Im just saying

So I just finished watching You, Me, and Everyone We Know, and can now make a list of The Worst Movies Ever.  Before I only had one movie to put on the list, and I thought, well you can't make a list with one.  It's just the worst movie, and well that could be a very controversial title to give to a movie.  I mean, I haven't seen all the movies out there- who am I to say that this is the worst movie ever?  So basically I couldn't get myself to commit to giving the movie the title.  And I couldn't make a list because in order to have a real list you must have more than one item... or is that only with Power Point presentation bullets?  Well anyways, today I saw You, Me, and Everyone We Know and I realized, now I have two worst movies ever. 

Now before I go any further let me just clarify what it takes to be the worst movie ever.  You can't just have a bad movie, like The Titanic or The Guru.  Those movies are just bad, but to be the worst movie ever you have to move up a level from just mind numbing or trite.  Problems such as predictability or bad dialogue may put you at the level of Woody-Allen-bad but to make a truly wretched movie, you have to have a certain unrepeatable artistic flair that most artsy and/or teeny bopper movies, while seeminglyto strive to their utmost, just can't seem to reach.  And it can't be a movie that is so bad it is actually good (think PCU and Bring It On) because at the end, these movies were actually good!  The oppositve, so good they are actually bad, hasn't really happened to me yet.  But enough with defining the terms.

The first movie on the list is The Afterglow with Nick Nolte, Lara Flynn Boyle, Julie Christi, and Jonny Lee Miller.  It came out in 1997 and I just found out (thank you Google) that it was nominated for an oscar and won 8 other random awards.  (This is another reason to be suspicious of whether there really is a relationship between awards and reviews and the actual quality of a movie.)  So here is the background on how I came to be watching this movie: I had just come home after going out all night.  For some reason after being out for several hours, instead of hitting Pizza Mart or any of the other regular places, Jimmy took the rest of us out to some pizza joint on P St. that serves amazingly good jumbo-sliced pizza, especially for 3 AM.  I got a slice of the chicken pesto pizza.  When I finally got home I couldn't fall asleep, so I turned on my TV.  I usually never surfed passed the 5 MTV channels on cable thinking that after channel 145 there was only the vast wilderness of pay-per-view or weird purple-screen channels.  But recently I had discovered that I actually get some movie channels past 145 and decided the see what was on.  And that's when I stumbled across The Afterglow.

So I can't really remember where this movie is supposed to take place but I think it's Montreal.  I do remember that it was definitely somewhere in Canada because they kept saying "Get oot" instead of out, and some other stereotypical Canadisms (Canadianisms?  Canada-isms?).  But two things caught my eye and kept me from immediately flipping past this movie.  The first was Lara Flyn Boyle who looked amazing in the movie, and who played a very annoying stereotypical needy housewife.  THe stark difference between that role and her role in The Practice caught my attention initially.  But the next reason was much MUCH more captivating- the real estate.  The Byrons (Lara Flynn and Jonny lee) (what's up with the 2 words names?  does that give you an "in" in Hollywood?) live in the MOST AMAZING residential building I have seen.  If anyone knows where this building really is in Montreal or wherever, LET ME KNOW!  I am totally fascinated with this building.  The condo building looks sort of like a Picasso painting mixed with those orange built-into-the-hills Native American homes, except not built into a moutain or steppe.  I know, worst description ever.  Start making your own list!  Even inside the apartment was awesome.  The master bedroom overlooked the living room, the interior decoration was modern contemporary and monotone- it was just my definition of perfection, both inside and out.  Truly, the real estate shown was amazing.

Unfortunately, the movie was not.  The plot was pretty basic: There are two couples.  Couple #1 is elderly and consists of a philandering plumbr husband and an ex-actress who starred in some small movies and watches them incessantly.  You learn that she knows about his cheating and they have an unspoken agreement where she basically makes small catty comments about his "Activities" and in return she doesn't have to have sex with him.  The turmoil in their marriage stems from a fight they had when they were madly in love.  She told him she had cheated on him and their teenage daughter might not be his.  The daughter runs away when she hears the fight and the ensuing horrible things Nick Nolte's character says and the couple moved to Montreal years ago in an unsuccesful attempt to find their daughter.  Couple #2 consists of a high powered husband who withholds sex from his wife as a tool of control, emotional abuse, and due to an inherint distaste he has for the neediness of his wife.  The wife is needy, dependant, and emotionally shallow and pays her husband too much attention which feeds a sick cycle that their marriage seems to rely upon. 

Through a series of events, the plumber from couple #1 starts sleeping with the wife of couple #2 and the husband of Couple #2 starts sleeping with the wife of couple #1.  The movie culminates with everyone finding out.  Characters grow, personalities are strengthened, the daughter is found, and everyone kind of ends up in very similar positions to the beginning of the movie.  The combination of the mind-numbingly slow pace, horribly self-important dialogue and transparent attempt to make the movie deep and about something more than the common stereotypes interacting in a formulic plot line that we have all heard many times makes this movie truly the worst movie ever.

On the other hand, I have never seen a movie anything close to You, Me, and Everyone We Know... thank God.  I'm still not sure what  the movie was about.  It is allegedly "a unique take on contemporary life and the ongoing struggle people have connecting with others" (back of the DVD cover) and won a ton of awards (see note above on the meaningless of awards in the movie industry).  The thing that is truly sad about this movie is that there are some genuinely amazing moments.  There is a scene where 2 cars drive down a high way trying to ensure the safety of a gold fish bouncing from car to car.  Another great scene is when the modern-artist writes "You" on one shoe and "Me" on the other and depicts the ups and downs of an entire relationship by just moving her feet back and forth.  I absolutely LOVED LOVED the random bizarre flirtation between the artist and shoe salesman- it was perfect.  The weird sex scenes were awkward to watch, sitting with my dad and all and didn't really seem to add anything to the movie.  But the insertion of these either great or at least memorable scenes only reminds the viewer of the utter lack of content in the rest of the movie, much less the lack of a point.  This is the only movie I have ever seen that could rival the tradegy that was The Afterglow.

I'm sure I could add to this list, but no movies come to mind that are quite at this level.  But now that I actually have a list, i will be sure to keep an eye out!