Most overrated movies ever

[GregMcduck]

I take it you never read the book.

The book is what created the cliché.

[ObscureGamer]

I take it you never read the book.

The book is what created the cliché.

So it was a good adaptation of a bad novel?

[GregMcduck]

Actually, the novel is way better then the film. I'm just saying it created the cliché, and is thus not a cliché.

[ObscureGamer]

Actually, the novel is way better then the film. I'm just saying it created the cliché, and is thus not a cliché.

In that case I'll have to read the novel sometime, because the film was definitely a bit over-the-top and was so maudlin as to
actually be farsical.

[Junkyard]

I've read the book, and I'd say it exaggerates some of what you're saying about the movie, but treats other parts with quite a bit of subtlety.

[Dim of the Yard]

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is a rarely mentioned, but VERY overrated movie.  Yes, I enjoyed it, but I think
it's doing the movie a disservice to treat it as tearful, maudlin, acadamy-darling oscar-winning gold.  It was cheeseballing
at its finest!  The over-the-top stereotype mental cases (like the sensitive, quiet giant indian guy who immediately recovers
from his catatonia after Jack Nicholson talks to him), not to mention how quick the audience is to identify a lying, cheating rapist,
pedophile and woman-beater as our hero simply because he takes mental patients along with him on a wild ride of hedonism and
self-indulgent behavior. 

This film is a very transparent rebels-vs.-authority movie, and not even a good or serious one like Coolhand Luke.  It pretty much
reduces a lot of deep and complex questions about the mentally disturbed to "crazies are our friends and they shouldn't be caged up;
they should be allowed to spread their wings and SOAR!"   ....and then freak out when something triggers a panic attack and accidentally
kill six or seven people.   

In conclusion, this movie fails to be a serious rebels-vs.-authority-figures movie like Coolhand Luke, and it also fails to be a good comedy
about the mentally ill like Harvey, or King of Hearts, although it comes closer to the latter sorts of movie.  This is definitely a movie that requires
you to shut off your brain to enjoy, so I guess that's what the Academy did when they showered it with oscars.

Odd.  Take out the references to mental patients and replace "Oscar-winning gold" to "Oscar-nomination bait," then you've basically got A Clockwork Orange.  Main character who is less than agreeable whom we are given the task of sympathizing with, rebels-vs.-authority, shutting the brain off to enjoy... it's stylistic and pretty to look at, and I enjoy the performances, but personally, I don't really see it as a movie that bears multiple viewings, and it's something I don't really think deserves the excessive amounts of praise that it's received.

The main problem that I have with the movie is that Kubrick used the American release of the novel to base the movie around, and that release took out the final chapter of the book.  The final chapter was dedicated to Alex's life after the Ludovico treatment and shows that he's grown past that part of his life, anyway, solidifying the idea that Ludovico was unnecessary in the long run.  Without that little tidbit, the entire meaning of the story, as the movie had revealed, is completely different.  The Ludovico treatment and the eventual cure for it seemed more like an inconvenient derailment from his basic, rotten attitude.

I hope this doesn't come across as "I hated this movie because it wasn't like the book in the end."  That's only a fraction of my argument, and is just a foolish thing to state upfront, anyway.  The movie was simply, "I'm a bad person; being forced to be a good person really sucks; I'm cured of being a good person, I think I'll be a bad person again."  Not exactly something to be revered.  It's this dodgy moral that I dislike the most about the movie and makes me think that it doesn't deserve the heaps of praise that it has received.  (Then again, I'm judging the "heaps of praise" thing solely on its rating on IMDb, so I might be horribly mistaken in calling it overrated.)

[Tyrant]

And my opinions say the Star Wars Prequels are the most UNDERrated movies ever, the entire Indiana Jones Trilogy rocked, and Roger Rabbit was the greatest movie ever. :^)

  Haahahahaahaha!!!! You're the funniest man ever! For a minute there, I thought you were serious. 

[Variety of Cells]

Odd.  Take out the references to mental patients and replace "Oscar-winning gold" to "Oscar-nomination bait," then you've basically got A Clockwork Orange.  Main character who is less than agreeable whom we are given the task of sympathizing with, rebels-vs.-authority, shutting the brain off to enjoy... it's stylistic and pretty to look at, and I enjoy the performances, but personally, I don't really see it as a movie that bears multiple viewings, and it's something I don't really think deserves the excessive amounts of praise that it's received.

The main problem that I have with the movie is that Kubrick used the American release of the novel to base the movie around, and that release took out the final chapter of the book.  The final chapter was dedicated to Alex's life after the Ludovico treatment and shows that he's grown past that part of his life, anyway, solidifying the idea that Ludovico was unnecessary in the long run.  Without that little tidbit, the entire meaning of the story, as the movie had revealed, is completely different.  The Ludovico treatment and the eventual cure for it seemed more like an inconvenient derailment from his basic, rotten attitude.

I hope this doesn't come across as "I hated this movie because it wasn't like the book in the end."  That's only a fraction of my argument, and is just a foolish thing to state upfront, anyway.  The movie was simply, "I'm a bad person; being forced to be a good person really sucks; I'm cured of being a good person, I think I'll be a bad person again."  Not exactly something to be revered.  It's this dodgy moral that I dislike the most about the movie and makes me think that it doesn't deserve the heaps of praise that it has received.  (Then again, I'm judging the "heaps of praise" thing solely on its rating on IMDb, so I might be horribly mistaken in calling it overrated.)

It's true that the book says something different than the movie.  What I got from the movie is that trying to control the way people act with physical pain, or any sort of method that does not include changing the mind, makes that person just a shell, and they lose their humanity.  If they do not have the freedom to chose then they can not really be considered good or bad. 

The book caries that point as well, I believe.  But where the book says Alex eventually grows out of it, the movie does not leave that impression, which to me is something much more interesting.  It says that people as twisted as Alex will stay twisted, which resembles our world more realistically, in my opinion.  The movie doesn't let you classify the treatment as pure evil, because it makes you continue to wonder if getting rid of it was the best idea.  Yes, it takes away his humanity, but is it worth it for the greater good?  I guess that might just be my preference for open ended films.

[Thrifty]

Fellowship of the Ring
Godfather

Those spring to mind.  They were just awful movies that everyone in the world swears up and down are indisputable cinematic masterpieces.

Love it or hate it, Fellowship was a fairly faithful adaptation of the novel, except that it deleted the Tom Bombadil/Goldberry scene, which was really chipper and kiddy and contributed nothing to the novel anyway.   Oh, and except for the jedi force-push duel that Gandalf and Saruman had.  Other than
those things, it was a fairly straightforward adaptation.  Sure, it was "a movie about walking", but if you pick up LotR and read it, what do you find?
People walking!  Wow, what a novel idea.   So yeah, overrated movie for sure, but if you were a literate person who read the novels instead of
seeing the movie with no expectations whatsoever, you wouldn't be blindsided by how much you disliked it.

Yep, I went through the same hostility back when the movie came out.  This movie is, apparently, so wonderful that you are factually wrong in not liking it.  The statements "The Earth is flat" and "I never liked Fellowship of the Ring" are equivalent it seems.

[Johnny@theFair]

People have different tastes in movies.  Isn't it conceivable that people enjoy a movie or don't revile it as much as you do?

Didn't you recently post this on another thread?  Or was I reading it wrong?

[Hebs]

The over-the-top stereotype mental cases (like the sensitive, quiet giant indian guy who immediately recovers
from his catatonia after Jack Nicholson talks to him)

Wait.

When did that become a stereotype?

Oops, cliché was the word I was looking for, not stereotype.   You know, that a convict laying low in a nuthouse can immediately "connect"
with a deeply troubled patient who was beyond the means of the clinic's staff to help.   Clichéd in that hallmarky, chipper sort of "aww,
all he needed was someone to reach out to him, to cure him of his debilitating mental condition!"

I enjoy that movie very much, and the book as well.  I really don't see it as overrated only because of the the scores of bad movies I've watched lately.  When you come across a movie that is actually good, it puts things in perspective.  I don't like movies that scream 70's - meaning movies that use very topical 70s music that the film becomes dated instantly, but I don't feel One Flew Over... does that.

[mrbasehart]

La Strada and La Dolce Vita  I've never really "gotten" Fellini, and the movies I've seen of his have left me cold, though admittedly he's the European "auteur" I'm least familiar with. 

[Hebs]

La Strada and La Dolce Vita  I've never really "gotten" Fellini, and the movies I've seen of his have left me cold, though admittedly he's the European "auteur" I'm least familiar with. 

Me, too - only his shorts make sense to me.  Well, his short films, not his underoos. 
He has very wonderful moments in movies, scenes you can tell he drew or dreamt and wanted to film, but his movies can be depressing and usually have bizarre 'lady issues'.

[daltysmilth]

Terry Gilliam is one of those whose films are made up of a lot of good scenes, but more often than not, the sum of the parts is greater than the whole.  I mean, I really like parts of Time Bandits, especially David Warner's character, but the whole film suffers from pacing problems.

[ObscureGamer]

I feel I have to add Army of Darkness to this list, because more than any other movie I can think of, geeks treat it with the same quiet awe and reverence that Jews attribute to Schindler's List.   I've never heard a single bad thing said about this movie, ever.   And I'm not saying it's bad,
but I definitely prefer Evil Dead I and II over it.   I think it fits the description of "overrated" because it's a decent movie but it gets treated as some sacred
holy artifact that's completely perfect in every way by fanboys who have a deep-seated homosexual attraction to Bruce Campbell and probably watched
Xena just because he was in it.   Thoughts, comments?