2019 is a bit hard for me to sum up. I could just talk about all of the headline news and politics that was going on but it was often just more of the same and I frankly tried to avoid it as much as possible, even when signs of hope surfaced. For you see, despite having lots of fun throughout it, 2019 was rough on the personal front. I suffered severe big losses amid my family and friends and often had to partake in a lot of other people's painful suffering. I was able to keep my head above water throughout it but it still sucked up so much of my time and enthusiasm.
On the movie front, I continued to struggle with my movie-watching lifestyle, particularly when it came to any work not released last year. I once again fell behind on my Netflix usage which lead to me missing out on a lot of their exclusives. I sadly never went to my beloved drive-in theater at all despite multiple prime opportunities. MoviePass finally burned to the ground after all of the crap it pulled. And my local treks to Regal Cinemas began to become a bit of nuisance in the fall thanks to the newly implemented strategy of showing more and more commercials past the scheduled start time. None of us could win with the reserved seating and now we have to suffer through more ads because of their "premium" benefits.
As for what was going on in the film industry, oh boy where to begin? China was cracking down on more than just Hong Kong, spending most of the year hurting their film division due to intense censorship and the outright banning of movies. Disney had a boffo year in box office returns but at the cost of producing more pointless live action remakes of beloved animated films and disappointing to subpar sequels. American animation suffered through one of its worst years recently with many a film failing its execution and/or falling to deaf ears. Lori Louglin and Felicity Huffman lost their squeaky clean images thanks to their involvement in college admissions bribery. Very damning accusations were levied against two popular voice actors that shocked their fanbases. Amazon dropped a huge amount of money to acquire many prominent features coming out of the Sundance Film Festival only to end up heavily in the red once general audiences had a chance with them. Nobody cared for tales of British Indians who were motivated by or decided to crib influential rock music. Way too many talking dog movies were produced only to bomb badly. Sequels to very old movies that no asked for strangely flooded the video market in this day and age. Studios and a bunch of boomers rallied against the influence of Netflix, with Steven Spielberg briefly and depressingly leading the cause to have their works be banned from the Oscars. An extremely divisive movie received way too much attention and drama thanks to the stupid antics of the media and government officials and also the absolutely awful things spewed forth by its director. Martin Scorsese stirred up a shitstorm with his comments on Marvel and superhero movies that a lot of people took way too seriously. And in what hit me very hard this year, a deranged man set fire to Kyoto Animation's main building, killing over thirty people.
Amid all of the bombs, busts and failures, I was able to drum up twenty "lucky" losers: An instantly legendary fiasco that will be mocked throughout the ages; a sea of bad animated films; technologically advanced films that disturbed and annoyed audiences; And so much more.
These are the films I have deemed the worst of 2019.
Now comes the usual disclaimer that everyone forgets to remember: This list is of my own opinion, not the general public nor the Internet consensus. If I didn't see the film at all or in its entirety, it isn't counted or considered to be included.
TOP TEN WORST FILMS
1. Cats
It may be such an obvious and easy pick to be labeled as the worst film of the year but my god what a disaster. The terrible decision in a post-Green Lantern world to super impose CGI fur on people. The abysmal direction. The nauseating camerawork and choppy editing. The poor excuse of an plot even for a musical famously known for its lack of a plot. Human-faced cockroaches being munched on and the squirm-inducing sight of human kids as mice. Starting off as undiluted nightmare fuel only to become a colossal bore in its second half. The terrible singing and acting on display throughout the cast, including thespians like Judi Dench and Ian McKellen. Its stubborn refusal to end right at the perfect time only to haphazardly cut to black. The bare human hands and other CGI missteps. Again, what a disaster.
2. Arctic Dogs
I don't know what is sadder: having a main character whose life goal is to be a postal carrier or making an animated movie that's designed and marketed heavily as a celebration of Jeremy Renner. I especially loved it when it drops literally everything mid-movie so it can create a finale revolving around fracking and the protagonist running around and facing off against the bad guy in his tighty whities.
3. Norm of the North: Keys to the Kingdom
A former king of the shit pile decided to resurface last year with not one but two animated atrocities. This one was the more painful to sit through thanks to its slapdash script (literally two basic sitcom plots smushed together) and its grade-school level animation. The fact that Rob Schneider didn't reprise his role, despite making a second career recently in lending his voice to garbage CG animated fare, was the real shocker.
4. Norm of the North: King Sized Adventure
It had far better animation that Keys to the Kingdom but at the expense of being heavily catered to Chinese audiences. Honestly though, Norm didn't need to be in this Indiana Jones rip-off at all. Worst yet, it is less laughably bad than the second film and more of a tough sit.
5. The Lion King
I don't have this high up on the list just because it's a remake of one of my favorite films of all time. It deserves its placing thanks to Disney and Jon Favreau's decision to suck the life out of all of the beloved songs and waste a colossal amount of money on CGI animals that are highly detailed but completely lifeless. The "Can You Feel The Love Tonight" sequence has to now be forever logged as one of the worst musical sequences of all time, from the passionless expressions on Simba and Nala, to Donald Glover and Beyoncé's lackluster singing, to the sheer fact that it entirely takes place in bright daylight.
6. Playing With Fire
An unfunny mainstream comedy from Hollywood? Who would have guessed. It would have been better suited as a 22 minute sitcom pilot, not a 96 minute torture fest that violently swings between obnoxious buffoonery and depressing gloom. The best thing to come from this movie was seeing the unbridled joy my niece was experiencing with it at the theater. At least she had fun.
7. It Chapter Two
Nearly three hours of painful boredom and padded out horror. Slightly worth it for the fantastic dramatic turn from Bill Hader but only slightly.
8. Gemini Man
At its core, this movie is very trite and could be relatively painless to watch. However, Ang Lee's irritating agenda to shove 3D filmmaking and high frame rate down your throat, coupled with the utter failure of Will Smith's CGIed younger self, made me utterly loathe this film.
9. Wheely
There's been many clones of Cars with far worse animation quality than this Malaysian import. But those pathetic efforts don't spend most of their time being utterly depressing or featuring a villainous plot involving car trafficking and mutilation.
10. Joker
A great man once said that it is okay to like a movie. That being said, outside of Joaquin Phoenix's performance, the score and cinematography, I was not having this film. Young adults routinely get lambasted in film school for copying and/or plagiarizing from famous directors but it's a-okay for Todd Phillips to wholeheartedly crib from Scorsese?! The muddled main message, the bad dialogue, the twists that are either way too predictable or outlandishly dumb, and its wipe-everything-away conclusion all made it more of a miserable affair than it actually wanted to be.
THE NEXT TEN
11. 3 From Hell
Why in the blue hell would you want to make a sequel to a movie that had an amazing ending? Rob Zombie continued the exploits of the Firefly family by essentially remaking The Devil's Rejects again but to pitiful results. He even pulled an Ed Wood: Captain Spaulding was heavily advertised by due to Sid Haig's then real life health problems his character is killed off and replaced with a butt monkey played by Richard Brake.
12. Doom: Annihilation
Universal Pictures Home Entertainment unleashed a mighty plague on the video market with a slew of unnecessary sequels throughout 2019. The most high profile of them, especially with video game fans, was this dreadful Aliens ripoff that made you long for the 2005 Dwayne Johnson-starring misfire. Lowlights included the decision to name the lead heroine Joan Dark, feature more zombies than actual demons, the head slapping fan service, and making the BFG weapon a big deal again only for it to do little to no damage to an average undead.
13. Playmobil: The Movie
Anya Taylor-Joy deserved a lot better than wasting her talents in this laughably bad attempt to ride on the coattails of the Lego movies. Great timing there STX Films in waiting until the iron was ice cold.
14. Tokyo Ghoul S
I'm a sucker for anime-based products but this was an embarrassing watch. They turned a very important supporting player to the franchise into a villain of the week, the main hero is dumber than a bag of hammers, the whole production screams low television budget, and the second half of the film takes place entirely on an obvious soundstage.
15. Hobbs & Shaw
The reheating of the dick waggling between Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham was bad. Making a boring action blockbuster is even worse.
16. The Man Who Killed Don Quixote
In my review of this film, I said that a rewatch might make this movie more enjoyable. Instead, the film has only soured with me more and more, largely due to Gilliam plagiarizing his own works and its repugnant attitudes toward its female characters.
17. Wonder Park
The story of what happened behind the scenes with this animated movie is far more engaging than actually watching the final product. Seriously, all that trouble just to whisper into a monkey's ear? That song about pi was mighty catchy though.
18. Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie
I really wanted to get into this anime property last year and thought that this movie could be a good first step. Not only is it terrible for newcomers, never explaining its isekai design or who the hell Being X is, the film languishes in its inability to generate real danger at any point, even with a opposing character literally named Mary Sue.
19. The Addams Family
Utterly pointless. The cast is perfectly suited and the animation is spot on but like other bad movies on this list, it stretches out a baby-friendly sitcom plot way too long. Even Captain Planet would say this movie is too preachy.
20. Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker
This spot has routinely been given to a Disney produced failure and oh boy do we have a doozy this time around. I don't know what was more soul-sucking: the continuous bombardment of random plotlines and MacGuffins, the sickening decision to resurrect the Emperor in a desperate attempt of fan service, the boring battles and action sequences, the concept of force healing, or Disney and J.J. Abrams' smear job at wiping away all of the advancements set forth by the previous film.
Next Up: The Best Films of 2019
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