Movies That Don't Hold Up With Age [Possible Spoilers]

[NihilSinLulz]

After growing tired of modern-mediocre-moody-mega-movies, I went on a 'classic movie' binge.

North By Northwest, The Birds, Casa Blanca, The even number Trek films, The Day the Earth Stood Still, etc. All great films btw.

However, there were also some films that while I could see why they may have been great in their day, I felt lost a lot of their uniqueness with age and more modern films improving on what worked.

Some examples that come to mind are: The Thing (1951), Friday the 13th, most 90s action movies, Hammer horror films.

The Thing: I liked the way it was shot. I liked the innovative (for the time) interrupting, thus more 'real' conversations. And I liked the mystery surrounding the first half of the movie. Then the monster shows up and the plot becomes comically stupid. The characters go on and on about how the Thing is so advanced, having traveled millions of miles through space in its super awesome space ship. So what is the master plan of such an advanced being? To try and get at our heroes by breaking through doors, growling at them, then slowing walking towards them in the most direct fashion possible. Frankenstein's monster-style. Ugh.

Friday the 13th: I wanted to like this movie, I really did. I mean I enjoy and appreciate A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and I even have some admiration for Halloween for its interesting and iconic music and maniac design. Friday the 13th though has no likeable or memorable characters, lame deaths, annoyingly repetitive "creepy" noises, and overall ugly cinematography. I will say the twist at the end was interesting, especially for a modern viewer given what the sequels became and would lead to expect retrospectively. My main problem is that every aspect of the film has been done better by other films.

90s action movies: Fight choreography has advanced so much. I men remember when the fight sequences in The Matrix or Ong-bak used to be awesome and as such, we forgave other weaker areas of a film? After watching The Raid: Redemption, or even the impressive fight sequences in children's cartoons such as The Legend of Korra, what wowed me before only induces a resounding meh in me now.

Hammer horror films: These films became famous for moving away from the mood-heavy 30s-40s Universal monster flicks, and instead relied on violence and tits to be edgy. Sadly, violence and tits has become such a mainstay of modern culture that they have even become a sort of currency of quality for advertising and reality television. Hammer films with their bit of fake blood here, and odd tit there has become little more than quaint.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Honestly I find films that revolve around the birth of the internet back then don't hold up too well either (look up The Net and You've Got Mail).

 

[Casual Shinji]

90s action movies: Fight choreography has advanced so much. I men remember when the fight sequences in The Matrix or Ong-bak used to be awesome and as such, we forgave other weaker areas of a film? After watching The Raid: Redemption, or even the impressive fight sequences in children's cartoons such as The Legend of Korra, what wowed me before only induces a resounding meh in me now.

Eh, I still find the fight scenes in The Matrix way better than any other similar ones. Mainly because they're short, sweet, and to the point. They don't go on for like 15 minutes like in The Raid, where I literally just started tiddying up my room, because the fight scenes went on way beyond the initial excitment of the fight.

Also, 90's action movies still had practical stunts compared to all the green screen/sound stage nonsense we get today.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

90s action movies: Fight choreography has advanced so much. I men remember when the fight sequences in The Matrix or Ong-bak used to be awesome and as such, we forgave other weaker areas of a film? After watching The Raid: Redemption, or even the impressive fight sequences in children's cartoons such as The Legend of Korra, what wowed me before only induces a resounding meh in me now.

Eh, I still find the fight scenes in The Matrix way better than any other similar ones. Mainly because they're short, sweet, and to the point. They don't go on for like 15 minutes like in The Raid, where I literally just started tiddying up my room, because the fight scenes went on way beyond the initial excitment of the fight.

Also, 90's action movies still had practical stunts compared to all the green screen/sound stage nonsense we get today.

That's true. I just watched Speed yesterday, and crappy acting aside, there were some incredible stunts in that film. And Terminator 2? Best Helicopter chase ever.

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

Gone With The Wind.

I love classic movies and many hold up incredibly well.

However, in the case of this "classic" the writing and acting is simply atrocious. Sure, the story is nice and the visuals are wonderful, but none of the actors seem to have any idea what they're doing, which isn't helped by the irritating, sometimes goofy dialogue.

 

[Wereduck]

It still gets a lot of respect as an innovator among movies of it's day but most modern viewers I've spoken to agree that Citizen Kane doesn't hold up at all.

For me personally I'd also say that The Wages of Fear doesn't hold up very well. I thoroughly despised almost all of the main characters and it really lowers the stakes when you don't care whether the protagonist gets killed. I'd imagine that in a time when racism/classism was more socially acceptable they were much more sympathetic characters.

 

[Saxnot]

Blade Runner. I understand that it had a lot of influence and paved the way for much of modern sci - fi, but it is a very, very slow movie. I don't remember a single shot that lasts for shorter than 5 seconds, and that gets very old when there's nothing but a random alley on screen. The storytelling was also rather disjointed, never giving much context about the world or the characters. It may be a historic film, but it is way too steeped in the slowness and disjointedness of some eighties movies to hold a lot of interest for modern audiences.

 

[twistedmic]

Friday the 13th though has no likeable or memorable characters, lame deaths, annoyingly repetitive "creepy" noises, and overall ugly cinematography. I will say the twist at the end was interesting, especially for a modern viewer given what the sequels became and would lead to expect retrospectively. My main problem is that every aspect of the film has been done better by other films.

The main problem is that the first Friday the Thirteenth was more about atmosphere and suspense and less about the gory and 'creative' kills. It was later sequels, and later "scary/horror" movies that shifted focus away from creepy atmospheres and suspenseful moments towards gallons of blood, vicious kills with unorthodox weapons.

 

[Silvanus]

"A New Hope" does not stand the test of time, I'm afraid to say.


An old housemate of mine told me he had never seen Star Wars, and we all agreed to make him watch the originals, by way of educating him. We all felt a little embarrassed for Episode Four, and its poor imitation of our memory of it.


Episodes 5 and 6 are still fantastic, though.

 

[Vausch]

I think we're going to be seeing a lot of "Seinfeld isn't Funny" tropes based on your examples including Friday the 13th there.

"A New Hope" does not stand the test of time, I'm afraid to say.


An old housemate of mine told me he had never seen Star Wars, and we all agreed to make him watch the originals, by way of educating him. We all felt a little embarrassed for Episode Four, and its poor imitation of our memory of it.


Episodes 5 and 6 are still fantastic, though.

You mean aside from the fact that the film is the pinnacle of pacing for a story, was the creation for some of the most memorable characters in history, had had fantastic practical effects?

I know it has more errors than any film in history if you get in analytical mode but it's still a fun ride.

 

[bluepotatosack]

Blade Runner. I understand that it had a lot of influence and paved the way for much of modern sci - fi, but it is a very, very slow movie. I don't remember a single shot that lasts for shorter than 5 seconds, and that gets very old when there's nothing but a random alley on screen. The storytelling was also rather disjointed, never giving much context about the world or the characters. It may be a historic film, but it is way too steeped in the slowness and disjointedness of some eighties movies to hold a lot of interest for modern audiences.

I'm going to assume you meant you couldn't remember a shot that lasts for longer than 5 seconds, rather than shorter. More to the point though, what version of the film are you referring to? The theatrical cut was always considered crap.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

Gone With The Wind.

I love classic movies and many hold up incredibly well.

However, in the case of this "classic" the writing and acting is simply atrocious. Sure, the story is nice and the visuals are wonderful, but none of the actors seem to have any idea what they're doing, which isn't helped by the irritating, sometimes goofy dialogue.

Huh. I hate movies from around that period and Gone with the Wind is one of the few I really like. I have no idea why. Maybe it's the goofiness of it all, maybe it's the way it presents a world I am entirely unfamiliar with and it's a place I wouldn't mind living. Of course, it's incredibly romantic and idealistic and nothing like that exists in real life, which is the opposite of what modern movies try to do with all their realism even in fantasy films.

 

[Saxnot]

I'm going to assume you meant you couldn't remember a shot that lasts for longer than 5 seconds, rather than shorter. More to the point though, what version of the film are you referring to? The theatrical cut was always considered crap.

No, i meant less than. It kept showing me these endless shots of streets or alleyways, and while it was clear they were trying to bring across the atmosphere, i had got the dystopian vibe before they spent ten seconds just showing a shot of the outside of a building where the last two targets lived. Nothing happened. It just kept going on.

I don't know what cut i saw. I watched a DVD a couple of years ago. It could have been either.

 

[bluepotatosack]

I'm going to assume you meant you couldn't remember a shot that lasts for longer than 5 seconds, rather than shorter. More to the point though, what version of the film are you referring to? The theatrical cut was always considered crap.

No, i meant less than. It kept showing me these endless shots of streets or alleyways, and while it was clear they were trying to bring across the atmosphere, i had got the dystopian vibe before they spent ten seconds just showing a shot of the outside of a building where the last two targets lived. Nothing happened. It just kept going on.

I don't know what cut i saw. I watched a DVD a couple of years ago. It could have been either.

Fair enough on the length of the shots. To each their own, etc.

As for which cut, if it had Harrison Ford narrating the entire thing, that's the American theatrical release. If not, it was most likely either the Director's Cut or the Final Cut.

 

[CleverCover]

I'm going to repeat A New Hope.

I never watched it as a kid, but while my aunt was braiding my hair it came on. So I decided to watch something my father swears was a great action/sci-fi movie growing up.

It just annoyed me. Everything about it just annoyed me and it put me off watching the next two.

 

[Nouw]

I nominate Jaws only because of the shark which by today's standards, looks very fake.

 

[ThatDarnCoyote]

The 1989 Tim Burton Batman.

When I first saw it in the theaters, I was mesmerized. I thought it was the most amazing thing I'd seen on screen. Viewed now, a lot of it seems dated and hokey, especially when held up next to the Nolan movies. It was definitely a product of its time.

Don't get me wrong, it's still a good movie, it just has lost a certain something, or at least, it feels that way cause I'm older now.

 

[Saltyk]

Depends on what you mean. I tend to finder older animated movies to be less than stellar. Both CGI and hand drawn. We've come so far in terms of the techniques and technology that they do tend to look unimpressive or even bad in the case of CGI.

And there's always those movies that didn't understand what something was or would become. Gotta love those movies that thought computers are another name for magic.