#10: J. Edgar
While Clint Eastwood's biopic J. Edgar is a good film for the most part, it suffers from the same problem as many other biopics. Namely, refusing to take a side. While the majority of the film works, the ending feels lacking and leaves the audience hanging. This lack of direct characterization makes for a disappointing movie-experience.
#9: Rise of the Planet of the Apes
I remember reading something about a tentative Planet of the Apes prequel a couple of years ago, but I did not know about this movie until I saw a poster last January. This worried me. A lack of marketing led me to believe that the film would be rushed and that it would only be a cheap cash-in. I was wrong. This is a good movie, but it suffers from the horrible problem of constantly referencing the classic film. This gets very annoying very fast.
#8: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
I would have enjoyed this as a four hour film, but I guess that a lot of people don't want to sit through that. The problem with this is the same as the problem with part 1, this isn't a complete movie. It is always a bad idea to split a story in two parts. it messed up this movie and it will mess up The Hobbit. The first film was painfully dull, and this one had no real story to it other than a series of battles. I imagine that in the intervening year most people have forgotten what happened in part 1.
#7: Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol
Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol is a fun movie, but falls into the traps of all spy-thrillers. It attempts to parody the ridiculous films of its genre, but by the end it is doing exactly what it had parodied. Another problem with this film is the ending, which is forcibly sentimental and completely pointless. The film fails at balancing humor and action with drama. Good in small dosages, but a bit too much in the end.
#6: Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
The fourth film in the Pirates of the Caribbean series is... well it isn't the third one, that's good. This movie has fun, but again we have an incredibly weak ending. It also has no real link to the other three aside from Johnny Depp, which leads me to question what the point of this entry in the series is. It is based on a book which had nothing to do with the other films, so why not just adapt the book in its own film? Johnny Depp isn't bad in the film, but the Jack Sparrow character is getting old. Not to mention a plethora of inexplicable plot twists, such as Black Beard's bizarre magical powers.
#5: Super 8
Super 8 has a lot of potential to it. The problem comes as soon as the audience is allowed to see the alien creature, in all of its ill-designed glory. This ruins the mystery of the creature and its intentions. One would think that after Cloverfield, bad though it was, JJ Abrams would know when not to show the monster. It is also overly sentimental, and contains some appalling performances on the part of the children.
#4: New Years Eve
This was one of the more painful experiences of recent memory. By my count, this film contains 8 stories. Of these, I will say that 3 were mildly enjoyable and the rest are terrible. This film gave us: Bon Jovi singing terrible songs, Robert De Niro in a bland and forgettable part, cheap romance, awful jokes, every cliche in the book, and sympathy-garnering gimmicks that are the absolute dirtiest tricks available to film. this movie is about horrible, vapid people being horrible and vapid.
#3: Source Code
Yet another "science is evil" movie. The de-facto villain of this film is the scientist who insists on keeping comatose Jake Gyllenhaal alive in order to test his amazing and revolutionary "source code" device. For whatever reason, he is vilified for wanting to test this machine on the only person he know it works on. Why is he the villain? Because no matter how much good this device may do, it seems wrong to keep Jake alive as a guinea pig. How incredibly vain of Mr. Gyllenhaal's character.
#2: Green Lantern
I did not see this movie in 3D, and it still gave me a headache. The problem? Painfully bright effects and two bad villains. The first villain is Hector Hammond, whose increasing intellect is causing his body to suffer. Maybe this is just me, but I don't enjoy seeing Ryan Reynolds punch a wheelchair-bound man out. The second villain is the monster Parallax, who is yet another terrible CGI monstrosity. basically a giant fiery octopus, Parallax comes out of nowhere in the last 15 minutes and is quickly beaten. This film had potential. As a comic-book fan, and a Green Lantern fan, I know that the hero can make for a good film. Hell, he did make for a good film. It was called Green Lantern: First Flight and it was excellent. This though? This was a disappointment.
#1: Anonymous
This is probably not the worst film of the year. In fact, it is probably not the worst film that I saw this year. But it is the only film that actively made me angry. What's more, it was proud of making me angry. Let me start by saying that they are wrong, and Edward de Vere did not write any of Shakespeare's work. But, I concede, it could make for an interesting story. Only this film, it does not know how to tell a story. Lackluster performances only worsen the confusing timeline-jumps that plague this mess. It is confusing, not worth the effort that it takes to follow. I hate this movie. It is a symbol of intellectual-imperialism and pig-headed arrogance. It is, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the most loathsome film of the year.
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