My Worst Films of 2009

Before 2009 is out, I will have seen 80 films or more at the theater. I'd be lying if I said every movie I saw was worth the money spent each time on the price of a ticket and concessions. If there is any consolation in knowing that I wasted up to $400 to watch lousy movies, it's that I get to do an article like this - bashing them at the end of the year. The following are what I deem the worst films of 2009, which fell into four categories.

One Note Performance Movies

I define the term, "one-note performance movie" as 1) the type of film, which is all about the actor/actress in the leading role. Nothing else matters, be it the plot, the screenplay, or any of the other supporting characters. I also define it as 2) a movie so bad the actor/actress knows it, yet they make the best of their leading role by giving a stand-out performance. This year, the top acting honors, in the worst movies, went to Dakota Fanning, Sienna Miller, Seth Rogen and Hillary Swank.

“Amelia”: Oscar winner Hillary Swank is no doubt a dead ringer for real life aviatrix Amelia Earhart in terms of appearance. Screenwriters Ron Bass and Anna Hamilton Phelan, who base their script on the biographical books, “East to the Dawn” and “The Sound of Wings”, along with director Mira Nair know the notes. They captured Earhart's private life with publicist George Putnam (Richard Gere) and her brief affair with TWA founder Gene Vidal (Ewan McGregor). In between these dramatic moments is the black-and-white newsreel footage showing the real Earhart's successes and sometimes failures as well as her publicity stunts promoting various products inspiring women everywhere. The filmmakers just don't know how to put any of this into music. Swank's character is so emotionally distant, it's like spending almost 40 years with someone you've fallen in love with and by the time they have unexpectedly passed on, you are unable to shed any tears because you haven't really gotten to "know" them.



“G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra”: The two words that best describe G.I. Joe is "no imagination." I am not even going to address the plot except to say the characters here are as soulless as the plastic ¾-inch and 12- inch Hasbro action figures you see littering the store shelves of Toys R' Us. The only saving grace is Sienna Miller's leather-clad Baroness villain who chews up the scenery, firing machine guns in both hands, struts around in leather boots or expensive black pumps, engages in catfights with a female redhead "Joe" named Scarlett O'Hara (Rachel Nichols), and utters lines like "Nice shoes," as she throws a woman out of an elevator at a Paris mall. She'd make a great James Bond villainess should she ever want to venture into other action-adventure roles. I wonder how Miller would react if I told her I didn't agree with her comment, "G.I. Joe is not going to be the best acting work I've ever done."

“Observe & Report”: Midway through Observe & Report is a scene where anti-hero Ronnie Barnhart (Seth Rogen), a mall security guard with dreams of joining the police force. He is set up by a detective into thinking he passed the police exam when in fact, he failed. The joke backfires when another detective hiding in the closet walks out saying, "I thought this was going to be funny, but this is just sad." Therein explains the mood of the entire film. “Observe & Report” is a humorless, racist, raunchy dark side of “Paul Blart: Mall Cop,” the hit box office comedy earlier this year that starred Kevin James as a lovable, overweight mall security officer who takes on terrorists. By comparison, Rogen's Ronnie Barnhart is anything but lovable. There is nothing funny about a loser who suffers from bipolar disorder and lives with his alcoholic mother who makes it his mission in life to track down a male flasher who's been running around the local mall showing off his private parts. In fact, there is nothing funny about mental illness.

“Push”: The advertisement makes one think this might be a fun rendition of NBC's “Heroes” about people born with exceptional powers wanted by rogue government agents. “Push” is anything but fun, though it is laughable. The heroes, led by Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning, might as well be called Jedi Knights from the Star Wars prequels since they can perform telekinesis and predict future events. Fanning, now 15, who has been in a number of popular television shows and box office hits like “War of the Worlds” (2005), provides a show-stopping performance of her own, getting laughably drunk on Sake and drawing pictures of dead people. I wonder if she is the long-lost sister of the character Haley Joel Osment played in “The Sixth Sense” (1999) who often said he saw dead people.

Out of This World Premises

“Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant”: Don't be fooled by the talented cast of Freak Circus characters that include Willem Dafoe as a decades old vampire, Salma Hayek as a Bearded Lady, Ken Watanabe as the circus conductor, Mr. Tall, who boasts an incredibly large forehead, and John C Reilly as Vampire Larten Crepsley. I didn't care one bit about the story in which a young kid (Chris Massoglia) chosen to be Crepsley's "Vampire's Assistant" gets into a war between the circus freaks and another group of vampires called "Vampanzees." The only saving grace here is the film's dark, macabre production design. Otherwise, this might just be the first vampire movie where I wished a coffin was around so that I could crash for an hour and a half after losing interest. When it comes to trying to hold my attention, “Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant” sucks the life blood out of you.

“The Fourth Kind”: Milla Jovovich branches out from her Resident Evil movies playing Dr. Abbey Tyler, a psychiatrist who interviews patients who may have experienced being abducted by aliens while sleeping. The trouble is director and screenwriter Olatunde Osunsanmi know nothing about how to tie facts into fiction and make it into a compelling thriller. Instead, he combines actual interviews with the "real" Dr. Abbey Tyler and her patients with reenactments featuring the cast. The sequences don't work and what's especially insulting is the way each cast member is introduced in the reenactments that say "Will Patton - actor" playing Sheriff August and "Elias Koteas - actor" playing psychiatrist Abel Campos. It's as if Osunsanmi thinks the audience is so stupid that he feels he needs to tell us when a reenactment is happening. Like we can't figure that out for ourselves. The bottom line is that the film is a complete fake and raises three times more questions than it answers. The Fourth Kind offers no solid proof that there even was a Dr. Abbey Tyler to begin with, much less an incident where her blind daughter was abducted by aliens.

“Where the Wild Things Are”: I get skeptical when every film critic in America embraces a children's movie like this and I can find absolutely no one out there in the entertainment media who dislikes it (remember how much they loved “The English Patient” - 1996). I think the only reason critics loved this movie is not so much as it is their love for its director, Spike Jonze, whose previous movies “Being John Malkovich” (1999) and “Adaptation” (2002) received Oscar nominations. Just because “Where the Wild Things Are” is based on Maurice Sendak's nine-page children's story about a bratty little kid named Max who conjures up a fantasy world of his own where he is king doesn't mean it's for kids, much less adults. I have read how some young ones below age 10 feared the creatures and I can't say I blame them. From a kid's perspective, the creatures in Where the Wild Things Are really do look scary. From an adult point of view, I found them all incredibly ugly, annoying and repulsive. Seeing these furry characters, I could not help but be reminded of Sid and Marty Kroft kid's show from the late 1960s called "The Banana Splits," which featured a group of adults dressed up as ugly-looking adult dogs named Fleegle, Bingo, Drooper. and Snork.

Sequels That Wore Out the Franchise's Welcome

“Halloween II”: Michael Myers, the masked indestructible, inhuman, towering serial murderer of director Rob Zombie's unnecessary remake of John Carpenter's “Halloween” (1978) continued his bloody mayhem in this sequel to Zombie's 2007 follow-up. Like the 2007 predecessor, “Halloween II” is not scary, suspenseful, or fun. The film is instead a disturbing, tragic take on what happens all too often in real life murder cases. An echo on the life of twisted serial murderers and a tabloid take on how authors make money writing best-selling crime books about the subject without any thought for the victims.



“Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”: I will not be surprised if “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” goes down as the number one worst reviewed film of 2009. The film deserves the honor so much that I actually hope it gets nominated for several Golden Raspberry Awards at next year's Razzies and wins. This sequel to the 2007 summer blockbuster wasn't made for movie critics. The picture was made for dumb, slow-witted audiences who have no sense of adventure and imagination, and for kids whose idea of adventure is to watch a lot of things blowing up. Whereas the original was kid friendly, which I considered a good thing, Revenge of the Fallen is just annoyingly loud, vulgar, and filled with sexual innuendoes that are not funny.

The I Want to Put A Bullet Through My Head Award Goes To:

“The Informers”: Now I understand what a friend of mine meant when after sitting through “Leaving Las Vegas” (1995) that starred Nicholas Gage as a suicidal loser who drinks himself to death, he felt like putting a bullet through his head. Based on Brett Easton Ellis' book about the early 80s sex and drug culture, which was also chronicled in his books, “Less Than Zero”, and “Bright Lights, Big City”, both of which became movies in 1987 and 1988, The Informers is a depressing, sleazy exploration into the drug addicted, rich, sordid, unhappy lives of several Los Angeles residents. Kim Basinger, Mickey Rourke, Winona Ryder, and Billy Bob Thornton have supporting roles. When the spoiled young rich kids are not busy engaging in threesomes, sometimes with the same sex, they're doing drugs, talking about some strange disease affecting the gay underworld before the illness was called AIDS, and asking themselves why their friends have begun noticing strange cancerous scabs on their skin. If this isn't the immoral abyss of Hell, it's got to be Purgatory.

Two-star movies that weren't the worst but were forgettable nonetheless: “Confessions of a Shopaholic”, “Friday the 13th”, “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past”, “The Haunting in Connecticut”, “Jennifer's Body”, “Knowing”, “Obsessed”, “The Taking of Pelham 123”, “Terminator: Salvation.”

Close But No Cigar: Two-and-a -half star movies that almost won me over but still failed: “Fanboys”, “Fast & Furious”, “Public Enemies”, “The Hurt Locker”, “The Informant”, “Law-Abiding Citizen”, “Race to Witch Mountain”, “The Twilight Saga: New Moon.”

©12/31/09

Not yet ready to endorse Sarah Palin for president in 2012

The mass media hype over the release of Sarah Palin's book last month sent chills up my spine. I can't exactly say they were 100 percent positive feelings.

Watching an ABC News story reported by Kate Snow, seeing fans waiting in line outside a bookstore in Grand Rapids, Michigan to meet Palin, who was there to sign copies of her new biography, "Going Rogue: An American Life," reminded me of the mass-marketed hysteria last January when Barack Obama was sworn in as president.

The same mass media/mass marketed hype that surrounded Obama that is now focused on Sarah Palin worries me. Palin, a former Alaskan governor, rose to prominence as John McCain's vice-presidential running mate. She doesn't know if a 2012 run for the presidency is in the cards for her.

"That certainly isn't on my radar screen right now," Palin told Barbara Walters in a Nightline interview. "[But] when you consider some of the ordinary turning into extraordinary events that have happened in my life, I am not one to predict what will happen in a few years."

"My ambition if you will, my desire, is to help our country in whatever role that may be, and I cannot predict what that will be, what doors would be open in the year 2012," she said. "If people will have me, I will."

Apparently, the people waiting at that mall in Grand Rapids have already made up their minds. Some had buttons that say, "Palin 2012." "Sarah! Sarah! Sarah!" was the chant yelled by some as they waited in line.

"She is very down to earth," said one woman waiting in line. "She can handle all the politics, all the media, all the press, and still be able to raise her family of five kids. Awesome. Strong woman."

"If the news media leaves her alone, she can win," said another woman when asked if Palin could be the next president of the United States.

I am not about to jump on the Palin bandwagon just yet. All Americans did, when they voted for Obama, was moronically judge a book by its cover and toss aside all the questionable issues. They thought of him as a new African American version of JFK with socialist stances.

Some people voted for him because he has a great personality, a beautiful wife and two wonderful children. Obama is, however, definitely no JFK. By comparison, Palin is no Ronald Reagan. I am beginning to think the only reason people want Palin for president is simply because she is a woman and they think it's time for a woman to run the White House.

I am all for an African American or a female president running the country. So long as they are the right person for the job, and they aren't voted in on the sole basis of their good looks.

Granted, I have no love for CBS' Katie Couric, whom I don't consider a real journalist but, instead, see her as an attractive talking head. The fact is Palin screwed up the Couric interview late last year when she was asked what newspapers and magazines she reads regularly and failed to give a straight answer.

"It wasn't my best interview," she said.

All right. At least Palin admits she messed up.

But what about her sudden decision to leave office as Alaskan governor last summer saying it was in the best interest of the state?

"I was heading into a lame duck session, that final year in office, and most normal politicians, what they do, knowing that they're not going to run again, they're in that lame duck ... that, that situation, they milk it. They collect the paycheck. My administration was inundated and paralyzed by those who were filing these frivolous lawsuits, and, and, um, ethics violation charges. And it was unfair to Alaskans. So, I knew that what we were doing was right," Palin said.

So here are my questions for Palin: Let's assume you are elected president of the United States in 2012 and upon your fourth year in office in 2016, you decide not to run a second term. Am I to assume you might do what you did in Alaska - decide to call it quits and let your vice president take over? Can you take the huge media scrutiny you are going to get if you decide to run in 2012?

The media coverage Palin would draw in 2012 would be nothing like what she got when she was chosen as McCain's running mate.

Don't misunderstand me. Palin is close to winning me over. I like a lot of the stuff she has said so far, especially when it comes to her criticism of Obama's track record in office so far. If the Obama administration isn't scared of her, why then do they keep spouting off negative comments about her?

I have no love, for example, for any of Palin's critics. I think the only reason McCain staffers are speaking out against her is more out of jealousy that she actually helped boost voter turnout for McCain.

Some of her critics are getting their comeuppance. I never liked David Letterman and that was before the late-night talk show host made tasteless remarks earlier this year about Palin's daughter. For years, I could never pin down why I never liked Letterman. Then the talk show host's sex scandal broke out and I finally got my answer.

As for Bristol Palin's ex-boyfriend and father Levi Johnson's claims against the former governor that she called their son, Trigg, who has Down Syndrome, "retarded," I am not going to listen to someone who reduces himself to doing nude spreads in Playgirl magazine for money.

Then there is that recent eye-opening picture on the cover of Newsweek showing Palin in a sexy shot that was already used in The Runner's World magazine. Don't tell me that ploy wasn't used to get people to buy their magazine. Kudos to the Newsweek staff. Thanks to that photo, I am not renewing my subscription and have high hopes their lousy revamped publication that now consists of essays meets a quick, well-deserved death.

You hear that, Newsweek?

As much as I would like 2012 to get here quicker so we conservative and independent Americans can choose a better leader than the one we have now, three years is still a long time.

For now, I'll stick to what one woman said as she waited in line to meet Palin at the book signing.

"I am not sure she is qualified to be president quite yet, but she is a heck of a lot more qualified than Barack Obama."

©12/8/09