Worst Films of 2009

In preparation for my favourite films of 2009 list, which will be in the next few weeks, I thought I would take look at the pictures that annoyed me the most this year.

10) Observe and Report – I liked it better when it was called Taxi Driver. Sadly this is not the only mall related film to make this esteemed list.



9) Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen – Robot Heaven, jive talking cars, a female terminator…did I mention robot heaven?



8) The Limits of Control – I really love Jarmusch’s other works, which is why this film was such a big disappointment for me.



7) Drag Me To Hell – Look, I enjoy Sam Rami’s horror classics as much as the next guy. Heck, I even went to see the Evil Dead Musical when it came to town. Yet trying to recapture that campy low budget feel through a big budget production just does not work.



6) 12 Rounds – This made Walking Tall look like Shakespeare…Walking Tall!!! Aidan Gillen goes from the sensation series, The Wire, to this? Gillen deserves better, Hollywood.



5) Push – As a comic book, video game, or a television series the premise is great. As a movie, on the other hand, this is an unsalvageable mess. Push way too much stuff into this film.



4) My Bloody Valentine 3D – Thanks, Avatar. Now certain movies will not just be awful…they will be awful in three dimensions.



3) X-Men Origins: Wolverine – X2 was great. X-men: Last Stand was awful. Which one would you assume Hollywood would follow?…yep, they fooled me as well. To prolong the pain even further, Deadpool is getting his own spinoff.



2) Bride Wars – Number 2 by a hair…or bridal tiara. This film was offensive beyond belief and single handedly set feminism back a few centuries…and this is coming for a male. Worst of all, Hathaway goes from being on my best of 2008 list, for Rachel Getting Married, to the worst of 2009 list. Hudson can take solace in the fact that she has now made my worst list two years running.



1) Paul Blart: Mall Cop – What is with Hollywood’s obsession with mall security guards? Is this really the last sect of the population whose stories have yet to be told? It was a close call for the number one spot but Paul came out on top.



Runners-Up: He’s Just Not That Into You, The Box, Race to Witch Mountain, A Christmas Carol 3D

Normal Activity On Par With Average

Paranormal Activity


I purposely held out on seeing Paranormal Activity when it first hit theatres because the hype was so loud that I knew I would go into the film wanting to disprove it. Clearly I want to be subjective with every film I see but it is rather tough when people are rampantly claiming it is the scariest movie of all time. I mean did they not see Bride Wars? That movie was easily one of the scariest movies of 2009. Still, I have to give the marketing team for Paranormal credit. Having a trailer that consists of nothing more than showing how people reacted to the movie is pretty ingenious for a horror flick.

The premise of Oren Peli's film is deceptively simple, Katie (Katie Featherstone) and Micah (Micah Sloat) finally get settled in their home when strange things start occurring. The couple is repeatedly awoken on various nights by strange noises and Katie claims that she senses the presence of someone else in their room on certain nights . Micah is sceptical of Katie's paranormal theory and decides to document everything that occurs on video. Micah believes that everything can be explained rationally but, as the couple is increasingly terrorized, the couple must ultimately question both their beliefs and their sanity.

Now did avoiding Paranormal Activity for a lengthy period of time help to bring my usual unbiased ways back to normal? To a great extent, yes. Sure there was that occasional bug buzzing in my ear questioning the validity of the praises in certain scenes. Yet I was still able to appreciate the film for what it was, a fun psychological romp that offers a few brief creepy moments. The actors did a good job making the story believable, which helped to hold my interest for the majority of the film. The reason I think the majority of the film works is because it aims to violate one of our most sacred place...our homes. Most of us have been raised to believe that home is the one place we should feel safe from the horrors of the outside world. Once our home is violated there is truly no secure barriers left. This is why every creak, and every door slamming, is amplified to great effect in the movie.

The problem I had with the Paranormal Activity is that I felt it ran far longer than the material could sustain. There are only so many times a character can say "what was that?" or "Did you hear that?" without providing some sort of payoff. After a while a swinging chandelier and doors moving ever so slightly just do not cut it anymore. Also, there comes a point in the middle act when a very important secret is revealed in regards to events possibly having occurred before. Yet the characters continue to operate as if this information was never given. Sure they make reference to it every now and then but the characters never evolve the way they should have after hearing this information. Instead Peli keeps his characters repeating the same notes over and over. I think the movie would have been much stronger if we saw how the revelation put a far greater strain on the relationship. This would also allow the ending to be far more disturbing than it currently is.

Is Paranormal Activity the scariest film of all time? No. To be honest, I just did not think that Paranormal Activity was all that frightening to begin with I can probably list a dozen or so films that scared me more than this. I will say that I did enjoy the film more than I thought I would. It was far better than My Bloody Valentine 3D and some of the other gore centric horror movies to come out this year. Though if I had to make a list of great horror movies Paranormal Activity would not even make my top twenty.

3D Valentine Card Still Bloody Boring

My Bloody Valentine 3D

Over the last few weeks I have slowly been catching up on some of the horror flicks that have come out this year. Two movies in particular, Paranormal Activity and My Bloody Valentine 3D, have exceeded expectations at the box-office but for vastly different reasons. Today I will focus on the latter and leave Paranormal for another day.

James Cameron’s much anticipated film, Avatar, is suppose to be the picture that finally legitimize the 3D movie industry. Yet I would argue that My Bloody Valentine 3D is reason enough why the 3D revolution should end. Sitting just behind The Final Destination as the second highest grossing non-family oriented 3D movie to be released this year, My Bloody Valentine proudly displays everything that is wrong with both modern horror films and 3D movies in general.

Set in a small town mining community, Tom Hanninger (Jensen Ackles) and his girlfriend Sarah (Jamie King), along with pals Axel (Kerr Smith) and Irene (Betsy Rue), attend a Valentine’s Day party at the infamous Tunnel No. 5 section of the local mine. A few weeks prior to the party, Tunnel No. 5 was the site of a horrendous accident in which 6 miners were trapped underground for six days. As coincidence would have it, Tom's careless mistake while on the job is what actually led to the mine collapsing in the first place. When the miners are eventually found only one, Harry Warden (Richard John Walters), is still alive. It seems that, for reasons no one knows, Harry snapped while trapped underground and killed all of his co-workers. Through a series of nonsensical events Harry ends up in a coma and is hospitalized. Or so the town thinks.... Harry magically awakes in times for Valentine's Day and goes on a killing spree unlike anything the town has ever seen before. Flash forward 10 years, with Harry supposedly dead, and the body count start to pile up again. Has Harry Wardern comeback from the dead to finish what he started? Was he even dead to begin with? More importantly, can the killer be stopped before it is too late?

2009 has been the year of the 3D movie and, to be frank, the madness needs to stop. My Bloody Valentine only helps to prove that the 3D explosion is nothing more than a gimmicky cash cow for Hollywood. The whole movie is basically a series of set ups to provide the director, Patrick Lussier, opportunities to throw objects at the screen. There is nothing remotely authentic or interesting about the whole production.

My Bloody Valentine 3D even fails in comparison to the other horror remakes, such as Friday the 13th, released this year. At least Friday the 13thremake knew how to balance both the campiness and the gore of the slasher genre. When My Bloody Valentine is not focusing on the 3D silliness it seems to be rather lost as to what to do next. As a result, Lussier ups the gore to ridiculous and uninspiring levels every chance he gets. Also, to fill the nudity requirement, Lussier has Besty Rue walk around nude in a scene that was clearly designed with 13 year-old boys in mind. Yet even Rue's ample physic cannot distract us from how awful the movie is. The acting is horrible, and not in the so bad it is good way, and the plotting is pedestrian. Worst of all My Bloody Valentine does not have a single good scare in the entire picture. Maybe Avatar will ultimately change my mind about the whole 3D movie experience but, as it stands, I think Hollywood should finally put a nail in the 3D coffin.