2020 Calvin Awards: Worst Picture
By Reagen Sulewski
February 15, 2020
BoxOfficeProphets.com

She hated the end of Game of Thrones, too.
The crisis of originality in Hollywood is making itself felt not just at the upper echelons of film, but also in the dregs, as most of this year's worst films, as voted by us, come from ideas that have already been done before, sometimes well, sometimes poorly. All right, mostly poorly. Look, if you have any better ideas than exactly the film we made six months ago, I'd like to hear it. No, seriously, I'd desperately like to hear it. Just... not too original, OK?

In a slight upset, our champion of terribleness for last year is the latest X-Men outing, Dark Phoenix. Literally redoing the story of X-Men: The Last Stand from about a dozen years ago (which surprisingly avoided our ire), it managed to do exactly the same thing for the First Class series that the other version did for the original films - sticking a dagger through the dank, dirty heart of them. The interesting Forrest Gump-like idea of having the X-Men influence major events in society has by this point dissipated into high comic-opera, but unfortunately with the understudies in place of the real stars.

The lack of interest Fox has had with continuing this series (coming as it did in the run up to being bought out by Disney) shows in spades with this film, with a spareness and cheapness in setting and filming. It's like they handed the whole thing over to the TV department. Major cast problems also reared their heads, with Sophie Turner not quite able to turn her smolder from Game of Thrones into genuine menace here. It's less "Destroyer of the Universe" than "Destroyer of your Mentions." The rest of the cast didn't fare much better, and Jennifer Lawrence got the best out of the deal, having clearly gotten an advance script and putting in the note that maybe her character wasn't so necessary, and if they wanted to add some stakes, maybe have something happen to her?

This series has made less and less sense as it's gone on, as it inevitably tries to develop its most outlandish stories and hits a wall where they all just become incomprehensible VFX battles. Perhaps some of these are unfilmable stories, but it may be that we need to stop giving these over to hacks that can't film an action scene. Trying to do a speedrun through one of the most famous X-Men storylines without actually establishing these versions of the characters also doesn't help - we're not doing your homework for you.

Second place goes to the Internet's Punching Bag, Cats. The adaptation of the inexplicably long running Andrew Lloyd Webber musical about assisted cat suicide. Upon hitting theaters, this film, which made the bizarre decision to digitally place its cast in virtual cat suits, and then *sex them up*, became an instant punchline and hallucinatory trainwreck must-see. While the execution was terrible, that neglects the obvious truth that this was a bad idea from its very conception, and its very existence is an affront to all that is good and holy. When even Furries are distancing themselves from your movie, you have made a legendary piece of hot garbage.

Out of four films in the Men in Black series, three have made their way to our Worst Picture list, with the second film actually taking home the top prize in 2003 (Men in Black 3 was a distant 10th). So maybe third place isn't the worst that could have happened here for Men in Black: International, which attempted to drag the concept back without Will Smith's involvement. While Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson were game, it became yet another vehicle for distracting effects work and lame, half-baked jokes, and literally rehashing all of the first film's plot. "Weird character design" is not a substitute for story, but that's all you get here.

In fourth place, we have Joker, which was this year's most polarizing film. Either you found it a bold, gritty take on mental illness through the lens of comic book movies, or you found it an exploitative, derivative, ugly mess that wallowed in the very thing it claimed to decry. So, like, two sides. While there were things to appreciate about the film - its score, some of the performances, the fact that it was in focus - it was a slow, one-note march to an unpleasant finish line. I personally would enjoy a visit to the alternate universe where the three explicit Batman references were stripped from it, and to see the reaction to the film then.

Two of Disney's "live-action" remakes land in fifth and sixth, with The Lion King just nipping Dumbo at the post. We once again have a film that seems wrong right from the concept, with the photo-realistic animals "thinking" out dialogue brings to mind a very elaborate "Disney Buddies present: Hamlet" concept. That it was a complete, 100% retread of the original doubled the pointlessness. Can you feel the cash grab tonight?

Tim Burton at least gets credit for trying with Dumbo, turning the story of animal abuse and belief into an anti-corporate shot at Disney itself -- but the overstuffed cast and curiously charmless animal action doomed the film to be a lifeless, noisy and garish mess.

Alita: Battle Angel answers the long-pondered question: "What if the pod-racing scene from Phantom Menace was two hours long"? Robert Rodriguez's dystopian tale about a future dominated by androids and corporate overlords in the sky both explained too much and also not enough about its world, and spent the entire time disturbing its audience with body horror and the Uncanny Valley of its lead performer's enormous, off-putting eyes. Oh, and it's also a terrible YA romance, making it about three bad concepts in one.

While 70 may be the new 40, Rambo: Last Blood, our eighth place film, tested everyone's tolerance of the idea of an elderly ass-kicker with PTSD. Ramping up the violence from his last outing, it also decided to pile on a nice heap of ugly racist dog-whistles, and barely held together for 90 minutes of action.

Robert Eggers doesn't seem to care if you're on his wavelength for his films, which is probably why The Lighthouse wound up ninth for us. A black and white fever dream, our voters couldn't handle its weirdness and pretension.

This list winds up with Stuber in tenth place. The buddy comedy with Dave Bautista and Kumail Nanjani was curiously laugh-free, which makes for a long, long experience when you're trying to be a comedy.

2020 Calvin Awards
Calvins Intro
Best Actor
Best Actress
Best Cast
Best Character
Best Director
Best Overlooked Film
Best Picture
Best Scene
Best Screenplay
Best Supporting Actor
Best Supporting Actress
Best TV Show
Best Use of Music
Breakthrough Performance
Worst Performance
Worst Picture