Movies You Were Told Were Amazing But You Hated

Your taste in film is abysmal.

The singing in Umbrellas is grating to me because the lead female characters sing in what sounds like untrained, thin, "head voice." (Ironically, if Vernon and Deneuve had done their own singing, it might have been less annoying--and more charming). Aside from the great theme, none of the music is memorable, just monotonous recitative.

Fun fact: Anne Vernon is still alive, aged 101.

“Love, Actually.” What a tedious slog.

Star Wars

Titanic

That preposterous space movie with Sandra Bullock

Ghostbusters

CASABLANCA. What a boring pos it was. And I like Ingrid and Humphrey. But I don’t get this one at all.

“Moulin Rouge.” Once was more than enough.

Traffic.

Out Of Africa.

I’d have to also vote for Love, Actually. It’s tedious and there’s not one remotely functional relationship in the bunch. It should have been called “Infatuation And Abuse, Actually”. Plus there’s zero representation for LGTBQ couples. I realize that’s a “the food is terrible and the portions are too small” kind of complaint. But the fact that he had to basically invent the stupidest scenarios for straights (porn Star stand-ins?) to get his two hour feature makes me cringe.

The Godfather.

Yup, I think I’ll get slagged for this, but I stand by my assessment. It sucks.

The Usual Suspects. I no longer remember anything about it except thinking, “this, this is something people think is so great?” I truly didn’t understand.

Clue.

Lord of the Rings. All of them. Shakespeare in Love Crash Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragons The first 3 Star Wars (Eps 1-3 which came after the real first 3)

Shampoo.

Boring

[quote] Lord of the Rings.

Oh, how I tried to like these. And they are remarkably crafted with care and love. The quality is evident and undeniable.

But such a bore. An endless bore.

“Everything, Everywhere All at Once” was the most headache-inducing nonsense that was high on its own fumes.

Messy and overrated. No need to revisit. Ever.

The Academy will be embarrassed by this embarrassment one day.

Since many of the titles that have been posted were not movies that anyone said were amazing but as for being overrated, I would choose The Turning Point (1977) which was nominated for 11 Oscars including Best Picture as well as unfathomable nominations for Mikhail Baryshnikov and Leslie Brown in the supporting acting categories. It didn't win a single Oscar

This year it's Emelia Perez with 13 nominations which may outdo The Turning Point by going 0/13

Even though you hated "Umbrellas," OP, give Demy's first feature. "Lola" a try.

The second half of The Brutalist

Anything with Will Smith. Every movie disposable and forgettable. Every film the same character.

If only he could’ve stated cancelled.

[quote] The first 3 Star Wars (Eps 1-3 which came after the real first 3)

To be fair, no one said those were amazing. Not even “Star Wars” fans.

R12 Your taste in film sucks.

Fucking Blue Velevet and everything by Cate Blanchett i've seen

The Substance. An actual pile of shit.

Fitzcarraldo. - hysterical (not in the good, fun way) and just tedious. Kinski was magnetic, but only in the way one might feel compelled to stare at a mental patient.

Herzog made one of my favourite films, The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser, but I hated Fitzcarraldo so much that I actually felt angry at it. Such a weird reaction!

"Seance on a Wet Afternoon". Kim Stanley whispers throughout the movie and I couldn't understand almost anything she said. The entire climax was of her whispering and I couldn't hear anything - I had no idea what happened.

[Quote] Fucking Blue Velevet

R25 I found that the films of David Lynch really haven't aged well. Mulholland Drive which is considered one of his best films has so much in it that's unnecessary I actually think his best film might actually be The Elephant Man

The Greatest Showman and Moulin Rouge

Both awful 😖

[Quote] Anything with Will Smith. Every movie disposable and forgettable.

I wouldn’t argue with you too much as a general matter. But I truly love Men in Black.

[Quote] Mulholland Drive which is considered one of his best films has so much in it that's unnecessary I actually think his best film might actually be The Elephant Man

Elephant man is an historical film about a tragic and heroic person.

Lynch was a splendid storyteller. But imo he squandered that in making movie after movie that was really self indulgent nonsense.

When he was telling other peoples stories, like TEM and The Straight Story, his movies were brilliant. (I’ll include Dune for my part, although I know a lot of people hate that movie.) When he was telling his own, it was mostly pretentious nonsense.

I didn’t hate Moulin Rouge but I’m still not sure I understand it after all these years.

The DaVinci Code and it's awful sequels.

R32 Self-indulgent I think is the right word. After his death The Criterion cChannel was featuring a lot of his films and I found that Mulholland drive on a second view doesn't hold up and I watched Twin Peaks Fire Walked with Me for about the first hour it just seemed so repetitive, and I didn't really care after a while and gave up. I saw a Erasehead years ago and thought it was very weird and interesting, but T think he should have tried different things instead of just repeating himself.

The Elephant Man was one of the most conventional of all of his films and I believe it's the only one that was nominated for Best Picture by the Academy. Lynch himself received 3 nominations for Best Director for the Elephant Man, Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive.

E.T. I was told was the best movie-classic! Next Wizard of Oz! Didn't think it was a big deal. And now the ET thing is ugly and dated.

Anything by Gus Van Sant. aka Just Can't Stand.

August:Osage County

Because of its cast it was marketed like crazy and I’ll admit I was curious to see Meryl Streep and Julia Robert’s in the same movie.

Ugh. About 15 minutes in, I hated every character except Chris Cooper’s, and would’ve walked out except I was with somebody else.

Seriously, I want a refund.

Along with R18, once again… Everything Everywhere All At Once.

What a contemptible, overwrought trash pile of smoldering shit. A nonsensical and pretentious load of codswallop. A festering, shitpile of bloviating tripe. An insufferable indulgence in complete cinematic putrefaction with no redeeming qualities whatsoever.

There is no “there” there. It’s not profound, it’s not deep. It was a tedious exposition of pseudo-mystical bullshit that only managed to con just enough movie goers and lemmings at the Academy to laud the dreadful thing as groundbreaking and innovative because they needed to genuflect on their prior #OscarsSoWhite twitter haranguing that the Academy looked at it and said “OOH, Asians! Lots of Asians! In a stupid-as-shit film with fake Kung Fu fighting! This is perfect!”

Morons.

I loved Umbrellas of Cherbourg -thought it was wonderfully romantic and sad. One great song in the score, but it was always visually appealing.

I'm with the posters who couldn't get into Ghostbusters -I was so looking forward to it and I just didn't find it funny at all. I got more laughs from The Exorcist...

Taste is subjective, and reasonable men can disagree. I hate most films made in the last ten or twenty years. The industry has become homogenized like the recording industry, with the same crap being made over and over again. Every once in a while you get something that appears to break the mold, like The Brutalist, but then you find all the behind-the-scenes effort was really just to see how much you can alienate an audience. God, what a bleak, depressing film with no redeeming values!

It's very telling that younger people are doing reaction videos to older films and loving them. When a twenty-something laughs hysterically all the way through a Mel Brooks film you get the feeling there may be hope for the world yet. Films WERE better back in the old days. Music was better, too.

Now, I can sit back and read all the posts calling ming old and senile and out of it -and maybe I am. But I'm not wrong!

Love your diction, R39.

anything by Terrence Malick

Blair Witch Project... I saw it in the theater and when it was over, I thought...that's it? Boring, low budget crap.

Death in Venice. I died a thousand deaths watching it.

Another vote for Blair Witch Project. I laughed at many scenes, and I don't think I was supposed to...

R4 must be deaf and blind

Do I hear Citizen Kane? Going once, twice…..

The English Patient

Barbie.

R22 He was great in The Pursuit of Happyness.

That's it.

No hatred here but every time I've tried to watch Fantasia I've fallen asleep.

Gone with the Wind.

Fucking racist and nasty.

[Quote] Anything by Gus Van Sant. aka Just Can't Stand.

R37 Have you seen Drugstore Cowboy (1989) or To Die For (1995)? both excellent films

R29, it's funny you say that. I was a massive Lynch fan in college in the 00s. I loved almost every film of his that I saw. I watched them several times on dvd. But now that I'm older, I just cannot watch his films anymore. I've moved to other film and his movies look gimmicky now.

Any film by Terrance Malick. Like watching paint dry in real time.

Barbie

2001: A Space Odyssey. Boring as hell.

Barbie. How the hell was that piece of stupidity nominated for best picture?

[quote]2001: A Space Odyssey. Boring as hell.

So true. One of the most boring films ever made.

Sophie's Choice. Zzzzzzzz.

Doctor Zhivago (1965) Tried on several occasions to watch it and could never get through it.

Step Brothers.

A friend told me it was better than Lawrence of Arabia...

R61, I saw that movie on shrooms. That being said, I will never watch it again.

[quote]“Love, Actually.” What a tedious slog.

Another vote for Love Actually; I finally watched it this Christmas...and couldn't figure out for the life of me what the fuss was about. I suppose it appeals to the Brits - Hugh Grant flipping the bird to the asshole Americans. Okay, I get that, but his porky girlfriend busting through security to hug him? Alan Rickman, who seems gay as a Christmas tree ornament buying expensive jewelry for someone besides his dumpy wife Emma Thompson? Yawn! The scene with Bill Nighy - who is great in everything he's in - professing his love for his manager that he's abused through the entire movie. That's somewhat somewhat sweet - but you want the manager to tell Bill to fuck off.

To those who have disliked Love, Actually, (which I also didn't care for), the best scenes were those deleted but included on the Blue-Ray dvd.

I remember one or two scenes with Emma Thompson that might have gotten her that supporting nomination had they been included.

There was also an entire lesbian storyline involving one of the boys' teachers at the school; cut from the movie but in it's entirety on the dvd. I recall it being better than most if not all of the other storylines.

Snowpiercer. O dear God.

Breaking the Waves.

Star Wars. I must've been the only 13 year old in the theater bored out of my mind.

The Mirror Has Two Faces. I went with two friends who had seen it earlier without me, and wanted to see it again. Being a Streisand fan, I wanted to see it - but I could wait for it to run on HBO. I figured if these two girls wanted to see it a second time because it was 'so good', I'd go with them and see it on the big screen. What a mistake that was !

R66, I HATED Breaking the Waves. I fucking hate that ending with a passion. Dogville was much better.

La La Land!

Another vote for student film Everything Everywhere All At Once.

R67 6-word People magazine review of The Mirror Has Two Faces: And the Theatre Has Many Exits.

Boyhood. No plot, a total gimmick, amateurish performances, seemed like a student film.

Sometimes you're just not in the right mood. I kept hearing how brilliant Chinatown was. I tried on 3 separate occasions and could never get thru it. I was either bored or just fell asleep.

Finally, years later, it happened to just be starting on TCM. It was late in the evening, I was by myself, comfortable; I think I was enjoying Ben Mankiewicz's intro. (When he first took over from my beloved Robert Osborne, I couldn't stand him....but I was starting to get used to him. I love him now. Anyway....)

I think something Mank said made me pay special attention to the music soundtrack. Next thing I knew "my daughter/my sister...".

They were right! It was a masterpiece!

So maybe some of you should give it a second or even third try! :)

^^ I've watched it at least three more times since.

Clint Eastwood’s.

Todd Field's Tar

Dune. My son got me to watch it, he thinks it's amazing, but I hated it.

Oppenheimer

I didn't hate Oppenheimer but it wasn't the masterpiece everyone said it was. It just wasn't that deep.

Barbie.

Barbie is bad...really, really bad.

I hated The Big Lebowski. However, it was recommended by a stoner heterosexual man, and this demographic practically worships this movie. I still fail to grasp its appeal.

Pulp Ficiton. I didn't 'get it' when I saw it in the theater, and I couldn't tell you what it was about today. Same with 'LA Confidential'.

I just found my old imdb account and am having alot of fun reading posts of mine from as early as 2006. Anyway, I had forgotten the sheer LOATHING I had for Juno, that self indulgent Gen X mess Diablo Cody...and looking back, yeah it was as bad as I thought it was then. The absolutely ridiculous non stop "quirky" obscure pop culture references, the unrealistic messages, the incredibly annoying attempts to get us to like the heroine....dear god it was all so terrible and everyone loved it.

Garden State. I wanted to puke.

R83 DC won a fucking oscar for it ffs.

The Dark Knight. Not terrible but not a classic.

CALL ME BY YOUR NAME 🥱 🥱

I fell asleep during The Dark Knight

Brokeback Mountain. I couldn’t finish it. And they were sheep herders Not cowboys.

I haven’t seen a good movie made since the turn of the century.

Emilia Perez is the Everything Everywhere All at Once movie of 2024.

Hate them both.

[quote] That preposterous space movie with Sandra Bullock

Did you see that in a theater or on TV?

The Matrix. Lousy movie made worse by its continued influence on the whole alt-right manosphere.

Please explain how The Matrix influenced the Alt-Right. ^^^

I saw the first of the wildly-praised Lord of the Rings films and almost died of boredom.

I will never understand what makes people love this tripe.

All the Korean films I’ve seen. Hammy acting and very over the top premises in general. Parasite was great for the first 2/3rds, then became a terrible movie.

i don't really see how anyone with a soul couldn't be moved by the end of Umbrellas of Cherbourg. Its a litmus test for me of any friend/relationship prospects: If you aren't affected by that film, you lack the empathy chip in your wiring.

R83 Right there with you on the Juno hate. A movie completely enthralled by itself.

R98 But it proved that men CAN have babies.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

'Steven Spielberg's film climaxes in final 35 minutes with an almost ethereal confrontation with life forms from another world; the first 100 minutes, however, are somewhat redundant in exposition and irritating in tone'-VARIETY

It felt endless and pointless

As Good as it Gets is hot garbage.

The Princess Bride...so fucking twee and precious.

Christopher Guest movies....some funny bits but not enough for a full film. And, Chris Guest himself is really unfunny.

Schindler's List....it's awful. Like Hallmark decided to make a Holocaust movie.

[quote]If you aren't affected by that film, you lack the empathy chip in your wiring.

I'm exactly the same way, but the film is "Munster Go Home!"

r102, Spielberg struggles with "adult" movies

Dune 1 and Dune 2 (actually didn't see 2, 1 was boring enough)

Parasite!

Blair Witch Project is also another cinematic garbage can.

LA Confidential

R108 I strongly agree with you. I was bored to tears.

THE IRON LADY.

OUT OF AFRICA.

"American Hustle".

It's nothing but "Casino" for late Gen-Xers/early millennials.

Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood. Other than the ranch scene, it was dull and meandering. So much driving around…

I wasn't impressed by American Hustle, either

Star Wars. Dont understand my reaction but refused to ever see it

The Empire Strikes Back is superior

I loathed both The English Patient and The Talented Mr. Ripley.

RIP Anthony Minghella but I'm happy he no longer foists hot garbage on the viewing public.

The Talented Mr Ripley is great until Jude Law dies. It is still a good film in the 3rd act but his character is so fucking appealing you actually miss him.

R114 R115 As a teenager I loved Star Wars. I think I saw it 4 separate times in the theater. I loved The Empire Strikes Back even more. I still love the original trilogy.

I absolutely hated Crash. It was like a second rate rip off of the 1991 Grand Canyon. I was horrified when I saw it nominated for best picture, and then to win it ?!

12 Years a Slave an epic of cotten picking and whipping The protagonist was a non entity and the film offered nothing new

“The Last Picture Show”

Gone with the Wind. Hours and hours and hours of horrible.

"La, La Land". Everyone told me it was wonderful, when we saw it, I hated it-it was terrible.

Do I hear Citizen Kane? Going once, twice…..

R47 - I remember a TV special that was determined to show that this film is pretentious but it only showed how brilliant it is.

To R107...OMG!! The Blair Witch Project was terrible, I was waiting for the scary parts-it never happened.

It was laughable-totally fucked stupid!!

R112 It's fun if you grew up in LA.

Anything with Liza Minnelli or Robert Wagner

The Artist

I understand why people don't like Citizen Kane but if you are a fan of avant-garde film, it is very easy to appreciate the movie for what it did for film making. It's really not like anything that came before it.

The Age of Innocence. There is ZERO passion between Michelle Pfeiffer and Daniel Day Lewis.

^^^^ It is the 19th century; it is Repressed Passion^^^^

Michelle pussy is dripping all over her underwear& DDL monster member is leaking.

To me, 2001: A Space Odyssey is like 8 or so absolutely amazing YouTube videos mashed together into a disconnected godawful mess.

^^^^Absolutely Fucking Boring as shit^^^^

R131-great description of the movie!!

I have to admit that watching the two male leads Gary and Keir running around the spaceship in their shorts is fun but yeah, the movie is a snoozer.

[quote] and am having alot of fun

Oh, DEAR!

I'll have to agree with The Umbrellas Of Cherbourg. I couldn't make it through the first 20 minutes.

R129 Agree. Terrible movie that consists of a narrator reading pages from the book throughout the movie.

R136 Joanne Woodward is great in The Age of Innocence!

[quote]R94: Please explain how The Matrix influenced the Alt-Right. ^^^

Weird how right-wingers demonize trans people but slobber over a movie created by two trans women

I like most of the movies named here except 2001. The special effects are impressive for its time, but I’ve never been able to enjoy it as a whole.

R139, maybe the dummies don’t know? 🤭

I just cannot get into most Kurosawa movies. I think his film noirs and Shakespeare films are better than his samurai stuff. I think Harakiri and Samurai Rebellion are better than any of the Kurosawa samurai films.

R139 The Wachowskis weren't trans when they made The Matrix. They were just two freaky dudes into kinky sex.

^ They were trans, they just weren't out

I agree R101. I also don’t appreciate a movie where the lead actress’ nipples get a supporting role.

[quote] I just cannot get into most Kurosawa movies

Me neither but I love the one about people living in a junkyard.

Ingmar Bergman's "Persona."

[quote]2001: A Space Odyssey. Boring as hell.

I'll see your 2001 and raise it with the Andromeda Strain from 1971.

I liked Andromeda Strain. It was okay. Did it receive that much hype?

R147, Persona is like masturbation material for people who hate avant-garde movies. It is filled with every negative stereotype associated with that kind of filmmaking. It is just exhausting, meandering, pretentious, filled with pscyhobabble, etc. Many of those things can be said about a lot of Bergman films but maybe none moreso than Persona.

70% of the movie is actors playing with mechanical arms and other close ups of a biochemical lab in action.

RIVETING stuff.

Cherbourg is slow. But the final scene in the Esso station at Christmas is so beautiful and heartbreaking it pulls everything together. Are Catherine and Nino the most beautiful couple ever in a movie?

Gangs of New York.

I love Scorsese but, gosh, what a boring ordeal of a film.

If you have sleep issues, watch Gangs of New York to catch some sleep.

The Searchers. Didn't hate it but nowhere near the great film everyone makes it out to be.

The Sound of Music when I first saw it. I thought was pretty mediocre. Though I have come to find the first half ok. The only really great thing about it was Eleanor Parker and she hated the thing. But her son said she saw it on TV at the end of her life and she probably hadn't seen it since the premiere. She didn't find it as bad as she thought.

Umbrellas is not slow for a French movie and Michel Legrand's score is beautifully romantic plus the story is just wonderfully presented but I imagine you have to have lived in that era to really appreciate it, which I was.

PULP FICTION. Pretentious, hipster BS. It’s difficult for me to sit through most of Tarantino’s work.

Gangs of New York suffers because it had a dumb script and Leo and Diaz in it.

She had no business being in that movie...so ridiculous.

Another vote for Citizen Kane.

Everything Christopher Nolan

I understand the theme of this thread and fully realize it's all subjective but if I know someone and they tell me they hate "Citizen Kane" then they lose about 30 friendship points. I mean...it's great art. And fascinating. Like Roger Ebert said, you see something new in it everytime you watch it.

I like Umbrellas of Cherbourg but can more fully understand resistance to it....that music IS very sing songy. Still. It's beautiful.

Feel free to take me out of your will R160.

Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore

Citizen Kane may not seem at all the masterpiece it is because we're not looking at it from a 1941 POV. It was a revolutionary film on so many levels I don't know where to start but I'll say this, if you ever have a chance to attend a film lecture or read a book where the film is dissected, you will see why it is far and above all other films ever made.

R73 That magnificent trumpet solo was performed by the late Uan Rasey. Just freaking gorgeous.

[quote]Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood. Other than the ranch scene, it was dull and meandering. So much driving around…

I would love a cut of that movie consisting of nothing but Brad Pitt driving around 1960s LA. The lack of traffic was so amazing it was like a special effect.

Persona is not my favorite Bergman film by a long shot but Bibi Andersson's performance is so brilliant it's worth watching at least once. I definitely would not recommend it as one's introduction to Bergman, and in some ways it is like a parody of a Bergman film.

In general I try not to over-hype films that I love to other people because everyone has different tastes and preferences, and I don't want to impose mine on them. Whenever someone has dragged me to see some ostensibly must-see movie or lent me a book saying 'You HAVE to read this!' I invariably end up hating it.

Boyz n the hood

I never enjoyed The Shining. And neither did Stephen King.

So Stephen King went and remade it as a shitty TV miniseries that was boring and horrible with a ghastly child actor as Danny.

There's a reason Kubrick dumped the "living" topiary animals....they were stupid.

Kevin Costner's Field of Dreams. Everybody was swooning over the feelgood, Hallmark meets Ouija board plot. I had heated arguments with friends over how much I HATED that film.

It seems to be forgotten now. Good!

Titanic was a titanic cheesefest

Oppenheimer

BULL DURHAM…especially the line with Kevin Costner talking about long wet kisses that last three days 🙄🙄🙄.

R67 let me guess Yentl is your favorite movie?

R170 baseball fans disagree. It’s an all-timer on our lists. A yearly MLB game is played in Iowa at the baseball diamond location

“Love, Actually” is crap, actually.

My Big Fat Greek Wedding is garbage. Absolute garbage.

r163, all you have to do is watch any film that came before Citizen Kane to see how groundbreaking it is.

[quote] There's a reason Kubrick dumped the "living" topiary animals....they were stupid.

No, he dumped them because he couldn't pull it off with the SFX of the time.

[quote]R179: No, he dumped them because he couldn't pull it off with the SFX of the time.

And once the effects had been achieved in the remake, it was clearly seen to be a stupid idea.

That may be true.

Everyone beat me to it with Citizen Kane, 2001: A Space Odyssey. The English Patient and Field of Dreams.

I'll just add It's A Wonderful Life. I don't get the appeal at all.

The Power of the Dog

R144 please, they only became trans when it was fashionable and they needed to reinvent their careers.

R184, not R144, but I don't know about that, they came out as trans long before it was "fashionable" to do so.

I'm not sure if it's liked here, but Darren Aronofsky really shit the bed with MOTHER!

Pi, Requiem for a Dream, and Black Swan - are wonderful. Disturbing as hell but wonderful.

Don't know what the hell happened with MOTHER! I turned it off.

Motherfucker! Motherfucker!

People who put Citizen Kane with The English Patient together in the same sentence should be hanged by the genitals.

[quote] Christopher Guest movies....some funny bits but not enough for a full film. And, Chris Guest himself is really unfunny.

And he doesn’t have an Oscar. And never will!

Touch of Evil

The Magnificent Ambersons

Wow, you didn't like Touch of Evil? That's sad.

The Magnificent Ambersons is worth watching just for Agnes Moorehead's performance. She's brilliant in it.

Also: Herrmann's score. And, Stanley Cortez's cinematography.

Every movie by M. Night Shyamalan that I have regrettably seen.

Gratefully, being given top billing readily identifies his piffle.

The Lobster

I second Citizen Kane and 2001: A Space Odyssey. I don’t get why these movies are so famous

OP- I agree about that Umbrella movie- TOTALLY for FRAUS. The first few minutes of the movie are charming but after 10 minutes of that movie it’s totally grating.

R100- You sound PRETENTIOUS

Armageddon Time was a nothingburger with a bad bad bad obvious lousy script. I didn't like it.

Geostorm

[quote] I second Citizen Kane and 2001: A Space Odyssey. I don’t get why these movies are so famous

I understand why you wouldn't enjoy these movies but to say you don't understand why they are famous is dumb. Just go on youtube or google to see why they were so innovative!

This entire thread reminds me how I feel about French food- Most of the media including the NYT WORSHIPS French food and while I can't say that I hate it- it's very overrated. I had a very tasty quiche in January. Some of it is very nice but not worthy of breathless worship and I generally find French deserts too rich I prefer high quality homemade American desserts- layer cakes, pies, cookies.

As for main courses Italian food over French anyday.

Out of Africa

The English Patient

Oppenheimer

The Conversation (Gene Hackman, F.F. Coppola).

Traffic

Pillow Talk

Some Like it Hot.

The only acclaimed Billy Wilder movie I don't like. Mayeb "hate" is too strong a word.

*Maybe

Can't understand hating Casablanca.

Some like it hot is a hoot.🦉

LaLaland

To R182-I totally fucking agree with you on "It's A Wonderful Life".

I've posted on here& have had arguments about IAWL; during the gym scene when the gym floor opens up and everyone falls or jumps into the pool. I was HOPING that someone would hit the button to close the pool. Then the movie would end in their DEATHS. MR Potter is my HERO. Every Christmas I am tortured by my friends who love this movie.

Donnie Darko

LaLaLand blows too-already posted on that POS movie.

R195 That's because you're an moron. It has nothing to do with the movies.

R208 I love your righteous indignation about It's a Wonderful Life. For years, I thought I was broken because it's so smarmy and sappy and I can't stand the bank run scenes! Ugh. Thanks for cracking me up

Singin' in the Rain. Gene Kelly smarminess and Debbie Reynolds' dullness is too much.

[quote] The Conversation (Gene Hackman, F.F. Coppola).

Hackman died today. Coincidence? I think not! Jokes aside, I didn't like the movie the first time I saw it. I saw it again a few months ago and I loved it. One of the best thrillers ever.

Every movie with a cunt in it.

Meaning every movie made since 1982.

Not a movie, but if I have to hear how great Ted Lasso is, I will ....

Moonrise Kingdom. Ugly, boring boy as the lead; deadpan, tableau acting in the throughout the film is pretentious and awful.

I liked "La-La Land" - it wasn't bad.

Little Man Tate can replace Ambien if viewed in the evening.

yeah, I used to love Wes Anderson but Moonrise Kingdom was just off the charts with the tweeness and every movie since then has been a bit of a turd for me.

Still Love Tennenbaums and Life Aquatic.

Lost In Translation

R182 R208 I always hated It’s a Wonderful Life — I find it depressing.

R204 Certainly, almost any movie, if viewed frequently enough over time, can become annoying or at least less than entertaining. And having everyone go on about how great it is, that just makes it worse. But if you can say that you hate, or even "don't like", the movie Some Like It Hot on your first viewing, then I'm sorry, I have to question your humanity.

Quentin Tarantino films

Forrest Gump

Avatar

A current cinema darling......the Demi Moore shot show known as "The Substance. "

Beyond awful

R225 - yes! I thought that movie was so goofy

I wouldn't say that anyone described it as "amazing", but I couldn't see the fuss over Poor Little Things. I liked the quirkiness of it all, but I kept looking at my watch, wondering when they were going to wrap the whole thing up.

The vast majority of netflix movies. Hyped a ton and never all that great. Bird Box is a prime example.

Another vote for Casablanca. A straight male friend assured me that I’d love it, so we watched it together. I thought it was unmemorable, melodramatic, and boring.

So, according to this thread, basically every movie ever made is flawed and sucks.

Ok!

R231 Yes, according to this thread Casablanca, Citizen Kane and 2001 A Space Odyssey should never have been made.

Well, generations have Fan Boys have sworn that the Marvel Universe movies are brilliant and they're ALL shit.

Lord of the Rings is a BORING pretentious slog. (And, the Hobbit films somehow manage to be worse)

Except for the original trio, the Star Wars movies are garbage.

It’s all about taste which is idiosyncratic.

[quote]Another vote for Casablanca. A straight male friend assured me that I’d love it, so we watched it together. I thought it was unmemorable, melodramatic, and boring.

I don't know...I love Claude Rains in that movie and given our current predicament, the scene when everyone in the restaurant, no matter how desperate our depraved they may be - stand up & sing La Marseillaise, it brings tears to my eyes ("Viva La France! Viva La France!")

[bold]Vive la Résistance!

The Substance!!! The worst movie I have ever seen. If Demi Moore wins Best Actress for this crap, I will wreck havoc!!

The Favorite

The problem with Casablanca is that it's so iconic...every line is well known. It's so overly familiar that it's practically a caricature of itself. Same thing is true of a lot of iconic movies like Gone With The Wind and The Wizard of Oz.

R237 I’m 90% sure she is winning and I don’t agree with it either. Yes, she was good. Best actress good? No.

The Substance lost the plot with the ridiculous gore at the end. The Carrie like explosion squirts of fake blood in that ceremony sequence was absurd and very B movie. So was all the creatures she turned into. And what was the purpose of them seeking people to try this new experiment.? They never really delve into what the purpose of the people who are targeted to try it. It wasn't even for money or any other tangible reward for this super secret society finding "candidates".

No, Mikey will win.

The problem with Casablanca is that it's so iconic...every line is well known

R239 - this seems an exaggeration. There are a couple of lines I can quote but not the entire script!

How to answer every movie question meant to create listicles of good or bad movies with the twist that most people have the opposite opinion as your own:

Just mention an inscrutable movie:

My go-to is always Marienbad. And I always say or write the French title to for the frisson of pretentiousness. L'Année dernière à Marienbad.

^^^^ To R244-On that list I saw 2 movies I watched-Blue Velvet( which I loved)& 2001^^^^( I wanted Hal to kill everyone, including me).

I do think Blue Velvet is good but it is massively overrated. One critic said it was just Crimes of Passion with "the polarities reversed". I actually think there may be something to that. And Crimes of Passion is more entertaining.

‘Silver Linings Playbook.’ A mediocre rom-com with average performances that Harvey Weinstein conned people into thinking was a major achievement.

‘Her Majesty, Mrs. Brown’ a middlebrow period piece with a merely satisfactory performance by Judi Dench that many still think was robbed of an Oscar.

I hated ‘Slumdog Millionaire.’

Dances With Wolves is the clear winner.

BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID

For the life of me I cannot understand the devotion to this overblown television show.

Eyes Wide Shut

With all due respect to Kubrick.

R250, I'm always suprised when I hear that Kubrick fans didn't like Eyes Wide Shut. It's my favorite Kubrick film.

It’s because we can’t stand the Top Gun guy.

But there’s something so meta about Tom Cruise in a movie about true evil.

R253, not to mention a movie about how he cannot have sex with women no matter how hard he tries.

R252, I totally get that but you shouldn't let that get in the way of the movie. Same with Barry Lyndon and Ryan O'Neal. Both mediocre actors but both are perfectly appropriate in their roles.

I finally saw “The Last Showgirl.” As much as I loved the 90s indie vibe (I truly miss those movies), it was pretty bad.

I kinda hated Pam Anderson’s character. A truly dumb, selfish skank who somehow thought she was a great artist. Maybe that was the point? That these “showgirls” are pathological? Somehow I don’t think that was the goal. I think we’re meant to pity her, but I just can’t.

R255 Ryan was perfectly cast because Barry Lyndon is essentially an asshole.

R257, right, an asshole who is all empty talk. He's a poseur.

But having said that I will give Eyes Wide Shut another try. I only saw the original theatrical release. And there was too much Tom/Nicolle drama going on in these days.

Art is subjective. Sometimes it touches you, moves you. Sometimes it doesn't. And that could be for many reasons. Maybe you can't relate to the subject or themes being presented. Maybe you don't like the director's style or vision. Maybe the actors' performances didn't connect for you. Maybe you feel the plot doesn't make sense. Maybe the hype was so intense it was just going to inevitably let you down. But maybe for others, those things worked. You can not like a movie (or book, show, painting, etc.) for any number of reasons, but that doesn't mean an artwork is inherently bad. It just means that it didn't do anything for you. And that's OK.

But this thread isn't about whether certain movies are "good art". It's about the ones that you were told were amazing, yet they didn't do anything for you.

For me, that movie is "Amadeus". Before I watched it, the hype machine made it seem to me that it was going to be the most amazing, beautiful, moving film experience I would ever have. Yet, I was completely bored. I hated every character, especially Mozart, and couldn't wait for it to end. This movie is now shorthand for me when my friends hype a movie (or anything else) to me. I will ask them, "Is this going to be Amadeus?"

And while it's not a movie (yet) and I haven't seen it on stage, I suspect "Hamilton" is the new "Amadeus".

Interstellar

Terms of Endearment

Amadeus is actually pretty good. I watched it again recently. It held up well.

Everywhere…All at Once

Tedious Crap.

I'm not questioning whether it is good, R263. I'm saying it didn't do anything for me. But I'm happy you enjoyed it.

To Kill a Mockingbird.

I don't get the extreme love for this film at all.

There's a much better, somehat similar one, Intruder in the Dust (1949). Based on a book--also much better than To Kill a Mockingbird--by William Faukner.

I'm not even sure why I don't like it. Gregory Peck is wooden. The story seems trite. The courtroom scene is overacted. It just doesn't move me.

Heaven Can Wait (1978), starring Warren Beatty, Julie Christie, James Mason, Jack Warden, Dyan Cannon, Charles Grodin. Directed by Beatty and Buck Henry. Screenplay by Elaine May and Beatty. BIG hit, NINE Oscar nominations including Best Picture.

Don’t know about it or hardly remember it? That’s because it’s an overblown turd. Everyone is a decade or two too old for their roles. It supposed to be funny and romantic and fails at both. Streisand’s The Mirror has Two Faces is similar in its failure to be funny and romantic.

San Francisco (1936). Nominated for 6 Academy Awards. Jeanette MacDonald's trilling makes you long for her to get killed in the earthquake.

R266, the love for the film may be because the tv networks used to show it every years like it was a Wizard of Oz Classic.

Like TITANIC R268, I watch it for the special effects. I love disaster movies.

The trouble is I'm the one who is telling family & friends that a movie is amazing, and I'm surprised they've never seen it. You gotta see it! Then they do, and their response is meh, or worse. Especially uncomfortable if I am watching it with them.

For a few that I've recommended (Something Wild, Best in Show, Birdcage), it's made me question my judgment.

"THE Batman"

Heaven Can Wait is a remake of a much better comedy, Here Comes Mr. Jordan, with Robert Montgomery and Claude Rains.

I couldn't get into Planet of the Apes (the original, 1968)...my friends all loved it. It was a re-release, in the '70s.

R10 Yeah I really hated Traffic.

The Substance

Inception was so up its own ass. Interstellar wasn't that much better either

Pulp Fiction

I just watched Blade Runner last night with my friend. That movie was torture to watch- an incoherent mess. The visuals of the futuristic 2019 Los Angeles ( remember this movie was released in 1982) were the only impressive thing about this dud.

R273 Heaven Can Wait was fine. It just wasn't Academy Award for best picture caliber, which surprised me when it was nominated. And at age 41 Beatty was at lest a decade too old to play the football quarterback role.

Nosferatu (2024)

Emilia Perez

R280 In the original Robert Montgomery (late '30s) played a boxer.

Not hate, but I never loved The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), which so many people think is a masterpiece. I read the book after seeing the movie and it was really absorbing. I have some aversion to Alec Guinness, I think that may be why I don't love the film.

The Shape of Water. A cleaning woman falls in love with a sea monkey. Bad idea, bad movie.

R284 I don't know, even if it's not a favorite, you've got to give it some credit for originality. It's so camp, that'd be like saying Ed Wood is a bad movie about bad movies.

I could not get through The Shape of Water. Terrible.

R280 see R267

[quote]I have some aversion to Alec Guinness, I think that may be why I don't love the film.

Oh, I love Alec Guinness; he was so good as the chilly brother in Zhivago. And I liked Kwai too, but I never quite got the "masterpiece" thing

Anora

Pillow Talk? How if the fuck can you not like Pillow Talk!

I thought "The Royal Tenenbaums" was insufferable (Look at me! I'm quirky!) and when everyone swooned I felt like an alien.

"Blue Velvet" is one of the dullest and ugliest movies I've ever seen. I was on a date and my date said, "You seem nice, but I'm leaving". I followed him out and got laid. It wasn't great at all, but it was better than "Blue Velvet"

I also hated "Field of Dreams" What malarkey!

The Royal Tenenbaums always resonated with me because Royal reminded me of my dad; I was no child protege, but the Gene Hackman character reminded me of my dad (particularly the scene where he played to win against his young son). There's some scene (can't remember what part) when he's talking to his children and says "I don't understand anyone of you. I never did." which is *exactly* (if he was honest) the kind of thing my dad would say.

I like Wes Anderson's movies, but they have become increasingly twee and I get that they're not everyone's cup of tea.

[quote] Pillow Talk? How if the fuck can you not like Pillow Talk!

Nothing about it rings true. The jokes are obvious. The title song is terrible. The Roly Poly song is even worse. Even Thelma Ritter wasn't good in it. None of the characters or their actions seem genuine. They behave like stupid dipshits. Typical Ross Hunter comedy schlock. It makes me long for Tracy and Hepburn.

1966’s cult French/English fave King of Hearts. It was colorful and all and Alan Bates was pretty, but as a whole no, it didn’t do it for me.

If winning best picture Oscars is equivalent to “amazing” I have disliked a bunch of them, but there’s a special place in hell for Crash. Hated that trite, preachy thing. Big Lebowski and Fight Club I would add. Straight bro faves recommend by my brother that I couldn’t get into. I love Citizen Kane though it seems to have its nay sayers here.

Yeah, Fight Club. I sat down with a lot of anticipation to finally see it, and I hated it from the get-go. Not because it was so straight-bro, but it seemed very contrived. Never read the book.

Superbad...a couple of people I worked with at my old job told me it was hilarious, I had to see it. Didn't think it was funny at all. Even now, I hate Seth Rogan. Speaking of Michael Cera movies...Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Just couldn't get into it, it was annoying with all the pop-ups.

Everyone here will be outraged, but My Fair Lady with Audrey Hepburn is unwatchable, I loved it as a little kid and would watch it every year. Revisited it in my 30’s and hated it.

R292, you had me until the Hepburn-Tracy part.

Mary Poppins. I can see how kids would be entertained, but anyone over the age of 12? Dick Van Dyke was awful as we all know, but how Julie Andrew’s managed to win an Oscar for her performance is laughable.

I don't actually disagree with what the earlier poster said, but I still like Pillow Talk.

I think its silly and charming and a perfect distillation of 1959 Hollywood star-driven comedy, so sue me!

EVERY Star Wars movie since 1999.

EVERY Star Wars movie

Star Wars is mind numbing.

[quote] Dick Van Dyke was awful as we all know

I know he's mocked for his bad accent, R298, but I don't think he was awful. As a musical lead, singing and dancing, I thought he was very good, actually. If you don't like the movie, I don't like it any more, either, but I haven't ever seen a lot of dispute over Julie Andrews deserving the Oscar. I don't think the movie is great, but what's wrong with a movie aimed at 12 year olds or younger? They don't deserve to be entertained?

[quote]but how Julie Andrew’s managed to win an Oscar for her performance is laughable.

Dame Julie was the sentimental favorite that year. Mary Poppins was a big box office hit, and much was written about Julie being denied the movie role that she originated on Broadway in "My Fair Lady."

The two outstanding female performances that year were from fellow nominees, Anne Bancroft and Kim Stanley, in small British productions that very few had seen, "The Pumpkin Eater" and "Séance on a Wet Afternoon."

Tom Cruise is an annoying or distasteful person but he's a fairly good actor.

STEEL MAGNOLIAS.

Fraus loved it. But wow, what a 💩 movie it was. The Olympia Dukakis and Shirley MacLaine characters were so annoying. Especially the way Olympia talked out the side of her mouth like a mob boss.

R306, I don't think it's just fraus. Gay man love it too, especially gay men who grew up in the South. My best friend (may he rest in peace), used to quote Ouiser and Clairee all the time.

R305, he was a lucky actor

R28 Seance on a Wet Afternoon is one of my favorite movies although the book is better. Kim Stanley's breathy, phony voice was perfect for that part but very irritating - I get your point.

R308-Not to mention a stud for hire in the early 80s.

It seems that Mamma Mia! is considered iconic and a classic but it took me three sittings to get through it and I forced myself. Not good.

A Few Good Men

Whether or not Cruise can act, his performance in this movie is what they say - cringe. Throughout.

[Quote] And while it's not a movie (yet) and I haven't seen it on stage, I suspect "Hamilton" is the new "Amadeus".

Hamilton is even worse than Amadeus. Talk about overhyped! I was bored after 30 minutes and there was still two hours to go. And of course, like so many new Broadway musicals it didn't produce a single song that anyone remembers or that anyone has ever covered that I'm aware of.

R313 It somewhat redeems itself as a banquet for pantaloon crotch-watching.

[quote] The two outstanding female performances that year were from fellow nominees, Anne Bancroft and Kim Stanley, in small British productions that very few had seen, "The Pumpkin Eater" and "Séance on a Wet Afternoon."

R304 But why are dramatic performances outstanding and musical performances not outstanding? Could Anne Bancroft and Kim Stanley sing and dance? I see nothing wrong with awarding an outstanding performance in a musical, and Oscar doesn't have a separate category for them. Damn hard work, and it you pull it off perfectly, which Andrews did, you deserve awards.

R313 and Lin- Marie had to use color-blind casting since white men can't rap as well.

R292 I think Pillow Talk has a clever premise, especially (spoiler alert) when Doris sits down at the piano, idly doodles some sheet music of Rock’s and suddenly is on to the whole deception. There is a lot of really silly stuff along the way, though, and I think Doris’s double takes are way too broad and unfunny. Her Oscar nom should have been for Love Me or Leave Me, and how this won a screenplay Oscar over The 400 Blows, North by Northwest or Wild Strawberries is a mystery. However, my mother always said that she and my dad never laughed so hard at a movie as at Pillow Talk, so I can’t say anything too bad.

The party line premise of Pillow Talk is what I never could understand. Growing up, my friend's family had a party line, we didn't (on the same street). Party lines were cheaper. But the people in the movie are well off. Why would they have to share a party line?

R317 You look at the Rolly-Polly scene and think these are adults? In a bar/nightclub? Flirting with one another? And appearing to enjoy themselves. And movie-goers accepted this as normal romantic comedy good fun? It's like theatre of the absurd.

R318 I guess it is similar to why don’t the executives, presumably well-paid, in The Apartment (an infinitely better movie) just go to a hotel?

R319 And I imagine the background action in The Apartment’s Christmas party, kick-lines on the desks, seems just as improbable today.

Anyway, I am not really defending Pillow Talk except as a mildly enjoyable, often very silly, bauble—that made my parents laugh.

Fargo and titanic come 2 mine.

Mind.

The Apartment really is a classic! Great Wilder movie.

THE KINGS SPEECH. Dull af.

[Quote] and Lin- Marie had to use color-blind casting since white men can't rap as well.

R316 That wasn't rap dear. It was ersatz hip-hop

The Virgin Suicides. I didn’t hate it, but didn’t like it. Maybe I just didn’t ’get it’.

Has anyone mentioned The Brutalist yet? I had to suffer for 3 hours with that giant shnauzz.

I want Adrien Brody deep inside me, 24/7/365!!

However, I do not want to watch a 3-1/2 movie.

[Quote] The DaVinci Code

We need to get you new friends if that is being recommended to you as amazing, my love.

R326, I’ve never quite gotten the point either. And I read the book and saw the film. Is it satire of the era? Or maybe allegory? I just don’t get

***SPOILER***

All the girls killing themselves in one night. Why?

Umbrellas of Cherbourg was supposed to be a Hollywood musical if they were set in the real, depressing world.

[Quote] It somewhat redeems itself as a banquet for pantaloon crotch-watching.

Not at $240 per ticket

Beloved was freaky. It had these zombies coming up out of a pond to kill evil plantation slave drivers who graphically milked a black woman’s tits on screen and nursed on her breast milk. I had no idea that movie was a freaky horror slave plantation abuse graphic shock fest but it was.

Is Beloved worth watching? That movie was promoted and hyped endlessly for obvious reasons but it's a movie I never hear anyone in movie circles really discussing anymore (which usually means the movie hasn't aged well). It's probably the Jonathan Demme film discussed least among his 80s and 90s films.

Demme's Crazy Mama was so much better R334

Beloved has never been considered an “amazing” movie by anyone other than Oprah

R335, i didn't even know that was a movie of his.

Wait a minute...ORCA made a Zombie movie!!

Is that what that POS movie was about?

R334, no. The book’s magical realism and imagery lands with a thud when it’s made concrete.

Like in the book, when Sethe first see Beloved, she has to urinate badly all of a sudden and it comes out in a river, symbolic of birth and that Beloved may be her dead daughter reincarnate. In the movie, you get to see Oprah taking a long piss.

Also there’s a moment when Sethe, Paul D., and Sethe’s youngest daughter are walking and Morrison says the shadows looked as if they are holding hands. In the movie, all three are walking with the hands free and the camera pans to their shadows which are holding hands. It’s clunky.

This big fancy book that Oprah “wrote” entitled “Journey to Beloved” came out at the time of “Beloved”’s release, with a big b&w photo of Oprah in a dramatic pose of holding her head in her hands on the cover. The movie was a disappointment and the book tie-in was as well. You can get it for about four bucks on eBay.

R339, it sounds clunky as hell.

Remember the huge deal made about Oprah losing all that weight to play the role?

And Oprah got the VOGUE cover. It was the best she’s ever looked.

Then the movie tanked. I am certain that she thought it would be successful and that she’d get awards and platitudes.

Instead, the movie bombed. And she lined up pans of Mac and cheese the way that Epstein would line up teenage girls.

I honestly think Oprah looks the best she’s ever looked now

Adults loved Mary Poppins when it opened and love it today. You don't make that kind of money or have such a legacy when the movie is only for the under 12. It is considered Disney greatest film(you may disagree) but it is a warm joyous bittersweet film. And its cinematic imagination is above reproach. Everyone involved was at the peak of their considerable talents.

Hereditary. I'm not a fan of horror, but it was recommended as being, if not amazing, then a creative example of the genre. I only got through the first third of the movie and had to quit. Call me a wuss, I didn't hate it, but I did regret having watched as much as I did.

R320 Wild office Chrtistmas parties were pretty common at the time of The Apartment, and still very common at least 20 years after The Apartment.

Maybe the reason the guys didn't bring their dates to a hotel had to do with the times. We're used to anything today, but back then a couple would be suspicious sharing a hotel room if they weren't married, or if it appeared they were there for something illicit. In a good hotel, anyway.

(And I'm not sure these older guys bringing hot young chicks to a hotel could get away with registering as husband and wife.)

A person using a hotel for illicit assignations on a repeat basis runs the risk of being seen by someone they know in the public areas of the hotel, whereas the odds of running into anyone who would spot you and your side chick in an anonymous apartment building are relatively low.

Was having to register as man and wife really necessary in a midtown Manhattan hotel in 1960? (I really don’t know.)

Also, wouldn’t using the apartment, knowing your co-workers, the people you see daily, are having sex in the same place, feel a little creepy?

Don’t get me wrong— The Apartment is one of my favorites. I was just trying to say it is easy to question premises and behavior in movies from over 60 years ago, even Pillow Talk.

p.s. I still can’t believe Father Bing Crosby thinks it’s OK to send Sister Ingrid Bergman off to Arizona without telling her she has tuberculosis!

To be fair, r350, Ingrid wasn't always very fresh.

R345 I am a huge horror fan, and Hereditary was hyped as one of the best of all time. I was extremely disappointed by it. Not scary, unnecessarily grim. Only Toni Collette and the cute son redeemed it

R348 That's the main reason, yes.

R350 Back then even doctors or family didn't always tell patients the truth. I read stuff like this in biographies sometimes and I'm amazed. Like, Howard Lindsay (playwright, actor) was never told he had leukemia, I think it was, by his doctors or his wife, Dorothy Stickney.

R354, or Kay Kendall never being told she had leukemia.

R349, it’s husband and wife, not man and wife.

I do not hate Citizen Kane but I think Magnificent Ambersons is a far better film even in its sadly truncated form.

Anyone remember the movie Breaking Away (1979) with Dennis Christopher and Dennis Quaid? That one.

Sonja Henie’s husband knew that she was dying of cancer but her doctors swore him to secrecy. She died while they were on a flight.

I loved Breaking Away.

R360-Even to this day, I wanted that Dad to be my Dad.

BLAZING SADDLES. I walked out of the theater it was so lame. Always disliked Mel Brooks’ “humor” with the exception of High Anxiety, which someone dragged me to. It’s a take off on Hitchcock movies with the wonderful Madeline Kahn.

R362 yeah, I have to agree. Really, the only great Brooks' film is Young Frankenstein...because Brooks wasn't in it.

He wasn't funny.

R361 That dad basically was my dad.

I went to Blazing Saddles one night with my dad when came to visit me at college. I made a mistake and thought they were showing North By Northwest that night (it was at another auditorium on campus). I might have snickered a couple of times but my dad didn't laugh once. I've never liked it. Young Frankenstein is very good, though.

R352 To a horror fan, is it possible to hate a truly scary movie, or is that the metric it is judged on?

As someone whose scariest movie experience was Alien, what's the least hate-worthy horror film you can recommend?

I was young but when my friends said The Poseidon Adventure was amazing I had to see it, and I thought it sucked. I know now people like it as camp, but I wasn't looking for that. I wanted to kill Ernest Borgnine, he screamed and hollered for most of his time on screen, and gene Hackman yelled almost as much. I liked the Rosens, of course.

I didn't like The Sting. I HATED The Sting. No idea why.

I now notice Borgnine and Stella Stevens seem to be based on Wallace Bbery and Jean Harlow in Dinner at Eight (but Beery was quieter).

Anora

People with whom I associate do not refer to movies as "amazing."

R360 I also loved Breaking Away. I was in high school at the time, I went to see it three times.

All of them

I showed Breaking Away last year for a film club, everyone loved it.

R373 I loved the twist at the end when Dave switched from Italian to French.

Memento, Inception, and Tenet. I know we're all supposed to genuflect f or Christopher Nolan, but while a I love a lot of his stuff, those there were just awful ...IMO.

I hated Magnolia, and I also hated There Will Be Blood, but I like other movies by Paul Thomas Anderson. I love Boogie Nights and Licorice Pizza.

Thank you for taking the time to comment, R370.

There Will Be Blood and Licorice Pizza. I wasn't able to make it all the way through either of those movies

Longlegs was horrible.

Fantasia. I saw it at 5, hated it, and had nightmares for weeks.

Koyaanisqatsi

I hated "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and thought Holly Golightly was a shallow bitch.

I thought “Debbie Does Dallas” was about Debbie Reynolds having a cameo on “Dallas.” I was so disappointed!

I agree r382. The movie is just a pale shadow of the wonderful novella.

That said, it’s hard not to love Miss Audrey in anything she’s in.

And the movie is such a time capsule of New York right at the dawn of the 60s, when America was just starting to emerge from the conservative/conformity cocoon of the 50s, and to cast around figuring out what it wanted to be now.

After I see film or photos of the early 60s, the world I was born into, I look around and see how different everything now is. It’s exhilarating and it’s terrifying.

The Robert Redford directed Quiz Show. I had major trouble with the casting of Ralph Fiennes in the lead - he just could not do an American accent of any kind. John Turturro chewed scenery like crazy. Not the movie I wanted about the TV quiz show scandals of the 1950s. My friends said I’d love it like they did.

Brian DePalma's Body Double. It might not be terrible, I haven't rewatched it, but at the time, watching it in the theatre, I really hated it. Would have walked out if it weren't for the person I was with.

Dead Poets Society. Manipulative treacle with a phony “inspirational” ending.

^agree Dead Poets doesn't hold up. I loved it as in my youth and then rewatched years later and it fell flat and hokey.

Crash

Birdman

The Usual Suspects

And another vote for Love, Actually. 🤮

Kalifornia

Anyone calling Love, Actually an amazing film would also be saying it about anything on Hallmark or Lifetime. Basic.

R389 Crash has to be at the top of many most-hated lists. Adding insult to idiocy, it inexplicably beat out Brokeback Mtn. at the Oscars. I think this was nearing the end of the era when "The Church" still held sway in the industry. It was named the worst Best Picture Oscar winner of the 21st century.

I really don't like Random Harvest. I'm pretty sure it's the movie (with some variations) Holden Caulfield trashes when he sees it at Radio City. (I know, it's not the exact movie, but it's obviously based on R. H.)...I like old MGM movies, I like Ronald Colman, Greer Garson. But this one--oy.

I going to call out myself on this. I used to think certain films were great, and as my tastes have changed and developed over the years, some are now a bit cringeworthy to watch for a variety of reasons. So much doesn’t stand the test of time. I don’t recommend films I haven’t rewatched in the past few years because of this.

Examples are most ‘acclaimed’ films by these directors:

-John Hughes: Captured Gen X suburban meanness. Explains why they are mostly MAGA now.

-Todd Solanz. Often creepy in a bad way, and the NJ-schtick gets old.

-Terrence Malick. Tedious to sit through just to appreciate that magical evening light and other cinematography gimmicks.

-Christopher Guest. As someone else said, just a few funny scenes but stretched out over a full length film.

R393, with Phillip Seymour Hoffman winning the Oscar that year for Capote, I think the Academy voters had enough "Gay stuff." I seem to recall an interview with Tony Curtis from that time where he said he didn't watch it and would never vote for it. I think the older voters sunk it.

THe irony is that both Capote and BBM were nominated for 5-6 awards and Brokeback Mountain won 3 Oscars including Best Director and adapted screenplay. The fact it didn't get Best Picture after winning best director was a huge upset that year. Capote only won for Best actor.

Is Capote a classic? I was thinking of giving it a go since apparently Phillip Seymour Hoffman was that good in it.

That’s not the topic, R398. This is about movies people say are good that we don’t like or respond to.

Ooops !!! It's the DL PoPo !! R398, it's definitely worth watching.

R400, thanks! I will give it a shot.

R399, we are more than 400 posts into this topic, chill out.

Moulin Rouge.

The longest 10 hours of my life.

At least that’s what it felt like.

^^^^ I LOVED THAT MOVIE^^^^ MOULIN ROUGE WAS AWESOME!!

"One Day I'll Fly Away"- "Come What May"-still play that CD!!

Never understood why those 2 songs were not nominated for Oscars, I wanted Nicole& Ewan to sing "Come What May" in front of cruise faggot at the AA. Wasn't even nominated!! The Drama involved would have driven Miss Tom over the edge.

r404, "Come What May" (which I also adore) wasn't written specifically for the movie and was thus ineligible.

To R405, Does the Academy still have those "stupid, outdated rules" about songs written for movies?

R406 Sorry, this is one of the Academy’s sensible rules. Do you really want to have, say, “Defying Gravity,” a song that has been a Broadway standard for over twenty years, win an Oscar in 2025?

But two foreign films, excuse me, “International” films ought to be able to come from the same country. And since composers (looking at you, John Williams) or cinematographers can be nominated twice in a category, why can’t actors?

I despised Moulin Rouge and Brokeback Mountain!

Brokeback was such over-heated tripe with bad wigs! Corny as fuck.

I like the way people energetically dislike what they do not like.

When it comes to movies, I'm boringly easy. Everything that isn't great, is just alright, or not to my taste.

The usual suspects. I hated it.

Avatar

R411, I watched the first one and enjoyed it. But then I was finished. I didn't see any reason for a second one, and now he's proposing a third? Jeez.

"The Butterfly Effect".

Pretentious crap, yet some people of my generation (I was born in 1995) think it's the most thoughtful film ever made.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Couldn’t finish it.

The Wolf of Wall Street. Fuck that guy.

I think a lot more people would enjoy The Wolf of Wall Street if one sees it as a comic opera, almost a fantasy.

I was prepared to hate it, but then I saw it for what I think Scorsese was shooting for. I might be nuts, but that was how I enjoyed it.

To R411-I never saw Avatar or had any interest in seeing it in the movies.

I told everyone that if I want to watch cartoons, I'll watch "Looney Tunes" and other WB cartoons.

The Wolf of Wall Street is based on a true story/biography, so I’m not sure how that qualifies it as a fantasy.

Well, I'm not unaware of that, but all films are stylized storytelling whether based on fact or not.

It's not a journal entry and is told in an almost over-the-top style, an almost operatically dramatic fashion.

The only Scorsese movie I haven't seen. By choice.

R367, I can see how The Sting would be boring to a kid, especially if you're too young to understand all the gambling details. Tastes changes as you grow up, for sure. When I was in my late teens, I hated The Breakfast Club. I think I just needed more emotional distance in order to not get triggered (MARY!). I saw it again recently, light years away from adolescence, and I liked it a lot more.

R420 That's not really why I didn't like it. I was very into the '30s at the time, and I thought it was exaggerated and inauthentic. Like a '70s cartoon version of the 1930s. I didn't get the anachronistic Scott Joplin music. The dialogue was stitled. It didn't seem like real life, it looked like a the back lot. You're right, though, that gambling does bore me.

R20 Also it's been a while since I've seen it (I was 15), but if I recall correctly I fingured out the twist, or twists.

^Amazingly, this won Best Picture over American Graffiti, and Paper Moon and Serpico weren't even nominated.

AND THE WAY WERE WASN'T NOMINATED!!!

[quote]The only Scorsese movie I haven't seen. By choice.

MARY!

I loved the Wolferine of Wall Street!

True, DiCaprio often gives me a goiter. But he’s ok in this.

I read the book. Wolf of Wall St. That guy was so unlikeable by the end of the book, he disgusted me. I decided not to repeat the experience.

[quote] The only Scorsese movie I haven't seen. By choice.

[quote] MARY!

And Joseph! Yes, I've even seen The Last Temptation of Christ.

Santa Claus Conquers The Martians

Most any movie post 2010.

“Iron Man” was the turning point. Its success dictated that mid budget movies for grownups would no longer be made.

SAN ANDREAS. I went to see it on the recommendation of a friend of mine who loves disaster movies as much as I do. But it was really preposterous and poorly acted. And some of the disaster sequences were artificial af.

One Day I'll Fly Up Your Ass

R419 What other movies have you not seen?

There are whole threads about movies people have not seen.

R433 Too numerous to mention, believe me, you would not be fascinated.

R435 Oh, there's nothing that you can post that would not be mesmerizing.

Don't doubt yourself, ever.

The solar system realigns itself around the things you haven't done.

I'm efforting to not do anything at this very moment. What marvels await?

[quote] Santa Claus Conquers The Martians

On Christmas Day

you'll wake up and say-

"Hooray for Santy Claus!"

R419 Do you see movies involuntarily? How does this work?

Anything Christopher Nolan.

Maybe not all hated, but surely a 'seen it once, it's enough'. Certainly well-crafted films, but always overly pretentious, bloated, and exhausting. The man managed to suck all the fun out of Batman. Jesus Christ.

I think it's the film fanboys that have elevated him to this untouchable film god of the modern era that has done me in. That kind of hype (which is rampant everywhere with everything now) actually turns me away...or at least makes me highly skeptical or suspicious.

Nolan's Odyssey with Matt Damon should drive the stake into his coffin.

The Sopranos

[quote] Aside from the great theme, none of the music is memorable, just monotonous recitative.

There are at least two absolutely gorgeous melodies in THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG, the ones that were adapted into the pop songs "Watch What Happens?" and "I Will Wait for You." And while it's true there's a LOT of sung dialogue/recitative in the movie, there are also several other beautiful melodies throughout. Plus I've always loved that cool jazz music at the very beginning, in the garage scene.

I watched The Umbrellas of Cherbourg once and I liked it, but I would never sit through it again.

If you liked it, why would you never sit through it again?

I don't know, exactly. There are movies I feel that way about. Notice I didn't say I thought it was fantastic or that I loved it.

I understand, R446. You feel you don't need to see it again. But if I liked a movie the first time I saw it, I would probably want to see it again years later to see if my feelings changed for better or worse.

R447 I guess I didn't like it enough for that.

Not a movie (so banish me) : Only Murders In The Building.

What a fucking slog. And that was only season 1. Can't imagine hate-watching the rest.

OK. I am watching Anora on Hulu. It's fun. It's not Oscar worthy. And Mikey Madison is good so is the Russian rich kid. I just realized who she reminds me of in this movie. She reminds me of Dakota Johnson. Ad actually Dakota could have played this role except she may have aged out. Mikey is good. The movie is fun. Very predictable.

I finished Anora. I really liked it. And Mikey Madison was very good. She looked really homely. Sort of a worn out, beat up prostitute. I loved the guy who played Ivan the rich kid, and Igor the Russian tough guy. The rest of the cast was excellent, especially the Russians. Hilarious.

[quote] It's not Oscar worthy

Is that intended to be the "but I hated it" component of the otherwise extremely positive assessment of Anora? Anyway thanks, I didn't realize it was on Hulu.

Many movies are fun but not so with repeat viewings. Some should only be seen once.

I hardly ever watch movies twice. Exceptions include both Godfathers, Ordinary People, An Unmarried Woman, and All That Jazz. TV series: Homicide: Life on the Street; I'll Fly Away; L&O in all its iterations; The Patty Duke Show; thirtysomething.

I find I don't enjoy binging on L&O: SVU. Too much creepiness all at once. In a similar vein, I stopped watching Criminal Minds years ago. The relentless misery of the victims I don't find entertaining.

R452, nope I didn't hate it at all. I expected to, but I didn't. It stayed with me. This may sound corny, but it seems like something that may have really happened in some neighborhood in a borough of NYC. It seemed realistic. The "bad guys" weren't so bad. I mean, in most movies about Russian gangsters or oligarchs, they're one dimensional, almost cartoon character villains. These were not. They were very human, very funny, unintentionally, and very inept. The story wasn't just about "sex worker snags rich kid from Russia, and get in trouble. " I may watch it again to see things I may have missed, although it wasn't that complicated.

I watch certain movies multiple times. (I'm the one who said I probably wouldn't re-watch Umbrellas of Cherbourg). I think I was already doing this in high school if they were on TV, say, once a year. In college I took a film course where we had to rewatch certain films several times. The Third Man, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Psycho. It really gives you a perspective on them, the symbolism, how they're put together, whatever. I recommend it.

R455 here. Will add that the entire movie was shot on the streets of Manhattan and the club scene, etc. The camera work was excellent. You were either in the car with them or blustering your way through the clubs. The mansion where the Russians lived was fabulous. Seriously. It was gorgeous.

From your descriptions of Anora, I am looking forward to it. Not particularly into dramatic portrayals of sex work, or transvestitism for that matter, but I really loved Sean Baker's Tangerine. Remarkably all shot on a smartphone camera, it made gritty L.A. locations look great, along with the very unique characters and cast.

2001. Boooooooooooooooring.

^^^^Totally Boring-top 5 boring movies-mentioned before by me!^^^^

I never liked 2001 either.

That Terry Gillam film BRAZIL. Didn't get it, could barely sit through it. At first I thought that I wasn't sophisticated enough to appreciate it, but no, it's just a pretentious, shitty film.

^^^^I agree with you, Brazil was a terrible movie^^^

I tried watching Brazil and couldn't make it past the first 30 minutes. So boring. So, so boring.

Brazil has some inventive sets, but it doesn't hold together as a film I barely remembered it after seeing it

Perhaps it is not supposed to be clear; perhaps the movie's air of confusion is part of its paranoid vision. There are individual moments that create sharp images (shock troops drilling through a ceiling, De Niro wrestling with the almost obscene wiring and tubing inside a wall, the movie's obsession with bizarre duct work), but there seems to be no sure hand at the controls. -ROGER EBERT Chicago Sun Times

Brazil doesn't add up to much, not only because its cautionary tales are familiar, but because it has no real point of view, nothing urgent under its facile symbols. And the story winds on and on looking for a finish. Three or four times I reached for my coat prematurely. - STANLEY KAUFFMANN The New Republic

Twelve Monkeys put me to sleep.

OMG Twelve Monkeys is one of my favorites.

Anyway, pretty much anything with Meryl Streep.

I just don't "get" Terry Gilliam. I hated Brazil and 12 Monkeys.

[Quote] Anyway, pretty much anything with Meryl Streep.

I feel the same way too R467 esp. The French Lieutenant's Woman, Out of Africa, Plenty, Falling in Love, Heartburn, Sophie's Choice, Ironweed, Florence Foster Jenkins, Iron Lady. August: Osage County, Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again, The Post, Ricki and the Flash, The Giver, It's Complicated, The Hours, One True Thing, Dancing at Lughnasa, Marvin's Room, Before and After, The House of Spirits and She-Devil💣💣💣💣

I've only every like Memento of all the Nolan films. I agree they bloated, long and not as sophisticated as intended. They seen to try to cover the bloat with effects. Interstellar by far being the biggest offender. I was shocked watching it was so acclaimed.

R469 I'm happy to see at least that you did not include Silkwood & A Cry in the Dark - two preternaturally brilliant performances.

R470, Nolan is an overblown director. His movies don't have much depth but somehow they are classics? I thought Oppenheimer was OK and Cillian deserved the Oscar but it just wasn't that deep of a movie. If movies have a veneer of seriousness, they are just assumed to be good nowadays.

In my opinion, OPPENHEIMER was a total bore and somehow managed to become incredibly successful through sheer hype. My theory is that many people who saw it and say they loved it are only saying that because they don't want to appear like they're stupid and missing something everyone else is getting, but that they secretly were as incredibly bored by that pretentious, overlong mess as I was.

R473, and that's perplexing because there was nothing to "get" about the movie. It's all right there in front of you. It's just not that deep of a biopic.

[Quote] Would have walked out if it weren't for the person I was with.

Did they superglue you to the seat? My dad used to do that to me!!!

R469 And yet you saw all of those films?? I don't like Meryl Streep, so I've only seen about 4 or 5 of her movies, and she usually wasn't the lead in those.

R473, Nah, I've known people who loved it and went back and saw it again, they liked it so much (I didn't see it).

R475 No glue, just dinner, a movie, and the promise of a good rogering afterward. If I remember correctly, he was massaging my nuts through much of it.

One of the few Meryl Streep's film I actually hate is "It's Complicated".

I found it pretentious and cringey.

I did get a good laugh when her character tells Alec Baldwin's physician that she likes a lot of cum.

Philadelphia story

^^^^Hated that movie-LOVED High Society however^^^^

[Quote] I'm happy to see at least that you did not include Silkwood & A Cry in the Dark - two preternaturally brilliant performances.

Her performance in Silkwood is fine but it's hardly brilliant or outstanding and the film itself is overrated. It's murky and unresolved, and I hope I never hear that song Amazing Grace again. The only real interest in the film is to see who's going to get 'cooked' next. The thematically similar The China Syndrome is better.

R476 Actually I didn't see most of those films. I was smart enough to stay away from stuff like the French Lieutenant's Woman, Plenty, Iron Lady and Ironweed who's running time is like a death sentence according to Pauline Kael. And having seen part of the first Mamma Mia I wouldn't go anywhere near the sequel. I can testify that both Falling in Love and Heartburn are completely vacuous, The Post is boring, Sophie's Choice awful and what little I saw of Marvin's Room was dreary and Out of Africa is safe, non-habit-forming sleep aid.

R483 Saw it in the theater, but once it was available on tape, I rewatched the scene of Streep reaching into the refrigerator for a sandwich - and what she does when she retrieves it - over and over again on video. There's an almost uncanny-valley element to it, like nothing I've seen before. Genius. I was not surprised to learn that Mike Nichols reported he was frightened and intimidated by her on set.

R485, what do you mean by "uncanny valley" in this context?

Hyper-real bordering on the surreal.

The Philadelphia Story is a great movie. High Society is trash.

Drowning by Numbers, by Peter Greenaway.

Past Lives. I love Greta, but not in this basic, boring relationship mood piece.

I almost forgot - MOONSTRUCK. Never thought of it as a great film, or even a good film. Cher’s performance was not Oscar worthy to me either.

[quote]Cher’s performance was not Oscar worthy to me either.

Correct.

MOONSTRUCK is one of the best-ever films of its type, and anyone who's immune to that is not someone whose opinions I need to know.

MOONSTRUCK is sentimental slop as anyone from Brooklyn knows.

Patton 1970 Long, loud and vacuous

Gandhi.

Not that I didn't want to see a film about Gandhi. It was okay--I guess I didn't "hate" it but it didn't seem to be a brilliant film like Lawrence of Arabia or something. like that. Just sort of a flat film.

No,R494, I disagree. You don't have to like it. Fine. But it's not slop. Notting Hill was, IMO sentimental slop. It was cringe worthy. I hated it.

Very few Rom Coms withstand t he test of time. Moonstruck does. And I can't even say why. Maybe it was the characters. They were priceless. All of them. Not a weak characterization in the bunch. And I adored Olympia Dukakis.

Citizen Cane. Never made it past the first 10 minutes.

"Requiem for a Dream" and "Manchester By The Sea".

Tedious and try-hard.

R499. Nor, apparently, past first-grade spelling class.

[Quote] Citizen Cane. Never made it past the first 10 minutes.

Well, it's not really a film for illiterates.

Maybe it's a movie about elves that make Christmas candy.

Or an old lesbian?

KRAMER VS KRAMER. This movie made me hate Dustin Hoffman for a long time.

Same. Him and that kid. eech.

I notice K v. K didn't make the Streep-hater list. I thought she was pretty good as the evil lesbian.

Pretty much all Spielberg movies...and that 'Hollywood' music at every turn

R507 She wasn't a lesbian in Kramer vs. Kramer.. That was Manhattan.

r509: Let's face it, she's a lesbian in every movie she does.

R509 You're so right, thank you. That's why in my mind's eye, I see her delicious hair toss in black & white.

Carrie Snodgrass gave a brilliant and heartbreaking performance in Diary of a Mad Housewife. Her husband, children, lover and even the cleaning lady disrespect her. Yet the film doesn't work. The last scene, where she is trapped in group therapy with a bunch of self-obsessed, angry people, is an unsatisfying conclusion.

R508, Close Encounters of the Turd Kind infuriated me.

I'm not much of a Spielberg fan. I've never been able to figure out the exact reasons, but I feel like there's always some point where people act illogically or counterintuitively. In several of his movies I just didn't buy the premise, either. But I enjoyed Close Encounters more than most. Duel, his first movie for TV, I loved.

For me, Spielberg has to view almost everything with a "childlike" vision ALL the fucking time. There are a few movies where he doesn't do that but it's more common than not.

Molly Haskell review of Jaws.

R515 I feel like Spielberg often "gets in his own way." My most recent personal example is Lincoln. Brilliant brilliant performance by DDL, some fine supporting performances, and yet. I felt like the movie should have ended with him walking away from us, on his way to Ford's Theater. Instead we got more. More. Milking the tragedy, IMO. We all pretty much know what happened at the theater. Did we really need to see his young sone hearing about it while he was out at another theater? Did we really need the death scenes? They seemed anti climactic. Too much. And IMO Spielberg does that a lot. He doesn't seem to know how the end his movies and layers them over with sentiment. Oscar Schindler's shattering scene as he leaves his factory for the last time. The End? Oh no, we needed even more.

SINNERS!

R517, you put it perfectly. To me, this is why that scene with the girl in the red jacket in Schindler's List is so infuriating. Did we really need her jacked colorized? Why? Why did he feel the need to hold the audience's hand? Maybe that's why movies his movies like Jurassic Park are his best, the humans are secondary.

I really dislike the Spielberg movies where he has to prove he's become a mature filmmaker. I dislike some of his other movies, too, but it's worse when he tries to be serious. He's not a deep filmmaker, no matter how hard he tries.

All these older filmmakers, like Ford, Hawks, DeMille, Hitchcock, Capra--they were just being themselves. Spielberg used to be himself, sometimes--like in Close Encounters and ET--which is when he was at his best. I can't beleive he directed that remake of West Side Story--it was like a TV movie directed by a middling anonymous talent.

R520, the more he tries, the more he exposes himself as a "popcorn" director.

The Fountain. I remembering thinking what in the hell did I just watch.

Babette’s Feast. A frustrating movie to like.

The Fountainhead

Oppenheimer

I adore the Spielberg films, and the big sweeping John Williams scores (nothing quite like 'em). But I do agree that his best works are the fun 'popcorn' films (The Indiana Jones films, ET, Jurassic Park, etc.). That said, on the drama side, I think he did a fantastic job with the original "The Color Purple".

R525, I think OPPENHEIMER was the worst example of totally unwarranted hype of a movie in my lifetime. There was no "there" there, and it was excruciatingly boring.

R527, not R525, I agree. I didn't have it but Nolan really does not do characters well. Or scripts, apparently. The movie wasn't nearly as deep as it's supporters would have you think. I'm sure the book it was based off (the Oppenheimer biography) is much better.

Btw, people have been recommending Interstellar to me, is that another case of a movie being more hype than anything else?

Moonlight

Roma

La La Land

Everything Everywhere All at Once

Yes, R529. It's kinda silly.

English Patient

"The Patriot" (2000) starring Mel Gibson.

It's basically a prequel of "Independence Day". Just change 1996 for 1776; and change the aliens for British officers.

I disagree, R533. I really enjoyed The Patriot when it came out mainly because of Heath Ledger. I hated Jason Isaacs for a long time.

Ghandi.

[quote] Everything Everywhere All at Once

Nothing, Nowhere, Never.

Moonlight has no plot. It was all atmosphere. It does stay with you, though. The last scene in the diner is lovely.

The Fountainhead is deliriously campy and impossible to dislike on that basis. Max Steiner’s score is great.

R538 Nothing is impossible to dislike.

1968s The Lion in Winter The family squabbling is endless and ultimately not very interesting

[quote]1968s The Lion in Winter The family squabbling is endless and ultimately not very interesting

I wouldn't necessarily describe LiW "amazing" but it holds up well: BIG performances from Hepburn & O'Toole, young Anthony Hopkins & Timothy Dalton & beautiful cinematography. It's become one of my go-to Christmas movies. Though I would've liked to better understand why Eleanore & Henry have such contempt for Geoffrey. But it's still a fun watch rather than the dreary Beckett

And the early shot of geese flying in formation, with the one that presages leaving the flock.