Banana Scoop

I’m very mixed when it comes to the website Rotten Tomatoes.  A website full of over pompous critics that take an hour and a half of their lives to judge what someone spent millions of dollars and weeks to create.  The idea sounds heartless and in truth it really is.  The only issue is that I’m often one of those over pompous critics that will usually agree to the general consensus.  Talk about hindsight.  But critics don’t know everything.  Some movies are simply made to entertain and if they can do that, who cares if there’s nothing deeper or the acting was bad or if the movie was too loud.  [I hate it when Rotten Tomatoes deems a movie too loud, what does that even mean?].  I’ve always believed the critics consensus said more about the movie than the Tomatometer, but that’s another story for another time.  So here’s a list of some movies Rotten Tomatoes deemed ‘rotten’, but I actually enjoyed and wouldn’t mind watching again.  There are probably more, but I had trouble remembering which movies, if you’ve got some more, let me know.

Equilibrium (37%)

Critics Consensus: ‘Equilibrium is a reheated mishmash of other sci-fi movies’

What a load of crap.  Maybe it’s because I’m younger than most of the critics on the site, but I’ve seen my fair share of sci-fi movies and I’ve read a decent amount of sci-fi and the only things I’m reminded are of the emotional supressents of Brave New World and maybe Do Androids Dream of Electric Sleep (Bladerunner), but not too many times have I seen it on film.  And maybe it is because I haven’t seen as many Sci-Fi movies as I would like, but I generally liked this movie.  It might be my love for Christian Bale and Sean Bean, but I thought this movie was totally badass.  Gun Kata, swords, a war-torn world, book burning, and emotion suppression?  And watching Christian Bale ‘find’ himself is always an enjoyment also.  I’d totally get behind this movie and I still do.   Reheated mishmash my ass, I’d like for you to show me a movie where they combine swords, guns, and Bale as well as Equilbrium does.

Hook (27%)

Critics Concensus: None

I’ve tried to stray away from childhood movies because it’s incredibly bias.  Anything and everything that wasn’t a boring drama was awesome in your childhood, but I’ve watched Hook again as a young adult, and I am still impressed with it.  It’s by Steven Spielberg for goodness sake.  How is it at 27%?  You’ve got a creative story about what would happen if Peter Pan ‘grew up’ and re-encountered Hook.  Some critics say the lost boys look like they were picked up out of a skate park and Spielberg’s rendition of them is ‘childish and moronic’, but I like to believe that’s what a realistic version of the Lost Boys would be in contrast to young kids that like to ‘adventure and frolic’ in animal costumes.  Especially at that time that’s what being young was all about, skating, playing make believe, and pranking adults.   And don’t even get me started on how miraculous Dustin Hoffman’s Captain James Hook was.  Hands down, one of the most memorable pirates I’ve ever seen on film [until Jack Sparrow].  And his plot to turn Pan’s own son against him?  Marvelous.  And just for a gush of childhood memories: the final battle scene still makes me get goosebumps to this day.

The Island (40%)

Critics Concensus: ‘A clone of THX 1183, Coma, and Logan’s Run, The Island is another loud and bombastic Michael Bay movie where explosions and chases matter more than characters, dialogue, or plot.’

I have not seen any of those movies.  And as a  critic myself, I’m supposed to hate director Michael Bay.  I don’t hate him to say as much, because he fills my appetite for giant robots fighting each other and making movies that the public will generally enjoy.  People complain and bitch about what a bad director he is or how he cares more about explosions and stuff, but let’s be honest, the man entertains.  The people pay for his movies because they provide 2 brainlesss hours of entertainment.  With The Island, he gives us not necessarily brainless entertainment, but a quite thrilling adventure about two clones looking for their identities, literally.  Regardless of whether or not he copied them from past movies, to a viewer who hasn’t seen any of those movies, The Island is surprisingly smart.  And I love all movies with Sean Bean and Steve Buschemi, so that is definitely a plus also.

The 90’s Stupid Comedy

there so many great pictures for this movie. So I had to step it up and choose a moving one.

90’s Adam Sandler: Billy Madison, Happy Gillmore (~40%)

Austin Powers Franchise (~58%)

Ace Ventura (~40%)

It’s not exactly a single movie, but more of a very specific genre of movies.  But in some way, all these stupid comedy movies are actually essentially the same.  And critics don’t like the stupid comedy.  Just look at how many of them were nominated for Oscars.  How many?  Zero?  Exactly.  Like I mentioned earlier, I don’t mind 2 hours of brainless entertainment every once in a while.  Sometimes hearing Adam Sandler make stupid noises or seeing Jim Carrey talk out of his butt is exactly what I need after a long day.  I don’t exactly know if the g2000-2010 generation stupid comedies like Step Brothers and some Farrelly Brothers movies are the 90’s Stupid Comedies of our time and future critics will find them reminiscent as I find these 90’s movies, but regardless I still find these more enjoyable then more contemporary stuff we have today.

Click (33%)

Sweet Mama Pajama

Critics Concensus: ‘This latest Adam Sandler vehicle borrows shamelessly from It’s A Wonderful Life and Back To The Future, and fails to produce the necessary laughs that would forgive such imitation.’

I’ve seen and loved Back to the Future and I haven’t however seen It’s a Wonderful Life.  When critics talk about imitation, it kinda gets on my nerves because nothing today is completely original.  Very few topics haven’t been covered in the entertainment industry and some ideas are bound to relapse.  This is no reason to slap a movie on the hands too hard.  Click, for me, was surprisingly deep and emotional.  And it’s fun watching Adam Sandler get ahold of this new power and watch the ramifications of him abusing it and then the emotional regret he goes through.  Throw in a dancing Christopher Walken and the beautiful Kate Beckinsale (who in my opinion is the hottest housewife I’ve ever seen in my entire life) and as long as Doc Brown and the word ‘JiggaWatt’ doesn’t show up, imitation can eat my shorts.

Wasabi (43%)

Critics Consensus: None

Usually Foreign movies are known to do really well.  Well according to RT, even foreign movies can score under the 60% Fresh line.  Jean Reno stars in this cop action/comedy film.  I honestly don’t know what’s wrong with it.  The film has thrilling action, genuinely funny scenes, and is even set in an interesting atmosphere.  Throwing a French man in the middle of Japan is funny and Jean Reno delivers as the stiff, introverted father of an outgoing and extroverted daughter.  Why this movie sits at 43% is beyond me.

The Romantic Comedy

Critics Consensus: ‘Predictable Rom Com’

The Proposal (43%)

The Switch (52%)

Romantic Comedys or Rom-Coms have one purpose in my opinion.  To make you feel better.  I think all Rom Coms are feel good movies.  Now there are critically acclaimed rom coms like 500 Days of Summer and Love, Actually that know how to balance the romantic comedy aspect with intelligence and wit, and then there are unoriginal, unnecessary direct derivations of other romantic comedy’s: Valentine’s Day, Kate Hudson movies etc.  Dive in the middle to see movies like The Proposal and The Switch which are original and clever in their own way, but the consensus to both call them ‘predictable or formulaic’ in their own right, which is why they sit at 43% and 52% compared to other romantic comedies.  But I think the 30% boost from other romantic comedies make them worth the watch.  Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds are just an absolute delight to watch in The Proposal and so is Jason Bateman in The Switch.  These movies may be formulaic, maybe, but that doesn’t make them any less enjoyable when you’re trying to watch a feel-good movie.

Smokin’ Aces (28%)

Critics Consensus: ‘A violent mess of a movie, Smokin’ Aces has some Quentin Tarantino’s style but not much of his wit or humor’

Anyone trying to replicate Tarantino is a naive fool.  You don’t get much better writing than Tarantino except maybe in a Coen Brothers movie.  Why they’re trying to compare Smoking Aces to Tarantino is beyond me and if anything it’s a compliment that they do.  Smoking Aces has a very exciting and surprisingly original story.  Take multiple teams of bounty hunters, each diverse and mad in their own way, and pin them against each other for one target.  Also, add in Ryan Reynolds as a cop who’s stuck in the middle of it all.  The consensus called it violent: yes.  It points out a general lack of wit or humor, but I don’t really recall the movie trying to be witty or humorous and I don’t think that was really the point of it.  I thought this movie and the characters in it were really cool.  But I guess at 28%, the critics don’t seem to think so.

Kingdom of Heaven (39%)

Critics Consensus: ‘Although it’s an objective and handsomely presented take on the Crusades, Kingdom of Heaven lacks depth.’

Battle for the 9th movie was between this and Troy (55%).  Just do 10 movies you say instead of 9 you say?  Well no thanks, I’m getting rather tired to typing, so 9 movies it is.  My history teacher in high school told me Kingdom of Heaven was a very objective movie to both Muslims and Christians during the Crusades, and then when I got older and checked the RT critics consensus, I was surprised to see the same thing.  So I picked Kingdom of Heaven over Troy because it’s more than just an entertainment flick like the ones I’ve mentioned above.  The fact that a movie didn’t sacrifice the history to make something more agreeable to the audiences and it’s still deemed a 39% is confusing to me.  Both Troy and Kingdom of Heaven were penalized for lacking emotional depth.  Troy I understand, but Kingdom of Heaven’s dedication to making it fair should count as depth in my opinion.

__________________________________________

I am such a hypocrite because for the last one thousand words, I’ve been using Tomatometer percents to compare movies when this is an idea I’m strictly against.  There are a lot of things that can be misconstrued when someone uses Rotten Tomatoes as a reference tool, like saying one movie is better than the other strictly based on Tomatometer percents.  This article will lead into another article I’ll post later this week about my take on Rotten Tomatoes

‘The Problem I have with Rotten Tomatoes’

Coming Soon.