The Top 5 Worst Movies of 2017

Writer's Note: Still working on the Best Movies of 2017- here's a Worst Of to tide you over in the meantime! 

5. It Comes at Night 

The It Follows of the year, It Comes at Night arrived on a mountain of hype and, like that movie, promptly failed to live up to it. (Yeah, I said it- It Follows was over-hyped and underwhelming and quite frankly, didn't make much sense. The only worthwhile things in it were the cinematography and the score, IMHO.)

Like that film, It Comes at Night drops us into the action already in progress, aka "in media res," which is fine in and of itself, but we expect to have the blanks filled in by the film's end, and that's not what happens here. Even It Follows attempted to lay out some ground rules, even if they didn't ultimately add up. Here, we just get the vague sense that there's something contagious out there and it's best to stay hidden and locked away, lest you catch it. 

However, the thin plot isn't the problem here, not really. Technically, Night of the Living Dead, which this has more than a few things in common with, had a pretty threadbare, basic plot, too. We never did find out what caused the dead to rise, and the film ends on a lamentable note that doesn't inspire much confidence in what the future holds, which is confirmed in the sequels that followed.

But NOTLD is a stone-cold classic, and there's a reason for that- it keeps the action coming, and the dialogue and setting helps to ratchet up the suspense. That's why it still holds up to this day. ICAN, on the other hand, despite a solid cast, is monotonous and boring, and little happens until the end, beyond the arrival of a stranger and the subsequent arrival of his family. 

The "excitement" at the end lasts maybe five minutes tops, and then we end on a bum note, which would be fine if the movie on the whole wasn't so damn boring. It's too bad, as the house most of it takes place in is really cool, and the cinematography, though occasionally underlit- one assumes by design- is great when it's on point. But overall, this is a snooze-fest that commits the most cardinal of sins when it comes to a horror movie- it's not at all scary. 

4. The Mummy

Granted, I didn't have high hopes for this one going in- Tom Cruise movies, for the most part, particularly of the action variety, tend to be pretty predictable- but what lands it here on the list was the fact that it effectively sunk an entire potential franchise.

I liked the idea of a "shared universe" of classic movie monsters and thought it had potential. But after the face plant of both Dracula Untold (at least in the US- it did okay everywhere else) and Victor Frankenstein, to say nothing of I, Frankenstein (itself intended as a possible tie-in with the Underworld series), the third time was definitely not the charm for this one. 

Ironically, it was largely because of Cruise's meddling that this one failed for me. Cruise can be great when he ventures outside his favored wheelhouse- check out his ace performances in Magnolia, Vanilla Sky and Tropic Thunder, for instance- but in making this more of an action flick than a horror one, and, even worse, making it all revolve around him instead of the titular character, he does the movie a grave disservice.

The sad thing is, I thought Sofia Boutella was great. I liked that the Mummy was female (which nicely dovetailed with the whole "Year of the Woman" thing going on IRL), and the back-story was pretty neat and appropriately twisted. She also looks the part of an Egyptian Princess, which is not always a given in these oft-white-washed times. 

But by high-jacking the narrative, Cruise makes it all about him, relegating the Mummy herself to, at best, a supporting role in her own movie. Just like a man, right? I mean, don't get me wrong, the Mummy absolutely IS a supporting role in pretty much every previous movie, so that's nothing new, but this had promise to be something different, and you can just smell the stink of extensive rewrites to placate Cruise's ego here, which is too bad.

Deleted scenes also show that his female co-star, Annabelle Wallis, suffered from these changes as well- not too cool, Tom, in the "Year of the Woman." The end result is a mess of tonal shifts that don't quite work (see Jake Johnson's sidekick, which might have functioned better in a sort of An American Werewolf in London sort of way, but misses the mark entirely and lands on the side of annoying), plot elements that are more set-up for hoped-for future installments than well-thought-out twists (see Russell Crowe's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde) and a hesitance on Cruise's part to fully commit to the "dark side" of his character, which could have been interesting (see, once again, Magnolia). 

As you might have guessed, this leads to a jumbled mess of a movie that ends up playing like a series of unrelated set-pieces than a coherent narrative. Too bad, as the general set-up of classic movie monsters in a shared universe held promise. Oh well, we'll always have TV's Penny Dreadful, right? 

3. CHiPs/Baywatch

I don't know that either of these entries deserves their own separate one, so I'm just going to count them both as one big mess. In this corner, there's CHiPs, a TV show-turned-movie-adaptation that no one was clamoring for, which makes the dreadful mistake of trying to go the tongue-in-cheek 21 Jump Street route and fails spectacularly, falling under the weight of tone-deaf homophobic jokes and other equally terrible attempts at low-brow humor.

I'm not a huge fan of actor/writer/director Dax Shepard in the first place, and only watched this because it was available for free during a Showtime sneak preview- or was it Starz? Not that I would have in the first place, but I'm really glad I didn't pay for it, as it was one of my worst viewing experiences of the year- hence it being on the list. 

My main reason for watching was the involvement of Shepard's better half, Kristen Bell, but her vapid character here is much better served in the more fleshed-out version to be found on TV's exemplary The Good Place. Check that out, but avoid this at all costs. 

Ditto the wrong-headed Baywatch, which, to be fair, would have done fine in the less-preoccupied-with-PC-ness 80's, but is likewise tone-deaf in these more modern, enlightened times. Oddly, it doesn't even get the more obvious jiggle-fest elements of the original show right, which, let's face it, were a primary factor in its mindbogglingly massive success all over the world.

In its place, we have a movie that, once again, reaches for the satire of the 21 Jump Street movies, and falls flat on its face- or, to use a more appropriate metaphor for what passes for a "memorable scene" here, trips on its own dick. This just isn't the year for a sordid 80's throwback to the crass teen/20-something comedies of yore, and I'm not sure there is any going back to such things in today's climate, quite frankly. 

I mean, don't get me wrong- I did laugh at Dwayne Johnson's constant ribbing of co-star Zac Efron, who is impressive in his ability to take a joke at his own expense in movie after movie (see also the Neighbors movies, which are much better than this, or, if you must, Dirty Grandpa- though that is surely a low-point in poor Robert De Niro's illustrious career).

But its lame-brained attempts to feature "woke" female characters that still flash the requisite cleavage was as wrong-headed as they come, and most of the "jokes" fall flat, as do the attempts to inject typical "The Rock"-style action antics into the proceedings. Hell, it even fumbles the cameos from Baywatch luminaries David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson. 

The best I can say about it is that winning co-stars Alexandra Daddario and Kelly Rohrbach manage to charm despite underwritten roles, and like Johnson and Efron, should emerge relatively unscarred by the film moving forward. You might not be so lucky. 

2. Wonder Wheel

Can someone explain to me what the big deal about Woody Allen is? I've tried, time and again, to get into his stuff, but nothing seems to stick, with the notable exception of the completely atypical Match Point. Maybe it's a generational thing- after all, to the Gen X and Millennial generations, he was the guy who married his adopted daughter (which is all kinds of ick-inducing), not the perennial comic genius behind the likes of Annie Hall or Manhattan. But should one's former glories give them a lifetime pass on everything that's come since? I just don’t know.

What I do know is that the bad taste left in my mouth by the stories about him sure don't help matters, especially the one by another of his adoptive daughters, Dylan, which would seem to indicate a disturbing pattern. How Hollywood royalty can continue to aid and abet this guy (to say nothing of Roman Polanski, though I do love some of his movies, admittedly) is beyond me. 

But even if you can get past that stuff, if such a thing is possible in this day and age, the simple fact of the matter is that the vast majority of his movies suck. There, I said it. I get coasting on one's reputation, but as they say, you're only as good as your last movie, and Allen hasn't had one worth a shit in ages, and even if you allow Match Point, and maybe Blue Jasmine, the misses FAR outweigh the hits.

And yet, year after year, he persists in making them, and almost always with enviable casts that most genuinely talented directors would kill to work with. I just don't get it, and I think I've hit my saturation point in watching any more of them. 

I watched this one with a friend who rented it because of her affection for star Justin Timberlake (who's own wife, Jessica Biel, somewhat ironically, starred in a TV miniseries about the long-lasting after-effects of sexual abuse, in the excellent The Sinner), pointing out that it also had Juno Temple in it, who I adore- but we should have quit while we were ahead, as it was hardly a showcase for either. 

The time has come for Hollywood to stop making excuses for this creep- or for the fact that most of his movies suck these days. As for me, I'm done- this Wonder Wheel stops here. Time's Up, Woody. 

1. The Dark Tower

I've been a Stephen king fan for ages, and he was the first "adult" author I ever got into, long before I hit my double digits. Arguably his magnum opus, the "Dark Tower" series encompasses eight novels, which would be a daunting adaptation for anyone- hence it having taken so long to surface in the first place. For my money, a Game of Thrones-style TV series would have been the best bet- Lord knows there's plenty of material to sustain an ongoing series, for at least a season per book, perhaps more than one for the longer entries.

Alas, such turned out not to be the case, as filmmaker/co-writer Nikolaj Arcel opted to do, of all things, a sequel to the books instead. You'd think the daunting task of absorbing eight books of material would be hard enough, but to not only do that, but follow them up would be overwhelming to any filmmaker. That was certainly the case with this atrocious film, which clocks in at all of an hour-and-a-half and expects an audience largely unfamiliar with the source material to be able to keep up. 

Remarkably, King himself signed off on all of this, which makes one wonder if the accident that nearly claimed his life a few years back maybe rattled his brains around a little more than we thought. The pre-accident King who declared Kubrick's adaptation of The Shining "cold" and sued to get his named removed from the movie The Lawnmower Man never would have stood for this travesty, to be sure. (He's already distanced himself from it- see here.)

Arcel damn near gets everything wrong, from the controversial casting- is there a word for the opposite of "white-washing"? - to the direction itself, which is flat and features lifeless, mirthless action sequences that are few and far in between. I love Idris Elba as an actor, but he's all wrong for Roland, who was partly inspired by Clint Eastwood's legendary "Man with no name" character, and whose whiteness greatly informs the proceedings, particularly in regards to a main character that IS black and comes from the Civil Rights era. 

In other words, by making the character a black man and conveniently side-stepping the thorny racial politics, Arcel manages the mean feat of both seeming progressive (in the "color blind" casting of his hero) at the same time he does something hopelessly backwards-ass that could have been a fascinating and thought-provoking exploration of racial tensions, as it was in the book. (For those who have read it, picture someone like Timothy Olyphant as Roland, Aaron Paul as Eddie, and perhaps Taraji P. Henson or maybe Kerry Washington as Odetta/Susannah and tell me that wouldn't be fantastic!)

Just as bad is the casting of Matthew McConaughey as the Man in Black, aka Walter. McConaughey is too preoccupied with being cool to be scary, and as a result, is completely ineffectual as a main villain. What's more, he doesn't really come across as a formidable foe when it comes to Roland, what with his magic not having any effect on him and all, and his being pretty easily defeated in the end. 

If this was intended to be the final movie, and a cap to the series as a whole, it's even more insulting to fans, who have followed Roland's escapades for literally decades. I can only imagine that the director somewhat sensed this, as he peppered the proceedings with a host of King references- a model "Christine" car here, a Rita Hayworth poster there, et. al.- perhaps in hopes of distracting fans from realizing there's no "there" there. This one wasn't fooled, and I can't imagine many others were, judging by the film's dismal box office.

The worst part is, thanks to this one bombing, we probably won't get another shot at it anytime soon- if ever- which is a shame. Even if we do, people will be dubious because of the stink of this one, and the ever-growing feeling of "reboot" burn-out (as in "Isn't it a little TOO soon to be rebooting this?"- see Cabin Fever or "Spider-Man"- twice, no less). I can't believe we waited decades for this pile of crap. Oh well, there's always The Talisman. 

(Dis)Honorable Mention: Jeepers Creepers 3

One of my cardinal rules is to never review a film I haven't seen, or even only partially seen. When I was younger I remember reading a review of Roger Ebert's, possibly more than one, where he admitted to walking out of a movie a short time after it started, yet he still reviewed the movie as a whole. I've never walked out of a movie, and I've never not finished a movie I've started, for better or worse, no matter how bad it was- at least not one I had to review.

There were any number of sequels I could have included on general principle, whether or not I'd seen them in the first place, such as the latest iterations of Transformers or Pirates of the Caribbean, but I didn't, because I didn't actually see any of them, nor do I particularly want to. However, I'm going to make an exception, just this once, in my decade-plus of writing movie reviews for this one, and I'm sure certain people already know why. 

This year saw unprecedented movement in areas of female empowerment, with the largest single-day assembly of women ever at the Women's March on Washington, which was mirrored all over the world by others in support of the movement. In addition, we saw a host of celebrity and public figures taken down one by one on charges of sexual assault, rape, and other heinous charges, practically ending their careers overnight.

Finally, we had the "#MeToo" and "Time's Up" movements to make sure that this kept up in places other than Hollywood and Washington, in everyday work-spaces and all over the world, no matter what line of work one was in. Suddenly, it seemed that progress was being made, once and for all. To paraphrase the classic movie Network, women were mad as hell and not going to take it anymore. Ditto a lot of men, such as actor Anthony Rapp, who brought down Kevin Spacey with allegations Spacey attempted to assault him when he was all of 14. 

Given all of that, it's frankly unthinkable that a convicted PEDOPHILE could gotten a movie green-lit this year, much less gotten it into theaters, albeit briefly, where it earned just over $3 million at the box office. Not much, admittedly, but it was probably made on the cheap, so between that and its home video and syndication rights, it probably will turn a healthy profit, which means that this pervert is laughing all the way to the bank, and that just won't stand in my book.

Now, there's even talk of a fourth installment! Hopefully, you will join me boycotting this film and any subsequent entries in the franchise, as this guy doesn't deserve a cent more of anyone's money, quite frankly. Now mind you, I saw the first two movies in the series before I knew who writer/director Victor Salva was, and I enjoyed them, more or less. It's not about that. It's just about his continued participation in making them and earning money from it. 

(You should know better, too, returning star Gina Phillips.)

By all means, if someone else wants to take over the franchise, that's fine, but Salva needs to go ASAP. I mean, the guy even had the unmitigated gaul to make JOKES about child molestation in the latest movie, according to those who did see the film. That's just awful, and more than a little bit uncool. Take it to Facebook, take it to Twitter, take wherever you can, but this needs to stop NOW. You can read more about this despicable guy here, if you must, but stop supporting his stuff, period, from here on out, if you haven't already. Here's a petition you can sign to boycott the film as well- hopefully, there will be another if they try and do a fourth film.


Okay, rant over. Sorry to end on such a downer note, but I needed to get it out of my system. Be sure to join me soon for my list of the Top 15 Best Movies of the Year later this week, and thanks for reading! 😈