Cine-bile

When compiling my list of the worst films of the decade, I asked myself three questions. Does this movie literally make me taste bile? Does it symbolize a cinematic cancer larger than itself? Did I leave the theater incredulous, intellectually offended and filled with despair?

These 10 films pass the “bile test”:

No. 10: Melinda and Melinda. The worst Woody Allen comedy in a decade of unfunny stinkers is also a failed drama.

No. 9: Stolen Summer. Project Greenlight gave us great television and god-awful movies, none worse than Pete Jones’ anti-Semitic “feel-good” film.

No. 8: The Longest Yard. Degrading Robert Aldrich’s gutsy football/prison flick into a PG-13 Adam Sandler comedy makes this the most offensive of the decade’s many terrible remakes.

No. 7: Tideland. Awful not just for the unleavened tedium, but also because director Terry Gilliam appears beforehand to pre-emptively condemn the audience’s “fear and prejudice.”

No. 6: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. The only movie that could make the first Transformers look like an E.M. Forster comedy of manners.

No. 5: The Lara Croft duology. How do you screw up Angelina Jolie running around in short shorts? You make the most joylessly frenetic action movies of the decade.

No. 4: The Majestic. A condescending “homage” to classic films and a mockery of the Hollywood blacklist combined into one shameless Jim Carrey treacle-fest.

No. 3: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The Star Wars prequels didn’t make the list because George Lucas is dead to me, but Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford willingly collaborated in this candy-assification of Indiana Jones.

No. 2: The Terminal. Obscene product placement was the decade’s most noxious trend, and this was the unquestionable nadir, with every shot lovingly framed by corporate logos.

No. 1: Northfork. To me, this insanely unwatchable 2003 religious “parable” has come to symbolize a film completely devoid of value. Six years removed, and I can still taste the bile.