Two Sandler films make this year’s list of failures
So many bad movies, so little space. This year’s collection of stinkers proves Adam Sandler can be counted on to make at least one monumentally bad film, not all comic book movies are good and there are times when there’s nothing funny about a comedy.
Here’s the worst of the worst of 2011.
1. “Jack and Jill”: It should have been called “Dreck and Swill.” Adam Sandler nailed down the worst actor award for 2011 with a performance so rancid it couldn’t be contained by one character. Sandler plays a brother and sister who are the most torturous thing since waterboarding was invented. And Director Dennis Dugan proves it’s possible for a talentless hack to still get work in Hollywood.
2. “Green Hornet”: Comic book fans expressed concern when it was announced that Seth Rogen was going to star in the film version of the comic book. Those worries weren’t unfounded. Rogen bungles his way through a script that couldn’t have been more inane had one of the “Jersey Shore” cast written it. The film was the biggest crime committed in Hollywood this year.
3. “Hall Pass”: What do the careers of Bobby Farrelly and Peter Farrelly have in common with an old woman in a TV commercial? Both have fallen and they can’t get up. Old jokes and lame performances abound as Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis play two guys given a pass from their marriages for a week to do anything they want. They should buy disguises and leave the country.
4. “Arthur”: This feeble remake is not just repugnant for its lack of humor, amateurish acting and lead-footed pacing, but it’s also an insult to the memory of Dudley Moore, who starred in the 1981 version. Russell Brand firmly establishes himself as a contender for Adam Sandler’s bad acting crown with a performance that is about as entertaining as sticking a ferret in your ear.
5. “No Strings Attached”: Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher play bank robbers … oops .. that’s wrong. They merely steal the money they got paid for this film because they did no acting. They play a couple who agree to be intimate without obligations – and who manage to make sex look boring.
6. “Sanctum”: There’s no sense of time or tension. In between deaths, director Alister Grierson focuses his cameras on the actors walking or swimming from cave to cave. Ioan Gruffudd – cinemas’ answer to tryptophan – headlines the film where bad acting, a predictable script and worthless 3-D effects make this tale of the great cave escape a real spe-clunker.
7. “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark”: Just be afraid of this movie. This insult to moviemaking is a sadistic and vile film that tries to pass off the emotional and physical torture of a young girl as entertainment. Putting children in peril in horror films is one of the easiest way to engage an audience. But there is a line between the entertainment value of seeing someone in danger and the sick depiction of abuse. This film obliterates that line.
8. “Just Go With It”: It’s a twin killing for Adam Sandler as another of his movies makes this year’s hall of shame. When it comes to mindless comedies, you expect poop jokes. But this movie is relentless, including a scene where a young boy goes to the bathroom on a man’s hand. There’s just a point where the bathroom humor stinks. This smells like a diaper laundry service before washing day.
9. “Limitless”: A drug makes a man smart. That same drug makes this movie stupid. The potential of “Limitless” was just that. It fails. Under Neil Burger’s disjointed direction and Bradley Cooper’s cold performance, the movie should be called “Hapless.”
10. “Immortals”: The Muse that was behind this script should be tossed off Mount Olympus. We will never know what it’s like to live forever, but we can at least get a taste of what eternity feels like with “Immortals.” The last time something this big and bloated moved this slowly there was an Ice Age going on.
Dishonorable mentions: “Transformers: Dark of the Moon,” “Something Borrowed,” “Happy Feet 2,” “Crazy, Stupid, Love,” “Bridesmaids.”