Terrifier (2018)

zero stars
Terrifier is pure, unadulterated trash. I hated every second of it. Director Damien Leone gives us a killer clown named Art, who dispatches his victims in the most gruesome ways possible, but he doesn't stack up well at all to filmdom's more sinister clowns. Pennywise commits psychological warfare and exploits his victims' fears. The Chiodo Brothers' killer klowns from outer space were inventive in their use of circus props to hunt humans. The Joker? He's been analyzed to death. He warrants it. He's one of the greatest comic book villains of all time. Art the Clown doesn't belong in that company, nor does he belong in the company of Freddy, Jason and Michael. He's a one-dimensional killing machine in a one-dimensional movie that isn't scary, suspenseful, interesting or clever. It's witless and stupid. It's a parade of characters who meet a grisly demise for no purpose other than to showcase the special effects crew's talents.

Baby's Day Out (1994)

zero stars
Despite his '90s output, John Hughes will forever remain one of my favorite screenwriters. The guy knew how to write great dialogue. He viewed his teenage characters as complex individuals with strengths and weaknesses, dreams and insecurities. What happened? How did he go from Sixteen Candles to this? Baby's Day Out (1994) is his worst movie. Though he wasn't the director, he still wrote it and produced it, which meant he had enough input to take much of the blame for its failures. There is not a single redeemable aspect of the finished product. I didn't buy the premise. The characters are stupid. The soundtrack grates all the way to the bitter end. The special effects are substandard, which might be okay if the movie were any good as a live-action cartoon, but it isn't. The direction is appalling, though I'll give director Patrick Read Johnson a pass because he made Angus the following year. No, this is a John Hughes film, and its existence represents a low point in the revered writer's catalogue. His gifts to Gen X teens and children are still held in high esteem. Baby's Day Out is that lump of coal that accidentally fell into the stocking.

Prom Night (1980)

zero stars
A character in Scream says that if someone watched Prom Night, that person would know the rules of the slasher film genre and survive if such a scenario ever came up. As I watched Prom Night, I couldn't find any rules established anywhere in its runtime, so its educational value is in question. Its entertainment value is also in question, since there is not a single decent acting job to be found, nor is there any reasonable attempt by the director to generate any kind of tension, nor is there any interesting dialogue written to get the plot going. In short, this is a wasteful 87 minutes of stunningly awful story exposition.

The Avengers (1998)

zero stars
This review is for the 1998 film based on the British T.V. show and not for the Marvel series.

If I were to come up with a new way to market The Avengers, I'd say put copies of the movie in the pharmacy next to the sleeping pills. This disastrous film would probably make more money that way than it did in the theaters. I woke up on a Friday morning after a good night's sleep, and a trip to the movies sounded like a great idea. After halfway through The Avengers, I was ready for a nap.

Day of the Dead: Bloodline (2018)

zero stars
I can only speculate what motived the people behind Day of the Dead: Bloodline into making this ridiculous movie, but I suspect it has a lot to do with the success of the television series The Walking Dead. The T.V. show takes the zombie apocalypse concept and stretches it out over a long period of time with recurring characters, offering viewers a unique and often tense narrative about the end of civilization. George Romero popularized this concept in 1968. His imitators are legion. Whether they are from Italy or Bulgaria, the pretenders never run out of steam. In the case of Day of the Dead (1985), there have been two remakes, neither of which captured the Romero magic while lumbering over the material in a braindead manner. This movie has no business existing. There’s nothing about it to justify its commitment to film (or digital, whatever the case may be). It’s badly acted and plotted.

I Spit on Your Grave (2010)

zero stars

The fire started slowly and grew hotter and more intense as I Spit on Your Grave played out. It was an endurance test, orchestrated by filmmakers with questionable motives. Here is a remake that is every bit the movie its superior inspiration was accused of being, serving up improbabilities and clichés without any sort of noble purpose in mind. By the end of the movie, the fire had grown out of control, my blood boiling, putting to test all my efforts to continue watching. If I had stopped watching, I could not declare this the worst movie I’ve ever seen. I did finish and can therefore declare it so. I Spit on Your Grave is the worst movie I’ve ever seen.