IMDB Bottom 100: Number 12 - Going Overboard

Number 12: Going Overboard (1989)

A true story: sitting in a cinema, I saw a trailer for an upcoming movie about video game characters coming to life and destroying the world. ‘Oh, that looks like it could be fun’ I thought to myself but then I saw the film’s star. ‘Oh, Adam Sandler. I’ll give it a miss then.’

That film was Pixels and by all accounts, I made the right choice.

I’ve said before, a bad movie can have enough going for it that it can become enjoyable. A bad comedy is always just bad. A bad Adam Sandler comedy though is an instrument of torture.

I appreciate comedy can be subjective and I know Sandler has his fans. If his brand of juvenile frat-boy humour is what you like, that’s fine. Bear this in mind about Going Overboard though, Adam Sandler removed this from his filmography on his official website. The guy who made Little Nicky doesn’t want his fans to know this film exists.

It was Sandler’s first starring role to be fair to so we probably shouldn’t really expect much from him, which is just as well as he delivers nothing. One of the first things Sandler does is break the fourth wall to tell us this is a ‘no budget movie’, you soon find it’s a ‘no laugh movie’ too (if you’re interested to know, IMDB lists the budget for this film as $200,000 which is not a lot in movie terms but a fair-size budget for an independent feature).

Adam Sandler is a waiter on a cruise ship with dreams of being a stand-up comedian but he’s not very good. He’s not good by the end of the film either but what would you expect.

One of the first things I noticed was the credits saying they were ‘introducing’ actor Burt Young. I remember seeing Burt Young in a highly successful film franchise that started 13 years earlier, the first film even won a Best Film Oscar (he was Paulie in the Rocky films). Couldn’t have been him though as he was only being introduced here.

They’re on a cruise ship travelling to undisclosed location with some beauty Queen contestants so cue lots of beautiful ladies in bikini’s, though to the films credit it doesn’t particularly dwell on it apart from one scene where Sandler is wobbling while delivering drinks. I think the joke is he has an erection and is trying to hide it or alternatively, he could just be clumsy.

It’s bad joke after bad joke. I’m being generous describing them as jokes, they’re just sentences. Bad sentence after bad sentence. Actually, it’s not even fair to call them sentences as they lack the coherency, so it’s bad syntax after bad syntax.

I look at the clock and realise I’ve been watching 20 minutes. It feels like hours and this film is 97 minutes long. 97, it’s too long. 5 minutes is too long.

Some other stuff happens with a dickhead ship comedian, talking heads from the beauty contestants for some reason, terrorists turn up but tragically don’t throw Adam Sandler into the sea.

Going Overboard is not a film you watch, rather it is one you endure. My recommendation, like with any Adam Sandler past, present or indeed future, is avoid. Sandler is obviously very youthful here but lacking any charm or charisma, so to be fair to the man he has improved a little over the years. He's not helped any by poor directing and a script that promises a joke but lacks build up or punchline.

Still, at least there’s no Kevin James.

IMDB Bottom 100: Number 13 - Disaster Movie

Number 13: Disaster Movie (2008)

It’s crap.

Oh you want some more? Let me put it like this:

The Avengers. Kim Kardashian. Cloverfield. WWE. Wanted. Jessica Simpson. Indiana Jones. Hannah Montana. High School Musical. Gladiators. MTV. Justin Timberlake. Alvin and the Chipmunks. Amy Winehouse. Batman. Juno. X Factor. Step Up. Kung Fu Panda. Sex and the City.

A pretty random list of popular culture with nothing intrinsically funny about any of them but all things that exist. Which is all Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer think it takes to make a comedy movie.

IMDB Bottom 100: Number 14 - Manos the Hands of Fate

Number 14: Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966)

This film has picked up a fair following over the years and has a reputation for being ‘The Worst Film Ever Made’ (though there are obviously other contenders). Here is the story behind the ‘Cult of Manos’:

Back in 1988, a man named Joel Hodgson created a show called Mystery Science Theater 3000 (commonly referred to as MST3K) which aired on Public Access TV in Minnieapolis. The premise is an average Joe(l) is shot into space by a mad scientist and forced to watch bad movies. He’ll try to keep his sanity with the help of his robot friends by watching the movies and making jokes over the top of them, with various little skits in between.

It was a success, eventually picked up by Comedy Central and later the Sci-Fi channel. There were cast changes over the years (most notably Joel being replaced by Mike Nelson) but the show ran for 11 seasons and there were 197 episodes plus a spin-off movie (which was basically just another episode) in total. So popular was the show, producers and directors were actually sending them their films to make fun of, reasoning it was the best way their work would be seen.

One such film they ‘riffed’ over was Manos: The Hands of Fate. It became notorious for the writers and producers of the show, as to make each episode they had to watch the films multiple times and Manos was one of the hardest ones they had to get through.

The story doesn’t end there though as Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett, writers and actors on MST3K would go on to form rifftrax.com, where the premise is much the same. However, the added bonus is you can buy audio files to play over mainstream movies. For example, you can watch the Twilight movies whilst listening to their riffing (definitely the preferred option) on the film.

One film available through their website is Manos: The Hands of Fate, with all new jokes and quips. But wait, there’s more! In 2012, they done a Rifftrax: Live! Event. Simulcast in theatres all over the States, they performed a live performance of their Manos riff.

All this adds to the reputation M:THF has garnered for being one of the worst films ever. Without that exposure, probably no one would have seen it. Is the reputation deserved? Absolutely.

Written, produced, directed and ‘starring’ Harold P Warren, Manos is another low-budget horror film that gets it wrong on every level.

The acting ranges from more wooden than a tree to ridiculous overacting. Poor editing means lines of dialogue get repeated, which is doubly bad because the script is terrible to start with. Consider this line from main character, Mike (Harold Warren himself):

‘We’ll go hide in the desert. Someone is sure to find us.’

You know why it’s called a desert don’t you? The clue is in the name.

The story is a couple are driving, somewhere, with their young daughter but they get car trouble and stop off at an old house. Here they meet a man named Torgo, and after establishing they won’t be able to go anywhere that night they agree to stay the night in the house.

Now Torgo is a creepy looking guy with inflated knees (hunchbacks are so cliché) with a staff that has a hand at the top and has spasms that making it look like he’s masturbating. He is constantly referring to ‘The Master’ and how ‘he won’t like you staying here.’ Would you stay in a place like that with a weird guy like Torgo? At least he has his own slightly comical theme music.

‘The Master’ as it turns out is, well I don’t know what he is really. He sleeps through the day like a vampire but he never drinks any blood. He has a robe with handprints on it but it looks more like he’s wearing two beach towels. He has six wives who stand still all the day, which is the best acting you will see here. The Master wakes them up and instantly regrets as they all start chatting amongst themselves while he can’t get a word in him.

Turns out they are all worshippers of Manos, some evil God thing, and are debating whether they should kill the family. Then a Royal Rumble breaks out amongst the women, which is what I imagine happens whenever any group of 3 or more women get together. Well it does in films. This goes on for ages and resolves absolutely nothing.

The rest of the film revolves around the family’s attempt to escape the cult. There is an entirely pointless scene with two cops who hear two gun shots. They move five feet from their car, wave their flashlight (which looks more like a miniature dildo) and that’s enough for them. They get in their car and drive away. Thanks. For. That.

The ending is obvious to anyone but it takes so long to get there with awful jazz music in the background. A chore does not begin to describe it.

The Manos story doesn’t end there though. Thanks to a kickstarter campaign from actress Jackey Neyman (who plays Debbie in Manos), a sequel is scheduled to be released in November 2016, just in time for the 50^th anniversary.

IMDB Bottom 100: Number 15 - Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2

Number 15: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 (2004)

Wow, what an incredible movie.

When I looked at its IMDB page I was shocked when I saw it hadn’t won any Oscars. This film was released in theatres on 27^th August 2004 but the Best Film award at the 2005 awards was given to Million Dollar Baby. And Baby Geniuses 2 wasn’t even nominated. What a disgrace, the Academy should be ashamed. Million Dollar Baby indeed with its coherent story, focus on characterisation and good acting.

I just hope Clint Eastwood done the decent thing and handed back all his awards, he knows he doesn't deserve them.

But seriously, this film sucks. Everything about it is wrong, just look at the title it's the wrong way round. Conventional film titling is you put the franchise name before the subtitle, so it should be called Baby Geniuses 2: Superbabies. If they can't even get that right, what hope for the rest of it?

I am just grateful this is the only one in the series I have to watch, there are actually 5 Baby Genius films but all with different casts of babies in them. Because babies are unreliable as actors with their habit of getting older all the time. It is a problem in this film as well as sometimes the babies are noticeably bigger in some scenes than in others.

The whole thinking behind these films though is crass in its simplicity. I can imagine the production meeting:

Big Producer Man: So, any ideas?

Assistant #1: Well, our research shows people are quite fond of babies.

Big Producer Man: Really? Whatever for? They just cry, shit and piss a lot.

Assistant #1: People think they’re cute.

Assistant #2: And Rugrats was very successful for Nickelodeon.

Big Producer Man: We can exploit this. Let’s put babies on screen for 90minutes and make a film around it. And we’ll ‘borrow’ the idea of babies talking to each other. We got anything else?

Assistant #2: Well, Clint Eastwood has submitted us a script about an old boxing trainer who reluctantly takes a young woman under his wing.

Big Producer Man: Like that would ever be successful. No, brainless baby movies it is.

And that’s how it happened.

The ‘story’ here is something about a mind control pulse, a legendary child who protects the world’s children but is actually 70, babies get superpowers and the least emotional reunion between a mother and son ever captured on film.

To be honest, I was trying not to pay too much attention because I was scared my brain cells would melt if I did.

So yeah, it’s pretty bad.

IMDB Bottom 100: Number 16 - Humshakals

Number 16: Humshakals (2014)

Interesting thing about this one.

When I first downloaded The List this one was simply titled ‘Doublegangers’. I have to track these films down so I can watch them and a title like that will bring up some, interesting results. And not ones I particularly want on my search history.

Luckily, this isn’t a Premier League footballer’s favourite fetish movie but actually a more innocent Bollywood movie about lookalikes, which presumably should have been ‘Doppelgangers’ but was mistranslated to a more suggestive title.

I almost wish it was a porno as at least that would be easier to explain and this one makes my head spin just thinking about it.

Primarily set in London, there’s billionaire Ashok (Saif Ali Khan) aided by his best friend Kumar (Ritesh Deshmukh) who dreams of being a stand-up comedian. Unfortunately, he sucks. I think I’ve spotted one of his problems though, he’s telling jokes in Hindi to a mainly white, British audience. British people won't even learn French, no way will they learn an Indian language fluently to the point of understanding set-up and punchline.

He has a problem though in the form of his Uncle Kans who wants to take over the family business so creates a drug that makes Ashok and Kumar temporarily think they’re dogs. Just go with it. This gets them put in a mental hospital and allows Kans to take control of the business. If you’re hoping this plays out like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, you will be sorely disappointed.

This is where it gets complicated, two genuine loons are also in the hospital who look identical (well they should, they are the same actors) and are also called Ashok and Kumar. Thanks to a mix-up so obvious they might as well have put a massive sign saying ‘IDENTITY CONFUSION HAPPENS NOW’ as the loons are released with the real Ashok and Kumar staying in the hospital. In a sense, they done exactly that with a snippet of song saying that’s exactly what happens.

The loons are picked up and brought to the real Ashok’s mansion, which they think is all part of a popular reality show where ordinary people are allowed to live like millionaires for a week. Trust me, it makes sense in the film. Sort of.

The real Ashok and Kumar meanwhile are trying to deal with the hospital warden, who is really subtly portrayed as being a cruel, dictator figure. Not really, they put him in an SS uniform and he refers to Adolf Hitler as ‘Uncle’. Yes, he really does.

They do find out their Uncle Kans is responsible for their incarceration but more incredibly, there is a lookalike of their Uncle in the hospital too.

And this is where I tune out. Various schemes are planned up to regain control of the company, lots of identity confusion where it’s hard to keep tabs of who is the real one and who is the duplicate. A third set of duplicates are added (triplicates?) because two sets of each character wasn’t enough. There’s a Prince Charles lookalike. Except it’s the real Prince Charles. If he was a cockney.

It all works out in the end.

I’ve tried to condense this down to just the key plot points but there is so much going on here. I haven’t mentioned the trio of beautiful ladies who are the love interests of the film, the drug dealer responsible for loony Ashok and Kumar being put in the asylum to begin with, one of the lookalikes severe OCD issues. I haven’t mentioned any of the “hilarious” scenes the director Sajid Khan (whom from what I can tell has a reputation for being a bit of a hack) thought would sell the movie. The warden’s torture method of making inmates watch Himmatwala…hey, hey, hey, hey! No spoilers! That one’s for later.

The music videos are actually a welcome break in this film, they gave me a chance to sort out what was happening in the film in my head. Though one of the songs as far as I can tell was all about creating a personal ring tone. Deep stuff.

I need to stop now. My head hurts thinking about it all. So many questions of identity. I mean, am I really me?

I don’t know anymore.

IMDB Bottom 100: Number 17 - United Passions

Number 17: United Passions (2014)

I have been looking forward to this one.

Ever since I first looked at the list of the films, this was the one that jumped out. As a big football fan, it was inevitable I’d have to watch this film at some point. A film made for $30 million but returned just $607 at the box office. A film that star Tim Roth described as ‘a crap movie I did for the money.’

In part a FIFA biopic, in others a biopic of one Joseph ‘Sepp’ Blatter. At time of writing, Mr Blatter is up to his eyeballs in allegations of corruption, receiving illegal payments and new charges coming seemingly every day. If you’re reading this in the future, he may be sitting in a prison cell right now or he may have got away scot-free (though personally, my money is on the former).

I’ll fill in the early part of the movie but if you want to know, 56:34 is when Blatter comes into it.

It starts in 1904, with the coming together of the heads of various football variations across the world to form a global governing body of football. An invitation to join is given to the English FA but as the inventors of the game, they turn up their noses at the chance to join this little organisation. The English are probably the closest this film has to villains, being portrayed as arrogant, snobbish, racist and sexist. Which to be fair, may well have been true of the gentlemen in question.

The group is formed anyway, taking the name ‘Federation of International Football Associations’ (it is implied the ‘Football Association’ part of the name was a deliberate slight against the English FA). It is actually interesting to see throughout the film how FIFA grew from one small room in Paris to the vast, lavish headquarters it now has in Zurich.

Skip on a few years and we meet now President of FIFA, Jules Rimet played by Gerard Depardieu. This covers the period between 1924-1950. It starts with Rimet’s attempts to launch the first World Cup tournament in Uruguay. They present it as fairly straightforward here but in reality it was fairly shambolic with countries withdrawing (only 13 out of 24 invited took part) and stadiums barely finished on time. Heck that would make for a film of itself.

It’s a success but FIFA is still considered a small time organisation at this point and limps along. Tensions rise throughout the Thirties between Rimet and the Italian and German delegates as real world politics threaten to tear the world apart.

Skip forward to 1942, and they tell what is known in football folklore as the ‘Death Match’. It’s the story of a Ukranian youth side in Kiev who played a team of German soldiers. They were supposed to lose the game but ended up winning the game 5-3 to the delight of the watching crowd. The Ukranian players were believed to have been executed soon after. Much of this is now believed to be myth but what is true is that it showed the power sport can have as an inspiration for an oppressed people. On a lighter note, it was the inspiration for Escape to Victory (though that is actually a more brutal film than many remember. Irish international Kevin O’Callaghan deliberately breaking his own arm anyone?).

Happier times come with the 1950 World Cup in Brazil. This is Rimet’s last World Cup as FIFA president, though he still has time to thank the English for ‘joining our little organisation’. Which is a nice call back to an earlier conversation. Or at least it would be if Rimet had actually been present for that conversation.

And this is where the film should have ended. This should have been the film, the life of Jules Rimet, the visionary who launched a tournament nobody thought would succeed, ending in front of a crowd of over 100,000 people at the Macarena stadium in Brazil with millions more following the game around the globe. It’s a shame about everything that follows, as the first half of this film is actually really good.

There is a bit of filler until we reach the year 1974, when we have our main event. Enter Sepp Blatter (Tim Roth) and the film becomes his vanity piece.

The FIFA president is now Joao Havelange, Blatter’s mentor and a man some believe to have been even more corrupt. He’s played by Sam Neill, who speaks with a Brazilian-Portuguese accent whenever he remembers to.

FIFA is in trouble, they are losing money. Only one man can save them: Super-Sepp! You see, he has an ‘ability for finding money’ (films words). He can ‘create new revenue streams’ (films words).

See how Super-Sepp saves the world of football as he:

• -          Brings football to Africa and Asia
• -          Saves FIFA brokering deals with Adidas and Coca-Cola, just by asking for it
• -          Tackles corruption in FIFA by not actually doing anything

Now to give Blatter his dues, in his time as FIFA Secretary General and later President, football has grown massively in Africa and Asia. Women’s football is the biggest it’s ever been. Whether Blatter can take as much personal credit as he does here though is highly questionable.

FIFA is more profitable now than it’s ever been but again that’s more down to its business practices where the host country of a World Cup pay all the costs but FIFA take all the profits.

And corruption. Blatter talks big about corruption in the film, how the gravy train is over but again, he doesn’t actually do anything about it. Maybe this was the film-makers subtle hint to the audience that Blatter is either a liar or an idiot.

Corruption within FIFA was the world’s biggest open-secret, everyone in football knew about it. Where they went wrong though, was screwing over the USA for the 2018 World Cup. Screwing over little European nations is fine but you don’t fuck with America. God bless you, America!

All that remains to be seen is how much Blatter was personally involved.

The film, first half was good but very poor display in the second half. Substituting Rimet for Blatter was a bad idea. The boy Blatter was brought on to be a hero but at the end of the day, his performance left much to be desired.

I'll leave the last word to Tim Roth:

IMDB Bottom 100: Number 18 - Gunday

Number 18: Gunday (2014)

How best to describe this Bollywood offering?

I’d say Gunday is like The Krays meets Scarface with a big serving of rom-com thrown in the mix. And that is as bad as it sounds.

The first thing I want to mention is the music because out of everything this is what bothered me most. Calling it background music would be inappropriate, as this is very much foreground music. It drowns out everything else on screen, dialogue is barely audible. Ok, I have to watch with subtitles anyway but it’s still distracting. It’s not even good music, they just gave some children a variety of instruments and told them to make some random noises.

Ok, plot and this will require a brief history lesson first. In 1971, Bangladesh won independence from Pakistan following a bloody conflict. The aftermath of this with the drawing up of new borders meant in the region of two million people were ‘displaced’. Amidst this turmoil is where our two heroes come in, as two young orphan boys (Bikram and Bala) who have escaped into a refugee camp in India. They do various jobs such as gun smuggling for one of the guards but this arrangement goes pear shaped when one of them is pimped out (Bala I think) for some child abuse.

They kill the abuser and escape to Calcutta where they begin their criminal empire. It seems to be built around stealing coal from trains. British Gas gone gangster. They become the biggest gangsters in Calcutta and grow up into male models, who like nothing more than to run merrily across the plains together (which is kind of true). Bikram (Ranveer Singh) rather reminds me of Steve Coogan character Tony Ferrino. 

Hey, maybe thats one I can pitch to Steve Coogan, Tony Ferrino gets mistaken for a crime boss and is put in prison. Meanwhile, the crime boss is living Tony's life as an international singing sensation but even more annoyingly, is getting better reviews than Tony ever did.

Back to Gunday and a police detective (Irrfan Khan) is put on their tail of the dynamic duo to bring them down. And that's as far as character development goes for him. Seriously, he should act as their nemesis but all we know about him is he exists.

Clearly this first 30 minutes was too grim for a Bollywood movie, so the crime gets parked for the next hour and the film turns into a rom-com. Both guys fall for dancer Nandita, played by the impossibly beautiful Priyanka Chopra. So Bikram and Bala both try various things to impress her, including dancing with a fish. Yeah. That happened. More amazing than that, it seemed to work. So next time you guys want to attract a girl in a nightclub, bring a fish with you.

It all goes a bit pear-shaped when a visit to the cinema ends with Bala shooting a guy. He has to leave Calcutta while the heat is on. This opens the path for Bikram to have Nandita all to himself. Bala hears of this and gets pissed off so he returns to Calcutta to confront Bikram. They have a fight in a warehouse which looks like it came out of a Marvel movie. It’s a good thing they both remembered to oil their chests beforehand. Otherwise the whole thing would have looked ridiculous.

Actually, the Marvel comparison is quite appropriate as a lot of the time it does seem like they are being presented as superheroes.

After a revelation about Nandita that comes as a shock to nobody, the police now feel they have enough evidence to take the not-quite-brothers down.

The two are re-united as they have one final showdown with the police but still make time for a last oiled up run together.

At two and a half hours, it feels short for a Bollywood film but at least 30 minutes too long for anywhere else. It always feels to me when watching Bollywood stuff that every scene could have been done in half the time. I guess that’s just their style.

The uneven tone of going between gritty crime thriller and whimsical romantic comedy does the film no favours. If it knew what it wanted to be this could have been ok but as it is, Gunday comes off as an awful mess.

With awful music. Awful, awful music.