Ask Lemmy

Much of this thread be like...

Snowpiercer. The movie was just a weak attempt at socio-economic metaphor, with an absolutely terrible premise, bad effects, action sequences shot mostly in the dark, weird pacing, and goofy characters. It seemed like a live-action Anime, and I hate Anime. I sat through that movie, the whole time wondering how and why it got such great reviews.

I went into Bridge to Terabithia at 11 years old excited to watch two kids have a fantasy adventure and I still haven't forgiven it

I like these threads when people complain that “old classic movie” is formulaic and trope ridden or unoriginal… seemingly forgetting these films set the tropes, formulas and genres that all subsequent film makers hopped-on. That’s why, in retrospect, it appears clunky.

In another similar thread somebody said the band Queen were boring… yeah, maybe now. But fifty years ago when they first released? Not so much.

Harry Potter.

Before JK went mask off, I had dropped the books about half way though for being increasing annoyed with how they ended. Never any change to the status quo except Harry actually regressing in character development. I watched the first movie, but that was around when I dropped the books and never looked back.

I was able to just quietly keep my opinions to myself, but with with JK becoming increasing unhinged with both her tweets and books, I haven't felt the need to be polite with the "separate the art from the artists" types. Especially when they just assume that you're a fan if you don't correct them.

Borat.

Supposedly it's a comedy, but it's completely devoid of humor.

Titanic.

The hype here was insane, when I finally saw it the experience was.. underwhelming. Such a boring slog of a movie, mediocre CGI when disaster finally struck and that stupid end.. Get on the piece of wood that is obviously big enough to hold you both, you dolt.

Only upside is that I watched it on TV, so apart from some hours of my life I'll never get back it didn't cost me anything.

The John Wick series

Watched them all over the course of a weekend - its the same fucking moving over and over and over and over again. The amount of disbelief I needed to suspend got exponentially larger so by the time I got to the last movie I just couldn't take it anymore. There is no real plot or any development of characters, it's just implausible fight scene after implausible fight scene.

I think if I put a few months between each movie I wouldn't have this opinion - on their own the movies can be mindlessly entertaining but all together was too much for me.

Inglourious Basterds.

However much I liked all the Tarantino flicks before this one, I just cannot get into Inglourious. Also, everything Tarantino made after that movie is also tainted by the same uneasy feeling I get. If pressed to guess why, I'd say he took the stories out of the 'now' and transported them to other times and places, which just does not seem to agree with me.

Not necessarily hate, but did not like as much as the rest of the internet: Oppenheimer

The moment I left the theater, I thought it should have been longer. Yes, I think an already 3hr film should be even longer. Just torture the audience at this point. But I thought that there was just so much stuff to cram into that 3hr length, there was not enough room for the story to breath, even if those stories were needed to paint a better picture of Oppenheimer's life, morals, and conflicts.

I'd still recommend it to people. If anything, it's still a visually well directed film. But if you aren't a physics/history buff, you might not enjoy the story as much.

In my opinion, a better history based movie would be The Imitation Game. Much more focused story, even if some aren't historically accurate.

Oh I have another one. Thor Ragnarok. People loved it because they liked the Thor character and found his earlier films too dull or something, but I loved that they were unapologetically serious about themselves, using comedy in ways that felt very authentic to the characters.

But Ragnarok? It came out later the same year as this excellent essay about bathos, and it was dripping in it. I was hyper tuned to the problem with bathos, and it leaned even harder into that took than nearly any other MCU film did.

What sucks so much is that it had the bones of a really good dramatic story. The Bruce Banner/Hulk storyline had built up over multiple previous films, and come the climax of this film it's established that he's in Bruce form now and has enough control to stay that way, but if he transforms into Hulk it'll be a big deal and he may never be able to be himself again. So they arrive in Asgard at the climax of the film and it's pretty urgent. In a dramatic moment you can see him steel himself to make the sacrifice; he jumps out of their aircraft onto the rainbow bridge, clearly intending to transform into Hulk to fight Fenris.

…and he splats. Faceplants on the bridge. Still in human form. It's played for laughs. The ultimate conclusion of Hulk's story in this movie and probably the most important moment of his arc over the entire MCU to this point, and it's undercut by a joke. Not even a very funny one. A slapstick joke that would make Charlie Chaplin cringe.

And it means nothing, because the very next shit, he's transformed anyway and throwing Fenris around like a doll.

Not to mention it undermines the verisimilitude of the movie. I can suspend my disbelief in these movies pretty hard, but Bruce Banner, in human form, is meant to be painfully average, physically speaking. He should have died from that fall, given he didn't transform. That's certainly not the worst thing about the moment, but it is was the sprinkling of salt on top of the wound that just made it that little bit worse.

That moment was the worst bit, but the film as a whole was full of lazy humour and bathos, and it was really just the worst example of what was wrong with a lot of MCU movies at the time. I was shocked to hear so few people came away disliking it in the same way I did.

Comic book movies.

They have dominated the box office over the last 10-15 years, there are infinity reboots/origin stories, and all of them use the ”man, I really hope the bad guy doesn't use the super heroes loved ones as hostages" as a plot point. All of them are so predictable.

2001: A Space Odyssey was rightfully not well received when it was first released. It is incredibly well crafted in terms of visual effects and has about 30 minutes of great, tense sci-fi in it. Shame about the other six hours (perceived) of tedium. Even in the late 60s people in ape costumes smashing things while the soundtrack goes aaaAAAaaUuuAaa wasn't interesting for more than a minute, don't even get me started on the stewardess, docking, moon journey or the damn screensaver. Which, yes, is iconic, but 20 minutes?

It does make sense that people would get high before subjecting themselves to this and then put on a Pink Floyd album during all the tedious scenes.

2010 is a better movie. It starts with dialogue and knows when slowing down increases tension.

The Big Lebowski

Interminably dull. Watching it made sense of why the people bigging it up were stoned..

Anything by JJ Abrams. He only knows how to start his shitty mystery box plots but never finish them.

I think the acting and dialogue of the original Star Wars trilogy is just awful. Bad writing delivered poorly by most of the cast.

I totally understand why people love it and why it has its place in film history but man.....not for me.

Ted.

Juvenile fratboy humour done badly, very badly with lots of fan services to get the brainless cheering.

Made me laugh once in the first few minutes (I can't even remember the joke) and walked out of the cinema after about an hour.

It's kind of interesting how the reasons people dislike things range from "it sucks" to "here is a carefully constructed argument showing why the film's thesis promotes toxic ideas of etc etc"

Also interesting when someone's reasons for hating something are someone's reason for loving it. Like a review says "It's full of sad gay shit" and one chunk of people are going to boo and the other are going to perk right up.

The Ready Player One movie was absolute dogshit. Was that movie even well liked? Pretty sure everyone agrees it was buttcheeks.

Pretty much every Nolan film, with the disclosure that I stopped watching his movies after Inception. His films are always well-acted and well-produced, but the scripts are just… dumb? They take themselves way too seriously and carry this air of highbrow intellectualism while being riddled with plot holes and contrivances. Not to mention the crypto-fascist messaging.

He’s like Zack Snyder, but he pulls it off well enough that critics buy into it. It drives me crazy when I see his name mentioned alongside great auteur filmmakers like Kubrick and Scorsese.

Ready player 1 - oh yeah, I agree with you. Garbage film. Just an excuse to do fan service. I viewed it like a music video or clip compilation. It was neat to see all the random franchise together on the big screen but worthless as a narrative. I enjoyed it like I enjoy godzilla films, turn brain off, watch the spectacle.

I hate Avatar (blue cat people). Dances with Wolves but Halo. It was pretty! However people seem to act like it was an actual film and not a tech demo. They literally called the mineral unobtanium. It's a meme. Smh.

This thread confirms my theory: For everything universally loved there is a person on the internet that thinks it's shite.

The Greatest Showman is a masterclass in style over substance—a glittery spectacle that sacrifices depth and integrity for catchy tunes and flashy visuals. Beneath its feel-good facade lies a shallow, formulaic narrative that romanticizes P.T. Barnum’s exploitative history while failing to give meaningful voices to the marginalized characters it claims to celebrate.

The musical numbers, though undeniably infectious, feel jarringly modern and out of place, prioritizing audience pandering over authenticity. Despite its popularity, the film’s sanitized themes and lack of emotional nuance reveal it as more empty circus than cinematic triumph.

If you’re looking for substance, you’ll find the tent empty.

Elf.

Once you’ve seen the first 3 minutes and get the premise, then the entire rest of the film is so predictable in its jokes and situations that I derived absolutely zero pleasure from watching it and it just grated the entire way through.

Films can be funny because the initial premise leads to really entertaining, unexpected or clever situations… or a film can super straight up and shallow in its humour.

I really don’t get why Elf is so incredibly popular.