The Hunt For The Worst Movie Of All Time: August Rush
After watching Death Sentence, a terrible movie starring Kevin Bacon as a father in search of vigilante justice directed by Saw's James Wan, Gabe embarked on The Hunt For The Worst Movie of All Time. This is his sad journey.
The only movies worse than movies about orphaned children who just want to find their parents are movies about children of divorced parents who scheme to get them back together again. What's that all about? Divorce is almost always for the benefit of everyone involved, and no amount of summer camp hijinx or locking your parents in the basement until they love each other again is going to make up for the deep, irremediable wounds inflicted by two people who've lost all interest in each other romantically, and often platonically as well. Any child who actually succeeded in one of these poorly imagined schemes would end up in a domestic nightmare of Eminem and Kim Mathers proportions. Stop it, kids of divorced families in those movies!
August Rush happens to be the former. But with its combination of star-crossed love and Beautiful Mind But For Music And In A Child plotlines, it quickly surpasses the latter. On the way down. To the bottom. This thing is more painful than a stepfather's belt whipping! (Ouch! That joke is terrible! As an homage to how this movie is terrible!)
August Rush is about a little boy who can hear the music in the wind and in street traffic, because this movie came out in 2007, long after Dancer in the Dark had been buried beneath the sands of time and turned into coal. No, wait, August Rush is about two incredible musicians (NOT incredible musicians), Keri Russell who is a world-class cellist in the symphony, and Jonathan Rhys Meyers who is in DriveShaft. They meet at an NYU party and fuck on a moldy couch on a roof because love at first sight. They agree to meet up again at 10 (in the morning? At night? Who knows!) by the arch in Washington Square Park, but Keri Russel doesn't show up, and so Jonathan Rhys Meyers jumps out of his cab on the way to the airport and runs to where she is (even though I'm pretty sure she never told him?) but her dad doesn't like this relationship (already?) and forces her into a limousine. Now they are star-crossed lovers, and one of them is a pregnant star-crossed lover.
Jonathan Rhys Meyers quits the band because he is too much in love with the person he met that one time? And then, after a fight with her dad, Keri Russell is hit by a car, and while she is in the hospital for car injuries her dad forges her signature and gives her baby up for adoption. That car knocked the baby right out of her! And apparently dads can do that! So now, many years later, Keri Russell and Jonathan Rhys Meyers are still star-crossed, and their son who they don't even know they have is waiting for them to come find him at a New York orphanage. So one day, he runs away because he needs to "follow the music" or something and he knows that if he can just "make the music" then his parents will "hear him" and they will love him or something. He gets picked up by a farmer on his way to the farmer's market, who calls Terrence Howard, the state-appointed social worker assigned to the little boy's case, and then he gives the boy 12 dollars and tells him to wait for Terrence Howard to take him back to the orphanage, and then he PEACES OUT. Because being a farmer at the farmer's market is busy stuff, and you can't just sit around all day making sure CHILDREN DON'T DIE. Anyway, SPOILER ALERT the little boy doesn't wait for Terrence Howard. Instead, he goes to Washington Square Park and meets a sassy little black boy playing guitar. He befriends the sassy black boy and goes to live with him in a condemned theater full of self-sufficient, musically talented, runaway children, like something out of Hook (Jesus Christ). Speaking of Hook, this secret society is led by Wizard (Robin Williams), who looks like 12 miles of bad road on the way to a Josh Homme solo show.
He is blown away by the little boy's innate musical talent and tries to exploit him. But also he sees a lot of himself in the little boy, because of course he does. Then one day there is a police raid on the condemned theater and the little boy, now named August Rush because of a TRUCK THAT DOESN'T EVEN MAKE ANY SENSE--
is in Brooklyn. At first he is scared because a car full of black people playing hip hop drives by, and even though he can hear the music in the electrical hum of high-tension wires or the clatter of a subway running through a tunnel, he still is scared of hip hop. Anyway, he wanders into a church and a little girl gives him a little girl's explanation of how to read music and suddenly he can both read and write music and play the organ. Sure. So the pastor takes him to Julliard and now he is at Julliard and now Julliard has decided to let him conduct the New York Philharmonic in Central Park. AS LUCK WOULD HAVE IT, Keri Russel has just found out that he exists from her father on his death bed. AND she has been asked to rejoin the New York Symphony Orchestra as the world's most famous cellist. But then Wizard finds August Rush and says "You can't conduct the philharmonic because I have become the villain in the second half of this movie," but eventually the sassy black boy hits Wizard with his guitar and August Rush runs into the subway tunnel and is covered in dirt and panicky sweat, but he manages to emerge in a TUXEDO, just as the Philharmonic is going to begin playing. And Keri Russell has already finished playing the cello but she hears his music as she walks away in a straight line across the park (Dear Keri Russell, that is a ridiculous way to get home) and Jonathan Rhys Meyers has left his job as a rich BUSINESSMAN (of completely indeterminate nature, but it's definitely not the "business of being in a horrible band") and is playing music at Irving Plaza to a huge crowd of people because that's the size of crowd that always greets a no-name band that hasn't played together in 11 years, and he just happens to see a streetlight banner for the concert with his lover's name on it and he rushes out of the cab (again!) and gets to the park just in time to hear the music of his son (who, incidentally, he JAMMED with in Washington Square Park earlier but they didn't even know it! Sure!) and he sees Keri Russell and somehow they both know that this is their son and the little boy turns around and sees them and knows that they are his parents.
The end.
HOLY.
SHIT.
Now, any movie that tries to capture the ineffable, like where creativity comes from, or the exhilaration of love, it's easy to fall short. There is a reason those things are ineffable. Because they aren't effable! But this movie! This movie fails on so many levels!
First of all, the acting is impossible.
YIIIIIIKES. The green screen is better at acting in that scene, and the green screen is terrible! Oh, and that harmonica player in the park? It turns out later that is Robin Williams. Ugh. Not to mention that this cheesy encounter between a womanizer and a pixie idiot, resulting in a one night stand, is the central fulcrum for this whole movie? I'm supposed to care that two 20-somethings who fucked at a party can't seem to get their lives together? Not to mention the complete emotional implausibility of every relationship in this movie. Like, sorry, but crazy homeless people who govern condemned buildings full of children are much more likely to rape and/or stab them then they are to try and exploitatively manage their musical careers. And people who haven't seen each other in 11 years are going to have a lot of shit to work out even without the functionally retarded idiot savant child that one of them didn't even know existed. And children who have just survived a harrowing couple of weeks being homeless on the streets of New York after being raised in institutional foster care are probably going to be cutters. And what does Terrence Howard even do in this movie? He's supposed to be a benevolent state-appointed social worker, but he never finds the boy, he never reconnects him with his parents, he never brings Wizard to justice, he just makes sad faces and ignores faxes that have fallen on the floor.
Wait, hold on, go back to the beginning for a second. Why can't they find each other again? Like, at one point, Jonathan Rhys Myers, now a BUSINESSMAN, is looking at Keri Russell's profile on her webpage?
Yup, that is what a webpage looks like. I'm glad they spent 10 seconds on this webpage so that we would know for sure that the director has seen a webpage before. But, um, so, why doesn't he just email her? Why didn't he email her 11 years ago? Why didn't he specify whether she was supposed to meet him at 10AM or 10PM in the park? That seems like an important detail. And why does it actually turn out to be 10AM? That is such a weird time to meet someone!
And of course, because this is a movie about music, it's got to be filled with UNBEARABLE MUSICFACES.
YUCK.
This movie, with its pretentious artsiness*, its horrible performances, its completely unrealistic everything, and its Robin Williams is easily one of the very Worst Movies of All Time! I am putting it in a close second, right behind Elizabethtown.
Next Week: I am going to a wedding next weekend, so I am going to take one PRECIOUS weekend off from watching a terrible movie, if that is alright with you MONSTERS. But we're actually done with this round of nominees, if you can believe it, so next week we will outline the next round.
*If August Rush had not been shot on film it would have been shot on a batiked peasant's blouse.
Posted by Gabe at 5:45 PM in The Hunt For The Worst Movie Of All Time
Tags: August Rush | Jonathan Rhys Meyers | Keri Russell | Robin Williams | Terrence Howard
You're doing ANOTHER round?
I'm so sorry.
Score = 13
While the "nature of creativity," and the "exhilaration of love," may, indeed, be ineffable, I can't stop thinking to myself: "eff this movie."
Score = 30
YES. This is absolutely the worst movie I have ever seen, for every reason outlined here. Thank you.
Score = 7
Le Divorce...
You know you (don't) want to!
(Another excellent installment, Gabe).
Score = 3
CODE 46. Watch Code 46, Gabe.
Score = 0
I nominate STEALTH. Jamie Foxx (the worst) decided to follow up his success with Ray (his best) by staring in this? (the worst!)
Score = 5
A small fact, Stealth was filmed years before Ray and put on a shelf cause they didn't think it would sell. Then Ray came out and Jamie Foxx was big time so they thought Oh, people will see this now.
Score = 3
you know entirely too much about the movie STEALTH
Score = 16
please see my sisters keeper. It is trying to be a serious movie, about a serious thing, but then it has cameron diaz in it. I could say more, but I think that actually kind of justifies looking into it on your own. Also I think that it was originally made for lifetime, but then lifetime was like we have good sense and this movie is garbage, which is a thing lifetime has never said before. Truly remarkably bad.
If you are wondering why I saw this movie, the answer is simple: The Proposal was sold out.
Score = 18
absolutely the worst movie i have ever seen. far and away.
Score = -2
Oh, how I have waited for this day. For weeks I suggested August Rush, and then Gabe announced he would review it, my happiness abounded, and now I have been waiting for this review and my happiness hasth runneth over. Thank you Gabe. I now believe that justice has been served.
Score = 9
For goodness sakes, do Darjeeling Limited.
Score = -61
No way. I don't care if it's technically Wes Anderson's worst movie, -1,000,000 to you.
Score = 13
Yes do Darjeeling Limited please! I love Wes Anderson but that is the most boring movie!
Score = 1
August Rush was pretty bad, but last night I watched Art School Confidential. It was horrible, but inexplicably filled with all sorts of top notch indie actors. Except Max Minghella. He sucks. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0364955/
Score = 11
If you think Max Minghella gave a bad performance in the movie you just mentioned try torturing yourself through his unbearable performance in 'How to Lose Friends and Alienate People.' Please review this horrible craptastic piece of shit!
Score = 2
YES!! How to Lose Friends and Alienate People was one if the worst I have seen! And I agree about Darjeeling even though Wes Anderson is my very favorite director. Also, has The Spirit been done?
Score = -3
YES! Art School Confidential is THE WORST.
Also, Dragonfly, with Kevin Costner: "A grieving doctor is being contacted by his late wife through his patients near death experiences". I mean, come on.
Score = 1
August Rush was pretty bad, but last night I watched Art School Confidential. It was horrible, but inexplicably filled with all sorts of top notch indie actors. Except Max Minghella. He sucks. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0364955/
Score = -8
This same thing happened to me at an NYU party, except instead of a musical orphan-child the surprise was chlamydia.
Score = 128
Oh hey, that was me. I've been waiting for you since 10 o'clock the next day. I aborted our baby but I'm sure he would've been a musical genius. Whoops!
Score = 84
thank you, Matt!
Score = 1
I love how he is a BUSINESSMAN, "get me 10%!" Oh, ok. Because of Wall Street.
Score = 19
"August RUSHES into the subway tunnel and is covered in dirt..."
woof on me!
Score = 6
AMERICAN DREAMZ!!! Come on!!!! It deserves the Gabe-treatment.
Score = 3
The King of California. It has so many elements you're looking for... a mental patient teaching people important life lessons, a forced sense of indie whimsy, characters doing things for no reason. Oh, and Evan Rachel Wood. Need I say more?
Score = 11
"I KNOW WHO KILLED ME", please!!
Score = -50
i know who blogged that. his name is gabe.
Score = 51
i will nominate The Lake House every week.
for your consideration, the ending scene. you need to know that just before this scene, sandra bullock's character finds out keanu reeves' character is dead - so she rushes to her magical time machine mailbox to stop him from accidentally killing himself.
and then he drives up - alive again... apparently he resuscitated himself from two-years of rigor mortis into a viable enough condition to drive sometime during the approximately two hours it took for her to hear that he was dead and get to the magic time machine mailbox.
or... something....
Score = 15
The Lake House also has a confusing time travel plotline, which always makes for a bad movie.
Score = 6
yea, the time/space continuum is still icing its ass.
Score = 6
I agree. The Lake House is the worst. Why was their magic time travel mailbox/house only time travelling 2 years? That seems like such an odd, arbitrary number. It would have been better if it had been like 85 years then she could have gotten letters about handlebar mustaches and box socials.
Score = 43
Music And Lyrics because Drew Berrymore won't stop talking.
Score = 11
Gran Torino. Make it happen.
Score = 0
I know everything in that movie was bad except for Clint Eastwood and the preacher (I liked the preacher. I thought he was a good actor) but Clint and the preacher made it redeemable.
Score = -2
gtfo
Score = -1
I still don't understand why this movie is disliked. It's not one of Eastwood's best, but it's a perfectly good Father-Son film for him to end his acting career on.
Score = 3
those kids need more comprehensive hobo stab (AND OMG RAPE!) insurance.
Score = 9
Don't be mad about the lame webpage Gabe, it's obviously the PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.
Score = 32
PLEASE do The Quiet. Ultimate combo of American Beauty meets Poison Ivy, with Edie Falco naked (???) and the buxom chick from Eastbound and Down.
Score = 3
Yes x 1,000,000. The Quiet is AWFUL.
Score = 0
Is it too soon to mock twilight? I think not. And then there's Stepford Wives, Street Kings and Stealth. (those are just the S's on my list)
Score = 13
THE FORGOTTEN. I recommend this every week, and someone named Sen or something has started helping out as well. Gabe, I'm sure you read every comment all the time (I would), so you are probably like "Yes, ok, I get it. Stop recommending the fucking Forgotten, because I haven't." Title ZING! But I thought it needed one last plug. A reminder. Because sometimes, apparently, aliens wipe certain random pieces of information from every mind on earth, for no reason, so no one can really be trusted to remember anything. That is, of course, unless you leave it in fingerpainting on the wall. Aliens can't erase or paint over children's fingerpaint. This is well known. Ask McNulty.
Score = 17
And because "The tapes were always blank." Because, y'know, I checked all those VHS tapes under the TV in the cabinet there. They've always been blank. Because I watched 'em all. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEiqWaIKJ5Q Oh and also this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ti_FbgdU3s&NR=1
Score = 1
the makers of August Rush obviously just kept shouting "we're going to need more Oliver Twist!" at each other until they finally shat out the final cut. Shame, really. Dickens is spinning in his grave.
Score = 33
I went to go see this movie, and I still remember sitting and watching the credits, going:
"There going to give Charles Dickens a writing credit, right? They must, because copyright. I'm sure they'll at least give him an 'inspired by' shoutout, since he pretty much wrote thi...WHAT THE FUCK???"
Score = 0
My nominations for the next round:
Face/Off
Mission to Mars
Michael
Snake Eyes
Con-Air
Score = -7
-7, looks like we have some Con Air fans out there!
Score = 0
Seriously, what is up with that? I love (to hate) Nic Cage as much as the next guy and I'd be shocked to find out that my fellow 'gummers appreciated in earnest his "southern" accent in Con-Air. Or maybe everyone here really liked Mission to Mars! It's hard to hate on Don Cheadle.
Score = 1
I saw this movie as a hostage on a long flight. I actually only saw it and did not hear it, since I didn't want to pay for the headphones. It looked pretty bad. But by the time Robin Williams appeared as some kind of musical Fagin, I knew this had to be one of the worst of all time. Laughably terrible. Thanks Gabe!
On a side note...I found it very interesting that the trailers I had seen for this movie did not include Robin Williams...
Score = 6
Last three movies I've had on transatlantic flights:
You, Me & Dupree
A Night at The Museum
Mamma Mia
I am now afraid of flying.
Score = 3
Seriously-- I was flying internationally this weekend and was subjected to "Hotel For Dogs" one way and "Inkheart" the other. Apparently to fly on American Airlines you should be 12 and under.
Score = 3
I saw this movie in a hostage situation too! But my headphones were free and I watched it (why did I watch this?).
DUETS needs to be in the next round. Gwenyth Paltrow sings. Huey Lewis is her con-artist father and Paul Giametti? The most recent comment on IMDB: "Better than your average karaoke road movie..." PLZ WATCH THIS GABE.
Score = 8
Robin Williams is the ultimate GOTCHA!!!
Score = 4
The Convenant...absolutely terrible
Score = 3
Didn't this movie come out over a decade ago? And wasn't it called Shine? And wasn't it actually kind of good? And didn't it not feature Robin Williams looking like he just five-starred Psychobilly Freakout?
Score = 6
Music and Lyrics
Be Kind Rewind
Score = -8
Can we change up the rules this time and allow a movie currently playing in theaters, cuz AWAY WE GO was the WORST movie I have ever seen. My girlfriend had a laughing fit during Maya Rudolph's "dramatic monologue about fake fruit and her dead parents" and had to leave... She missed the last 5 minutes which easily put this thing over the top. I don't know if I can't wait for the DVD for this to be added to The Hunt. Let's make this happen.
Score = 4
whoops.
Score = -2
Jesus I thought I was the only one. It's not the WMOAT but the script was written by a 12-year-old. A 12-year-old Dave Eggars, I guess.
Among other things, [SPOILER] If they were so poor, why the hell did they let that million-dollar lake-front property (that belonged to her?) just sit there decaying for 12 years? Also, loved the whole, "We're moving to Montreal! -- Oh, whoops, you had 5 miscarriages? Gross. Nevermind." What a waste of possibly the best cast ever put together.
Score = 2
Oh man, please please PLEASE let Beloved be on that list! PLEASE.
Score = 2
that's racist! (that's not racist)
Score = 8
Dr. T & The Women. Now and forever the worst.
Score = 6
agreed
Score = -1
Dear Gabe,
Sex and the City.
Sincerely,
Carrie
P.S. Do it.
Score = 18
Dear Gabe,
Sex and the City.
Sincerely,
Carrie
P.S. Do it.
Score = 5
Ugh why are there two. Why are there even two.
Score = 24
Last Chance Harvey. I could write an August Rush-style symphony about how bad this movie is. Also, The Sweetest Thing and My Big Fat Greek Wedding. WOOF.
Score = 9
Wasn't Bonnie McKee in this? She's pretty awesome.
Score = 0
In the Land of Women. GET ON IT.
Score = 10
IN THE LAND OF WOMEN FOR FUCKING SERIOUS.
Although this movie looks well nigh unbeatable. I concede that now. (P.S. Also do Breakfast at Tiffany's.)
Score = -1
My dad recommends "Bio-Dome."
Score = -2
An A-list of failure:
Cool World - Brad Pitt fail
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within - Alec Baldwin fail
Highlander II: The Quickening - Sean Connery fail
Planet of the Apes (2001) - Marky Marky fail
The Ninth Gate - Johnny Depp fail
Score = -4
this was hilarious and great. please, never stop the hunt, gabe. i love it so very, very much.
Score = 5
why is it that every time a movie is supposed to be touching, it must also utterly and completely suspend reality? i guess baffling, implausible attempts and poignancy and heavy handed symbolism is what touches the modern human soul. in which case, i welcome our coming robot overlords.
Score = 20
also, let it be noted that even thinking about this movie left me so addled that i both mis-spelled my own name AND wrote 'and' instead of 'at'. pray for mojo.
Score = 4
I saw Knowing last week and I still can't believe how ridiculously bad it was. I'm so mad I watched it I want Gabe to tear it apart. I truly think it might actually win the Worst Movie contest, and nominate it wholeheartedly.
I love this column.
Score = 5
YES! Please do Knowing in the next round. I was subjected to it a few nights ago. It's like apocalypse porn for the rapture crowd. But with aliens from Dark City.
Score = 0
It's been a few weeks, so I again offer Closer up for your consideration. Not just because of the terrible, but because of the terrible pretending it's edgy and daring. Also, Clive Owen.
Score = -3
I'm going to second Closer. I used to really like it but then after watching it again a few months ago I realized the writers wrote a few lines and then based a movie around them. The lines themselves are pretty painful.
Score = -5
Gabe you are so brave for doing another round. Good for you. Also, I saw a scene of Elizabethtown this weekend. I say scene b/c it was between Orlando Bloom and Paula Deen and my mind exploded! Why is Paula Deen in that movie?!
In other news, I nominate Little Black Book and Because I Said So. These are just terrible, awful movies.
Score = 5
Maybe it's because I'm a lady, or maybe because I went to nyu and have already Had Enough, but good god, All the Real Girls was a pretentious, whiny, condescending piece of nothing. I feel like I only ever hear good things about it. Wrong things. Please, make it a part of the next round, the people need to know, this is not a movie you want to spend 108 minutes with.
Score = 4
Was the 4th of July the reason PUBLIC ENEMIES wasn't the Videogum Movie Club pick of the week? I would've loved to hear the debate over an actually DECENT film...
Score = 1
God this movie was horrible. I remember seeing the preview for it and Kerry Russel not seeming to know she had had a son, and thinking how the fuck do you not know a human being came out of your vagina. Oh your father stole it from your comatose womb, well that makes sense?
Score = 6
HILARIOUS. May I suggest the movie Birth? It was less watchable than Margot at the Wedding. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0337876/
Score = 6
Eagle Eye. Every frame of that film has something ridiculous, from the big (The last we see of the big baddie she's trying to escape from the heroes, and then the movie just ends without saying what happened to her) to the small (The evactuation plan for the Pentagon is just a drawing of the ENTIRE PENTAGON as seen from above with some vague red lines on it.)
It's so bad it's hard to talk about except in a stream-of-consciousness ramble, because every time you bring up one problem with the movie, it reminds you of five more related problems, like some kind of bad movie hydra.
Also, I kind of feel like there's been too many straight drama films in The Hunt lately. Let's get some genre picks up in here.
Score = 5
I thought Eagle Eye was lazy, but it was entertaining enough.
Score = -1
Miami Vice!
And, to support the annoyance of Gabe, I Know Who Killed Me! (just watch it again)
Score = 2
Miami Vice was awesome, you just weren't watching it right. Gong Li's character was a cuban citizen with Chinese parents who defected there, and now she's a boss that wants to help the vice squad. mhmm. got it. Anyway, she's naked in it, and the camera work is nice, so I liked it.
Score = 1
I still don't know why we haven't gotten to Nick of Time yet. Dude, ROC hits CHRISTOPHER WALKEN with a WOODEN LEG. What do you want from me? Blood? Do you want my blood?
Score = 3
oh God the Lake House made me wish for a sudden and swift blow to the head.
Good call.
I also nominate the Notebook because I hate love.
Score = 9
I have not seen this movie. And thank GABE for that. Between the painful rendition of 'Moondance' and the MUSICFACES I just VOMed all over myself. And I'm a romantic you guys. But that just made me want to full on throw my guts up. HUUUURL!!!
Score = 2
The 6th Day
the third Schwarzennegar movie (that i know of) to feature a scene in which arnold talks to his own clone/double. They're pals!!
also: somehow Robert Duvall agreed to be in this?
Score = 0
I watched this movie on a plane without headphones. I was able to pick up the entire plot without hearing any dialog. It was compelling in its unyielding scrofulousness. I simply could not turn away. Just one observation: any kid street-smart enough to survive a couple weeks as a New York street person is going to hear his rapedar beep type loud when R. Williams strolls in with his corpse-Bono self.
Score = 11
It's the ultimate GOTCHA!!!
Score = -2
I think the funniest part is that the news link to the eminem story is to an MTV coverage of it.
Score = 0
CLERKS 2! Seriously...
Score = 7
My mom cried when we went to see this, so I tried to get into it. I did. But the time they played that weird John Tesh/Yanni/windchime orchestra piece at the end, I just couldn't pretend anymore.
Score = 2
John Q! That turd was on TNT a couple weeks ago, and Good Lord was it bad. Denzel's son is sick and needs a new heart but the evil hospital won't give him one, so Denzel takes the whole damn place hostage. Spoiler alert - God rewards Denzel's faith by murdering a woman with a compatable heart for his kid. Also the kid was bumped to the top of the list thanks to his dad holding doctors at gunpoint. Happy ending! Sorry strange lady and everyone else on the organ donor list!
Score = 6
My biggest beef with The Lake House is not the fact that Keanu Reeves still gets paid to act in movies nor the fact they try to bend the space time continuum but do so in a really confusing way that never makes sense. No, I'm pissed off that in the world of The Lake House, there is a passenger train that runs from Chicago to Madison, Wisconsin. This train does not exist, people! I'm sorry if riding the Van Galder bus to Madison was not sexy enough for Sandra Bullock, but let's at least try to make SOMETHING in this movie plausible.
Score = 11
bottle shock! it's incredibly bad
Score = 1
Please please please:
A LOT LIKE LOVE
Score = 0
I have a rule against effing men who sing to me to try to get me into bed. But on the other hand, I have a rule that says go to bed with all the Irishmen you can find. Hmm, so many ethical quandaries this movie presents!
Score = 12
Evening, please.
Score = 0
Lost in Translation with Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson. If your post has anything more than the word "what?", I'll be impressed.
Score = -11
The guy who played Michael Meyers in Halloween wrote this movie. No joke.
Score = 6
the notebook
the notebook.
the notebook..
Score = 0
nominating The Core again. and any Kevin Smith movie.
Score = 2
Please. The Rules of Attraction. Worst movie ever.
Score = 6
I also saw August Rush on a flight. The other direction was Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (consider that a nomination). I vote for a subcategory of movies that are so atrocious that the only means for their widespread circulation is trapping an audience in a confined space for several hours.
Score = 3
Oh, this was a post on the Bullworth comments:
'I'm forced to be the person to defend August Rush. It's a fairy tale! It wasn't supposed to be believeable. People were supposed to feel good that the pedophile ex-street performer dubbed a runaway "August Rush" who has been estranged from his parents who have been estranged from each other and are all brought together by music. I watched it with my girlfriend. Not great, but it meant well. Obviously, it wasn't made with the videogum crowd in mind.'
Take that HATERZZZ. Up with positive depictions of pedophilia, down with film snobs.
Score = 3
Hi. Thanks to the one random person who gave me a shout out.... Just wanted to say that I had the pleasure of actually being IN this amazing movie, August Rush. I got to play Kerri Russel's BFF and comfort her when she learns she has a magical mystery baby.
To answer the question about why dreamboat couldn't contact his cherub faced floozy.... He did attempt to call her, and even showed up at her apartment (that she shared with me... remember the answering machine "Hi you've reached Lyla... aaaannndd Lizzyy!! Leave a message after the tone!!!" God it's so much fun to be the quirky "alternative" best friend to a stoney faced pout machine.)
Anyway so he shows up at our apartment and asks the land lady about the musician who lives there and she thinks he means me, because I am Kerri's accompanist who lives with her. She didn't think to be like "Oh you mean the chick from Felicity? Or that smoking hot redhead she lives with? Because there are two fucking people that live here" No. Instead she just tells him that she went on her honeymoon. Which is where I was. On a honeymoon with a husband that was never mentioned in the plot. So he thinks that she is married and gives up trying to contact her. Why he didn't just leave her a message I'll never understand.
Then, when Kerri starts having strange feelings about babies and thinking that she is losing her mind, she decides to call me on my honeymoon from a payphone (because it's way more dramatic to have a breakdown in a glass case of emotion than to just use your cell phone like a respectable modern crazy person.) And I, being the solid besty that I am, tell her to hang in there and that i'll leave my own honeymoon to come comfort her. What a pal, right? Yeah. And then you never see me in the movie again.
I'd like to defend the movie I was in. It is a respectable role for a first time actress to be among a cast of Kerri Russel, Johnathan Rhyse Meyers, Terrance Howard, and Robin Williams. But when there's a huge plot hole surrounding your own character, it's hard to ignore. I went to the premiere with my dad and when the lights came up after the movie I looked at him grimacing and was like.... "so... what'd ya think?" and he turned to me and was like "Well, YOU were great!"
This is the last thing I'm gonna say, because it's frowned upon to hate on your own movie, but I really tried, guys. I tried to give a more interesting performance. I tried to think what would I really do if my friend was chasing after a child she lost ten years ago and made me drive to upstate new york in the snow to go look for him? What would I do if my friend was losing her shit and pouting all the damn time about some mystery baby someone probably adopted a long time ago? I would shake her! I would be a little hard on her and be like "Yo!! Wake the fuck up!!" and so I kinda tried to portray that when we were shooting. I tried to be a little more tough love. But No. The director kept saying "Sweeter. Can you make it a little sweeter?" and I was thinking "Sweeter!?!?! If this fucking movie gets and sweeter my teeth are going to rot out of my head!!" But I had a job to do. So I went sweeter, and I'm sorry to say that I contributed to the cavity inducing Hallmark flavor of this un-effing-effable film.
PS review I Know Who Killed Me please. and the Sweetest Thing.
Score = 13
Your dad was right, you were good in this movie. NOT YOUR FAULT. Put down the gun. Not your fault.
Score = 8
The Happening by M. Night Shaymalan with Mark Wahlberg, John Lequizamo, and Zooey Deschanel.
Score = 0
I love Zooey. Just so everyone knows, for the always up and coming holidays.
Score = 0
can I nominate "P.S I Love you". i knew it was going to be bad, but it was much worse than i could ever imagine.
Also, any Nancy Meyers movie. "The Holiday" being the most-worst I think.
Score = 1
I'm just pretty amazed that you managed to get Josh Homme into a TWMOAT review.
Score = 0
This has quickly become my favourite thing on the interwebs.
Score = 0
Yet again I have to suggest Nell. Here's the tag line from imdb:
"Her heart. Her soul. Her language are a mystery...A mystery called Nell."
I saw it ages ago but I remember the courtroom scene as being one of the funniest / most awful things I had ever seen in a movie.
Score = 3
Eye of the Beholder.
Score = 0
My nomination: Bram Stoker's Dracula
Questions?
Score = 1
OMG! I love you. I had to watch this crap twice because my English professor had a perverse fascination with horrible movies based on Victorian novels. I also think she hated us...
Score = 0
Thank you for noticing that they wasted 11 good internet years not searching and e-mailing. I noted this to my stupid roommates and they tried to argue that the internet was big enough back then. Bullshit.
Score = 2
I'm continuing with my campaign for Home Fries.
Score = 0
Gaber: what you missed in this film is that everything that happens to "August" after he ends up in NYC is his fantasy. It's too ridiculous plotwise not to be the fevered imaginings of Robin Williams' sex slave boy. None of the movie makes any goddamn sense otherwise. They must have accidentally left out the last scene of the film, where August is chained up in a dungeon as Wizard plays a cello concerto. Has to be. I saw this fucking movie. Please tell me they weren't serious.
New nominees:
Rules of Attraction (the anal rapey one with James Van der Beek)
Igby Goes Down.
PS: I am having trouble posting since I changed my profile picture to the greatest actress of our generation. Coincidence?
Score = 6
Nominations:
***WITH HONORS*** (Brendan Frasier at his finest and Joe Pesci plays an intelligent Harvard bum)
***DEFIANCE*** (unwatchable. racial stereotypes GALORE... Jewish stereotypes GALORE. Just when you think it can't get any worse, it does. Movie has it all: the Feminist Jew. The Socialist Jew. Jews who lose their faith... Jews who find their faith. Dancing Jews. Literary Jews. And last but not least... Even Moses is referenced: all seriously of course).
Score = 0
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: "THE WOMEN."
Also, after it was broadcast on Fox tonight, I would like to nominate "Legally Blonde 2: Red White and Blonde" (actual title). A major plot line involves gay dog rights. Woof. (get it?!)
Score = 0
Alpha Dogs.
I will never stop nominating it.
Score = 0
Please do Alpha Dog,
Score = 1
Gabe - I will pout forever if at least half of these don't make it on your list.
THE FORGOTTEN
NELL
THE LAKE HOUSE
THE HAPPENING
BLINDNESS
HOME FRIES
SEX IN THE CITY
NATIONAL SECURITY
ROAD TRIP
Score = 2
For your consideration:
Boat Trip
Dungeons and Dragons
America's Sweethearts
Shallow Hal
The Other Sister
Girl, Interrupted
Score = 1
Please do the Postman or Wild Wild West for the next round.
They are both so unmercifully bad. I just need to see you tear them apart.
Score = 1
This is the best Hunt article in a while. A respectable golf-clap to Gabe. More nominations:
The Lake House (it must be done)
Revolver
Catch and Release
Confessions of a Shopaholic (another airplane hostage nom)
Melinda and Melinda (my DVR called this a 'bitingly funny comedy'. my DVR is a LIAR!)
Score = 0
Deja Vu, with Denzel and Val Kilmer. Worst time machine movie ever, and almost as big of a snorefest as Face/Off.
Score = 0
this movie drove me CRAZY. i got forced into watching it by some idiot who thought that since i am a cellist i would like movies about cello no matter what, but that person failed to consider that this movie is THE WORST.
what makes it bad (aside from everything gabe mentioned, everything), is that keri russel obviously has no idea how to play the cello. not like i would expect them to do this, since they put so little effort into every other aspect of the film, but seriously - get an actress who played cello for six months in fourth grade. or something. so my eyes will bleed less.
Score = 1
Alone in the Dark starring Christian Slater. It's not even worth it because it's crappiness is already so well established.
Score = 0
I don't think the Covenant is the worst movie of all time (I mean, it has the Kitsch, COME ON), but as I rewatched it earlier this week, all I could think was, "this was made for a gabe write-up"
Score = 1
No way, dude. Best ending ever. I wish every movie ended with a full-screen shot of a baby coming out of a vagina.
Score = 0
This was in response to the suggestion of "Dr. T & The Women"
Score = 0
This was in response to the suggestion of "Dr. T & The Women"
Score = 0
Cold Mountain
Nell
make it happen plss
Score = 0
I'd like to suggest Gran Torino.
Score = 0
The stupid fucking Lady in the Water. That movie is how old now? (it's just not worth my time to look it up on imdb) and i'm still pissed at the 2 hours it stole from my life. Together with damage done to my brain by The Village, I think I might have to sue stupid M Knight Shyamalamalan. I hate him so much for making the 6th sense and then turning out so much crap, i will never see another movie of his ever.
Score = 0
The stupid fucking Lady in the Water. That movie is how old now? (it's just not worth my time to look it up on imdb) and i'm still pissed about the 2 hours it stole from my life. Together with damage done to my brain by The Village, I think I might have to sue stupid M Knight Shyamalamalan. I hate him so much for making the 6th sense and then turning out so much crap, i will never see another movie of his ever.
Score = 2
Gabe, I hope that COLOR OF NIGHT (1994) makes the cut for the next round. You could not any worse. The ultimate Bruce Willis fail movie. Brad Dourif and Lance Henriksen in a race for last. Scott Bakula shows up. See, they were so super serious about making a good movie, this is what makes it the very worst.
Score = 0
Bobby
Radio
The Postman (Tom Petty PLAYING HIMSELF)
Masked and Anonymous
Score = 0
OMG! I freaking love you! I ended up having to watch this twice, because one of my English professors had a perverse fascination with horrible movies based on Victorian novels....
Score = 0
P.S. this was in reply to Staveitoff, and I second the Dracula.
Score = 0
I want to see The Love Guru in the hunt. In a long line of terrible Mike Meyers movies, it is easily The Worst. But it doesn't want to settle for merely being the worst Mike Meyers movie. Oh no. It wants to be TWMOAT. That it IS TWMOAT is perhaps its only success.
Score = 2
Please look at Cheri starring michelle phieffer and directed by Stephen Frears. It is the biggest pile of expensively dressed guff I ever did witness.
Score = 0
Theodore Rex! Whoopi Goldberg is paired with a wacky anthropomorphic dinosaur in this futuristic buddy-cop movie!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ez5GFtMLvYc
Score = 0
Theodore Rex! Whoopi Goldberg is paired with a wacky anthropomorphic dinosaur in this futuristic buddy-cop movie!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ez5GFtMLvYc
Score = 0
x-men origins wolverine. cahm ahn.
Score = 1
I must nominate Knowing with Nicholas Cage.
Come on -- freaky girl predicts end of the world with numbers, mysterious beings whispering in the ears of a random little boy, space pods transporting people out of Earth, and Nicholas Cage?
That is prime Worst Movie material.
Score = 0
suggestions for the worst
1. "the happening"
2. "wild wild west"
3. "godzilla" (1998)
4. "batman & robin"
5. "twilight"
Score = 0
I nominate R.O.T.O.R.
Score = 0
Vantage Point. This movie sucks for so many reasons, the biggest being the end is supposed to be happy, but in reality is horribly horribly sad.
Score = 0
Yes.
This movie totally deserves it — absolutely the worst movie about music I've ever seen.
But the heckling the little boy's musicfaces — awww, that's a tad harsh.
But fuck it, go for the throat.
Score = -1
I thought August Rush was a good movie. It was very inspirational and although you have some good points if you actually paid attention to the movie you would find that all those questions you raised, were all actually answered. i rate it an 8/10
Score = 1
I nominate Kicking and Screaming
Worst movie EVER
Score = 1
I nominate Kicking and Screaming
Worst movie EVER
Score = 0