I can't believe Moulin Rouge made the list and Scary Movie Garbage, I mean three did not!

I have never seen Scary Movie 3. Was it really that bad? I heard it was funny.

Titanic and Jurassic Park (the first one anyway) do not belong on this list.

The Royal Tenenbaums
Ghost World
Contact
The Player

These are not disappointing movies. I can see why some people who didn't pay attention to the reviews and trailers might think these are disappointing, but that's not the fault of the movie. These are low-key movies that should make you think. I think most people went to see Contact thinking it was some alien-invasion action flick, when it was really just, at heart, about finding faith and hope.

A.I. is a perfect example of what constitutes "truly disappointing" to me. It had a great concept, and even the story was good . . . until they passed up what should have been the real ending and tacked on a cutesy little storybook ending, and even accompanied it with narration. People left the theater when they pulled that crap.

I think some criteria for what made each particular movie so disappointing should be included. I mean, it's a given that The Last Action Hero sucked. But it can't possibly be in the same way The Royal Tennenbaums does. I'd like to know why each of these movies is disappointing - and what "disappointing" means, in this case.

That said, I demand that Armageddon and Saving Silverman be added. Those were two horrible pieces of shit.

Armageddon fine, but Saving Silverman doesn't belong on the list. It is true that Saving Silverman was awful, but who actually had expectations for it. If it was never hyped up, then it can't really be overrated.

The thing is that I liked the Royal Tenenbaums, but it doesn't really surprise me that a lot of people were disappointed in it. That being said, Ghost World is usually the kind of movie that I like, but that movie had no flow. It had reasonable character development and there were some decent performances, but overall the movie did not work.

Bridges of Madison County-This movie promotes adultery. It disgusts me!

The English Patient-This movie encourages wives to force their husbands to sit through it on a saturday night, instead of watching Monster Garage. It disgusts me!

A.I. I would have to agree was very disappointing.

Yes, Craig Scary Movie Three was horrible and I use horrible in the sense that there is no word conceivably worse than 'horrible' to describe this movie.

What was horrible about it? Pick a scene any scene. The race jokes were lame, the spoof on 8mile was hard to sit through and the opening (spoof on dumb blondes) was predictable and stupid even for blondes (no offense). I did not find anything entertaining about this movie at all. Can you sense that I am little upset I actually spent my own money to see this?

I'm sure Scary Movie 3 was terrible. I wouldn't know, I avoided it like the plague, but it's a parody comedy, never intended to be "good." It's bad by design.

Movies that are bad by accident, like "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil," now those are worth making fun of.

I actually loved Contact and Any Given Sunday. What you need up there is The Minority Report. That was one of the dumbest most hyped movies I have ever seen. I also liked Bridges Over Madison County and I dont see it as promoting adultery although that is the situation. I see it as showing a woman who never had an opportunity to experience love, fun and fulfillment at the same time - actually getting a chance to do exactly that, even though it was temporary. He husband was nothing more than an extension of his tractor and a boring, corn husking, ex vet who never really knew what he had in his wife. She was so grateful of his integrity and responsibility she wouldnt leave him, regardless of her unhappiness. Anyway, thats my take on the film...

Independence Day has clearly earned its place on the list, being the piece o' shit that it is.

Jurassic Park was excellent. C'mon. Titanic? Oh, please. It was terrific. Blair Witch exceeded all expectations for a low-budget production, so should be taken off the list.

Might add these, but then again...

American Beauty (Oscar class? Highly overrated)
A Beautiful Mind (ditto)
The Right Stuff (this movie just pisses me off -- and I really like Tom Wolfe)
Bonfire of the Vanities (speaking of Tom Wolfe)
Exorcist II (The Heretic) (what a letdown after the original)
The Matrix (it's just me, I realize)
All the Star Wars movies since The Empire Strikes Back

Ok, I cannot agree with American Beauty. I thought that movie was amazing and eerily funny. The war between Kevin Spacey and his wife is just incredible.

I didn't see Titanic until it came out on video. Honestly, it was a good movie, but nowhere near as good as it was made out to be by so many people. I say the same thing about My Big Fat Greek Wedding because it was like "The Great Movie" from last year that everyone was talking about. A bigger piece of shit I haven't often seen. The jokes weren't funny, I didn't find what's her name who is now retired, very likable, and it had that idiot from N'Sync in it. Which idiot you ask? I don't know, but he sucked as well.

In a remarkable display of no-fucking-way, I either liked or have never seen every single movie on this list. Okay, the parts of A.I. were much better than the sum, but I think the reviews have actually underrated it. And how can you not like a big, bloated, abusrd pile of shit like Independence Day? I mean come on.

showgirls--everybody agreed it was one of the worst movies ever that didnt come out of chatsworth, so to speak.

i think the list qualifications are too vague. is a sucky movie that all says sucks really overrated?

i'd say shakespeare in love was the most overrated movie of all time because it beat such a great film for the award.

Of course the qualifications are vague. There is no meter unless you are willing to take a specific critic as the measuring stick.

Shakespeare in Love is a pretty good pick, although Ben Affleck movies, even ones where he had a cameo, are almost immune from this list, as he is the greatest young actor of our time.

:-) (Or maybe he isn't.)

American Beauty was terrible: a hollow yammering fake of a movie that had nothing to say about life in suburbia, and an extremely snide, smug way of not saying it. It was nothing but a collection of platitudes. It was the kind of movie educated liberals could look at and find confirmation for every muddle-headed notion they ever had about the middle class. It was dishonest, too; when the blonde girl at the end announces she's a virgin I felt like throwing up my hands. At times it was just stupid, such as that wet dream of Kevin Spacey's with the girl in a tub of rose petals -- only art directors have dreams like that. And don't get me started on the performances, especially Annette Bening's, which was a case study in histrionics.

i liked American Beauty 'cause it confirmed my muddle-headed liberal notions about the middle class.

'look closer and see the beauty'

Duane, what offended you so about The Right Stuff? Personally, I loved it - but I haven't seen it for a long, long time, so I reserve the right to change my mind on that.

I'd like to add to this list Adaptation. Damn, did I walk out of that theater disappointed. I thought it was great until the third act. And YES, I get what was going on (I won't spoil it for those that haven't suffered, I mean 'seen' it yet) but I think it was still a cheap move. Everyone involved in that movie was far too clever and intelligent to resort to something so painfully obvious. I don't find anything clever about doing something so obvious and easy. If they were going to go that route they should have hammed the whole thing up to a level where it was completely ridiculous, and let the audience really enjoy the cliches. As it was, the ending fell far short of funny, and wasn't even ironic if that's what they were shooting for. It was just lame.

I don't understand why you take pains to say that Cabin Boy is considered too bad to list and then you go and include Showgirls -- a movie that was neither expected to be good or was said to be good by, so far as I know, anyone. Cabin Boy was no masterpiece, but it did have some funny moments in it.

Ghost World is easily one of the best films I've seen in the past few years, one of the few that get anywhere near the heart of adiolescence. I loved its look, its wit, its style, and Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi could not have been better cast.

The whole idea of a list of overrated movies isn't all that fun unless you really go for the big cinematic guns -- just as this list did with classic rock. When you get right down to it, almost every movie is overrated -- it's a charge no movie has ever escaped, unless it was absolute dreck.

I think we can all agree American Beauty was one of the most polarizing movies in recent times. I don't actually think it was about anything other than style, and that style can make life - even the most desiccated soulless suburban existence - worth living.

If you really want a movie that goes American Beauty several steps better -- and digs deep into the heart of 1990s America -- check out Robert Altman's masterpiece Short Cuts.

Would it be fair to add sequels? If so throw Lion King 2 in the pot.

My thing with Cabin Boy is that it is Cabin Boy.

Showgirls on the other hand was directed by Paul Verhoeven who has a bit of a record as a filmmaker. We kind of have expectations for certain people that we don't have from Chris Elliott.

I think Gigli was pretty overrated.

...Short Cuts... i think i read that book. the only thing i remember about it was the bored couple who decided to try smoking crack...hmmm, now i've gotta go home and find it.

Hey Joe, I would like to insult you and your blog now for no apparent reason. Let me just include a link.

(I liked your post on Things New Bloggers Should Know)

Verhoeven made some arty films in Germany. Here in the Land of Milk and Honey he made RoboCop and Basic Instinct. By the time he got around to shooting Showgirls, no one expected anything but Elizabeth Berkeley's tits.

Oooh oohh! Alien Resurrection - that was crap. Come on - Ripley is cloned from a drop of blood and somehow retains the memories she had before dying in Alien3? Not that Alien3 was a masterpiece either, but compared to Resurrection . . . man, that was some good stuff.

Well, maybe nobody expected that to be good either. I hoped, I guess.

Oh please add Dances with Wolves. What an amazing piece of self-indulgent drivel.

most polarizing movie? easy.

that will be American Beauty II starring Natalie Maines.

I've always thought Independence Day is really overrated. After screening V recently I am even more sure of that. Parts of it are lifted directly from V

I thought "The Deer Hunter" was vastly overrated.

The Deer Hunter was equally hated and panned when it came out. Personally I liked it, despite its flaws.

Don't you mean it was equally loved and hated, dumbass?

Yes I do.

Did anyone ever really think Gigli was going to be anything other than poop?

Tom, re your post #18 question: my opinion concerning The Right Stuff is not very objective. I liked the cast, and it was well produced. I just have this thing --- almost a complex --- about the way scientists and engineers are portrayed by Hollywood. I get similarly pissed off by Independence Day (see the secret underground lab sequence). I should just get over it.

But Independence Day is disappointing in a few ways:

(1) the inexcusable misuse of Judd Hirsch

(2) failure to convey a sense of fear and hopelessness

(3) exaggerated Top Gun dialogue from guys who are about to do battle with ultra-high tech aliens ("kick the tahrs and lot some fahrs" -- something like that). I want to see some fear in the eyes of people who are about to get themselves turned into plasma spray. Just think of Aliens -- yeah.

(4) aliens capable of interstellar space travel being outsmarted by Jeff Goldblum and his laptop

(5) the Randy Quaid character. Yes, I am proud to be a citizen of a country composed of loveable dolts.

(6) aliens capable of interstellar space travel engaging in dogfights a la Star Wars -- we don't even do that now, I mean, in the real world

(7) a very non-presidential president

(8) aliens capable of interstellar space travel really needing a reason to wipe out the Earth

(9) all that money they spent on this cartoon

I know, it's just a movie. Why not make a plausible thought-provoking movie with all that money? There are hundreds of good sci-fi stories just waiting to get made. You can add a few explosions and Ashton Krutcher to bring in the teens, and there you go. I thought they might try to make something like Childhood's End (A. Clarke) but they needed a bunch of stereotypical bullshit to sell those tickets.

Ohh for some reason duane's bashing of ID made me come to my realization of the MOST overrated movie - The Remake of Planet of the Apes. Pee-Ewww!

Duane, thanks - that makes sense. It's been so long I can hardly remember how the scientists/engineers were portrayed, but I'll have to check it out again soon.

I never got much more out of ID4 other than it was just a modern-day overly patriotic war movie - kind of a parody of them, really. It was fun, but stupid, and I definitely don't ever need to see it again.

To me, what makes a disappointing movie is one that I don't ever care to see again. ID4 counts. Ghost World does not. I'd happily see it again - hell, I own the DVD! Sure, it didn't quite live up to what I'd hoped it would be, but it was pretty satisfying because the characters were well developed and intelligent. And it had some hilarious scenes in it. Adaptation? Don't care if I ever see that again.

Good sci-fi - 2001: A Space Odyssey. Silent Running. I even found Capricorn One really compelling when I was younger. There's not much good sci-fi anymore, sadly.

Tom -- I'm with you on Adaptation for the same reasons.

But Duane,

"Our Germans are better than their Germans"

Oops, wrong thread...

This is really getting off the original topic that Craig posted, but what really made the space program work was the design engineers (and I'm not an engineer, by the way), not the astronauts. As brave as they were to volunteer to be "spam in a can," it's fairly easy to do compared to having to respond to JFK's push for a Moon landing within 10 years, before we had even achieved a manned orbital flight. The whole movie is a distortion of an otherwise interesting slice of American history, Germans and all.

That's true, Duane - something that is easily overlooked. Wolffe focused on the bravery of the men who climbed into these dangerous machines instead of the men who struggled to get them to not blow up under them. The HBO series (I forget the name, sorry) did actually follow the lives of some of the engineers in some episodes, rather than the astronauts. Very interesting stuff - those guys suffered a great deal for the hours and stress they endured.

I think overrated doesn't necessarily mean a disappointing movie to you. Overrated would probably be a movie that seems to have a prevailing attitude "out there" somewhere that it was a great movie, etc... but is actually bad. So Gigli would not be an overrated movie, since no one actually "overrated" it, it was bad, period (although I've never seen it). On the other end of the spectrum, Titanic (I've never actually seen this either and refuse to to this very day), may have been good, but was it really highest-grossing-movie-ever good? Titanic would be fitting to be declared an overrated movie then if you think the latter. It's clearly subjective, and that's my own view of what an overrated movie should be.

Anyway, I second the motion on A Beautiful Mind. Frankly, I think a lot of Russell Crowe movies are overrated simply because everyone thinks, "oscar worthy" for any role he plays in. That leads me to my 2nd pick for overrated, The Gladiator. Yeah it was alright for an action flick, but was it really deserving of all those oscars?

I would like to defend ID4 for no apparent reason.

Comment #36

(2) failure to convey a sense of fear and hopelessness

Thought of another one - Men in Black II.

Just a couple of comments on points above:

1. Speaking of Robert Altman, try to track down "OC and Stiggs." The source material is from Chris Miller of the National Lampoon. He cocreated and cowrote Animal House, so that give you an idea of his humor. OC was similarly comic, but very, very darkly so. Altman managed to make a movie that was, to me, singularly *unfunny*; astonishingly so for a director of his supposed caliber and reputation. It's like a blueprint for a funny movie. You can see where the laughs ought to go, but they sure ain't there. You'll be amazed at how flatfooted Altman is.

2. Kevin Smith once told the story of meeting Jon Peters when he was contracted to write a new Superman movie. Peters impressed Smith as being unusually dim and disconnected from reality. At one point he suggested a new villain for Smith to write for Superman, to make the movie bigger: an enormous mechanical spider! Smith noted that a year or so later, he went to a Peters-produced film and sure enough, there was the villain that Peters had suggested. The movie? Wild, Wild West! I think the story is on the "Evening with Kevin Smith" DVD.

Some of these movies, especially the more quiet, introspective ones need to be seen more than once to be appreciated. I enjoyed Ghost World after seeing it a second time and Eyes Wide Shut, like any Stanley Kubrick film, needs to be seen at least three times. Showgirls was one of the all time great awful movies. It's just so bad it's funny. To avoid disapointment, forget the movie theater and get HBO or Starz. There are so many movies that are critically panned that are actually good and vice versa. All these posts prove that everyone has different opinions of good and bad and a lot of it is based on life experience, education, personality. Unless you have your clone go see a movie for you and review it you can't trust anyone else's opinion on whether you'll like it or not.

The idea of seeing Eyes Wide Shut "at least three times" is horrifying -- actually, if you just see it halfway through you realize that he took a wrong turn; some people, of course, will realize this fact much quicker.

My Own Private Idaho
All of the "The Oscar goes to pretty-boy-mediocre-actor-turned-director" flicks:
Reds
Out of Africa
Dances with Wolves
Braveheart
Unforgiven (although I think this one's borderline)

Lord of the Rings: Return of the King

This movie was so boring I fell asleep both times I tried to watch it. Endless talking in that overly dramatic way about "We must prepare for war........". Boring dream sequences & love story crap & characters you can't keep track of & don't want to anyway. Frodo is not exactly the greatest character ever invented either - at least not the one played by Elijah Wood. And Viggio Mortenson (?spelling) - what's so great about him???? And Orlando Bloom really sucks. Movies need to have different things going on to make it interesting, not just one long battle preparation.

I am amazed The Big Lebowski wasnt on the list the most boring pretentious drivel I have ever seen. I Would get more laughs at a funeral.

Citizen Kane...
Grease...
Gone with the Wind...
The Godfather..
E.T....
Top Gun...
The Graduate...
Monty Python's Search for the Holy Grail...
Sixth Sense...

Not that they were BAD, but just overrated.

Showgirls - bad, but then pretty much everyone agreed it was bad, so it can't be considered "overrated"

The Royal Tenenbaums - horrible movie that lots of critics adored - overrated

Independence Day - great film

Deep Impact - decent film, but horrible acting from Téa Leoni

Wild Wild West - decent...but then again I think I saw this stoned...so maybe I can't be a fair judge...

Ghost World - ???

A.I. - didn't see

Blair Witch Project - i thought it was good

Jackie Brown - not "bad" but definitely overrated

Jurassic Park - this was a classic

The Lost World - didn't see

O Brother, Where Art Thou? - still haven't seen this, but the soundtrack is pretty cool!

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - never saw it

Men In Black II - wasn't impressed enough with the first installment to see the sequel...

3000 Miles to Graceland - awful movie, but it was universally panned, so it can't be considered "overrated"

The Player - didn't see

The Last Action Hero - pretty damn bad...

Contact - great film!

Meet Joe Black - never saw it, but I heard it was horrid

The Talented Mr. Ripley - see above...

Eyes Wide Shut - THE WORST MOVIE EVER MADE!!!

Gangs of New York - watchable, but overrated

My Big Fat Greek Wedding - humorous...

Any Given Sunday - only saw parts of it

Dazed and Confused - overrated

Star Wars: Episode II: Attack of the Clones - Episodes I, II, and III were all disappointments, if you ask me...

Moulin Rouge - didn't see it, but i'm sure it was garbage...

Tomb Raider - didn't waste my time with this one...

The Madness of King George - never saw it

Every Woody Allen movie since Sleeper - how about just changing that to "every Woody Allen movie"???

Titanic - no, this was a good flick

Out of Africa - never saw it

American Beauty (Oscar class? Highly overrated) - agreed!

A Beautiful Mind (ditto) - agreed!

The Right Stuff (this movie just pisses me off -- and I really like Tom Wolfe) - never saw it

Bonfire of the Vanities (speaking of Tom Wolfe) - only saw a little bit of it...

Exorcist II (The Heretic) (what a letdown after the original) - never saw it, and have no interest...

The Matrix (it's just me, I realize) - the sequels were bad, but the original was cool

All the Star Wars movies since The Empire Strikes Back - I liked RoTJ, but fair enough...

And "The Big Lebowski" was dreck as well...

I loved 'Meet Joe Black' there was nothing wrong with that movie.

a few sorta recent Sharkian pet peeves:

Pulp Fiction -- WAY WAY overrated [along with everything QT has ever done]

Million Dollar Baby -- overrated piece of shit

Ray - ditto + laughable cartoony cliche

=====

BTW: one can't consider a film overrated [ie. Showgirls] if it's universally accepted as one of the worst movies ever made -- but yall would know that ...if you weren't motards.

Delete from your list:

Showgirls (believe me, nobody liked it! Hard to call it overrated)

Blair Witch Project ( great film)

Episode II (again, hard to call a film nobody liked overrated)

Madness of King George (great movie!)


ADD:

Million Dollar Baby (this movie sucks big time, and pulls a bait and switch!!!!)

Snakes on a plane (For those who liked it)

English Patient (See above comment)

SW: Episode III (overrated because it was better than I and II, which is not saying a lot. It still majorly sucked but it is overrated when discusses)

Citizen Kane (overrated because it used unique film techniques, and should be studied in film class, but it's BO-RING)

Brokeback Mountain (only got extra hype because straight guys were playing gay lovers, yeah, you know I'm right!)

Crash by Paul Haggis (decent movie, but overrated because it dealt with stereotypes)

The other Crash movie, the NC-17 James Spader movie, is just unwatchable.

How about "War Of The Worlds" with Tom Cruise?

I agree with the guy that said Quentin Tarantino's overrated, since he just has ripped of a lot of stuff from other more obscure movies(kill bill ripped off stuff from sex and fury).

Also ass:

Requiem for a dream
nightmare before christmas(teen goths overhype it mostly)
donnie darko(see above)
eternal sunshine of a spotless mind
lost in translation

Titanic is NOT overrated. I loved that film.

American Beauty is slick in many ways, but the story and the characters and the theme are appalling.

I'm not sure if it's a satire about the middle class or an art film about seeing the beauty in everything. Either way, the example given is too unrealistic - a Hollywood liberal view of middle-class America.

If it's a satire, then make the the characters somehow believeable, otherwise you are satirising your own projected stereotypes.

If it's about the beauty in everything, then using the examples of a wind-blown plastic bag and a guy with his brains blown out is aiming pretty damned low!

A general comment: Isn't it fascinating to see some people hating very popular films and other people loving very unpopular films? People are different!

You forgot "RENT"

titanic sucks the fat end of an erect donkey but its pretty fucking cool when everyone falls into the sea at the end. I like the way the bodies slam into the ship and bounce off. It could have been a bit more violent though. Not blood and guts flying everywhere cause that may seem to over the top and ditatch us from whats going on, but some more death and terror would me nice. Maybe someone playing golf while all the chaos is going on around them.

So why is Blade Runner not on this list?