Tomb
Did these films used to be good? No just popular.
While I usually prefer to use this space to draw attention to worthy films that shouldn’t be forgotten this week I indulge my grumpy side to point out a few tacky movies that were once popular but are now barely discussed at all. Let’s look at these now-irrelevant films as evidence that we are progressing and maturing as a society.
• Michael (1996). After Pulp Fiction (1994) resurrected John Travolta’s career audiences were so pleased to have him back that we’d watch the guy in pretty much anything. Loads of odd Travolta vehicles appeared. This one was a doozy. Sure movies about angels are supposed to be flaky but yikes people.
As the literal angel Michael Travolta wears a set of huge ridiculous wings throughout the film. He does things that are completely inexplicable such as head butting a bull. He also dances because hey he’s Travolta. Every human woman becomes horny in Michael’s presence and they all point out that he smells like cookies. All of the characters other than Michael are only there to watch him argue with him describe him to others and comment on how terrific he is.
Despite the pointless story and the talent vacuum that is Andie MacDowell Michael is actually pretty fun to watch thanks to Travolta’s considerable charm. You probably watched it back in the day and enjoyed it. I did too. Do you want to see it again? Probably not.
• Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992). This film really has no idea how ridiculous it is. It takes itself incredibly seriously even asserting that all previous vampire films are pale imitations of the mighty original text that this film purports to finally be utterly faithful to. (It isn’t.) So what do we get after all these promises? The world’s funniest wig. A bat costume that gets big laughs. Hokey melodrama. Shadow puppets. And Keanu Reeves. Really Francis Ford Coppola? Really?
If this movie were a person it would be a pompous douche bag with a popped collar and an orange spray-on tan sneering at people in a nightclub.
• Driving Miss Daisy (1989). First off I must observe that Morgan Freeman and Jessica Tandy are both brilliant actors. Good thing too because they’re onscreen pretty much non-stop and the script isn’t helping one bit. We’re supposed to feel good because a hateful racist old bitch finally realizes that the servant she’s been mistreating for 20 years is a good man? Hooray for abusive one-sided friendships!
• The Natural (1984). This is an interesting film to watch but the ending tries obscenely hard to be uplifting and inspiring while actually being repellent. Robert Redford plays a gifted baseball player who is told by his doctor that if he tries to play in the Big Game he’ll die. He plays anyway. Hooray! Remember kids always ignore the advice of health professionals and risk your life in order to hit a ball with a stick! You’ll obliterate the scoreboard in a huge shower of sparks and start running slo-mo out of sheer awesomeness!
This movie is for people who think that The Wrestler (2008) has a happy ending.
• Jack (1996). Coppola strikes again. Jack is the heartwarming tale of a boy with a rare condition that causes him to age four times faster than normal. He’s a 10-year-old child in the body of Robin Williams. When he enrolls in public school the film becomes a desperate attempt at comedy as Jack uses his adult appearance to buy porn for his friends and to lie to their teachers. In the “happy” ending Jack ecstatically celebrates graduating from high school despite the fact that he is now horrifyingly close to death.
• Freebie and the Bean (1974). This was considered the height of buddy-cop comedy at the time but today? Yuck. James Caan and Alan Arkin waste their considerable talents as the title duo who start the film by picking through trash from a garbage can. They interrogate one informant by threatening to rape his girlfriend who seems strangely OK with it.
This film might have the funniest car chase ever filmed. I say “might have” because I didn’t actually watch it because I switched it off after about 20 minutes of painfully unfunny sexist racist comedy.
Oh and Arkin’s character is nicknamed “Bean” because he’s Mexican. Hilarious!
