Tag: comedy

Cinema Dispatch: Top 10 Worst Movies of 2016

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 3 Comments

Alright, well we got through all the GOOD stuff, so now it’s time to remember 2016 the way it SHOULD be; as one never ending nightmare of awfulness and broken dreams.  There were no shortage of bad films this year which admittedly is true of ANY year, but the yearly ritual of remembering the worst of the worst must be maintained, and so I present the worst of what I had to sit through in the hopes that I can spare some of you the anguish that these films have caused me.  Well there’s no point in dragging it out.  Let’s get this over with.

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Dishonorable Mention: The Do-Over

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How bad is this movie?  It is so blisteringly awful that I couldn’t even finish the damn thing.  At one point (when I was truly naïve), I had decided to review all four of the Adam Sandler Netflix films as they came out and I managed to get through The Ridiculous 6 mostly unscathed.  This proved to be quite the fool’s errand however as the film they did AFTER that is so much worse.  I’ve got two thousand words already written about the movie, and I just abandoned that shit when we got to the part where Adam Sandler was fucking a blow up doll for no reason.  I managed to see MAYBE ten minutes or so after that where David Spade was creepily (and successfully) macking on the window of the guy who’s identity he stole before realizing that there’s no way in hell I’m finishing the rest of this even for the purposes of a review.  Neither of the main actors, Adam Sandler and David Spade, give the smallest of shits about this movie (the latter is straight up smiling during an emotionally distressing moment), the film is shot like a REALLY bad porno (Stormy Daniels is clearly a far better director than Steven Brill considering how flat and under lit everything is in here), and the film is just so unbearably mean spirited without the tiniest bit of legitimate humor to back it up… unless of course you think that Luis Luis Guzmán’s ball sweat dripping on David Spade’s forehead is the height of comic genius.  Adam Sandler is just going to continue regressing further and further into his own comfort zone; not unlike someone else on this list, but we’ll get to them soon enough.  Look, everyone knows better by this point than to take Adam Sandler seriously ever again, so you don’t need me to tell you that he’s made another crappy movie.  If you’ve already managed to avoid this one, then keep on doing so; especially considering how much great content Netflix produces that you can be watching instead of this garbage fire from a bunch of lazy hacks.

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Cinema Dispatch: Top 10 Best Movies of 2016

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 2 Comments

So who else is ready for this year to be over?  I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one who felt that things got pretty rough over the last twelve months, but we’ll get to the Bad list soon enough.  For now, let’s try to focus on the things that were GOOD about 2016; namely the movies that you all should have gone out to see when they were still in theaters.  Unlike last year, I did manage to see quite a bit more movies which has led to a somewhat more well-rounded list, even if you can probably guess which genres got a lot of love from me this year.

Without further ado, LET’S START COUNTING!!

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Honorable Mention: Skiptrace

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Now last year I needed an extra spot just to fit an indie film on my list as most of what my local theater got was just the mainstream fare and therefore those kinds of films completely dominated my Best Of list.  This time I actually went through the effort of seeing the smaller stuff, and while most of them still didn’t make it on my list, at least there’s SOME representation this time around to help fill things out.  Because of that, I figured I’d be less serious with my unofficial eleven spot and would choose a movie that wasn’t exactly GOOD but a hell of a lot of fun.  It was a tossup between Skiptrace and Huntsman: Winter’s War, but I’m gonna give it to the Jackie Chan flick just out of sheer nostalgia.  It’s a Renny Harlin action comedy starring Jackie Chan and Johnny Knoxville; basically making this the greatest thing imaginable for the ONE GUY out there that loves Jackie Chan buddy films but also thinks that Die Hard 2 is the best in the series and that Johnny Knoxville is an underrated actor.  So basically it was made for me and no one else (Die Hard 2 is criminally underrated).  Look, this movie is really sloppy, especially on the production side (why the hell is Jackie Chan subbed, dubbed, and ACTUALLY speaking English all in the same movie!?), but it’s got so many joyful and delightfully stupid moments like Johnny Knoxville being rolled down a hill in a garbage can or Jackie Chan getting in a fist fight while using a Russian Nesting Doll as a shield that it makes up for the cliché ridden script and lack of any real structure.  Even the stuff that’s straight up incompetent is hilarious like how the script puts these two on a train for no other reason than to jump off of it two minutes later, or how a woman gets shot three times and there’s ZERO blood to show for it.  It all adds to the goofy charm that makes it hard to stop watching even knowing just how bad the plot is that revolves around Jackie and Johnny needing to cross all of China looking for a damn cell phone charger.  In the end, none of that ends up mattering all that much when you’ve got Johnny Knoxville trying to dodge bowling balls or when we get to see drunk ass Jackie Chan singing Rolling in the Deep while hanging out in a Mongolian village.  If you’re looking for something incredibly silly and nonsensical with just enough sincerity and heart to avoid coming off as too cynically made just on Jackie’s star power, then you’ll definitely have a good time here.  Also, if you like watching Johnny Knoxville get the crap beat out of him because that happens constantly!

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Cinema Dispatch: Don’t Think Twice

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

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Don’t Think Twice and all the images you see in this review are owned by The Film Arcade

Directed by Mike Birbiglia

I always like to see comedians (especially of the Stand Up variety) take a chance behind the camera, especially considering how many really great works that transition has produced.  Bobcat Goldthwaite’s been making angry and brilliant films since the nineties with people only noticing in the past decade or so how great thy are, and Louis CK made such an impact with his television series that it’s become the template for comedian focused shows since then (*cough* Real Rob, Maron, Lopez *cough*).  Now it’s time for Mike Birbiglia to take another stab at it, and while I didn’t see his first film Sleepwalk with Me, I’ve heard very good things about it and can only hope he’s improved since.  Does this insight into the world of improv comedy turn out to be the sleeper hit of the year, or is it destined be yet another victim of the Sophomore Slump?  Let’s find out!!

The movie follow the six members of a New York City improv group known as The Commune; some of whom have been there since it began in the late nineties, others came later, and some are rather fresh to the scene.  Miles (Mike Birbiglia) is the presumptive leader of the group as he has seniority and also teaches an improv class where a lot of the members came from, including Jack and Samantha (Keegan-Michael Key and Gillian Jacobs) who seem to be the rising stars of the group.  You’ve also got the other old timer Bill (Chris Gethard), the rich girl who wants to be taken seriously Lindsay (Tami Sagher) and the one who’s TOTALLY writing a novel and will finish it eventually Allison (Kate Micucci) to round out the crew.  Everything seems to be going fine and they’ve built up their own little life around the show they do a couple of times a week at this small theater, but then life as to throw a curve ball and things change once they find out the theater is shutting down.  Not only that, Jack and Samantha managed to secure auditions for NOT SNL (Weekend Live) which puts even further strain on their friendship; especially with Miles who tried out years ago but couldn’t make the cut.  Will these comedians be able to survive the changes that are being thrust upon them?  Can Jack and Samantha make that transition to the big leagues without burning out or losing their friends in the process?  Why can’t they ALL be winners!?

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“Anyone thought of some good material today?”     “meh.”

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