iCM Forum's Favorite Low Rated Movies: Nominations

[Minkin]

How come many early documentaire shorts have a low rating? A lot of one-shot outdoor stuff from Lumière and the likes have a low rating. Do people who rate this low because they really think these are bad shorts or do they think this stuff is too hard to rate and just rate it a default 5 or whatever because they want to keep track on IMDb?

I don't understand it either. But some people are like that. When I was in middle school I ordered a Melies VHS compilation - since it included À la conquête du pôle (1912), and I was just fascinated with the other shorts that were included - things like a luncheon afternoon with a baby - just thinking that that baby is dead now and must've had quite the life in France between the wars. I just love the Belle Époque representation of life in these shorts - getting snapshots into the past and seeing them come alive - seeing what daily life was like back then. I'm sure in 100 years people will be looking at Youtube videos with the same sort of admiration - for it captured the moment, the era, the existence of that particular moment.

Of course I tried to show these shorts to all my friends, and fucking nobody gave a shit.

Oh, and I'm on the fence about making a list - as I'd have to sign up for IMDB (cause I dont feel like making an ICM list). But most of my picks are stuff that the rest of you would snub your nose at (Breakin' 2 Electric Boogaloo), but there's some hidden gems. But I also don't have a way to check for IMDB scores - so its just going to be me manually checking the scores of all my favorite films that I suspect have a low rating. So that doesn't sound like much fun to me.

[Onderhond]

The closest thing that comes to mind is "luddite" but that's not really it, though it might describe some people who for example hate digital tech out of hand. I have a vague idea of what you're talking about but it's not coming to me.

No, that's almost the opposite. I think it was a name/moved referenced here on the forum by someone, I remember looking it up and thinking "hey, that's me!". Oh well, bad brain

[Lakigigar]

How come many early documentaire shorts have a low rating? A lot of one-shot outdoor stuff from Lumière and the likes have a low rating. Do people who rate this low because they really think these are bad shorts or do they think this stuff is too hard to rate and just rate it a default 5 or whatever because they want to keep track on IMDb?

Documentaries might quickly get outdated, especially if they go factual, but i'm not sure if that's the case for early documentary shorts (i haven't seen any), and i don't know what you mean with early.

[Onderhond]

Documentaries might quickly get outdated, especially if they go factual, but i'm not sure if that's the case for early documentary shorts (i haven't seen any), and i don't know what you mean with early.

The Lumière shorts were made around 1900, are usually about 1 minute long and show you a single shot of a street. There's also a bunch with people coming of boats. That's about it.

If you're interested in the time period or the context of these shorts, there's a lot more to say of course. But that's a big "if".

[Lakigigar]

Documentaries might quickly get outdated, especially if they go factual, but i'm not sure if that's the case for early documentary shorts (i haven't seen any), and i don't know what you mean with early.

The Lumière shorts were made around 1900, are usually about 1 minute long and show you a single shot of a street. There's also a bunch with people coming of boats. That's about it.

If you're interested in the time period or the context of these shorts, there's a lot more to say of course. But that's a big "if".

Yes okay, that's something totally different, but you're right about that.

[joachimt]

Oh, and I'm on the fence about making a list - as I'd have to sign up for IMDB (cause I dont feel like making an ICM list). But most of my picks are stuff that the rest of you would snub your nose at (Breakin' 2 Electric Boogaloo), but there's some hidden gems. But I also don't have a way to check for IMDB scores - so its just going to be me manually checking the scores of all my favorite films that I suspect have a low rating. So that doesn't sound like much fun to me.

I can help you with that. Do you want me to filter your favs on iCM for low ratings on IMDb? Or do you have a certain iCM list you want me to check out? Not too hard to do that, but certainly don't do it manually.

[matthewscott8]

Antiviral (2012 - Brandon Cronenberg) started of pretty slowly but became intense and I felt like I was in a spider's web. New fan here, feels very weird to use those words though given the subject matter of the film.

[matthewscott8]

I'm pleasantly surprised with numerous votes for Vox Lux. One of my favorite films of the 2010s.

Soundtrack is still in my rotation.

Same here. Sia did a great job!

this was a helluva movie, can't believe I never heard of it before. This was one of the most shattering experiences I've ever had in front of a screen. My cup floweth over with some of the picks I've been watching from peoples' lists.

[Silga]

I am glad you liked it, Matthew! I already watched it 3 times and still picked up new details during the most recent rewatch. More to follow for sure.

Willem Dafoe's narration fits so perfectly.

[matthewscott8]

I am glad you liked it, Matthew! I already watched it 3 times and still picked up new details during the most recent rewatch. More to follow for sure.

Willem Dafoe's narration fits so perfectly.

it's so ballsy, just starts treading on electrified lines straight away. Willem Dafoe as narrator is perfect, but you know it's the first ultra ballsy play, this is the guy who's performance in Platoon spawns the comedy Tropic Thunder, like the accidental comedy actor who only finds out he's been in comedies after they've been done, but also the ultimate vehicle, he has described himself as a colour that artists put on their palette, which is kind of what the film is about, Celeste is a phenomenon more than anything else, she's Delphic, the oracular pronunciations flow from the Gods of chaos through her. But yeah... the guy played Bobby Peru in Wild At Heart.

Spoiler

Next we have a school shooting, which is hideous, it is so much more hideous than I've seen in other film treatments, the look, mascara, contact lenses and roughly shaven head, is inspired, the kid ends up looking like some sort of demented seraph. Not only that but one of the main bits of the aftermath is a pastor asking for the perpetrator to be included in the prayers. It's a provocation. There's no context to the act. Although we don't really need the context right, we know certain people are ritually excluded from society and that there are guns around, so sometimes somebody snaps.

These are two massive plays straight out the gates. I'm not surprised that the film has had difficulty, but I do think it is absolutely awesome and I loved it.

[musikurt]

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls532629937/
1-32 ranked; rest unranked

[Jimi Antiloop]

I bring them in as well.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls532644432
ranked

[Opio]

I bring them in as well.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls53264443
ranked

Jimi, your list is set to private, so I couldn't look at it.

[matthewscott8]

I bring them in as well.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls53264443
ranked

Getting a "This list is not public" message from IMDb

[Jimi Antiloop]

I bring them in as well.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls53264443
ranked

Jimi, your list is set to private, so I couldn't look at it.

actually it was set to public, as it also the default setting.
I just set it to privat and back to public again.

Can you please check if it works now.

[Torgo]

I visited your IMDb profile as linked in your signature, looked up your low rated list and then it works. URL is exactly the same as here.

[Jimi Antiloop]

I bring them in as well.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls53264443
ranked

Getting a "This list is not public" message from IMDb

I bring them in as well.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls53264443
ranked

Jimi, your list is set to private, so I couldn't look at it.

Oops, I just forgot to copy paste a number.

It's
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls532644432

[Jimi Antiloop]

I wonder if somebody else has

Wim Wenders "The Million Dollar Hotel"
Terrence Malicks "The Knight of Cups" [edit: Oh I see, there is some love for it here.]
Roman Polanskis "What?"

on their list?

[Lonewolf2003]

I suspect on of those

Spoiler

will make it into the top 10 at least, based on how many lists I saw it already

It's easiest btw if you just copy and paste the whole url for me, including the / at the end. Cause program won't download the list without it.

[sol]

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/low+ ... reat/sol-/

RANKED

I might add more later but this will do for now. It's crazy how many great films have such low ratings.

[RogerTheMovieManiac88]

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/low+ ... reat/sol-/

RANKED

I might add more later but this will do for now. It's crazy how many great films have such low ratings.

Very happy to see 'Who Done It?' and 'Advance to the Rear' in your list, Sol. Two very funny and chaotic farces that deserve more love!

[sol]

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/low+ ... reat/sol-/

RANKED

I might add more later but this will do for now. It's crazy how many great films have such low ratings.

Very happy to see 'Who Done It?' and 'Advance to the Rear' in your list, Sol. Two very funny and chaotic farces that deserve more love!

Just two of a whole bunch of films that I was amazed to learn had sub-6.0 ratings. I guess comedy is just really divisive. I was expecting over 80 horror films in my list, but not over 70 comedies -- that was a surprise.

[matthewscott8]

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/low+ ... reat/sol-/

RANKED

I might add more later but this will do for now. It's crazy how many great films have such low ratings.

Very happy to see 'Who Done It?' and 'Advance to the Rear' in your list, Sol. Two very funny and chaotic farces that deserve more love!

Just two of a whole bunch of films that I was amazed to learn had sub-6.0 ratings. I guess comedy is just really divisive. I was expecting over 80 horror films in my list, but not over 70 comedies -- that was a surprise.

I'm surprised you're surprised that a Benny Hill movie has low ratings, that guy is like a voodoo doll in feminist circles. Not seen the film myself so no comment on it in particular.

[sol]

Very happy to see 'Who Done It?' and 'Advance to the Rear' in your list, Sol. Two very funny and chaotic farces that deserve more love!

Just two of a whole bunch of films that I was amazed to learn had sub-6.0 ratings. I guess comedy is just really divisive. I was expecting over 80 horror films in my list, but not over 70 comedies -- that was a surprise.

I'm surprised you're surprised that a Benny Hill movie has low ratings, that guy is like a voodoo doll in feminist circles. Not seen the film myself so no comment on it in particular.

And I'm surprised that you think I travel in feminist circles. I don't. I don't think I have seen any of Benny Hill's TV work (and I mostly know him from his bit parts in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and The Italian Job) but Who Done It? is a delight, and scripted by T.E.B. Clarke - who of course wrote The Lavender Hill Mob - and a Clarke script is always a plus.

Of course, if what you're implying is that some filmgoers are voting down the film based on Hill's name rather than the quality of the movie itself, that could well be right. I don't really hear much about Hill over here, but of course he would have been bigger in the UK.

[RogerTheMovieManiac88]

It's a very young Benny Hill as well, and made all the more delightful by Belinda Lee's presence. I remember laughing a lot at the antics and being thoroughly charmed by it.

[OldAle1]

I put Benny Hill in essentially the same category as the Three Stooges - and yes, I realize they are VERY different. But for ME, they are both examples of comedy that fell completely flat for me from the moment I first saw them, and I've seen enough at this point (not by choice, really) to know that there's little point in every watching more. I think Benny HIll, like the Stooges, is/was a completely acquired taste that has always been considered pretty lowbrow and stupid - and dull and repetitive - by many, and I'm definitely in that camp.

And yeah, I mostly know him from TV too - and it's possible his film work could be quite different; I really love Rowan Atkinson on Blackadder but haven't liked what little I've seen of his film stuff, and perhaps Hill is just the opposite. But I don't care enough to find out; this is a case where it comes down to: why bother? When there's so much else in the world that I'm much more likely to like, why bother?

Also Chitty Chitty Bang Bang absolutely sucks.

[Lonewolf2003]

I put Benny Hill in essentially the same category as the Three Stooges - and yes, I realize they are VERY different. But for ME, they are both examples of comedy that fell completely flat for me from the moment I first saw them, and I've seen enough at this point (not by choice, really) to know that there's little point in every watching more. I think Benny HIll, like the Stooges, is/was a completely acquired taste that has always been considered pretty lowbrow and stupid - and dull and repetitive - by many, and I'm definitely in that camp.

Totally with you on the Tree Stooges. Seen a few, which is enough to know I need to stay away from them for now unless I want to waste time.

[sol]

I actually watched my first-ever Three Stooges movies a few days ago (Punch Drunks; the one that is an Official check) and I thought it was hilarious. I mean, not the exaggerated sound effects as Moe whacks the others (something I have seen spoofed far too often), but some of the sheer madness, like Larry speed racing up and down the streets at night, some of the City Lights-ish boxing match moments, the WTFery when Curly first punches someone and he flies vertically up into the air. Giddy fun.

[matthewscott8]

Just in case anyone doesn't know, in the UK Benny Hill is best known for his pro sexual assault slapstick. This was part of a pervasive culture of misogyny which I grew up in and am still deprogramming. It was prime time tv. Most people here will have seen The Italian Job, where he cameos as the professor, again doing sexual assault humour. To be clear, this was mainlining on tv when women did not have the right to refuse sex to their husbands. This is hairraising.

The film in question I haven't seen, but Hill is so toxic I'd imagine a lot of his stuff gets downvoted automatically.

[cayado-coro]

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls536005362/ (chronological/unranked)

Looking forward to the results!

[matthewscott8]

I asked my mum about Benny Hill, she said it's not really a re-evaluation. She thought the content was terrifying at the time. But women in UK at the time weren't expected to voice opinions on such things.

[Opio]

I know my religious grandmother didn't like it and wouldn't let me watch it when I stayed with her. This was in southwest U.S. with no cable TV, so I guess they were showing it on PBS?

[OldAle1]

I know my religious grandmother didn't like it and wouldn't let me watch it when I stayed with her. This was in southwest U.S. with no cable TV, so I guess they were showing it on PBS?

Yeah, if it wasn't on cable, it would have been PBS. Come to think of it, I may have seen some of it while in high school on PBS; my dad might have liked it, he has a pretty lowbrow sense of humor, but I suspect even he would have been bored with it quickly. Plus he has a hard time understanding most accents, and while he liked some British TV, a lot of it he just couldn't comprehend because of his hearing and general slow-witted mind. I remember now my first girlfriend railing against it - must have been one of my first introductions to feminism and to the concept that objectifying women might in fact not be such a good thing.

[Fergenaprido]

All I know about Benny Hill is Yakety Sax. That, and it was a bonus question on a math assignment in grade 12 or 13 and my friend and I were competing for top score, and we both got all the other tv shows (it was a page of silhouetted images from famous shows), but because we missed this one show, we only got 1 out of 2 bonus points for the semester, despite getting everything else all semester long. We were a bit peeved since the tv show had nothing to do with math, and we tried to persuade the teacher that we deserved both points. I mean, they were bonus points so we weren't entitled to them, but we definitely felt like we were back then! It's funny the silly things you remember.

[blocho]

There's a grade 13 in Canada? How curious.

I had a teacher in ninth grade who put bonus questions like that on tests, which always annoyed me. If he wanted to put bonus questions on an exam, that's fine, but the questions should be about the topic being tested, not my teacher's boomer cultural fixations.

[gromit82]

I know my religious grandmother didn't like it and wouldn't let me watch it when I stayed with her. This was in southwest U.S. with no cable TV, so I guess they were showing it on PBS?

Yeah, if it wasn't on cable, it would have been PBS. Come to think of it, I may have seen some of it while in high school on PBS; my dad might have liked it, he has a pretty lowbrow sense of humor, but I suspect even he would have been bored with it quickly.

"The Benny Hill Show" aired in syndication on commercial stations in the U.S., too.

[Fergenaprido]

There's a grade 13 in Canada? How curious.

I had a teacher in ninth grade who put bonus questions like that on tests, which always annoyed me. If he wanted to put bonus questions on an exam, that's fine, but the questions should be about the topic being tested, not my teacher's boomer cultural fixations.

Only in my province, I think. We still graduated from high school after grade 12; grade thirteen was only required if you were going to university, and you only had to take 6 classes instead of 8. You could go to college without needing grade 13, though. They changed the curriculum and got rid of it a few years after I graduated.

And agreed, bonus questions should have been topical.

[Lonewolf2003]

Updated the OP.
Please check if your list is stated, ordered and linked correctly

49 voters so far. A few days left still get your list in.

[beasterne]

Updated the OP.
Please check if your list is stated, ordered and linked correctly

49 voters so far. A few days left still get your list in.

Good response to this poll for sure! I will most likely have a very low “seen” rate, but looking forward to the results all the same.

[ckfilm88]

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/icm+ ... /czarniak/ (RANKED)