All VGFlicks, Ranked Worst to Best (#26-#19)

(#26-#19) - (#18-#10) - (#09-#01)

Since 2014, I’ve been covering video game movies under the VGFlicks subtitle, whether they are film adaptations of existing franchises or stories that involve video games to some extent but aren’t adaptations of games. I also reviewed quite a few movies that I’ve seen in theaters without giving them a full-length review. I was waiting until I had covered over 24 movies to make an interesting list.

Well, I currently have 26 movies on the list. I put them together in a page on TierListMaker, which can be accessed here. Note that that list includes some movies that I’m planning to cover on the blog eventually. I encourage folks to make their own tier lists from that page and to share them! In the meantime, I’ve made my own and will be sharing my thoughts here on the placement of each film, and my reasoning behind the position. I’ve made sure to reread my own reviews for that purpose. Also note that I’m covering less than 10 films per article, since I try to condense my thoughts about each to justify the position. Last but not least, I’m going from worst to best – therefore, we’re going over the bad ones today.

Let’s begin with the absolute worst.

#26. Gamer

I don’t recall watching this film since 2014, and if I did, I feel I would only despise it more. I can’t think of a single pleasant thing about it. The tone is nasty, the imagery is gross, and the rhythm is all over the place (That editing is atrocious!)… This may be one of the only times I uttered what TVTropes calls the eight deadly words: “I don’t care what happens to these people”. The characters I do want to root for, the rare likeable ones, are either put through Hell or unceremoniously killed.

Michael C. Hall hamming it up.
No, it salvages nothing from the film.

If there’s a tying theme to everything I do, it’s the notion of respect; expect it to crop up a lot on this list, as a lot of the better video game movies are respectful to gamers while the worse ones…well, aren’t. This is the most unflattering portrayal of gamers that I’ve ever seen. The main gamer character is an egocentric asshole (who only chooses to do the right thing in time for the climax), and the only other one we see is a morbidly obese slob willingly making the character he controls, an actual human being within the context of this film, get sexually assaulted. Any respite among the other characters? Nope – the actual protagonist, Johnn Tillman AKA Kable (played by Gerard Butler), is perfectly willing to kill innocents on his quest.

It is, still to this day, the most miserable viewing experience I’ve had – and ironically, it was also my very first proper movie review on the blog. Here’s to hoping I NEVER have to review another movie as bad as this.

#25. Max Payne

Mark Wahlberg has been a standout actor in several films; this isn’t one of them. In fact, the performances in this film are unremarkable across the board. That’s not even the worst part about this movie that stands as one of the most awful film adaptations of video game franchises. I remember the color-coding, grey for most of the film, and in color only when something interesting was going on; the unremarkable special effects; the plot twist, which made no sense whatsoever within the context of the film; oh, and there’s so much more.

Pictured: Max Payne (right) and one of the most
poorly-implemented twist villains that I have
ever seen (left).

Now, in all fairness, an attempt was made – to homage the original game, we even have the super slow-mo sections where Max gets heightened senses. Shame it only happens twice over the course of the entire film! There’s plenty of references to Norse Mythology, much like the games the film adapts; but the adaptation seems to use it like a crutch. It doesn’t even edit its own sets to reflect changes in the script – the Valkyr drug at the center of the plot is a liquid to be drunk, but there’s still graffiti around the city showing a V with a syringe! Well, that’s a staple of terrible films: Rewritten mid-filming, creating inconsistencies up the wazoo.

It’s a bad movie of the type that isn’t even fun to watch for a few laughs. Steer clear, this is not worth your attention.

Also, the poor Ludacris has roles in the two films I’ve reviewed that I consider the worst. Dude had no luck with his acting career in the late 2000’s.

#24. The Super Mario Bros. Movie

Nothing quite sums up the film as Mario, his
adopted son Luigi (??!) and the "princess"
Daisy talking to the real King (???!) of the
Dinosaur Universe, currently a fungus (?!?!?).

A movie so miserable, even the actors hated the experience of filming it. Like many bad films, the script saw several rewrites – even mid-filming! – and the directors kept arguing with each other over what to do with the product. The result is an unfocused, poorly-executed, garbled mess of bad ideas, very few of which fit the tone of the Mario franchise. Now, the film came out in 1993, and admittedly there wasn’t much to work from at the time. The film references games all the way to Super Mario World, with the appearance of Toad, Yoshi and Princess Daisy (the latter from Super Mario Land), but little of that actually salvages anything. At least, it’s silly enough to make it come past “unwatchable bad” into “hilariously bad”. Dennis Hopper’s memetic moments as King Koopa certainly help.

It’s still bad enough that I won’t recommend it if you want to watch a movie based on the Mario universe. Some argue that it’s more enjoyable if you pretend it’s not a Mario film; I disagree. Even without the Mario name attached to it, this would still be stupid and terrible, because all the flaws of a bad film are still there.

Oh, and that's a Goomba. Sleep well!

With this, a parenthesis: You probably wonder what I think of the upcoming animated Super Mario movie by Illumination, featuring Chris Pratt as Mario and Jack Black as Bowser. Eh, Illumination have their own formulaic issues that you can see in several of their movies, but I generally enjoy what they do; their films are high-quality and quite fun. I have my reserves about Pratt; the guy is a decent actor but I have high doubts on his ability to portray a good Mario, especially after so many years we’ve spent hearing Charles Martinet in the role. (Jack Black, though? Heck yeah, bring it on.)

#23. Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

Style over substance? More like "tech display
over substance".

Back when motion capture was still a new idea for CGI animation, we got this film that felt like a tech demo for the technology. And credit where due, this did offer a nice insight into what mo-cap and CGI could achieve, on top of having some of the most stunning and detailed models of the early 2000s. Sure, it’s outmatched by today’s standards, but it was impressive for a long time (and still is, to some extent). However, though this has the Final Fantasy name attached to it, this film’s about as far removed from that franchise as can be, with only a glimpse of ‘fantasy’ to its plot.

As I said in my original review, everything here is average or uninspired at best; some characters exist only as monster fodder and as such get only one major character trait to show off when on-screen. General Hein, the villain, is a cartoonish yet unmemorable butthole. The performances aren’t fantastic either. To top it off, the color palette is rather grey – sure, it’s got more color than Max Payne, but very little actually stands out, meaning that most of the details are barely visible.

This film’s biggest crime is to be forgettable and boring, which admittedly means I could rank it a little better than some films that follow. It’s still, in my opinion, a good watch if only for the technology on display.

#22. War Games: The Dead Code

Sorry, buddy, you don't have Matthew
Broderick's charisma.

You want to talk about a movie whose plot wouldn’t exist without three dozen contrived coincidences? Look no further. The Dead Code is a sequel nobody asked for to a beloved film from the ‘80s, and was released straight-to-DVD. WarGames neither needs nor demands a sequel, however; it’s perfectly self-contained. This sequel at least does what any good sequel should do: It treads new ground while building up from the foundation set by the film it follows. It has story beats one would expect due to its status as a sequel: Stephen Falken returns (albeit played by a different actor), and the WOPR is once again a key element of the story. And much like any other sequel, the stakes (and resulting damage) are also greater.

The characters are fine for the most part, with one exception (I still despise Dennis with a burning passion, that character is a waste of air). I’m also not a fan of how weird the plot had to be for any of the intrigue to work; so many contrivances that are beyond improbable even within the setting. At least I understand it more now that I’ve seen and reviewed the original WarGames for this blog. In all fairness, I think I remembered it worse than it actually was – sure it’s not all that good, but ultimately I’m not too bothered by it. Forgettable and unnecessary, but that's about it. (Shame, too, because Colm Feore is always a fun actor to see in a film.)

#21. Hard Corner: Le Film

Expect a lot of gaming references.

Hey, remember when reviewers on YouTube made movies? I wish I could forget some of those movies. Benzaie, the French video game collector and reviewer, had his own opus in 2014, following the origin story of his greasy Hard Corner gaming store owner. What makes this list unfair for this film in particular is that I’m pitting it against Hollywod productions while it’s a labor of love, an independent product made on a small budget – so of course it wouldn’t look great in comparison. In spite of that, I still felt it fared better than some of said Hollywood productions.

Yeah, the ccomedy is pure early-2010s Internet. It’s got bawdy humor, grossout humor, moments of sheer stupidity… The characters aren’t all that endearing either, and there’s padding that the film could have been done without. In the end, it’s an elongated episode of Benzaie’s Hard Corner, which is fine if you enjoy his YouTube series (which has come to an end in 2021), but your mileage may vary on whether that translated well to a feature-length production.

But I’m not too mad at it, because it’s a YouTuber making a dream come true and, as far as I can tell, there haven’t been any massive controversies or problems to arise from the creation of that feature. That’s more than I can say of some other movies I’ve seen from YouTubers and/or critics…

#20. Pixels

How did Sandler and Gad's characters, whose
experience is limited to playing arcade games,
become amazing shooters instantly on the 
field just because they were battling Centipede?

At least this one is well-made, it has excellent production values, the actors play their roles right (unfortunately), the special effects are impressive and many scenes are enjoyable, even if they don’t make any sense even in context. Other than that… yeah, there isn’t much to salvage in Pixels, the film starring Adam Sandler. It ranks above the Super Mario Bros. movie because the director, Chris Columbus, actually knew what he was doing. I still consider this one to be quite terrible, but it’s the sort of badness one can laugh at.

The film is constantly inconsistent, the characters are a mixed bag (Peter Dinklage is hilarious playing a mullet’ed asshole, but Josh Gad is infuriating as a conspiracy theorist nut; Sandler’s character is okay at best). There’s a gross air of casual sexism to how 3/4ths of the characters basically earn women at the end of the film. My nerdy self can’t help but point out how the film doesn’t even adhere to its set-up of the aliens picking gaming references from before 1982. Oh, and what about all the facts they get wrong? I’m still hung up over every mistake the film made about Pac-Man (even if the sequence was cool, I’ll give them that).

That does look cool.

So, it’s of the quality you might expect from the average Sandler film. I won’t go as far as to say that I’ve mellowed towards it, but comparing it to other films I’ve reviewed helped put it in perspective. It’s still bad (hence its position on the list), but I’ve seen worse. Still wouldn’t recommend.

#19. Spy Kids 3D: Game Over

I do have a soft spot for this one, considering I saw it in theaters when I was a kid. In spite of that, I have to acknowledge the massive flaws in it. Harmless but still pretty dumb, Spy Kids 3D is terrible and makes no sense… but at least it rolls back to being funny. Even by family film standards, this isn’t too great. The CGI looked dated when the film was released, in 2003, though I assume that was intentional. The "video game" at the center of the plot is poorly defined and runs on complete nonsense. Or it runs exclusively on what might look cool for the kids watching, sense be damned.

I’m genuinely not mad at this one, because it’s such a funny ride in spite of its very low quality. The one critique I do have is that the film seems to justify its own low quality by being for children. That doesn’t excuse anything. How many films for children have I reviewed on this blog that were of better quality than this? At least everyone who worked on it seemed to know it wasn’t great, so many actors gave their silliest performances (though some did come across as bland). Sylvester Stallone, in particular, is hilarious here. It was also Ricardo Montalbán’s final live-action performance, so he at least tried to deliver something heartfelt and sincere in spite of the surrounding silliness. He's the one to resolve everything, by having a sincere talk with the villain!

I legit don’t know if I reviewed any film that adhered so well to the statement “so bad it’s good”. As a result, Spy Kids 3D: Game Over is a part of the more negative portion of the list, but deserves to at least be considered above the other “bad” films I’ve reviewed.

See you soon for Part 2 of this list: The middle ground.