Tag: Humpday Horribleness

Humpday Horribleness: ‘Going Overboard’

going overboard

One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

going overboard

Title: ‘Going Overboard′

Release Date: May 11, 1989

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 7/29/2009): #69 (based on 5475 votes)

Why it’s Here: We thought in honor of Adam Sandler’s new collaboration with Judd Apatow and Seth Rogen, ‘Funny People,’ (which is bound to make each one of them enough money to buy a small country) we would go back and view one of the earlier and universally panned films of Sandler. Lucky me. ‘Going Overboard,’ in fact, Sandler’s first feature film after making a few spots on “The Cosby Show,” has to be the worst film I’ve had to write up for this column. Hokey and lame and not funny in the least, it is the one film I’ve seen that I can truly say there is absolutely nothing redeemable about.

Sandler plays Schecky Moskowitz, a name, I’m sure, writer/director Valerie Breiman, just died laughing at as soon as she wrote it. Schecky is a struggling comedian who takes a job as a waiter on a cruise ship. As luck would have it, there Miss Universe contest being held on board. This provides absolutely nothing to the story. The crew shot on this particular cruise ship that was headed for Cancun and the real Miss Universe contest, and there had to be some explanation for all the pageant contestants in the background.

Anyway, Schecky’s rival on the ship is the ship’s entertainment, a flashy comedian named Dickie Diamond, played by Scott LaRose, who can’t go 30 seconds without dropping an F-bomb on everybody. Throw in a grungy rock star, King Neptune, and General Noriega (yeah, you heard that right) and you’ve got yourselves a recipe for comedy.

Not really. This film isn’t funny in the least. It’s budget, or lack thereof, is actually flaunted in earlier moments. Schecky, talking directly to the camera, talks about how “no-budget” the film is, then provides a demonstration on how to create an earthquake by shaking the camera. This is early Sandler, way, waaaaaayyyyyy before he honed his skills as a comedian. The idea that Schecky is a struggling comedian who just can’t catch a break is about the only believable thing here.

To look at the cast list is to hang your head in shame at some of the people who stepped on board this project before they were anybody. Peter Berg and Billy Zane are at the top of that list, showing up as a sleezy manager for the rock star and King Neptune, as previously mentioned. It’s just shameful and cringe-worthy at its very worst. Billy Bob Thornton makes an appearance as an audience member. He gets a few lines, and no one in the room believes that less than ten years later, he’s have an Oscar on his mantel. Burt Young and Milton Berle give glorified cameo performances, and you can’t feel sorry for them, too bad. They’d been around Hollywood enough to know how atrocious this film was.

Stay away from ‘Going Overboard.’  In fact, the film as shelved until Sandler became a huge star nearly ten years after the film was completed.  You can probably find it in the $5 bin at Wal-Mart.   Do yourself and everyone around you a favor.  Shove it all the way to the bottom and keep moving.

Lowest of the Low Moments: As part of our journey with Schecky, we become privy to his inner thoughts.   He daydreams, and we are forced to watch these dreams come to sparkling life.   One, in particular, features Schecky and Dickie in a boxing match.   However, this isn’t just any   boxing match.   No punches are thrown, just insults.   Each insult, increasingly brutal and unfunny, causes physical harm to the opponent.   It’s as lame as it sounds.   In fact, it’s even lamer than that.   Honestly, I’m sure there are worse moments than this in the film, but your brain will be so numb to it all by the time they come around that it won’t matter.   This scene happens early enough that your still lucid and not contemplating throwing your TV in the trash to save it.

Will it Ever Get Off the List: Let’s hope not.   There isn’t much hope for ‘Going Overboard’ to ever get itself off the Bottom 100 list, nor should it.   If Sandler’s success hasn’t driven enough people to go back and watch this piece of trash, nothing will.   It only has 5475 votes compared to the just over 66,000 votes for ‘Click.’   And, honestly, the more people who see this movie, the worse the chances of it getting off this list become.   It’s wholly unfunny and completely annoying.   I’m sure this is one Sandler wants hidden in his closet for a long, long time.

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Miss Cast Away’

hump day miss cast away

One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film: Continue reading Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Miss Cast Away’

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Fist of Fear, Touch of Death’

humpdayfirstoffear

One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

fist fear touch death

Title: ‘Fist of Fear, Touch of Death’

Release Date: September, 1980

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 6/24/2009): #37 (based on 816 votes)

Why it’s here: Imagine my amazement when I was scouring the IMDB bottom 100 and saw a Bruce Lee film on it. How could this be? Had the voters truly lost their minds on this one?

Of course, after watching the film, I now understand why it is here. Despite the marketing to the contrary, this isn’t a Bruce Lee film. Instead, it is a mockumentary about his life, death, and the martial arts match to determine his successor.

Adolph Caesar plays a TV anchorman who is covering the event. When we first see him, he is talking with martial arts promoter Aaron Banks. Banks believes Lee was murdered with a move called the “touch of death,” which kills the victim three to four weeks after being applied. The “murder” angle of the story goes absolutely nowhere, and you have to wonder why it was included at all.

Caesar talks to various martial arts “greats,” most of whom you’ve surely never even heard of, about Lee and the martial arts displays that are taking place behind them. The in-ring action includes Bill Louie plucking out an opponents eye and tossing it to the crowd, sound effects included.

All of this is spliced with a few interviews with Lee himself that are clearly cut up and dubbed. There are even a few skits involving Fred “The Hammer” Williamson oversleeping and Ron Van Clief foiling an attempted rape in a park. In fact, the film features not one, but two, attempted rapes in a park with one of our martial arts “greats” swooping in to save the day. The second of these features Bill Louie in a Kato get-up. The whole scene is ridiculously disconnected from the rest of the film, not that there’s much cohesion to be found otherwise. It does offer up some laughs as Louie flaunts his nunchuck and throwing star skills. After Louie leaves the scene, someone actually utters the words, “Who was that masked man?”

At one point, Caesar takes us back in time to show us Bruce Lee’s childhood and the life of the martial arts master’s great grandfather. We’ll get to this part of the film in the next section.

All in all, ‘Fist of Fear, Touch of Death’ is an atrocious attempt to bank on the name of a superstar. Matthew Mallinson served as the director on this film, and, if you’ve never heard his name before, it’s because this is the only film he’s ever made. There’s a reason for that.

This film would be one to watch as the cinematic train wreck that it is. It could offer up a number of laughs here and there were it not so painfully insulting to the star it is exploiting. At one point, Williamson talks to Caesar about how a match to determine Bruce Lee’s successor is an insult to Bruce Lee. Never mind the fact that the entire film is an insult to Bruce Lee.

Lowest of the low moments: This film is loaded with low moments, but the film nosedives into a mountainside through the middle segment where we are shown the “Bruce Lee Story.” Taking the ‘What’s Up, Tiger Lily?’ approach and dubbing English over found footage, this section depicts a young Bruce Lee who is “karate crazy” and whose family disregards his desire to go into the martial arts. These scenes incorporate Lee as a child on the TV show “Longstreet” and then his early performance in the film, ‘Thunderstorm.’

These scenes of Lee’s childhood play out like a God awful, black and white soap opera. The voice chosen for Lee is that of a whiny kid, and it almost makes you forget the idiocy of what is going on narratively. Almost.

This flashback segment also flashes back itself to show us Lee’s ancestor. According to this film, Lee’s great-grandfather was a…wait for it…Samurai warrior. If that doesn’t sound strange to you, it’s because you aren’t realizing that Bruce Lee is Chinese and Samurai are strictly Japanese. The scenes showing Lee’s Samurai ancestor are taken from the 1971 Samurai film, ‘Invincible Super Chan.’ These scenes actually don’t look all that bad, but none of that credit goes to the makers of this film. Instead, the nature of these scenes sucks whatever life ‘Invincible Super Chan’ had in it to begin with.

Will it ever get off the list: There is very little chance that ‘Fist of Fear, Touch of Death’ will ever get out of the IMDB bottom 100, nor should it. Its current position at 37 is a long way away from the top, and the film is nearly 30 years old. Three decades of pissing off fans of martial arts films is something you never want to do, and that is exactly what this film has done ever since it first came out. Not only is it insulting, not only is it horribly put together, it is downright boring. No level of cult status is ever going to help this film get off this list, and I, for one, have absolutely no problem with that.

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Hobgoblins’

humpdayhorriblenesshobgoblins

One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

hobgoblinsposter

Title: ‘Hobgoblins’

Release Date: July 14th, 1988

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 6/10/2009): 26 (based on 4,196 votes)

Why It’s Here: Director Rick Sloane has done a little bit of everything in the movie-making biz, from writing to producing, editing to cinematography, visual effects and even a little composing. All of this on just 14 films since 1984 when he made ‘Movie House Massacre’. He’s probably best known for his epic six-part ‘Vice Academy’ film franchise (that’s a joke, see) but his swan song certainly has to be ‘Hobgoblins’.

There has to be something said about the appeal of   ‘Hobgoblins’ which, believe it or not, spawned a sequel in 2008. Sloane clearly isn’t trying to make an art house flick or a cerebral mind screw of a movie. The DVD opens at Fred Olen Ray’s Drive-In Theater which is apparently staffed completely by well-endowed bikini-clad hotties who take your money upon entry and give guys a special “sneak peek” if the tip is good. The tag at the beginning breaks away to director Sloane in his car watching a drive-in movie. Sloane starts in on a brief history of drive-in movies, then gives his version of a Hitchcock-style introduction to his own movie.

‘Hobgoblins’ actually isn’t a difficult movie to watch. Sure, it’s cheesy and the acting sucks, but that’s all part of the appeal. To me, a truly “bad” movie needs to be difficult, if not painful to watch, but watching ‘Hobgoblins’ is actually kind of fun. The reason ‘Hobgoblins’ is on the IMDB Bottom 100 list is clear. Not one thing about the movie can be described as being “done well”. Many films on the list are so bad they would lead most to turn the channel or demand a refund, but for the few movies like ‘Hobgoblins’ their failure becomes their success.

What? Oh, you want to know why I haven’t talked about the creatures themselves? The truth is they don’t even show up until 29 minutes and 30 seconds into the movie and, despite being low budget puppets, are actually kind of cool, in a cheesy sort of way. The little critters tap into your mind and make your most desirable fantasies come true, but it’ll cost you. [Think ‘Wishmaster’ meets ‘Gremlins’] The real question is, why was McCreedy hiding these little green trouble-makers in the film vault? This is all explained, but you’ll have to watch to find out the secret and story behind the Hobgoblins.

Lowest of the Low Moments: The low moments in ‘Hobgoblins’ are more like small moments of extra cheese peppered randomly throughout this stinker. The story kicks off as aging security guard McCreedy (Jeffrey Sullivan) attempts to keep his newly hired guards in training from exploring inside the film vault housed inside the abandoned movie studio they are hired to keep watch over. The first new hire we meet manages to fall off a rock & roll stage to his death in mid performance after entering the restricted film vault. Kevin (Tom Bartlett) becomes his new replacement. What on Earth could possibly be in there?

Another great example of low moments that actually make the movie ridiculously enjoyable is when Kyle steps away and asks to use Kevin’s phone to call his “girlfriend” but actually calls a sex line 976-SCAG. When Kevin walks in on him, he asks if he’s calling a sex line and Kyle nervously denies it as Kevin finds himself confused with why he keeps having to dispute phone sex charges on his bill every month.

‘Hobgoblins’ is filled with moments that just make you shake your head in disbelief, like when Nick falls on a live grenade to save the others and when the grenade goes off, we hear a BOOM sound effect and then see Nick flailing around screaming, covered in flames, but still has all his limbs. Or, when a punk trespasser return to the studio lot to pick a nunchuck fight with Kevin, which has a purpose but is just so funny in it’s execution.

One of the more infamous low moments from ‘Hobgoblins’ is when Army-friend Nick takes Kevin out on the lawn to teach him how to fight with gardening implements. The scene is constructed by Sloane to be a tense fight scene but ends up being an elongated laughter-producing low moment, immortalized by the MST3K crew. Watch them tear it apart below:

Will it Ever Get Off the List: It’s unlikely ‘Hobgoblins’ will ever make it off the list. Sure, it’s got a big cult following but it’s still really bad and deserves to be on the list. The fact that ‘Hobgoblins’ has become one of the most popular episodes of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 is probably it’s only hope for rising above the list, but I think that’s part of the appeal. The more people exposed to this film, especially through MST3k, the more it will be relegated to the depths of cinematic shame by it’s fans. It’s a double-edged sword, being supportive fans of bad movies because they are bad. ‘Hobgoblins’ was made in 1988 and is VERY 80’s which is another reason it will probably remain on the IMDB Bottom 100 list for years to come… it has good company from the decade. ‘Hobgoblins’ is merely one of 17 films from the 1980’s to appear on the list.

I’ll close this week’s Hump Day Horribleness with a special treat. Here’s that transcript of the final phone call between Kyle and his “girlfriend” at 976-SCAG (played by Tamara Clatterbuck) for your enjoyment…

Fantazia: Hi. It’s me, Fantazia. Thanks for calling. I need a new house pet to impress my friends. Now hurry before the zookeeper comes. Help me hide this iguana on my body.

Fantazia (as zookeeper): [covers her mouth to stand masculine] Uh, can I help you miss?

Fantazia: Oh, yes Mr. Beastmaster. Something just crawled up my leg. Oh, see if you can find it.

Fantazia (as zookeeper): I think you better come back to my office with me.

Fantazia: Now, wait a minute. Are you sure your office is in the baboon pit?

[Kyle holds the phone closer to his ear with a look of pure ecstacy on his face while a Hobgoblin sneaks up behind him.]

Fantazia: Uh, Mr. Zookeeper… what do you think you’re doing? This isn’t the childrens petting zoo.

Fantazia (as zookeeper): I have a new house pet for you, miss. Ha ha ha ha ha.

Fantazia: Oh, Mr. Zookeeper. I could never take a cockatoo that size.

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Santa with Muscles’

santa-with-muscles1

One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

santa-with-muscles-poster

Title: ‘Santa With Muscles’

Release Date: November 8th, 1996

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 6/2/2009): 84 (based on 5888 votes)

Why It’s Here: Let’s be blunt for a moment.   This movie shouldn’t be on this list.   Granted, it’s #84, which isn’t the lowest of the low, but the fact that this film is on this list at any number is head-shaking.   To note, ‘Santa With Muscles’ is anything but a good movie.   It’s lame.   It’s trivial.   It’s much of what sent these low-rent, kids comedies of the mid to late ’90s straight to the VHS/DVD racks.   But, is it really 84 movies out from being dubbed the worst film of all time?   Certainly not.

The story is nothing to call the Academy of Motion Picture Sciences about.   Hulk Hogan plays a millionaire weight lifter who, after running from the cops because of reckless driving, gets amnesia, gets mistaken for Santa Clause, and, inadvertently, saves an orphanage from an evil scientist.   Ed Begley, Jr. plays said evil scientist.   Garrett Morris pops up as the janitor of the orphanage.   A young Mila Kunis plays one of the children.   Even Ed Leslie (AKA Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake) makes a brief appearance as a Sumo Lab Assistant, the only Sumo anything I’ve ever seen with six-pack abs.

Hogan is dreadful as usual.   This isn’t the seemingly tough Hogan of the mid-80s.   This is this Hogan:

Of course, for all its misgivings, horrid fight scenes, and ridiculously lame attempts at injecting something Christmas in every line of dialogue, ‘Santa With Muscles’ isn’t the worst of the worst.   Hell, it’s not even the worst movie featuring a wrestler.   It’s not even the worst movie starring Hulk Hogan.   How specific can we get?   This isn’t even the worst Christmas-themed movie starring a professional wrestler.   It seems its on this list, because A. it’s not a good movie and B. the title is excruciating.

Lowest of the Low Moments: The worst moment in this film comes at the end of a fight scene that, believe it or not, actually shows some talent from director John Murlowski.   Either that or he just had a dolly and a crane for one day and decided to pack all those shots into one.   The fight scene is fine, but it’s what happens to Hogan and a, seemingly innocent, Santa statue at the end.

Just see for yourself.   Jump to the 1:00 mark for the atrocity:

Will it Ever Get Off the List: It should, though it might not.   Even though it is pretty high on the list, it’s been out for 13 years.  Two possibilities arise here.  It could drop off the list if, in the next couple of years, it garners some type of cult status a la ‘Troll 2.’  It could also drop off the list if John Cena decides to do about 15 more movies.  Unless either of these two scenarios occur, it’s looking like ‘Santa With Muscles’ is here to stay.

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2’

horriblesuperbabies

One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

superbabies_poster

Title: ‘Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2’

Release Date: August 27, 2004

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 5/27/2009): #4 (based on 8,052 votes)

Why It’s Here: When first viewing this movie, you may wonder why it’s even on the IMDB Bottom 100 list. It’s a kid’s movie, so a certain level of schlock is expected, and it even sort of resembles a earlier, less cool, lower budget ‘Spy Kids’ kind of idea during the introductory 5-10 minutes. Unfortunately, once the story of the Kahuna (the ultimate superbaby) and Biscane (Jon Voight) begins, it’s all downhill from here. Voight is actually sort of fun (in a horrible way) as a cheesy German master-villain that oddly reminds me of an elderly Rutger Hauer. I’m almost ashamed to admit that, but sometimes the truth hurts.

Venturing further into the movie, it becomes clearly evident that ‘Superbabies’ is all premise with greatly under-achieved execution with laughable special effects. The fight scenes are thrown-together with half-ass wire work and shamefully employ puns older than Bob Barker’s belly button lint. The movie’s physical comedy consists of gags worn out in the silent era or stolen directly from The Three Stooges. The dialogue is painfully bad, even for a kid’s flick, but there are some irresistibly enjoyable lines of dialogue made humorous only by the fact they were uttered by veteran actor Jon Voight.

Lowest of the Low Moments: The movie runs fairly consistent when it comes to low moments. No scene stands out as especially bogus over the others, but ‘Superbabies’ does have on incredibly low moment that only appears before and after the movie proper… it’s the director’s credit. ‘Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2’ as well as it’s predecessor was directed by Bob Clark. A relatively common, unfamiliar name, but for we movie geeks who grew up in the 70’s and 80’s it’s a name that has a nostalgic vibration.

Mr. Clark gave the world my all-time favorite Christmas movie called ‘A Christmas Story’. Aside from this holiday classic, Clark gave us a couple other classics including the horror movies ‘Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things’ and ‘Black Christmas’ and we can’t forget he brought us the first two ‘Porkys’ films. Unfortunately, after ‘A Christmas Story’ Clark made the regretful Sylvester Stallone/Dolly Parton disaster ‘Rhinestone’ and he never really recovered after that. To see a filmmaker so inclined with great genre sensibilities take a long and lethal nose dive into a tiny bucket of sour lime juice simply breaks my heart. Then again, we can’t all be Stanley Kubrick.

Will it Ever Get Off the List: It’s my opinion that, while ‘Superbabies’ is an awful movie, it doesn’t seem to deserve being nearly so high (or low, perhaps) on the IMDB Bottom 100 list. What I attempted to keep in mind while watching the movie was that it is primarily a kid’s movie, after all and that has to play into it’s rating. So, given that [at least] 99.9% of users on IMDB are adults, it doesn’t make for a very unbiased sampling of the film’s target audience. With that said, I highly doubt this will ever make it off the list altogether, but I feel in time may squirm it’s way into a higher-numbers spot on the list and see it’s infamous notoriety as #4 begin to dwindle.

This YouTube video pretty much sums up everything you need to know…

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Manos: The Hands of Fate’

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One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

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Title: ‘Manos: The Hands of Fate’

Release Date: November 5, 1966

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 5/19/2009): #7 (based on 18,283 votes)

Why it’s here: One thing you will have to learn, as I learned in looking at potential films to discuss in this column, is that most of the worst movies ever made have been covered by the Mystery Science Theater 3000 people.   Joel Robinson and the gang have an uncanny knack for making any crap-laden piece of cinema almost watchable.   Almost.   There are certain cases, however, that not even MST3K can better.

‘Manos: The Hands of Fate’ is one of those instances.

Harold P. Warren was a fertilizer salesman from El Paso, TX who had a dream.   Okay, maybe he didn’t exactly have a dream, but he didn’t think it was a big deal to make movies.   Thus, a bet was put in place.   Warren bet a screenwriting friend that he could self-finance, write and direct a feature film.   $19,000 later, ‘Manos: The Hands of Fate’ was born, and the film is complete travesty.   It’s the kind of film that seems to meander in a dream-like haze of horrid.   It goes nowhere.   Watching the actors and actresses stumble over their lines of dialogue is horrendous.   Certain aspects of the film, such as the acting by one John Reynolds, is downright cringe-inducing.

The film tells the story of a couple and their small daughter who get lost while driving cross country.   They stumble upon a small shack where a crazy man named Torgo (Reynolds, in all his horrible glory) keeps spouting out dialogue about The Master.   The Master, of course, is the leader of a group of devil-worshippers, and he has certain plans for the couple and their daughter.

‘Manos: The Hands of Fate’ is unwatchable, a menagerie of pointless scenes and meaningless characters.   One woman was cast in the film only to have her leg broke early in production.   Her character was rewritten so that, now, she just sits in a car making out with her boyfriend.   It’s a character we go back to a few times, and it provides nothing to the overall film.   Most of Torgo’s screen time is spent with the character walking from one end of the frame to the other.

The Master, played with drastically over-the-top staginess by Tom Neyman, looks like Freddie Mercury in a red and black cape.   Honestly, if there is any saving grave in ‘Manos,’ it is the acting by Neyman who seems to damn the ideologies that less is more.   ‘Manos’ is a rotten ham, and Neyman is the hammiest of all.

Lowest of the low moments: The Master has eight wives who can never seem to agree about anything.   They bicker about whether or not to kill the mother of the couple, and, in the film’s lowest moment, the arguing actually turns into a half-assed cat-fight.   On paper, this would probably have been viewed as one of the film’s better moments, but its execution is atrocious.   GLOW (Glorious Ladies of Wrestling) had better choreographed fighting than this.

Will it ever get off the list: You bet your ass it won’t.   This movie has been around for more than 40 years, and it is still consistently in the bottom 10.   It might actually move up and down the list, but, unless Uwe Boll becomes the next Woody Allen (in terms of his prolific nature, that is), there will never be enough, bad movies to knock ‘Manos: The Hands of Fate’ off the bottom list.   It is here to stay, and it deserves to stay.

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Laserblast’

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One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

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Title: ‘Laserblast’

Release Date: March 1, 1978

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 5/13/2009): #96 (based on 1,833 votes)

Why it’s here: To be honest, it kind of broke my heart a little when I saw this movie on IMDB’s Bottom 100 list, even if it does technically deserve to be. You see, while he didn’t direct this movie, Charles Band did produce ‘Laserblast’ and Band is a bit of a childhood hero of mine. One of the busiest dudes in the filmmaking biz, Band has either directed and/or produced over 230 movies in the sci-fi and horror genres. So, at least I can say this one only “barely” made the list at #96.

‘Laserblast’ is about a teenage boy named Billy Duncan (Kim Milford) who, according to his girlfriend Kathy (Cheryl Smith), is not an ordinary person. Billy is something of an outcast in his small, rural town and is constantly being harassed by the local cops and two bullies, a douche-bag named Chuck and his nerdy glasses-wearing sidekick called Frog.

One day, Billy is “messing around” out in the desert and stumbles upon an odd-looking laser cannon that is worn on your arm. Once Billy figures out how to use the alien gun, he slowly becomes a raging maniac. The laser gun only works while the user wears a large amulet around their neck. However, this amulet turns the user into a mindless green creature like the Hulk without the super-strength that jumps and flails around like a mad ape.

This movie makes the list for some very obvious reasons, including the production quality and the writing, but especially the acting, which is atrocious. However, I realized fairly early in the film that it’s a bittersweet honor for this movie to be listed on IMDB’s Bottom 100 list. Much of the cheese-factor can be written-off and tolerated as a direct result of the era in which the film was made. Perhaps the most deserving blame for ‘Laserblast’ making this list is the writing.

The movie begins with a raging green human blasting away as the stop-motion animated aliens (who sound like Ernie from ‘Sesame Street’ crossed with Charlie Brown’s teacher) return to Earth to stop the human. Once they vaporize him (not Billy in this scene) they just leave the laser gun and the amulet laying in the desert and fly away in their spaceship. Which is it? Do you want the humans to have the damn gun, or not?

It’s the insanely stupid plot flops like this, along with the anti-acting, that ruin ‘Laserblast’. The first time we meet Kathy’s crazy grandfather, he’s rambling incoherently about some secret mission and conspiracies against him, but later on he appears quite normal and just happens to know the much younger FBI agent Craig who is in town investigating “something” that is never revealed nor serves any purpose in moving the story along.

Lowest of the low moments: There are several equally low moments in this movie. From the idiot rural cops who smoke weed on the job that they confiscated from local teens, to the mysterious FBI agent that shows up with Dirty Harry’s haircut, wearing his wardrobe and just trying hopelessly to be Dirty Harry in general, ‘Laserblast’ certainly has it’s unfortunate moments of cinematic lameness. One of my favorite low moments is early in the film when Billy’s mom tells him she is going to Acapulco again (and we never see her again) and Billy’s reaction speaks for itself:

BILLY: “Mom. (whining) You’ve already been to Acapulco. How many times do you want to go to Acapulco?”

Seriously, dude. Who wouldn’t want to go to Acapulco multiple times? What’s wrong with you? The lowest of the low moments however, is the ending which I’ll explain below.

!!! Warning !!! SPOILER Below!

>> While the Raging Green version of Billy is having a good ole time blowing things up in town, he manages to stumble upon Agent Craig’s black sedan parked on the curb. Both Agent Craig and Billy’s girlfriend Kathy are sitting in the car, but Billy just stands there staring at them instead of blowing them away with his laser gun. Suddenly, a massive red laser beam pummels Billy for literally 20 seconds before he collapses and the alien, standing atop a building across the street with his spaceship hovering close overhead, turns and leaves. In response to this shocking event, Agent Craig and Kathy casually exit the car and calmly approaches Billy’s dead body on the street. Without crying or screaming, Kathy kneels to the ground and lays her head on Billy’s chest… and, the credits roll. WTF? Did they not see the the alien blast him right in front of their eyes and then fly away in a spaceship, or… is this just something that happens a lot in this little town and they’re used to the occurrence? Good grief! <<

Will it ever get off the list: Given some time, I actually have faith that ‘Laserblast’ will eventually fall off IMDB’s Bottom 100 list and become more of the cult classic “bad movie” that it really deserves to be. The fact that it’s only barely on the list helps to encourage that possibility as well. During Billy’s marathon of destruction, he obliterates five vehicles, three buildings, a post office drop box and a billboard advertising the new ‘Star Wars’ movie that came out the year before this movie was made. Now, that’s funny! Personally, I believe the title should be changed to ‘Laserblast: or, How I Found an Alien Laser Cannon and Learned to Blow Shit Up‘… now, that would certainly boost this movie enough to drop off IMDB’s Bottom 100 list!

Enjoy this clip from ‘Laserblast’ with the MST3K crew adding their trademark commentary…

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘House of the Dead’

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One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

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Title: ‘House of the Dead’

Release Date: October 10, 2003

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 4/29/2009): #85 (based on 18,953 votes)

Why it’s here: The question shouldn’t really be why is this movie. Â  The real question should be, why aren’t more Uwe Boll films here? Â  The man has a built-in hatred amongst the film world. Â  Hell, I think my mother even knows Uwe Boll’s name based simply on how much hatred there is out there for the man. Â  ‘House of the Dead,’ while not his first film (that would be the seldom seen, but instantly sought after ‘German Fried Movie’ in 1991), was his introduction to most American filmgoers.

Many fans of the video game from which the movie is based were eagerly awaiting to see if the film even came close to expectations. Â  Boy, were they shocked by what they saw.

The acting is horrid, but that’s really not saying much when you consider the most notable thespians in the bunch are Jurgen Prochnow (who, I think, lost all credibility the moment his arms were ripped off in ‘Judge Dredd), Ellie Cornell, and Clint Howard. Â  Seriously, Howard was in a theatrical release, and the director wasn’t Ron Howard. Â  Go figure. Â  I’m not going to rip into Cornell too hard, because she seriously seems to be the only one of the bunch who is trying to make an effort in any way. Â  Of course, we get her hacked up pretty early. Â  I think the director felt she was trying to upstage him or something.

The screenplay is nonexistent. Â  Basically, they’re just making it up as they go along, with General Boll sounding the charge. Â  Three different people worked on the screenplay, and two of them haven’t written anything since. Â  Mark A. Altman, the only one of them to have a writing career post-‘House of the Dead,’ followed up the trainwreck with a few more straight-to-DVD horror flicks including ‘House of the Dead 2.’ Â  Hey, at least he’s earning a paycheck, though, right?

Back to ‘House of the Dead.’ Â  It clearly is a trash film, and it’s reasoning for being on this IMDB bottom 100 grows from a much deeper hatred people have for Boll as a person. Â  Sure, he makes horrible films, but there are countless other films out there that deserve to be amongst the 100 worst films of all time more than ‘House of the Dead.’ Â  Boll’s other should-be embarrassments, ‘Alone in the Dark’ and ‘Bloodrayne,’ deserve their place on this list more than ‘House of the Dead.’ Â  Regardless, this was Boll’s first, mainstream, American endeavor, so it holds its place on the list as a holding pin for Boll’s career as a whole.

Lowest of the low moments: Despite it’s horrid acting and near ludicrous screenplay, the absolute worst moment from ‘House of the Dead’ is this scene right here:

Words can’t describe the amount of trainwreck filmmaking that went into that scene, which brought the film’s running time from 83 minutes all the way up to 90. Â  Glorious.

Will it ever get off the list: While it may appear that ‘House of the Dead’s days of being amongst the worst films of all time are numbered, it might hold its position for a long time. Â  It is currently at number 85, but that is with nearly19,000 votes, and the number of 10s it’s getting don’t seem to be multiplying any day soon. Â  Unless, years down the line, it garners some kind of ‘Troll 2’ cult status, I’m gonna say ‘House of the Dead’ is going to be on the Bottom 100 list for quite a while.

Hump Day Horribleness: ‘Zombie Nation’

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One of the great features over at the Internet Movie Database is the Bottom 100. Based on ratings viewers of the site give to various films, the worst of the worst films get put on this list. Some of them are on and off in a matter of days. Others stick around for the long haul, showing just how much suckage they truly emit.

It’s time to look at these movies and determine where they stand. Do they deserve to be on the Bottom 100 list? Are they not as bad as everyone says? Will they be off the list any time soon?

Here’s the breakdown for this week’s film:

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Title: ‘Zombie Nation’

Release Date: October 5, 2004 (DVD: 12/06/2006)

Ranking on Bottom 100 (as of 4/22/2009): #23 (based on 3,381 votes)

Why it’s here: Let me just begin to answer this question by stating that the only Uwe Boll film that is currently on the IMDB Bottom 100 List is ‘House of the Dead’ and it’s all the way down at #85! So, this should say something for fellow German schlock-auteur Ulli Lommel’s ‘Zombie Nation’. I believe a “Wow!” is in order, here.

The general idea behind ‘Zombie Nation’ is to bring the serial killer and zombie genres together in one movie. Officer Joe Singer is a mentally disturbed police officer who is secretly a serial killer on the side, but finds himself facing his victims in an unexpected turn of events when they rise from the dead to exact revenge. From the plethora of faults and flaws that combine to form the train wreck that is ‘Zombie Nation’ I’ve managed to conclude that two primary factors play into this movie’s place in the hall of shame and they both have to do with expectations.

1. ‘Zombie Nation’ is supposed to be a zombie horror flick. The key word here is “supposed” as viewer expectations are geared towards seeing a scary (or, at least attempted) movie with zombies, but the marketing for this film is textbook false advertising. First of all, the so-called zombies in ‘Zombie Nation’ don’t even make their first appearance until about 50 minutes into the movie. The first zombie is the result of a voodoo ritual on a living woman that is intended to turn her is she should happen to be killed by the bad cop/serial killer Joe Singer.

Questionable plot aside, the important thing here are the zombies, and believe me, using that beloved terminology here is difficult. The zombie chicks walk, talk and think just like humans, have desires and emotions and yes, I kid you not, they apparently eat cheeseburgers to survive… when not feasting on humans. To make matters worse, the special effects are virtually absent as the only thing signifying these women are now zombies is an explosion of mascara around their eyes. Genre fans expect filmmakers to treat the zombie lore respectfully, as we discovered when many fans were upset by the sudden onset of super-fast, raging zombies in movies like ’28 Days Later’, etc. But, what about the DVD cover art, you ask? HA! Don’t be misled by that illusion. It might as well be from an entirely different movie because it has no place housing this DVD.

2. I found myself checking my remote to make sure I had my television’s input set to DVD and not cable, because ‘Zombie Nation’ had me thinking I was watching some late night Skin-e-max movie, except the soft-core sex scenes never happen… just the terribly bad acting and cheesy dialogue. Really, where’s the payoff? The entire movie is shot like this and just feels really lame, not scary or cool or even funny, assuming you would try and stretch this to be a comedy. I had mentioned Uwe Boll earlier and there is one crucial difference between Boll and Lommel. Uwe Boll’s movies may be bad, but at least he understands the importance of production quality and what that means. Lommel apparently missed that class at Ed Wood University because there are no signs in ‘Zombie Nation’ that he has any idea of what he’s doing.

Lowest of the low moments: Golly gee, there are so many. In fact, is it possible for a movie to be made entirely of low moments? Oh, fine. If I have to pick just one it would have to be the first truly, unforgivably disastrous scene in the movie when Officer Joe Singer kills his first innocent woman. Why is it so bad? He is riding with his partner (a good cop) in an unmarked cruiser when he pulls the woman over, proceeds to verbally abuse her and then forces her out of the car, into the police car and drives her to a secluded warehouse, tells his partner to wait in the car and practically drags the woman into the warehouse. OK, nothing abnormal here. Then, after a relatively suspicious wait, Singer’s partner watches him exit the warehouse without the girl but now carrying a large black duffel bag, dumps it into the trunk of their cruiser and drives off. Singer’s partner innocently asks where the girl is and he says he let her go and his partner doesn’t find ANY of this worrisome? WTF? My friends, it only goes down hill from here.

Will it ever get off the list: While it seems unlikely it will ever leave the list, ‘Zombie Nation’ was practically a direct-to-DVD movie and less than 5,000 people have voted on it on IMDB. In other words, this isn’t nearly as well-known a movie as many of the titles on the IMDB Bottom 100 List and given time, may find itself released early on parole due solely to the fact that other more widely seen crappy movies will likely nudge it slowly to the bottom until it falls off onto the floor to bne forgotten with the dust bunnies and moldy Cheerios.