Screenhead

Prepare to disagree with the following list. Of all the great films, some underrated, some overrated, some forgotten, we’ve selected ten which have been overrated not only by audiences but by critics as well. Bare in mind that we do not consider these films bad, not by any means, but they’re not as good as people say they are either.

10. Casino Royale.

This is where the Bond franchise died. No, Casino Royale isn’t where it was “reborn” as many have suggested, but where the soul of James Bond was finally laid to rest. By trying to be “realistic” like most other action thrillers these days (e.g. The Bourne movies), the filmmakers stripped the movie everything that made 007 cool. The gadgets. The one-liners. The humor. The over the top villains.

Casino Royale wasn’t there to resurrect Bond, it was there to sell products — Sony products — which got as much screen time as many actors. James Bond is no longer a cool secret agent. He’s a spokesperson for Sony.

9. Gran Torino

Essentially the same character Clint Eastwood played in Million Dollar Baby, an old, grumpy white-guy, this time stuck in a banal and unrealistic plot, not to mention the horrid acting from the supporting cast, which seem lost in their lines and the English language as well.

Eastwood himself is as great as he always was, despite replaying a character found in many of his films, including Million Dollar Baby, True Crime and even Absolute Power.

Gran Torino is not only unrealistic, it lacks a coherent plot and relies too much on the sentimental stuff. Worst of all, it’s a waste of talent such as Eastwood’s.

8. The Departed

One, it’s a knock-off remake of a Hong Kong action thriller Infernal Affairs, and by definition, should have never been allowed to win a Best Picture Oscar. Two, it’s the quintessential anti-Scorsese film; doesn’t feature any of his trademark style nor substance.

Besides the good performances by DiCaprio and Damon, which make up for the Bostonian-alike Marc Walhberg, who’s lines nor character make any sense, The Departed is nothing but truckload of fake-Boston accents with no Scorsese-feel whatsoever.

The Oscar he won is mostly because he was neglected so many times for so many great films.

7: Crash

Cliched plots? Check! Cliched characters? Check! Constantly remind the audience that racism is bad? Double check! Crash, while not a bad movie, is on the other hand, constantly repeating the same message over and over again: racism is bad. Racism is bad. Yeah, we know, so what else you got?

Instead of repeating the same message in several different stories, a better alternative would’ve been one story, for instance, the battle Terrence Howard’s character go through — a great performance by a great actor and solid writing as well — but overshadowed and undermined by the rest of the huge cast which shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

6: Sin City

All looks and no substance is a phrase that’s dealt out to lots of films. And it should be likewise applied to Sin City, while featuring a great noir look and style, falls flat with one-dimensional characters and no coherent plot nor theme that binds them together. Neither do the characters do much besides looking cool and feature a few snappy lines — the main selling point of the film, and the reason so many fanboys eagerly watched it.

“Jessica Alba pole-dancing? Greatest film ever!” is probably a phrase that went through the minds of a lot of the audience slightly older than the R-rating allowed for the admission for the film.

5: Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Brad Pitt, David Fincher and $150 million dollars. What could possibly go wrong? Well, throw in an impossible and unrealistic story and you’ll see how much can go wrong. The film pays an incredible attention to detail, accurately portraying the style and the world at the time, but it doesn’t matter as there isn’t really anything under the hood. A guy ages backwards. Ok. And then what happens? Well, not much.

The movie strongly resembles another film that Ben Button screewriter Eric Roth did a decade ago, called “Forest Gump”. And unlike Forest Gump, which was perfectly paced and structured, Ben Button goes on forever and completely loses the track of whatever story it had going on in the beginning.

4: 300

All looks and no substance, once again. 300 did look great. So great that it actually resembled the comic book. But the characters, besides the abs and the screaming retarded one-liners? Flat. Boring. One dimensional.

The movies was, for the most part, a frame for frame interpretation of the comic book, featuring the same style, setting, and framing. Since that was the case, why was a director needed in the first place? A 14-year old kid with a 2-day course in film making could’ve directed 300, as there was no need for any creative input. Just make sure the scene looks like the comic books trip and yell “action”.

3: Iron Man

One of the most unrealistic comic book films of the decade, if not the most unrealistic. Granted, it’s a comic book movie and realism isn’t supposed to be the top priority, but the main plot, which centers around the main character who’s got a miniature fusion reactor stuck to his chest in order to prevent pieces of metal to penetrate his heart? And that this fusion reactor can be assembled in a cave in Afghanistan? And that Iron Man can fly halfway around the world using rockets in his feet, but no rocket fuel?

All this and more adds up and completely overshadows the great performances by Robert Downey Jr. and Jeff Bridges. And one again, it’s popularity and success was determined by the hype surrounding it, not proper film making. Or a sense of realism for that matter.

2: Star Trek

Strip away all the great stuff that made vintage Star Trek great, replace it by JJ Abrams flawed vision of “sci-fi” and “time travel”, add a cast of pre-puberty, high-pitch voiced actors and you’ll get Star Trek 2009. Maliciously crafted so it has as a broad appeal as possible, to sell as many tickets to as wide an audience as possible. Some action for the boys, some love for the girls, some quasi intellectual sci-fi nonsense for the “hardcore” fans.

It’s pop sci-fi at its worst, High School Musical meets Lost. Completely deprived of soul and art, it mostly resembles a German car: great engineering, no passion.

1: The Dark Knight

It was raved by everyone, and eventually went on to gross $500 million. Most people though, especially fan boys, were utterly blinded to see its massive flaws. Morgan Freeman’s character provides Batman with all the gadgets he needs to kill everyone he deems bad, but draws the line when it comes to surveillance? The Joker, poised as a lunatic who works alone, yet has a whole army of folks who even mange to plant tons of explosives at a hospital and no one notices? The two ferries, one loaded with prisoners and the other with civilians, have to decide whether to push the button and blow each other up, but don’t consider jumping off the boats?

It’s plot holes 101, the first thing every screenwriting class is thought. The Dark Knight, while overall a respectable and entertaining film, features too many inconsistencies to be regarded as one of the “best films ever”, as many are quick to point out. They’re wrong.

To contact the author of this article, write to jamesxhyde(at)gmail.com.

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