37. Con Air - (1997) - 32 points
(2 of 17 lists. Highest ranking - #1 DB Barnes)
This movie is ridiculous on so many levels. In terms of riffing potential, this is what you would call extremely target-rich. Between the lame plot, cheesy one-liners, and over-the-top characters/performances, this pile is just begging to be riffed. Who else voted for it?
I should've.
If you want to read something bizarrely contrarian, some writer at AV Club passionately defends this movie:
Question: What movie have you spent the most time arguing about?
A: Con Air is an incredibly entertaining movie on pretty much every level... I see a director (Simon West) and producer (Jerry Bruckheimer, of course) who took all the conventions of bad action movies and added a great cast (Nicolas Cage in the role he was born to play, Steve Buscemi, John Cusack, John Malkovich, Ving Rhames, Danny Trejo, Dave Chappelle) and a sense of hilarity to the whole thing. Con Air is an action movie that winks if you want it to and plays it straight if that's what you're after. To me, it's hilarious on purpose, and also just plain fun, in that blow-'em-up way. If you can defend Face/Off (as some do), you should certainly give Con Air another shake. Or three. (Josh Modell)
(http://www.avclub.com/articles/avqa-movie-arguments,2524/)
Can't quite swallow that.
Now, regarding "self-awareness":
You could make the same argument for Flash Gordon and Starship Troopers, and I'm sure there will several others before this list is done. Besides, there's plenty of that talk over in the Suggest-a-Trax thread.
Starship Troopers is more than merely self-aware, though. It's a vicious satire. It's a futuristic military propaganda video. How much more self-aware can you get when your entire movie has the deliberate style & mannerisms of a military propaganda video?! And there's a reason the citizens of Buenos Aires are pretty much Aryan-esque models. What's next, riffing Dr Strangelove & Network? (Not saying Starship Troopers is on a quality level near Dr Strangelove, but... there
are people who fail to realize that Strangelove is a comedy. More and more...)
Sorry, it's just... bizarre to me, the idea of riffing something that's a completely different picture than what the riffers saw. Shall we riff Network because "the acting is over the top"? Riff Wag the Dog because "the filmmakers can't even get the phrase 'wag the tail' right"?
I may have said it once, in which case I'll say it again: If you're gonna pick a Paul Verhoeven sci-fi/action film for riffing, I think
Hollow Man is by far his worst, lacking in wit or even the usual tactile ultraviolence.