Courtesy of Rotten Tomatoes
Number 5: King’s Ransom (2005)
Starring: Anthony Anderson, Jay Mohr, Regina Hall, Loretta Devine
Synposis: Successful but boorish business man Malcolm King and his mistress plan his own kidnap after his wife threatens a costly divorce. He will be ransomed for a substantial part of his fortune, which will be kicked back to him. Unfortunately, he gravely underestimates the ineptitude of his kidnappers.
Critical consensus: An utterly inept, would-be comedy.
Comments: “The wordplay of the title here is the only slightly clever element of this extremely lame comedy.” “King’s Ransom deserves to be bashed, burned, and have its ashes scattered over Hollywood.” “Spurn King’s Ransom as you would spurn a rabid weasel.”
Tomatometer: 0%
Number 4: Pinocchio (2002)
Starring: Roberto Benigni, Carlo Guiffre, Nicoletta Braschi, Breckin Meyer
Synopsis: Well, you know the story.
Critical consensus: Torturous: Avoid it like the plague.
Comments: “Benigni presents himself as the boy puppet Pinocchio, complete with receding hairline, weathered countenance and American Breckin Meyer’s ridiculously inappropriate Valley Boy voice.” “If you saw Benigni’s Pinocchio at a public park, you’d grab your kids and run and then probably call the police.” “This is a monumental achievement in practically every facet of inept filmmaking: joyless, idiotic, annoying, heavy-handed, visually atrocious, and often downright creepy.”
Tomatometer: 0%
Number 3: Crossover (2006)
Starring: Anthony Mackie, Wesley Jonathan, Allen Payne, Lil JJ
Synopsis: A story about street basketball – a tale of two friends from Very Different Backgrounds who discover, through streetball, that they…well, we wouldn’t want to spoil it for you; suffice it to say that copious amounts of Wayne Brady are crucial to the plot. Draw your own conclusions.
Critical consensus: This heartfelt but incompetent picture is the cinematic equivalent of an airball.
Comments: “A real air ball, so poorly scripted that most of the major plot developments occur offscreen.” “Much as they would like it to, basketball can’t save the youthful inner-city players here. Nor does the ultra-fast-paced street version of the sport save this movie from predictability and tedium.” “I hated this movie. It’s a piece of junk.”
Tomatometer: 0%
Number 2: Alone in the Dark (2005)
Starring: Christian Slater, Tara Reid, Stephen Dorff, William Sanderson
Synposis: A paranormal investigator faces the toughest case of his life – rooted in his own dark past. All sorts of stuff about some kind of supernatural evil. Too involved to reproduce here.
Critical consensus: Stylish, but inept on almost every level.
Comments: “Lame monster movies like this adaptation of the popular Atari video game are scary for all the wrong reasons.” “Little of Alone in the Dark makes Earthly sense, but it at least knows how to be bad in original ways.” “This is pretty close to one of the worse movies that I’ve ever seen and having to recap it is making my brain bleed.”
Tomatometer: 1%
Number 1: Ballistic: Ecks vs Sever (2002)
Starring: Lucy Liu, Antonio Banderas, Gregg Henry, Ray Park
Synopsis: Lucy Liu and Antonio Banderas are opposing super-deadly secret agents who team up to take down the corrupt head of their agency in order to save a young boy who has been injected with a deadly weapon/virus thing.
Critical consensus: Wall-to-wall action without a hint of wit or plot.
Comments: “Banderas mopes through this hideous and unintelligible enterprise like a bloodhound with a hangover, while Liu elects to look cool in leather in lieu of a performance.” “Antonio Banderas, Lucy Liu, have you no pride? Have you no standards? Have you no shame? Don’t you pay attention to what’s written on the papers you’re signing?” “Sadistic: Gratuitous Vs. Arbitrary.”
Tomatometer: 0%