My Top 8 Worst Films of 2018


     
     
    8) Venom

    Tom Hardy plays a free-lance reporter who gets on the wrong side of a dodgy science experiment. Luckily for him, the alien (Venom) who now controls his body takes a shine to him and they form an unlikely alliance against the man who conducts the cruel tests.
    Venom was a fun ride, though it feels painfully unoriginal alongside other, better Marvel films. Without Hardy it was unlikely to be the success it was!
    MY RATING: 3 STARS OUT OF 5
     
     
    7) Hotel Transylvania 3: A Monster Vacation

Dracula (Adam Sandler) is coerced into taking a break from running his hotel, and going on a cruise, by his daughter Mavis (Selena Gomez). Their family and all their friends come along too, and Dracula falls in love with the ship's Captain...who also happens to be the granddaughter of his greatest enemy.


The premise was great, the animation was gorgeous, but after two previous films it already felt tiresome coming into it. Who decided the Macarena was a good song choice to dance to? Still, like its predecessors, A Monster Vacation will be entertaining enough when there's nothing better to watch on TV.

MY RATING: 3 STARS OUT OF 5




    6) The Grinch

The Grinch was heart-warming, enough. It looked beautiful, and His Green-ness was gleefully grumpy, but it still feltredundant and a shameless cash-grab. My favourite addition was Fred the rotund reindeer.

MY RATING: 3 STARS OUT OF 5





    5) Red Sparrow
Jennifer Lawrence plays an injured Russian ballerina who is recruited to 'Sparrow School'. She is trained to use her body as a weapon, with her first target being a CIA agent (played by Joel Edgerton).

It sounded exactly like the Black Widow film Marvel fans are still waiting for, but the amount of predictable double-crossing and explicit sexual scenes just made for uncomfortable viewing. Also I'm fairly sure a man watching it on his own while I was there was enjoying the whole thing far too much...

MY RATING: 3 STARS OUT OF 5



    4) The Greatest Showman


(Okay, okay. The film might have been released in late 2017, but I saw the Sing-Along version in 2018).

The Beast from the East brought me to see this film. After too many days stuck at home, I was begging to get out for any reason at all, and the loud and raucous hype around The Greatest Showman drew me in. Yes, the soundtrack was and remains marvellous, but the plot and characters left a helluva lot to be desired.
MY RATING: 2 STARS OUT OF 5




3) Early Man

Aah, Aardman. I missed you. This time you brought Eddie Redmayne, Tom Hiddleston and Game of Thrones' Maisie Williams along for the ride. Early Man juggled the familiar animation Aardman are famous for with an obvious love for football. Except there were too many questions unanswered and it was a stereotypical under-dog story that was...really boring.


MY RATING: 2 STARS OUT OF 5




2) Sherlock Gnomes


As a belated (and painfully irrelevant) sequel to Gnomeo and Juliet, the gnomes are moved to London. When it transpires gnomes are going missing, Gnomeo (James McAvoy) and Juliet (Emily Blunt) enlist the mind of – you guessed it – Sherlock Gnomes and Watson.
I went in the cinema with pretty low expectations... I was neither disappointed or surprised. Sherlock Gnomes sniggered at its own poor humour, and didn't seem to know who it was appealing to at all. Also, what was with the Elton John soundtrack?


MY RATING: 2 STARS OUT OF 5


Now last, and certainly the least...


1) Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

Behold, the dumbest Jurassic Park sequel so far! Claire and Owen (Bryce Dallas Howard and Chris Pratt) return to the ill-fated Jurassic World because a volcano is about to blow up and they want to save all the dinosaurs. Oh, and Blue the velociraptor is still alive. A billionaire named Hammond – I mean, Lockwood helps them on their way, but some associates of his have other ideas for the dinosaurs.

Yeah. It was basically Jurassic Park III but everyone made utterly terrible life decisions. Although Claire changed her shoes, and Owen was miraculously impervious to lava. It was almost an insult to watch. Also, clone daughter? Hear that? That's the whole audience collectively face-palming in despair.


MY RATING: 2 STARS OUT OF 5 (but I think I was being too generous)

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