Most overrated films of all time

[WrestlingDeacon 0]

GtD: I think you nail a lot of good points on the head with your mini column on Kane there. Two things do come to my mind to mention. I don't really see the movie as a comedy in the first half, although I do see where there are lighter moments and a lighter tone. I think that is to highlight the idealism Kane starts with in running his newspaper. You can contrast this with the early scenes based on Thatcher's diary which are just as dark and sober as most of the rest of the movie. When it moves into the lighter part, it is Bernstein's recollections and he is the type of character that would remember the lighter and more joyful moments and play them that way in his tale. You are probably one of the few I've seen that does pick up on how Kane and the movie tweaks every so slightly depending on who the reporter is talking to.

 

I also think that close attention should be paid to the relationship between Leland and Kane and that for me is the money relationship and storyline of the film that most overlook. Kane and Cotton have magnificent chemistry and their scenes centered around Jed's review of Susan's opera and his leaving the Chronicle employ are very well played by both men with fine subtleties, I also feel that these scenes are where the writing comes off the best and strongest still today.

[godthedog 0]

yeah, that relationship does get overlooked a lot, since his story is the one that focuses on his political career, and most just focus on the political career. kane & leland's final meeting is GOLD. i'd give my left nut to write 2 lines and a sound effect that perfectly. i don't know if there is a money relationship in 'kane', but i personally think the most interesting one is with susan...probably because it has so many great dramatic moments. i think jed leland's big speech after kane loses the election drags his segment down a bit, just because it's overblown and kind of embarrassing to watch.

 

i personally think the writing is the best part about 'kane', but i agree that it has the most flaws. there's some parts of it that are just overwritten & don't work on screen. cotten didn't need a monologue about how kane wants the people to love him, one or two lines would've been fine. and dorothy comingore did NOT need to say "oh, i get it. it's not me this is being done to at all. it's you. i can't do this to you? oh yes i can." it draws out the moment for way too long. she could've just said "oh yes i can" and left. hell, a facial expression would've said everything.

[WrestlingDeacon 0]

A big part of those writing flaws was that Welles was used to writing for radio where you have to spell everything out as much as possible. True, co-writer Herman Mackiwiecz was experienced with film, but word now is that he was drunk for great portions of the writing and Welles had to hold his hand through it. I also want to say that there was a conscious effort on Welles' part to showcase Cotton and get him over with viewers, hence the lengthy monologues here and there and some of the lunacy involved with him as an old codger. My favorite scene for Cotton is during the opera where he is slowly tearing the program to shreds and makes a sort of fan out of it. I don't know if that was written in, but Cotton just plays his boredom beautifully there and that's all in body language and facial expression with a neat little prop to add the icing on the cake.

 

You want to talk about some GOLD work between Cotton and Welles, check out the ferris wheel scene in The Third Man. I would have given my left nut to have written that or have that kind of crackling chemistry with an actor on screen.

[godthedog 0]

from what i've heard, mank was more responsible for the overwriting, just writing heaps and heaps of material with welles having to organize it & pare it down. but there is definitely an element of showboating in the writing for the actors that isn't totally necessary, & that welles may have been responsible for.

 

and i may be shot for this, but i don't think cotten was used quite properly. he's great in it, but there's something about the movie trying to make him too proper & high class that just doesn't sit well with his everyman appeal. his character is written to be a little too articulate and self-aware. i thought cotten was MUCH better in 'the third man'.

 

speaking of which...

 

You want to talk about some GOLD work between Cotton and Welles, check out the ferris wheel scene in The Third Man. I would have given my left nut to have written that or have that kind of crackling chemistry with an actor on screen.

oh, hell yeah. that's one of my favorite scenes in any movie ever. joe is so boiling in his everyman way, and orson plays it off so cool. i've gone to the library between classes & taken the laserdisc to a video booth, just to watch that scene.

[Guest El Satanico]

To add to the Kane discussion...

 

I think the "Citizen Kane is overrated" claims are also a product of what was revolutionary about Citizen Kane is now common place. Because people are so accustomed to seeing that stuff, they will automatically think "what's the big deal...it's just a typical hollywood movie".

 

When I first saw it I went into it thinking "This has to be overrated...it can't be that good". Despite that mindset, I loved it upon my first viewing.

[Guest ShamRock]

About Citizen Kane, I love the camera work. It's very good, and the story is an interesting one, but the way it's told, it just bores me. I would call Kane a good movie, but not "the greatest of all-time".

[Guest evenflowDDT]

Despite seeing it quite a bit in my film class last quarter, I really can't add too much to the Kane discussion, so I'll switch gears, if I may.

 

I've never liked The Exorcist. The atmosphere puts me off, and the "evil" behavior has hardly held up over time. With the exception of the crucifix fucking, my sister does all that on a daily basis. Plus, it's much too slow for anything to take root if you're not instantly shocked by her terrible behavior. I saw the "restored" version in theatres, and, with the exception of the "spider walk" sequence, I was bored to tears.

[Guest ShamRock]

Taxi Driver

Why do you find Taxi Driver overrated?

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

Personally, I think Night Of The Living Dead and Dawn Of The Dead are BOTH overrated to the points of lunacy. Great movies? Yes. Pivotal horror movies? Yes. Excellent social satires disguised as gorefests? Yes. Overrated? Yes.

 

Night Of The Living Dead's acting is wooden, the characters cliché, and the story pretty predictable. Of course, I say this 35 years after its release, so I've seen other zombie flicks (Return Of The Living Dead, Zombie, Dead Alive, etc.) that have studied the original Romero masterpiece, so hey. All in all, I do think the original NOTLD is a classic, and should be seen at least once by EVERYBODY (whether you like zombie films or not), but it's not too life altering.

 

Dawn Of The Dead is guilty of this too. For a movie that is heralded as "THE zombie picture," it sure is really boring at times. Worse yet, the non-action parts, which is where characters are supposed to be explored and developed more so than prior, aren't used all too well. Sure, the relationships are touched upon, but when the zombies aren't around, it's almost hard to watch unless you have your thumb hovering over the fast-forward button. And I say this as a LOVER of Romero's trilogy.

 

To touch upon Citizen Kane...I couldn't get into the story too well. Whether it be because of writing that isn't incredibly strong (as previous posters have already said) or because I've seen all of the camera angles done since (and done better, perhaps), but I just couldn't get too into it. Tastes and generation, perhaps. I still respect it as a landmark film in the sense of both unique direction and a great fight against the Hollywood Elite (™Lloyd Kaufman).

 

And I just know somebody is going to say Evil Dead and/or Evil Dead II, and I'm prepared to discuss those. Just nobody better say Ghostbusters (Ghostbusters II is acceptable, just not the original), because then I'll go apeshit.

[Guest El Satanico]

I just thought of one no one else mentioned.

 

This movie is extremely overrated...

 

Evil Dead

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...Trap

[Vern Gagne 0]

I think people confuse overrated with bad.

 

Star Wars is overrated. I don't think it's bad though.

[Kardo 0]

It begins and ends with Heat, or the movie that never ends. I mean c'mon what sort of cop/robber acts in the way they were, especially the coffee scene, total garbage. Could have cut at least 1 hour out and had exactly the same effect.

[Guest evenflowDDT]

I just thought of one no one else mentioned.

 

This movie is extremely overrated...

 

Evil Dead

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...Trap

Have you seen it? I've heard it hyped a lot, but that it's actually not too good at all (though I saw the trailer for the sequel and it looks fantastic). Same thing with Guts of a Virgin. Conveniently, both are out on DVD in the U.S. courtesy of Synapse Films (well, not Guts...yet...they got shitty masters, and had to get new ones, boo!).

[Rendclaw 0]

In 40 years, they are going to look at Star Wars and look at that light we do Citizen Kane...Over Hyped.

 

It doesn't help that Star Wars is pretty much exposed as a weak movie MADE by it's fanboys obsessive devotion to the movie and the series itself already.

Speaking as one of those "fanboys" who got to see it for the first time at the tender age of 8, thats how Star Wars has lived into the next millenium, and thats how it will continue to live, just like Star Trek.

 

Do I love the series on principle? Yes, but that does not mean that I don;t take it for what it is, a rehash of the serial sci-fi radio/TV shows/movies going back at least as far as the 30s. The idea's time had come again, and in 1977, the rest was history.

 

The original movie has already been around 26 years. The franchise has suffered because of the sub-par efforts of the prequel movies, and the last three episodes will never be made. With the exception of Star Trek, which is a whole different can of worms, Episodes 4, 5 and 6 have been the standard by which all other sci-fi films have been judged, fairly or unfairly.

 

I have to disagree that it is overrated. It was perfect for its time, and judging a movie by what its obsessively devoted fans do is rather weak. I shake my head at the geeks who will sit out there in line a month or two before the new movie hits and have lightsaber duels in the parking lot. But that it judging the phenomena surrounding the movie franchise, instead of judging the movie itself. its rather unfair.

[Kahran Ramsus 0]

1. The Big Lebowski

2. Titanic

3. Fight Club

4. Chasing Amy

5. Traffic

[WrestlingDeacon 0]

I think with Evil Dead and Night of the Living Dead, you're getting into films that are only liked and hyped by a certain segment of the film going population. Overall, films like ED and NotLD could be considered underrated or not even on the general radar of most. You could stop a random 100 people on the street and I bet at least 90 would have no idea what you were talking when you said "Evil Dead."

 

I'm beginning to think that Titanic is overrated for being overrated. Most critics and those in the know admit that it's not that great of a film and just managed to ride the wave of hype around it more than anything.

[Guest El Satanico]

I just thought of one no one else mentioned.

 

This movie is extremely overrated...

 

Evil Dead

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...Trap

Have you seen it? I've heard it hyped a lot, but that it's actually not too good at all (though I saw the trailer for the sequel and it looks fantastic). Same thing with Guts of a Virgin. Conveniently, both are out on DVD in the U.S. courtesy of Synapse Films (well, not Guts...yet...they got shitty masters, and had to get new ones, boo!).

Actually I was just screwing around because poster above me remarked about someone calling ED overrated.

 

I haven't seen EDT

[godthedog 0]

To add to the Kane discussion...

 

I think the "Citizen Kane is overrated" claims are also a product of what was revolutionary about Citizen Kane is now common place. Because people are so accustomed to seeing that stuff, they will automatically think "what's the big deal...it's just a typical hollywood movie".

actually, the only things 'kane' pounced on that are still being used today are having ceilings in the shot & using wide angle lenses. even when wide angle lenses are used, they're mostly used to make spaces or characters look distorted, not to have everything in focus. when was the last time you saw a hollywood movie that had 3-minute shots with everything on the screen in focus? actually, the trend in hollywood has gone away from the welles/toland style of long takes: the the 40s, the average length of a shot was around 10 seconds, in the 90s it was 4-5 seconds. and even when longer takes are used, they're not used for the compositions-in-depth that welles used, with multiple characters & characters shifting between the foreground & the background; normally, a long take today is usually used for tracking shots where the camera goes from place to place (paul thomas anderson, 'time code', etc). invisible edits didn't start becoming common practice, and except for some film noir examples, nobody in hollywood lit their sets with the big, baroque shadows that were in 'kane'. the movie was innovative, but it wasn't like every movie after 'kane' started looking the same as 'kane'. the only hollywood movie i can think of offhand that looks anything like 'kane' is 'the best years of our lives', & that movie had the same cinematographer that 'kane' had--the look of the film is hardly commonplace. if you pay attention and compare, it still looks totally unlike anything from hollywood since.

[razazteca 0]

1. The Big Lebowski

2. Titanic

3. Fight Club

4. Chasing Amy

5. Traffic

1. Let me guess your not a fan of John Goodman?

2. the biggest chick flick ever?

3. ML Oday dies in it! Its good on that principal alone.

4. Ben Affleck sucks.

5. I wonder how this compares to the British mini series of the same name.

[Nighthawk 0]

Actually, the British mini series was called Traffik, but close enough.

[MrRant 0]

I enjoyed Kane and it is one of the better movies I have seen but it to ME isn't the best film ever made.

 

And I think the overrated platform is too subjective because after a good 10 years or so when half of the teeny boppers grow the fuck up they will realize that Titanic is crap and it will go from overrated to what it is. Crap.

 

It takes TIME to determine if a movie is actually overrated or underrated.

 

I DARE anyone to say that the Wizard of OZ is overrated and give specific points as to why.

[PLAGIARISM! 0]

Matrix is good for the effects. Citizen Kane was groundbreaking in terms of production. They can't be overrated in those contexts, but as a whole they are.

 

Everyone pretty much realises how bad Titanic was now.

 

And I was considerably let down by Spiderman. That's only because all my friends loved it however, I wouldn't call it a bad film, I just really didn't like it.

[WrestlingDeacon 0]

I'm going to play Devil's Advocate here and make a case against The Wizard of Oz as being overrated. Not that I believe this though.

 

By today's standards, The Wizard of Oz is a cheesy, dorky hokey little picture. Aside from "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (which a five year old could pick out on a keyboard) the songs are rather unimpressive and forgetable; certainly not on par with the Fred Astaire musicals and popular swing based pictures of the day. The acting is rather wooden and bland, even for a children's picture. The only person who doesn't have that problem is the Wicked Witch of the West who is over the top and scenery chewing that Robin Williams would tell her to tone it down. The movie went through four different directors and it really shows as the film seems to lack a focused creative vision and the use technicolor hides the fact that the direction, especially in the musical numbers, is lackluster and stilted for the most part. Finally, when has "oh, it was all just a dream" ever been a good ending?

[Guest Choken One]

It was at the time...it seems dumb now since Movies...TV and other mediums done that finish so many fucking times...

[WrestlingDeacon 0]

Actually, the "it was just a dream" ending has been around since the dawn of storytelling and was a constant deus ex machina of fables and fairy tales during the medieval era. At the time of the film's release, Oz writer L. Frank Baum was unhappy with the ending and wrote a lengthy essay (I forget where it was published) demoaning the dream ending as a literary crutch in general.

[Anorak 0]

MASH - Maybe its my years as some people might put it but for me it seems a tedious and almost smug film in thrall to how radical it thinks it is. For a film lauded for being sophisticated in its humor and politics there's a lot of toothless satire & camp pratfalling going on in an almost 'Carry On' style.

 

IF...... - Another 'radical' film that hasn't aged too well, very heavy handed and obvious when it could have been more subtlely effective and the presumably french new wave influenced sequences come over a bit ham fisted.

 

Any Woody Allen film. For every exact same character with a different name, for the whole 4 facial expressions, Jewish 'humor', the recycled jokes, the pretty 17 year olds, the kooky divorcees etc, etc, etc.

 

Just to check, 'Dead Alive' is the American title for Peter Jackson's 'Brain Dead' right?

[Guest MideonMark]

Ok to finally contribute to the tread again after posting the topic last night, I'll name a few more I think are overrated. What I will say though is that will I consider myself a big film fan and I even plan to possibly take a career in the industry(I have applied for a Scriptwriting for Film and TV course at University, I just need the grades to get in), I would definately not consider myself a so called 'anorak' in the vein of say WrestlingDeacon, who could probably name what film won Best Picture in the 1963 Oscars. I'll also say that my arguments will not be as intelligent as someone like WD's(I could never argue that intelligently on Citizen Kane for instance). But anyway I tried to think of some pre 1990, and heres what I came up with-

 

-Star Wars-

 

Yeah I know some of you have mentioned it already, but I'll have to add my name to that list. The argument that only avid fan boys consider it one of the greatest films ever is not actually true in my experience. Let me take you back to last year for instance, Channel 4, a TV channel on British TV, wanted the public to vote for the 100 Greatest Films of All Time. The program was split into two 3hr parts shown on separate nights. I watched both parts and it eventually got to the Top 10 and I thought 'Aww crap Star Wars is in the top 10', so it gets to no.2 and The Godfather was no.2 on the list, so 3 guesses what was No.1 in the 100 Greatest Films of All Time as voted for by the public. Now I don't think there are enough avid Star Wars fanboys in Britain to influence the vote to that extent, so I do think that its not just the fanboys who consider this extremely overrated film to be the greatest ever.

 

-The Deer Hunter-

 

First of all, what I will say about this is that all the performances in this were top notch(with Christopher Walkens performance in particular excelleny better than even De Niro's) and I think that the scenes in Vietnam are excellent(even if historically the Vietnamese never forced POWs to play Russian Roulette), but this film is 3 odd hrs long, and the makers could have cut at least an hour off it. The first hour of the film, whilst some would say essential to the development of the plot, is incredibly boring. Maybe it was the fact that I was like 8 when I first say it that hardens my opinion on the film, but it is pretty damn boring.

 

-The Exorcist-

 

I think someone already mentioned this but this has to be included. I remember hearing stories of when it was first released in the 70s, cinemas actually had EMTs hired because of the frequency of people fainting in horror because this film was deemed extremely scary. I also believe the film was banned in Britain(but I think that was mostly due to the Crucifix scene). So I saw it a few years ago and it is not scary in the slightest and I actually found it more amusing that frightening. Granted I don't ever recall finding a film frightening(Well I guess Mr Nanny counts, but in a different sort of way), although The Ring(the original) freaked the hell outta me, esp. the scene where the girl on the video walks toward the screen then steps out of the screen into the room(I watched that at like 2am and it freaked the hell out of me). Maybe The Exorcist just didn't stand the test of time and I don't think many people consider it a great movie, just a great horror film, when really its neither.

 

-Get Carter-

 

Reason I included this is because I bought it on video a few days ago for £2.99, having heard that it was probably the greatest British film ever. Maybe it was just me, but I didn't like it at all. I found it very boring. Also Michael Caine gets a lot of praise for his acting performances but I don't think hes that great of an a actor and in this he comes across as very wooden and isn't menacing enough to play such a menacing character. The film is not helped by the dialogue which at times is very corny and is not realistic of Northern England and Newcastle in particular.

 

Ok, thats all I can think of at the minute. I'll be waiting anxiously for WD to tear me a new arsehole for including Get Carter and The Deer Hunter and for not explaining my choices well enough. I'll try to include more later.

[WrestlingDeacon 0]

Best picture of '63 was Lawrence of Arabia. Winning over To Kill a Mockingbird, Mutiny on the Bounty, The Music Man and I think, Days of Wine and Roses (nope, just looked it up and it was the Longest Day. See, I'm not infallible.)

 

Actually, I'm impressed that you've seen the original Get Carter. I found it very funny when Stallone was doing the remake and people was fawning over the original like it was some great film. Caine was much better in lighter films during that period, such as Alfie and The Italian Job. If you want to see Caine as a menacing villain, check out Dressed to Kill where he comes off as suitably psychotic yet proper.

 

Probably the best British film I've seen is Peeping Tom, outside of The Third Man of course.

 

I agree that the first half of Deer Hunter is slow, but it really helps in adding dramatic weight to the second half. The Deer Hunter was one of the first movies that really dealt with soldiers before becoming soldiers and how the effects of war wrecked their personalities and home lives. A little cliched by today's standards true. I also think this is one of the few times De Niro's performance could be called 'understated' and it really works here as I like his chemistry with Walken, especialy during the finale. Again, I think the first of the movie gets lost on today's audience as they are just not trained to watch a movie of that nature.

 

The Exorcist has a reputation of being a great movie and actually was the harbinger of darker, more gritty and realistic horror films that started coming out in the seventies like The Omen. You have to remember that there was a time when the original Dracula and Frankenstein scared the hell out of people and caused national hysteria. Now you could barely call those movies suspenseful. You keep pushing the envelope and the envelope keeps getting farther out. Twenty years from now, someone will watch The Ring and fall asleep because it's scare tactics are not anythign they haven't seen a thousand times before. I do believe the days of gross out horror are mostly dead and a return to more suspenseful fare is hopefully coming. The Exorcist was certainly a product of its time and why I feel it holds up as a good film today, it's not the blood curdling horror movie it was originally. Although, I liked the Exorcist III so maybe I'm just an idiot. (II sucked, naturally, as it came during Richard Burton's "Fuck the Academy and their damn Oscars, I'm working for scotch" period.)

[godthedog 0]

i'll say 'wizard of oz' is overrated, and with sincerity. i don't really find anything magical or entertaining about it.

[Guest JMA]

I think Tim Burton's "Batman" is vastly overrated. Especially Keaton and Nicholson. The costume was terrible, Gordon had almost no role, Vicky Vale made you root for the Joker, and Alexander Knox is quite possibly the most annoying character ever. This movie is nothing compared to Mask of the Phantasm (THE Batman movie, IMO).