The Absolute Very Worst Movies Of 2012

Written by Ashley Burns / 12.12.12

After last year’s Worst Movies feature, I received feedback from some readers and Twitter folk about me possibly being “too negative” and “mean” when it came to criticizing films that I chose to watch for this annual hate crime report. Some people even pulled the “What movies have you written?” card, which is cheap because I can just turn around and ask what dog they’ve ever photoshopped a mustache on, and BOOM – argument over.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of films are made each year, and a lot of them are bad. That’s not just by my standards; that’s by the standards of the majority. I have never, in the several years that Vince has let me poison the quality of his website, proclaimed to be a critic. I am just a bro who likes watching movies, and I have a naïve innocence that lets me still believe that people in Hollywood care about making quality films. Then I watch Bucky Larson and that gullible side of me is shoved into a wood chipper.

So how, then, do I determine which of the many, many mainstream films that I have watched in 2012 are the absolute worst of the worst of the WORST? It’s a little pinch of common sense mixed with a dash of “Come on, that’s just f*cking awful”. But I also have some rules, and let’s review them now…

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MUST-WATCH VIDEO: Happy Madison’s Peter Dante urges LAX Bros to not be so Bro-y

Written by Vince Mancini / 11.12.12

So I was in the middle of pissing my pants laughing at this overly-earnest video from Lacrosse Playground (“Don’t Be a LAX Bro”) urging lacrosse bros to not be so bro-y — sample quote: “I love this game more than anything in the world. It’s been the most important thing in my life. (*points at netty stick thingy*) This is the key. This is the instrument. This is my paintbrush.  You guys have an opportunity, and it starts in here. (*points at heart*)” — when all of a sudden, PETER DANTE SHOWS UP!

You may remember Peter Dante as Adam Sandler’s buddy who we last saw inexplicably donning different outfits, urging us to see Bucky Larson in a series of relentless TV spots on Comedy Central. He’s in virtually every Sandler movie and features prominently in Burnsy’s guide to Happy Madison. I didn’t know he was into lacrosse, but if I was any less surprised the news, my face would turn into an actual line-mouth emoticon :-|

DANTE: “We are all a brotherhood, we are all a family. We do not like the term ‘lacrosse bro.’ Lacrosse bro is a kid who is not respectful. A kid who’s mouthy, a kid who doesn’t listen, a kid who is an individual. You’re a part of that fraternal order because you’re a team.”

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Adam Sandler Is Making ‘Parody’ Films Now

Written by Ashley Burns / 10.29.12

“Check my diaper for my next script idea!”

First the good news – Adam Sandler is re-teaming with his old comedy writing partner Tim Herlihy, with whom he made classic, hilarious movies like Billy Madison, Happy Gilmore and The Wedding Singer. Unfortunately, they were also responsible for The Waterboy and Little Nicky, which leads us to the bad news – their next effort will be a “comedy western” film entitled Ridiculous 6, which could possibly be a spoof of The Magnificent Seven, according to a stab in the dark by Deadline.

This is the laffer that Sandler was going to make at Sony before Happy Madison Productions moved it to Paramount. The title is reminiscent of the 1960 United Artists pic The Magnificent Seven that starred Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson and James Coburn, the drama about seven gunfighters drafted to protect a Mexican town, so might this be a variation featuring inept gunslingers? The studio would not go beyond confirming the title and the terrain.

Here’s my guess as to why the studio had no further comment – because any time a producer or executive asks Sandler what his film will be about, he just mumbles, “Shabba doo, yabbo goo!” and then points to a wall of headshots, featuring Kevin James, David Spade, Chris Rock, Allen Covert, Nick Swardson, Peter Dante and Kevin Nealon. And nobody knows which five of Sandler’s friends will join him in this parody, because he hasn’t drawn their names from a hat yet.

Regardless of whether Ridiculous 6 is actual parody or if it’s just a play on the name, it obviously doesn’t sound like it’s going to be anything new for Sandler and his Happy Madison crew, who are so devoid of ideas that they said, “F*ck it!” and decided to make Grown Ups 2. So if you loved Three Amigos but hated the comedy parts, this just might be the movie for you.

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Weekend Movie Guide: It’s ‘Looper’ Time!

Written by Ashley Burns / 09.28.12

See what I did there?

Opening Everywhere: Looper, Hotel Transylvania, Won’t Back Down, Pitch Perfect

Opening Somwhere: Solomon Kane

FilmDrunk Suggests: I’ve been looking forward to Looper for weeks now and the positive reviews (like Vince’s, in case you haven’t read it) have me very excited. Seriously, feel the moist spot on my Capri pants.

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Happy Madison Got Its Claws On ‘Bad Toys 2′

Written by Ashley Burns / 07.26.12

For the second time in two years, Adam Sandler’s Happy Madison production company is getting into the short-film-goes-big-time business. In 2010, Sandler picked up the rights to the immensely popular Pixels, which saw New York City invaded by classic 8-bit video game characters. And now, Happy Madison will bring the beloved French short film Bad Toys 2 to theaters.

Bad Toys 2 is the simple story of a dad who gets his hands on his kid’s toys and his imagination turns them into his very own big budget action films on the mean streets of a child’s bedroom floor. The action switches awesomely between the dad’s hand racing two cars against each other while using the other toys as obstacles and the imaginary cops and robbers that he voices along the way.

You can watch Bad Toys 2 in its entirety after the jump, while I go get some morphine and prepare to offer my standard Happy Madison response.

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