January – Movie 43

Yeah, this year did not start out on a high, did it? It’s a shame this film is (allegedly) awful, as I wish there were more anthology comedy films. It could be a great way for new writers to get their work published alongside established ones. A way to overload a film with talent so you’re almost guaranteed to get an audience. Plus they’re easier to film as you can do quite a lot at the same time on different sets, and you don’t have to worry about continuity that much. This could have led to a resurgence in the genre. As it is, we got one of the worst films ever made.

February – This Is 40

This is such a waste. So much of it is not needed. Entire characters seem like they’re just there to pad out the runtime. It’s a shame as there is some very funny and interesting stuff in here, but since the film is over 2 hours long it’s not that you remember. There’s so much nothing there that it overloads the good stuff. This really could have been edited down to a really good 90 minutes.

March – Red Dawn

This movie exists. I had no idea this movie exists until now. I know the original exists, but I had no idea this did. There have been so many remakes of classic 80’s films and barely any of them have been any good: Footloose, Robocop, I’m sure there are more but they’re so forgettable that I’ve…….yeah I’ve forgotten them.

April – Scary Movie V

This film series went down FAST. I think it’s because the parodies became less focused. They stopped being genre parodies and just became “this film happened, let us reference it”. The first one specifically targeted the scream movies, as such the things they made reference to were well researched and funny. A good parody should make it hard to watch the original without laughing, and the newer films scattergun approach to parody doesn’t achieve that. The series also led to the unfortunate “[blank] movie” films, most of which were just terrible (Date Movie, Disaster Movie etc).

May – It’s Such A Beautiful Day

This is not a film you enjoy, even if you like it, you won’t really enjoy it. It’s an animated film which is a lot bleaker than that sounds. Don Herzfeldt is a scary genius. If you don’t believe me, look at what he did for The Simpsons. That was him on a leash (not literally, unless he’s into that sort of thing, I don’t know him.), so imagine him with no limits, no eye on the mass market. It’s insane. At time horrifying, at times beautiful. At times unbearably sad, at times it’s so uplifting it’s wonderful. This film is everything you want and everything you don’t want but you need to witness. Just watch that Simpsons clip first, if you can’t handle that, you won’t manage the film. If you see the beauty in it (the “still love you homar” moment always makes me feel teary) then you will in this too.

June – Man Of Steel

Why hasn’t the DC universe hit like the MCU has? Maybe it’s expectations. Everyone knows Batman and Superman so everyone has expectations for when they watch a film with those characters in. Not as many people were familiar with Iron Man when that film came out, so the film-makers had more of a blank slate to work with. Plus, there hasn’t been a critically and audience acclaimed film based on the MCU characters (with the exception of Spider-man and he didn’t arrive until late), the only character to have a film audience was The Incredible Hulk. Compare this to DC, the main characters for that: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman. All three of them have already had iconic performances (Christopher Reeve, Adam West, Michael Keaton, Christian Bale, Linda Carter etc) and great films (and some terrible ones, let’s be honest).

July – The Smurfs 2

Did we really need a smurfs sequel? Did we really need the first one? Both of these questions and more can be answered in my Big Book Of Fuck No, available everywhere because it didn’t exist.

August – Kick-Ass 2

Fuck Jim Carrey. Now, this has nothing to do with his performance in the film, which was actually surprisingly good, and everything to do with his promotional work for the film. Which consisted of him disowning the film and telling people not to watch it. His reasoning was that after the Sandy Hook massacre, saying he could no longer support being in a film with that level of violence. Because before Sandy Hook there was never any violence, and certainly no mass shootings. Nope, not, a, single, one.

Whilst I have no doubt that Sandy Hook was a tragedy, for it to be the bit of violence that tips you over the edge is just strange. It’s almost naive to think there was no violence in the world before that, and his reaction is like a schoolchild getting into politics “guys, guys, did you know there was a war years ago?” Also, he’s anti-vax. So yeah, fuck him.

September – White House Down

I’m still not sure if I’ve seen this. I watched either this, or Olympus Has Fallen, and I can’t remember enough about it to remember which one. It was so dull. It would have worked in the ’80s but it was just so lacking in substance that it left zero impression on me (I can’t even remember which guy was in the one I watched, that’s how little impact it left on me).

October – Thor: The Dark World

I saw this at a midnight screening, so not only did I watch a terrible film, I stayed up until about 2am to do it. Really soon after this, a relationship ended which I’m not entirely sure I’m completely fine with yet. Now I’m not saying this film was entirely to blame, but it didn’t help. Electric bastard.

November – The Counselor

I should love this film, it’s dark, gritty, has an interesting plot, is well made, and has great performances. My issue is that it’s a little too dark. It’s just relentless bleakness, but it’s so relentless that you end up becoming immune to it and just not caring. It’s just too cold a film with characters who you don’t really care about that much.

December – Frozen

Yes, there was a time before this movie existed. A wonderful time, America had a black man as president instead of someone who probably blacks up in his spare time for sex with his wife. Britain had an unpopular racist in charge instead of a perplexingly popular racist one. Alan Rickman was still alive, sugary drinks didn’t have an extra charge on them. It was a good time, then this happened. I feel I should watch this film but I won’t be able to take it seriously as one of the only voice actors I know in it is this guy.