The SI’s All-Time Motion Picture Reviews
by Bill Dusty
With the new year upon us, I thought it would be a good time to get in a good-hearted post (as so few of mine apparently are!) on a subject that all but the most ardent critics of mine would not find offensive: movie reviews.
This is an all-time rating of mine that I’ve put together, and it focuses on all the movies that I’ve actually seen and so feel qualified to at least have a fan’s opinion on. Because there are so many cool – and awful – movies to choose from, I’ve opted to go with more than one selection in the various categories. My choice 
Remember, this is not about Gone with the Wind (never seen), Citizen Kane (never seen), nor any other film so many other folks might find worthy of rising to Hollywood immortality or sinking into the bowels of entertainment infamy. It’s all about my experience.
Let’s begin!
BEST MOVIE:
Forrest Gump
This movie has it all – comedy, tears, drama, adventure, quotable lines – and all wrapped up in a storyline that weaves through the simple yet extraordinary life of a somewhat less-than ordinary guy.
What makes this movie so different from others produced by Hollywood’s cadre of partisan, progressive producers and directors is that in this one, despite having partially taken place in one of the most controversial periods in American history (the Vietnam War), we are spared any moral or political lectures from the main characters. Forrest could care less about either side in the many political debates over Vietnam, religion, government or any other hot-button topic that might get the rest of us all hot and bothered. He just wants Jenny. And as for Jenny herself, though she appears to be more mentally balanced and set in her ways (even if those ways are self-destructive, having come from an abusive father), she doesn’t really seem to care too much about the political causes of those she hangs out with, either. She’s just hanging with her boyfriends and peeps.
Star Wars
When this movie first came out (1977), many sci-fi aficionados declared that it wasn’t so much a science fiction movie as it was an adventure movie set in space. In perhaps the purest sense of the genre, they might have been right. But who cares? (Personally, I thought they were just being snobs – upset because of their devotion to one of the most boring films I’ve ever had to suffer through in all my life. More on that later.)
Star Wars was a fantastic film. I was a mere young teenager when time it first came out, and I dutifully bought all the collectable cards (which I didn’t keep – damn!) action figures (which I didn’t keep – damn!) and other memorabilia (which I didn’t keep – damn!). And, of course, I had a crush on Carrie Fisher’s Princess Leia. (I also had an earlier crush on Space 1999’s Maya, played by Catherine Schell. There was something about those sci-fi chicks…)
Unfortunately, besides The Empire Strikes Back, the Star Wars franchise devolved into a kiddie-fest soon thereafter, eventually leading to creator/director George Lucas’s adolescent prequel trilogy (XXXXXX) some decades later.
Which leads us to…
BEST MOVIE TRILOGY:
The Lord of the Rings
Confession: I did not see any of these movies in the movie theaters. As a Lord of the Rings devotee who had read the fantasy trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien at least four times, I was fearful that the movie versions of the trilogy would be a big letdown. And had the producers of the film version kept to their original budget, I probably would have been greatly disappointed, indeed. The trilogy was first conceived as a two movie endeavor, then reduced down to one, with very many important scenes and characters being cut out (including, in one version, Rohan’s Eowyn, whose role would have been merged with a more warrior-like Arwen). Fortunately for us devout LoTR fans, production switched from cheap-o Marimax studios to New Line Cinema, where it was again pitched as a two-movie deal. NLC’s head honcho, Robert Shaye, then immediately asked why there were only two films when the book was published in three volumes.
Yeah Shaye!
As it was, due to the time constraints given with even three very long movies, some memorable parts of the book trilogy had to be left out in the film versions. (These included the hobbits’ visit with Tom Bombadil and his wife Goldberry, and how the three companions got their first weapons from the spooky barrow wrights.)
Still, after I saw the three movies, I was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed them immensely. The producers and directors, I felt, did a fine job of staying true to the storyline as best they could. (And I was actually happy to see that, in one scene where hobbit Merry takes up a horse with a disguised Eowyn to go into battle, he recognizes her right away. In the book, she was pretending to be a man-warrior and Merry doesn’t recognize her at all. Not very likely! The producers didn’t think so either, so they changed it.)
The Bourne Identity Trilogy
I liked all three movies in this trilogy, though I favored the original and the third movie. I was not happy about Bourne’s girlfriend getting killed in the second movie.
MOVIE TRILOGY LET-DOWNS:
The Matrix Trilogy
The original movie was fantastic. Second and third movies? Ho-hum.
Star Wars Prequels
The Phantom Menace, the Attack of the Clones, and the Revenge of the Sith all pretty much sucked in comparison to what I was anticipating. In fact, if you Google “Star Wars Prequels,” what you’ll get is a long list of links to sites that explain why they all sucked. So apparently I wasn’t alone in my disdain for them.
Star Wars Original Trilogy
The last film in this trilogy, Return of the Jedi, was a kiddie-flick that featured those annoying, muppet-like characters, the Endorians. I actually felt bad for the Empire at the end of this movie and was hoping they’d come out and do the whoop-ass again.
MOST OVER-RATED MOVIES:
2001: A Space Odyssey
When this movie first came out in 1968, it was largely panned by critics despite making big bucks at the box office. I’m going with the critics on this one. For some reason, a lot of people found this film to be “intellectually stimulating,” or some other such nonsense. (Why is it that some of the most amazingly boring movies are always considered to be intellectual classics by the snobbish liberal arts community?) When the most exciting scene in a movie is when a guy is in a space pod trying to get back into his mothership, to coin an over-used phrase, “Houston, we have a problem.” And staring at a black cube while a bunch of opera chicks hum in the background doesn’t do it for me, either.
Jurassic Park
The goofiest scene in this over-rated pop tart was when the dino-geeks were all standing around an incubator watching a hand puppet come out of a plastic egg. The actors really earned their pay in that one.
The child actors in this flick were also not very believable (I kept waiting for their real parents to run onto the set to wipe their noses) and were nowhere near the caliber of talent we saw in Macaulay Culkin (Home Alone) or Peter Billingsley (A Christmas Story). Casting should have been more patient and thorough.
WORST MOVIE (recent):
Contagion (2011)
Let’s see…. No action? Check. No drama? Check. Everyone who gets sick dies? Check. No heroes? Check.
This movie SUCKED? Check.
WORST MOVIES (all-time):
Journey to the Center of the Earth (2008 Remake)
Perhaps I was unduly influenced by the fact that the original movie starring James Mason was so good, but really I don’t think so. This movie, which I made the horrendous error of seeing in the theater, sucked really, really, really bad.
The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008 Remake)
Another stinker remake of a classic movie. Keanu Reeves is an alien visitor who tries to save the earth… from us. I wish I could have been saved from watching this film.
Twins (1988)
Including this movie in my “worst” listing is pretty notable since I actually like every other Arnold Schwarzenegger movie I’ve ever seen. (Sorry, I missed out on Pumping Iron.) I’m not really sure why Arnie made this tragedy of a film, except for maybe he wanted to do something with Danny DeVito.
The Sequels of Caddyshack and The Sting
I’ve opted to lump these movies together since they were both so bad I figured why waste time writing two separate listings? Both were awful and painful to watch.
Beyond the Poseidon Adventure
Who in their right mind would go down into a large, capsized ship that only had its ass-end bobbing above the water? Even if I was truly interested in “salvage rights” to the wreck, I would wait for it to sink first and then go down with scuba gear!
DUMBEST TELEVISION SHOWS
I’d thought I’d wrap up this post with a couple of dishonorable mentions over in TV land. So-called reality television has largely taken over the prime-time arena, with only a smattering of quality dramas still airing. But for some of these not-so-real stinkers, I cannot fathom how people actually watch them and think to themselves, “This is just fascinating stuff.”
Two of my least favorite programs are listed below.
Ghost Hunters
Why do people watch this show?
“Ooo! Did you hear that?!”
No, we didn’t.
(In a basement) “I just felt cold air brush over my shoulder!”
It’s called “a draft.” Someone opened the basement door upstairs, dude.
And why the heck are they always walking around a house or business at night with all the lights off? Can’t ghosts haunt with the lights on?
This series has been on the air for several years, now, and the so-called hunters have not found a single ghost in all that time. But they’ve suspected they might have. So I guess that’s good enough for true wanna-believers.
Finding Bigfoot
This show is in its second season. Guess what they never find?
Folks, in order for any animal to survive in nature, there has to be a viable gene pool in order to propagate the species. You can’t just have a bigfoot here, a bigfoot there, one in Alaska and a couple in New Hampshire. There has to be a group of them, and that group needs to be successful in its environment. Yet with “bigfoots” we have found no verifiable living areas, no poop, and no bodies – living or dead. True believers have always argued that we never knew gorillas existed before we found them in central Africa. Yes, that’s true, but at the time we also didn’t know central Africa existed. Once we went there, we found plenty of gorillas.
Both Ghost Hunters and Finding Bigfoot feed off of the superstitions of the masses, and thus neither show will ever be required to actually discover what they are searching for. That’s the only “reality” of these two bone-headed television shows.
And that wraps up my first – and probably only – all-time movie review. Have any favorites or stinkers you’d like to share?
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