The 5 Most Disappointing Films Of 2017
While there were several exceptional films last year, there was also an abundance of steamy crap too. Generally, a rotten film can be easily sniffed out (like The Emoji Movie, The Dark Tower, or CHiPs), so some bullets can easily be avoided; however, there are a few occasions where a film's marketing can get you excited for what they already know is a muggy mound of unacceptable trash. There are also a handful of screenwriters and directors attached to projects that get you pumped, and then ultimately disappointed. We've already shared our favorite films from last year with you, and now it's time to share our picks for the worst.
This is a list of the top five films that disappointed us the most, not a list of the objectively worst. These are films that had us pumped and didn't deliver, films that had better trailers than the finished products, films that promised something and didn't fully deliver...
- 5: Bright
When we first saw the trailer for Netflix's Bright we were thoroughly intrigued. Max Landis and David Ayer can be a wishy washy associations to any project, which should've tipped us off that it might be a dud, but the trailer seemed promising so we pushed any negative feelings to the wayside. What we thought we'd get was a fantastical buddy cop film with fantasy-rooted racial commentary; what we got was an unimaginative, uninspired tawdry mashing of genre and ideas that fails to deliver the goods as a hardboiled R-rated cop film or a fantasy driven sci-fi film. Even then, it didn't totally disappoint us — we debated the film previously — but regardless of how you receive it, we can agree that it fell supremely short of our expectations.
- 4: The Belko Experiment
Our first peak at The Belko Experiment was a trailer that looked like Battle Royal in an office. It even featured Battle Royale’s "Requiem, Dies irae" as the trailer song. We hoped for more with James Gunn attached...but no, all we got was Battle Royale in an office with very little nuance or innovation. We would've maybe given it more points if we didn’t already have 4 Hunger Games movies...PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds game...and dozens of other retreaded properties leeching off Battle Royale's excellence. Earlier this year, we wrote an article on the top 5 films that prove the workplace can be murder and shoehorned The Belko Experiment on that list; however, this year's Mayhem would more appropriately fit the bill. If Belko looked appetizing to you and you haven't seen it, check out Mayhem instead.
- 3: A Cure For Wellness
The trailer for Gore Verbinski's A Cure For Wellness promised a David Fincher-esque horror film, complete with weird visuals and a mystery at the core. The actuality of the film is that it's a two and a half hour slog of unlikeable characters, sterile visuals, and a boring, easily predictable plot. It brought to mind a few neo-noir films operating within a similar domain: Matin Scorsese’s Shutter Island and Samuel Fuller’s Shock Corridor, which we'd recommend over this bloated and boring stinker. A Cure for Wellness will literally turn you ill — and not in a "sick" or "rad" sense — so listen to your M.D. and stay far, far away.
- 2: The Killing of a Sacred Deer
We're pretty much to the point where we feel comfortable saying that Yorgos Lanthimos is the most frustrating filmmaker working today. He has very clear cinematic prowess, yet the stories he chooses to tell and the decisions he makes as a director do not do his skills justice. 2016's The Lobster didn't work at all for us, and while The Killing of a Sacred Deer worked a little more, it's still not enough of an improvement to herald it as "good". The trailers for the film vowed to deliver a peculiar and unsettling experience, but the film spoils all the mystic and fizzles out into a climax of complete lackluster. It's clear that Lanthimos is being championed by some (although we've never met one in person), but we definitely don't see what all the fuss is about.
Before we get to our #1 pick, we'd like to acknowledge the films that weren't quite as disappointing to make our top 5:
- Last Flag Flying
- Downsizing
- Beatriz At Dinner
- The Justice League
- Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets
- Life
- It Stains the Sands Red
Without further ado, our pick for the most disappointing film of 2017 goes to...
- 1: The Bad Batch
On the surface, there's a lot to get excited about with The Bad Batch. All you need to do is glance at the cast list (which boasts names like Jim Carrey and Keanu Reeves), see that Annapurna and Vice are attached, and take a gander at the trailer (which makes the film look like a grand cinematic spectacle). However, the reality here is that there's little to nothing to get jazzed about with Ana Lily Amirpour's new film. Essentially, it's long-winded music video of pseudo-interesting images, devoid of substance, meaning or plot. With a nearly 2 hour runtime, it plays like an extremely dull, directionless meandering toward flat and weak conclusion. The film doesn't know what it wants to be, and fails to do much of anything in its own pallid confusion, which is why it's our top pick for the most disappointing film of the year.
Well, that's our list! Were we disappointed in a film you're strongly passionate about? Were there any more disappointing films that we left of our list? We want to know. Share your thoughts and feelings in the comments section below, and as always, remember to viddy well!