The nostalgia that accompanies the experience of going to the Drive-in movie theater often helps mask the quality of the film you are seeing. Movies such as "Exorcist: The Beginning" and "Charlie's Angels II: Full Throttle" seem a little less shitty when you pay only $5.50 for two movies and are able to sneak in your own drinks and snacks. For God's sake, I saw "Waterworld" at the Drive-in years ago and was never tempted to demand a refund. Regrettably, the power of this magical experience proved ineffective against the mighty clout of crappity crap-ness that is "The Brothers Grimm". If the director, Terry Gilliam, had hoped to make a wondrous tale explaining the origins of our most beloved bed-time stories, he failed miserably. However, if he had hoped to keep the audience consistently annoyed for two hours straight, he succeeded remarkably. How did he do this, you ask?
Step 1: Make everyone speak with accents. Peter Stormare as an Italian torture specialist...truly frightening. I thought he was Russian until his character said that he was Italian. You know that the director snuck that line in after he realized that Stormare's accent was unrecognizable by all those who have the ability to hear. You may remember Stormare from Fargo...he was great in that movie...he had about two spoken lines. So the Italian torture guy has an Italian accent, the French general has a French accent, and the German peasants have...English accents? Well, Matt Damon doing an English accent is scary enough; the thought of him attempting German is terrifying.
Step 2: Utilize really, really, really bad CGI. Can we start a petition that will make it mandatory for directors to acquire a license before using computer graphics? It would be quite simple; just ask the director what their idea of great imaging is. If they answer "Lord of the Rings", they are granted the license. If they answer "Clash of the Titans", they are imprisoned. This system could save lives.
Step 3: Make us not care, whatsoever, about the characters. The audience should normally have an emotional attachment to the characters and should want to see them achieve their goals. If, however, the audience is rooting for them to die just so that they will shut the hell up, there will be little suspense in the story-telling (see also: Dakota Fanning in "War of the Worlds").
Needless to say, this movie is not recommended to be seen at a drive-in, nor in a regular theater, nor in a DVD player. This movie is not even recommended as a "let's go see it and laugh at how bad it is" kind of outing. You're tempted now, aren't you? Don't even think about it.
Because we go to the movies a lot, people often ask us, "Seen any good movies lately?" Unfortunately the theater that we now attend selects its largest theaters for showings of "Son of the Mask" and was playing "Fat Albert" for at least two months- the good movie pickings seem to be a bit slim. Therefore, we opt for movies that, while not good, may at least unintentionally make us laugh at the unspeakable crimes that they commit towards the art of cinema. Now, with excuses out of the way, let's get on with the review.
Whenever a movie starts off with two girls stopping at a boardwalk fortune-teller to be told "BEWARE! You bear the mark of the Beast! I see BLOOD! Sooo muuuch bloooood!", you pretty much know that it's going to be painful. But there's also this hope that Christina Ricci will make the movie a little classy. Sure, she's got a forehead like the grill on a Mack truck, but her resume is impressive, so she would never be in anything crappy...would she? Then to your horror, you suddenly remember...she was in 'Casper'. This is going to be a long two hours. Well, maybe 90 minutes if we're lucky.
It turns out, Kevin Williamson is to blame for the majority of this movie because, well, he wrote it. If this isn't enough evidence needed to burn him at the stake in front of enraged Villagers with pitch-forks, consider this: he also wrote for 'Dawson's Creek'. Speaking of which, the casting director for 'Cursed' called in the pinch-hitter of all crappy movies, Joshua Jackson, to play Christina Ricci's love interest. C'mon now. Christina Ricci has played a lesbian so many times that she's as convincing as a straight girl as Hillary Swank is at playing a female. What? She is a female? Woof.
The true climax and official "COME ONNNN!!!" moment, however, is when a werewolf gives Christina Ricci the finger. Yes...a werewolf...giving the finger...
Overall, this movie gets a rating of four silver bullets as long as they are shot through your head in order to put you out of your misery.
Okay, we realize that by writing a critique of this movie, we are simply setting ourselves up for ridicule, seeing how we actually PAID to see this movie. With that out of the way, please refrain from poking fun unless you are so incredibly perfect in every way and are able to resist the evilness that Michael Keaton exudes, drawing you to see his movies, whether it's 'White Noise' or 'Jack Frost'. He's the Devil, I tell you...
I mean, why else would perfectly sane people go to see a 90-minute movie that is about 80% static? (the other 20% consists of the audience waiting for Michael Keaton to confront his female co-star's obviously botched face lift). So, here's a summary so you won't waste your hard earned cash on this movie:
Guy has perfect wife and adorable son from previous marriage. Wife dies in a freak accident. Guy upset. Guy approached by obese British man regarding communications that have been established with dead wife. Guy disgusted by British man at first, but eventually succombs to the traditional thought, "He's British, therfore he must know something that I don't..." Guy becomes obsessed with communicating via static and eventually becomes a clairvoyent and saves people from menacing dark figures. The End.
We have nothing bad to offer up about this movie series because we have spent the better part of a year trying to find a flaw in this trilogy. One would think that a movie that goes back and forth between time periods would certainly lose some facts along the way, but no, they are able to keep the story intact through three adventurous films. Sure, we've theorized on a couple of flaws for the third movie, both of which revolve around the character of Clara Clayton, but they are pretty weak. So consider this a challenge to present a time-travel flaw to us- and we don't mean some stupid, factual flaw like "the Native Americans wouldn't have shot arrows into a DeLorean" or "Marvin Barry never performed at any High School dances...he wasn't even a musician!", because, c'mon, this is a movie we're talking about! They can't be perfect!
1. Dance-off's.
2. Unnecessary glass smashing (especially after drinking an experimental serum).
3. Leafy Greens and a French Baguette overflowing from a paper grocery sack.
4. Flicking of a cigarette into a flamable liquid to create a huge explosion (made even better if the bad-ass walks away from the explosion without flinching).
5. Cars that explode AS they are flying off a cliff, before they have made contact with anything.
6. Perfect parking spots on the busiest of city streets.
7. Car gas gauges that go un-checked until the driver is being chased by a homicidal maniac.
8. Drunks who hiccup.
9a. Heterosexual men who find themselves in such desperate situations that they must dress as a woman.
b. They then, despite looking hideously androgenous, get hit on by very horny and aggressive men.
10. Dance routines that everyone automatically knows.
11. Windows without screens.
12. People climbing up a gutter, or better yet, an ivy-filled lattice in order to ENTER the window without a screen.