Peter Young Writes For You

This column was originally published in the Central Western Daily on Tuesday 31st December 2013.

With 2013 done and dusted, it’s now time to wade through the cinematic dregs of the year and fish out the floaters which are my bottom 5 films of the year.

5. One Chance – Based on the life of internet sensation and winner of Britain’s Got Talent Paul Potts, this biopic offended me. Obviously a talented opera singer, Potts does  practically nothing to pursue his dreams until he is plucked from obscurity by a Christ-like Simon Cowell. Unsurprisingly, this flick was produced by Cowell. The marketing campaign compares this drivel to Billy Elliot. For the record, One Chance is nothing like Billy Elliot besides the fact that both films star Julie Waters and focus on a bunch of unhappy poms.

4. Movie 43 – All I can say is that a lot of favours must have been repaid considering the A grade cast of this Z grade comedy which consists of a series of interconnected short films. Emma Stone, Richard Gere, Greg Kinnear, Halle Berry, Kate Winslet and a remarkably brave Hugh Jackman are just a few big names in this all star cast. Like Jackman’s abnormal facial growth in his segment The Catch, this film is unwatchable.

3. Save Your Legs! – This Aussie disaster should have been titled Save Your Money! A mediocre amateur cricket team goes on tour to India and loses a bunch of games. Gripping stuff I know. Even the exotic setting couldn’t reprieve this alleged comedy which stars the usually solid Brendan Cowell and Stephen Curry. Give me the drop toilet scene from Slumdog Millionaire anytime. I only got to the end because I watched it on a plane and couldn’t walk out.

2. Sharknado – Granted, some may say that this is the greatest bad film of all time. They’re wrong. This is just a bad film. Originally a TV movie, this makes the list for it’s one day theatrical screening. Starring Beverley Hills 90210 has-been Ian Ziering and a surprisingly non-nubile Tara Reid, the list of things wrong with the bomb is never ending. Sharks managing to stay alive out of water and flying through the air until they are shot out of the sky like birds. Disastrously bad editing and continuity. CGI effects done on a Commodore  Vic-20. Dialogue written by monkeys. Did I mention that Tara Reid keeps her clothes on?

1. Scary Movie 5 – I’m ashamed to say that co-writer and uncredited co-director David Zucker was responsible for two of my favourite spoofs of all time, The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! and Airplane! (a.k.a. Flying High). By unpopular demand, he now brings us the wildly unfunny latest entry in the Scary Movie franchise, which continues to suffer from the law of diminishing returns. The problem for moviegoers is that they are insanely cheap to produce and someone keeps buying tickets. Letters of apology to the CWD please. The talented Anna Faris wisely stayed away from this abomination, and is replaced by the untalented Ashley Tisdale, whom your tweeners will remember from the saccharine High School Musical series. She’s joined by an array of B grade stars making cash for cameos such as Charlie Sheen, Snoop Dogg and the pneumatic Lindsay Lohan. You know you’ve seen a bomb when one of the best jokes in the trailer is Sheen getting crotched by a door and it doesn’t even make it into the final cut.

Happy new year everyone. Fingers crossed for a brilliant year of cinema starting tomorrow.