It is a lame, uninspired choice to use Good/Bad/Ugly as a movie rating system so I made a slightly adjacent choice. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly is not so much my kind of movie (although there was a Bard on the Beach interpretation of Taming of the Shrew that was set in a the wild west, using this movie as inspiration, that might be one of the best things I’ve ever seen … but I digress). The Good, The Bad, and the Weird, however, is one of four excellent South Korean films* that I’ve seen and as a rating system I think it fits better. It’s not much of an improvement over “lame” but hey, it’s a pandemic and imagination is hard to come by.
A Trip to the Moon (Le voyage dans la lune)
The Good: This 13 min French movie from 1902 can be found on YouTube and you should definitely stop everything you’re doing right now and go watch it. It is fantastic, hilarious, and oddly ahead of its time in many aspects of travel to the moon (albeit not so much once they land there where they wander around breathing the “air” and encountering alien creatures.) You are probably familiar with this movie from the iconic image below. For 13 mins, you really should just watch it. 1902! Telephones didn’t even exist yet!
Diner
The Bad: A college buddy movie that struggled to hold my attention. TBH I’m pretty sick of guy buddy movies where the women characters (if there are any) are basically just props. Strangely, a lot of people seem to think highly of it. Who knows, maybe I slept through the important parts.
Gunga Din
The Weird: A strange romp through British-ruled India during a Thuggee uprising. It features the comedic antics of Cary Grant, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., and Victor McLaglen, along with Sam Jaffe playing the title character, an Indian-native-British-soldier-wannabe, as they try to quell the Thuggee mob. The cherry on top of this peculiar sundae is that the story is based loosely on a poem by Rudyard Kipling, author of The Jungle Book. (A quick personal aside: Kipling also wrote the poem The Sons of Martha which, in 1922, became part of the Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer performed by Canadian engineers at their graduation.)
An American Werewolf in London
The Good: A full 2 minute scene of David Naughton transforming into a werewolf, amazingly using practical special effects – no CGI here, my friends! Also, his friend, murdered by the original werewolf, keeps popping up in increasingly advanced states of decomposition, to make jokes about being dead and to explain the curse of the werewolf and how to break it by being killed.
Easy Rider
The Bad: The characters spend the entire movie drunk, high on pot, and driving motorcycles. I’m pretty sure the actors do too.
Daisies
The Weird: Another Czech movie, this one from 1966, that makes me wonder *what* is going on over there? This one is brimming with weirdness as two teenage girls decide that the world is spoiled and ergo so should they be. They then spend a large part of the movie tricking older men into buying them lunch before abandoning them on trains. Fun bit of trivia – the movie was banned by Czech authorities for “depicting the wanton”. It is true that the two girls stuff themselves with pastries and cake while at lunch with one gentleman who clearly thinks he’s on a date with one of them and can’t quite figure out why the other one is there.
Robin Hood
The Good: This is the Robin Hood that all subsequent movies tried to be, from that catastrophic Kevin Costner disaster (Rule 4!) to its humourous spoof starring personal fave Cary Elwes, and of course the ones in 2018, 2010, 2013, 1991, 1973, and so on. But nothing quite lives up to Errol Flynn’s wacky adventures, disrupting castle ops and wooing Maid Marion as he works to keep the Norman king from taking the throne until Richard the Lion-heart can return from war to claim it. Tons. Of. Fun. As an added bonus, you get to see that Bugs Bunny scene for real. Welcome to Sherwood!
The Deer Hunter
The Bad: The horrors of the Vietnam war are horrifyingly horrible. Also, some pretty horrible Russian roulette scenes, just in case the horribleness wasn’t quite horrible enough for you. You may like and appreciate this movie – lots and lots of people do – but for me it is disturbing and unwatchable.
Stalker
The Weird: A guide, known as the Stalker, escorts 3 people into The Zone in search of The Room where they hope to achieve spiritual awakening and meaning. The Zone turns out to be a Chernobyl-like nuclear wasteland , except this movie was made in 1979, so … not Chernobyl. It was, however, inspired by a different nuclear accident that took place near Chelyabinsk in 1957. This is a pretty heady movie and it’s necessary to pay close attention to the subtitles (the movie is Russian) if you have any hope of following the plot. You will probably still have trouble, especially when they all start taking naps in puddles on the wet ground on their way to enlightenment. Another weird, yet surprisingly unsurprising fact, is that people who escort tourists illegally into the actual Chernobyl exclusion zone have taken to calling themselves Stalkers.
King Kong
The Good: Everything about this movie is fantastic! The feisty Fay Wray agrees to a questionable ocean voyage to star in a movie (and admiringly embraces her adventure!). When the film crew arrives at the uncharted Skull Island, Fay Wray is captured and offered up to King Kong as a sacrifice. Immediately enamoured with her (who wouldn’t be!), Kong takes her to his lair. On the way, he has to fight off a Tyrannosaurus Rex (technically, he wrestles the T-Rex in a scene that could easily be part of the WWE), a Plesiosaurus, and a Pteranodon. ALL of the effects are done through stop-motion animation, a technique that could take a full afternoon to complete 1 second of screen time. Somehow, in the scenes where King Kong is manipulated by the animators, Fay Wray can be seen kicking her legs, trying to escape from King Kong’s grip. And we’re not even at the Empire State Building yet!
Red River
The Bad: Basically Mutiny on the Bounty, but with John Wayne and a herd of cows. If you like dude ranch movies, can I recommend City Slickers instead? And if you like John Wayne movies, can I recommend City Slickers instead?
Requiem for a Dream
The Ugly: OMG….. What even to say about this portrayal of 4 people and their respective spirals into drug addiction. Really, that old “this is your brain on drugs” commercial missed the mark. Which one makes YOU want to just say no to drugs?
This?
This is your brain. 
This is your brain on drugs.
Or THIS?
This is your brain. 
This is your brain on drugs.
*The 4 Korean movies are The Host; The Good, The Bad, and the Weird; Oldboy; and Parasite. I can recommend them all, but be warned Oldboy is very hard to watch.
This is just the best! I was laughing out loud here in the dark at 5:30 am. (Agree with you about almost all of them, although I think the first section of The Deerhunter is amazing. But Diner — ugh! I remember liking it when I first saw it, but tried to watch it with Mary a while ago and it was so sexist that I was mad as hell by about Minute #7.) You are definitely my favourite movie reviewer.
Thanks Glenda! Glad you liked it, I had fun with this one!
I agree with Glenda and being a favorite movie reviewer. You don’t like things because they are famous or well known.
My I suggest that you become a “movie curator” and make customized lists of movie recommendations for your friends/fans?
Thanks Chrystal, that would be a fun idea! I already recommended Stalker to Mr. Hipp for it’s spiritual quest.