Wednesday, December 30, 2015

DC Outlook's 10 Worst Movies of 2014

Alison Brie & Jason Sudeikis (r) star in Sleeping with Other People

Nobody wants to see a bad movie: It just happens. Unfortunately, when you're a movie critic... it happens a lot. Some are easily forgotten (like a bad dream) but others linger. If you ask me, that's just not fair; but every now and then, we get a chance to "even the score." Bad reviews are therapeutic. Year-end bottom 10 lists are utter satisfaction. Time to dish out some long overdue (but well-deserved) criticism...

10. Jurassic World: Perhaps it's not one of the 10 worst, but it's close enough. Plus, it's made almost $1.7 billion worldwide in just over six months. That's more than all the films in our Top 10 combined... and one of those is Avengers: Age of Ultron ($1.4B.) Definitely the most overrated film of 2015.

9. Chappie: Sci-fi meets gangsta' rap in Neil Blomkamp's follow up to District 9 & Elysium. The results are painfully predictable: It stinks. In fact, this might be the most poorly acted (even Hugh Jackman is bad) movie of the year. "It's expensive. It's big and it's ugly." Amen to that.

8. Jupiter Ascending: Once upon a time, the Wachowskis made great movies (The Matrix, The Matrix Reloaded.) Not any more. $200 million is an awful lot of money to spend waste on cheesy special effects, gosh-awful writing and space lizards... which is probably why Lana and Andy (Wachowski) had to co-produce. Can you (please) say retirement?

7. Rock the Kasbah: Bill Murray hasn't stepped on many landmines in his storied career, but Rock the Kasbah established the kind of body count that few actors ever recover from. Thank Heaven for short memories (and lobotomies.)

6. Hot Tub Time Machine 2: You know it's a bad movie, when Neil Patrick Harris stars as the President; but even the cruelest soothsayer wouldn't want to predict a future like this. The first one was sorta charming... The sequel? Far from it, unless you like "dick picking" and lots of inexplicable screaming/yelling. John Cusack didn't. Neither should you.

5. Fantastic Four: Oh, the humanity! This fantastic flop had special effects so bad, it brought our critics-only screening to a literal halt (uncontrollable, unintentional laughter.) You can't buy that kind of awfulness (even with a $120 million budget.)

4. American Ultra: Some movies are just too ugly to sit through. Meet American Ultra, a grunge fest of the lowest order. It's cursed with awful casting, direction and writing... not to mention the worst romantic pairing (Jesse Eisenberg & Kristen Stewart) since Madonna and Sean Penn (Shanghai Surprise, real life.)

3. Entourage: Four never-weres play dress-up in 2015's most self-indulgent film (by a mile.) Hey look at me: I'm a movie star... not. Pass the hot blondes (as if.)

2. The Human Centipede 3 (Final Sequence): How many times/ways can you say "disgusting?" Smut peddler/director Tom Six does his damnedest to find out. Don't make the same mistake.

1. Sleeping with Other People: Jason Sudeikis' character boasts, "I let someone put a protein bar up my ass once." Congratulations douche. Suddenly asexuality doesn't sound so bad.