What Is the Worst Movie You've Ever Seen?

[csyphrett]

Costner was great in Silverado

Kline: You're making a mistake.

Costner: That's what I said.

CES 

[Grailknight]

Costner's baseball movies are very good. Field of Dreams is a classic and Bull Durham and For Love of the Game are both good.

[Pariah]

Kevin Costner was actually fantastic in the last two movies I saw him in: Hidden Figures and Draft Day.

[Pariah]

14 hours ago, Old Man said:

... the book, to which it was only tangentially related. 

 

Oh yeah, that reminds me: Starship Troopers was a horrible, horrible movie.

[Old Man]

24 minutes ago, Pariah said:

 

Oh yeah, that reminds me: Starship Troopers was a horrible, horrible movie.

 

See, I liked Starship Troopers precisely because it parodied the book.

[death tribble]

I read the book and I liked the movie. You could not have done the book version as power armour is not cinematic until they got the idea to do Iron Man they way they did in the Marvel films. You could not do that with multiple actors without really confusing an audience. So cinematic licence. It references Robocop with the dark vein of humour which is a Paul Verhoeven trademark. It has Michael Ironside and Clancy Brown as Zim. So I have no complaints.

[Bazza]

54 minutes ago, Pariah said:

 

Oh yeah, that reminds me: Starship Troopers was a horrible, horrible movie.

 

28 minutes ago, Old Man said:

 

See, I liked Starship Troopers precisely because it parodied the book.

 

See, I liked Starship Troopers... 

[csyphrett]

Starship Troopers is the same as any other adaption of any material.

CES 

[Sundog]

No, can't agree at all. The latest Dune. Or even Lynch's flawed adaptation. These were made with respect for the source material. Likewise Blade Runner.

I have a great deal of respect for Verhoeven - Robocop was a superbly well designed and crafted film. But I can't watch Starship Troopers, because what he did was take Heinlein's  ideas and concepts and take a big dump on them, then post the result to the screen.

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Costner is kind of hit and miss but mostly he's hit and he can be quite good.  He was great in Highwaymen, for example.  I loved him in Tin Cup.  He was a big miss in Postman and Waterworld, sadly, because they were kind of dream projects he had that just failed so bad he'll never get a shot like that again.  I loved him in Silverado, obviously; he seems born to play westerns.

 

The thing is, he's kind of an Eastwood protege in that like Eastwood he buys scripts he loves then makes them when he can get money together.  He's not as talented as Eastwood (and obviously not as experienced) but he is one of the few directors out there doing any sort of original content coming from Hollywood and for that he gets respect from me even when its a fail.

[Matt the Bruins]

Is it fair to name a movie if I walked out during the opening credits? Just a few minutes of Out Cold were enough to convince me that practically anything would be a better use of my time. That's one of very few movies I recall cutting my box office losses on due to lack of enjoyment rather than illness or being traumatized (thanks, Twilight Zone: The Movie!)

 

Of the movies I watched until the end, Stigmata is the one I remember being most disappointed in. I slept through most of The Cider House Rules to the amusement of my ex, but what I recall being awake for seemed good, if slow.

[L. Marcus]

Battlefield Earth. 

[Grailknight]

I forget the names of some of those old spaghetti fantasy flicks that came out in the 80's but the the worst I remember blew its entire budget on the SFX for the laser bow.

 

For modern movies, a three way tie, Prometheus(The stupid, it's everywhere, it burns...), The Last Jedi(Why do you carry all those TIE fighters? Maybe you could give cover to your capital ships or chase down a patchwork fleet and kill it by attrition) and The Rise of Skywalker( Really, these things are supposed to fly all over the galaxy on their own, but they can't figure out how to move to a higher orbit without  external computer control?)

[Spence]

7 hours ago, L. Marcus said:

Battlefield Earth. 

 

oh

oh....

oh.......

 

Curse you L. Marcus! 

 

I had finally forgotten that steaming pile and now you have restored every painful moment to my memory

 

The only movie worse than Starship Troopers on earth.... 

[Michael Hopcroft]

On 3/6/2022 at 8:59 AM, Sundog said:

No, can't agree at all. The latest Dune. Or even Lynch's flawed adaptation. These were made with respect for the source material. Likewise Blade Runner.

I have a great deal of respect for Verhoeven - Robocop was a superbly well designed and crafted film. But I can't watch Starship Troopers, because what he did was take Heinlein's  ideas and concepts and take a big dump on them, then post the result to the screen.

 

Many of those ideas deserved it.  Limiting the franchise to a group of people who had performed a specific set of tasks, and then taking it away from those who were best at them, is the mark of a dictatorshp. His "Moral Philosophy" department at Johnny's school was neither philosophy nor moral. Rather, it was indoctrination -- at least they were open about it though. Everyone is trained to fear or even hate change. Humans had developed weapons capablke of cracking planets open, yet continued to put boots on the ground.

 

Starship Troopers is fun to read, but I question juist ow worth defending its society is. And I can;t decide whether RAH was satirizing other writers or endorsing his ideas as some sort of ideal society.

[Sundog]

1 hour ago, Michael Hopcroft said:

Many of those ideas deserved it.  Limiting the franchise to a group of people who had performed a specific set of tasks, and then taking it away from those who were best at them, is the mark of a dictatorshp. His "Moral Philosophy" department at Johnny's school was neither philosophy nor moral. Rather, it was indoctrination -- at least they were open about it though. Everyone is trained to fear or even hate change. Humans had developed weapons capablke of cracking planets open, yet continued to put boots on the ground.

 

Starship Troopers is fun to read, but I question juist ow worth defending its society is. And I can;t decide whether RAH was satirizing other writers or endorsing his ideas as some sort of ideal society.

 

I always saw it as a set of ideas that Heinlein considered worth talking about. A limited franchise based on voluntary service. A specific ethical/moral position endorsed by the government, which you could reject, but you had to understand. I don't get the "hate change" part - where do you get that? As to taking the franchise away, if you're referring to the fact that officers couldn't vote, neither could enlisted men - the franchise was only offered to people who had completed their service, and officers had voluntarily not done so yet.

 

As to why they still put boots on the ground when they had planet crackers, that's actually addressed in the novel. The Skinny Raid at the beginning of the book is an attempt to pressure the Skinnys into changing sides with military pressure, they don't WANT to do too much damage in a demonstration raid. The second attack, when Rico is an officer, is seeking to take a forward base, so they can't just blast the planet (plus, the planet-crackers aren't ready yet). Rico also notes that Space Force actually DOES think boots on the ground is an obsolete idea. The final attack, on the Arachnid capital, is conducted because the Arahnids have human hostages (and implied to be a large number) present to prevent the Humans just blowing the planet. (We don't see the results, but Word of God is that Rico is killed in the fighting there).

 

If Verhoeven wanted to counter the ideas, he could have adapted a book that was, according to it's author, an answer to Starship Troopers - The Forever War. Instead, he just decided to denigrate the book, it's ideas, it's author and it's fans with ludicrous bombast while not offering one iota of actual response.

 

[Bazza]

These Are The Worst Films Of All Time, According To Rotten Tomatoes

https://www.bleacherbreaker.com/trending/worst-films-of-all-time/

[archer]

2 hours ago, Sundog said:

 

I always saw it as a set of ideas that Heinlein considered worth talking about. A limited franchise based on voluntary service. A specific ethical/moral position endorsed by the government, which you could reject, but you had to understand. I don't get the "hate change" part - where do you get that? As to taking the franchise away, if you're referring to the fact that officers couldn't vote, neither could enlisted men - the franchise was only offered to people who had completed their service, and officers had voluntarily not done so yet.

 

As to why they still put boots on the ground when they had planet crackers, that's actually addressed in the novel. The Skinny Raid at the beginning of the book is an attempt to pressure the Skinnys into changing sides with military pressure, they don't WANT to do too much damage in a demonstration raid. The second attack, when Rico is an officer, is seeking to take a forward base, so they can't just blast the planet (plus, the planet-crackers aren't ready yet). Rico also notes that Space Force actually DOES think boots on the ground is an obsolete idea. The final attack, on the Arachnid capital, is conducted because the Arahnids have human hostages (and implied to be a large number) present to prevent the Humans just blowing the planet. (We don't see the results, but Word of God is that Rico is killed in the fighting there).

 

If Verhoeven wanted to counter the ideas, he could have adapted a book that was, according to it's author, an answer to Starship Troopers - The Forever War. Instead, he just decided to denigrate the book, it's ideas, it's author and it's fans with ludicrous bombast while not offering one iota of actual response.

 

 

Yeah, I'm kind of the opinion that if you buy an intellectual property that you should try to put the author's vision on the screen.

 

Then let the audience debate whether it was a good movie and whether the society as presented held together as a worthwhile idea.

 

Most fictional societies don't because most authors aren't sociologists, political theorists, or public policy wonks. But it's the filmmakers' job to put the author's work on the screen then let the audience members pick it apart at dinner afterward.  

 

I think the society put forth in the Starship Troopers movie was repugnant. It's been too many decades since I've read it to pass judgement on the book, which I barely remember reading as a teen.

[csyphrett]

10 hours ago, Michael Hopcroft said:

Many of those ideas deserved it.  Limiting the franchise to a group of people who had performed a specific set of tasks, and then taking it away from those who were best at them, is the mark of a dictatorshp. His "Moral Philosophy" department at Johnny's school was neither philosophy nor moral. Rather, it was indoctrination -- at least they were open about it though. Everyone is trained to fear or even hate change. Humans had developed weapons capablke of cracking planets open, yet continued to put boots on the ground.

 

Starship Troopers is fun to read, but I question juist ow worth defending its society is. And I can;t decide whether RAH was satirizing other writers or endorsing his ideas as some sort of ideal society.

The idea was if you served anywhere in the government once, you could vote. You couldn't vote if you were on active duty.  Even the disabled could get a job somewhere so they could vote. And people who didn't want to serve the government weren't penalized except they couldn't vote. Rico's old man was rich before he joined the service to fight the arachnids.

 

And anyone will tell you that it doesn't matter if you can crack a planet if you need to hold an area. You need someone on the ground to hold that area. That was why the Death Star was considered a weapon of mass destruction and terror but fairly impractical. They could already glass planets before they built that, but the Emperor wanted something that would blow up a planet at any time as a demonstration of what he had. Troopers were still going to be on the ground to hold planets he didn't feel like blowing up.

CES 

[Grailknight]

9 hours ago, Bazza said:

These Are The Worst Films Of All Time, According To Rotten Tomatoes

https://www.bleacherbreaker.com/trending/worst-films-of-all-time/

 

It is worth noting that the movie that does not exist is listed twice. Happily I have only seen three of the movies on that list from start to finish, I have seen seen snippets of many of the others while flipping channels and going "Nope." after 20-30 seconds. 

[Spence]

13 hours ago, Michael Hopcroft said:

Many of those ideas deserved it.  Limiting the franchise to a group of people who had performed a specific set of tasks, and then taking it away from those who were best at them, is the mark of a dictatorshp. His "Moral Philosophy" department at Johnny's school was neither philosophy nor moral. Rather, it was indoctrination -- at least they were open about it though. Everyone is trained to fear or even hate change. Humans had developed weapons capablke of cracking planets open, yet continued to put boots on the ground.

 

Starship Troopers is fun to read, but I question juist ow worth defending its society is. And I can;t decide whether RAH was satirizing other writers or endorsing his ideas as some sort of ideal society.

Completely depends on the version.  The original version and what is sold now are changed and have entirely different meanings.  They should be course material for how a editor can subtlety change a work to be completely different. But then the new version is in direct support or the current agenda, so no one will want to teach that.

[Old Man]

10 hours ago, archer said:

I think the society put forth in the Starship Troopers movie was repugnant.

 

That was literally the entire point.  As the story goes, to make a movie based on a book about a fascist society, the studio forced a man who had grown up in Nazi-occupied Europe to direct.  So, he put fascism on the screen, and SF fans have been pissed off ever since.

[Sundog]

40 minutes ago, Old Man said:

 

That was literally the entire point.  As the story goes, to make a movie based on a book about a fascist society, the studio forced a man who had grown up in Nazi-occupied Europe to direct.  So, he put fascism on the screen, and SF fans have been pissed off ever since.

Part of the problem. Verhoeven saw it as a fascist society. And I reject that interpretation, which I think is shallow and undeserved.

The fact Verhoeven has boasted about not having read the book doesn't help.

[Spence]

1 hour ago, Old Man said:

 

That was literally the entire point.  As the story goes, to make a movie based on a book about a fascist society, the studio forced a man who had grown up in Nazi-occupied Europe to direct.  So, he put fascism on the screen, and SF fans have been pissed off ever since.

 

23 minutes ago, Sundog said:

Part of the problem. Verhoeven saw it as a fascist society. And I reject that interpretation, which I think is shallow and undeserved.

The fact Verhoeven has boasted about not having read the book doesn't help.

Yep.  If you read the original book it has zero to do with the unholy trinity fascism-communism-socialism.  I know I know, fascism was rebranded right about 25 years ago ( or more) when they went from representing the political spectrum as a line from zero personal freedom/ total government to anarchy/ total personal freedom to the current mess where socialism has been transformed from mass murder to ultimate cool system if government. 

 

But if you want to actually read the boo, get a version printed before 85. 

[death tribble]

15 hours ago, Bazza said:

These Are The Worst Films Of All Time, According To Rotten Tomatoes

https://www.bleacherbreaker.com/trending/worst-films-of-all-time/

some of these I have seen and some I am aware of. For example Jaws the Revenge I have seen all the way through but not the Garbage Pail Kids movie.

I have seen Caligula and you can't really criticise the acting of Helen Mirren, Malcolm McDowell and John Geilgud as they give nuanced performances. It is the uncensored version that people would have a problem with for obvious reasons.

 

I have been trying to remember an awful film but it goes out of my mind. I saw it at GenCon in Britain and did not know the name for years.

It is called The Magic Sword and has Basil Rathbone in the cast. It just has to be seen to be believed. It is a man on a quest movie with Basil as an evil sorcerer.

 

I could put the remake of Clash of the Titans and its sequel Wrath of the Titans plus the film Immortals on here as well for a specific reason. If you are doing films about ancient Greece, do not push the one god agenda. We get it, there is one god but this is set at a time when people worshipped more than one god. Reminding us of our existing faith is at the very least patronising and insulting.