Pleasant Surprises

[Narkalui]

Which films were you expecting to be awful but found quite enjoyable?

Bearing in mind I saw these with rock bottom expectations:

Jupiter Ascending
Dan Carter

 

[AlexH]

I don't really go into films with any expectations these days, but films that are not so well rated I enjoyed include:

Herbie Fully Loaded (I loved most of the Herbie films as a child, and this remake was great fun)
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (good fun again, and it helped it was partly set in Angkor)
Hulk (2003)
Spider-Man 3

 

[Narkalui]

I also enjoyed Hulk, but I expected to because Ang Lee is awesom. Frankly I don’t get why critics panned it...

 

[Rodders]

To be honest, a lot of movies I have enjoyed more than I thought I would.

John Carter of Mars. Totally underrated IMO and didn't deserve to fail.
I was surprised to enjoy Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. Good fun and not to be taken seriously.
I am one of the few that enjoyed Stallone's Judge Dredd movie.

The list goes on.

 

[AlexH]

I was surprised to enjoy Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. Good fun and not to be taken seriously.

That was a rare case of me being put off by reviews, but I wasn't a fan of The Fifth Element, so that link put me off too. If it wasn't for that link, I would've gone to see it.

 

[Vince W]

Be sure to check out this thread as well.

 

[Narkalui]

Oh look at that! Thread duplication, apologies...

 

[Randy M.]

Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988) -- Aliens come, eat townspeople, witnesses aren't believed, John Carradine shows up briefly, one nice animated sequence of a shadow attacking someone ... My wife and I enjoyed it enough that when my daughter reached her teens we watched it with her.

Re-Animator (1985) -- gory, funny, gory, nasty, funny, obscene, gory. Somewhat satirical as it progresses from excess to excess, sort of keeping the spirit of the Lovecraft story then completely sending it off the rails. Not for all tastes. Not sure it would even be for my taste anymore, but I enjoyed it greatly at the time.


Randy M.

 

[Judderman]

Ghost in the Shell (2017). I read it was inferior to the Manga film and so didn't watch it at the cinema. But I recently enjoyed it. Actually I recalling finding the old manga film dull in parts when I saw that 10 years ago.

 

[Narkalui]

I felt the old manga one was dull too! Wow! Not just me!

I felt that the whole bionic implants thing should have led to a deep, introspective exploration of a “what does it mean to be human?” theme (Perhaps the inclusion of a character who started as a robot but gained artificially grown biological implants?) but it was wasn’t even a plot device, let alone a theme!

 

[Judderman]

They hinted at it with talking about residing in a network after your body dies but they made it seem like their mind would function like normally. You are right, not particularly deep. I think the graphics and scenes of the new film were really good too.

 

[Narkalui]

I haven’t seen the new one. I avoid reboots remakes and what have you. It’s the whole reason I watched Jupiter Ascending: originality...