Arts Worst Movies of 2006
posted by on December 19 at 15:42 PM
If Oscar buzz is giving you tinnitus, it’s often restorative to consider the noxious filth that was released to American movie screens in the past year.
Remember, as the editor of The Stranger’s film section, I get to assign myself reviews. Therefore, I have probably avoided the very worst movies of the year. But I still managed to expose myself to ten movies I wouldn’t advise my parents’ deaf dog to see. They are, in descending order of evil:
1) What the Bleep?: Down the Rabbit Hole: STRANGLING NEWBORN BABY KITTENS EVIL (original review here)2) Deck the Halls: BILIOUS VOMITOUS EVIL (original review here)
3) Wicker Man: OK, I actually haven’t seen this one, but I believe Lindy West—NEIL LAPUKE EVIL
4) Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus: SLIMY HAIRBALL EVIL (original review here)
5) Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing & Charm School: FLOURY COITUS EVIL (original review here)
6) Keeping Mum: VINYL THONG-WEARING FAKE-BAKED PATRICK SWAYZE EVIL (original review here)
7) Expiration Date: Local, but I’m sorry, CRINGE-INDUCING EVIL (hidden in Film Shorts here)
8) For Your Consideration: CRIMINALLY UNFUNNY EVIL AND CATHERINE O’HARA DOES NOT DESERVE AN OSCAR FOR APPEARING ON SCREEN WITH A BLOATED FACE EVIL (original review here)
9) School for Scoundrels: SCROTAL MASOCHISM EVIL (original review here)
10) Fast Food Nation: UNFORTUNATE INEPTITUDE EVIL (original review here)
Who saw John Tucker Must Die? Material Girls? One Night With the King? Does anything approach the evil of a science-distorting reincarnated Lemurian warrior?
It's sad to say considering the talent involved in making it, but LET'S GO TO PRISON was awful. You'd hope a movie written by Thomas Lennon, Ben Garant and Michael Patrick Jann from THE STATE, starring Will Arnett from ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT and directed by MR. SHOW's Bob Odenkirk would have some humor in it, but no. The only thing that made me even crack a smile was the sequence over the end credits.
Goddam it! Now you went and reminded me that I rented What the Bleep?: Down the Rabbit Hole.
The title was a tip-off - it could of been called, "Talking to Crazy Ass People Who Make Shit Up That's Boring, and Stupid Graphics (with Marlee Matlin)"
Fast Food Nation doesn't qualify as awful or evil. It was a good movie, if a bit intense for you sheltered cityfolk who haven't seen cows, chickens, horses, and other farm animals killed to make your hamburger, steak, chicken tacos, french yummies, or other things you eat and have no conceptions of exactly what that really means.
Very good acting by many name actors, and a big thumbs up to Herve Villachez (mangled name, sorry, Fez from That 70s Show) for a fine role.
And you wonder why I became vegetarian when I was 11 ...
You are not allowed to bump a movie without suggesting a worse one.
And obviously, Fast Food Nation is not evil because of its intentions, which were pure as the driven snow. It was intensely mediocre because of the endless speeches and the muddy colors and the profusion of name actors (why?!). The best performance was by a no-name actor: Ashley Johnson.
Fast Food Nation was so ineffective as propaganda that I took my first knowing bite of bird in a decade after seeing it.
Funny... I also have started eating meat again after having seen Fast Food Nation. Maybe it's covert pro-meat propaganda masquerading as an inept political film.
Come to think of it--I went to a talk Eric Schlosser gave at UW after the book came out. It came out during the Q&A that he isn't a vegetarian. The vegans in the crowd (who apparently thought the book was endorsing their philosopy) seemed shocked...
Prairie Home Companion was the worst movie I saw this year, (except for the Wicker Man remake - the original is a classic, don't spoil the plot by seeing that turd, even for laughs) so sad that the same guy who made McCabe and Mrs. Miller and The Long Goodbye had to die after THAT.
Gosford Park being an exception, Altman's later films are not his best work: Pret-a-Porter, The Company, Dr. T and the Women, Prairie Home Companion.
It's not uncommon for even the most brilliant directors to lay a bunch of turds toward the end of their careers.
My boyfriend, who is a photographer, hates Diane Arbus with the fire of a thousand suns.
I agree that Prairie Home Companion was bad, but I think it was bad as in misconceived rather than evil.
Which brings me to an admission: Fast Food Nation does not, in fact, belong on this list.
I hereby replace Fast Food Nation with The Shaggy Dog. Now that was a shitty, shitty movie.
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