The Flop 10 – the Worst Ten Films of 2012

Upon me falls the sad duty to take stock and tell you, honestly, what were the worst or most disappointing ten films of 2012. So here we go.

 

10 To Rome With Love

Some films feature on this list, not because they were objectively amongst the worst films of the year, but because they were very disappointing in comparison to a precursor. After the surprisingly ironic and thoughtful Midnight in Paris, Woody Allen’s return to farce and stereotype – even though not without some good jokes – is one of these disappointments.

 

9 Wrath of the Titans

Wrath of the Titans is the opposite of To Rome With Love: An equally clear and unexpected improvement on the first film of the franchise. However, when that first film is the abismal Clash of the Titans, this by no means indicates that Wrath… is any good. At least it did feature an actual titan…

 

8 Man on a Ledge

Poor Sam Worthington stars in two movies on this list. Bu unlike Wrath of the Titans, Man on a Ledge actually had the balls to pretend it was a smart and sophisticated thriller. Something that was finally disproved when Genesis Rodriguez (that’s her actual name) strips down with no apparent reason in the plot. Nice to look at, but utterly stupid. Much like the film then.

 

7 Dark Shadows

Perhaps we should give Tim Burton some credit for actually trying to adapt a crap soap opera. Perhaps. But Burton has a reputation. He has talent – as he showed later in the year with the gorgeous Frankenweenie. For a film maker of Burton’s stature there is simply no excuse for making something so boring and incoherent.

 

6 The Watch

Alien invasion films are so 2011. Vince Vaughn was never funny in the first place. Stiller must be expected to deliver more. Jonah Hill was supposed to have grown up a bit after Moneyball. And the fabulous Richard Ayoade deserves a much better Hollywood debut. Extra dislikes for ruining an apparently original set-up.

 

5 On the Road

It is good that we now know for certain that Jack Kerouac’s famous beatnik novel does not translate well to film. And is genuinely outdated. Terribly unlikable characters are a stallwart of the worst fiolms of 2012, and On the Road is no example. Especially the talented female actors in this film (Kristen Stewart and Kirsten Dunst) are particularly badly treated.

 

4 Rock of Ages

Really. These 1980 wannabe rock songs did not need sugarcoating. Nor did they need to be performed by kids who appear to have wandered straightaway from the Disney channel. Good supporting roles by Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin and Russell Brand cannot save this trainwreck of a musical.

 

3 John Carter

Missing all your marks, looking like a drug addicts fever dream, being utterly silly and failing massively at the box office (Disney reportedly lost some 200 million dollars on this single film) are not enough to be called the worst film of the year. But it does get Andrew Stanton’s trainwreck of a blockbuster on third spot.

 

2 Alles is Familie

Another film that is here because it utterly fails to live up to the standards of a precursor. 2007′s Alles is Liefde was a delightful romantic comedy – even better than Love Actually, from which it stole its concept. But this ‘semi-sequel’ has no likable characters, nothing ot no-one to relate to, no balance or structure, and – most importantly – no good jokes.

 

1 Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

A ‘film’ that looks and sounds like a computer game. Like there are so many out there – every summer. But this one (produced by Tim Burton and directed by none less than Timur Bekmambetov) had the guts to sideline the sad history of slavery as something invented by fantasy monsters. Shocking.

Review: The Bourne Legacy (dir. Tony Gilroy)

Story: Jeremy Renner is Alex Cross, another agent in the secret Treadstone project of the CIA. His superiors want him dead to cover up the project after Jason Bourne exposed it. Together with a doctor (Rachel Weisz) who is also on the kill list, Cross escapes and sets out to reclaim his life.

I have never been a big fan of the Bourne movies. I liked Robert Ludlum’s novels well enough, but I though that The Bourne Identity was a poor adaptation. The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum, directed by the much lauded Paul Greengrass, took their titles from the novels, but nothing else. Supremacy and Ultimatum are widely considered to have changed the face of action films. But I never much cared for that new face. The shaky camera style that makes it impossible to keep up with what is happening in an action scene is in my opinion but a trick to conceal that the filmmaker does not know how to properly shoot an action scene.

(Proper action scenes, I think, are hardly shot anymore, now that this trick has become widespread. Even the James Bond movie Quantum of Solace was hampered by it. I much prefer old-fashioned action set pieces like those directed by Michael Mann or Philip Noyce)

Where I find Greengrass’ contribution to the Bourne series to be overrated, I must admit that I was a big fan of Matt Damon as Bourne. Over the years, I’ve grown into the idea of Damon as a bona fide character actor, rather than as a Hollywood pretty boy. But for the fourth film in the Bourne series, The Bourne Legacy, both Damon and Greengrass have not returned. Tony Gilroy is now in the director’s chair. He was one of the writers of the previous films and he directed the exciting thriller Micheal Clayton. And the leading man is now Jeremy Renner, the rising star of The Hurt Locker, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol and The Avengers.

In The Bourne Legacy, Renner does a decent job with admittedly poor material. This film is shockingly underthought and underwritten. Entire plot strands and developments make no sense at all (including a lengthy opening scene in Alaska). Characters are introduced and dropped at a whim, or not used at all (why Joan Allen’s Pam Landy had to reappear is a mystery to me). Curiously, the action scenes were better than they ever were in the previous films. Especially the Manila motorbike chase is a spectacle the likes of which we have not seen since The Matrix Reloaded.

Verdicht: This film will entertain as long as you do not overthink it. Renner and Weisz are always a pleasure. There is some realy good action. But I can’t escape the thought that this was an idea for just another action movie first, and that the Bourne label got stuck onto it later, for marketing purposes only. And exactly that change has made this film such a mess.

Review: To Rome With Love (dir. Woody Allen)

Story: An American architect (Alec Baldwin) visiting Rome meets up with a younger version of himself (Jessie Eisenberg). An Italian undertaker (Fabio Armiliato) is pushed to become an opera star by the new father-in-law of his son (Woody Allen). A couple from the countryside gets separated and experience the attractions of Rome apart from each other and a simple clerk (Roberto Benigni) suddenly becomes famous. And none of these stories have anything to do with each other.

The new Woody Allen is a disappointment. The most productive senior in cinema tries to do for Rome what last year’s Midnight in Paris did for the French capital. And he fails miserably. True enough, individual stretches and jokes are entertaining, and there is just enough absurdism in order to accept some of the less logical developments in the plot, but on the whole this is a mess of a film. The four major story lines are predictable (with the exception of the Roberto Benigni subplot) and drag on. Allen’s visual style is tiresome, just bombarding the audience with beautiful sights of the Eternal City. The editing is shoddy, ruining the timing of a number of jokes.

What kept me from yawning and falling asleep where the energetic performances by Alec Baldwin, Ellen Page, Jesse Eisenberg and Benigni. Greta Gerwig, Penelope Cruz and Woody Allen are much less interesting, while opera singer Fabio Armiliato mades a decent impression on the big screen. However, a serious problem with Allen’s characters is that none of them is mildly sympathetic.

I was never a big fan of Midnight in Paris, but that film, in the end, at least had a point. Something that is utterly lacking from To Rome With Love. It becomes more and more clear that Allen is not a gifted director. He is a very talented writer who is clearly running out of things to say (or, and this is a little joke for you Dutch-speaking readers: hij is aan het einde van zijn Latijn). What we’re stuck with is a tourist post card with a silly title that does not make any sense.

Final verdict: Let’s go and rent Manhattan or Annie Hall. Or take a trip to Rome yourself. Airplane tickets have never been cheaper and it will certainly be more interesting than sitting through this snorefest.

Review: A Few Best Men (Stephan Elliott)

A problem with many comedies is that they are so predictable. And this predactibility is a problem, because the secret to comedy is timing. Surprise, and mostly, timing. So if you can see a joke coming from a mile away, than it is probably not going to make you laugh.

That is the theory, but as usually, theory does not really translate flawlessly into reality. The best example of that truthism, with regard to film comedies, is A Few Best Men. This British-Australian comedy is predictable from beyond the grave. However, I laughed. A lot. And especially about the jokes I saw coming.

I honestly cannot say why. Well, there are a few reasons. The first is the films complete unpretentiousness about being anything but what it is. It is not even trying to pretend to be a good film, it is just very, very crude. Another reason, more technical, is an outstanding soundtrack, which has oddly funky music playing softly throughout entire sequences. This lends to the comedy a bit of a silent-era Laurel & Hardy quality. If you think that this insults Stanley Laurel and Oliver Hardy, than you did not know that their films were, to their audiences, exactly what A Few Best Men is to its audiences today: just plain, enjoyable nonsense comedy.

But still, the comedy in A Few Best Men is not of the sort that usually cracks me up. It involves mishaps with cocaine, a disastrous wedding and blokey British guys. Stuff I can usually do without quite well. And now I laughed. Even when I saw the jokes, which were not the kind of jokes I usually laugh at, coming from a mile away.

It is the mystery of comedy. It really is. I cannot say anything else about it. If you see this trailer, and you think it is not for you, than you feel the way I did. And yet… Don’t expect Monty Python, or 1970s Woody Allen. This is not smart comedy. If anything, it is a strange mixture of American Pie and Crocodile Dundee. However, if you even mildly enjoyed these films, you will ahve a 90 minute ball with A Few Best Men.

Trailer Tuesday: Lay Miserables’ Premium Legacy

Lay the Favourite

Dir. Stephen Frears. Starring: Bruce Willis, Rebecca Hall, Catherine Zeta-Jones & Vince Vaughn

Release date NL: TBA

 

Les Miserables

Dir. Tom Hooper. Starring: Russell Crowe, Hugh Jackman, Helena Bonham Carter, Anne Hathaway, Sacha Baron Cohen & Amanda Seyfried

Release date NL: January 10, 2013

 

Premium Rush

Dir. David Koepp. Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michael Shannon, Aaron Tveit & Jamie Chung

Release date NL: November 22, 2012

 

The Bourne Legacy

Dir. Tony Gilroy. Starring: Jeremy Renner, Rachel Weisz, Edward Norton, Joan Allen, Albert Finney, Donna Murphy & David Strathairn

Release date NL: August 30, 2012

Review: Moonrise Kingdom

Let’s be clear about this film. You get it or you don’t. It touches you or it leaves you completely cold. I don’t think there is a middle way. And with Wes Anderson, there never has been such a thing as a middle way. The director of The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou and The Darjeeling Limited has a style that can best be described as ‘detached’. Or ‘stylized’. In Anderson’s film the two are almost synonyms.

Some basic elements of ‘Andersonesque Stylized Detachment’ are gorgeous set design, long takes, voice-overs and narrators, bright colours and depressed children. And depressed grown-ups. And a depressed Bill Murray. Actually, if he wasn’t making these gorgeous films, Wes Anderson would be that annoying person who flaunts his depression and his medicine addiction as fashionable accessories. He would be Woody Allen. But without the sex jokes.

But, thank God, Wes found another outlet for his hipster world weariness. His previous films have all been about loss, lack and nostalgia. About something that is no longer there. And although they were beautiful, a ‘certain fatigue’ easily sets in during a Wes Anderson marathon. Therefore I am happy to say that Moonrise Kingdom, though obviously a typical Wes Anderson film, is a completely different thing. It is a film during which nothing is lost (yet). It is a film about the things that are lost in all Anderson’s other films: love, friendship, innocence and perspective.

Set on a fictional New England island, during what must be a 1960s/1970s summer break, Moonrise Kingdom tells the story of twelve-year-olds Suzy (Kara Hayward) and Sam (Jared Gilman) who decide to take off together and leave their family (Suzy) and boy sout camp (Sam). And it is the story of the grown-ups pursuing them: Suzy’s estranged parents (Bill Murray and Frances McDormand), the scout master (Edward Norton) and the island sherriff (Bruce Willis). I won’t say more about the plot, as this is a film that must just be experienced, in its full audiovisual beauty. Because apart from gorgeous visuals, Wes Anderson has had a very lucky hand in picking the music for Moonrise Kingdom, the highlight being Francoise Hardy’s Le Temps de l’Amour.

The film is excellently acted. Murray and McDormand and, in smaller roles Jason Schwartzman and Tilda Swinton are very much in their natural environment in films like this. But Norton and especially Willis are very surprising. Norton brings a beautiful vulnerability to his character, and action star Willis is a revelation as the weary sherriff. But the true stand-out performances are those of the kids. Hayward and Gilman are fantastic. Those obnoxious brats in Hugo should sit still, watch and learn.

Add to all this biblical metaphores, animal costumes, a terrible storm, a portable gramophone player a cute dog and Bob Balaban as the narrator and I am sold. Actually Moonrise Kingdom might be the film that people who hate Wes Anderson films might hate less or even like a little bit. Despite all the rain this is a fundamentally sunny film experience.

Trailer Tuesday: Savages Versus the Sweeney With Love

Savages

Dir. Oliver Stone. Starring: Blake Lively, Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Johnson, John Travolta, Benicio Del Toro, Uma Thurman & Selma Hayek

Dutch release date: September 27

 

Lola Versus

Dir. Daryl Wein. Starring: Greta Gerwig, Joel Kinnaman & Bill Pullman

Dutch release date: TBA

 

The Sweeney

Dir. Nick Love. Starring: Ray Winstone, Ben Drew, Hayley Atwell & Alan Leech

Dutch release date: TBA

 

To Rome With Love

Dir. Woody Allen. Starring: Everyone (Woody Allen, Ellen Page, Alec Baldwin, Jesse Eisenberg, Penelope Cruz, Greta Gerwig & Roberto Benigni)

Dutch release date: August 23

Pre-Academy Awards Last Mini Reviews

I have already reviewed six out of the nine nominees for the Best Film Oscar, which will be handed out during the big ceremony tomorrow: Hugo, The Descendants, War Horse, The Help, The Artist and The Tree of Life. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is not yet released here, but two films have been released last year that I’ve managed to miss out on so far. So here are brief catch-up reviews of Moneyball and Midnight in Paris.

Moneyball (dir. Bennett Miller) is the story of baseball manager Billy Beane (what a name!) – played by Brad Pitt – who manages the relatively poor, bottom-of-the-league team Oakland A’s. Despite his efforts, Beane sees all his best players being lured away by rich teams such as the New York Yankees, and is unable to replace them on his modest budget. It is only after he meets computer nerd and economic Peter Brand (Jonah Hill) – who has come up with a statistical analysis of players that values players who are overlooked by anyone else – that Beane is able to put together a team that can win. Eventually, because by radically rethinking baseball Beane and Brand alienate the entire club, and the wins don’t come easy.

Moneyball is very decent, and a very good sports movie, even though there is very little sporting shown. But a best picture nominee? I could think of a number of films that are more deserving of such honor. I enjoyed myself, but not much more than that. And while the nomination for Best Actor for Brad Pitt is more or less deserved (he’s not going to win anyway), the one for Supporting Actor for Hill is a joke. Hill’s role is small, one-sided and without any meat to it. He was being applauded for lpaying a role different to the usual nerd he plays in Judd Apatow like comedies. But his Peter Brand is just a very bland, grown-up version of that same nerd. Americans, ts.

Midnight in Paris is said to be Woody Allen’s best film in twenty years. I would not know as I have not seen everything he has done in that period. But I do question whether that justifies nominating the film for an Oscar. Sure, the writing nod (Best Original Screenplay) makes sense, as much of the dialogue is zingy and entertaining. But ultimately the film lacks the pull or punch to stay with you for more than an hour afterwards.

Owen Wilson is surprisingly un-annoying as the American bread-writer-with-literature-amibtions in love with a fairy-tale version of 1920sParis. And who is mysteriously drawn into that world, populated by the likes of Hemingway and Dali, when the clock strikes midnight. However, his impersonation of a 1970s/80s Woody Allen is also very uncanny, and I would have preferred novel, original character. There is some surprising, and surprisingly funny, supporting casting being done. For instance with Adrien Brody’s rhinoceros-obsessed Dali and Kathy Bates’ friendly matriarch Gertrude Stein.

Allen’s best in twenty years? I’ll believe that. But Moneyball and Midnight in Paris, despite being completely acceptable, show that the decision, some years ago, to have more than five nominees for Best Picture does not necessarily produce added value for every year’s award ceremony.

Misjudged Eulogy of Early Cinema – the Hugo review

The two most Oscar-nominated flms this year are the fantastic The Artist, the big favourite that has received ten nominations, and Hugo, Martin Scorsese’s first 3D and first family film. It has received eleven nominations, mostly in technical categories, although Best Film and Best Director are also on the list. Curiously, both films are about the past of cinema. But whereas The Artist is a wonderful birthday party, Hugo is a bittersweet eulogy. At its better moments at least.

Because for the longest part of its running time, it is boring, standard fare. My list of things that I dislike about Hugo kicks off with its infuriatingly romanticized, stereotypical representation of 1930s Paris, a quality which the film curiously shares with another overhyped nominee, Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris. But at least Midnight in Paris admitted that this representation was a fantasy. This is literally a film in which the Eiffel tower can be seen from every window in the city.

The second problem is the story, which is strangely two-sided. There is a bit about a young boy – the titular Hugo Cabret – living in the walls of a train station, operating the clocks and trying to rebuild the automaton his late father left him. And when this story is more or less told and done with (after a little more than an hour, a proper running time for a mediocre kids’ flick) another story begins, about an old and bitter shopkeeper and his mysterious past. Needless to say, that story is much more interesting, and I would have loved to see it as a proper drama on itself.

The third problem lies very close to the second problem. It is the actors’ performances. As the depiction of Paris, they are so stereotypical that it hurts. Starting with the young Asa Butterfield (Hugo), who for the sake of his youth will be spared harsh criticism. And continuing with the also-very-young Chloe Moretz, who we have seen in such better form in Kick-Ass and Let Me In. Far more problematic is the supporting role of Sacha Baron Cohen as the station chief, who is a stumbling cliche of a man, and a painfully underused Jude Law as Hugo’s father. The only major cats member who fare better are Sir Christopher Lee as a bookshop owner, also much too little in the picture, and Sir Ben Kingsley, as the ill-fated shopkeeper. Also, what is it with the thick English accents in a film set in Paris? What is the point of that?

The good things then. First of all there is the 3D, which is actually justified in some moments; for instance when showing the inner mechanics of the station clocks, or in flashbacks to the first years of the twentieth century. It isn’t perfect, but it shows at least a bit of potential for the technology. Unfortunately an inferior variety of the technology is used – the one with the heavy glasses that give me headaches – instead of the more common and superior RealD.

The second good thing are those flashbacks, which are the crown jewels of the film and which belong to the second, more interesting, part of the story. Without giving away too much, these are the scenes that won Hugo its Oscar nominations, the technical ones as well as the ‘ major’ ones. They are the ones that won over the hearts of film ‘connaisseurs’ (rather than fans or the regular audience) and members of the Academy. There may be some rewriting of history going on in the process, when the First world War substitutes for copyright struggles and financial misadventures, but that fits the drama and is pardonable.

Director Martin Scorsese is a film connaisseur. A lover of the history of the medium and the art, as his many documentaries on the subject clearly show. In interviews he says that he wanted, for once, to make a film that his children could enjoy, who are too young for Taxi Driver or The Departed. But it was a mistake to make his first 3D film, and an ode to early cinema at the same time. The three objectives fit crudely together, much unlike the perfect mechanisms of the clocks and the automaton.

Trailer Tuesday: The Legacy of Seeking Lincoln in the Iron Sky

The Bourne Legacy

Dir. Tony Gilroy. starring: Jeremy Renner, Edward Norton, Rachel Weisz, Joan Allen & Albert Finney

Release date NL: September 13 2012

 

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World

Dir. Lorene Scafaria. Starring: Steve Carrell, Keira Knightley, William Petersen & Patton Oswalt

Release date NL: TBA

 

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

Dir. Timur Bekmambetov. Starring: Benjmain Walker, Dominic Cooper, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Rufus Sewell & Anthony Mackie

Release date NL: July 11 2012

 

Iron Sky

Dir. Timo Vuorensola. Starring: Julia Dietze, Christopher Kirby & Udo Kier

Release date NL: TBA