Poorly-Received Movies That Are Actually Good!

[Rudolph]

For the longest time, I was under the impression that Albert Pyun's Cyborg (1989) - produced by the infamous Cannon Group - was just some so-bad-it's-good shlock movie starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. However, it turned out that the movie is actually... well, good! Now, do not get me wrong: it is still a B-movie with a really basic plot with an underdeveloped lore, generally mediocre acting, distracting ADR lines and goofy moments (especially towards the end). That being said, the fights are well-choreographed and you can tell that everyone - Jean-Claude Van Damme included - is giving their all, the main villain is charismatic and photogenic, the special effects and animatronics are easily on par with the times, the soundtrack kicks ass and the movie as a whole is very gritty and atmospheric.

 

All in all, a forgotten 80s gem that is definitely worth the watch.

 

 

Edited December 29, 2023 by Rudolph
Renamed it to avoid further confusion

[out_of_service]

Heck yes I remember this movie! This is the one where Dolph Lundgren gets turned into shredded beef at the end.

[Rudolph]

You must be thinking of a different movie (Universal Soldier, maybe?), because Dolph Lundgren is not in Cyborg.

[out_of_service]

54 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

You must be thinking of a different movie (Universal Soldier, maybe?), because Dolph Lundgren is not in Cyborg.

Yeah that's the one! Universal Soldier is the one I was thinking about. It's been years since I've seen either film. Time to give them another viewing because they're both awesome.

[Rudolph]

I need to check that one as well. I have watched Stargate recently and it held up quite well, which is surprising for a Roland Emmerich movie!

 

Maybe, much like Albert Pyun, he made a good movie on accident. :P

[Liberation]

The original Universal Soldier is a good film, for an 80's action flick. It did spawn some sequels that were pretty awful iirc. However Universal Soldier: Regeneration, which was released in 2009 and a bit of a reboot was half decent, although the setting might hit a bit close to home these days.

[Rudolph]

Speaking of actually good movies starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, check out Tsui Hark's 'Knock Off'!

 

The movie was poorly received upon its original 1998 release; unfairly so, as it is such an amazing film on so many levels!

 

On the surface level, it is Hong-Kong action cinema at its finest, with high-octane action scenes, incredible stunt work and dynamic, at times downright experimental cinematography from legendary director Tsui Hark. On a deeper level, it is also a hilarious action comedy, as legend has it that Tsui Hark hated his short-lived collaboration with Jean-Claude Van Damme and Hollywood so much that he used this movie as an opportunity to get revenge while at the same time using American money to experiment as much as he could. To Jean-Claude Van Damme's credit, however, he cannot be killed by ridicule, having already played a bumbling metrosexual fitness teacher in 'Double Impact' (1991), and he still gives its all playing a happy-go-lucky fashion designer (!) despite being visibly all coked-up; likewise, the normally crass and unfunny Rob Schneider gets to play Van Damme's sidekick and, what do you know, he is actually good at it in addition to having good chemistry with Jean-Claude Van Damme, oftentimes outacting him!

 

Also, the movie theme song, "It's a Knock Off", by the band Sparks is pretty damn good.

 

 

Edited April 16, 2022 by Rudolph

[Ghostly_Pops]

NACHO LIBRE 

Edited April 16, 2022 by Ghostly_Pops
typo my bad

[Rudolph]

I watched the Chinese historical drama '1911' (2011) by Zhang Li, starring Li Bingbing, Jackie Chan in a dramatic role (!) and Winston Chao. The movie has an inexplicably poor reputation online, even though it is a solid, engaging war movie with good performances - at least, from the Chinese actors.

 

It is much better than a lot of recent American war movies, that is for sure...

 

 

Edited April 24, 2022 by Rudolph

[Taw Tu'lki]

Pulp Fiction! 

 

[Rudolph]

38 minutes ago, Taw Tu'lki said:

Pulp Fiction! 

Wait, people actually disliked this movie? I was under the impression that it was one of Quentin Tarantino's most successful films.

[Aaron Blain]

For some reason, I had always assumed that Darkman is a bad movie, but I recently saw it for the first time and it's great. It's an excellent comic book/noir style story with a good protagonist played by Liam Neeson and some fun Sam Raimi directorial touches.

[hybridial]

53 minutes ago, Aaron Blain said:

For some reason, I had always assumed that Darkman is a bad movie, but I recently saw it for the first time and it's great. It's an excellent comic book/noir style story with a good protagonist played by Liam Neeson and some fun Sam Raimi directorial touches.

 

It's one I enjoyed and I didn't know a thing about it when I first saw it (which was long before any Evil Dead movies)

 

I would name Return of the Living Dead 3. I know the first one is quite famous, and the first two in general are more comedic, I have not seen them, they're not very easy to find here, the third one did get a Vestron Video blu ray release, and I was intrigued with the premise. Like I won't lie, the script was probably a werewolf based one which was changed to fit a zombie premise, but I like those kinds of tragic stories and that's what it's going for tonally. It did have all the hallmarks of a Brian Yuzna directed movie; and I appreciate a lot about his film making. They have their flaws but you get really gritty cinematography and quality practical effects and above average casting which sells the material well. I enjoyed it quite a bit but it might be completely offbase if you go in expecting it be anything like the other two. 

Edited April 24, 2022 by hybridial

[Mr. Freeze]

I didn't expect Magnum Force to be as good as Dirty Harry but it's really solid and even refutes the first film a bit.

 

[Rudolph]

1 hour ago, Aaron Blain said:

For some reason, I had always assumed that Darkman is a bad movie, but I recently saw it for the first time and it's great. It's an excellent comic book/noir style story with a good protagonist played by Liam Neeson and some fun Sam Raimi directorial touches.

Oh yeah, Darkman! That is a good movie!

 

The sequels are alright too, even though they are not directed by Sam Raimi and Arnold Vosloo is nowhere near as charismatic of a lead as Liam Neeson.

[yourlocalchef]

B-Movie that is funny.

[Rudolph]

@yourlocalchef The video appears to be unavailable, at least on my end. What is it?

[yourlocalchef]

@Rudolph Space Truckers maybe its because I linked the free to watch version on youtube. Try the trailer.

[Rudolph]

Looks neat! I see it is available on TubiTV, so I will give it a watch. Thanks for the suggestion!

[Rudolph]

Okay, I watched it: pretty neat indeed, despite some dated CG and awkward moments, mainly in the middle act with the Space Pirates and the uncomfortable sex jokes. The satirical anticapitalist text is a fun bonus and reminds me a lot of Paul Verhoeven's Starship Troopers, which I believe was released around the same time. It might not a great film, but it was an interesting watch. Thanks again!

Edited May 1, 2022 by Rudolph

[Captain red pants]

 

 

[DrWho42]

i love space truckers!

[Jello]

On 4/26/2022 at 10:21 PM, DrWho42 said:

i love space truckers!

I just watched it for the "first" time last night. I'm pretty sure I had seen bits and pieces of it shortly after release, I certainly remember the Captain. It's really not bad, it's not hilarious, but it's well worth watching if you like b-movie sci-fi schlock. The biomechanoid machines in their latex suits jerking around looked kind of ridiculous. And Dennis Hopper, as always, was a pleasure to watch. All in all, if I was rating it on a "It's bad, but you'll enjoy it" scale, I would probably give it a 7.

 

But it seemed like Hopper started to sign on to some money sinks in the 1990s, notably Waterworld, with a budget of 175 million, which was unheard of at the time, which fared poorly domestically, but made it's money back over seas. And he played Deacon really well in Waterworld. But Space Truckers, with a budget of $25 million apparently only grossed over $1.6 million. It was far more enjoyable than watching Kevin Costner drink his own urine. And it was nice seeing Hopper play a good guy for once. 

 

And before that... he played Bowser. Now in retrospect, I think he did everything he could've possibly done to make himself Bowser. There was nothing to work with though, but I think he tried his damndest to make Bowser work in that movie, but you can only do so much with the source material. Everything about that movie was terrible. I think I've watched it once since I saw it in theaters 1993 and I was a very sad seven year old. It was absolutely nothing like the videogame, but they were making dystopian futuristic movies at the time, because it was the early 90's, they were good at it. But that wasn't the target audience for Mario Brothers. But, when I watched it again, Dennis Hopper really gave a good performance as King Koopa, given what he had to work with. The rest of the movie was terrible.

 

Dennis Booth in Twin Peaks was an amazing performance as well. The guy was a really good actor. 

 

Anyway, if anyone out there likes sci-fi schlock from the late 90's, and hasn't seen Space Truckers, I give it a thumbs up.

[Rudolph]

5 hours ago, Jello said:

The biomechanoid machines in their latex suits jerking around looked kind of ridiculous.

Really? I thought they look kind of cool, actually, and it was also impressive to see how flexible they were, especially during fight scenes.

 

And that is coming from someone who thinks the worst parts of Ridley Scott's Alien is when the fully-grown Xenomorph is on screen.

[Jello]

On 4/28/2022 at 6:46 AM, Rudolph said:

Really? I thought they look kind of cool, actually, and it was also impressive to see how flexible they were, especially during fight scenes.

 

And that is coming from someone who thinks the worst parts of Ridley Scott's Alien is when the fully-grown Xenomorph is on screen.

Well, from the front they looked really intimidating, even if their twitchy, spastic movements seemed a little over exaggerated. I was referring to the shots of them from the back, when you could clearly tell that it was just some guys in spandex (yeah I said latex originally) jerking around. They just looked kind of goofy from behind, but from the front I agree, they did look kind of cool.

 

But at least they used actual actors instead of CGI'ing it. And I agree, the xenomorph did look rather jerky, but it looked pretty good since it was a puppet. It's probably the scariest horror movie creature that has graced the silver screen. But even if it looked kind of off, it's still better than the CGI aliens they've been using. I will always be a firm believer that practical effects will trump CGI.

[Rudolph]

7 hours ago, Jello said:

And I agree, the xenomorph did look rather jerky, but it looked pretty good since it was a puppet.

The original Xenomorph was played by an actor in a suit.

 

I have mixed feelings about CGI; the early attempts tend to have aged poorly and can be very distracting in bland movies like the Star Wars Prequels, but nowadays, they generally look pretty good and I even welcome them when they are used for experimental/over-the-top effects, like in Tsui Hark's movies. 

 

And let us not forget that the original Jurassic Park did use a combination of practical effects and computer-generated imagery!

[Tetzlaff]

Con Air (1997) when you watch it as an action comedy. When I watched the movie I thought it was  supposed to be a comedy and enjoyed it, the over the top characters and escalating events. Don‘t know if the German dubbing had anything to do with it. Later I learned from colleagues that it was supposed to be a serious thriller.

[Rudolph]

Watched another Stuart Gordon movie, Robo Jox:

 

 

Not bad, not bad at all! I like it way more than Space Truckers, even though it suffers from a similarly weak script and uneven pacing; Jack Packard of Red Letter Media's fame was right: "Two Men. Two Machines. Two Fights..." However, the Paul Verhoeven-esque satirical worldbuilding and the old-fashioned practical effects (which have aged better than Space Truckers' mid-90s CGI) are always a pleasure to watch.

Edited May 1, 2022 by Rudolph

[kwc]

Frank Henenlotter joint:
 

This is my first-date movie.

[Sotenga]

My personal pick for "ostensibly bad movie that's actually a hell of a ride" is Wes Craven's Shocker. It's not necessarily a hidden piece of art, and it's tonally inconsistent, but it's also more fun than it has any right to be and turns in solid performances from its lead actors. So if you ever wanted to see Walter Skinner as a body-hopping mass murderer, this is the movie for you.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMS2dbL2hMo

Edited May 5, 2022 by Sotenga