildly well-known among Alabama fans, maybe even more for being an All-American, but he doesn't go into the pros and kind of fades away from the sports scene, so I wouldn't quite call him famous yet; certainly not a household name.

Then he hits the military, fights in Vietnam, and earns the Medal of Honor. Now, no disrespect intended, but Medal of Honor winners are hardly well-known among the general populace. Two major distinctions here, yet still (very believably) no household name.

He then plays ping pong at the professional level. Now, I may be wrong here, but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say I would be amazed if anyone outside of the the ping pong community would be able to name any pros at all, let alone be able to recognize Gump. A household name, he is not.

So, he takes his ping pong money and starts fishing. Forms Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. This is the first part where one could reasonably argue he would be a household name, but not very many companies have their founder's identity be well-known, and of the companies that do, it's nearly always by design. Dave Thomas was the face of Wendy's for a long time. Donald Trump shills the hell out of his brand. There's no guesswork behind who created The Walt Disney Company. But what family owns Samsung? Who founded State Farm? If you waited for a bus and the guy on the bench next to you introduced himself as Garrett Camp, founder of Uber, would you not disbelieve him? Not at all unreasonable that he would still not be a household name, especially if neither he nor the company has no interest in publicizing him.

Sure, he was on TV a few times, but "the ping pong guy who wasn't John Lennon on the **** Cavett Show" is hardly a national sensation. And when the pool of people you're complaining about not recognizing him boils down to a handful of average Joes in Savannah, Georgia, I think it's more than a little nitpicky to claim it doesn't pass reasonable suspension of disbelief.

Pan the movie all you want, but those specific complaints (especially the latter two) seem like you're just reaching.

[oudeis]

The Lord of the Rings trilogy. All of them. I regret seeing these because I can't stand the fact that I'll never see the books adapted correctly. Philippa Boyens' depictions of the characters will probably be considered definitive for the remainder of my life, since I doubt they'll be remade anytime in the next several decades. Slacker Aragorn? Arxena, Warrior Princess? Samwise Gump? Gimli Blutarsky? Emo Faramir FarEmo? Eowyn the Nazgul-Slayer? Denethor-the-completely-and-utterly-opposite-of-everything-he-was-in-the-book? Searchlight Sauron? All terrible. Worse than all of these, however, was the utter fisting given to what could have been truly epic moments: Aragorn declaring his lineage to Eomer, Eowyn's confrontation with the Lord of the Nazgul, Sam's willing march into death on the plains of Gorgoroth, the Battle of the Black Gate, Frodo's departure from Middle-Earth- it just breaks my heart how badly these were done.

The Hobbit...trilogy? Is this true? I must accept that it is, though I would fain not. Putting aside Radaguano and his wacing wabbits (he really needed an Elmer Fudd accent), Galadrietta (seriously, am I the only one who noticed how abnormally long her legs were?), Tauriel Sue, Botox Legolas, Beorn the pants-wetter (book: goblins went leagues out of their way to avoid him; movie: he quaked in fear at the mention of them), Azogothoth the Definitively-Killed-by-Dain-in-the-books, Thorin Foster Oakenshield (he wasthisclose to wandering through a mirrored hall in Erebor wearing a bathrobe), Bard the Boreman, Pimp Kili, and virtually every other character adaptation aside from Balin, who was actually pretty good, my real anguish over this movie comes from how badly they mangled the last charge of Thorin and the dwarves of Erebor. I'll enclose it in spoilers for those who don't remember or haven't read it:

Spoiler

Show

Suddenly there was a great shout, and from the Gate came a trumpet call. They had forgotten Thorin! Part of the wall, moved by levers, fell outward with a crash into the pool. Out leapt the King under the Mountain, and his companions followed him. Hood and cloak were gone; they were in shining armour, and red light leapt from their eyes. In the gloom the great dwarf gleamed like gold in a dying fire.
Rocks were buried down from on high by the goblins above; but they held on. leapt down to the falls' foot, and rushed forward to battle. Wolf and rider fell or fled before them. Thorin wielded his axe with mighty strokes, and nothing seemed to harm him.
"To me! To me! Elves and Men! To me! O my kinsfolk!" he cried, and his voice shook like a horn in the valley.
Down, heedless of order, rushed all the dwarves of Dain to his help. Down too came many of the Lake-men, for Bard could not restrain them; and out upon the other side came many of the spearmen of the elves. Once again the goblins were stricken in the valley; and they were piled in heaps till Dale was dark and hideous with their corpses. The Wargs were scattered and Thorin drove right against the bodyguards of Bolg.

Not exactly a movie, but I think a TV miniseries is close enough to count:
Earthsea. In my entire life, nothing else has inspired such white-hot nerdrage in me than this.

I was tempted to bring this up, but I too wasn't certain that a TV miniseries counted. Holy Gods, did this piss me off. I had to download this from the file-sharing nets because I didn't have cable, which was fortunate because I literally had to stop this to get up and pace around my apartment to work off my disgust about every 15 minutes. A Wizard of Earthsea is near the top of my list for fantasy novel, both as a self-contained story as well as part of a trilogy. To see it tortured, bent, and twisted into... this caused me genuine physical discomfort.

[DomaDoma]

I get most of your objections to the LotR movies, Oudeis - I can live with all of them, mind, except Faramir and not having the good grace to at least give Denethor a palantir - but there was not even one thing wrong with their portrayal of Sam.

All non-Steward-related flaws are more than outweighed by the fact that, by dint of the respective story structures, film Rohan is about fifty times more compelling than the book version. Book-Eomer is all "I'm from a country you've heard about in maybe two throwaway references, and we're fighting the B-villain, which will in no way help you find your friends. Mordor? Minor annoyance, just like Gandalf. Want in on our problems?" And meanwhile you're not going to see one hair of Frodo for another ten chapters and Howard Shore is not there to help.

[Velaryon]

I can forgive any and all faults in the three Lord of the Rings films because they had the good sense to keep Tom ****ing Bombadil out of them. Hated that character from the very first moment he appeared in Fellowship of the Ring. He's nothing but a waste of pages - he contributes nothing meaningful to the story or the world, is tonally inconsistent with the entire rest of the story (though he might have fit okay in the lighter tone of The Hobbit, and Tolkien had to bend over backwards to justify why this nearly all-powerful, allegedly kind being wouldn't be able to help them at all on their quest.

Not wasting film time on Tom Bombadil was the single best decision Peter Jackson could have made, and for that reason alone I will let anything else about those movies slide.

[lunaticfringe]

Saw V for Vendetta in the theaters, I have no problem with Muslims or LGBTQ so that movie didn't open my eyes or anything. It was just too long, heavy handed, & poorly acted. Only movie I can remember feeling ripped off by. Was a huge Natalie P & original Matrix fan at the time so that might explain my disappointment. Just a garbage movie.


Had to watch​ Hunger Games 2 because of GF a few times, it was okay the first time but gets dumber with each viewing. Never bothered watching the last 2 because of my contempt. I was curious about the books at one point but now I have no interest

[DomaDoma]

Saw V for Vendetta in the theaters, I have no problem with Muslims or LGBTQ so that movie didn't open my eyes or anything. It was just too long, heavy handed, & poorly acted. Only movie I can remember feeling ripped off by. Was a huge Natalie P & original Matrix fan at the time so that might explain my disappointment. Just a garbage movie.


Had to watch​ Hunger Games 2 because of GF a few times, it was okay the first time but gets dumber with each viewing. Never bothered watching the last 2 because of my contempt. I was curious about the books at one point but now I have no interest

Here, read these instead. The writer loves Hunger Games, but under the charitable assumption that Katniss's worldview is suffering from a bad case of myopia. Her Haymitch tells the story with the points of focus that the original story should have gone with to begin with, and only a cursory knowledge of the basic premise of the series is required.

[lunaticfringe]

Here, read these instead. The writer loves Hunger Games, but under the charitable assumption that Katniss's worldview is suffering from a bad case of myopia. Her Haymitch tells the story with the points of focus that the original story should have gone with to begin with, and only a cursory knowledge of the basic premise of the series is required.

This made me lol because that perhaps is my biggest gripe about the films. 2 just feels like a rewrite of 1, like someone just decided to take a Mulligan on one to better set up what follows.

Also friggin Poison Death Fog the negative effects of which are fixed by Water! WTF! And no one feels guilty or remarks about the Old Lady dying for no frakking reason. Yeesh....

[8BitNinja]

Even 5? I don't believe you.

Never mind, I forgot about 5.

Maybe my subconscious decided to block that memory from my consious thoughts to protect me.

Also, for another movie, Independence Day 2

*vomiting*

[Zavoniki]

Well let's start listing stuff off here:

Play 9 from Outer Space: I fell asleep watching this movie. Multiple times.

Darkstar: See above.

Star Wars Episodes 1-7: When 7 was coming out I decided to re-watch 4-6 because they hadn't left a lasting impression on me. Now I know why.

Next: Nicholas Cage + Stupid Plot Twist + This seems a little Rapey.

Spoiler: Explanation

Show

Cage's character can see 2 minutes into the future at all times. Except that he can also see his interactions with love interest girl. So he uses his abilities to get in her pants by playing out scenes of their first meeting over and over till he gets it right, thus removing her ability to choose.

Batman V Superman Dawn of Justice: I watched this on a plane. Then I watched Suicide Squad and X-Men: Apocalypse. Those two movies I remember as being fairly decent. Most likely because of what I had to recently compare them too.

Interstellar: This movie is long, and boring, and the twist is awful and makes very little sense and yet tries to play itself off as too clever. Trying to be Hard Sci-Fi and failing utterly makes it even worse.

The Kings Speech: This movie felt oddly disjointed and disconnected, like a bunch of random scenes strung together.

Mulan: I recently rewatched this, and man does it not hold up.

Specter: I've watched this movie, read the IMDB and TV Tropes on it, and still have no idea what happened or what it's about.

[Knaight]

Forrest Gump. ****ing Gump...alright, here's a drinking game for you:

1) Take a shot every time the movie props up blind obedience or puts down intellectualism.

2) Take a shot every time the movie presents a left-leaning person or group in a negative light.

3) Take a shot every time Gump's entire effect on an event is "he was present for that thing".

4) Take a shot every time the movie whitewashes history.

5) Take a shot every time Gump does something that should make him a household name, and you remember that basically nobody recognizes him while he's telling this story.

If you're lucky, you'll be dead by the time you're a third of the way through, and the reason you'll be lucky in that case is because it will mean you can stop watching Forrest Gump.

Don't forget when it veers into looking like a particularly hamfisted morality play, as the setting itself contorts around whatever insipid message is currently being embedded.

[Rodin]

Specter: I've watched this movie, read the IMDB and TV Tropes on it, and still have no idea what happened or what it's about.

Skyfall was another that landed on my "watched it against my better judgement" pile when others told me it was good. Disjointed plot with an uninspiring villain who requires massive stupidity from multiple people to be threatening. Yes Q, nothing can possibly go wrong if you hook up a super-villains laptop directly to your top secret network which also electronically controls the locks on his cage.

I've never bought Daniel Craig as Bond and this movie didn't improve my opinion in this regard.

[Cedar]

Mulan II - Horrible.

The Magnificent Seven - Watching in a movie theatre felt like a scam.

[Aedilred]

Skyfall was another that landed on my "watched it against my better judgement" pile when others told me it was good. Disjointed plot with an uninspiring villain who requires massive stupidity from multiple people to be threatening. Yes Q, nothing can possibly go wrong if you hook up a super-villains laptop directly to your top secret network which also electronically controls the locks on his cage.

I've never bought Daniel Craig as Bond and this movie didn't improve my opinion in this regard.

There are some obvious plot holes in Skyfall, but then there almost always are in Bond films. I still thought it was the best Bond film* since Goldeneye.

*Overlong Venice epilogue aside, I think Casino Royale might be the best film in the Bond series. But it's not a very good Bond film, imo at least.

Mulan II - Horrible.

The Magnificent Seven - Watching in a movie theatre felt like a scam.

The remake of The Magnificent Seven, or the original one with Brynner, McQueen et al?

I've finally thought of a film I regret watching: Baise-Moi. I encountered this on a couple of lists of "scandalously edgy films" and not really bothering to do any research into it I came to assume it was something in the vein of A Clockwork Orange or Straw Dogs. I was bracing myself for something in the vein of Cannibal Holocaust or The Last House on the Left - something I would not in any way enjoy but which might at least present some interesting ideas. Or at absolute worst, Caligula. But no. It was a complete waste of my time, with nothing whatsoever good about it.

That's right, it's worse than Caligula.

I think I might also add Nymphomaniac, vol. 1 to the pile. Where Baise-Moi is squalid and badly made in a way you don't normally expect from French cinema, Nymphomaniac has clearly been obsessively polished, and is actually pretty well-shot and well-acted (even by Shia theBeef!) - but there's a saying about that. It is insufferably, risibly, pretentious, far too long, and with no real throughline or plot. It's almost worth it for two moments: the exemplary moment when Charlotte Gainsborough describes a humiliating moment in her sexual history and Stellan Skarskard nods sagely, and goes "those are Fibonacci numbers", somehow keeping a straight face, and a scene where Uma Thurman plays an outraged wife. But still, no.

And hey, since I'm being ruthless, Don't Touch the Axe. This won a few awards and the trailer made it look pretty good, plus Guillaume Depardieu was at the time something of a rising star in French film at a point when French cinema was generally excellent. But it's just plodding, boring and static, offering, for a period drama, relatively little in the way of sumptuous visuals. Not worth the time it took to watch, imo.

[DomaDoma]

I have long since decided that the only good part of Bond movies is the opening song. Never gave a fig for any incarnation of Bond, but I've incorporated "Live and Let Die" and "Skyfall" into one of my favorite playlists, and the only reason "You Know My Name" isn't on there is that I elected to ditch "When the storm arrives/Would you be seen with me/By the merciless eyes I've deceived" for "I pray you'll be my eyes/And watch her where she goes."

My musical knowledge is hilariously patchy, but to my flawed knowledge, "Skyfall" might be the only truly beautiful hit song to come out of that entire decade.

[Aedilred]

I have long since decided that the only good part of Bond movies is the opening song. Never gave a fig for any incarnation of Bond, but I've incorporated "Live and Let Die" and "Skyfall" into one of my favorite playlists, and the only reason "You Know My Name" isn't on there is that I elected to ditch "When the storm arrives/Would you be seen with me/By the merciless eyes I've deceived" for "I pray you'll be my eyes/And watch her where she goes."

My musical knowledge is hilariously patchy, but to my flawed knowledge, "Skyfall" might be the only truly beautiful hit song to come out of that entire decade.

I think Bond songs are good:ok:terrible in rough proportion to the films (n.b. not all the good films have a great opening song, although most do).

Controversially, I don't think Live and Let Die (the song) is all that good. It has some strong melodies but it doesn't commit to them, and comes across as indecisive (not to mention the dodgy bit where he tries his hand at something approximating reggae). It's like McCartney had two or three ideas for the song and couldn't decide which to use, so did all of them. It's nowhere near the worst of the Bond themes, but wouldn't make my top five or probably even ten.

Ultimately, I think you either enjoy Bond films or you don't. Which is one of the reasons Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace bother me: they're Bond films apparently designed for people who don't like Bond films - and most of the people who cite them as their favourites are people who don't like the series as a whole. Bond films are meant to be formulaic and slightly cheesy and not to be taken entirely seriously (though that's a fine line to tread: you don't want to go full Moonraker).

I think to be fair, too, they are largely speaking films for men. Which isn't to say women can't enjoy them, but in my experience women seem to enjoy them on average much less than men do, and most of the men I know who claim not to like them tend to cite treatment of women in the films as the principal reason they don't. Certainly I think the cool spy flying off to exotic locations, having sex with beautiful women, decked out with cool gadgets and a great car, knocking back cocktails and reeling off one-liners, is much more of a male fantasy than a female one, generally speaking. And since a large part of the film's appeal is rooted in that fantasy element, if that doesn't do anything for you the films will just come across as ridiculous and/or exploitative. There are always problematic elements in Bond films (the treatment of women in the more recent films is actually considerably better than in some of the earliest ones...) but you have to kind of write those off as a necessary genre convention. If you can't, they're going to overpower the films.

[Rodin]

I think Bond songs are good:ok:terrible in rough proportion to the films (n.b. not all the good films have a great opening song, although most do).

Controversially, I don't think Live and Let Die (the song) is all that good. It has some strong melodies but it doesn't commit to them, and comes across as indecisive (not to mention the dodgy bit where he tries his hand at something approximating reggae). It's like McCartney had two or three ideas for the song and couldn't decide which to use, so did all of them. It's nowhere near the worst of the Bond themes, but wouldn't make my top five or probably even ten.

Ultimately, I think you either enjoy Bond films or you don't. Which is one of the reasons Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace bother me: they're Bond films apparently designed for people who don't like Bond films - and most of the people who cite them as their favourites are people who don't like the series as a whole. Bond films are meant to be formulaic and slightly cheesy and not to be taken entirely seriously (though that's a fine line to tread: you don't want to go full Moonraker).

I think to be fair, too, they are largely speaking films for men. Which isn't to say women can't enjoy them, but in my experience women seem to enjoy them on average much less than men do, and most of the men I know who claim not to like them tend to cite treatment of women in the films as the principal reason they don't. Certainly I think the cool spy flying off to exotic locations, having sex with beautiful women, decked out with cool gadgets and a great car, knocking back cocktails and reeling off one-liners, is much more of a male fantasy than a female one, generally speaking. And since a large part of the film's appeal is rooted in that fantasy element, if that doesn't do anything for you the films will just come across as ridiculous and/or exploitative. There are always problematic elements in Bond films (the treatment of women in the more recent films is actually considerably better than in some of the earliest ones...) but you have to kind of write those off as a necessary genre convention. If you can't, they're going to overpower the films.

The cheesy Bonds are definitely the ones I prefer. The best Bond film to come out in the last 20+ years was Kingsman: The Secret Service, and that was a pastiche. The modern Bond films are so wrapped up in trying to be Jason Bourne that they've lost the sense of fun that filled the older ones.

I'm there for the laser watches and the submarine cars, so when Q shows up and talks trash about the gadgets from the earlier movies it's hard not to be offended. I'm there for villains trying to fire a death ray at the U.N to blackmail countries, and couldn't give a fig about some personal vendetta with Judi Dench. Again, that's Jason Bourne's department.

Even if the recent movies were decent movies (which I disagree on heavily, with the exception of Casino Royale), they aren't good BOND movies in the tradition we've come to love.

[Aedilred]

The cheesy Bonds are definitely the ones I prefer. The best Bond film to come out in the last 20+ years was Kingsman: The Secret Service, and that was a pastiche. The modern Bond films are so wrapped up in trying to be Jason Bourne that they've lost the sense of fun that filled the older ones.

I'm there for the laser watches and the submarine cars, so when Q shows up and talks trash about the gadgets from the earlier movies it's hard not to be offended. I'm there for villains trying to fire a death ray at the U.N to blackmail countries, and couldn't give a fig about some personal vendetta with Judi Dench. Again, that's Jason Bourne's department.

Even if the recent movies were decent movies (which I disagree on heavily, with the exception of Casino Royale), they aren't good BOND movies in the tradition we've come to love.

This is the sort of criticism that amuses and exasperates me in equal measure, because when one looks at the older Bond films, they're not generally about what we think they are, or at least not to that extent. There are many Bond films where the future of the world is at stake, it's true, because the villain is trying to provoke war between the great powers, or gain control of a critical resource. But that's not something the newer films have abandoned, either: Casino Royale and Skyfall are pretty much the only ones which ostensibly aren't about that. And there are also many where the stakes are much lower: SPECTRE trying to gain control of a gadget, or a drug kingpin being brought to justice.

As for "if only we could get back to villains blackmailing the UN and away from all this personal nonsense" the film that conforms most closely to the "blackmail the UN with preposterous macguffin" plot is probably On Her Majesty's Secret Service, which is also the "classic" film with the most personal content of any of them. The personal rivalry between Bond and Blofeld runs all through the film, and it also has the Tracy subplot with its downer ending. Even as early as From Russia with Love we had the pre-credits sequence is Red Grant being trained to kill Bond specifically, and their whole plot revolves around Bond personally. Although the film doesn't play it up that much, the station head killed at the start of Dr. No who Bond goes to look into was a former colleague and friend of his. The films have always been personal to an extent.

It's kind of like the collective idea we have of Bond fighting the Soviets because of the Cold War setting, whereas in fact the Soviets are never the principal antagonist in a Bond film and I'm pretty sure are allies more often than not. In Skyfall, the reference to the Goldeneye pen (less disparaging than wry, I think) is taken at face value as a rejection of gadgetry even when the DB5, complete with ejector seat and machine-guns, drives straight out of Goldfinger and into the film later.

Even the criticism of newer Bond films as being modish isn't a new one. (I think it's generally agreed that Quantum did ape Jason Bourne too much, though I don't think it's a fair criticism of Casino Royale or Skyfall). Live and Let Die was "Bond does Shaft". Moonraker was "Bond does Star Wars". Licence to Kill was "Bond does Miami Vice". Die Another Day was "Bond does The Matrix and also any other film we've seen in the last two years". (Of the resulting films, imo, one was great, one was ok and two were execrable).

As for cheesy, I don't have any problem with the one-liners or most of the gadgets or wacky henchmen. Even in The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day the Q scenes are highlights. But Sheriff J.W. Pepper, the gondola on wheels, double-taking pigeon, the inflatable end of Mr. Big - several steps too far, I think.

I do agree that Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace were not good Bond films. But I think Skyfall was, and was indeed a cunning blend of old-school Bondery with newer sensibilities. Spectre lost the plot completely, though.

I thoroughly enjoyed Kingsman (well, apart from that one joke, mercifully cut in the DVD release). But I feel I can enjoy that and Skyfall and see no contradictions there.

[Velaryon]

This is the sort of criticism that amuses and exasperates me in equal measure, because when one looks at the older Bond films, they're not generally about what we think they are, or at least not to that extent. There are many Bond films where the future of the world is at stake, it's true, because the villain is trying to provoke war between the great powers, or gain control of a critical resource. But that's not something the newer films have abandoned, either: Casino Royale and Skyfall are pretty much the only ones which ostensibly aren't about that. And there are also many where the stakes are much lower: SPECTRE trying to gain control of a gadget, or a drug kingpin being brought to justice.

As for "if only we could get back to villains blackmailing the UN and away from all this personal nonsense" the film that conforms most closely to the "blackmail the UN with preposterous macguffin" plot is probably On Her Majesty's Secret Service, which is also the "classic" film with the most personal content of any of them. The personal rivalry between Bond and Blofeld runs all through the film, and it also has the Tracy subplot with its downer ending. Even as early as From Russia with Love we had the pre-credits sequence is Red Grant being trained to kill Bond specifically, and their whole plot revolves around Bond personally. Although the film doesn't play it up that much, the station head killed at the start of Dr. No who Bond goes to look into was a former colleague and friend of his. The films have always been personal to an extent.

It's kind of like the collective idea we have of Bond fighting the Soviets because of the Cold War setting, whereas in fact the Soviets are never the principal antagonist in a Bond film and I'm pretty sure are allies more often than not. In Skyfall, the reference to the Goldeneye pen (less disparaging than wry, I think) is taken at face value as a rejection of gadgetry even when the DB5, complete with ejector seat and machine-guns, drives straight out of Goldfinger and into the film later.

Even the criticism of newer Bond films as being modish isn't a new one. (I think it's generally agreed that Quantum did ape Jason Bourne too much, though I don't think it's a fair criticism of Casino Royale or Skyfall). Live and Let Die was "Bond does Shaft". Moonraker was "Bond does Star Wars". Licence to Kill was "Bond does Miami Vice". Die Another Day was "Bond does The Matrix and also any other film we've seen in the last two years". (Of the resulting films, imo, one was great, one was ok and two were execrable).

As for cheesy, I don't have any problem with the one-liners or most of the gadgets or wacky henchmen. Even in The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day the Q scenes are highlights. But Sheriff J.W. Pepper, the gondola on wheels, double-taking pigeon, the inflatable end of Mr. Big - several steps too far, I think.

I do agree that Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace were not good Bond films. But I think Skyfall was, and was indeed a cunning blend of old-school Bondery with newer sensibilities. Spectre lost the plot completely, though.

I thoroughly enjoyed Kingsman (well, apart from that one joke, mercifully cut in the DVD release). But I feel I can enjoy that and Skyfall and see no contradictions there.

Skyfall is the only one of the Daniel Craig Bond films I've seen, and I wholeheartedly agree with Rodin's assessment that it felt more like a Jason Bourne movie than a Bond movie. YMMV, but everything from the gadgets to the one-liners to the unique, gimmicky villains was missing, in favor of something that seemed entirely like it was trying to be more gritty and "realistic" (or what Hollywood thinks is realistic, anyway).

It has been a few years, but when you said you felt that Skyfall was a blend of old-school Bondery, I have absolutely no idea what you mean. What elements from old-school Bond films did you feel were present? I seem to have completely missed them.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Craig's Bond films are far more in line with the books than the borderline-weird-tales crap the movies have often been (especially the Moore years). That means none of the screwy magic gadgets (in fact, the technology is fairly realistic across the board), the plots are not cartoonish and there's a steady current of 'who can I really trust in this business' going on.

[Aedilred]

Skyfall is the only one of the Daniel Craig Bond films I've seen, and I wholeheartedly agree with Rodin's assessment that it felt more like a Jason Bourne movie than a Bond movie. YMMV, but everything from the gadgets to the one-liners to the unique, gimmicky villains was missing, in favor of something that seemed entirely like it was trying to be more gritty and "realistic" (or what Hollywood thinks is realistic, anyway).

It has been a few years, but when you said you felt that Skyfall was a blend of old-school Bondery, I have absolutely no idea what you mean. What elements from old-school Bond films did you feel were present? I seem to have completely missed them.

I'm not going through the film line-by-line looking for one-liners, but I felt there were plenty in there. I don't understand the complaint about absence of gadgets given the presence and use of the car which came pretty much straight out of Goldfinger. The villain had a prosthetic face and a personal island. There was even the occasional moment of camp silliness: the digger in the pre-credits sequence; Bond escaping from the komodo dragon pit by using one as a springboard - a Live and Let Die reference? Maybe.

So I think it was all in there, and there is a lot more of it than there is in Casino Royale and Quantum. Probably more than in some of the older Bond films, in fact (the early Connerys, the Dalton films, Tomorrow Never Dies). Unlike the first two Craig films it doesn't seem embarrassed by its own heritage. This was the first of the revived Bonds to feature Q and Moneypenny, and possibly Tanner too (I can't remember if he was in Quantum). But it was undoubtedly more subtle about it than most older Bonds were; there was an attempt by a proper director to make a proper film rather than just a collection of clichés linked together by a barebones plot, as in some of the pre-Craig films.

[ThunderCat]

Sucker Punch

"It's not just fanservice!" he said. "It's really deep and thought-provoking" he said. "You'd be surprised" he said. The latter was technically correct, since I used to think he had good taste.

[2D8HP]

you don't want to go full Moonraker

Moonraker was the first Bond film I saw (which was in the theater), I enjoyed it (I was eleven years old!). It's been said that "Not all men want to be Bond, but all boys do."

I really hope that "Don't go full Moonraker" becomes a common expression, i.e:

"I want the setting to have some levity so it's not too grim-dark."

"Well OK, but don't go the full Moonraker."



Anyway, I stayed up late on Sunday night and watched:

King Charles III

I still feel exhausted from the sleep I lost, which I regret.

The film's dialog uses Shakespearean rhythms, which it marries with current political issues, and supermarket tabloid subject matters.

Best television I've watched in a long time, it really makes most of the junk that's broadcast pale in comparison.

[Lethologica]

I watched Lost in Translation a few nights ago and kind of regret it. Kind of, because nothing about that movie inspired strong feelings in me one way or another. It's like the creators mistook "being in Japan" for plot/character development.

[RicB76]

Requiem for a dream for me, not that it's a bad film at all, I'd say it was a great film. Just really, really harrowing! It's a good job my other half at the time was about or I may have jumped out the window!

As for bond films, of the recent Daniel Craig films Casino Royale is my favourite, the others have been good but Royale brought bond back with a bang! The Parkour chase scene at the start, probably the best chase scene I've ever seen! Pun intended.

[Seppl]

As there is currently a thread discussing The Hobbit 2: The Hobbit 2. Usually I would not regret watching a bad movie but in this case I had seen part 1, did not like it, and still I let myself be persuaded by a friend to watch part 2. I got what I deserved. At great expense, too, because my friend insisted to make a long trip to a very expensive cinema that was showing it in 3D at 60 fps. What a waste of good money (I was a student on a budget at the time). At least I learned my lesson and skipped part 3.

Other movies I regret watching:
The Matrix Reloaded: Just took so much away from the legacy of The Matrix which I had in very fond memory at the time (Although I must admit, it did not age that well). I did not watch the third part.

Star Trek Nemesis: An incredibly stupid, grimdark, and generic action movie in space. Not worthy of the name Star Trek, a franchise that once stood for the exact opposite. The movies before Nemesis might not all have been good (and some are even pretty bad or did age terribly fast) but at least they tried to embrace the values and ideas of Star Trek. The fact that Paramount Pictures allowed such a movie to be made showed me that they were no longer interested in keeping up the integrity of the franchise and instead were only trying to sell the brand name. I am pretty sure, such a movie would not have been allowed to happen 10 years earlier. And in retrospect the worst aspect: This is now the canonical ending for the TNG crew! Just like Matrix Reloaded this one ruined a good thing that came before it. What a downer ending for a great show
I did not watch the new Trek movies after seeing them advertised in trailers as just more brainless action in space.


At least I can say that I learned from my mistakes, as all of these have been respective franchise killers for me. I could probably say the same thing for The Force Awakens, but I did not really watch it, therefore I have no regrets. Instead I turned it off after hearing the dialogue in the first scene.

[Fable Wright]

On the other side of the brow spectrum: Not Another Teen Movie. Only film that has ever compelled me to march out of the theatre for sheer concentration of mindless gross-out humor. I guess I can count myself fortunate never to have seen a parody film by those two guys who get the real flak.

...Dammit, now I remember Disaster Movie. That... god, I did my best to wipe that from my mind, but it was bad. All I remember are clips of random celebrity look-alike cameos doing unfathomably stupid things for no reason in a mindless film that had literally no plot to speak of and feeling like I died on the inside walking out of the theater. The three Twilight movies that my dad dragged me to were less horrible.

Really unpopular opinion in this crowd: Interstellar is going to be acclaimed as the definitive classic of the 2010s. The spectacle, the Nolan touch, the twist, and above all its look all round the zeitgeist of the decade... it'll be immemorial. You mark my words.

Er, no. All I need to do is make this noise and people think of Inception. The moment any of my friends mention the word 'big', 'dark', or 'painful', Baneposting immediately follows. Fury Road and The Wolf Of Wall Street are movies that still get talked about. The Cabin in the Woods is already the cult classic horror movie of the decade.

Interstellar has been forgotten, and will be kitche within a decade. It's not the definitive classic of the 2010s by a long shot.

...Actually, what would you say is the definitive classic of, say, the 80s, 90s, or 00s? Just to get an idea of where you're coming from.

Had to watch​ Hunger Games 2 because of GF a few times, it was okay the first time but gets dumber with each viewing. Never bothered watching the last 2 because of my contempt. I was curious about the books at one point but now I have no interest

It was moderately better than 1.

That's not a very high bar.

Mulan: I recently rewatched this, and man does it not hold up.

It's not so good on the rewatch, but as a kid, it was easily my favorite movie. Action protagonist who was smart, went and worked hard for her goals, and they actually did build up the emotional triumphs she made throughout the movie. Also, the action and comedy were pretty great to a younger audience that wasn't allowed to see PG-13. Not so great for the adult audience, but a film that can really appeal to kids.

[The Eye]

Not only it's a boring movie, but it ruined dinosaurs for me. I have some geek friends who really like talking about dinosaurs but I never really got into it because I saw this movie as a kid.

So it takes the spot since it ruined a potential interest of my life.

[8BitNinja]

The 1996 Sonic the Hedgehog movie.

At first, I saw memes and quotes tossed around by random people. I thought "this is just exaggeration, it can't be that bad."

Long story short, I was wrong and it was that bad.

If you want to know how bad it is, the whole movie is on YouTube and you can find a lot of terrible quotes from it on IMDB.