5 Reasons I Don’t Like ‘Boyhood’ But Do Like ‘Whisper of The Heart’

It might be a bit late to talk about Boyhood but it’s a film I’ve really wanted to talk about ever since I started reviewing films. I started reviews films in text form in 2014, and shortly after I did, I was hearing tons of buzz about a film called Boyhood. Now, at the time, I was preparing to write an article on the Oscars in 2016 since I was giving my thoughts on all the films that were going to be getting nominations, which involved me watching all the Best Picture nominees, and I was hearing a lot about this film: it was an “amazing piece of work”; it was a “marvel in filmmaking”. In short, people thought it was great piece of cinema… And I did not like it. I think I gave it a pass at the time for the simple fact of what it was and how ambitious it was, but I’ve since grown to really not like this film.

I think part of it has to do with my thoughts on director Richard Linklater. I’ve never really been a fan of his films; they just seem to me to be films that think they are cleverer than they actually are. Still, they seem to do the job, and before you suggest to me that my bias against Richard Linklater might be clouding my judgement, I will point out that there are several films he’s directed that I actually do like. School of Rock is probably one of my favourite Jack Black films and probably the time he was most perfectly cast, I actually kind of like Me and Orson Welles, and his adaptation of A Scanner Darkly is one of the best Philip K Dick adaptations out there. Even if I do find the film a bit of a confusing mess at times, I do have to praise just how well it was put together to tell the story of the book. So, Boyhood for those not in the know is a slice-of-life film which was shot over 12 consecutive summers with the same cast and would tell the story of a family growing up over that time period. In short, it was a major gamble – you can’t go back and reshoot, you have to stick with the same cast, and they’re not necessarily all going to be great actors as they grow up, so the fact that this film even exists is somewhat of an achievement. But the fact of the matter is, it didn’t do anything for me; this film really bored me to tears.

People will then say, “Well, you obviously aren’t really a fan of slice-of-life as a genre,” but here’s the thing, I kind of am a lot of the time, and I think I found a film that really does that job really well and barely anyone knows about. It’s a film called Whisper of The Heart that was produced by Studio Ghibli, and the screenplay was even written by film industry legend Hayao Miyazaki, though he did not direct, that was handed to Yoshifumi Kondo. The film tells the story of a middle-school student in her final years and a sense of self-discovery through several scenarios – all the books she wanted being checked out by someone she has never heard of in her school, as well as coming across an antique shop after she follows a cat to it to discover that the boy at school she thought was a jerk is a skilled violinist and she’s pre-judged him. From there, and her fascination with a statue of the Cat Baron in the shop, she decides to become an author and puts all of her effort into writing a book. Now, even if you talked to Anime fans and even fans of Studio Ghibli you won’t find many people talking about this film. This one has kind of been swept under the rug; it does not often come up in conversation about Ghibli’s best work. And that’s a shame because in my mind it’s one of their better films and probably one of the best slice-of-life films I have ever seen.

So, at this point, I’m going to talk about 5 reasons why I don’t like Boyhood and counteract it with a reason why Whisper of The Heart does it better and is worth more of your time. Let’s begin.

• Plot Structure

In short, Boyhood does not really have one; it really is just the life of these characters. Now, that could have worked but for reason number 2, it does not quite work, and as a result it’s all a bit of a buzzkill. I was actively wanting there to be more of a plot to this film. The fact there is not kind of suggests the idea that the script was being written as the film was going. As a result, it does not feel like a film that has a beginning, a middle and an end. In fact, the ending just feels like the film stops; there is no real climax to Boyhood. It starts with the main boy at a young age and ends with him in University, and even then, at the point I was expecting it to end – which would have been a nice way to send off the film – it just kept going. Again, I’ll get back to that point later.

What’s more, Boyhood also has a real issue with the fact that, because not much is happening, you’re really getting a sense of the fact that it’s a little too realistic. I kind of was really hoping that some sort of plot was going to kick in, but at about the halfway point I kind of realised it was not actually going to happen. There’s not much character development for any of these characters. You can have a slice-of-life story and have character development. The film I think tries to boast a similar theme to Whisper of The Heart – both films have an idea of finding your identity in something you’re good at, and your experiences making you who you are from both the good and the bad. Whisper of The Heart even adds a certain sense of learning from failure to succeed later. But in the case of Boyhood it feels tacked on – again, this does feel like a film that was being written as it was going along. In fact, quite a few plot points are actually dropped partway through. One of my favourite parts of the film was at the point when Patricia Arquette’s character was married to the alcoholic professor from her college who eventually revealed his true colours and started treating everyone like crap because it actually felt like the plot was finally kicking in, but then partway through the film they just leave and it is never mentioned again.

Now, take Whisper of The Heart: it has a very good 3-act structure (beginning, middle, end) and it actually commits to its themes. Yes, it is about Shizuku becoming an author and having that ambition, but it also has lots of different subplots and they all feel like they’re well thought out: The rather awkward romance with Seiji and their interactions; the fall out with the fact that her best friend’s crush does not like her and it involves a massive love-triangle; the budding fascination with the antique shop owner who’s Seiji’s grandfather and a keen violinmaker who she is desperate to impress with the book. There’s a lot more going on and they all have resolutions. Granted, Whisper of The Heart also has the same problem as Boyhood in that it doesn’t really have an ending, it just kind of ends and is, probably out of all the Ghibli’s films, the one with the most abrupt ending. Though I suspect that might have been an issue with the fact they were translating a source material. Ghibli films often don’t have that issue since they usually are not adapting other people’s work. The point I’m making is that Boyhood is a film which is trying to have a plot but does not really have one. There are a lot of moments which are set up to indicate they’re going to have a plot, but the film never commits to it, and whatever themes they were going for feel half-thought, whereas Whisper of The Heart feels like a fully thought out screenplay.

• I Could Not Tell You Much About These Characters

Boyhood’s characters just are not there. If you’re going to do a film about slice-of-life and simple day-to-day moments, you need to have good characters and preferably characters that even will develop as the story goes on. It is possible to do that, but that does not really happen in Boyhood. I would have to look up the names of most of the characters because I could not tell you them off the top of my head or what their character was all about. The main boy has virtually no personality; I could not tell you a thing about him despite this being a film about him and him growing up, but he is the most unremarkable character to follow. You just remember the character as archetypes, like the sister, both of her alcoholic boyfriends, Ethan Hawke who’s the kid’s dad, and Patricia Arquette who plays the mum, arguably the most compelling character in the entire film (no wonder then that she ended up winning Best Supporting Actress for a role in this). I mentioned before that they sort of set up these character arcs, but they surprisingly feel rushed if they ever feel like they get off the ground, and they’re rather bland. Hell, I couldn’t even really tell you what happens to half of them by the end of the film – there are a ton of characters which are introduced in the movie that later just sort of disappear. Now, this might have been down to the fact that they couldn’t get some of these actors to come back, and that would be a fair point.

Then we take a film like Whisper of The Heart where, in that film, I remember virtually most of the characters and their arcs. I remember everything about Shizuko, Seiji, her best friend Yuko, Seiji’s grandfather Shiro; there’s all sorts about them. There’s the fact that Seiji acts like a bit of a jerk but he’s actually a very talented individual who has trouble expressing himself to other people. You’ve got the fact that Shizuko doesn’t really know what she wants to do with her life, which is a very common personality trait for someone at that age, especially during a major transition in your life which is what Shizuko is going through. You have real personality-building scenes. I could not really tell you much about some of the scenes from Boyhood but I remember very clearly Shizuko, Seiji and Shiro performing ‘Country Road’ on their instruments in the shop’s basement. We’ll get back to that later. The point is you need good characters and good character arcs. Whisper of The Heart really has a lot it; Boyhood just doesn’t, and as a result the film is not that compelling (and when we get to number 4, that’s really going to create a problem).

• The Use of Pop Culture Isn’t As Interesting As They Think It Is

Boyhood was shot over 12 summers, and to tie into that there is a lot of use of things that were popular at the time to make the point of when the film was taking place as a way of showing the transition of time. You’ve got the kids watching Dragon Ball Z or the boy using a Gameboy Advance, then when the film is taking place a few years later he’s using a Nintendo DS instead because that was the next console to take over. There are a lot of references to songs that were charting very highly around that time; there are a lot of references to news stories which were going on around the time period.

Here’s my problem: they don’t serve much of a narrative purpose, they just exist to show the transition of time. Cool in theory but in practice it is actually rather annoying – it almost feels like the directors are winking at the television, going, “Remember that?” It doesn’t really add anything and it kind of sticks out. I saw a review of Boyhood when I was researching this that said they found it weird that Nintendo would give out a product placement for a product that was going to be out of circulation and production by the time the film came out, which brings me to another problem I found with the film: it dates the film poorly. I feel like it doesn’t really add a timeless quality to the film, and I think Boyhood would have succeeded better if it had a timeless feel to it. Instead it feels like it’s an exhibit of a lot of moments of the noughties and some of the early 2010s.

Now, pop culture doesn’t play too much of a factor in Whisper of The Heart except for one point, the John Denver song ‘Take Me Home, Country Roads’. Now, you all know that song, but it serves a particular purpose in the film for several reasons. For one, it’s actually a decent choice of song. It is slightly dated in its referencing, but it represents something that a lot of Japanese teenagers go through at that time – obsession with American culture. We like to think of Japan as being this very insular culture that has very much its own identity, influenced by itself and not much outside sources, but there are a lot of people who have a very big obsession with American culture, and pop culture in particular. The song plays a factor in several ways: Shizuko and Yuko practice singing it and have trouble translating it, which leads to a bad translation joke which does not work in the English dubbed version of the film; it’s the song that Shizuko and Seiji perform together which brings them closer together; and you have the fact that it’s used in the opening and closing credits. But it actually serves a purpose within the narrative as it’s a song that everyone likes and binds them together and it’s a part of the story as a whole; it doesn’t feel like it’s tacked on at any point.

Then we come to one of my biggest problems with Boyhood…

• It’s Way Too Long

Boyhood runs at 165 minutes. That’s 2 hours and 45 minutes. I didn’t get to see Boyhood in the cinema, I ended up watching it on a flight coming back from America when I knew I would have enough time to watch it without anywhere to escape, and on flights I tend to have a much larger tolerance to longer films. It’s probably why I didn’t like Zero Dark Thirty so much on a second viewing when I saw it on the ground. But even then, Boyhood was way too long – you could cut 30 minutes of this film and I don’t think you’d lose much. Hell, if you want to keep the structure and the time periods all in place, cut it by 20 minutes. Seriously! I was begging and pleading this film to end. By the halfway point when you realise this film is going to have absolutely no plot whatsoever, I was really begging for it just to end sooner rather than later. And as I mentioned, there was even a point where it looked like he was driving off to University and that would be the end of the film, but it still goes on for like 10 more minutes! I don’t care! And then the film just suddenly stops. The fact that there’s not much character development means that what was already a long runtime feels like it’s even longer; this film feels like it goes on for three hours. And considering it doesn’t have much of a plot, it also makes the film really, really boring. Whisper of The Heart is very sensible – it goes on only for 111 minutes, and while I wish they kind of had a slightly better ending, it at least does not feel like it overstays its welcome. It’s perfectly paced and as a result feels like it runs at a good amount of time – it never feels boring and I didn’t feel like anything should have been cut from the film. But I feel like I have to go onto my next point…

• It’s All A Bit Of A Gimmick

The one thing Boyhood really has going for it is the sheer feat it was to shoot the film over 12 years, with the same cast, watching them grow up with the film. Here’s the thing though: if you took that out of the mix, this film would not get anywhere near the level of recognition it did get. It really has not much going for it once you take that out of the mix. Linklater had a vision for this but I don’t think he got beyond the sheer concept of it, and I think that really shows in the fact that not many people talk about this film anymore. And unlike Whisper of The Heart, which I also have a problem with in that not many people talk about it, it’s not because it was overshadowed by other films and some of its contemporaries. The fact Boyhood did not win Best Picture probably didn’t help but I think everyone got over the gimmick and it really died down. I’m just kind of glad that it’s in that state as I don’t think it deserves as much of the recognition it got, and the fact that it took someone reminding me that this film exists really brought home to me that this film is largely forgotten. And I think as the years go on it’s not going to be remembered as much because, well, its gimmick is really what it has to hold onto.

Now, Whisper of The Heart I think will have a similar problem, but the studio it was made in was established on fantastical storytelling and did a very good job with it. As a result, it’s got people to really talk about that studio and so, as a result it’s going to live on in some fashion. Granted, it’s probably always going to just have a small or a cult following; it’s never going to achieve the sort of critical success of a film like Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away or Howl’s Moving Castle. But the sheer fact that those films exist, there will be people that will go through the collection and find this film. As a result, it doesn’t really need to rely on anything – the reputation of its contemporaries will mean that people will eventually find this film and it will hopefully stick with them. Ghibli obviously saw something in this because it was the only Ghibli film to receive a sort-of sequel with The Cat Returns, which was basically what Shizuko’s book would have turned out like when she kept up her writing. So, yeah, absolutely see Whisper of The Heart.

But I want to hear your points. Did you like Boyhood and have a counterargument to my points? I look forward to reading some of them in the comments.

When it comes to the Oscars, most people look to Best Picture as one of the big ones of the night. But in all honesty, one of the categories that I really look to is Best Animated Feature. It’s no surprise that I’m a big advocate for animated films, I really do enjoy animation to an extreme degree. So to see which films do well in this category really is invigorating for me, or at least it would be if most of the films I wanted got nominated. Yeah, this is a category where I really wish the academy would be much more stringent and not just pick films their kids watched. I’ve seen so many great animated films that got passed up for complete crap that someone’s kids enjoyed – Cars got a nomination for Best Animated Feature for crying out loud. The Boss Baby got a nomination for Best Animated Feature.

So, since I’m ranking a lot of decades list, I’ve decided to look at all ten films that won Best Animated Feature at the Oscars. And if you’re expecting to see a lot of Anime at the top because you’re aware of my tastes, don’t. Despite the fact that four animated productions from Japan got nominations, those being The Wind Rises, The Tale of Princess Kaguya, When Marnie Was There and Mirai, none of them won. In fact, there hasn’t been an animated film from Japan to win this category since 2003. But obviously expect a lot of Disney and Pixar in this one, particularly Pixar. The category has jokingly been called The Pixar Awards since they won it more times than any other studio, and that’s no exception for this list. In fact, half the winners from films that came out in the decade were animated films from Pixar, and three of the others were Disney. Only two films in the last decade that won the award were not made by either Disney or Pixar, and it’s pretty much an incredible indictment on the method of voting and nominations that the academy gives. Yes, I grant you, Pixar and Disney are two of the biggest animation studios on the planet and they do make amazing films, however it does seem rather excessive how much they’ve dominated this category, and it was at the expense of several studios. But, without complaining, let’s get on with the list.

Now, to make sure this represents the decade, this will not include the 2010 winner of Best Animated Feature since that award ceremony covered films from 2009. To ensure this represents the last decade, this will cover the winners from the award ceremonies from 2011 to 2020, though I will state them as the winner of the film from the year it came out. Now we’ve avoided that confusion, let’s get on with the list. And remember, these are ranked by both how much I enjoyed the film and what I thought of the film on a technical level, and trust me, picking the no.1 was really hard. Picking the no.10, on the other hand, was not.

10. Brave

came out in 2012 and won the Oscar in 2013

I still don’t know why Brave won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature because it really is a disjointed film. I really thought this was a Disney film before I discovered Pixar actually made it, and it’s a bit of a mess all round. It’s a rather bizarre film; it’s almost like Pixar looked at Brother Bear and said, “Let’s do that but set it in Scotland,” and it’s a rather soulless film all round. It tries to do a very headstrong and independent lead female character but she doesn’t feel organic in the role, she feels more manufactured. And I honestly think that of all the films that Pixar made that have not been sequels, this one is one of their weakest, and it wasn’t as if it was coming out in a year where there were not a lot of nominations to pick from. Okay, Frankenweenie wasn’t that great of a film but it was nominated in the same year as ParaNorman, The Pirates in an Adventure with Scientists and Wreck It-Ralph. All three of those films vastly deserved that nomination; the academy picked the absolute wrong answer. Brave’s legacy has really been a rather bland, rather boring film that has kind of proven the point of the stranglehold Pixar has on the award ceremony.

9. Frozen

Yeah, you all saw this one coming. I’m not a big fan of this film and I don’t think it should have won the Oscar, but I’ll get more into what should have won. But really, I knew going into the ceremony that Frozen was going to absolutely dominate that year in both Best Original Song and Best Animated Feature. What sets Frozen above Brave is the fact that, firstly, it has a more coherent and a just generally better-written script, and I actually think the animation is well-done, and I admit the film is obviously not aimed at me but I ultimately just don’t find myself enjoying it. It feels like the film is constantly winking at the audience with how much it’s trying to subvert expectations, though I do admit that the world design is well put together, even if it would be the worst part of Kingdom Hearts 3. But seriously, while it was nominated against a lot of not-too-extraordinary films, it was also up against The Wind Rises of all things, which was probably my favourite film to come out that year and was meant to be a send off to the legendary Hayao Miyazaki. Granted, he has since unretired… Again. But that’s aside from the point. At the time, it genuinely felt like this would be his last film, and if that had been the case, it would have seemed criminal for him not to go out with a bang for everything he’s done. And it seems a bit weird to me the academy did not take that into account considering that they give out Oscars a ton of times for actors that probably deserve them but not necessarily for the film they’re nominated for, something I’m hoping happens for Miriam Margolyes sometime soon. Seriously, if you haven’t checked it out yet, see The Wind Rises. It’s a rather interesting look into the minds of people who end up building weapons for war, told from the perspective of a pacifist; it’s a genuinely fascinating film.

8. Rango

Yeah, I forgot this film existed too until I did this countdown. I actually was kind of on board with Rango at one point, but it’s hard to deny the fact that, rather like Brave, it’s a rather unremarkable film. It is however a beautifully animated film. Rango has been an excellent film in several regards. Gore Verbinski, the director of Pirates of The Caribbean, produced the film and he also stayed on as director. And you can really tell that he brought a lot of what had worked in Pirates of The Caribbean, including very similar cinematography. Let’s just hope that this film didn’t give him the idea to make The Lone Ranger. I think the reason it won was because it was a really well-animated film in a year where the other films that were nominated had a lot of very standard animation. I also find it surprising that it’s the year DreamWorks had two nominations and they still didn’t win. Personally, out of the five nominees I wouldn’t have given it to Rango. I personally would have given it to Kung Fu Panda 2, and that’s purely because I really, really like Kung Fu Panda 2, I think it’s the best film of the trilogy. And seriously, the animation in those films is brilliant. If you missed out the Kung Fu Panda films, you’re doing yourself a disservice; they’re much better than you think they’d be.

7. Toy Story 4

Toy Story 4 really is, in my opinion, the weakest of the Toy Story films. I reviewed it last year and I kind of was of the opinion that it didn’t really hold up, all things considered. It just kind of existed for the sake of existence. I personally felt Toy Story 3 – more on that later – was a better cap-off to the series. Now I did think Toy Story 4 had some good points – the acting is really good in it and it feels like an end to a few character arcs, but that being said I thought it was the end to character arcs that already ended in the previous film, but it definitely felt like a film series that was now being pushed to an audience that was no longer including adults. Considering I grew up with the Toy Story films throughout the various stages of my life, I kind of just felt upset that they weren’t there anymore for me. Toy Story 4 was probably always going to win this category since it was up against the arthouse films, I Lost My Body and Klaus. DreamWorks had How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World which is an alright film but I wouldn’t have been happy if it had won, and Missing Link which, again, because Laika produced it I kind of wish it had won considering that film bombed at the box office and it’s actually really good; it was probably the one I enjoyed the most out of all those films. Though granted I haven’t actually seen I Lost My Body and Klaus, so my opinion might have changed; I’ve only heard good things about Klaus. And trust me, Laika’s probably going to be a studio that, with the current economic crisis, will more than likely go out of business; they did not need Missing Link to be that big of a bomb.

6. Big Hero 6

Honestly, that’s not me trying to be cute, it genuinely just happened to be no.6 on this countdown. Big Hero 6 won in the year that no one expected it to win – it was the year when the biggest controversies of the Oscars was the fact The Lego Movie hadn’t received a nomination for Best Animated Feature in spite of the fact it did receive a nomination for Best Original Song for Everything Is Awesome, and I am so sorry that I put that song back in your head, I can only apologise so much. Honestly, Big Hero 6 was the winner in what was, if you took one of the nominations out, probably the strongest year for that category. In fact, if you took out The Boxtrolls and replaced it with The Lego Movie, you would have had one of the toughest decisions. I was probably not going to be happy with the winner but Big Hero 6 is a really good movie; it’s a nice celebration of Disney’s acquisition of Marvel, since this film was based on a now defunct Marvel comic team, but also has some interesting takes on Anime. It’s no coincidence that both the series and the movie it’s set in is a combination of Tokyo and San Francisco. But it also has some interesting themes of loss and grief that I was surprised were handled so well. It’s kind of proof that you can use a superhero story to tell these kinds of subjects. Big Hero 6 is not the greatest film, however – it’s got way too obvious a villain for a start. I don’t know why they thought that reveal was going to be surprising, and in spite of Baymax’s infectious personalities, the other characters range from passably enjoyable to downright annoying. Big Hero 6 is a good film but man, I wish the award had gone to either The Tale of Princess Kaguya or especially Song of The Sea. Seriously, both of those are excellent but if you haven’t seen Song of The Sea, it’s an amazing Irish animated film that uses Irish mythology to a wondrous degree. Tom Moore really has become the Hayao Miyazaki of Ireland on the back of it. And I really would have liked it as well if Isao Takahata’s final film The Tale of Princess Kaguya won, though I suspect that got the nomination for its animation on the fact that it was Ghibli. I think the voters might have been put off by the bittersweet ending of that one, that and the fact it was the year we found out that the academy voters really don’t pay much attention with the Best Animated Feature category considering that one voter’s ballot was leaked where they said that their kids didn’t like the two “Chinese” cartoons that were on display, in spite of the fact that those films came out in Japan and Ireland. Academy voters are dumb.

5. Zootopia

Zooptopia’s really an excellent film; I thoroughly enjoyed this one. It’s actually a film that’s kind of more relevant now than it was when it came out. It uses its structure of a city full of anthropomorphic animals and uses it to tell a story that tackles issues of sexism and racism, and while it ultimately does pin the blame for a large portion on one person, it also acknowledges that both are societal issues that require a coming together of people to acknowledge their own faults. This is probably one of the boldest Disney put out in the decade. It’s really the film that, out of all the Disney films that came out this decade, I possibly enjoyed the most. They really put a ton of effort in to this one and it genuinely surprised me how much I enjoyed it. The world design is very well thought out and the character dynamics also felt well-executed. Plus, the voice cast is made up of very talented people for this one. I will say though that Zootopia really was the obvious winner in spite the fact it was a very strong year – Kubo and The Two Strings, which is another excellent Laika production, got the nomination, and Moana also was the second Disney nomination, and I’m actually kind of surprised it didn’t win considering how academy voters like it. I still haven’t seen My Life as a Zucchini so I can’t really comment on that one, and in spite of the fact The Red Turtle was partly produced by Studio Ghibli, it’s not one of the films that they’ve made that I had much affection for. It’s a good film but it’s one of those films that feels a bit too self-congratulatory, and it’s also kind of messed up when you really think about it.

4. Toy Story 3

Toy Story 3 was a phenomenal choice to win that Oscar. Yeah, it was up against How To Train Your Dragon and The Illusionist, but really Toy Story 3 should have got this one. If it had been the end, it would have been an excellent end to the franchise. It’s a great send-off film – it’s putting these characters in some brilliant situations, it has an excellent villain, the animation is top-notch once again, and it has some excellent character arcs. Seriously, I really love the end portion of that film. It also was a wise decision to not have Andy still be a young boy this time considering that the first film had come out in 1995 – we’d all grown up with these films. I can actually distinctly remember going to see the first two in cinemas, so probably the nostalgic edge to it is why I probably find the film so enjoyable. I also very regretfully can say this is the one Toy Story film I did not see in cinemas, much to my eternal regret. If you haven’t seen all the Toy Story films, I really would recommend it as a good movie marathon, but obviously out of the Pixar films that got the wins, it wasn’t my favourite, not even my second favourite. That would go to…

3. Inside Out

Inside Out is probably Pixar’s most inventive film of the decade. It was really just an excellent production from start to finish – you’ve got everyone being brilliantly well-cast, and an interesting story that’s directly about emotions in a very literal sense, and it has an excellent message about coming to terms with oneself. Seriously, there are so many moments in this film that will give you ‘the feels’. And despite the fact of how much I really adore this movie, it still wasn’t my pick for Best Animated Feature by the end of the year. Note: If you looked at my Oscar choices which actually did make for that year, I did pick it but it was under the proviso that I was able to change my mind later because one of the films hadn’t come out, and I did see that film. When Marnie Was There is fantastic and, in my mind, it probably should have won. Again, I kind of think it probably should have won not only because it was my favourite but the fact that this was the last time Ghibli was going to get a chance to win that outward. If you haven’t seen Inside Out really go and see it, but really try to watch When Marnie Was There – it’s an excellent film with a brilliant central performance from Hailee Steinfeld which tells the story of love, loss, and has similar themes to Inside Out of coming to terms with oneself. Although, I think it’s a film that also was a bit harsher with how it confronts its main character. I just personally though it was an excellent film and would have been a great way for Ghibli to go out. See both films.

2. Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse

Choosing between numbers 1 and 2 was the hard decision I had to make. These two are unabashedly the best films in my mind out of the 10. Spidey just missed out, but man is Into The Spider-Verse an excellent film. It’s a brilliant introduction for people that haven’t yet seen anything of Miles Morales’ Spider-Man, and it’s a really excellent take on the Spider-Verse storyline. I think my review was a bit harsh on it because I was just off the high of the Spider-Man videogame that came out on PlayStation 4, but this one really in my mind now is the best Spider-Man film to date. It’s another brilliant film from Lord and Miller, and I’m glad to see they finally got their Oscar nomination and win after they failed to get nominated for The Lego Movie. The only other option would have been Mirai which, as much as I love Mamoru Hosoda, when he finally got the Oscar nomination it was for the wrong film; he should have easily been nominated for either The Wolf Children or The Boy and the Beast, both films which I think are superior in my opinion. I don’t think that you even need to be a massive Spider-Man fan to get into this film; it’s just an excellent film about growing up and finding your place in the world and doing it on your terms. I actually agree with a lot of commentators – it could have easily been up for Best Picture.

1. Coco

I really adored Coco and it was the one time I was really glad Pixar had won it. It also really put me in a better mood considering the fact that it was one of my least favourites years for nominations considering that the two films I really wanted to get a nomination, Your Name and A Silent Voice, both failed to receive nominations, but the abysmal The Boss Baby did. I’m glad Coco did get the win because it is a brilliant take on Spanish myths and legends, and Pixar did a brilliant job in contextualising The Day of the Dead celebrations to tell a significantly brilliant story of both passion for one’s craft as well as family being one of the most important things in your life. Plus, this is a beautifully animated film, it looks amazing and I think it still will in ten years’ time. It really put The Book of Life to shame which this now does a much better job at of visualising that world, and it actually managed to add some peril to dead characters. I am amazed they pulled that off. And do I need to even say the music is phenomenal? It’s no surprise that ‘Remember Me’ also got nominated for Best Original Song. If you like good music in films, you really need to see it. Though personally if I was picking a song to get nominated For Best Original Song, I would have picked the song ‘La Llorona’.
While it was a weak year, two of the nominations being Ferdinand and The Boss Baby, there were actually two excellent other films nominated: I really enjoyed The Bread Winner, even if it did seem like a really brutal film overall but that was a good tone choice because it really suited the subject matter, and Loving Vincent is one of the best animated films of the decade, animating watercolour painting to tell the story of the life of Vincent Van Gogh.

5 Reasons Why The Blair Witch Project Is Still Great

The other day I was watching a video on YouTube by Mitch Benn, where he listed the 5 reasons why David Lynch’s adaptation of Frank Herbert’s Dune is still great. It’s an absolutely excellent video, you really should watch it. He made it in light of the fact that Dune is due to get another remake, this time directed by Denis Villeneuve of Arrival and Blade Runner: 2049 which, if you know anything about my thoughts on those films, means that you’re very much aware that I’m very excited to see that film. But it got me thinking, if I was to do a list like this, which film would I pick? And then it hit me. There are only a few films which I think are unnecessarily maligned and deserve to be talked about a lot more favourably. And I thought I’d start off with this film since it’s more divisive than it is one way or another, The Blair Witch Project.

Released in the late 90s, it was a hell of a landmark in the horror genre and it’s one of the most profitable films of all time. It was shot on a budget of $50,000 and turned in £250,000,000. Now I know what a lot of you are thinking: The Blair Witch Project has never been good, it’s always been bad, and you’ve got a million points about why it is bad. What I would say is to hold off those points for the comment section. Read through this and take in some of my points before you immediately say I’m wrong and click off this article.

Here are five reasons why I think The Blair Witch Project is not only great but is still the best found-footage film that has been made:

1. It used the found footage gimmick well.

Here’s the thing, found footage films have never been a particular love of mine. If anyone has read my reviews over a long space of time, I’ve often complained about them. They cheat with the editing; they show way too much; there is never a belief that it’s genuinely happening which is half the point of found footage. This is the stuff Blair Witch gets right. A lot of people say, “Well, why are they still filming everything?” The film comes up with a good explanation – they are film students making a documentary. These are people that typically will film just about everything and then try to work it in an editing booth afterwards, so it makes sense why they’re filming everything. It’s also the fact that Heather’s character is almost using the camera as a way to separate herself from the situation. If you ever actually re-watch that film, it’s really not until the famous scene where she talks to the camera that she actually really acknowledges just how screwed they are. And of course, she’s filming most of the time. Some of the few times she’s actually on camera are part of the fake documentary that they’re filming, not to mention that the filmmakers used viral marketing before it was even a thing. They did an excellent job using a barely used internet and did amazing viral marketing. I was there; a lot of people believed this was real, and the debates went on quite some time. The filmmakers were brilliant in being coy about not answering too many questions. Obviously, we now know it wasn’t because we know all the actors, but I stand by that this one used it well.

They also didn’t give them a particularly good camera. Most found footage films I see now, in spite of the fact that camcorder technology is way better and more accessible than it’s ever been, I get a sense with these ones that I could not believe that it was a genuine home-video camera. It just looks too professional most of the time, like you would not get that shot unless the room was lit in a certain fashion and everyone happened to have a microphone on them, which obviously they all do to make the job of editing easier. TBWP actually absconds from that. I’m pretty sure none of them were actually mic’d up and the whole thing is done through the camera’s internal microphone, and it’s not the best camera even by the standards of the time. So as a result, the believability is there, which adds to the fright factor. This all culminates in a film that really understand what makes the found footage genre work: it has to be believable. Because of the way it’s shot, you really feel like you are there with the characters as all this is going down, or that you could easily be watching something that you could just pick up by finding a camera in the woods.

2. The performances are well-improvised.

Blair Witch Project is actually shot with very little script; they weren’t really told much of anything. They were given a small map, the camcorder, some general motivation about what the character’s going through at that particular point, and then were just sent into the woods. So as a result, they kind of were in a very similar situation. Granted the team were on standby to make sure they were safe, but from what I can tell from anyone involved it was a very hard shoot, and it really shows in the performances. I think they play a group of people going slowly madder very well, there’s a real progression to that situation, particularly in Mike’s character. The thing about a lot of found footage and a lot of horror films in general is that I don’t believe the characters, the worst idea being when they make really dumb decisions. In Blair Witch it makes a lot of sense why they’re there – they’re film students trying to find a good scoop for a project and don’t realise that they’re way out of their depth. It’s not stupidity that brings them into this situation, it’s arrogance. And what’s more, it’s really amazing how they show just how much they change throughout the entire film. These are characters which seem to constantly change their mind on how screwed they really are. Plus, it helped the fact that they weren’t aware of what the filmmakers were going to do. For example, the tent-shaking scene was actually another example where they didn’t know it was going to happen – that was several members of production crew moving the tent. There was also meant to be a scene where we would actually see a bit of the Blair Witch. Well, not exactly. They actually dressed up a stagehand in all sorts of white clothing, and the shot was going to be that we just see a brief flash of a figure all in white to contrast with the dark environment. However, the actress playing Heather forgot to film the scene and they didn’t have time to go and do a reshoot. Brilliant decision on their part, for reasons that I’ll go into in the next point.

3. The budget is necessarily low, and they make the most of it.

This ties further into the found footage gimmick. The fact of the matter is they’re making a film about a group of students going into the woods, and they make it look like a film where a group of students go into the woods. This film is really terrifying in how it shoots its environment and it does it with real minimalism. I used to live just near a lot of woods in Derbyshire, and believe me, the woods look really frightening at night, and The Blair With Project is really good at capturing it. It’s really amazing just how well the film looks. They once again were doing a bunch of improvisations for things to freak out the actors when they left their tents. For example, the straw dolls that hang outside – they did not know that was going to happen, so that must have really freaked them out when they showed up. I can imagine the director got a few slaps to the face for half of what he put them through.

What’s more, they obviously didn’t have a great set, but where they shot the witch’s house is amazing. I knew a ton of houses in the countryside you could go around which looks just like the witch’s house, and they can Freak. You. Out. It again adds to the authenticity – they make the most of their budget and they make it look like a scary environment. Many films overdo it with their budget, putting a ton of effort into getting a big CGI monster to appear on camera. They don’t have the budget for it in this film, so what do they do? They don’t show the witch. Everything about her is in our imagination, and that is the best decision possible – it’s more frightening to have an unknown ghoul that could be just about anywhere and absolutely has it out for everyone that comes anywhere near her home. Plus, the shots with the locals are really well done. You can genuinely believe this is a town where everyone is sick of hearing the stories and their town being turned into a tourist attraction.

So yeah, when a lot of films overdo it with their budget and try to get more money to make a better film, it really stands to a test that this film had a low budget and made the best of what they had, and as a result made a more believable and more frightening film than many others. I stand by it: The Blair Witch Project is a genuinely frightening film when you consider just how screwed they really are. The film puts great emphasis on just how much trouble they’re in, and of course, because we’ve found their footage we know it’s not likely for any of it to end well, yet because of their characterisation we’re willing them to get out of there. Which leads me onto my next point…

4. The ending is perfect, and they picked the right one.

The team actually shot four endings for The Blair Witch Project. All of them take place at the witch’s house and, no, without going into spoilers, the Blair Witch doesn’t actually show up in any of them. (But I think you would have expected that.) Again, without going into spoilers, the ending they picked was perfect – it’s just minimalist enough to drive home the point and to frighten the audience, but not so overt that it feels out of place. The thing about the other endings are they feel like they’re just a bit too much. They’re just way too over the top and they’re trying really hard. From what I hear they didn’t do too well with test screenings, so they just didn’t have much to work with. But again, they did an excellent job with what they had. Blair Witch was always going to be a hard film to end on. You have to create tension and fear in a film that has an inevitable outcome, and I think it nails its ending really well. You feel the terror of the situation that’s happening, even though – again, without giving away spoilers – not much is really seen, just one image that will stick in your mind. And then the film abruptly ends just as it should. It’s something that a lot of found footage films fail at. I think a lot of found footage films I’ve seen recently try to end on a massive sting, and they don’t quite get what made Blair Witch’s ending work.

5. It’s endlessly open to speculation.

I stand by that the best horror films are really open to speculation, and a lot of the films that have failed have tried to give too much mythos to the story and tried to explain everything. There’s more fear in the unknown, hence why my favourite horror film ever is John Carpenter’s The Thing. So, that leads me to The Blair Witch Project which again is another film which is open to speculation. I saw Matt Patt’s movie theory video where he actually speculated that there is no Blair Witch and that the two students who go along with Heather are actually part of a plot to kill her. It’s actually one of his best videos and I would actually recommend watching it. You can tell he has a real passion for this film, but there’s all sorts: Is there a witch? What does she look like? Is the witch genuine? It is the child killer that one of the locals mentioned messing with them, or is a copycat? It’s always open, and again it’s because they made the wise decision that we never see the witch. We are put in the position of the characters and their true fears are put in our face for us all to see. Yes, there’s a lot of shaky cam; that’s what people in a frightened situation would be like. It’s not automatically scary, it’s just scary because it’s done in this way. And that’s one of the things I think that makes TBWP truly terrifying, it’s an unknown entity in a seemingly endless wilderness. You will get lost, you will be stuck in her domain, and you will never escape; the second you entered those woods you were in her control. It’s everything that I think the other versions of this story have failed to capture, including the 2016 sequel, the awful Blair Witch 2: Book of Shadows which I have no idea what anyone was thinking putting that film together, and the sadly disappointing Xbox and PC game which I actually had a lot of high hopes for.

Ranking the Highest Grossing Films 2010-2019

It seems to me that I never really did a piece around the beginning of January about my thoughts on the decade of films. But to be fair, it’s a lot harder to do a ‘Best of’ anything of the decade because, especially with films, you’re dealing with thousands and thousands of movies. It’s really hard to narrow it down and, fortunately, that was because there were a lot of great films that came out in the last decade. It really seems like we’re living in an age where we have a lot of choice of films and, while a majority of the films I see and review are simply okay or mediocre, the great ones have really stood out. So I’ve decided that until cinemas reopen, while I still want to talk about a large variety of films, every two weeks I’m going to be doing a list commenting on some aspect of film throughout the decade where I’m giving the ten films that triumphed in a certain category each year and ranking them. Thus, I’ll probably get to a lot of different films to talk about. And when the time comes, I will eventually talk about my best films of the decade.

For now, I’m going to start by looking at the films that you all went to see the most. While not every highest grossing film of the year would necessarily be in the same category as the highest grossing films of the decade list, I decided to take this approach because it allowed me to talk about a wider variety of films and meant that at least 1 film would be represented for each year of the decade. So, this list might not be the most accurate, but it does allow for a wider range of talking points. Now, for this list I’m talking about the UK box office which means a couple of films that didn’t do as well in America will be on this list. It also means that some films which were the highest grossing worldwide will not make this list – the most prime example being that Star Wars: The Force Awakens was worldwide the highest grossing film of 2015, but it was not the highest grossing film in the UK box office alone that year, so it is not on the list. I know that sounds like a weird cop-out but I chose this one because this is the film market that I am paying money into to see the films and, more to the point, most of the people that read these reviews are from the UK so chances are that if these are the highest grossing films in their respective years, over the last 10 years you would have seen a good majority of these films. Also, this does not take inflation into account so, as far as I can tell, DVD sales have not impacted their place on the list.

So I took each of the highest grossing films on the UK box office for each year, starting with 2010 and ending in 2019, and then ranked them on my personal opinion on which film I though was the most deserving of being the UK’s most viewed film in cinemas this year, compared to which one was the weakest one of the bunch and I have no idea why we paid so much money for it. Trust me, there’s a few films in this bunch which seemed like bizarre choices to be the highest grossing film, or just weren’t to my taste.

10. Avatar

highest grossing film 2010

We can start this list with one of the most unpopular film opinions: I don’t like Avatar. It’s bad enough it takes its name from one of my favourite Nickelodeon series ever and one of my favourite animated series of all time, but man is James Cameron’s supposed epic one of the most overabundant films of style over substance. I just don’t connect with this film. I’ve seen this plot point 100 times – it’s a very cliché plot with some really bad dialogue and it really wasn’t an enjoyable experience. This film really made a lot of its money based on the fact that it was one of the first widely-released digital 3D films to come out and probably made a lot of its money on the IMAX 3D experience. This film was a cultural phenomenon. But this film had to have one of the most ham-fisted environmental messages I’ve ever seen, and it’s really bizarre that people are still demanding sequels at this point. James Cameron is still pushing for Avatar 2 to come out but really, at this point it’s been more than 10 years; the audience for that film have pretty much moved on to other things. And I think it’s rather telling that out of all the films on this list, this one has the worst dialogue. Yeah, I’ve mentioned this in previous reviews, but I have to agree with film critic Matthew Buck: Cameron definitely writes women better than he writes men. Not sure why but it just seems to be better with his wheelhouse, especially if you compare a character like Sarah Connor or Ripley with a character like Jake in Avatar.

9. Jurassic World

highest grossing film 2015

After a long gap, we finally got back to the Jurassic Park franchise… And I’m not the biggest fan of this one. I made it clear in my review at the time that this was a film that kind of disappointed me and felt like it had a really boring first act with a second act that kind of made up for it, and I stand by that opinion. I think a lot of people that really like this film kind of forget its first act is really all over the place. And I still stand by the whole thing of the Indominus Rex, that it’s kind of misses the point on several occasions about what makes the dinosaur be both scary and a sense of awe. More to the point though, this film is very cynical. One of the early lines in the film is that no one is interested in seeing a dinosaur anymore, which is a rather tone deaf critique on audiences being comfortable with special effects in films like these, and as a result it doesn’t really feels like one of the better nostalgia-baiting films of the last few years. I’m not surprised that this was the highest grossing film of 2015 – we hadn’t had a Jurassic Park film in over a decade, and I think people wanted to see more of that. Plus, it came out in the summer after Avengers: Age of Ultron had come out and the next Marvel film was Antman, which there wasn’t a lot of hype for. People who had enough money had probably already seen Age of Ultron and saved up enough money to go see Jurassic World, and they probably would have picked it over the film that was obviously going to be a filler movie. Let’s face it, we all really like Antman – Antman is a way better film than Jurassic World – but we did not go into it with the most amount of hype, which was probably to its benefit. Now, is there anything I do like about Jurassic World? Oh, hell yeah. There are some things I like about Jurassic World, and that’s not just the fact that I gave a terrible review to Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. Seriously, Jurassic World 4 and Kingdom is the worst Jurassic Park movie by far. For one thing, the dinosaur fights and sequences at the end of Jurassic World are phenomenal. This film really makes up for its boring first act with an excellent second act, and I mean it. And what’s more, I quite like Chris Pratt’s character, even if he got a bit overbearing towards the end of the film. Plus, I must be honest, I did like the whole factor of seeing what the theme park now being open looks like; it was the one thing we all speculated on since the original Jurassic Park.

8. Iron Man 3

highest grossing film of 2013

Yeah, the first Marvel movie to get on this list, and be prepared, there’s a lot more on this list. Marvel, as you expect, really dominated the decade. Iron Man 3 is not a bad film. In fact, I actually like Iron Man 3 as a whole. Yeah, I’m one of the rare people that really kind of likes that film. It actually is pretty well-made, and it probably has some of the best sequences of any of the original Iron Man films. I think the change of director to Shane Black was probably one of the better decisions made. Jon Favreau is a good director but if Iron Man 2 proved anything, he was struggling to come up with where to go with the Iron Man franchise. I think bringing a fresh person onto the franchise made a bit of sense. Now, Iron Man 3 has some cool special effects and I actually like the story arc for Tony Stark in this film. It wouldn’t be his best moments, but it was certainly there. Why is it not higher on the list? The villains. The Iron Man films have never had the strongest villains in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. For example, Iron Man 1 only had its villain appear at the very end – he doesn’t really do much and is bland and forgettable, and if you want to challenge me, tell me what his villain name is without looking it up. And Iron Man 2 had Whiplash, but really the only reason you remember him is because Mickey Rourke played him. I will say that the Mandarin is probably the most memorable of the Iron Man villains but that’s just for the dumbass twist that they pull later down the film. It feels like a real waste of Ben Kingsley in the role. Plus, I think the film’s a little too long – I think they should have shaved 15 minutes off this film and it probably would have been for the better. The Iron Man films have never been the most compelling in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But overall, I actually really like Iron Man 3, I would recommend it. Again, I’m not surprised it was the highest grossing film of 2013 – this was post-Avengers and it was the first film to come out after that massive crossover event. I think we were all wondering what the Marvel Cinematic Universe was going to be like in a world that’s now had both an alien invasion and the coming together of the Avengers and how that was going to affect all the different franchises.

7. Star Wars Episode 8: The Last Jedi

highest grossing film of 2017

Yeah, this surprised me: Last Jedi is the only film of the new sequel trilogy that was the highest grossing film in its respective year. It doesn’t surprise me – Force Awakens blew our minds and Rogue One actually has some good feedback so I think people were genuinely excited to see where the franchise was going. I’ve heard a lot of people complain about Last Jedi and I actually quite like Last Jedi. Yeah, it’s a bit of a meandering film and some plot points aren’t as strong as others, but as a whole, I actually quite like the film. I think that Rian Johnson really brings some interesting ideas to the plate and its biggest errors now, in hindsight, are the fact that many of them aren’t expanded upon later on down the line. In fact, in most conversations I’ve had with people that don’t like Last Jedi, most of the points they bring up are that these things were pointless but they’re only pointless because of future films. If you look at the film in a bubble, it actually works quite well. I say works quite well, but the things that don’t work do kind of drag it down. For one thing, everyone acting stupid on the plotline of being pursued by the first order’s ship is kind of dumb, and the casino’s subplot goes on a little too long, but as a whole I kind of like this film. The things that made me really happy were the subplots involving Rey, Luke and Kylo Ren. So yeah, not an awful film but I think it’s weaker points don’t drag the film down the same way that the Iron Man 3’s weaker points drag it down.

6. Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows: Part 2

highest grossing film of 2011

This is where the UK box office definitely plays a factor. Deathly Hallows was the final film in the Harry Potter franchise – of course everyone wanted to see it in cinemas. This is actually one of the few films on this list that I didn’t go to see in a cinema, surprisingly. Deathly Hallows: Part 2 is a decent conclusion. I know a lot of people have their problems with it, potentially considering it’s a kind of a cop-out ending, but I would say I actually though it was a pretty good conclusion to the franchise. It’s really propped up by excellent performances from both Maggie Smith and Alan Rickman who really steal the film, and as someone who hadn’t read the books, it actually really surprised me just how brutal the film got at times. It’s a film however that is not without its faults. For one thing, it’s definitely not great that they split this film into two parts. This wasn’t two books, and as a result, from what I can establish from people that had read the books, they had to condense the plot of the book in certain areas and speed up certain moments that the book took a bit more time to flesh out, but that’s what happens when you adapt into a visual medium. Though I do not find it acceptable that so many films did this Part 1/Part 2 business; only one film actually did it to a tremendous effect and we’ll get to that later. There’s also the fact that there’s not much intrigue this time. This one’s basically an action film for the most part since, well, the first film seemed to get out all the mystery aspects of Harry Potter, though given how the Fantastic Beasts films have turned out, trust me, I don’t want more ret-cons or shocking moments for shocking moments’ sake that JK Rowling’s going to pull out in the future. So maybe overall it would have been better if we had actually concluded, even though I kind of think that Deathly Hallows: Part 2 is a conclusion that kind of rushes along through most of its plot points. Still, I actually like Deathly Hallows: Part 2 as a whole, although, when I judge the Deathly Hallows as a film, I tend to push both Part 1 and Part 2 together so that might be clouding my judgement.

5. Finding Dory

highest grossing film of 2016

Yeah, this one surprised me. I had no idea Finding Dory would have been the highest grossing film of 2016. This is especially surprising considering it came it in a year which had Batman vs Superman, Deadpool, Suicide Squad and Captain America Civil War just to name a few. You would have sooner expected one of them to top the list but apparently more people in the UK went to see Finding Dory than any other film. Finding Dory is actually one of the few Pixar sequels I’ve actually genuinely enjoyed, I think it’s quite good on the whole. It actually went in areas I wasn’t quite expecting it to and I think it changed a lot of the heart and charm that Finding Nemo had, something that I think a lot of the Pixar sequels kind of fall down. I’m looking at you, Incredibles 2. And especially you, Monsters University. I’m also genuinely surprised that more people went to see this than Inside Out which seemed to have a much bigger marketing campaign. It does have its issues, however – there are quite a few massive product placements, particularly SeaWorld, that are rather distracting, and I did find it repeated quite a few too many things from Finding Nemo. But as a whole, it’s a genuinely nice and charming movie and I really enjoy it. High praise from me.

4. Black Panther

highest grossing film of 2018

Yeah, this one really shocked me. I was really expecting Avengers: Infinity War to be the highest grossing film in the UK in 2018, but it was pipped by one of the other Marvel films that came out that year, Black Panther. Black Panther though is a very worthy film of that title, but it is a much better film than I was expecting. For one thing, it’s amazing how they use the special effects to imagine Wakanda for these movies. It really is a marvel. And they did a really good job building up these characters from the ground up which, considering the stage it was coming out in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, was a real challenge. Special note should definitely go to Chadwick Boseman and Lupita Nyong’o in their excellent performances, but I think the standout performance was Michael B. Jordan as Killmonger who played one of the best Marvel Cinematic Universe villains. Seriously, Killmonger is really impressive in how he is characterised in this movie, and Michael B. Jordan really brings it. He’s really proved over the years that he is probably one of the better actors working right now, and between this film and the Creed movies, it really made me want to see virtually anything he was in. But special commendation as well to Ryan Coogler who’s doing an excellent job directing this film and I’m glad he’s going to be directing the sequel down the line. And I am actually really annoyed he wasn’t nominated for Best Director considering just how many Oscar nominations – including Best Picture – Black Panther got. Seriously, check out Black Panther if you haven’t already, it’s an excellent superhero movie and there aren’t many other films that look and feel like it. It’s really excellent.

3. Guardians of The Galaxy

highest grossing film of 2014

You guys know how much I love Guardians of The Galaxy and I’m not surprised that it was the highest grossing film of 2014, but what amazes me the most is that Guardians of The Galaxy kind of did it on word of mouth alone. It didn’t have the greatest marketing campaign and it was not based on a particularly popular comic series that Marvel had, and at the time it felt like it was really only serving as a way to bring in the space elements of the Marvel Universe, the knowledge that Thanos was a factor. GOTG though really proves how you can take any concept but if you get the right person behind it you can make a truly excellent action film around it with some light-hearted moments that connect with multiple audiences, and GOTG really did that with good reason. James Gunn does an excellent job writing and directing these films. You can really tell between this and the second one how much he cares about these characters, and it makes me really glad he’s going to be able to now finish the story he wants to tell with the third movie. Seriously, I was genuinely considering not seeing GOTG 3 after he was fired. It’s weird because GOTG 2 probably on a technical level is the better film but I think I enjoy GOTG 1 more. And if there’s anyone that really lets GOTG down it’s the villain. Ronan the Accuser might be an interesting choice to be a villain but he’s also kind of bizarre in how dull he is as a villain – he doesn’t really do all that much as a whole, and I get a sense Lee Pace was doing more with the character than was given to him, like he had some extra motivation that only he knew about. Still, really good movie. You really should check it out, but you probably have already.

2. The Avengers

highest grossing film 2012

This was one of the biggest cinematic events at that time. It was hardly not going to be the highest grossing film of 2012, the first film that finally brought together all the characters of the Marvel Cinematic Universe into one movie. It was the promise that had been set out since the post-credits of Iron Man and it had been fulfilled. And man, is Avengers an excellent film. Even with everything that’s happened in the MCU, I think you can still go back and watch that movie and enjoy yourself. It does a really excellent job with balancing all the characters and the motivations, and it really delivers as an excellent high-pace action film and I still really love this movie. This is one of the highlights of any marvel movie marathon. You have excellent performances from Tom Hiddleston, Samuel L Jackson, Chris Hemsworth, and of course the debuting Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner and the Hulk, still the best actor to ever be in that role. And you have an excellent film overall. I also think this is the film that really proved to me that Chris Evans really was the right choice to play Captain America – you can tell with this film that he really can nail almost every aspect of the character. But it’s still not quite as good as…

1. Avengers Endgame

highest grossing film of 2019

What is now the highest grossing film ever and rightfully so. I really, really like Endgame in just about every way. It feels like the perfect conclusion to this era of Marvel. It has an amazing fight scene, amazing moments, and it really feels like an excellent character piece for virtually everyone involved. This is the film that we had wanted since the beginning of the Marvel Universe and we finally got it; it’s proof that patience pays off because it took 11 years to get to this, and trust me fellow DC fans, the Snyder cut will not make up for the lack of patience that producing the Justice league film did. I really like a lot of aspects of Endgame but I think it’s most of the central performances that really do it for me, particularly that of Robert Downey Jr – who should have been up for best actor – and his interactions with Chris Evans playing Captain America again. This is the first time they really had the two coming together since Civil War and it really paid off. You can tell the Russo brothers were planning out this story arc well in advance and it has really paid off. Endgame was my favourite film of 2019 and I stand by it. It’s a marvel – no pun intended – of what you can achieve when you have the right writers, the right directors, the right actors and the best special effects people all in the same place. It’s fan service at its best.

If you’ve read my reviews for quite some time, you’ll know one of the things that really annoys me about a film is when there’s a great idea there and it gets screwed up immensely. It’s something I really cannot stand, and this is my chance to vent it. I actually got the idea for this list from a suggestion from a member of the Axia team, and it really got me thinking, just what are the films that I think have really great concepts but they didn’t exactly work? And, in all honesty, it was not a difficulty to fill this list; it was a difficulty to narrow it down. I was even asking for suggestions from my friends and family. In fact, I just really had a hard time narrowing it down to 10. I even had a hard time ranking them. Therefore, I’ve decided this time not to rank them since I would go into some weird ratio of how bad the film was to how good the concept was, and it would end up being a complete mess that I probably would not like. So, I’ve decided to take 10 films in particular that had great concepts and great potential but did not live up to it, and I just simply put them on a list and I am going have them go in alphabetical order. These are all bad films, but they could have been good.

The Cell (2000)

I actually looked into a lot of lists to make sure I was not repeating too many of them. But the weird thing is, I never saw this film on the lists whenever I looked into them. This film came out back in 2000 and it has the basic concept of the idea of diving into the mind of a serial killer using near-future technology. The idea is that you could create several worlds based on the psyche of a person. Now, this idea could have gone well. Anyone who plays video games knows that Persona 5 Royal, while it did not dive into a serial killer, it did dive into the minds of several criminals with distorted desires and it did a very good job. The Cell does not have what Persona 5 had. See, Persona 5 really reins it in and trusts its audience to understand what is kind of overt symbolism, but it works quite well. I hate movies like The Cell – The Cell is a prime example of a pretentious writer and director trying to make a movie that is more confusing than it is informative, but want to act like it is artsy. No, you just made a mess and you’re trying to get away with it and have the audience fawn over you to tell them about the symbolism of everything that’s happening. Not to mention, the film is also not helped by some terrible performances from Jennifer Lopez, Vincent D’Onofrio and Vince Vaughn, the middle of which should have known better than to be in this movie. And the fact that this film was nominated for an Oscar for Best Make-Up astounds me considering that everyone in this film looks ridiculous. It really is an indictment of a film that relies on effects and weird imagery over a coherent story. And the imagery is not even that good – it just looks like a really bad Marilyn Manson music video.

Chappie (2015)

I actually reviewed Chappie years ago and I didn’t have much to say about it, but it’s one of a few films that confirms my suspicions: if a film has Hugh Jackman playing the villain, it’s going to be bad. Now, Chappie has a brilliant idea; it’s all about artificial intelligence and basically the one person on the precipice of making the first fully sentient artificial intelligence inhabiting a robot body. You kind of think of it the way the trailers were putting it: the trailers suggested that this film was going to be rather like a more modern and serious take on short circuit, which I was all up for, especially considering that we already had an excellent film like that with Ex Machina that had come out the previous year prior to it. (Seriously, Ex Machina is an amazing film. Go and watch it if you haven’t already.) Chappie fails though because, while it has a few interesting ideas, it squanders all of them. For one thing, most of the big stars are not really in the film all that much. Hugh Jackman is barely in the movie and despite the fact Dev Patel was over all thee trailers and clearly was advertised as being one of the main characters. He’s kind of pushed aside; he’s barely in the movie. In fact, even the titular Chappie is not really much of the focus. He’s mainly being created to be a tool for a gang pulling off a heist that’s played by the two members of Die Antwoord, a South African rap group that are both playing themselves and not playing themselves. It’s kind of weird; they have the same names but they’re not the rap stars, they’re actually now gangsters in Johannesburg, and I honestly have no idea what they were thinking with that casting decision. If it was designed to make me want to go and see the rap group, it had the complete opposite effect. And, in all honesty, Chappie is not one of the worst films I’ve ever seen but the fact it could have been so much better is infuriating.

Death Note (2017)

Now, Death Note has been adapted several times successfully. In fact, to such an extent that it became such a phenomenon. It really should not be that surprising that a Western adaptation was going to happen. The downside is: it happened. It’s not just the fact the concept of Death Note – what happens if you give a really smart kid with a God complex a notebook on which anyone’s name he writes down will die of a heart attack 40 seconds later – is not just good, but you could even work the idea of a Death Note story into an American setting. Despite what a lot of people ahead of time were telling you, that story is not inherently Japanese or requires a Japanese setting and Japanese actors. You can do it. Unless you want to have Watari in the film then yeah, you have to hire a Japanese actor and thank God they did. The problem is that director Adam Wingard, who directed You’re Next and some of the shorts of VHS, doesn’t really seem like he is up to the task. I don’t really blame him for this film. I suspect though that a ton of editorial mandates were put in his way considering that the film is a bit of a mess from a storytelling standpoint. The problem with the film is that none of the characters are as smart as they are in the source material or even the Anime version, so as a result, it loses a lot of the compelling cat-and-mouse nature that the original gave us. What’s more, everyone’s just acting weird in this. And it seems like they’re more interested in adding a bunch of gore effects into the film which have no real reason to be there. Granted, a lot of people say I’m a bit naïve but I was really rooting for this film and I actually though it had the potential, and there are a couple of things I like about the film: I think it’s actually got some every good cinematography and William Dafoe is actually really good as Ryuk, but as a whole, Death Note is a film that really stands for the massive failure in not understanding how to adapt Anime to a Western audience. And the worst part is: It has a sequel coming up.

Devil (2010)

M. Night Shyamalan might not have directed this but his fingerprints are all over it, so the fact I’m going to feature another one of his films later down the line is fair game. Picture this: it’s about five people stuck in a lift and one by one the power goes out, and every time it does, someone is killed. One of them is a killer. That sounds like an excellent suspense novel, right? The problem is, one of them then turns out to be the devil. Yeah, I know the title suggests that that was obviously going to be the case, but even then, I actually thought that was a pretty decent concept. It almost feels like something that would be in the Twilight Zone. The problem is that everyone is really dumb in this film and, of course, like most of the M. Night Shyamalan films, no one acts like a human being. I don’t believe any one of these people. Plus, the film screws it with one of the worst plot twists to any movie I’ve seen. In fact, there are only two other films on this list that have plot twists worse than this. Seriously, skip Devil. It is a good idea that has gotten out of hand.

The Final Destination sequels
(2003 – 2011)

Yeah, I decided to lump all these in together, though I would stress that I actually quite liked Final Destination 5. I know that’s weird to say but honestly, if I do have a list of films that surprise me for how much I enjoyed them, Final Destination 5 is definitely getting on the list. But that’s mainly because of what Final Destination 2-4 did to me, because it proved once and for all that the Final Destination series was doomed from the start. The biggest problem I had with the Final Destination films is something that the sequels really emphasised. For one thing, they tried to up the sort of weird Domino-effect deaths that happened in the first film, and they just look ridiculous. The third and fourth film, for example, have sequences that just beggars belief. But my biggest flaw with the Final Destination films are that they establish a set of rules, and then immediately at the end of the film just basically go, the rules didn’t matter. If the rules don’t matter, then I know going into these films that there is no chance for any of them to get out alive. So, I know that everyone will die. They never actually address why certain people get premonitions for their deaths in this film series; you think with five films they would have at least addressed that by now. The problem with the Final Destination films is that they never kept the deaths short and sweet, which they really needed to do. There is a reason why one of the best deaths in the series and the most memorable ones is from the first film, a death that is very quick and to the point, and just saying that means I’ve probably conjured up the image of it in your mind. The problem is that the rest of the films don’t space them out like that so, as a result, there’s no real suspense. If I had to state which one is the worst I think I would have a tough time choosing between 3 and 4 – both films had terrible characters and terrible sequences, but I think 4 might be slightly worse because the effects were appalling and they were clearly trying to cash in on the 3D gimmick.

The Happening (2008)

If it wasn’t for The Last Airbender, this would be M. Night Shyamalan’s worst film and I am done hearing people defend it. No joke, I’ve actually had friends who defend this film and I really have to ask them why. It’s not even a funny film, it’s just weird. So, here’s the thing, The Happening’s concept revolves around the idea of people suddenly losing all urges to live and committing suicide en mass, with a real mystery edge about why it’s happening. What ruins it? Well, the fact that the dialogue is appalling, the direction is terrible, Mark Wahlberg is giving one of the worst performances of his career and that the humour is incredibly tone-deaf. But the main problem is the fact that the twist is terrible. Not only is the twist terrible, it actively contradicts several moments in the film and actually is dumber the more you think about it. And it’s just a bizarre film all round. This proves why everyone really needs to tell M. Night Shyamalan, “You are not as deep and clever as you think you are.” M. Night Shyamalan actually mentioned in an interview one time that Hollywood does not seem to understand him and the critics did not understand him, to which the sycophantic ITV reporter said, “They just don’t get you,” which he responded to by saying, “They’ve never got me and it’s getting worse.” No, here’s the thing Shyamalan, we got you. We got you ages ago and that’s why we give your films bad reviews. It’s not that we don’t get you, we get it completely and it’s terrible. And after The Glass last year, any goodwill you brought back that made us think you might have some good films still left in you seems to have gone.

Hulk (2003)

This is one that was suggested by my colleague Reece and I have to agree with him. Just the concept alone of Ang Lee doing a Hulk movie when he is fresh off Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon should work, and I think Ang Lee really would have suited it. The thing is the effects aren’t that good and it has some really bizarre choices. The dialogue is another thing I really don’t like in this film, and Eric Bana is an actor I like but he feels really miscast as Bruce Banner. Mind you, it would take until Mark Ruffalo was cast before we get the best casting. And, what’s more, I really don’t like the effects in this film – everything’s just too floaty. I know Ang Lee was really into the idea of that after Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but as a result of that and the fact that the Hulk looks really fake, even back when that film was made, it appears like the Hulk has no weight to him; I don’t get the sense of the amazing strength and pure rage that he has. What’s more, they make some bizarre changes from the comic that really don’t work. I really find the whole thing bizarre. The MCU film The Incredible Hulk is slightly better but it’s still not that great and in fact I actually would say it’s the weakest MCU film. So it kind of proved that the Hulk really has not had much success on the big screen outside of Avengers and Thor movies.

Pixels (2015)

This is one my colleague Elliott insisted was on the list and I can’t help but agree with him. A film about aliens receiving a transmission from Earth around classic 80s retro arcade videogames is a really cool concept. Bringing those videogames to life and having us do battle in them for our society – sign me up. Okay, fine, it’s been done in Futurama but they kind of made it work. It’s being directed by Chris Columbus, the director of the first two Harry Potter films? That could work… Oh crap, it stars Adam Sandler. This is a film that really doesn’t care too much about videogames surprisingly. Yeah, you’ve got the license games there but it’s bizarre how much they take a backdrop to the usual Happy Maddison rubbish that I was sick of years ago. Everyone got sick of this years ago. Okay yeah, it was cool that they mentioned lesser known games like Centipede, and the Pacman sequence is alright. Man, is it terrible. Kevin James is in the film and actually plays the president… No, I’m serious. And the only reason why that’s not what we would consider ridiculous right now is because of you-know-who, but trust me, at the time it was considered one of the most ridiculous in casting. There’s terrible lines for Peter Dinklage’s character, who deserved better than to be in this film, and it has some of the weirdest cameos – Sean Bean shows up for like five minutes in one of the most thankless roles he’s ever been in. And I really have no idea what anyone was thinking being in this. Adam Sandler’s commentary on a playthrough of The Last of Us really reeks of old-man-yelling-at-cloud, with the idea that older videogames were better. And I could go on and on about how much I don’t like this film, but I wanted to leave people reading this with the will to live so let’s move on.

Prometheus (2012)

Prometheus was actually supposed to revitalise the Alien franchise. I already mentioned last week when I talked about Alien Covenant that it seemed to get rid of any sort of good will that Prometheus had. But really, that’s kind of stretching it because Prometheus is really not a good film. It actually has a cool idea – let’s look more into the space jockeys that we saw at the beginning of the first Alien film, and actually has some cool ideas about the mythology. Problem is, it doesn’t really capitalise on it. The characters are too dumb, and it doesn’t really reflect the world of Alien. It just doesn’t quite reach it; that’s the whole film in a nutshell. Good idea but doesn’t quite do it right. Everything needs just one more rewrite or slightly better direction. It’s just a weird film that’s way too full of itself and it doesn’t really have much to say when you really think about it. When I was in the office with some of my colleagues I actually got into a debate with my colleague Ren over whether this film or Alien Covenant is worse, and honestly, the fact he was saying that Prometheus is worse and I wouldn’t mind losing that debate should tell you everything. Though I do stand by that Alien Covenant is a worse film.

Red Lights (2012)

Well, since I did the good films by bad directors list last week, I felt it was only appropriate to move on and do the opposite in the following week. Same rules apply. One film per director, and once again, I should mention that these directors don’t all have just one bad film to qualify for this list, although I have said to get one of the directors on this list I have extended a number out to say three bad films is the maximum you’re allowed. This went a bit pear-shaped when I realised the director I put on for that actually has four bad films, but I’d already made the list and thought it was a pretty good list so let’s go with it anyway.

10. Spider Man 3

Directed by Sam Raimi

Sam Raimi was a bit of a difficult choice for this one; I actually had a choice between two films in regard to his filmography. Now, I was for the longest time considering go for Oz: The Great and Powerful which was a rather boring film that had terrible miscasting, including the weird decision to have Mila Kunis as The Wicked Witch of The West, but I settled on Spider Man 3 being his worst film. While Sam Raimi has directed some awesome films in the past including the previous two Spider Man films and, of course, The Evil Dead films to say the least, his conclusion to Spider Man was really off kilter. For one thing, the film not only has to introduce one new villain and give him a back story, it also has to reintroduce Harry Osbourne as the new Green Goblin, though luckily his motivations have been established in the previous two films, as well as introducing Venom with minimal amount of time to spare. I reckon they could have done a decent job of showing the conflicted nature that Venom brings on to Spider Man, but man they screwed it up. This is why that infamous dance scene has been mocked relentlessly.

This film is trying to bring a darker tone to what was a rather light franchise up to that point, and on no level was it successful. It is low on this list because I still kind of find myself enjoying Spider Man 3 for the most part. The stuff of the Sand Man is actually really good and probably the best thing about this film. But when you talk about many of the problems with the Sam Raimi Spider Man trilogy, most of it is not stark in Spider Man 3 but is amplified to absurd proportions. This is particularly the case with Mary Jane Watson who Kirsten Dunce is trying her best with, but the writing of this character is just awful, especially in this film. It also stays from going higher on the list because frankly it is also not the worst Spider Man film – that easily goes to Amazing Spider Man 2 which is now, in complete retrospect, an entirely pointless film and has the exact same problem in regard to the too-many-villains that this film has but it had to establish all three of the from the ground up which gave no time for character development.

9. Alien 3

Directed by David Fincher

David Fincher is an excellent director. He has directed some excellent works including The Social Network, Gone Girl and Fight Club, and his contribution to cinema has not gone unfounded. One of the things that surprised me however was that when I was starting to become a fan of David Fincher’s films, I was surprised to find he had directed Alien 3. Now, Alien 3 was Fincher’s first big film project and it’s very clear he had a lot to learn, hence why his follow-up film Se7en was a much better production. Alien 3 really suffers from a lot of problems – for one thing, it’s a drab-looking film. The other films definitely have rather cold and isolated looks to them, that’s not up for dispute, but the way Alien 3 is shot I can’t even tell who’s who (not helped by the fact that every cast member has been shaved bald so it’s really difficult to tell anyone apart). Not to mention it’s just an all-around off-kilter film; there’s no real clear direction that’s been given. The other two films had some cool ideas, the first film having themes of isolation and entrapment with the space setting and one alien that’s able to completely overrun the entire crew of a spaceship, followed by the second film which went for a more action-heavy edge and introduced a very likeable cast of characters. Alien 3 seems to want to go for both of these and fails miserably. I think Finch wasn’t really ready for a project like this. Though, with that being said, I honestly think that if he were put in charge of another Alien film, he could do a decent job. However, as it stands, his only Alien project to date Is pretty weak all things considered.

8. The Lady Killers

Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen

I’m not the biggest Coen brothers’ fan in the world. I do quite like the Coen brothers’ films, some of my favourites being No Country For Old Men and their True Grit remake, which should have gotten Haley Steinfeld her Best Supporting Actress Oscar. I have no idea what they were thinking however when they put together The Lady Killers. The film is just awful; it’s a frankly ugly movie in virtually every regard. It just feels ugly and childish as all hell. I really don’t get what direction the Coen brothers were going for. Plus, I don’t think it was possible that you could actually manage to make Tom Hanks really unlikeable in the film and not for the reasons that you were trying for. It’s just a mess of a movie, easily one of the Coen brothers’ worst. And there’s a very good reason when you bring up the Coen brothers’ career that this film never comes up.

7. Alien Covenant

Directed by Ridley Scott

Okay, please never read my review of Alien Covenant because it took me a few weeks to realise that I had given this film an unfairly decent review because Alien Covenant is awful. I was really tossing for the Ridley Scott entry to be either this or Prometheus because while I think Prometheus fails for its rather lofty ambitions, Alien Covenant fails because it takes those lofty ambitions and pretty much scraps them for the worst by-the-numbers Alien films in the franchise. I have no idea what Ridley Scott was going for with this one – not only does it not work on several levels building up from Prometheus, it actively feels like it’s a rant against people that didn’t like Prometheus. It’s almost as if he’s saying, ‘Oh, you don’t like what’s in Prometheus?’ Well, I’m going to make a film that sort of puts in everything you want but makes you feel awful for wanting it there in the first place. The characters are deeply unmemorable and the thing that pushed it over the top is one of the most self-indulgent performances from Michael Fassbender whose role has been greatly over-expanded for no good reason, including one of the most self-indulgent moments I’ve seen in a long time. Even at the time I thought it was a bad decision to get Michael Fassbender to do that.

6. Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull

Directed by Steven Spielberg

Steven Spielberg is probably one of the best directors that has ever been around. There is a reason why his name has been synonymous with film directors along with Alfred Hitchcock. I had two real choices to pick with Spielberg, but Spielberg had some bad films and I had other choices that I was considering for this list. The Lost World: Jurassic Park which, let’s face it, is not that great a film but is at least entertaining in a few regards so it obviously wasn’t meant for this list. But there was also AI which, due to the death of Stanley Kubrick who was meant to direct it in the first place, I can sort of forgive a lot of the decisions that were made for that film given that Spielberg was put in an almost unwinnable situation.

So, that left me with the worst Indiana Jones movie, The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull. Okay, there are so many things wrong with Indiana Jones: The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull, including that it brought a sci-fi element which never should have been there in the first place. It’s trying way too hard and everyone’s giving performances which make it seem like they don’t want to be on set. But the thing that bothers me the most about Indiana Jones: The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull is it’s dull. It is so dull and unmemorable. In fact, the only thing that is memorable about it is the surviving-the-nuclear-bomb-by-living-in-a-fridge sequence; that’s all we remember about that film. And the reason isn’t just because it’s a bafflingly stupid moment but its because everything else in the film is really dull so it stands out even more. I mean, if you think about it, there’s a lot of very dumb moments in the other Indiana Jones films but they’re genuinely enjoyable and exciting films so you kind of can suspend your disbelief and get over it. The fact that we didn’t get over that moment speaks to this movie’s failings. I think this is down to the demand for another Indiana Jones film that really never should have been made because you get a sense that no one really wants to make this film when you see it. Dumb film, let’s hope the in-production Indian Jones 5 turns out way better, though I’m not holding my breath.

5. Alice in Wonderland

Directed by Tim Burton

Okay, Tim Burton was actually the most difficult choice because he’s the director I mentioned who has four bad films. While I’m a fan of Burton, when he’s off the ball he is appalling. In fact, out of all the directors on this list, he has the least number of good films. The difference is, in most cases when he does make a bad film, there are some actually interesting ideas in place. When I was making this, you could pick films like Batman Returns and Mars Attacks for that basis, which are not exactly bad films but they also are very clunky films in parts. I really had four other films to choose from: It could have been Dumbo for how bleak and ill-advised it was in virtually every regard and how it’s trying to pander to an audience in the strangest way imaginable; Dark Shadows which is just a weirdly bleak version of his tropes all in one place; the Charlie and The Chocolate Factory remake which has one of Johnny Depp’s worst performances ever, and his Planet of The Apes remake which was just spared from this list because of the excellent make-up effects that were used in it. But there’s one film that really bothers me and that’s Alice in Wonderland. I have no idea how Tim Burton made a film this bad out of Alice in Wonderland. I’ve seen so many people defend this film, but I absolutely detest it in every regard – it’s just awful! The biggest problem with the film is it takes a story of mad lunacy and imagination and turns it into a battle epic with tons of characters and weird CGI all over the place. It’s got most of the typical Burton actors in it because every film he was making around that time had to have Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter in it but some of the casting are actually decent choices. Stephen Fry as the Cheshire Cat was a good choice and I actually thought Matt Lucas was a good choice for playing both Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. But god, it’s weird in how its direction has gone. These films really take a story which has absolutely no plot and gives it way too much plot. I don’t know what Burton’s going for with this one; he kind of tried to do a hybrid of Alice in Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass and he’s failed at both which is even more ironic considering that this film got a sequel which was entitled Through The Looking Glass which was also an awful hybrid of Alice in Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass, though Burton didn’t direct that one so he doesn’t take any of the blame for it. Also, I hate to say this because I know the actress is trying but she’s been given bad direction in every sense of the word but I really don’t like Mia Wasikowska (Alice) – she just acts dull throughout everything and has virtually no expression whatsoever. I don’t know what the idea they were going for was.

4. Ghost of Mars

Directed by John Carpenter

Ghost of Mars came out in the Mars craze, but this film came out in 2001 – we were over that craze by then. But if anyone was going to get it right it would have been John Carpenter who’s directed some of my favourite horror films including Halloween, The Fog and a film that’s always going to be in my top 10 favourite films of all time, The Thing.So here’s the thing, John Carpenter does have a really bad film in his filmography and it’s Ghost of Mars, one of the most ill-conceived films in this trend. It really stands out for just how bad the writing is. For a writer and director who was known for making really smart characters that made bad decisions because they were put in very desperate situations in films like Halloween and The Thing, you do have to wonder why he wrote such dumb characters in Ghost of Mars. There are some interesting ideas in Ghost of Mars but they’re ultimately awfully executed and it doesn’t even really feel much like a John Carpenter film – none of the director’s trademark is on this movie. And this film has awful performances from lead actors Natasha Hensgate, Ice Cube and Jason Statham, who have all been in far better films than this. It was no wonder that Carpenter wouldn’t direct a feature length film after this until the 2010’s The Ward which didn’t do much better, and it appears that the man has retired almost entirely. And no wonder Ghost of Mars is just an awful film – it’s badly shot, badly acted and the cinematography is terrible. If this and The Ward are the last two films from John Carpenter, it’s a sad way for his career to end.

3. The Dilemma

Directed by John Howard

Okay, now we’re going from just bad executions to: What the hell were you thinking making this movie in the first place? I have no clue what was going through Ron Howard’s mind when he decided to make a comedy about infidelity with actors like Vince Vaughn, Kevin James, Channing Tatum, Winona Ryder and Jennifer Connelly. This is one of the most ill-conceived comedies I have seen in my life. There was no way they were going to get any laughs of this rubbish so why did anyone agree to be in it? No joke, if someone had told me Ron Howard directed this I would have assumed this was a Happy Maddison production. That’s the level we’ve reached, people! Ron Howard has great films to his name – I actually really like his films like Rush, Apollo 13 and I even kind of liked the Star Wars film he did. But this is easily his worst work, including a rather offensive joke early on during an electric car presentation that was leaked in all the trailers. Yes, they put that as their best step forward. There’s a reason why Ron Howard and none of the cast members ever talk about this film.

2. Jack

Directed by Francis Ford Coppola

Yeah, you heard right. The man who directed The Godfather and The Rain Maker directed a film where Robin Williams plays a 10-year-old child that looks like a 40-year-old man. Look, if Francis Ford Coppola really wanted to work with Robin Williams, there were several better solutions than making this movie. It’s one of the most awkward films to watch. Robin tries both doing dramatic and comedic acting within the same film which has historically had very mixed results. Robin is an actor who I always thought is only as good as his director so Coppola should have been a match made in heaven, but they were working on a script that fails miserably. I think more people need to be more aware of this film – any time that people have said that Robin Williams was never in a bad film and I bring this one up, everyone I know either hasn’t seen it or, if they have, they then have to admit they forgot that one.There are some truly outstanding scenes in this film, from a concept that was doomed from the start.

1. Cats

Directed by Tom Hooper

Tom Hooper is definitely an excellent director, nominated for several Oscars, but I have a bit of mix-and-match when it comes to the guy’s credentials but I stand by that he has made some excellent films. I think one of my favourite films he has directed would be The Danish Girl which had excellent performances from both Eddie Redmayne and Alicia Vikander which won her her Oscar. And of course, despite the fact it was received with rather mixed reviews from both critics and audiences, he had turned some success to Les Misérables. I think that’s why Universal thought there might be some awards possibilities with Cats if we brought him on board but man, he lets his hubris show with the bafflingly poor film Cats.

For one thing, you won’t be surprised that most of the best parts of this film are when actual singers are involved. Yeah, when you make Jason Derulo one of the best parts of your film you know something’s gone wrong. Right from the start we knew this film was going to look atrocious – the effects in the trailer were vomit-inducing and they actually managed to be worse when the final film was done since many of the versions that were sent to cinemas were incomplete shots. Some of them actually had the characters in motion capture suits in the background. And, of course, the human-handed Judy Dench who was completely in cat mode otherwise at the end became infamous. This is a film they actually had to patch after release. Not to mention, it’s just bad in every regard; it’s not even so bad it’s good. It’s just awkward to watch. They tried to add a plot to a Broadway show that has absolutely no plot whatsoever. The characters are all over the place and no one’s really that great of a singer, particularly with Rebel Wilson’s terrible singing performance, Ian McKellen who doesn’t seem to even be trying and almost talk-sings his way through his song, and Judy Dench who breaks the fourth wall for about five minutes straight at the end in one of the worst scenes of any film of the last decade. I never got through the whole scene. I actually had to fast forward it because I was so bored.