Great Bad Reviews

I love it when Roger Ebert hates a movie. This review of Deuce Bigalow is especially great :

The movie created a spot of controversy last February. According to a story by Larry Carroll of MTV News, Rob Schneider took offense when Patrick Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times listed this year’s Best Picture Nominees and wrote that they were “ignored, unloved and turned down flat by most of the same studios that … bankroll hundreds of sequels, including a follow-up to ‘Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo,’ a film that was sadly overlooked at Oscar time because apparently nobody had the foresight to invent a category for Best Running Penis Joke Delivered by a Third-Rate Comic.”

Schneider retaliated by attacking Goldstein in full-page ads in Daily Variety and the Hollywood Reporter. In an open letter to Goldstein, Schneider wrote: “Well, Mr. Goldstein, I decided to do some research to find out what awards you have won. I went online and found that you have won nothing. Absolutely nothing. No journalistic awards of any kind … Maybe you didn’t win a Pulitzer Prize because they haven’t invented a category for Best Third-Rate, Unfunny Pompous Reporter Who’s Never Been Acknowledged by His Peers.”

Reading this, I was about to observe that Schneider can dish it out but he can’t take it. Then I found he’s not so good at dishing it out, either. I went online and found that Patrick Goldstein has won a National Headliner Award, a Los Angeles Press Club Award, a RockCritics.com award, and the Publicists’ Guild award for lifetime achievement.
. . .
But Schneider is correct, and Patrick Goldstein has not yet won a Pulitzer Prize. Therefore, Goldstein is not qualified to complain that Columbia financed “Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo” while passing on the opportunity to participate in “Million Dollar Baby,” “Ray,” “The Aviator,” “Sideways” and “Finding Neverland.” As chance would have it, I have won the Pulitzer Prize, and so I am qualified. Speaking in my official capacity as a Pulitzer Prize winner, Mr. Schneider, your movie sucks.

Apparently this Gannon-esque sequel is so horrible, it prompted Ebert’s editor to compile a list of his best negative reviews. I also love this one for Freddy Got Fingered :

This movie doesn’t scrape the bottom of the barrel. This movie isn’t the bottom of the barrel. This movie isn’t below the bottom of the barrel. This movie doesn’t deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence with barrels.

Many years ago, when surrealism was new, Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali made “Un Chien Andalou,” a film so shocking that Bunuel filled his pockets with stones to throw at the audience if it attacked him. Green, whose film is in the surrealist tradition, may want to consider the same tactic. The day may come when “Freddy Got Fingered” is seen as a milestone of neo-surrealism. The day may never come when it is seen as funny.

I also reccommend the reviews for Baby Geniuses and Battlefield Earth (a movie so bad that it literally gave me a stomach ache).


posted by greg on August 15, 2005 @ 12:51 pm

4 comments

  1. I love Ebert reviews. Did you read his review for the new Herbie movie? Also, I would be remiss not to mention the great Page 6 spat between Ebert and Vincent “Prince Vince” Gallo. Great stuff.

    Comment by E-Rock — August 15, 2005 @ 3:10 pm

  2. If only somebody would slice Tom Green’s eyeball with a razor. I’d pay $9.50 for that.

    Comment by norbizness — August 15, 2005 @ 6:46 pm

  3. A few years ago Ebert published a compilation of his worst reviews. The title, after his wonderful review of “North,” was “I Hated, Hated, Hated This Movie.”

    Comment by jfb — August 16, 2005 @ 12:18 am

  4. Speaking of Battlefield Earth, I noticed that Scientologist have invaded one of the local malls and were giving bullshit “stress tests” with their amazingly scientific e-meters. However, they were only trying to sell Dianetics books and not a single copy of Battlefield Earth…
    Why not?

    Comment by Kryten Syxx — August 16, 2005 @ 5:56 am

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