10. Monty Python
and the Holy Grail
Even complaining about this movie has become tired. We all know every single stupid line. Let Graham Chapman rest in peace.
9. Boondock Saints
Shooting people isn't that cool. In fact, it's wrong. Even if you're reciting lines from the Bible. And hey, did you guys ever think about all the work God has to do to decipher your accent? The poor guy! He probably doesn't even know what you're saying! There are jokes in this movie that are actually completely unintelligible without the subtitles. "Yuh luk-luk mushmuth farm furt erlbert!" Ha ha! Hilarious!
8. 300
Everyone knows that the most important end that we could ever aspire to is to give our lives honorably defending Sparta against waves of Middle Eastern transvestites, right? 300 is practically fascist in its implicit argument: kill the foreigners, kill the peaceniks, kill the creepy homosexuals and you'll all be remembered forever. And if you can get past that, it's not even a very fun movie. Nothing is "said", everything has to be proclaimed by huge men in red diapers, all the women are prostitutes and the action is obnoxiously repetitive after five minutes. Who knew there were so many places you could hit a Persian with a sword?
7. Moulin Rouge
Moulin Rouge is loud, glittery, shiny and everything in it moves really fast. Every other word is "love". It feels like it was written by a squadron of teenage girls at a slumber party. And of course, the total extent of "love" in this movie is "having sex with someone attractive." "Don't have sex for money," says Ewan McGregor's character. "no, that's bad! Have sex with me, because I love you! I love you because you're hot! This relationship doesn't make any sense! We met each other ten seconds ago!"
6. V for Vendetta
This movie was based on a graphic novel, which you probably know. It wasn't a bad graphic novel, as far as comics go, but the movie took what was acceptable entertainment and ruined it. There were moments of nuance, subtlety and powerful, interesting character development in the comic, and the film took them out and replaced them with kung-fu knife fights. Terrorism isn't actually that attractive, even if you have memorized the entire "V" speech.
5. Sin City
I am curious about Frank Miller. I am curious to find out whether, if you strapped him to a table and slowly began to aim a high-power laser at his genitals, he could write a female character who was neither a prostitute nor a stripper. I am also curious if he might be able to write something legitimately noir, instead of bands of leather-clad motorcycle-riding hookers. I am also curious whether all that stuff in the movie was blood. I couldn't tell! It was so ambiguous. What's the symbolism? Red and blood? Deep, man.
4. Superbad
In defense of this movie, I often hear people claim that this movie is all about "the awkwardness of growing up as a boy". Personally, my high school life wasn't exactly "Superbad", you know? There were a few differences. I wasn't a miserable, small-minded misogynistic worm who spent 95% of my free time talking about all the women I wanted to have sex with without any emotional connection. Maybe I'm out of touch with real boys. Maybe I'm just a stupid girl. Maybe you should build me a rocket ship so I can go live on Venus.
3. Donnie Darko
"It's cool because it doesn't make any sense," people say. "That's the point, man. It's so crazy." No! Shut up! It's about time travel! That's it! Time travel isn't that interesting! The entire universe bifurcates in order to get this one terrible little kid laid with a girl who has about 1.5 interesting lines of dialog throughout the movie! I'm sorry if your own relationships are so empty that you wish an airliner engine would fall on your house so everybody would care about you for once, but that doesn't mean you need to pin me down at parties and tell me how good the song "Mad World" is.
2. Fight Club
Fight Club is an entertaining movie. This I will accept. It is not anything else. People like it because it's basically a bunch of boys (huge, muscular boys) in a tree fort. It is "cool" to the point of being silly and it makes nihilism seem way too stylish to be taken seriously. Flashing a bunch of stupid images on the screen for two or three frames does not make this a "head trip". Because movies you don't understand are so cool, right? Personally, I do not feel anything powerful, primal or freeing about being kicked in the teeth. If you disagree, go start a fight and prove it, sucker.
1. Garden State
Garden State would be tied with Fight Club, except that Fight Club is somewhat enjoyable in a vacuum. Garden State, even without anyone gushing about it, is nothing more than Zach Braff rubbing his oiled actor-writer-director body all over the hapless audience. What's worse, Garden State has somehow become a banner movie for our generation. Men now aspire to be emotionally distant idiots who have to be "brought back to themselves" by "adorably quirky" pixies who change your life with a single indie rock song, and women aspire to be said pixies. I do not think that anyone who likes Garden State will ever be the President, and that is a fact.
Contact John Bailey at John.C.Bailey@UConn.edu.
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