movie film review | chris tookey
 
 

Mark S. Allen

 
 

K-MAX-TV, UPN-TV Sacramento, USA

 
 
     
 

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Freddy Got Fingered (2001)
Inspired insanity! This is a movie you’ll never forget! The Hannibal of comedies.
 
  Has it come to this? Yes, it has. If ever a movie testified to the utter creative bankruptcy of the Hollywood film industry, it is the abomination known as Freddy Got Fingered.
 
  (Stephen Hunter, Washington Post )
 
  Quite simply the worst movie ever released by a major studio in Hollywood history. Co-written, directed by and starring Green, this train wreck disguised as a movie is a case study of an annoyingly vibrant attack of arrested adolescent development. There is not one single moment in the entire 86 minutes of this film that is the least bit redeemable on any level.
 
  (Paul Clinton, CNN)
 
  Green's ever-upped ante of shock speaks of a desperation that borders on mental illness.
 
  (Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel)
 
  You watch aghast at how gruesomely awful it is.
 
  (Glenn Whipp, Daily News Los Angeles)
 
  A vomitorium consisting of 93 minutes of Tom Green doing things that a geek in a carnival sideshow would turn down.
 
  (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times)
 
  I'm not easily offended, but its nonstop assault of crude and sub-cretinous humor moved me to annoyance, then profound boredom.
 
  (Lou Lumenick, New York Post)
 
  Tragically awful.
 
  (Wesley Morris, San Francisco Chronicle)
 
  In the US, this has been hailed as the 21st century's worst movie; I think it is the 21st century's worst cultural artefact. Watching it was among the worst experiences of my life, up there with having a quarter of millimetre shaved off my upper molar without anaesthetic by an eccentric dentist when I was 15.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  Green has absolutely nothing to say, and nothing in his mind beyond self-promotion. It is this polluting combination of individualism, greed and mindlessness that makes his movie a lasting emblem of how the American Dream can, without any sense of values or personal - let alone global - responsibility, become everyone else's nightmare. And so debased has a section of American society become that it actually found this new low in comedy entertaining.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
Rat Race (2002)
Quite possibly the funniest movie ever!
 
  With alarmingly few exceptions... nothing that occurs can remotely be construed as humorous.
 
  (Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer)
 
  If ever there was a movie designed with the fast-forward button in mind, Rat Race is the one.
 
  (Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail)
 
  Rat Race chooses to rehash the worst aspect of Mad, Mad World, downgrading the experience from mindless to dreadful.
 
  (Elvis Mitchell, New York Times)
 
  That so much energy and talent could be squandered on such idiocy says loads about the state of Hollywood today.
 
  (Glenn Lovell, San Jose Mercury News)
 
  Why does the world hate us, Americans ask. If they can stand it, they'll find the answer in Rat Race... Eyeballs strain, faces contort, voices bellow, legs flail: I've never seen so much anatomy deputising for humour.
 
  (Alexander Walker, Evening Standard)
 
 
Dreamcatcher (2003)
Every bit the genius you would expect from Stephen King and Lawrence Kasdan.
 
 
  A monster movie of stunning awfulness.
 
  (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times)
 
  So ludicrous that you begin to wonder if it isn't all a big put-on.
 
  (Charles Taylor, Salon.com)
 
  Dreamcatcher is Hollywood idiocy on a staggering scale.
 
  (Bruce Kirkland, Jam! Movies)
 
 
  Terrible stuff.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  No way is there going to be a worse film than Dreamcatcher this side of midsummer... It is worse than an incompetent fiasco: it is a contemptuous one, too.
 
  (Alexander Walker, Evening Standard)
 
 
 
Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003)
The perfect mix of sexy-funny-rock-the-house action! You will see this again and again!
 
  This is not merely one of the worst films in recent memory but it could well go down as one of the worst things ever conceived by human hands - that is, if it gave any evidence that was actually made by human beings instead of by robots hell-bent on destroying humanity by turning human minds to mush.
 
  (Peter Sobczynski, Critic Doctor)
 
  The worst movie of the year.
 
  (Chuck Schwartz, Cranky Critic)
 
  An action movie so loud, stupid and unbelievable that it will alienate proud fans of loud, stupid and unbelievable action movies.
 
  (Phil Villarreal, Arizona Daily Star)
 
  Watching Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle is like being trapped inside a pinball machine operated by a 6-year-old having a sugar rush.
 
  (Kirk Honeycutt, Hollywood Reporter)
 
  Grim going unless you’re an exceptionally witless 13 year-old.
 
  (Catherine Shoard, Sunday Telegraph)
 
  This is basically one long, loathsome commercial for the ladette culture, which dictates that young women become as coarse, sexually exploitative and violent as the worst kind of men… This is a dumb movie that's so smug and self-satisfied in its own dumbness, everyone involved looks in need of a good slap.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
 
Spy Kids 3D (2003)
The best Spy Kids movie yet! Young, old and everyone in-between will love this movie!
 
  A nausea-inducing assault on the senses.
 
  (Nicholas Schager, Slant magazine)
 
  A flat and dreary disappointment... I wasn't excited, I wasn't amused.
 
  (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times)
 
  What seems so promising at the start degenerates into nothing much but kids stuck in a murky, greenish 3-D world... Tiresome.
 
  (Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle)
 
 
Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star (2003)
Simply hysterical! Relentlessly funny and full of surprises!
 
  There’s something about the smarmy David Spade that brings out the worst impulses in a person – that nasal whine, the snotty insincerity, and that stringy hair all make you want to slap him senseless and then some.
 
  (Steve Davis, Austin Chronicle)
 
  It’s buried by several false assumptions, the main one being that anyone in Britain cares for charmless, charisma-free American TV comic David Spade, a vacuum at the movie’s heart where a lead actor should be.
 
  (David Gritten, Daily Telegraph)
 
  Maudlin, mirthless drivel from the Dream Factory's nightmare annexe.
 
  (Nigel Andrews, Financial Times)
 
  Stale schmaltz.
 
  (Edward Porter, Sunday Times)
 
  The film is about as funny as being given a lift by a suicide bomber on his way to work.
 
  (Philip French, Observer)
 
  Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star is executive-produced by Adam Sandler and bears many of the hallmarks of that comic colossus: a love of sadistic humour, vast amounts of smutty misogyny interspersed with moments of gut-wrenching sentimentality, and a leading actor (in this case, David Spade) with no charm or plausibility whatsoever.
 
 
Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed (2004)
Zoinks. This movie is awesome!
 
  The filmmaker’s failure to hit the target audience cripples this film’s ability to be lighthearted and fun. It’s not just the ridiculous subplots that handicap Monsters Unleashed. The film also suffers from a convoluted storyline that even I could barely follow, let alone a child.
 
  (David Levine, Filmcritic.com)
 
  The same stoner and fart jokes, the same ham-fisted story arc.
 
  (Jon Strickland, LA Weekly)
 
  Goes way beyond the call of average badness to the point where it could actually be accused of wasting Sarah Michelle Gellar.
 
  (Tim Robey, Daily Telegraph)
 
  So relentlessly juvenile even 12 year-olds are liable to leave the cinema feeling very, very old.
 
  (Mike McCahill, Sunday Telegraph)
 
 
Twisted (2004)
Suspense and intrigue beyond your wildest dreams!
 
  Twisted walks like a thriller and talks like a thriller, but it squawks like a turkey.
 
  (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times)
 
  Would-be thriller that had its audience roaring with laughter at the screening I attended.
 
  (Matthew Bond, Mail on Sunday)
 
  You’d find a better script (and better actors) at the bottom of a dustbin.
 
  (Catherine Shoard, Sunday Telegraph)
 
  Ashley Judd thrillers have been getting worse over the years, and with Twisted she hits rock bottom.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
Barbershop 2: Back In Business (2004)
Off-the-hook laughs… A comedic masterpiece that touches the heart.
 
  Not unentertaining, but it's missing something - and it's not just the spontaneity, zest and fire of the original. This movie feels flatter, more complacent.
 
  (Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune)
 
  Did I like the film? Yeah, kinda, but not enough to recommend. The first film arrived with freshness and an unexpected zing, but this one seems too content to follow in its footsteps.
 
  (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times)
 
  Too much of it resembles a none-too-inspired, heavily contrived, sentimental sitcom, and the flashbacks to the 60s are bafflingly irrelevant.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
 
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007)
The best Pirates yet! Epic and amazing!
 
  A glazed, inhuman, cluttered piece of work, a storytelling mishmash that buries the considerable charms of its actors under heavy drifts of silt.
 
  (Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com)
 
  A convoluted, ponderous, joyless spectacle whose lack of charm is matched only by its incoherence.
 
  (Frank Swietek, One Guy's Opinion)
 
  Bloated, overwrought and convoluted three-hour misfire.
 
  (Claudia Puig, USA Today)
 
  Abandon hope all ye seeking a coherent, much less satisfying, narrative.
 
  (Lou Lumenick, New York Post)
 
  It sinks with all hands.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
Evan Almighty (2007)
Awesome fun for the whole family! Elephant sized laughs! Thou shalt laugh a lot!
 
  It's an almighty, humorless bore.
 
  (Claudia Puig, USA Today)
 
  It marks an unfortunate low point in the history of recent American comedy.
 
  (Robert Wilonsky, Village Voice)
 
  This is movie-making by and for dummies.
 
  (Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal)
 
  A colossal dud.
 
  (Michael Sragow, Baltimore Sun)
 
  Avoid like the Ten Plagues.
 
  (Phelim O’Neill, Guardian)
 
  There are more jokes in any chapter of the Book of Job than in the whole of Evan Almighty.
 
  (Philip French, Observer)
 
  A comedic disaster of biblical proportions.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
Semi-Pro (2008)
Will Ferrellicious! You’ll laugh so hard you’ll dribble.
 
  This could possibly be the worst film I have ever seen.
 
  (Matt Mungle, Phantom Tollbooth)
 
  It is chillingly devoid of laughs, and looks like some deconstructionist experiment, deliberately draining the comedy genre of jokes to reveal the parched, pointless story skeleton beneath... Mr Ferrell is seriously off his game.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  Will Ferrell’s movie success is a mystery to many of us - with his dead little eyes and air of Saturday Night Live self-regard, he’s hard to like, let alone laugh at.
 
  (Peter Whittle, Sunday Times)
 
  A turkey of gargantuan proportions. If you don’t believe me, watch the trailer. There isn’t a laugh in that either.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
Fool's Gold (2008)
Everything a romantic comedy should be!
 
  The script is fatally stupid, most of the gags fall flat, the secondary characters add little, Hudson fails to make anything interesting out of the exasperated heroine, and the endless references to McConaughey's sexual prowess finally become revolting.
 
  (William Arnold, Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
 
  Of COURSE it's bad. It was always going to be. But it's worse than necessary.
 
  (Lawrence Toppman, Charlotte Observer)
 
  Excruciatingly lame and laughless.
 
  (Lou Lumenick, New York Post)
 
  A two-hour explosion of rubbishness.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  The only interesting aspect of the movie is its unconsciously dumb celebration of greed. Basically, this is There Will Be Blood in bikinis and beach shorts, reimagined by Paris Hilton.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
Speed Racer (2008)
Spectacular! Visually stunning. It will blow your mind.
 
  135 minutes of noisy, infantile and shockingly boring mind rot.
 
  (Peter Sobczynski, eFilmCritic.com)
 
  Speed Racer has nothing extra to offer - no heart, no excitement, no moments to cherish.
 
  (James Berardinelli, Reelviews)
 
  One of the most painfully ill-conceived borefests to ever grace a summer movie season and an easy candidate of one of 2008's worst films.
 
  (Erik Childress, eFilmCritic.com)
 
  You have to be 12 to like it.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  This movie has all the soul, and about half the intelligence, of an 8 year-old boy on a sugar rush. It’s far too long, it’s a meaningless mess, and it gave me a headache.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
Terminator Salvation (2009)
The summer’s biggest thrill ride!
 
  Terminator Salvation puts the numb in numskull.
  (David Edelstein, New York Magazine)
 
  Terminator Salvation has no brains and no soul; it's just a mass of stiff, creaking metal joints. Clearly, the machines have won.
 
  (Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com)
 
  Fantastically dull... Bale’s belligerent, resentful facial expression is that of a stunned ox, or a vexed moose, or a rhino that thinks it’s overheard someone calling its mum a slag.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  A lumbering, joyless and deafening dud.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008)
Fun and Hysterical! Zack and Miri is the best date movie of the season.
 
  As in many of Smith's earlier movies, the moments of ostensibly genuine emotion aren't nearly as convincing as the moments of juvenile obscenity and quasi-homophobia.
 
  (Marc Mohan, Portland Oregonian)
 
  The jokes are forced, almost mechanical, in their crudeness.
 
  (Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com)
 
  It's really dumb… thuddingly unfunny… And Seth Rogen is totally out of control.
 
  (Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal)
 
  Smith appears to have poured his creative energy into the cheerful come-on of the title and left nothing in reserve for the movie. He fails to wring any memorable comedy from shoestring porno filmmakers because his own filmmaking is just as amateurish and slovenly.
 
  (Michael Sragow, Baltimore Sun)
 
 
Terminator Salvation (2009)
The summer’s biggest thrill ride!
 
  Terminator Salvation puts the numb in numskull.
 
  (David Edelstein, New York Magazine)
 
  Terminator Salvation has no brains and no soul; it's just a mass of stiff, creaking metal joints. Clearly, the machines have won.
 
  (Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com)
 
  Fantastically dull... Bale’s belligerent, resentful facial expression is that of a stunned ox, or a vexed moose, or a rhino that thinks it’s overheard someone calling its mum a slag.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  A lumbering, joyless and deafening dud.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
He's Just Not That Into You (2009)
The best date movie of the season!
 
  Here's a true S&M date movie. Only sadistic men and masochistic women could love it.
 
  (Peter Travers, Rolling Stone)
 
  Boring at best and insidious at worst.
 
  (Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com)
 
  An unendurable relationship romcom, which you should avoid the way you would a glass of punch with a frothy gob of Anthrax floating on the surface. It stars a string of dead-eyed mid-career thirtysomethings who do not appear to be carbon-based lifeforms.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  This romcom’s a good advertisement for celibacy.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
The Book of Eli (2010)
Brilliant and mesmerizing every step of the journey.
 
  The Book of Eli combines the maximum in hollow piety with remorseless violence.
 
  (David Denby, New Yorker)
 
  An absurd, incoherent narrative defined by contradictions: religious and violent, arty and exploitational, serious and trashy, stylized and gritty.
 
  (Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com)
 
  A post-apocalyptic western cursed by laborious pacing and a sense of self-importance which its nutty story does not warrant. Ponderous in the extreme and laced with portentous religious overtones.
 
  (Mike Goodridge, Screen International)
 
  As with All About Steve, it’s hard to convey exactly how mad this film is. Imagine The Road, remade by Christian fundamentalists with a sadistic interest in mutilation in general, and amputation in particular. It’s that weirdly deranged.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
Leap Year (2010)
The perfect movie for the season. Fun, funny and full of good cheer!
 
  We’re supposed to root for these two? I was hoping for a freak lightning storm to strike these idiots down, or perhaps a Guinness flood to wash them away.
 
  (Brian Orndorf, Filmjerk.com)
 
  Afterwards the only “leap” I felt like making was off a motorway gantry into the fast line of the M25.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  Abysmal... [Matthew] Goode knows full well what a terrible film he’s stuck in.
 
  (Tim Robey, Daily Telegraph)
 
  Astonishingly inept.
 
  (John Walsh, Independent)
 
  Leap years come round every four years, but dispiriting romcoms appear at least four times every year, and this is one of the very worst..
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore (2010)
Hilarious.
 
  A lazy, painfully dull, unfunny and nauseatingly silly action comedy that should have gone direct-to-DVD.
 
  (Avi Offer, NYC Movie Guru)
 
  Why isn't there a group that protects moviegoers from films like Cats & Dogs? Something like: The Don't Underestimate Moviegoer Brainpower Society — or DUMBS.
 
  (Gary Wolcott, Tri-City Herald)
 
  The kitties and puppies are cute to look at, no doubt, but your average cat on YouTube is far more charming than anything in this kitty litter.
 
  (Adam Graham, Detroit News)
 
  Going to see Cats & Dogs would be daft at any time of year. While Toy Story 3's still in cinemas, it's outright lunacy.
 
  (Robbie Collin, News of the World)
 
Burlesque (2010)
Sensational. This movie has it all!
 
  A movie that quickly proves achingly dull, with none of the madness, verve or talent of Paul Verhoeven's Showgirls or even the workmanlike energy of Rob Marshall's Chicago.
 
  (Manohla Dargis, New York Times)
 
  There's a chance you'll like the film. Perhaps if you're Christina Aguilera's mom or the spirit of Sonny Bono reincarnated as a person who can tolerate awful movies.
 
  (Phil Villarreal, OK! Magazine)
 
  It's not interesting enough to be a disaster.
 
  (Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic)
 
  Two hours of recycled plots and plastic acting.
 
  (Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News)
 
  Burlesque is, as that well-known film critic Friedrich Nietzsche might have put it, so beyond good and bad that it's rubbish.
 
  (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian)
 
  So bad it’s moderately entertaining, Burlesque is a lesson in how not to put on a musical.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
Remember Me (2010)
So perfectly acted, so brilliantly directed... This movie will become a part of you.
 
  Dour, hysterical sudser that never lifts off the ground, no matter how hard it flaps its wings with sequences of nicotine-stained rebellion, cycles of abuse, and bootleg turns of fate.
 
  (Brian Orndorf, Filmjerk.com)
 
  It’s hard to know what the director Allen Coulter could have done to improve Will Fetters’s absurdly contrived, yakky script about love and loss, largely set in the summer of 2001. But Mr. Coulter doesn’t help matters by infusing the movie with grave self-importance.
 
  (Manohla Dargis, New York Times)
 
  The dullness of this writing is more than matched by the dull look achieved by director Allen Coulter, who appears to have shot the film through a piece of yard-sale Tupperware.
 
  (Kyle Smith, New York Post)
 
  The film’s tone is all wrong, the pacing is dead and the veering between sex, sadness and sado-masochistic violence is enough to give you motion sickness. It’s a bad movie.
 
  (Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel)
 
  Bless you, R.Patz & Co., because this gloriously steaming pile is officially in the bad-movies-we-love pantheon.
 
  (Keith Uhlich, Time Out New York)
 
  A dire romantic drama, murkily lit and lethargically directed… Mr Pattinson’s young female fans are likely to find this film less unbearable than anyone else. But even they may find the big emotional climax, which exploits a major terrorist disaster, cheap and pretentious.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
The Hangover Part II (2011)
Relentlessly wrong and funnier than the first.
 
  Someone has finally dared to make a mainstream American comedy in which nothing funny happens.
 
  (Adam Sternberg, New York Times)
 
  It's hard to imagine a more calculating, creatively bankrupt piece of real estate than The Hangover Part II.
 
  (Eric Hynes, Village Voice)
 
  More of a vulgar assault than an attempt at actual comedy.
 
  (Brad Brevet, Rope of Silicon)
 
  Less attractive and far less amusing.
 
  (Philip French, Observer)
 
  The worst sequel of all time.
 
  (Chris Tookey, Daily Mail)
 
 
 
 
Any Given Sunday (1999)
This is a great movie. Brilliantly directed, perfectly cast, superbly acted. Not to be missed.
The Green Mile (2000)
Undoubtedly one of the last great films of the century!
Proof of Life (2000)
The most riveting action adventure in years!
Riding in Cars with Boys (2001)
The season’s first must-see film! Remarkable! Funny, charming and unbelievably moving!
A Man Apart (2003)
Non-stop explosive action!
Identity (2003)
An instant classic. The most unique, intense, satisfying film this year!
The Matrix Reloaded (2003)
Awesome!
Hollywood Homicide (2003)
Harrison Ford is at his best.
Hulk (2003)
Stunning – Never-before-seen effects combined with HULK-sized action!
Alex and Emma (2003)
Funny, sexy & smart, the perfect summer date movie.
SWAT (2003)
Intense, intelligent & the perfect cast!
The Rundown (2003)
The Rundown is quite possibly the first perfect action movie! Awesome, fun, funny with action sequences that will leave you breathless, but gasping for more.
Radio (2003)
Run, don’t walk to this phenomenal film.
Haunted Mansion (2003)
Eddie Murphy at his best!
The Alamo (2004)
This is The Alamo to remember! Oscar-worthy!
The Princess Diaries 2 (2004)
Royally entertaining! Funny, fun and fabulous!
Cinderella Story (2004)
Awesome. This is the Cinderella to remember.
Anchorman(2004)
Side-splitting, gut-busting laughs. The movie you'll be quoting for the rest of the summer. The funniest movie you'll see this summer!
The Forgotten (2004)
Not since The Sixth Sense has a movie contained such profound and compelling twists and turns.
Because of Winn-Dixie (2005)
The best family film of the season!
Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous (2005)
Charming, funny and even better than the original!
Dear John (2010)
The most overwhelmingly romantic movie since The Notebook.
PS I Love You (2010)
Funny, thoughtful and the most heart-felt movie you’ll see this season!
Sucker Punch! (2011)
I like that style of movie!
Horrible Bosses (2011)
The new standard for no-holds-barred comedy!
The Rite (2011)
Chilling.
 
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