The Gunslinger45's top 12 Biggest Film Disappointments

Hello MoFo’s! It has been a while since I did a list. Now I have already done my favorite movies list (and updated it a few times). I have done my favorite directors, film scores, film openings; to non movie lists like my favorite video games and anime. Hell I got a thread about my favorite guns. Because what is a gunslinger without a list of his favorite firearms.

But I am going in a different direction this time. I have done the films that I love and adore. Now I want to a list about the movies that after viewing I turned my head to the sky and said… meh. These are not necessarily BAD movies (thought a few you could argue that). But these are the films that for one reason or another I was hyped to see, only to have them fall short. These are my TOP 12 Film Disappointments!

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Fear and Loathing in MoFo... The Gunslinger 45's Top 50 Favorite Films

In the 10 Ring: Gunslinger45's reviews

I'm already disappointed.

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Then stick around. I am sure to piss off more then a few people here.

12. Fight Club / Oldboy



WAIT!

Before you get the pitchforks out and start trying to burn my windmill, allow me to say this. These were disappointments yes,



I SAID WAIT!

BUT they were so NOT BECAUSE OF THE FILMS THEMSELVES. They were disappointments because of SPOLIERS!

Allow me to explain. Both films revolve around a very prominent twist toward the end of their run times. And a REALLY good twist can really enhance a movie. But the twist needs to be a good one (see Hitchcock) and not lame (post 6th Sense Shyamalan). And if you spoil that twist, the movie suffers. At least for me it does.

Oldboy I had heard of but never seen. However I heard enough about it that I knew that one certain topic was a heavy theme of the flick. I also knew the movie had a twist ending. Add these two things together and I was able to figure out the twist pretty early in the movie. Now if I had gone in completely blind and without ANY knowledge of the film at all, I probably would have really liked the movie. But because I did not, the movie which is good really did not resonate with me. Now the fight scene in the hallway with the hammer is still great, the choreography is good, and the technical aspects are very good; but because of what I had known, the twist was not shocking as it should have been.

Fight Club fell into the same boat with one slight difference. My older brother was telling me about the movie and he flat out told me the twist. I heard this twist when I was in high school. But after my brother gave the twist ending away, I never bothered to see the movie until damn near a decade later when I joined MoFo. Still a good movie, but again it does nothing for me because the twist was ruined. I know a lot of people LOVE Fight Club and a lot of people like to say it is their favorite film, one of their favorite films, and I have talked to people who have said it was the movie that made them look at movies differently. Then again they probably saw the movie without knowing what the twist was. So thanks big bro for screwing that up for me.

I can think of way more than 12 disappointing films. One that made my top 10 just yesterday was Police Academy. I expected so much more, and was given so much less.

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You had high expectations of Police Academy?

I expected it to be another funny '80s comedy like Airplane, The Naked Gun, or even Weekend At Bernie's. But the humor was flat and plain silly. People have talked about it over the years, and it was a hit when I was in high school.

You know I consider both of those movies disappointments as well, even though I like them.

So... just like those other movies you listed, then?

Don't blame me, blame my older brother!

No. The other movies were more clever...better written. In comparison to Police Academy that is.

11. Suicide Squad

The most recent entry on this list. Now after I saw Man of Steel I was so pissed off I skipped seeing Dawn of Justice. Then again I had little hope for MoS in the first place after I saw the trailers. And for a guy who grew up watching ANY comic book movie from the Richard Donner Superman movie to both Reb Brown Captain America movies; when I skip a comic book movie it’s kinda a big deal. And the new DC movie universe got off to a terrible start. That being said when I heard they were making a Suicide Squad movie and the writer and director was David Ayer; I got interested. I love Ayer as a director. The man wrote Training Day, wrote the screenplay to SWAT, wrote and directed End of Watch, directed Street Kings, and directed Sabotage. I am a fan. So to see they guy get the shot at a comic book movie I was pumped. I became even MORE pumped after the trailers dropped. I thought to myself “Holy crap! I might actually see a good DCU movie!” I bought my ticket, saw it, and was really disappointed.

Now the acting I had no issues with. Well for the most part. The casting was very good, but holy CRAP was the writing bad. And this is David Ayer, I KNOW he writes good stuff. The man wrote Training Day! But the movie felt like it was on fast forward! The pace was break neck when it needed to slow down at times and establish this group as a collective unit and not just a pack of criminals shoved into a bad situation. I needed more character motivations, I DESPERATELY needed more back story on villains, I needed more back story on some of the team members, and I needed less tattoos on the Joker.

And why the hell is Amanda Waller so damn skinny in this movie? I blame the Nu 52 for this BS. In the Nu 52 reboot of the DC universe they made Amanda Waller; a smart, cunning, and ruthless FAT black woman into a skinny hot busty black woman. What the hell? We can’t have a government intelligence be a big girl? Look I ain’t a fragile crying SJW snowflake crying on Tumblr, but what was wrong with Amanda Waller being fat? Why change the character? The character was a damn good one. Why did we need to slim down Amanda Waller? Was it the artists thinking that to appeal to 13 year old boys they can’t have a fat character? Or would it because the character would be a unique figure be drawn and not just flat out traced. I don’t know but DC lost my business with that crappy reboot. Viola Davis is a great actor but she is just too damn skinny to be Waller. What the hell people?! Now I could go on about the Nu 52 and why it sucked, and how they messed up Jaime Reyes as the Blue Beetle, and why the hell Barbra Gordon can walk when The Killing Joke is still cannon, but that would take way too long.

The movie needed an extra 30 to 45 minutes to flesh out the story. And I can’t say that this was a new issue. Man of Steel was crammed with way too much story and not a lot of time, but that movie was around 2 hours and 30 minutes or so. This movie was closer to two hours. If they added an extra 30 minutes and added a few more scenes I think it would have really improved on the movie. But they didn’t and the movie just plain suffers for it. A+ in marketing, but a C- in execution of the movie.

Yeah but I don't want to do THAT many write ups.

I still remember seeing the first teaser trailer for SS thinking it was going to be the comic book film to end them all. I have to admit, I liked the film, but I really thought it was going to be something terrific and great at one point when they advertised it as something dark that reflected the nature of the characters it depicted. Never mind.

I'm trying now not to get my hopes up too much for Wonder Woman

It's more the concept itself than any specific entries.

That being said, I'd argue against the idea that Fight Club "revolves around" its twist. Oldboy is set up to be a mystery from the beginning so its twists are naturally going to be integral to its plot in a way that those in Fight Club aren't.

Not interested in Suicide Squad at all.

Sometimes negative threads generate more discussion.

Fair enough. But after finally seeing Fight Club after the twist, it just killed the movie for me.

10. 8 ˝

I could just put Fellini here in general. I just can’t connect to his films. But the biggest disappointment for me was when I tried to watch 8 ˝. A film that not only many argue is his best, but one of the best films of all time. Now I am no stranger to the art house and their aesthetics. And I have enjoyed foreign films from Japanese, the Czech Republic, Sweden, France, USSR, Hong Kong, China, and fair Italy. But I just could not get into one of their most famous and one of their most celebrated directors. And to top it off I know of many people who love and adore this film; especially from people who are artist and filmmakers, and quite a few critics. But I think that might be the major failing of why I can’t connect to this movie.

This movie is a pseudo autobiographical film for Fellini dealing with a creative stagnant. Director’s block. He is struggling with this throughout the film all the while we peek into his dreams in a few surreal sequences. And that is the crux of my disconnect with the film. I am not an artist. I have never suffered from writer’s block, director’s block, or any other kind of creative block. Now sure I write movie reviews, but I write on stuff I feel I have a lot to say about. If I don’t I don’t do a review on it and might write a few sentences in the “Rate the Last movie you saw” thread. And it is not like I write reviews as a job, this is a hobby. No I have no dead lines to meet and have pretty much free reign on my reviews. The main character is a professional artist. If he does not create, he does not eat. So he has to press himself. This leads to anxiety and the conflict of the film. One I just can’t connect to. Now could it be that i just can't connect with Fellini's style? Sure. Then again I thought La Strada was at least good even if I did not care for his other films that I saw. But this one was the biggest disappointment for me. Not bad, but just not for me.