"Looks good!" Those words, from my 4-year-old daughter, don't usually inspire horror, especially in this age of sublime children's movies, from Up! and Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs to Fantastic Mr. Fox and Coraline. But when they're uttered in response to The Rock sprouting wings in the name of kiddie comedy, my only recourse is a silent resolution: We'll catch the Tooth Fairy when Ava's much, much older; when she's 50 and I'm sucking food through a straw and no longer able to summon the mental energy to use the Neural Changer on my old Sony Holograph. And glancing further down the list of coming "attractions," there are 10 more titles in 2010 I plan on avoiding as long as I can until, bad-movies sucker that I am, my curiosity gets the better of me. (Find conveniently, refreshingly brief trailers where available.)
Sex And the City 2
I caught the first movie on a plane from Sydney to New York because it seemed a fitting way to distract myself at 35,000 feet. I wasn't expecting much because I a) wasn't a huge fan of the show and b) had been told by my other half, who's a die-hard Carrie-lover, that the flick was "disappointing." But I was still surprised it didn't work even as in-flight fluff. However, the $400m worldwide gross made a sequel as inevitable as a designer shoe reference in any given five minutes of a SATC ep. Carrie Bradshaw's cloying SATC 2 trailer voiceover promises "just when you think you've seen it all, it hits you: you haven't seen anything yet." Here's the real guarantee: You have seen it all -- a million times before. That the girls go to Egypt this time just means the shopping montage will feature harem wear, and someone will come down with a "hilarious" case of runny bottom. If they really wanted to show us something we hadn't seen before, how about pitting Carrie and Co. against a zombie horde... not that the undead would be able to strip much flesh of that femme foursome.
Cop Out
Perhaps appropriately, I think of Kevin Smith in awkward man-love terms. Back in the mid-1990s, I was enthralled by his DIY Clerks and Chasing Amy, and even had good feelings about Mallrats and Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back. As the New Jersey native might these days Twitter about his wife, he PWNED my taint. But then came the betrayals: the saccharine slop of Jersey Girl, the crass desperation of Clerks 2 and, even after I'd forgiven him for those, the squandering of Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks in Apatow-aping Zack & Miri Make A Porno. That slide is unlikely to be reversed by Cop Out. The hoo-ha over the title -- reminiscent of the Zack & Miri poster "controversy" -- presupposes anyone cares about a recycled interracial buddy-cop comedy starring the too-familiar shtick of Bruce Willis and Tracy Morgan. The clunky clincher? Those hoping against hope for a return of the raunchy wit Smith used to wield should know he's only a hired directorial gun on this. And if there's one thing he's been candid about over the years -- apart from brown and pink things coming out of/going into his/her body -- it's that Smith is, at best, pedestrian behind the camera.
Furry Vengeance
If only this were a parody 1970s porno featuring the sort of full bushes favored by Alec Baldwin in It's Complicated. Rather, this has Brendan Fraser returning to his doofus comfort zone as a developer beset by a bunch of animals who want to save their forest from destruction. How Fraser's sides must've split when he read the script! It's in the trailer: Our man cops a face full of scalding coffee, a noseful of skunk farts, a plasma screen to the head, a garden sprinkler to the crotch and the contents of a portable toilet to his whole person. Oh, for the Ernst Lubitsch-style sophistication of Encino Man and Dudley Do-Right. That said, director Roger Kumble would have to have worked pretty damn hard to make a motion picture worse than his The Sweetest Thing.
Cats And Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore
So Kevin Smith supposedly has to do without his Dicks, but a Pussy Galore parody title is right at home in a kids movie? Even more egregious is that this is another animals-as-super-agents movie so soon over last year's hideous G-Force. Director Brad Peyton made the delightful Tim Burton/Heathers tribute short Evelyn: The Cutest Evil Dead Girl in 2002, but this looks about as far from that black-comic sensibility as you can get; that it's written by the team who brought us the bland Open Season, Brother Bear and Chicken Little inspires little confidence. The plot, for 7-year-old Movieline readers who care, has cats and dogs forced to work together, which, as Venkman reminds us in Ghostbusters, is one of the signs of a disaster of biblical proportions. Question: How did we manage for almost a decade without a sequel to the 2001 original?
Valentine's Day
There's possibly no better argument for splitting up with your significant other than as a means to avoiding this poisoned candy come Feb. 14. It's tempting to conclude that Valentine's Day was assembled from Barbie and Ken doll parts simply because He's Just Not That Into You made bank. Consider the evidence: prime February release, a lady cast of odd consonance (then it was Jennifer, Jennifer and Ginnifer; now it's Jessica, Jessica, Jennifer and Julia) and Bradley Cooper as man-bait (this time there's tween-bait too: OMGZ it's Taylor Lautner!). Possibly more wince-worthy than Jessica (Biel) one-upping Katherine Heigl by product-placing her orgasm with a vibrating Blackberry gag is love guru Ashton Kutcher (last time it was Justin Long) declaring, "Love is the only shocking act left on the planet." You're actually wrong there, AplusK, so long as no-one has yet liveblogged giving Dick Cheney a footjob at a Carl's Jr.
The Back-Up Plan
Take Baby Mama and Knocked Up, add some white-with-pink trailer lettering like He's Just Not That Into You, add a sexy songstress with a comeback album about to drop and a leading man whose TV sex appeal has been simmering for years now and you've got a sure-fire hit, right? Not quite. This J.Lo rom-com is released simultaneously in April with her album, Love?, and the trailer offers precisely nothing we haven't seen before, except Alex O'Loughlin trying to do double takes on the big screen. And even if you were interested, your belief in Jenny From The Block's character glowing with post-IVF joy will be fatally undermined by knowing that in a recent Elle interview she said "you don't mess with things like" in-vitro because it's not "God's will." Nice way to start the media J-Lo-verload!
The Karate Kid Cuts Footloose On Elm Street
OK, a threefer because this year offers a triple bill of 1984 molestation. In The Karate Kid, Jaden Smith -- Will's son -- replaces Ralph Macchio, playing a pipsqueak who gets hassled at his new school in Beijing and so learns kung fu from senior citizen Jackie Chan. Let the culture war and trade wars meet! But if the kid really wanted to stop getting his ass kicked, wouldn't it just be simpler to change his name from the bully-bait "Dre"? Anyway, that this needless remake is from the director of Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London and The Pink Panther 2 makes me feel decidedly punchy. But even a rebooted high-kicking kid must be preferable to Chace Crawford trying to kick off his Sunday shoes in the new Footloose, compounded by the prospect of some R&B douche ruining Kenny Loggins's guilty-pleasure original theme song. And then there's the new A Nightmare On Elm Street. Scariest thing in the trailer? The four soul-chilling words: "From producer Michael Bay."
Friday The 13th: Part Two
Speaking of the Platinum Dude's crimes against cinema. Contemplating that this "new" Friday is a remake-sequel to a remake of an "original" that back in 1980 only made its reputation by being the first in a never-ending parade of sub-standard slashers to rip-off the superior Halloween [takes breath] is more frightening than anything we're likely to see Jason Voorhees do. Those who witnessed last year's remake know what I'm talking about. (That said, the line "You got perfect nipple placement, baby" was at least funnier than anything in Transformers 2, Michael Bay's other '09 contribution to culture.) That this one is going to be the 13th installment of the Friday The 13th franchise and it'll be released on August 13th -- a Friday! -- just increases the paraskevidekatriaphobia. If only Bay could somehow make it in 13-D!
Celine: Through The Eyes Of The World
Allow me to quote from the official release: "Celine Dion, the international superstar and best-selling female artist of all time, has toured around the world and back again, and now, Sony Pictures Releasing's special programming division, The Hot Ticket, will let audiences follow her everywhere. For a limited engagement beginning early next year in wide release, Celine: Through the Eyes of the World will bring Celine Dion's 2008-2009 Taking Chances World Tour to theaters. This special motion picture event gives Dion fans who attended the extremely popular tour -- which placed Dion second only to Madonna in ticket sales in 2008 -- another chance to experience the magical event, this time from a vantage point unparalleled by any ticket." Apple Trailers lists this as "documentary." The word "informercial" also comes to mind. But, have at it, Celine fans. Sony executives hoping for This Is It style box-office numbers are forgetting one very key factor. And I think you know who that might be.
Michael Adams is the author of Showgirls, Teen Wolves And Astro Zombies, which follows the entire year he spent watching bad films in the pursuit of the world's worst movie. It can be yours on Amazon.