The Year in Review continues. In the next two weeks, I will unveil the best and worst movies of the year. At this time, I thought I’d give praise to some of the movies that are somewhere in the middle and will doubtless never see much recognition.
The Nicholas Cage Money Grab Award
Winner – Bruce Willis (A Good Day To Die Hard, GI Joe Retaliation, RED 2)
Bruce Willis is one of the hardest working actors in Hollywood today. It’s not that he even needs to attempt to act anymore. As long as he just plays the gruff version of himself, he can collect his paycheck. Half of his movies go straight to DVD, and usually co-stars 50 Cent. He’s just in it for the paycheck. Somehow this year he managed to ruin John McClane forever.
Runner-Up – Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man 3)
Fat Ron Weasley Worst Makeup Award
Winner – Sean Penn (Gangster Squad)
Apparently the makeup artist from 1990’s Dick Tracy has found work again. By changing Sean Penn’s face, they were attempting to make him look like mobster Mickey Cohen. However, he looked more like Bruce Jenner.
Runner-Up – Mila Kunis (Oz: The Great and Powerful)
The Mariah Carey Pop Stars Can’t Act Award
Winner – Selena Gomez (Getaway, Spring Breakers)
This former Barney star has a terrible agent. In Spring Breakers, she plays the lone Christian girl, appropriately named Faith. Her voice-overs are the stuff of nightmares. In Getaway, she plays a would-be, tech-savvy carjacker. Someone please stop giving her roles.
Runner-Up – Justin Timberlake (Runner Runner, Inside Llewyn Davis)
The Travolta/Best Comeback
Winner – Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club, Mud, The Wolf of Wall Street)
It will still be a while before people forget the stereotype of McConaughey taking his shirt off in every movie. He only has himself to blame. This former chick flick powerhouse has apparently decided that he actually likes to act again. With his upcoming role in Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar, I couldn’t be happier.
Runner-Up – Sandra Bullock (The Heat, Gravity)
The Will Smith Memorial Award/Fading Star
Winner – Johnny Depp (The Lone Ranger)
Johnny Depp could only hide behind his makeup and costumes for so long. His role of Tonto, in The Lone Ranger, showed everyone that he can’t quit dressing up and playing quirky characters. Does anyone remember how good of an actor he was in the ’90s?
Runner-Up – Will Smith (After Earth)
Best Animated Movie
Winner – Gravity
The special effects in Gravity were incredible…. Obviously, the real winner here is Frozen.
Runner-Up – Frozen
Tommy Wiseau Worst Line Award
Winner – “Ta-da!” Loki (Tom Hiddleston) in Thor: The Dark World
Every once in a while, a character will say a line that completely takes you out of the movie and bring the movie to a screeching halt. This happened in Thor 2 when Thor, Loki and Black Swan flew through a magic portal on their magic canoe (seriously). For some reason, they added a voiceover of Tom Hiddleston saying “Ta-da!” It made me die a little inside.
Runner-Up – “I know why the hippo did it…” Max (Matt Damon) in Elysium
Best Zombie Movie
Winner – The Internship
Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson attempted to bring their careers back from the dead with The Internship. Ironically, the one thing missing from this outdated comedy was “Brainnnnnsssss…” (sorry)
Runner-Up – Warm Bodies
Best Remake
Winner – The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
While it doesn’t revisit the story of the Danny Kaye 1947 version, it keeps the spirit of the daydreamer who finally goes on his own adventure. I love that they chose to remake an old movie, that isn’t considered a classic, and improve on it.
Runner-Up – The Evil Dead
The Hangover 2 Copy-and-Paste Award
Winner – Disney’s Planes (A rewrite of Pixar’s Cars)
Disney: Remember how much kids loved the movie Cars and its fresh sequel, Cars 2? Let’s make the same movie! But this time, it will be about……airplanes!
Runner-Up – Carrie
Most Average Villain
Winner – Malekith (Thor: The Dark World)
Chris Eccleston is a better actor than the one-dimensional Malekith. Granted, he wasn’t going to get much time to develop his character, considering he is sharing a movie with Loki. Let’s be honest, with the exception of Loki, Marvel’s villains live in mediocre town.
Runner-Up – Adrian Killian (Iron Man 3)
Best Tyler Perry Movie Not Actually Made by Tyler Perry
Winner – Best Man Holiday
With a cast of Taye Diggs, Sanaa Lathan, Regina Hall, Terrence Howard and Morris Chestnut, how could this movie not be made by Tyler Perry? I’ll tell you how. Critics actually liked this movie. Also, there was no cross dressing.
Runner-Up – The Big Wedding
Stereotypical Indie Fluff Award
Winner – Frances Ha
Consider me old fashioned but I love a story and relatable characters. Frances Ha, starring indie poster girl Greta Gerwig, is shot in black and white and is quirky to an off-putting degree.
Runner-Up – The Bling Ring
Worst Movie Title
Winner – A Haunting in Connecticut 2: Ghosts of Georgia
Wait a minute. I’m confused. I saw the first Haunting in Connecticut. That movie made sense because it took place in Connecticut. I understand wanting to be a part of a franchise, but couldn’t they say A Haunting in Georgia? I’m not great at geography, but I don’t think Connecticut and Georgia are in the same state.
Runner-Up – The Last Exorcism 2
Worst Use of a Good Cast
Winner – Lee Daniels’ The Butler
This could also win best guilt trip award. Somehow this movie manages to make Forest Whitaker, Robin Williams, John Cusack, Liev Shrieber, James Marsden and Alan Rickman, all look like bad actors. There’s something wrong with your movie when the best performance is given by Oprah Winfrey.
Runner-Up – The Counselor
Most Average Movie Based on a Book’s Title
Winner – World War Z
I know I’m a little too harsh to this Brad Pitt dinosaur-zombie movie, but I blame it for so much. How could they buy the rights to Max Brooks’ excellent novel and then use zero percent in the actual movie? I wish they used a different title, so I could still look forward to a proper World War Z franchise.
Runner-Up – Ender’s Game
And Finally….The award you’ve all been waiting for…
The Taylor Lautner Obligatory Shirtless Scene Award
Winner – Thor in Thor: The Dark World
The character of Thor is just so deep. As he thinks about his long lost love Jane, he stands shirtless in his extravagant room wiping himself down with Cocoa Butter. That sentence wasn’t meant to be as dirty as it sounded.
Runner-Up: Carol Marcus in Star Trek Into Darkness
