Syrup

 Syrup jumps around from event to event without any logical transitions or foundation. It's supposed to be slick and cool, but it's just transparent and hollow. There are a handful of funny moments, but they don't even come close to justifying watching the worst movie I've seen all year.

Syrup was copyrighted 2011, but it wasn't released until 2013. I wonder if it got hung up somewhere, or if that's just how long it takes for a movie to come out after it's been shot. I'm betting it was the former. This looked cool from the trailer, so I wanted to see it. IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes said it was a waste of time, but I was tired of not getting to see any movies because they all had bad reviews, so I watched it anyway. It turns out the reviewers were right: this is the worst movie I've seen all year!

It was so terrible, the entire time I was watching it I just kept thinking, "This is the worst movie ever made!" The flow was absolutely horrible. They would go from snippy and snarky to something that was supposed to be meaningful and emotional without setting it up at all. The music was terrible. It would be silent, and then a cue would come in out of nowhere trying to force you to feel something, and it was just obtrusive.

Everything was totally empty. The voiceovers with "marketing 101" and whatever didn't work at all. Anytime someone broke the fourth wall and talked directly to the camera it felt super awkward and out of place. 6 was awkward, too. Nothing she did ever made sense. It was bizarre how everyone picked a new name. 3, 6, Sneaky Pete, Scat. I don't think real marketing executives do that. And who the heck would pick "Scat" for a name, anyway? He said it was referencing jazz, and okay, that's great, but do you not know what else it means?!

The guys at the competing soda company were so dumb. It's like they were trying to have a realistic movie, and then they put those guys in, and it didn't make any sense. Amber Heard's face bugged me. There's something off about her left eye, and I didn't like all that dark lipstick. Her spiel about what men expect out of women didn't work. None of her dialogue worked; it was just bizarre. She did look gorgeous in a couple of scenes in her apartment, though.

The Man with the Iron Fists

The Man with the Iron Fists has some cool stuff going on. Some of the acting is a little flat, but it's entertaining and it looks great.

It's nice that RZA got to make a movie. The Man with the Iron Fists is listed as a movie "by RZA," and that couldn't be any more true. He directed it, starred in it, and wrote the story, screenplay, and music. Crazy. It's a pretty epic movie. I'm not a classic martial arts movie fan, so it's hard to tell what's an homage and what's just not well done.

The costumes and props seemed a little cheap at times. They shot the movie in 52 days, so I guess it's reasonable to think they didn't have a lot of time for the other stuff, either. I could never get over the Lions' hair, but we'll assume that was on purpose. I think Dave Bautista is just the worst actor on the planet. I don't think there's any "homage" justification that can be made for his lack of performance. I liked the idea of this big guy who's just a total stone block, though.

The Campaign

The best thing about The Campaign is that it's over before you know it. There are a lot of funny parts, but overall it's pretty weak. As a whole, it feels flat and empty

 I love this picture for The Campaign. It's better than the actual movie. I'm not sure what Roeper was thinking giving it an A-. I would've gone with a C-, if I did that sort of a scale. I think most movies that I give a 3 would at least be a B-. In fact, I don't give The Campaign a 3/5; I give it a 3-. A 2.8, maybe. It didn't suck, but some parts of it did. I didn't like it as much as Roeper did.

Will's starting to look old. 

Fast Five

I have a lot of love for this series, and I wanted to like this more than I did. It felt like they only had about half a movie going here. I enjoyed everybody getting together, and Rio was a fun place to see, but about 70% of it was flat.

Lost in Space

Joey in a feature-length film..bad times. The whole thing was so terribly flat. A few interesting things happened, but that did not make this worth watching.