2011 / 2012 Ratings Summary – My year in films, according to OGR…

Another year.

Another couple kilos on a frame that doesn’t need them.

Another dent in the couch.

Another 287 films reviewed.

Welcome to the third annual oneguyrambling.com Ratings Summary for the 2011/2012 year.

Using my average of 95 minutes per flick let’s go through the raw numbers.

287 X ~95 = 27,265 minutes = ~450 hours… = 19 full days watching movies.

So again let’s look at the quality versus trash ratio to ascertain how many of those 19 days were worth the expansion in my waistline. As always I consider:

  • Anything less than a 6 / 10 is wasted time.
  • A 6 / 10 or 6.5 / 10 needs at least one redeeming feature to justify the time, but such a score will rarely warrant rewatching the film.
  • A score of 7 / 10 + will generally make the film worthwhile and often worth watching again down the track, or buying the DVD depending on the actual score.

This was 2011/2012…

Wasted time

Either I am getting harder in my scoring methodology or I am selecting my films less carefully. Last year I blew time watching 60 shitty flicks, this year I watched less film overall but a startling 75 of them were god-awful.

This year 5 days from the 365 allotted were blown watching dross like Iron Sky, Shark Night and the immortal Don’t be a Menace to South Central while drinking your Juice in the Hood!

The worst time thieves in the past 12 months were at opposing ends of the spectrum. I don’t think anyone anticipated the 80s T&A pioneer Hardbodies to hold up well to scrutiny three decades on, especially now that the nudity bar is set so low that every reality show and TV ad relies on anything up to actual insertion. But The Woman somehow thinks it is better than it is, and for some reason that I will remain blissfully ignorant of critics kinda seemed to like it.

I didn’t. The Woman was atrocious, Hardbodies might have been an inferior product but I hated The Woman more than anything else over the year this side of Real Steel. More on that later.

In other news I checked out some so called classics and was greatly underwhelmed. Wild, Wild West, Pluto Nash, Children of the Corn and Judge Dredd all blew goats, and in more recent releases Bad Teacher, Sleeping Beauty and Ghost Rider 2 all sucked arse. You can decide for yourself which category you’d rather be in.

The Fincher helmed remake of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo riled me not because of its ineptness, just due to the sheer unnecessariness of it all. It smacks of arrogance and I can’t help but think we’ll get two more sequels we don’t need.

So it was between Bad teacher and Real Steel as to which was the big budget disappointment for the year. Real Steel won thanks to its abysmal character arc that had neglectful and abusive dad Hugh Jackman doing a 180 degree turn in the span of about four minutes after his sons gambling robot made him rich.

Feel good hit of the year how?

And the only reason I haven’t mentioned Red State here is that Kevin Smith is now expected to make crap.

Last year I couldn’t retract my “Don’t Bother Watching” recommendations for any of the 60 sub-par titles, ditto this year – though the Jim Carrey misfire Number 23 is an adorably confusing mess.

Killing time

During the past few months I have redubbed films that garnered a 6 or 6.5 from 10 as ‘The Grey Area’, not because they feature Liam Neeson fleeing snarling wolves, but because I can see how on a different day in different circumstances someone might well derive an element of viewing pleasure from them – even justifying them as Worthwhile instead of merely ‘meh’.

Whether it was the day that I had, the mood I was in or just the fact that the film wasn’t that good, in 2011/2012 I watched 98 films that managed to amuse me momentarily without leaving an impression. Another worrying sign of my misspent leisure time is that the sum of the Wasted Time and Killing Time is over 60% of my movie watching expenditure.

That has to be poor time management.

Last year I named 5 films I might revisit: Inglourious Basterds, Ninja Assassin, Year One, Frontier(s) and From Hell. The only one that I checked out again was Basterds, and I didn’t alter my opinion one bit.

So separating into four broad categories:

Skin: Colombiana, Middle Men, Notorious Bettie Page, So Close, Rise: Blood Hunter, Bikini Summer

Dumb action: Assassins, Cobra, Contraband, Drop Zone, The Transporter, Underworld, Haywire

Harmless entertainment: The Mummy, Priest, Harold and Kumar, Eight Legged Freaks

So-so horror: Attack the Block, Audition, Creepshow, Apollo 18, Don’t be afraid of the Dark

So-so blockbusters: Green Lantern, Green Hornet, Journey 2 the Mysterious Island, The Adjustment Bureau, Cowboys and Aliens, Wrath of the Titans, Chronicle, John Carter

I will inevitably check out Attack the Block – I bought the DVD online – Balls of Fury and Eight Legged Freaks are both silly but kinda fun, my 5 year old will mean I see Cars 2 again, and John Carter, Rise of the Planet of the Apes and The Thing remake might warrant another look at some point.

And I stand by my assertion that Underworld 4 is the best of the Underworld series (still not that good though).

Time well spent

With a disturbing 60% wastage rate, my 40% – or just on a week of actual time – came and went, with no 10 out of 10s to cap them off.

Last year I wrote that while I am happy to buy DVD/Blu-Rays of films I will rewatch, I generally don’t buy dramas. I cited Winter’s Bone, The Constant Gardener and Gone Baby, Gone as examples. Funnily enough all three now sit cosily in my collection thanks to JB Hi-Fi sales.

I stated my intent to buy Let the Right One In, Machete, Piranha 3, Scott Pilgrim Vs the World and the old classic Big Trouble in Little China and I am pleased to say that I have been 100% successful. I also put Rango and Unstoppable as ‘maybe’s’ and grabbed them both too…

It’s a little more iffy this year. I have purchased Tintin and The Muppets already, but it’s thin on the ground from there. I will probably end up with The Avengers and can’t wait for The Raid: Redemption, but after that it starts looking maybe-ish. As in ‘maybe’ I’ll get Sherlock Holmes, ‘maybe’ Warrior, ‘maybe’ The Grey will be on sale and catch me feeling indulgent.

But that’s about it. Thin on the ground this year.

Time very well spent

Last year I watched 41 GREAT flicks, granted many were from my own collection, but that doesn’t excuse an entire year in which I only saw 14 GREAT films, I mean who can’t manage to find time for a little over one awesome film a month?

In any case only two were actually released in the last 12 months, The Adventures of Tintin and The Raid: Redemption. One a classic rollicking romp to please all ages and the other a callback to the golden era of Jackie Chan a martial arts masterpieces.

With The Dark Knight Rises a’coming and Adam Sandler in ‘That’s my Boy’ hopefully we won’t have too long to wait until the next GREAT film…

__________________________________________________
Last year I decided to be more severe with my ratings on mediocre films, a decision I have since maintained in my reviews.

In my view being merely average isn’t good enough, I demand more, so a 7 is the magic divider between worthwhile and… not.

___________________________________________________

Greater than 0/10 less than 6/10 –

“Dear Film-maker, whatever you were trying to achieve, you fucked up.”

3 / 10

Hardbodies

The Woman

X-Tro

3.5 / 10

The Adventures of Pluto Nash

Crossworlds

Mask of the Ninja

Ninjas Vs Vampires

Wild Wild West

4 / 10

Bad Teacher

Changing Lanes

Clive Barker’s The Plague

Fled

Hobo with a Shotgun

London

Punisher: War Zone

Red Canyon

Shark Night

Sleeping Beauty

Undead or Alive

4.5 / 10

Backtrack / Catchfire

Beverly Hills Cop 3

Children of the Corn

Disclosure

The Divide

End of Days

The Grudge 2

In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale

Little Deaths

Outbreak

Real Steel

Red Riding Hood

Romeo Must Die

The Ward

5 / 10

Black Mask

Bridesmaids

Cradle 2 the Grave

DOA: Dead or Alive

Escape from L.A.

Ghost Rider 2: Spirit of Vengeance

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (US)

The Grudge 3

Iron Sky

The Man with the Screaming Brain

Number 23

Osmosis Jones

The Specialist

Tekken

30 Minutes or Less

A Vampire in Brooklyn

V for Vendetta

Village of the Damned

5.5 / 10

Aeon Flux

The Amityville Horror (2005)

Babylon A.D.

Boogie

Broken Arrow

Bubba Ho-Tep

The Cave

Collateral Damage

The Devil Inside

Devil’s Playground

Don’t be a Menace to South Central while drinking your Juice in the Hood

Fear City

Howling Reborn

John Carpenter’s Vampires

Judge Dredd

The Killer Inside Me

Mars Attacks

The One

Our Idiot Brother

Poison Ivy

Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead

Red State

The Signal

Streets of Fire

War of the Dead

6.0/10 – “OK, so you made a movie, do you want a medal?”

6 / 10

The Adjustment Bureau

Anaconda

Apollo 18

The Assassin

Assassins

Audition

Bachelor Party

Bolt

The Burrowers

Cobra

Colombiana

Contraband

Cowboys & Aliens

CreepShow

The Distinguished Gentleman

Don’t be Afraid of the Dark

Drop Zone

Give ‘Em Hell Malone

Green Hornet

Green Lantern

Gremlins 2: The New Batch

Hell comes to Frogtown

Idiot Box

Journey 2: The Mysterious Island

Keeping the Faith

The King of Comedy

Max Payne

Metro

Middle Men

Mo’ Better Blues

The Money Pit

Monsters

The Mummy

Munich

My Name is Bruce

Needful Things

The Notorious Bettie Page

The Quick and the Dead

Puss in Boots

Rise: Blood Hunter

So Close

Takers

Tango and Cash

Tower Heist

The Transporter

Transporter 3

You Don’t Mess with the Zohan

Young Adult

6.3/10 – “For some reason I thought Wrath of the Titans was better than the first, but still not worth a 6.5.”

6.3 / 10

Wrath of the Titans

6.5/10 – “Not that crash hot but with one memorable or cool scene. EG: ‘At least it had boobies’.”

6.5 / 10

Attack the Block

Balls of Fury

Bikini Summer

Bunraku

Cars 2

Chronicle

Clerks 2

Death Sentence

Deep Blue Sea

Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story

Eight Legged Freaks

Eraser

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

Grosse Pointe Blank

The Grudge

Hanna

Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay

Haywire

A History of Violence

Hitman

Horrible Bosses

House Party

How to Lose Friends and Alienate People

Ichi the Killer

Immortals

The Island

I-Spy

The Italian Job

John Carter

Julia’s Eyes

Killer Elite

Mimic

The Mummy Returns

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

The Muppets take Manhattan

Once upon a time in China

The People Under the Stairs

The Planet of the Apes

Priest

Rambo 3

Red Planet

Ricochet

The Siege

The Thing

The Tournament

Transporter 2

Underworld: Awakening

Victory

Wedlock

7.0/10 – “Worth watching, let’s see what you do next.”

7 / 10

Action Jackson

Alien: Resurrection

American Movie

Beowulf

The Big Hit

Captain America: The First Avenger

Closer

Conan the Barbarian

Disorganised Crime

The Eagle

Fast Five

Fright Night 2011

The Grey

The Guard

Halloween

House

The Inbetweeners Movie

The Innkeepers

Journey to the Centre of the Earth

Kill List

Ladyhawke

The Mist

The Muppet Movie

Nighthawks

A Nightmare on Elm Street 1984

Payback

Paranormal Activity 3

Pump up the Volume

Rambo: First Blood Part 2

Rambo 4

Ravenous

Red Riding: In the Year of our Lord 1980

The Revenant

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Rock ‘N’ Rolla

Role Models

Running Scared

Safe

Split Second

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Traitor

A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas

The Wraith

7.5/10 – “It was OK, definitely worth a look.”

7.5 / 10

48 Hours

Another 48 Hours

Appaloosa

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

Bedevilled

Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Clerks

Contagion

Daylight

The Dead

The Devil’s Backbone

Dog Soldiers

The Exorcism of Emily Rose

Fallen

A Fish called Wanda

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Gremlins

Hugo

Inside Man

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang

Malcolm

Margin Call

The Matador

The Muppets (2011)

Naked

New Jack City

Parenthood

Perfume

The Pirates: Band of Misfits

Prometheus

Red Riding: In the Year of our Lord 1974

Red Riding: In the Year of our Lord 1983

Rush

Shoot ‘Em Up

The Skeleton Key

8.0/10 “This is better.”

8 / 10

Alien 3

Beverly Hills Cop 2

Blind Fury

Dark City

First Blood

Ghost Town

The Great Muppet Caper

Hard Candy

Heat

In Bruges

JSA

Jurassic Park

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

Marvel’s The Avengers

Moneyball

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Sin City

Swingers

True Romance

Unbreakable

Warrior

8.5/10 – “Now this is what I’m talking about.”

8.5 / 10

The Adventures of Tintin

Being John Malkovich

Beverly Hills Cop

Bowfinger

Do the Right Thing

Good Will Hunting

The Killer

The Raid: Redemption

Sleepy Hollow

Spartan

9.0/10 – “It’ll be hard for you to top this one.”

9 / 10

Blood Diamond

The Exorcist

The Professional

Reservoir Dogs

The Silence of the Lambs

9.5/10 “Absolutely lurrrrrve your work Sir (or Madam).”

Unbelievably enough none this year.

10/10 “Undeniable awesomeness. Perfection.”

Pulp Fiction

And there we have another year in OGR. Until 12 months time…

About OGR

While I try to throw a joke or two into proceedings when I can all of the opinions presented in my reviews are genuine. I don't expect that all will agree with my thoughts at all times nor would it be any fun if you did, so don't be shy in telling me where you think I went wrong... and hopefully if you think I got it right for once. Don't be shy, half the fun is in the conversation after the movie.
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