HOLLYWOOD has produced another bumper crop of turkeys this year – so grab a plate and give no-thanks today for these cinematic gobblers, stuffed with some of Tinseltown’s biggest names and garnished with tens of millions of wasted dollars.
After last year’s “Gigli,” Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez became the unofficial king and queen of turkeydom and sure enough, they defended their titles with their respective fall Butterballs, Affleck’s “Surviving Christmas” (which barely made it to Halloween) and Lopez’s downsized role in the lead-footed romantic musical, “Shall We Dance.”
And speaking of feet of clay, Brad Pitt played the ancient Greek warrior Achilles with fallen arches and a faux Russell Crowe accent in “Troy,” which boasted such immortal lines as, “Helen has left with the Trojans” – while Colin Farrell fell on his sword as the fey emperor in the year’s other ersatz historical epic, Oliver Stone’s “Alexander.”
Then there was that other Ben – the hyperactive and mugging Stiller, who will have graced five alleged comedies before the year’s end. It’s a safe bet that none will be worse than “Envy,” a desperate, unfunny farce for which co-star Jack Black personally apologized at the Cannes Film Festival.
While he was at it, Black should publicly atone for his mincing vocal performance as a closet-case shark in “Shark’s Tale,” with Italian stereotypes that should have slept with the fishes.
Back on dry land, Halle Berry hissed and licked herself in the purrfectly awful hairball of a would-be franchise “Catwoman” – can we take back her Oscar? – and the part-animated “Garfield” was another cat-astrophe that should have gone straight to the litter pan.
Speaking of pedigree, this was the year from hell for Oscar winner Nicole Kidman, who delivered three duds – the dull and pretentious “Dogville,” the campfest “The Stepford Wives” and the stillborn “Birth,” in which she propositioned a 10-year-old boy who claimed to be her late husband. (The boy was played by the creepy Cameron Bright, who was cloned by Robert De Niro in the similarly dreadful horror flick “Godsend.”)
Kidman and De Niro’s careers will survive, but serious questions about the future of the hypermasculine Vin Diesel were raised by his bellowing in the incoherent sci-fi epic “The Chronicles of Riddick,” and Heath Ledger capped his recent string of flops with a lethargic turn as the Australian Jesse James in “Ned Kelly.”
TV comedian Jimmy Fallon, however, was dead on arrival in his screen debut as a moronic cop in “Taxi,” while fellow boob tuber Ray Romano failed to make any impact on the big screen in the lame comedy “Welcome to Mooseport.”
Meanwhile, it’s time to stick a fork in the overhyped British character actor Jude Law, who notched four straight duds, including the smug and annoying “I [LOVE] Huckabees” and, worst of all, the pointless, obnoxious remake of “Alfie.”
“Seed of Chucky” graphically demonstrated alternative uses for turkey basters, while the megabucks animated “The Polar Express” slowed to a crawl with a chilly, supersized vision of the North Pole that Hitler’s architect, Albert Speer, could best appreciate – in 3D!
Vincent Gallo’s super-tedious drama “The Brown Bunny” blew, in more ways than one, but for sheer hot air, it was hard to beat “Fahrenheit 9/11,” which may have raked in big bucks – but utterly failed to deliver on Michael Moore’s boasts that his screed would unseat President Bush.
Happy Thanksgiving.