The Worst Movie I Ever Saw

The Worst Movie I Ever Saw

People throw around the phrase 'worst movie ever' around pretty lightly these days.  I do not. A movie has to be not only mind-boggingly bad but also blissfully unaware of its stupidity for me to classify it as one of the worst. Because face it, a lot of movies these days are made bad on purpose. I'm not okay with that but I've learned to accept it. However, some movies are so poorly constructed that you question the intentions of the filmmakers. 

What are you gettin' at here?

The movie in question is The Ultimate Gift. If I were going to pitch this movie to a producer I would call it Brewster's Millions meets The Bucket List. It co-stars James Garner primarily as a dead oil baron's video-will. It is a role so secluded it seemed like the producers were trying to hide the rest of the movie from him. 

 

"They told me it was a documentary."

The movie felt like one of those parody films except for a very specific sub-genre. One in which an apathetic character learns a series of valuable lessons about what life is really about through the completion of altruistic tasks so that he may attain riches both monetarily and metaphysical. Along the way he becomes a better person and also gets the bang the hot chick who shows him how to love again.

Our main character, Jason, must complete a series of tasks in order receive his inheritance from his grandfather's will. Over the course of the film, people go out of their way to help him even though he's a piece of shit and should probably kill himself. Every scene in this movie was such pure coincidence that it was driving me crazy.

It didn't help that when I saw the movie, I was a patient in a mental hospital.

First Off, Yes I Was in a Mental Hospital

Yes, I was in a mental Hospital. Why? There a lot of reasons. But mostly it was because I had a lot more sicks days than vacation days and Blue Cross/Blue Shield doesn't cover a weekend at the spa. So I settled for Meadowod Mental Hospital. You know what else Blue Cross/Blue Shield doesn't cover? The medicine I need to manage my bipolar disorder. 

I took a job as a teacher at a juvenile detention center. A month into the job I found out that my health care plan had a year long pre-existing conditions exclusion. That same month, my supervisor was fired and the other young black guy in my department quit. I was pretty much by myself in a job that I was woefully unprepared for. If I taught a swim class, half of these kids would have drowned. On top of that, my depressive episodes had gotten so bad that every morning felt like I was dragging myself to the gates of hell.

No refunds.

So one Friday, when I was driving home for work, I decided I didn't want to go home. I didn't want to go anywhere. Not in Delaware. I could go somewhere else. But I'd always have to come back to Delaware. There was no manic episode coming to rescue me for the weekend. I barely had the will to live.

This Movie Was Bad

Christianity Today said The Ultimate Gift  was "lovingly crafted ... but never manages to build up much mystery, suspense, tension, or narrative steam." Those are a lot of things to be missing in one movie. This movie didn't have so much of a story as much as it was just a pile of coincidences. In the beginning of the movie, Jason is at his grandfather's funeral. A secondary character, played by an inexplicably goth Abigail Breslin is also there. This is never explained. Even though half-way through the movie, Jason straight up asks her why she was there and she barks something along the lines of "Never mind that, throw it in the pile, We've got plot holes to leap over."

"Ill give you a nickel if you let it go."

I can't say I expected much when the social worker said we were watching a movie during group therapy but what surprised me most was:

The Heroin Addicts Were Into It

What a fun bunch.

I assumed that Heroin addicts were world weary cynics that had become jaded with even the seediest underbellies of human society. But apparently not being cynical enough to not do heroin also expresses itself as a naiveté attitude when it comes to shitty movies. Everything about the movie that I found disjointed and asinine, the heroin addicts perceived as inspiring melodrama.

For Example:

The Love Story Made No Fucking Sense

This is about as intimate as it got.

When the Jason is first introduced in the movie, he steps out of limo at his grandfather's funeral. He was wearing sunglasses when he got out of the car. Then he took them off. After he got out of the car. 

Did I mention it was raining?

"The water glistens! It's so Bright!"

The movie tries to depict him as a jaded asshole who's completely disillusioned by his own privilege, but he just comes off as an overgrown child who can't see the forest for the trees. Which is why his love interest doesn't make any sense. 

Over the course of the film, a relationship develops between Jason and Alexia, the mother of Abigail Breslin's character. I've seen more chemistry in a glass of water. There is absolutely no reason these two characters should fall in love. The mother is such a bargain bin version of Renee Zwellegger (Not exactly top shelf either) that it seems strange that her character would be the mother of Goth-Abigail Breslin, who's catch this, dying of cancer. I found my self constantly questioning whether they were really mother and daughter and not some person-midget team of con artists. 

Secondly, Jason isn't even slightly charming and gives no one in the film any reason to like him. Then the romance comes out of nowhere. Ms. Breslin is alone with Jason when she says:

"You should kiss my mom."

"Really? You thinks so?" He says, just as perplexed as I am.

"Yea, you're the main character. Do whatever you want."

This is right after they kissed.

Why Was I Watching a Movie With Heroin Addicts

 How did this happen?

When I first got to the mental hospital, I was admitted to the crisis ward. The crisis ward is full of people who freaked for a couple hours and tried to kill themselves. Basically, every time a new person was admitted they would brood in their room for a day or so before the rest of the ward barged in and bellowed, "Hey, you done being a miserable cunt. We're playing scrabble. Come one out." 

This isn't helping.

It was actually pretty fun until…

…The Children's Ward started to fill up and they had to move some of the crisis ward patients to a different ward. I was deemed not appropriate to be on the same ward as minors, which is ironic because I'm a teacher, albeit admittedly not a good one. 

So I was moved to a ward that was mostly populated by drug addicts.  I went from a ward where everyone was very active and chatty to a ward where people had to dragged out of bed in the morning cause they're so dopesick.

My vacation was over.

It Was like a Tyler Perry Movie with White People

This is just a funny picture.

Tyler Perry is not a skilled filmmaker. He lacks a flair for subtlety and structure that leads to a lot of his films ending awkwardly.  The Ultimate Gift has a similar problem where at some point the films ends. And then it doesn't. It just keeps going. I thought the movie ended and then the social worker fast forwarded the movie about 20 minutes past a sequence that apparently took place in the jungles of Columbia. 

And that's when Abigail Breslin's character died. Her death was both inevitable and yet didn't fit the tone of the film whatsoever. The movie shifted tones kind of the way Tim Curry drags the characters through the mansion at the end of Clue.

Jason presents a proposal for children's hospital to some board of directors. It goes swimmingly. 

SMASH CUT TO:

Jason is running though the hospital and finds the mother, who's welled up eyes and telling nod signal that Ms. Breslin has left the building. Its supposed to be an emotional and serious moment. But the films editor didn't give me enough time to digest how stupid that hospital proposal was, (which also came out of nowhere) so I wasn't ready to mourn this annoying little shit.

"Ha!" Said God.

The heroin addicts thought it was touching though.

Honeymoon is Over

Soon after Jason and Alexia acknowledge their inexplicable love for each other, they were struck with the tragedy of her daughter's death. Similarly, I had made a lot of progress and I was finally relaxing, but being moved to the drug addict ward had shattered my illusion that I was in some kind of fascist bed and breakfast. However, as much as I wanted to leave Meadowood, I did not want to go back to my job. 

I seriously considered quitting my job as soon as I was released. Being deemed inappropriate to be around minors gave me a lot of doubts about being a teacher. Having to commit myself to a mental hospital, I suspected my employer would be weary about having me work with children anyway. But most of all, going to work everyday at the detention center was like going to battle. It had become exhausting. 

But lastly, I had started doing stand-up comedy the month before and it was all I could think about. Even though I was only two months in, I felt like I finally found an art that I could conquer.

And this movie was going to make great material.

Conclusion

I didn't quit my job. Not immediately. And I was never able to turn my hatred of this movie into a good joke. In fact, I've never even tried it on stage. But I did write a couple of jokes about my stay in the mental hospital. And from there I started writing more and more inward about myself and my many insecurities. 

I eventually did quit my job.  But only after I revamped the program and created a whole new curriculum which made the class a lot more tolerable for me and my students. I am very proud of what I accomplished there. However, after about 5 or 6 months I fell out of love with the job again and I quit abruptly without a new job. I spent a week in New York looking for apartments and jobs. It didn't work out.

For now, I'm still in Delaware. Somedays I feel like I'll always be here. Nothing frightens me more.