Biggest Disappointment: The Place Beyond the Pines
I wanted so much to love this, and I did love the first story (the movie is structured as a triptych, telling three unique stories using the others as context). The first third is brilliant and so the stupidity of the second and (especially) the third segments becomes exponentially frustrating. So much potential... so much wasted potential. Although you have to [SPOILERS] give props to a movie that offs its headlining actor less than halfway through the run-time.
I'm not saying either The Host or World War Z deserve to win any awards (although some of the SFX in the latter are pretty brilliant), but I will argue that both of these movies are better than public reception led you to believe.
If The Host hadn't been cursed by the phrase "based on the book by Stephenie Meyer" on its poster it may have fared a lot better, regardless of content. Taken in and of itself -- ignoring all Twilight-y context -- it has some really interesting things to say about sexuality and sexual autonomy, as well as the mores of attraction. It's heavy stuff for a teen romance, and it's not all handled perfectly, but it's there and it's legitimately interesting.
World War Z had a similar expectation problem... only this time for the opposite reasons. The book (by Max Brooks) on which this is ostensibly based is brilliant, and has been a cult favorite for years. The movie cadges the title from said novel and not much else; if you were expecting a true adaptation of Brooks's work, you were left tragically wanting. Taken as a non-affiliated big-budget zombie apocalypse film, though, it works well and manages to do some interesting things in a genre that has been run into the ground.
I legitimately don't quite know what this movie was about. I truly don't know if I liked it or not. It's slow, it was clearly done on a beyond-shoestring budget, it's in many ways very, very disturbing... and yet, it was compelling in a modern-art kind of way. I'm not sure what happened or why I should care, but maybe that's beside the point.
This teaser whumped me. I fell in love. By all accounts, the movie doesn't live up to the promise displayed by the trailer... but I don't care. The pure, almost-tragic joy in these two minutes can (and maybe should) be taken on their own. Of Monsters and Men and magic realism -- can you get much better?
Biggest Guilty Pleasure: Battle of the Year
This movie is terrible. I'm not defending its merits, but just like you sometimes crave Cheetos instead of some fancy French cheese, sometimes you need b-boy dancing and Sawyer from Lost being emo instead of a film. This has training montages (multiple training montages!), inspirational coach speeches, some great male bonding, and dancing (so much dancing!). Cuddle up with your Cheez-Puffs, grab some Diet Coke, and turn off your brain. It's all good.
Worst Movie: Romeo and Juliet
I watched this with two brilliant Renaissance Lit scholars and thus cannot even claim to be as pained by it as one could be (although by the end even I was howling in rage)... but even if your sum contact with Shakespeare was reading Romeo and Juliet in high school, you may very well be offended by the aggressive stupidity of this adaptation. For one thing, you know that "wherefore" (as in "wherefore art thou Romeo?") means "why", not "where". Too bad nobody told Juliet that before she recited it. Ouch.
