List of overrated

[Evan3]

About once a year I need to blow my steam on this board and write about people who I feel are overrated.  Some examples of the past have been Quentin Tarrantino, Tobey MacGuire, Halle Berry, and Julia Roberts. Here is my list for this year, if you will induldge me.

M. Night Shyamalan - Not only is he overrated, but he is an egotistical director with nothing to back it up. First, "Night" is not in his real name anywhere, it is a nickname he made up for himself, now that is real stupid. Secondly, Sixth Sense was merely decent, showing promise, and sufficiently creepy. In each of his subsequent movies (I have not seen the Village, but the critics tore it up), they have gone steadilyy downhill, with Signs being awful, and Unbreakable being cheesy. He does get the most out of his actors, but that is about the only commendable thing he has ever done.

Tim Burton - Don't get me wrong I am not saying he is a bad director, merely overrated. I would submit that Burton has only made 3 really good movies, Edward Scissorhands, Beetlejuice, and Big Fish. But beyond this, he is really just a commonplace actor. He found one unique style, always highlighted by green and blue tones and uses it in all of his movies. Almost every one of his movies look exactly the same. His characters really tend not to show emotion all that often. In fact he had very little to do with Nightmare Before Christmas besides production, yet continually gets all of the credit from what I feel, could have been a much better film. Lets not even talk about his re make of Planet of the Apes.

Christian Bale - Now Mr. Bale has been in two terrible movies - Shaft and Reign of Fire, and has also been in the worst movie I have ever seen, American Psycho. I hear he is good in Equilibrium, but haved not yet been able to see this film. However, women seem to think he is hot, and men seem to think he is talented. Give me Edward Norton any time, or at least an actor who doesnt have something to prove as the next Batman.

Dave Matthews Band - really, he is overrated. As far as classical musicians go, he has no more talent than most college students, and as a singer, well, even he admitted he can't sing. WHY do people LOVE this guy? It makes to me, absolutely no sense. I mean if you are really taken away with lyrics just listen to rap, which has mastered the art of great lyrics more so than any other  musical genre ever has.

Thats all for now, feel free to add your own additions as you will.

[Ash]

I agree with you about Dave Matthews Band.

I have never liked them.
Except for their breakout single in 1994, "What Would You Say".
I liked that song.

[Dave Munger]

Tim Burton: I haven't seen Big Fish yet. Edward Scissorhands - eh. A litttle manipulative. Beetlejuice - Crap. Pee-Wee's Big Adventure - True masterpiece the reknown of which will resound through the ages. Everything else he did - Oh, let's put big candy canes in the background, it'll be all dark, ironic, and trippy. If it wasn't for Pee-Wee I'd say he was no real director at all, merely an art director, like HR Gieger.

[Tilebreaker]

After Unbreakable, I promised myself not to watch another of his movies unless it was free.

Burton's "Big Fish" just made me want to watch "Amelie" again.  Not a horrible movie, but it's been done before and better.  

Christian Bale, can't knock "American Psycho" cause the merits of Heuy Lewis and the news speech is great.  Haven't seen "reign of fire" but the one guy who likes everything hated it, and I took that as a sign.  In "Equillibrium" he plays emotionless very well, and that's not a compliment.

I remember riding around with a friend in '92 and he put in a Dave Matthews tape he had picked up from a buddy.  I was sitting there listening to it, thinking it how bad it was. Then a year later it's on the radio.  Go figure....

[dean]

I agree with Shymalan, to a degree.  Signs and Unbreakable are two films I really enjoyed, with Sixth Sense being adequete but nothing special.  Village isn't even out here yet so I'll wait for that one.

I just found Unbreakable to be a very good film, it's one of my favourites, and Signs, whilst plot-wise a bit stupid, I thought it was quite good.

Maybe it's a stylistic thing: I love what he does technically, and maybe I'm not paying enough attention to plot.

Tim Burton: How can you hate the man who made Batman cool?! :-P I enjoy most of his work, even if it happens to  be called Planet of the Apes, but I must admit he's been a bit lack lustre lately [haven't seen Big Fish though, which isn't meant to be horrible]

Christian Bale: Equilibrium was one of my surprise dvd's I rented recently without any preknowledge and I really enjoyed it.  I agree that Reign of Fire and Shaft were horrible, but I have high hopes for Batman, and I thouroughly enjoyed American Psycho.


Haven't really listened to Dave Matthews, so no real comments here either way.

[Mr_Vindictive]

Night - Not a big fan of his.  Signs was so inanely awful that it made my eyes bleed.

Burton - I'm a big fan of Burton.  Sure he's not an amazing director, but his films end up being pretty fun and interesting.

Christian Bale - I jumped for joy when hearing he would be the Batman.  I absolutely loved American Psycho and regard it as one of the best films I own.  He is an extremely talented actor, and one of the best breakout stars of the late 90s.

Dave Matthews - I liked their first two big studio releases.  Under The Table And Dreaming and Crash are both great albums if you are into the whole "jam" thing.  See I know that a lot of people don't like them because they set theirselves to one type of music.  I guess I'm just not that way.  I'll switch from listening to Big Tymers to Widespread Panic to Hepcat.  It's pretty erratic if you are in a car with me and I'm controlling the stereo.

[raj]

Regarding Burton, I did like Sleepy Hollow, once I got over the fact that it has nothing to do with the legend.  But you are right, he needs to use more than just blue & green.

[Eirik]

Shyamalan - Agreed, he's pretty pretentious... but I think a lot of his ego comes from having it overinflated by genuflecting critics and fans.  

Burton - Batman was awesome, I'm surprised you didn't give him credit for that.  I also liked Sleepy Hollow... but generally I find his stuff to be kind of cut from the same cloth.  If you're in the mood for dark and quirky, great... otherwise, yawn.

Dave Matthews Band - THANK YOU!!  Good Lord I am sick of their uninspired boring music, but EVERYONE I know thinks they're the greatest band ever.

My addition to your list:

THE BEATLES.  Their early stuff was passable jingle-pop type of stuff.  Their later stuff was overblown, pretentious jingle-pop disguised as serious art.  They were okay when they were at their best and unlistenable at heir worst.  Any five guys with doofy haircuts and English accents could have done the same thing if their timing had been right.  They are a classic example of mediocre artists propelled to great heights by marketing and actually believing their own hype (something we now see all too often - see item #1 on Evan3's list).

[Eirik]

How do I edit?

Meant "any four guys" obviously.

Beates - the most overrated band in history.

[Ash]

The Beates?
(look at your previous post)



Post Edited (08-20-04 12:04)

[Dave Munger]

I can't believe people give Burton credit for "making Batman cool". So he didn't go with the 60s TV white eyebrows Batman. He didn't invent the character, he just  crudely copied the dark knight version of him, and went with the cookie cutter comic book movie plot: He finds out the Joker was the one who killed his parents, and he kills the Joker, thus guaranteeing that the sequels can't possibly work, because THE JOKER is dead! You can't have Batman without the Joker! Oh, but I guess killing a guy makes it all true to the original artist's dark vision .... so kill off a henchy you feeb!!! BTW, not knowing who killed his parents is basically what makes Bruce Wayne Batman, he has to take it out on personifications of the concepts of madness, crime, and evil. Burton's Batman is just some Charles Bronson wannabe with stupid ears on his hat. Also, Burton takes "dark" literally, and tries to deliver a "dark" tone by making everything black and underlighting it. Arrg, it's a metaphor, retard!

[Harry]

Shyamalan is dissapointing, but not as bad as many make him out to be

I love Burton, Planet of the Apes being his only disaster.  And it's true that Burton didn't make batman cool, Frank Miller did that, but he has made the best Bat-Films as of yet.

Bale - American Psycho "the worst movie you've ever seen" give me a break and don't be so extreme.  If you didn't like it, I can't make you like it, but it's a good movie and can't be the worse you've ever seen.  I think Bale is a great actor, and perfect for batman.  Whoever it was that criticized Bale for playing a good emotionless character in Equilibruim...explain how that's bad.  He's not Keanu Reeves, he can play other characters quite well (you did also mention American Psycho, and I think he pulled out a little emotion in that one ;)

Dave Matthews - Dave Matthews himself is so overrated that it hurts me to think about it.  His BAND however, are some are the most talented musicians out there.  If you take away Dave...not overrated, with dave....way overrated.

[Kory]

I think I would add George Lucas to that.   His early stuff is awesome (original Star Wars trilogy, Indiana Jones Trilogy) and American Graffiti was good.  I can't think of a single movie after these that I liked- yet everyone in america bows down to the guy and his new crap movies.

Reece Witherspoon: I don't understand the fascination with her.  She isn't that great.

Quentin Tarantino: I know you mentioned him already, but I thought it worthy of an additional post.

Tom Cruise: He was good in Minority Report, but he really hasn't done anything good in a LONG time... yet everything he does turns to gold.  I have to mention, though, that I haven't seen "Last Samurai" yet so my opinion may change.


Anyways, just some thoughts.

[Kory]

I forgot to mention a huge one:

MICHAEL MOORE.

I don't want to start another huge thread, I just have to mention him because he is very overrated, in my opinion.

[raj]

The Last Samurai was good, but it suffers from the desire to portray American capitalist culture as bad vs. the noble & pure Samurai feudal system.

And I can't help but see Tom Cruise as Tom Cruise in his movies.