Who made the worst movie of the year?

I'm going to be posting infrequently this week -- everyone's entitled to a little holiday break -- but I couldn't resist indulging in every moviegoers' favorite ritual: toting up the worst movies of the year. I see so many movies each year that I treat the bad ones like way a baseball player handles the game where he struck out four times, the last time with the bases loaded: You forget about it and move on.

But Christian Toto, the Washington Times film critic, just posted a timely reminder of his least favorite films of the year, with his No. 1 pick going to "88 Minutes," the horrifically bad Al Pacino thriller, which will surely be remembered more for the color of Pacino's hair -- burnt orange -- than for its hapless filmmaking and inept acting. As Toto puts it: "If you're not thinking 'What were they thinking?' during every scene of this misbegotten crime thriller, then your brain may not be connected to the rest of your body."

Toto offers up a few other choice clunkers, including "Jumper," The Happening" and "10,000 B.C." But everyone has their own taste when it comes to really awful films, so I'm eager to hear your worst film of the year choices. Just to get the ball rolling, here's a few more candidates:

"Meet the Spartans," an inane spoof (allegedly of "300," though who would know for sure) that got so many bad reviews it actually earned a two on Rotten Tomatoes, inspiring heaps of critical abuse ("It's so bad that even Carmen Electra should be embarrassed," wrote the Detroit News' Adam Graham).

"Meet Dave," a clunky one-note Eddie Murphy sci-fi comedy vehicle that inspired Empire magazine's Simon Crook to write: "Avoid it like the plague."

Spike Lee's "Miracle at St. Anna," a soggy, interminable (2 hours and 40 minutes) drama about black World War II soldiers that might be Lee's worst film ever, filled with every WW2 cliche known -- or as the Christian Science Monitor's Peter Rainer put it: "Whatever miracle occurred at St. Anna never made it to the screen."

And the dreadfully unfunny "Hamlet 2," which Focus Films inexplicably bought for $10 million after seeing it at Sundance, enhancing the festival's reputation (remember "Happy Texas"?) as the burial ground for film comedy. The movie had so few comic moments that it inspired the New York Post's Kyle Smith to write: "I laughed zero times at 'Hamlet 2,' which is aimed at campy men and the women who find them hysterical."

I know there are lots of more possible deserving entries, from "Funny Games" to " Saw V" to Will Smith's "Seven Pounds," which is currently inspiring a wealth of critical venom. Surely I've forgotten a few groaners. Help me out here!

Comments

[Jay]

"Synecdoche, New York" was long, confusing, weird, and a waste of a good cast.

[utzworld]

"The Happening" is the worst movie of the DECADE...let alone the year! Easily top 10 worst of all time!

[gmkerwin]

Quantum of Solace: A great Bond - a great M - standing around with not much to do in a limp TV drama, with stock TV-style baddies, stock TV-level ingenues. And a critical moment of skullduggery, set during a weird-beard opera performance...huh?!

[NickR]

The Happening isn't Shymalan's worst movie, but it's the one he put out this year.
It's on my list of worst pictures. I'm glad I didn't pay to see it.

[dominic]

I definitely have to nominate Burn After Reading.... one of the worst movies I've seen.

[AMERIBOB1]

Move: Mama Mia: was miscasted. Play was ten times better. Better voices, better acting than movie.

[the dude]

I wholeheartedly agree with utzworld.

I'd also like to add "Rachel Getting Married" to the list, as well as, "Hankcock." *shudder*

[ns]

My first question is...who the F are you?
I hate to be dramatic but, how dare you name any movie with Al Pacino the worst movie of the year. I think you need to go back to school.
Sure it wasn't a great movie, but it wasn't THAT bad, and just the fact that he was in it is enough to keep it off the "worst" movie list. COME ON! There were a lot of movies a lot worse than that one.

[Mark P]

Wrong Pacino movie.....Righteous Kill was a waste of both Pacino AND De Niro.

[Firefly]

Trust me, "The Spirit" will top the list or climb precariously close to the top of the worst....and with only a week before it could be declared the worst of '09! Frank Miller's "The Stinker" would've been more accurate!

[Quintin Franks]

The Happening was definitely the worst... if it had been a Comedy, it would actually have been original, and would have made some sense...

[Micki Sackler]

It pains me to say this but of the films I saw this year (and since I don't get paid for watching movies and have long since stopped trying to see all potential Razzies before voting roles around, I do manage to avoid the vast majority of clunkers), the brain-numbing, criminally boring re-make of The Women has to get my vote for the worst of the year. Something must have happened to Diane English from her brilliant television days (Murphy Brown, anyone?) on the long road to getting this movie made. Me and my gal pals grew up watching the original on TV and then in repertory movie houses, on TCM and as part of our DVD collections. So we were especially excited to get into a very advance screening of the remake (Meg Ryan! Annette Bening! Bette Midler! Diane English!) That is, until we'd actually sat through the leaden mess and exited the theater disappointed, dismayed and pretty much horrified at how such a highly-anticipated, high-profile conglomeration of talent could produce such a stultifying, unsatisfying film. While certainly dated in spots, the original had terrific writing, acid-filled one-liners, a fluid, snappy pace and wonderfully realized characters . The 2008 version had superficial, trite and/or stereotypical characters (ooh! Jada Pinkett Smith as a tough-talking lesbian!) and except for a riotous performance by Debra Messing and an all-too-brief appearance by Bette Midler, the core cast was uniformly disappointing -- whether solely due to poor script or poor direction or what-all, we may never know. And production values? The classic dressing room scene from the original looked like it was filmed in someone's empty walk-in closet. The proof of just how bad this film was? As a woman I really try to support the too-small percentage of films made by women and starring women. But this film gave "women's pictures" a bad name. Just as I applaud the Golden Globes for separating drama and comedy since comedic performances, although often more difficult to pull off, are usually given short shrift, I've always thought that the Razzies should have two worst picture categories: worst you-knew-it-would-be-crappy-even-before-the-cameras-rolled production (example: The Hottie and the Nottie) and worst big budget, high profile-with great-expectations-gone-ballistically bad (say 88 Minutes). One can almost enjoy those in the former category but those in the latter are the biggest disappointments-- and this year The Women topped that list for me. Of course, I still haven't see The Day the Earth Stood Still ...

[Niko]

Answer to your question:

Frank Miller

[Russell]

The worst movie of the year had to be Love Guru, I'm sorry that movie was horrible. Mike Myers is done.

[Drasail]

Please remember the Angela Jolie vehicle "Wanted" which was "Fight Club"
for those too stupid to get the irony of "Fight Club". I heard she donates
a lot of her salery to the poor. Next time I'll skip the movie and send her
a check.

[Brent]

I usually try to avoid bad movies but Speed Racer is the only movie I walked out of this year.

[Harry]

"The Happening" was absolutely the worst film of the year. Absolute ineptness, with possibly the worst ending in at least a decade. Add on the worst acting and writing in a long time, and you've got possibly the worst movie ever made about killer wind.

[RubyMay]

I realize it is a huge critical darling but my vote for the worst of the year goes to Rachel Getting Married. From the ridiculous 5 minute dishwasher loading scene, to the interminable toasting at the rehearsal dinner, the pointless and endless dancing at the actual wedding, the contrived characters, unrealistic dialogue, annoying father, nausea-inducing camerawork and the "twist" about what happened to the family that you can see coming a mile a way, this movie was by far the worst thing I subjected myself to (film or otherwise) in 2008.

[The Rake]

Good job, Patrick. The worst movie I have seen this year so far is Pineapple Express. I am sure that there have been worse movies made, but that was the worst I had to experience so far. Ben Button on the other hand has been the best. You can see my review at thefilmnest.com should you care to check it out.

[JohnTEQP]

Speed Racer, definitely a travesty. I remember watching it when I was 5, so I was looking forward to the movie. I even bought a DVD of the original series. Surprise surprise, my taste is much more sophisticated than it was when I was 5. Just a mess. I had forgotten that "Speed Racer" was the actual name of the character. The only decent thing was watching Susan Sarandon and John Goodman, because you know each of them is getting paid well, and they actually seemed to be having fun. Apparently the third Matrix movie was not an anomaly.

[luvergrrrl]

Yeah, I'm going to have to second 'Wanted' as the worst film of the year. Why? The film held up the main character, who is, face it, a murderer, and for whom violence is the highest form of action, as the paragon of achievement. That last scene, where he looks at the camera, contemptuously asking the audience, "What have you done lately?" before blowing someone's brains out, made me what to ask the director for a refund, South-Park style.

[Sheldon]

I'll just add my voice to the "The Love Guru" contingent.

When I saw it, there were a half-dozen teenaged guys sitting behind me and they - being the target audience for that dreck - only laughed once over the film's duration. And that was at a colloquial [ie - unprintable] putdown of the film by one of them.

And yes, barring a miracle, Mike Myers is so very done...

[Randall Unruh]

Australia had so much schmaltz combined with camera muggings that what should have been a great epic movie turned into a farcical tear jerker.

[Ralph]

My Bottom Four

Speed Racer - Even made Matt Fox look bad. Was so awful my 8 year old made us leave after 30 minutes.
The Happening - Wind? Really? So we know for sure now, The Sixth Sense was a fluke.
The Women - The Botox.
88 Minutes - 88 Months. Interminable. He's a University lecturer but he carries a gun. Right.

[RedSoxNationWest]

@ the dude at 5:18: I thought Rachel Getting Married was a pretty darn good movie. Sure, it was a downer, but it was well acted and captivating.