Bottom 10 films of 2017
Disclaimer: I started my film reviewing blog from late June, so most of the films on this list (not all of them, though) are from June onwards.
Here are my least favourite 10 films I’ve seen this year. It actually turned out to be a lot trickier than I imagined narrowing it down to just 10, so here’s a few honourable mentions: Geostorm, Flatliners, Home Again, The Dark Tower and American Assassin. So, without further ado, here’s my bottom 10 films of 2017:
- 10: 47 Metres Down
This film bitterly disappointed me despite its relatively interesting plot. St at the bottom of the lake the film features more on survival than the typical shark-attack-films but with poorly written characters and barely any reason to worry for them (plus nearly every major plot point is foreshadowed) help this film onto this list.
- 9: Naked
One day I decided to load up Netflix and watch a random film: I chose Naked. A modern comedy take on Groundhog Day whereby the main character loops the same hour over and over until he is good enough to marry his wife-to-be. It’s not funny, it’s pretty boring and the story just copies from Groundhog Day (rather than change it up slightly like in Happy Death Day).
- 8: The Snowman
I was really excited about this film: how wrong I was. Between the trailer practically giving away the killer and the who-done-it aspect they advertised, and the teasing between villain and police, all helped this film in being underwhelming. There was no logic, no mystery and no excitement.
- 7: The House
There’s probably hundreds of comedies such as this that have been released throughout the year that could have filled this position, but I went with The House (although it was a close contest between this and Home Again). The “comedy” wasn’t funny nor was the story interesting enough to survive without the humour.
I’ve seen pretty mixed reviews about this film, but I fell on the side of being bored throughout. I didn’t like the humour, nor did I have any knowledge on the story beforehand to appreciate any cleverness used.
While Judy Dench could easily get some nominations for her performance, the film and its story bored me so much. She befriended a foreigner and everyone else as upset about it, but the story around that was so laughable that it became silly. While I appreciated the acting, I didn’t appreciate anything else.
- 4: The Mummy
There was a plan, once upon a time, to start another Universe of films, although this one was to be centred on some of the classical villains and it was to be called the Dark Universe. The Mummy was the Iron Man or the Man of Steel, the catalyst in setting this universe off to capture everyone’s intrigue and excitement. Instead they delivered a film so boring that the whole Dark Universe itself is in doubt. I get the appeal of a big-name actor like Tom Cruise to get fans interested, but he’s such a poor actor that having him lead a poorly written and poorly paced film was never going to work.
- 3: Overdrive
The Fast & Furious films have never overly excited me as I’m not a major fan of car-chasing-racing-stunt-flip films, but my god those who made this did a poor job. They were clearly trying to capitalise on the craze around Fast & Furious but did so in such a poor way that unless you really enjoy cars and driving this isn’t for you. I hated the characters, I hated the story and I don’t care too much for watching people change gear as they speed round corners.
- 2: Stratton
The first, and still only, live-action film to get a full 1* rating, Stratton is a British action-thriller that never really had much action nor did it thrill. But the worst part about this film was the rapid-fire editing; I get in some scenarios that can work but in this film it just screamed low-quality. I went in with no expectation (as it wasn’t advertised at all and only lasted a week in the cinema) but still managed to leave disappointed that I’d wasted nearly two hours of my life. But its low-budget and lack of advertising have kept it off the top spot …
… Because The Emoji Movie was everywhere and it was just as terrible. If there’s a product of the world we live in, it’s this film: full of product placing (in a world where native advertising is a prominent topic), full of emojis and an obvious we’re-in-this-for-the-money product. I took my nieces to this film (aged 10 and 11) and they were bored. I was bored. I didn’t laugh. I hated its “plot”, as I think it’s technically got one. Hopefully no movie in 2018 comes to close to this piece of sh*t or Stratton, as these are the types of films that really give film reviewers a strong reason to quit reviewing films.
Do you agree or disagree? Leave your comments down below 🙂
Steve James 