A Worst Movies list is obviously all dependent on how many films someone sees over the course of the year. Being someone that has to write about movies for a living I see my fair share, but I also do my best to avoid as many bad films as I can. So far this year I have reviewed 134 theatrical releases, which is a personal record for me since starting this site in 2003 so I would like to think I saw my fair share of bad films. Yet, so many films weren’t screened for critics and I tend to avoid films such as Disaster Movie, College, Mad Money, Superhero Movie!, Meet Dave, The Hottie and the Nottie or anything from Tyler Perry. So this list is my personal list of worst films and I am sure many of you will have a different top ten and I can’t wait to hear them.
When creating the list it was terribly difficult to try and figure out what should fall into the top ten, what falls short and what exactly makes a film worthy of being deemed “Worst Of”. A few films that fell short of making the list are Beverly Hills Chihuahua, 88 Minutes, Step Brothers and The Love Guru. Personally I can’t believe there are ten films from 2008 I consider worse than those four and if there was ever a temptation to create a five-way tie for tenth this was it. However, I think ties are a cop-out and I have used them in the past, but never again.
So what follows are the ten films I would prefer I never hear of again and if you things go my way you can add those previous four to the list as well.
A perfect example of what it looks like when an attempt at making a “cool” film about young teens taking Vegas for big dollars goes wrong. Non-stop aerial shots of Vegas and slow motion CGI attempts at making Blackjack action packed entertainment turn this dull dud into something akin to eye torture. While the boys and girls in 21 created hand signals to cheat at cards I had one big one left over for this one once it ended.
George Clooney’s attempt at recreating a ’20s style screwball comedy falls flat at every turn. I honestly can’t remember if I ever managed even a chuckle during this film which I could tell was doomed from the minute it began with an opening credit montage that only seemed to service the running time. Admittedly I think Clooney’s acting style lends itself well to this kind of tomfoolery, but this was not the material to start with.
There are several obvious and tasteless jokes I could make when it comes to this film, but I was actually quite happy to see this one crash and burn after Judd Apatow was part of a Comic Con preview reel shilling this one as if it was actually going to be funny a couple years back. Yeah folks, this one was produced by the Almighty Apatow… watch it crash and burn as Owen Wilson plays the street bum turned nerd protector.
