Have you ever watched a movie that’s revered by critics and praised by your pals, only to realize that you don’t understand all the fuss? Just because something is highly acclaimed doesn’t mean it’s not overrated. Here’s our list of popular and profitable movies that don’t live up to the hype.
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Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
John Hughes wrote and directed this 1986 comedy starring Matthew Broderick, and it’s still considered by many to be a classic. As much a tribute to the city of Chicago as it is to the life of the suburban American teenager of the ’80s, the film seems a fantastic escape for anyone who has ever dreamed about ditching school for a day and pulling one over on both parents and teachers. But the wealthy, bratty main character is less than relatable to most teens, and also a bit of a jerk to his friend, his sister and his girlfriend.
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The Notebook
The 2004 romantic drama based on the book by Nicholas Sparks is often regarded as one of the best love stories on film. Certainly the chemistry of actors Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling burns up the screen, but the sentimental nature of the movie—which portrays passion as the only thing necessary for lifelong commitment—is simplistic and a disservice to characters who should be more than romantic tropes. A few plot holes and that all-too-common but no less annoying thing where men are portrayed as charming for refusing to accept it when a woman says no add up to an overrated flick.
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Avatar
James Cameron’s 2009 film currently stands as the highest-grossing movie ever, and helped usher in the new age of 3D films. But the romantic space fantasy with an eco-conscious sub-story is somewhat familiar, with plot points that seem reminiscent of Dances With Wolves and FernGully: The Last Rainforest. Several parties have actually launched lawsuits against Cameron, claiming that he stole art concepts and ideas from creators, and while none have been successful, there remains a feeling that Avatar is less fresh and original than it first seemed. There is talk that three sequels are in the works, but even fans don’t seem to be clamouring for more the way they do with other blockbusters.
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The English Patient
E! News has named the 1996 movie to a list of overrated best-picture Oscar winners, and Den of Geek criticized the WWII period drama for not knowing whether it wanted to be a mystery or a romance. In an episode of the TV sitcom Seinfeld, the character of Elaine finds herself a pariah for admitting that she hated the much-beloved film, but once removed from all the buzz, it’s easier to see The English Patient for the overly long, slow movie that it is. If movies are meant to be enjoyed rather than endured, this Oscar winner falls somewhere short of entertaining.
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The Big Lebowski
Sometimes films can be like inside jokes that you either get, or you don’t. That’s what New Yorker critic suggested in her lacklustre review of the 1998 film by Ethan and Joel Coen, saying it’s about nothing more than brainy references, and “so drenched in knowingness…that there’s nothing really at stake.” Many other critics at the time weren’t on board with the movie’s confusing story and ambling attempt at clever comedy. But with its cast of memorable characters, The Big Lebowski won over fans, and became a cult hit, at least for those who consider themselves members.
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Napoleon Dynamite
The 2004 comedy from Jared and Jerusha Hess is meant to be the understated story of a nerdy protagonist. The awkwardness of Napoleon and the other characters in the film struck a chord with enough people to give the indie movie mass popularity as well as a whole lot of merchandising opportunities. You might even have a “Vote for Pedro” shirt at the bottom of your drawer, but like most trends, the tee and the movie have lost much of their cool. As Spectrum Culture critic Nathan Kamal has pointed out, the slow-moving, low-budget pic is actually full of “boringly bizarre sequences” with “ugly characters being unpleasant to each other.”
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Top Gun
Perhaps the 1986 action flick starring Tom Cruise was never meant to be more than a basic escape into the world of fast planes and dudes wearing cool shades, but somewhere along the way Top Gun became regarded as an ’80s film classic. Matt Glasby of GQ has said that the film is nothing more than “slightly obnoxious combat porn” and has declared it “the worst film ever.” While that particular dishonour is debatable, it does seem unworthy of its popularity and legacy, which includes an upcoming sequel, Top Gun: Maverick, set to debut in 2020.
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A Clockwork Orange
In his review of the classic Stanley Kubrick film, critic Roger Ebert said the movie “pretends to oppose the police state and forced mind control, but all it really does is celebrate the nastiness of its hero, Alex.” The 1971 futuristic fantasy impressed many critics in its day, and earned four Academy Award nominations, but Village Voice film critic Andrew Sarris had less to say about its violent characters and more to say about the long final third of the movie, which he called “a complete bore.”
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Love Actually
It’s part rom-com, part Christmas movie, and all parts over-hyped. Banking on all the tropes of feel-good love stories, the 2003 film stars Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Keira Knightley, Liam Neeson and about a dozen others, meaning there are far too many characters to keep track of, let alone care about. The romantic parts often fall short of heartwarming, and the comic parts aren’t really that funny.
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Inception
Christopher Nolan’s 2010 sci-fi thriller is the kind of movie that either leaves you feeling inspired or totally perplexed. While it was successful, both commercially and critically, the complicated concept means that viewers are spending so much time trying to keep up that they lose the chance to enjoy what they’re seeing. The movie is stacked with acting talents like Leonardo DiCaprio, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy and Ken Watanabe, but often feels more like a video game than a cinematic masterpiece.
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The Blair Witch Project
Of course it broke ground by popularizing the “found footage” horror movie, but once the hype surrounding the 1999 indie flick died down, what remained was a film where almost nothing happens. Reel Rundown critic Jeremy Gill argues that the movie’s protagonists are also so irritating and unlikable that viewers are almost happy to see them lost in the haunted woods.
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Knocked Up
According to Rotten Tomatoes, the comedy from writer-director Judd Apatow was the best-reviewed wide-release movie of 2007. Even as it faced a backlash from some critics—and its star Katherine Heigl—for its sexist portrayal of women, the film racked up dough at the box office. The main characters are outdated stereotypes and the supporting characters seem to exist for jokes alone. But even the funny lines aren’t enough to help Knocked Up live up to its own reputation.
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Crash
The Guardian‘s film critic Guy Lodge called the 2006 Oscar winner for best picture starring Sandra Bullock, Matt Dillon and Don Cheadle a “well-acted but clod-footed treatise on race relations in Los Angeles.” Since its win, the drama has received its share of ire from those who thought other films deserved the Academy Award. Its stylized narrative and melodramatic moments may have been well-intentioned in their hope to make an important social point, but it mostly came out a mess.
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Dead Poets Society
Not to disparage a beloved actor, but film critic Roger Ebert might have been on to something when he said that Robin Williams “punctured” the intelligent and quick-witted teacher he portrayed in the popular 1989 film with too many comic impressions. While he praised elements of the film, Ebert also accused it of pandering to an adolescent audience. In a piece for The Atlantic, educator Kevin J.H. Dettmar was even less kind, calling the movie a “misleading” portrayal of the study of literature and accusing the film’s main character of not allowing his students to think for themselves.
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Gravity
The 2013 drama in space starring Sandra Bullock as a stranded astronaut is a visually stunning survival story, but it’s also so unbelievable that it’s hard to see why it was beloved by so many critics. Believability is, of course, often irrelevant in the imaginative world of filmmaking, but in order for the peril and tension of the film to be maintained, audiences have to feel the events could actually happen. Alan Evans, film critic for The Guardian, also points out the main character’s “saccharine, implausible backstory” as one of the reasons why Gravity fell flat.
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The Hangover
A box-office hit that spawned two less successful but still profitable sequels, the 2009 comedy starring Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis and Ed Helms offers every Las Vegas stereotype possible without providing a whole lot of plot to carry them. While the performances are strong, celebrity cameos, predictable jokes and disconnected storytelling aren’t enough to cure the pain of a popular, but just so-so movie.
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Field of Dreams
Though considered a classic by many, of the quintessential baseball films, Sports Illustrated writer Jerry Blevins calls the 1989 flick starring Kevin Costner “a bad movie.” Blevins takes off points for inaccuracies, like the fact that baseball legend Shoeless Joe Jackson, played by Ray Liotta, bats right when he batted left in real life. He also takes issue with the mid-western use of “have a catch” when the common phrase is “play catch,” and says the movie is not re-watchable. Like so many overrated movies, he credits its popularity to the fact that people feel they are supposed to like it.
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Braveheart
Panned by film writer Nathan Kamal for being “cartoonishly inaccurate,” the 1995 drama starring Mel Gibson as legendary Scots warrior William Wallace won five Oscars, including best picture. Critical praise aside, it’s hard to overlook the movie’s lack of historical truth, including wardrobe choices that didn’t exist at the time, and a romantic subplot that would have been impossible.
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Cast Away
According to Andrew O’Hagan, film critic at The Telegraph, the main character isn’t the only thing missing in this 2000 drama starring Tom Hanks—the plot is also lost at sea. Credit to Tom Hanks, who tries to carry nearly the entire movie on his own, with some assistance from an inanimate volleyball, but the solo-man-versus-nature trope is not a new one, and there is nothing surprising in Cast Away.
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The Breakfast Club
It’s one of the most popular “coming-of-age” movies, and the kind of fun flick that’s jam-packed with ’80s pop culture icons like Molly Ringwald and Emilio Estevez, but dig deeper into The Breakfast Club and you’re likely to find an empty cereal bowl. It’s not the acting or pace of the movie that’s the problem, but rather the flawed concept of five high school stereotypes. Would detention really cause teens to battle their personal demons and find love and friendship over the course of a few hours? It’s almost as though John Hughes, filmmaking legend that he was, had never actually been around a teenager, or at least not long enough to see that no matter what their “type,” they likely wouldn’t relate to any of the characters.
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Black Panther
Sometimes films are let down by their own marketing. That is, the marketing and the buzz surrounding the movie are so magnificent that there’s almost no way the actual movie can live up to it. 2018’s Black Panther is one such movie—a culturally significant and well-acted movie that, despite its popularity, could be better. Film writer Daniel Cesário asserts that while the movie is good, the ending left him feeling underwhelmed. The pace is slower than it needs to be, and exciting characters are underused in service of the unnecessary, albeit beautiful, world building of Wakanda.
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Moulin Rouge!
While calling Baz Luhrmann’s 2001 musical “an overrated mess,” as writer Octavio Roca did, might be a bit harsh, it is true that the Oscar winner isn’t the flawless extravaganza it was hyped to be. Overzealous editing results in song and dance numbers coming across as rushed and choppy. Plot points are mashed together in an effort to pay tribute to the musical genre, but end up feeling emptier than they should.
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The Sixth Sense
Movies that hinge on plot twists are fine, as long as the twist isn’t too obvious. When The Sixth Sense came out in 1999, audiences weren’t yet aware of writer/director M. Night Shyamalan’s penchant for the big reveal that aims to turn the whole film on its head. By now, the famed “I see dead people” is so well-known that it can hardly be called a spoiler, but even if you’d never heard anything about the movie, it wouldn’t be too difficult to figure it out by the end of the first act. Bruce Willis is compelling in his role, and the film is definitely entertaining, but it’s much less original than it once seemed.
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Annie Hall
Writer and director Woody Allen’s 1977 romantic comedy Annie Hallis considered by many critics to be not just his best movie, but one of the greatest movies ever. But Allen himself doesn’t agree. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly magazine, Allen said of Annie Hall, “I’ve made better films than that.” JoBlowriter Alejandro Stepenberg agrees with Allen in his admittedly unpopular opinion of the movie, calling it “a schizophrenic work that drags on and on.”
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Forrest Gump
It garnered critical acclaim and was a box-office hit, but the 1994 movie Forrest Gump isn’t as sweet as it first appears. As The Richest writer Anya Wassenberg points out, the lovable but dimwitted title character becomes a caricature at several points in the movie. Serious and heavy material, like the abuse suffered by the character of Jenny, are mentioned, then left to flounder in favour of somewhat silly takes on American history.
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Twilight
As is the case with many film franchises based on books, devoted fans will come flocking whether the movie is good or not. The 2008 movie Twilight, starring Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson, made nearly US$400 million at the box office, but that doesn’t mean the movie should be considered a classic. While you’d think a story about a 100-year-old vampire falling for a high school girl would be steamy, if not a little creepy, wooden acting and a tedious plot make for a boring watch.
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Shakespeare in Love
It’s not that the 1998 film starring Gwyneth Paltrow and Joseph Fiennes is bad, but there is much debate about whether it was worthy of its Oscar for best picture. Cinema Blend counts the film in its Top 5 Worst Oscar Winners, noting its similarity to earlier films like Tootsie or Yentl, and the fact that, while entertaining, it’s mostly forgettable. It’s an especially overrated winner when you consider it was up against the emotional cinematic experience that was Saving Private Ryan.
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The Goonies
Like many movies intended for kids, the adventure comedy The Goonies has a certain nostalgic appeal for anyone who grew up in the ’80s. But just because something is remembered fondly doesn’t mean it’s remembered accurately. The movie actually contains some gruesome stuff that, while not necessarily scary by today’s standards, is at the very least less palatable. Racial stereotypes and questionable takes on developmentally disabled characters might have been more common in 1985, but there’s also the convoluted plot to contend with.
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Mulholland Drive
The 2001 David Lynch film is seen as a masterpiece to some, and an example of truly forgettable cinema to others. While Lynch is known for his surreal and often baffling films, Mulholland Drive ticks both the ‘experimental’ and the ‘boring’ boxes. James Rocchi of MSN Movies has called out critics who claim to love the movie, stating that what’s meant to be deep and dreamlike is actually “inert and inept.”
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Citizen Kane
Entertainment Weekly‘s Chris Nashawaty, a devout fan of the 1941 Orson Welles classic, has said that “no other movie is as hyped up and overpraised as this one.” Yes, it seems even good movies can be overrated, meaning they can’t live up to the reputation that’s been built for years—or in this case, decades—after they are first created. Filmmaker Richard Elfman declared Citizen Kane the most overrated of all time because it didn’t meet his personal test of a film you simply cannot turn off, and Indie Wire’s Matt Brennan described the movie as a good one that’s had its greatness put upon it by countless critics and cinephiles, and leaves you wondering if you like it only because you’re told you’re supposed to.
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31/31 SLIDES
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