Hollywood Can't Even Recognize Bad Movies

Every now and then, a really bad movie is released via mainstream Hollywood which is a howling mess of an endeavor, and it manages to get an almost unanimous "turkey" seal from not only audiences, but Hollywood itself. This includes directors, actors, insiders, journalists, critics, you name it. But sometimes this feels a mite convenient.

Try and think of Hollywood movies in more or less recent memory that earned their status of "Use DVDs for Skeet Shooting Practice". What pops into your mind? Batman and Robin, Catwoman (Bat-franchises! The most fragile of creatures among the commercially viable), Gigli, The Number 23...all absolutely terrible. However, there are equally deserving films that have been released in recent history that have received perhaps some small form of lambasting from a critic here and there, but soon after...silence. While the requisite "so bad that even Hollywood hates it" movie will be the subject of talk-show monologue punchlines or smarmy VH1/E! talking-head jeers, the truth is there really is ever one film every one or two years that receives this treatment. The rest of the trash is allowed to simply pass through the night.

Here's a little sub-problem: whenever a new movie comes out, anyone related to entertainment, whether it's a vapid "info-tainer" (I refuse to call these idiots "journalists") talk show host, or someone linked with the production of the movie, everyone is under this weird stipulation to offer stiff, forced promotion for the film, regardless of quality. In fact, I'm sure it's written into their contracts that some disclosed timeframe during pre-production, shooting, post and theaterical release, anyone related to the film has to portray the film in a positive light. I can grant, most Hollywood products are trashed by the time the first trailers hit Youtube, but it takes a special kind of film to earn derision from the people who actually had a hand in making it. Sadly, this only happens with a happy handful.

It appears that Hollywood picks the name of one of its myriad disasters to be its whipping boy for the year out of a hat, just so that insiders can have an excuse to go "well shucks, you got us dead to rights, savvy internet-browsing, energy drink drinking, electric car driving public! We certainly have egg on our faces! It was foolish of us to even consider that we could pull the wool over your eyes once again! Who's the dummy! We are! What say we buy you a beer and call it even?"

One of the few great exceptions to the rule of "radio silence" that Hollywood surrounds bad movies in, is Bill Cosby. The man went on the typical talk-show circuit promoting the infamous Leonard Part 6 and made it a point to talk down the movie at each appearance, making no bones about the fact that the movie was a turd sandwich served with a side of piss fries. He even offered money back to anyone who paid to see it. This was when the movie had just been released. Imagine Lindsay Lohan going on Leno and telling everyone not to watch I Know Who Killed Me and instead, offering anyone who paid to see the movie, naked pictures or a quick feel-up on the street. Or John Williams publicly confirming that he phoned in all his post-Jurassic Park film scores and that he was being held captive by Lucas and Spielberg in a dungeon, scoring movies in exchange for dog food and skunked beer. These things will never happen. Ever.

I'd like to play devil's advocate here and say, people can learn something from Hollywood with its attitude of trying to make a good thing out of a bad thing. A little game I like playing is noting the positive press quotes on trailers or DVD art for bad movies, and also noting the source for said clips. Even the worst movie is somehow able to find some podunk town free newsletter critic to write a quick positive missive on something like Eragon in exchange for some moonshine. I'm willing to bet these guys have either never seen a movie, or limits himself to only reviewing movies that a similarly cantankerous local video store owner puts up on his "Hot Picks" shelf while sitting at home with his cats and whittling quaint pipes out of mahogany and his shattered dreams.

There's another thing that amazes me even more about Hollywood not being able to realize when a film is a total crap shack: the mere fact that a film that is blatantly horrible, still manages to soldier on, spending its budget, wasting a lot of good peoples' time, spending more budget, hyping itself beyond its own capabilities, and then spending a little more budget (hell, they probably even cripple more deserving films' budgets just to get one more explosion or plastic fatsuit out of the deal). Does no one - I'm talking from the investors and producers, down to the guy who buys the actors' weed - does no one at all at one point go "Guys, I've seen coked out sorority girls that sucked less bonerdongs than this movie. I think we should give the rest of the budget back to the investors, tip our hats, walk in separate directions and promise to send a postcard now and then"? I really want to know if that moment does arrive on the set of, say, Big Momma's House 3: the Vienna Papers if production halts and if people just shrug and go "Squawk! It's a living!" Then they continue applying Martin Lawrence's estrogen and cholestorol injections (since I'm sure at this point he's happy to be in character 24/7 just so they'll have him ready to do another movie at the drop of a hat).

It just seems like such a terrible waste of money and effort. People actually woke up in the morning, drove to the set, drank some coffee, and sawed, painted and drilled together sets for Bloodrayne. They actually called that a "day of work" and talked about it during dinner.

Perhaps the big secret is this: directors, producers, actors JUST DON'T CARE. It's just a job like any other thing. Sure, in fancy pants interviews with magazines or talk shows, they'll amp up the tired old "What we do is art! We are artists! Years from now, Saw III will be displayed at the Louvre, along with that painting of Kramer from Seinfeld! You'll see!" Deep down, however, I think quality is a luxury not afforded to "big" Hollywood movies. This is probably why they're usually derivative, trashy, throwaway kitsch. The original, well budgeted and acted stuff usually comes out of a smaller production house for a reason. To a director making a bad movie, I am sure it's akin to someone building an apartment complex in a shitty neighborhood. It's probably pretty obvious to them that this apartment is going to end up being a crackhouse, but thats really not his problem. His job is just to fill a need, and do it quickly, get his check, and move on. I know that directors and producers have seen enough movies to know what sucks and what doesn't (with a notable exception or two) so it should be fairly obvious when they're making it, otherwise why would they spend so much time and money on it?

Doesn't mean I'm going to stop complaining about them online with the rest of them, petulant internet-age child that I am.