2014 The Worst of the Year

Noah Baumbach (left) and the cast of WHILE WE'RE YOUNG not long before Baumbach commits the worst moment by I filmmaker that I've seen at a film festival

As with every year I see hundreds of films I never write about. No I'm serious I see way more movies than is healthy, a lot of the new,a lot of them old favorites. Most of them you never hear about. Most of the good stuff I throw your way- and occasionally I toss you some crap. Its intentional during the Thanksgiving Turkey series but there are other times, when I'm doing festival coverage it's unavoidable. Most of the turds I turn off a good way in and forget- some I have to suffer through to the end.

The list below are the turd balls that seared their crappiness into my brain. These are the ones I have to kick one more time before I'm done. You can find the original reviews if you search Unseen, but these brief words to the wise should be enough.


UNIDENTIFIED- Unfunny found footage comedy about guys going to Vegas and getting into trouble. It really sucks during the first say 65 minutes -before it turns into a alien invasion horror film in the final fifteen minutes. In fairness the horror part is pretty good, but its too brief to mean much and has no place at the end of the film.

STORY OF MY DEATH- Long, dull pretentious film that's first half hour is about Casanova's bowel movements. Its gets worse from there as Dracula is brought into the the mess. Between the poo and the blood sucker I'm limited in what I can say about the badness lest I seem like a punny guy.

A SPELL TO WARD OFF DARKNESS- Triptych of long disjointed takes that doesn't even work if you read on what its not showing you. The film in the directors head is better than whats on the screen.

AUNT HILDA Crappy environmental animated film throws out the plot in favor of a message and is too preachy to be enjoyed as a result. (Actually this probably isn't the worst but from the producer/director of the similarly themed MIA AND THE MAGOO  as well as several other better films this is a huge let down)

the worst animated film of the year was the horrible FAT CAT which was a minute long,but so bad its a minute I never want to relive again

BUZZARD- A dick of a main character gets away with stupid things because the non-characters around him allow him to otherwise there'd be no film. Ultimately the film proves that if hate the main character you'll never like the film

The 3D in AMAZONIA-Was nonexistent and made me wonder why did they bother use it?

DYS- - A been there and one that horror film allegory about the death of a relationship through horrific means. Haven't we been there before?

SLEDGE-  is an all talk horror film that resulted in me getting hate mail after the review ran. Apparently the people involved didn't like my saying bad things about their bad film. Well guess what I'm saying it again.

CYBERNATURAL- supposedly a new step forward in POV/found foorage- is an "oh god I hope not" film that's about as exciting as watching the guy next to you surf the web

AIM HIGH IN CREATION- Hey everybody-lets make a film to end fracing using North Korean propaganda techniques. Are you serious? A waste of a chance to look seriously at NorthKorean propaganda films and to seriously stand up for the enviorment. Can you say lose lose?

MONSTERZ- unnecessary Japanese remake of the Korean HAUNTERS that makes even less sense than the first version. I and most people I know were never that high on the original so why remake it and do it badly?

NE ME QUITTA PAS-two drunk guys wander around in a supposed documentary. It looks staged to me.

BENEATH THE HARVEST SKY-on the list purely on the basis of the final ten minutes which has one character die in a sudden thunder storm that is over one house which it destroys thus rendering the ability to have a poetic and completely out of place ending.

XY- some sort of relationship film concerning an obnoxious couple doing stupid things. I had been warned but I went anyway.

YOUNG BODIES HEAL QUICKLY-two juvenile deliquents are sent off on a road trip by their mom when one shoots a girl. Where they are going is never explained-until the end credits. It might have worked if something had been explained somewhere along the way- but nope. It just lays there.

MAPS OF THE STARS-David Cronenberg film is funny for all the wrong reasons. The cast and a few bits hint that this might have made sense in another reiteration but whats there is truly laughably awful

GOODBYE TO LANGUAGE- Godard needs to be euthanized as does anyone who seriously thought this home movie is anything other than a hideous joke on the intelligentsia. As for it's 3D anyone who says its revolutionizes the medium needs to see more 3D movies or more likely needs to be blinded. I'm sorry my hatred for this film and its supporters knows no bounds

THE HAUNTERS (Documentary) weakest doc I've seen on people doing a commercial haunted house. Its jagged and a mess.

And my vote for the worst filmmaker moment- Noah Baumbach failing to comprehend his film

When asked by an audience member why plot lines were thrown out and characters did things that had been against their nature previously in the film he said that we were never supposed to notice and that wasn't what the film was about about so they didn't matter.

Noah Baumbach’s defense of the abandoning of all of the plot threads in WHILE WE’RE YOUNG is unconscionable. I’ve seen directors talk about things not in their films, I’ve seen then them explain what things really mean when it didn’t fit the film as shown, but having a director of Baumbach’s stature tell his audience that all of things the Ben Stiller character did were just there to give him something to do to until the end of the film and the complete 180 degree change in Charles Grodin’s view of truth in documentary films in a two minute period didn’t matter because that’s not what the film was about is as bogus a statement as you can get. His insistence that the only thing that matters is the tacked on out of left field ending where Stiller and Naomi Watts adopt is as wrong-headed as I’ve ever seen. Why did he tell the story he tells is none of it mattered? Why raise all of the issues he did? At the NYFF screening he said the point of the film was the end- which would be fine except it's an ending that belongs in another film with different characters that worked toward the adoption not have it magically pulled out of the directors butt..

This isn’t quirky, this is lazy. This isn’t a director arguing things from an earlier draft of the film, no,this is a director saying that we weren’t supposed to notice the plot of the film and what the characters were doing, and that we were supposed to know what he really meant- its bogus and bullshit. I’m so happy that someone called him on his shit and that he really couldn’t answer. Is he really that out of touch with what he was doing?

Apparently

Thankfully from here on out its all up hill.