Josh on...The Ten Most Overrated Movies

I decided for my list, that there weren't really videos necessary. I still think it is a damn good list. I'm thinking there will be a few surprises as well.

10. Fahrenheit 9/11
I was not a fan of President George W. Bush when I walked into this movie. However, when walking out of it, there was someone I hated more than George W. Bush: Michael Moore. After the first third or so of this movie, I got the point. The whole thing was messed up, handled poorly, and it sucked. It was a huge tragedy. I could've watched a movie about that. Instead, this movie became anti-Bush propaganda. It was the rallying point (literally, I got Democratic e-mails saying "Let's go watch Fahrenheit 9/11 together") for the Democratic presidential campaign that year. It sparked a sentiment that I found quite ridiculous. Namely, that anyone would be better than Bush. The movie, as I've seen from Moore's movie about healthcare, is just a tear down. It does not propose any solutions. If this had been a tragic telling of a horrible event, it would have potentially been worth the hype. Instead, it was anti-Bush propaganda that offered no viable solution for anything, and instead just bitched about things.

9. Scarface
The issues with this movie have been belabored on this website and others. Mediocre gangster film that is kind of fun, but overrall riddled with over the top performances. It doesn't even hold a candle to The Godfather or Goodfellas, yet we see t-shirts and posters with Tony Montana's face all over the place. Quite silly in my opinion.

8. Boondock Saints
This movie can frequently be found on college students' "favorite movies" section on the Facebook. In my experience, this also tends to be the action/gangster movie that women celebrate as the "guy movie" that they like. However, despite its frequent praise, this movie is just OK. I don't have any serious criticism of this movie. It is just an OK movie that often gets spoken of as much much better.

7. No Country for Old Men
Best picture? Really? While sitting through this movie I had an OK time. That was it. Huge portions of it were the Coen brothers showing us how artsy and cool they could be. Javier Bardem's character was kind of cool, but only "kind of." I didn't care about the characters while I was watching the movie at all. I felt kind of bad when one of the main characters died, but I was more just pissed off that the Coen brothers didn't feel that it was necessary to show how that happened. This goes exactly to the "art for arts sake" problem with this film. Which, of course, is one of the factors that makes film snobs go down on this movie with a passion.


6. Wizard of Oz
Have you watched this movie recently? Not for me. Obviously, it was innovative for its time. But at some point, the fact that a movie was innovative for its time is no longer enough for it to be heralded as a "great movie." Is it a classic? Definitely. However, having re-watched this movie recently, it felt...worn. Now, maybe that's because the movie is made for children. That's fair. However, I still enjoy most Disney movies, even though they were made for children. I just think that at some point, when a movie can no longer resonate with people, it does not deserve to stand amongst those movies which do.

5. Being John Malkovich
This movie is friggin weird. Seriously. This movie was Kauffman and Malkovich getting drunk and making a crazy movie. Yet people tend to really enjoy it. My thoughts on it? Malkovich, malkovich malkovich malkovich. Malkovich!

4. Anchorman
This movie had a few funny scenes, but that's it. Yet people quote it constantly, and Will Ferrell managed to keep landing leading role movies. He is a great team actor, but I don't think he can handle a lead role. This movie is exemplary of that. He only really does a few things well. He does them all in this movie, but it isn't enough to make this movie more than two hours filled with only a few funny scenes.

3. Sixth Sense
Think about this movie for a second. You immediately think of the ending, of course. This whole movie revolves around the ending. And once that ending occurs, there is a HUGE plot hole that we won't get into here. But once you know the ending, and you've rewatched it to make sure that Bruce Willis doesn't talk to anyone, the movie is no longer enjoyable. It's good the first time because of the awesome twist, but then it loses all re-watch value.

2. High School Musical
As it turns out, tonight's episode of South Park explains how shitty this movie is perfectly. For those that didn't see the episode, I will explain. High School Musical is obviously a musical about high school kids. However, the characters are wholly unbelievable. They are not even closely related to actual people, or the reactions that actual people would have in situations. Further, the music is just OK. Compare this movie to a good musical about high school students. It's called Grease. The characters are believable and even today, one can relate to those characters. Grease proves that a movie with in this genre is possible, but HSM proves that the genre is easy to screw up.

1. Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
Obviously Empire is a pretty damn good movie. But it is often considered the best Star Wars movie, which it is not. Jedi is the best Star Wars movie. So, while this movie is still good, it is overrated nonetheless. It is number one because it gets talked up a lot. And Jedi is much better than Empire.