Five to Avoid

I spend a lot of time on this blog talking about great movies that you should see, so why not look at the flipside and focus on the movies you should avoid?  I'm not too terribly hard to please when it comes to movies, so I'll just take a look at five movies, instead of the ten I'd talk about if I were recommending movies.

In Theaters


You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger - This is an example of Woody Allen on autopilot.  The plots are lazy and trite, and the narrator sounds as detached and bored with the goings-on as film-goers are sure to be.  Though many tend to dislike Allen's more recent work, I'm usually a fan, but I can't recommend this lame movie.

Nowhere Boy - One of my most anticipated films of the year ends up as one of 2010's most disappointing.  This look at John Lennon's childhood just isn't interesting enough: basically, he had a bad mom and a harsh but caring aunt.  That's it.  The formation of the Beatles is secondary and not handled in enough detail to satisfy rabid fans, so the film's only grace lies in a couple great performances from Aaron Johnson and Kristin Scott Thomas.  In this case, that's not enough.

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole - This one likely won't be hanging around theaters much longer thanks to the release of Megamind this weekend and Tangled later this month, but nonetheless, if you're tempted to see it, fight the temptation.  The plot is cliche fantasy junk and the star-studded voice cast is really underwhelming.  None of their performances are at all memorable.  The animation is beautiful and the 3-D is impressive, but it's like pretty frosting on a crap cake.

On DVD


Sex and the City 2 - Simply, this is the worst movie of the year.  After its surprisingly good predecessor, it's hard to believe how awful this second chapter is.  It's disgusting, cheesy, and offensive.  If you manage to suffer through the whole thing, you might end up using the DVD to slit your wrists afterwards.

Charlie St. Cloud - This horrifically bad Zac Efron vehicle comes out next week, but an advance warning is extremely necessary.  It's over-sentimental and cheesy in the worst ways, and despite Efron's best attempts, he just can't salvage the awful story.  Boring, trite, and far too predictable.