Leigh Paatsch: The 10 worst movies of 2018
If “Australian erotic thriller” doesn’t have movie disaster written all over it, nothing does. These are the worst movies of 2018 that are almost so bad they’re good.
Leigh Paatsch
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The Australian film industry may be in decent shape, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been responsible for some stinkers this year. Five of the 10 worst films of 2018 came from Down Under. Strewth!
1. GOING FOR GOLD
Australia’s first and last movie about competitive cheerleading. Remember Bring It On? Well say hi to Turn It Off. Very wobbly choreography and very stilted acting suggests either most scenes were filmed in one take, or nobody told the cast the cameras were switched on.
READ THE FULL REVIEW HERE
2. THE SECOND
A calamitous Australian erotic thriller where anything remotely resembling the erotic or thrilling has been absent-mindedly left out. With a few edit tweaks, it has the makings of a classic comedy.
3. SLENDER MAN
One of the creepiest urban myths in internet history became one of the un-creepiest horror movies in motion-picture history. The title character will always be a laughing stock to other big-screen boogeymen.
4. FIFTY SHADES FREED
The trouser-troubling trilogy came to an embarrassing end, like completing a bad Tinder date that lasted three years. Delete all mention of the franchise from your phone, and pretend it never happened.
5. THAT’S NOT MY DOG!
Shane Jacobson invites showbiz pals to tell “the funniest jokes they have heard”. On the evidence presented here, all involved urgently need their hearing checked. Or a complete sense-of-humour transplant.
6. PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING
Why does Hollywood still assume we just can’t get enough of big, blurry slabs of special effects smacking each other around and stomping on stuff?
7. THE NUN
Major debacle for a minor menace from The Conjuring universe. She’s hiding out in a convent in Romania, greeting all who enter with bared fangs, bad breath and awful housekeeping standards.
8. THE FLIP SIDE
A broken Australian rom-com where the rom just never happens. As for the com, it keeps entering and leaving the room like a drunk who has lost some keys.
9. SUSPIRIA
A deliriously pretentious combo of bum-numbing performance-art dance sequences and grotesque gore-mongering. A 152-minute cry for help that will never be answered.
10. THE BBQ
Aussie stalwarts Shane Jacobson and Magda Szubanski were the hapless faces of a family-friendly movie that no family would ever want to make friends with. Always cooked, yet never well done.
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