As difficult as it is to believe, the turning over of the new year means that 10 years have passed since the splendor of 2015, a year which, in film at least, was defined by soaring successes and enduring hits.Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakenswasthe highest-grossing movie of the yearwith a box office intake of $2 billion.Spotlightwent on to win Best Picture, while such hits asMad Max: Fury Road,Whiplash,Sicario, andInside Outhave come to be the revered gems of the year.
However, for all this acclaim and success, the year had some massive misfires as well. From abysmal adaptations to shocking sequels, horrendous horrors, and even some monumental missteps from some of the most decorated filmmakers the industry has ever seen,cinema’s low points of 2015 are as memorable as they are catastrophic.
10’Jupiter Ascending' (2015)
Directed by the Wachowskis
A rare mishit from the Wachowskis,Jupiter Ascendingwas an ill-fated attempt from the directing duo to kick-start a larger trilogy. Unfortunately, it underperformed at the box office and wasmet with derision from fans and critics alike, ensuring any prospects of further installments would remain unfulfilled. The space opera follows a maid on Earth whose life is drastically changed when she learns she is descended from a line of galactic warriors and pulled into a desperate struggle to protect humanity from a looming powerful force.
Despite an impressive visual display,Jupiter Ascendingcapitulates as a story so eager to engage with its grandiose scale that it never gives itself a chance to set a platform that audiences can invest in and care about. Couple such an unfulfilling narrative withuncertain plotting, puzzling performances, and even an underwhelming depiction of the sci-fi action sequences, andJupiter Ascendingdwindles as a deeply flawed attempt at epic grandeur that is entirely misguided and not even remotely accessible.
Jupiter Ascending
9’Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension' (2015)
Directed by Gregory Plotkin
A clever mixture of low-budget genius and mounting tension, theParanormal Activityfranchise is a defining highlight of 21st century horror. However, it still has its damning lulls with 2015’sParanormal Activity: The Ghost Dimensionby far the weakest entry in the series. The sixth film in the saga, it is closely tied to the prequelParanormal Activity 3as it follows a young couple moving into a new house who discover a series of disturbing tapes and realize they are in the midst of a supernatural nightmare.
While there is some intrigue to be found in how it connects to other movies in the franchise,Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimensionis incapable of generating new thrills, disappointing horror fans and critics alike with its unexciting execution and its shambles of a story. It lacks the patience to build any suspense and under-delivers when it comes to the frights, making foran underwhelming movie that saps the franchise of much of its initial brillianceand stands as one of the more monotonous movies of 2015.
Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension
8’The Boy Next Door' (2015)
Directed by Rob Cohen
A poor attempt at an erotic thrillerthat lacks the insight or maturity to address the underlying issues of its narrative,The Boy Next Dooris a film that disturbs in all the wrong ways.Jennifer Lopezstars as Claire, a recently divorced teacher who teases a steamy, flirtatious relationship with her new neighbor, a 19-year-old boy who goes to the school she teaches at. While she tries to keep the playful teasing innocent, she eventually succumbs to the youth’s advances and finds herself stuck in a violent and volatile situation when she tries to end things.
Perhaps an even greater offense than its ignorance of its problematic central relationship is itscomplete inability to generate any meaningful tension or intrigue with its stalker suspense. Lopez does what she can to imbue it with some semblance of energy and spark, but the film around her is simply a lazy realization of a half-baked story that doesn’t even have the presence or impact to become a so-bad-it’s-good cult classic.
The Boy Next Door
7’Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2' (2015)
Directed by Andy Fickman
Few films have cried out for a sequel less than 2009’s goofy comedy action filmPaul Blart: Mall Cop. However, given its impressive box office performance, there is perhaps little surprise it received a follow-up in the form of 2015’sPaul Blart: Mall Cop 2. Becoming an even more derided film than its critically lambasted predecessor, it sees Paul Blart (Kevin James) earn an invitation to a security convention in Las Vegas where he learns of a planned heist at his hotel and sets out to prevent it.
Even more heavy-handed on the fat jokes and the slapstick segway gags, all while losing any semblance of heart and charm its predecessor had,Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2isthe encapsulation of a derivative and unwanted sequel that hopes only to replicate prior success. It lacks anything in the way of redemptive moments or comedic highlights, dwindling as a calamitous misfire that, while still turning a profit, was berated by critics and moviegoers alike.
Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2
6’The Gallows' (2015)
Directed by Travis Cluff & Chris Lofing
Despite being made on a measly budget,The Gallowswent on to become something of an indie hit with its impressive box office gross of$42.9 million. Unfortunately, this financial success didn’t mean the film was particularly strong. In 1993, a high school stage production is met with tragedy when one of the students is killed when a prop malfunctions during the performance. 20 years later, the school tries to put on a new performance of the same play, only to realize that they may be putting their own lives in danger in the process.
The film’s admirable efforts to generate atmospheric tension falter beneatha glaringly formulaic and derivative script, a weak and unconvincing screenplay, and a host of main characters that are entirely inaccessible. Couple these weaknesses withan absurd plot twist endingthat only strives to be surprising and, in turn, works to the film’s detriment, andThe Gallowsis an unbecoming misfire that serves as a definitive low point of found-footage horror.
The Gallows
5’Accidental Love' (2015)
Directed by David O. Russell
While the mixed reception toDavid O. Russell’s 2015 dramaJoywas underwhelming to say the least, it still far surpassedthe director’s disowned releaseofAccidental Lovethat same year. The story of the picture’s production is a nightmare in itself, with shooting transpiring in 2008 before multiple issues with funding delayed the finalization of the production and even led to O. Russell departing. When it was finally released in 2015, O. Russell had his name removed from the credits with the pseudonymousStephen Greenelisted as the director.
Alice Eckle (Jessica Biel) is a smalltown waitress whose life is impacted by a nail entrenched in her head. Her efforts to gain compensation see the clueless Congressman Howard Birdwell (Jake Gyllenhaal) agree to aid her cause, only for the unlikely duo to find themselves falling in love.Neither its soggy romance nor its half-hearted satire of the American healthcare system finds any spark, leavingAccidental Loveas a star-studded mishit of squandered potential that is a colossal disaster.
Accidental Love
4’The Ridiculous 6' (2015)
Directed by Frank Coraci
It is quite the statement thatAdam Sandlerstarred inPixelsin 2015 and that still wasn’t the worst picture he was attached to in the year. That honor goes toThe Ridiculous 6, a Netflix original that follows White Knife (Sandler), an orphan raised by American Indians who learns that he and five other notorious outlaws are all half-brothers and sets out to unite them all on a quest to locate their father.
The Ridiculous 6is simultaneously too lazy as a spoof to appease lovers of goofy comedy, too grating and juvenile to imbue its racially insensitive undertones with any amusement or grace, andtoo familiar—even for diehard Sandler fans—to be anything other than stale and dull. One suspects it may have inspired mass outrage and offense if it had the depth or ingenuity to evoke anything of an emotional response. It is one of the few films tohold a 0% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
The Ridiculous 6
3’Fantastic Four' (2015)
Directed by Josh Trank
While the superhero genre has soared through the 21st century, it has still been prone to the occasional disasterpiece. Perhaps no film has embodied this unfortunate notion quite like 2015’sFantastic Four. The woeful comic book adaptation follows four young geniuses who teleport to an alternate universe and gain unique powers in the process. As they try to learn how to utilize their new abilities, they find themselves having to unite to stand against a former ally turned existential evil.
Stripping the story of much of the comics’ vibrancy and color, while failing to implement anything new in terms of riveting spectacle or action extravagance,Fantastic Fourisan abysmal misfire that failed in its attempts to leech off the success of the genre. Nothing short of an abomination, it isthe worst major release in superhero film history, an action-adventure spectacle so dour and downtrodden that it never even threatens to present anything in the way of fun or excitement.
Fantastic Four
2’Fifty Shades of Grey' (2015)
Directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson
Among the most infamous films of the past decade, the adaptation ofE. L. James’ smutty sensation is as tasteless and gratuitous as the shambolic source material it was based on. It follows Ana (Dakota Johnson), a young college graduate whose life changes forever when she begins an intense, sadomasochistic relationship with Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan), a billionaire entrepreneur with a tortured past.
Technically, it isthe ninth highest-grossing romance film ever. Realistically, it is an insult to romantic cinema to describe it as such. The film is a shallow and unsophisticated romp that coasts on surface-level scandal and sex appeal to make a splash. The fact that such an approach worked to the tune of $569.7 million at the box office is an indictment on modern movie-going audiences.Woefully scripted, deplorably executed, and meekly meandering from one sex scene to the nextwith even less passion than the characters muster in their most intimate moments,Fifty Shades of Greyis a steamy soap opera of melodramatic malaise that spends the majority of its screen time actively insulting the viewers.
Fifty Shades of Grey
1’The Human Centipede III (Final Sequence)' (2015)
Directed by Tom Six
The climax of a horror trilogy defined by grotesque visuals and little else,The Human Centipede III (Final Sequence)is yet another shocking yet shallow entry inTom Six’s meaningless body horror saga. It sees prison warden Bill Boss (Dieter Laser) and his admiring copycat Martin Lomax (Laurence R. Harvey) join forces as they develop a sadistic scheme to suture 500 inmates together.
Six brings his depravity and senselessness to the screen in a fashion which is demeaning and disappointing even by his usual low standards, withThe Human Centipede III (Final Sequence)nothing more thana twisted and borderline celebratory presentation of sadistic sexual violence and gratuitous torture porn. Tasteless and without purpose, the film is not only the worst picture of 2015, but a disgraceful embarrassment of juvenile depravity that succeeds only in cheapening the art form of horror film-making.
