| By Fred Topel
Don't Believe Them!
|
This week‘s film Crossover promises lots of basketball action, but it’s only a trick. Once they sucker you in, you’re stuck with your average urban drama about relationships and growing up. This isn’t the first time Hollywood’s lied to us. Steer clear of these bait and switch jobs.
10. Mr. Saturday Night - Billy Crystal, hot off his City Slickers success, promised a rollicking life story of a stand up comedian. Turned out it was a sober meditation on a lifetime of bitter unhappiness. David Paymer rules though.
9. Mr. Jones - Ooh, Richard Gere as a wacky romantic guy in a forbidden affair with a therapist sounds cute, huh? Not when he’s a manic depressive and all the happy manic scenes are in the trailer. Poor Lena Olin.
8. My Girl - After MacCauley Culkin hit it big with Home Alone, everyone was desperate to get him in their next movie. But if they wanted another comedy, why did they put him in the drama about childhood death?
7. A Thin Line Between Love and Hate - For his directorial debut, Martin Lawrence promised a crazy romantic comedy with his unique perspective. Instead, he delivered a drama about a playboy getting what he deserves from a stalker. Ripping off the opening of Sunset Boulevard was not cool.
6. Top Dog - Chuck Norris teaming up with a canine partner is sure to be perfect for the kids, even if it is a decade too late for the whole Turner and Hooch vibe. Luckily, few parents took their kids, because they would have seen an inane cop movie with Chuck fighting hate crime!
5. Click - This was actually a good bait and switch. They promised an Adam Sandler gross-out fest but it turned out to be a profound morality tale about trying to skip out on the difficult moments of life.
4. Light of Day - I was just a kid when Michael J. Fox decided to show his dramatic side. After Family Ties, Back to the Future and Teen Wolf, seeing Michael J. Fox movie as a rock star sounded awesome. That was really unfair of them not to warn us that this was a dysfunctional family drama about neglecting responsibility and religious criticism.
3. Angel Eyes - Look at every ad for Angel Eyes and tell me they weren’t selling a supernatural movie. If it wasn’t about angels, they certainly could have called it something else. Boring Ass would have been the most honest.
2. Calendar Girl - I should have known since it was coming out Labor Day weekend, but this Jason Priestley film vehicle looked like the perfect way to end the summer. Priestley was not the star. It was about some other kid trying to meet Marilyn Monroe. Lying bastards.
1. Snow Dogs - There was one dream sequence where one of the dogs says one line. They put that in the trailer to get kids to see the talking dog movie. All they got was Cuba Gooding Jr. making an ass of himself. |
