On the fence: movies you can't decide if they are good-bad or just bad-bad

[claws]

I have an on and off 'relationship' with Evils of the Night (1985). Sometimes I enjoy it more, the other times less. It has all the ingredients of a great bad movie (nudity, explicit outdoors sex, girls with huge 80s hair, bad 80s music, aliens in silly spacesuits drawing blood from teens, lazer beamz, lesbian space nurses, John Carradine, backwoods / rural setting, torture porn in car workshop, slasher vibe, sleaze) yet only half of it truly delivers.
Sometimes a movie grows on you after repeated viewings. Evils of the Night is like a zit growing on my forehead - it doesn't bother me first but after a certain time I need to get rid of it. Still, the DVD is a keeper because of nostalgia. Another movie that would qualify is The Being (1983).

What are your bad fence movies?

[Trevor]

This piece of anti-South African garbage:



But it is a well-intentioned film (and it was nominated for two Oscars) and it has it's moments, but it is still IMHO a terrible film, as are almost all the films which diss my country.

[zombie no.one]

Sometimes a movie grows on you after repeated viewings. Evils of the Night is like a zit growing on my forehead - it doesn't bother me first but after a certain time I need to get rid of it.

Nice analogy 

First movie that springs to mind for me is Champion Killer. It has all the right ingredients, and a couple of scenes always make me lol, but mostly it's too damn inept to even be bad in a good way

[major jay]

THE ROOM
Yeah I love Wiseau's performance, but the rest of it bores the hell out of me. It's basically a soap opera and that's not my cup of tea.

[zombie no.one]

THE ROOM
Yeah I love Wiseau's performance, but the rest of it bores the hell out of me. It's basically a soap opera and that's not my cup of tea.

I was a latecomer to this. only saw it for the first time about a year ago. I agree it is very Soap Opera like, in fact it almost reminded me of a movie version of that old soap Sunset Beach - if Sunset Beach had been directed by David Lynch on valium... still worth it for the funny bits though, imo

[SecondClassCinema]

Typically I can decide right away whether or not I loved or hated something.  But there are movies that just get better each time you watch them.

This movie Back From Hell (1993) that I've been watching pretty regularly for the last 7 years has yet to get old to me by my friends hate me for even bringing it up sometimes.

I'll have to give "Evil of the Night" a shot though haha.

[LilCerberus]

Fellini's Casanova
Setting aside my disappointment over the British import DVD had all the dirty stuff taken out...

With all of the effort put into the sets & costumes, I would've expected a slightly better film stock.

It stays pretty depressing throughout.

I don't know too much about the works of Fellini, but in Casanova, he makes it a constant point to remind the viewer that everything they're seeing is fake, which gets pretty tiring real quick.

[LilCerberus]

City Of Lost Children
I like this one, but it's got a lot of head scratching parts.
I'm not sure if this is supposed to be artsy, or if it's just oversights that come with any bmovie.

[WingedSerpent]

Smokin' Aces

The way this movie was described made it sound awesome.  A vegas magician is the target of a group of insane assassins.  I thought it would be like a new generation version of the movie FX, where the magician character had to use his stage illusions to evade death.

And it turned out to be a Reservoir Dogs/ Boondok Saints crime film.  I was disappointed.

Movie wasn't really bad, but nowhere near as smart, quotable, or quirky as it was trying to be.     

[JaseSF]

The Brothers Grimm (2005): There's some moments in it that I really like yet it disappoints very much on many other levels. A little too mainstream for a Terry Gilliam film.

[zombie no.one]

unless I misunderstood the OP, I don't think movies that people thought had the potential to be genuinely good (i.e. 'good-good') are relevant in this thread?

[BoyScoutKevin]

The Brothers Grimm (2005): There's some moments in it that I really like yet it disappoints very much on many other levels. A little too mainstream for a Terry Gilliam film.

43 years earlier, we got the same story in "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm." Though, the story told in that film was the opposite of what we see here. Maybe, which is why I think the earlier version worked better. Whereas, in this story we get fantasy treaded as reality, in "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm," we get reality treated as fantasy. Of course, the fact that George Pal served as director and producer, and there was no better producer and director of fantasy and science fiction in the 1950's and 1960's than George Pal, helps in telling the story immeasurably.

[Trevor]

43 years earlier, we got the same story in "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm." Though, the story told in that film was the opposite of what we see here. Maybe, which is why I think the earlier version worked better. Whereas, in this story we get fantasy treaded as reality, in "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm," we get reality treated as fantasy. Of course, the fact that George Pal served as director and producer, and there was no better producer and director of fantasy and science fiction in the 1950's and 1960's than George Pal, helps in telling the story immeasurably.

This was banned by the SA Censor Board: why, I don't know.