2) American Pie. Seen by some to be the resurrection of the 80s teen sex comedy, leaves me questioning if these people actually watched an 80s teen sex comedy. American Wedding saves the series with decent writing, jokes, and character work and is the only one I ever bother to watch.
American Pie marked the all-too-brief return of the 80s teen sex comedy. Without it, we wouldn't have gotten Road Trip and Euro Trip, which are both funny, underrated flicks. Sadly, American Pie shot itself in the foot by playing things safe in the far weaker sequels, watering down the comedy in a genre where that is an act of suicide. The sequels get consistently more unwatchable.
3) Any movie made by Rob Zombie. The guy's not a good director, not terrible .. but not good, and honestly, anything he's written could use a rewrite by somebody else ... anybody else.
I agree with you, for the most part. House Of 1000 Corpses is a fun little midnight movie, but it's nothing great. The Devil's Rejects is actually quite good. It's a neat little balance of 70s road movie with 70s exploitation/horror. His remake of Halloween is a fucking abomination. It's a disaster of bad logic (poor white trash family can afford a house with an in-ground pool?), bad pacing, bad soundtrack-to-film moments (his choice to use "Love Hurts" while mommy strips and li'l Mikey trick or treats was AWFUL), vanity (way too many needless cameos and the use of his talentless wife), and generally wanting to have is cake and eat it too (explaining the origins of Mike Myers while also wanting to keep him as The Shape).
The problem lies in exactly what you mentioned. He can direct a movie, and has enough contacts to get the actors he'd want to direct, but he desperately needs to either get a co-writer or just let someone else entirely write the scripts.
4) Any American import and redo of a successful Japanese horror film.
With the exception of The Ring (just the first one), I agree. The problem lies in trying to make these films into watered down, PG-13, fare for teens. The originals are often way too complex to allow for that type of laziness.
5) Torture Porn. Saw 1 had some interesting play in it, the other volumes in the series are quickly written and produced sadist fare. Hostel also fits this model.
The original Saw WASN'T a torture porn flick, actually. While is did feature various death traps, they really weren't the focus of the film. Saw deftly balanced the characters with the murder mystery plot to create a wonderfully tense film. The scene of Cary Elwes sawing through his ankle was shocking because the audience wasn't bledgeoned with acts of gore and torture.
And therein lies the problem with the torture porn genre of horror. By focusing on the kills rather than the characters, these films remove any sense of fear or tension or shock. The viewer cannot be moved by the violence because s/he doesn't give a crap about the person on the receiving end of said violence. All that is left is the gore, and that's just boring.
I went to see Hostel in the theater (support a local guy, y'dig?). The crowd around me was mostly high school aged couples who probably bought tickets to another flick and snuck in. Your basic mall crowd. Throughout the film, the crowd - who should've been grossed out or freaked out - just sat there. Bored. One high school girl actually walked out while the closing credits rolled and said, "That was dull. What a stupid movie." Sadly, I didn't disagree.
Westley, are you a horror movie buff?
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