I want to talk to you about The Avengers, but apparently there’s a lot I need to say, because I’m still working on the review. (I’m thinking it’ll be posted Wednesday, but we’ll see. It’s frustrating, how your actual job gets in the way of things.) But I did feel the need to get something off my chest today.
There were a lot of previews before The Avengers came on. After watching the trailer for Battleship, I leaned over and whispered to my sister that if this movie did not well and truly suck, I would be completely shocked. I’d put money down on Battleship being an awful movie, and not just a silly, dumb action movie, but a bad, bad movie.
And then I watched this trailer:
I’m predicting it right now: Worst Movie of 2012 will go to Crooked Arrows. Admittedly, I won’t be able to confirm this, since I’d have to be forced at gunpoint to actually see this film, but still. This looks horrendous. This looks so earnest and cheesy and terrible—your words are strong, but your spirit is weak, I mean, gah—that I could just cry . . . and then vomit. I don’t hugely identify with my Native American heritage—it’s a pretty small sliver that I know very little about—but the 1/16 or 1/32 or whatever fraction of Apache and Shawnee combo in my blood is just screaming for a movie that features Native Americans who don’t come off as a stock characters or total cliches.
I mean, really. Is that actually so much to ask?
My Geek Blasphemy 
Superman coaching lacrosse? I’ll be there opening night!
This needs to be paired with last year’s shitty lacrosse movie, A Warrior’s Heart, for a drinking game, or a night of mocking.
Oh my God. That’s . . . that’s awful. I mean, I was ready to agree with you based on the title alone, but then I watched this trailer, and . . . I have no words. I’m not even sure I could survive a double feature of these shitty looking lacrosse movies. I think I might actually choke on saccharine. Is there something about the sport itself that is inherently schmaltzy? *shudders and goes away to find anything less wholesome*
*snickers*
I’m kind of curious about it. I want to see just how bad the narration gets (oh man, I hope there’s a lot of it, it was my favourite part of the trailer) and if it really lives up to that whole Nicholas-Sparks-wrote-a-sports-movie vibe in the trailer.
If you do watch it, you HAVE to let me know how bad it is. You’re a braver man than I, Teacups. (Er, figuratively speaking.)
So, I watched it, and ended up writing this, which I guess I’ll post on Facebook.
I think there’s some potential in the idea of an overly-strong high school athlete who continually shoots himself in the foot due to his bad temper, and in better hands that could’ve made for a good movie. But that’s the nicest thing I can say about this one.
-It was less Nicholas Sparks-y than the trailer made it look – the romance didn’t actually get a lot of focus, for one. It’s was more like an inspirational sports movie crossed with what I imagine Seventh Heaven being like. Or something else that assumes very old school family values, and is clearly struggling to relate to teen culture. Whenever there were casual, lighthearted scenes between two or more of the teens, I could just hear a very adult voice saying “This is how the kids talk now, right?”
-You know, I’m not sure I’ve ever actually heard narration this bad before. I’ve been racking my brain trying to think of worse examples, which I’m sure are out there. But personally, I couldn’t come up with anything I’d seen which had this combination of unnecessarity, awful dialogue, and poor delivery. Here are a couple of quotes.
“You think you know someone. You have a nice connection. But before they can let you in, they’ve gotta let themselves in. They have to learn their own heart.”
“The heart’s a funny thing. It can break… It can beat a little faster… But the most important thing it can do is heal. And if you follow it, it’ll lead you where you need to go.”
“The beauty of finding yourself, and really knowing who you are, is that it allows the possibility for others to be a part of your world as well.”
I don’t think anyone could have actually saved these lines, but Ashley Greene’s delivery certainly made them worse. I don’t know if it was a lack of talent or just that she couldn’t be fucked putting some effort into such a piece of crap, but wow was she bad in this movie.
-Connor’s problems with his temper and lack of teamwork, which have so far been the main storyline, get totally solved about 2/3 of the way through the movie. In the space of about three minutes, too. The remaining half-hour is spent reuniting him with his girlfriend, getting him back onto the lacrosse team, and other would-be heartwarming shenanigans. The tension is supposed to derive from whether or not they’ll win the big game, which serves as the climax. This was actually my problem with the last twenty minutes of The Fighter, as well. Most of the movie was about Connor/Mark Walberg’s personal issues. Outside of how it affects that, actually winning at their sport of choice hasn’t really been a storyline thus far. And then it just pulls a bait-and-switch for the third act, and you’re suddenly supposed to care deeply about how their big damn match goes. But they’ve already gotten their happy endings, so really, why give a shit?
-In the last scene of the movie, Connor is playing for the Navy, which is a really big deal, apparently. It ends with him leading his team out onto the field and waving a giant American flag, in slow motion, while inspirational music plays. I just… I don’t even know what to say about that. Yowza.