The 2017 SSMB Movie Awards! - The Best and the Worst of the Silver Screen!

[Failinhearts]

LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION!

2017 is nearing its end, and I don't know about you, but I saw a hell of a lot of movies this year. Both good and bad.

So, how about we take a look back on the year and talk about what we saw.. in the form of an awards topic! If you saw the Movie Thread, you noticed that I did a similar thing last year. I thought "hey, let's expand on that and let everyone in on it!"

I wanna hear what you think is deserving of these awards, so here's what to do!

- You can only enter movies you saw that was released in theaters THIS year. So if it was a direct to home video/Netflix Original Movie or whatever, it doesn't count. Neither does a movie that was still running in cinemas despite releasing in 2016 count.

- If you saw a movie released this year through Blu-ray, DVD, etc later on down the line, it does count, so don't worry. You don't have to by physically present at the cinemas to participate, as long as you saw the film somehow that meets the above requirements.

- You do not have to enter a film in every category, although do try to add as much as you can.

- When you enter a film, please describe your feelings towards it and why you gave it such an award.

- Please spoiler tag your reviews if you want to describe certain plot points. Otherwise, keep your descriptions spoiler-free to not ruin the experience of someone planning to see the movie in question later down the line.

- Honorable mentions are allowed.

- Ties are allowed.

With that said, these are the categories.

MOST UNDERRATED FILM

BEST SCORE

MOST SURPRISING FILM

MOST DISAPPOINTING FILM

COOLEST LOOKING FILM

WORST FILM

BEST FILM

Now, I'll start things off!

MOST UNDERRATED FILM:

CARS 3

This movie sure is something, alright. I'm pretty certain nobody over the age of 6 demanded a new Cars film, as it is one of Pixar's weaker films in their lineup. While I love the first Cars, the second one (although a guilty pleasure), is a stupid STUPID movie. Of course, people went into Cars 3 cautiously.

After the first teaser, which implied a much darker tone, we didn't know what to expect. Was the real movie as dark as the teaser?

No, so it did play with our expectations... for better or for worse, you make the call.

Although despite the apathetic feelings the masses have for the movie, I gotta say I rather enjoyed it. It isn't perfect or anything, but it properly went back to its roots and doesn't involve shit like super spies. It's a nice movie with a good twist. Plus if you're a big Cars 1 fan with massive nostalgic feelings, there are those bits of fan-service and callbacks that made me smile like a little kid.

That's what Cars 3 meant to me in the end. It made me feel like a little kid at the theaters watching Cars back in 2006.

You could say that Cars 3 was a fun nostalgia ride

BEST SCORE:

TRANSFORMERS: THE LAST KNIGHT

Say what you want about the Transformers movies, you aren't wrong. Although every time another one of these films come out, the score by Steve Jablonsky knocks it out of the park. This movie was no exception.

Every Transformers movie has their own distinct sound to it. The first movie prided itself on memorable tunes with plenty of slow moments. Revenge of the Fallen was more fast-paced and sinister sounding. Dark of the Moon felt more grand with the use of heavy brass in many cases. Age of Extinction took a unique approach with the use of dubstep, digital sounds and Imagine Dragons littered throughout the score.

The Last Knight does something to differentiate it from the other films by making the score more elegant and emotional. Tracks like "We Have To Go" and "Purity of Heart" for example portray this feeling of sadness, despair and helplessness before building up into an eventual vibe of triumphance and devotion.

I just find this score beautiful and ol' Steve should pat himself on the back for a fifth time.

...But that's just Steve. I'll get back to this film later...

All you need to know now is that the Last Knight did something that once again transformed the series music-wise.

MOST SURPRISING FILM:

JUSTICE LEAGUE

I didn't know what to expect of this movie going into it. The initial trailers didn't impress me, and if you saw my 2016 Movie Awards you know Batman V Superman was my worst film. I fucking hated it.

The only hope I had pre-release was that Wonder Woman was really good. So good, it's one of my best films of the year. Although, the bad track record before that movie and the development issues regarding Joss Whedon's sudden involvement weren't exactly painting this movie a good picture.

Still, I went in hoping for a surprise and boy did I get one.

I'm saying this outright. I love this movie. I loved it so much, I saw it twice in IMAX. 

Is it flawed? Hell yeah. You can clearly see what's a Snyder move and what's a Whedon move. There are some glaring plotholes and the main villain was a walking talking plot device with an axe... but I don't care.

It was fun. I had a blast. In the end, isn't that why we go out to see movies like this? To have fun?

If you think the plotholes are too glaring to ignore, I don't blame you. Although I personally think I got my money's worth and I'm glad this movie ended up being muuuuuch better than what I expected it to be.

To me, this film did my hopes justice.

MOST DISAPPOINTING FILM:

Ladies and gents, we have a tie!

THE LEGO NINJAGO MOVIE

This movie... what the fuck happened? As you know, I'm a big fan of the Ninjago TV Show. It's fun, the characters are enjoyable and it tries a looot harder than any kids show of this nature should have any right to be when it comes to depth.

When the movie came out, I was skeptical at first because of the wildly different premise, like the ninja being in school with secret identities despite being young adults whose identities are out in the open in the show. Still, as the trailers came out for the movie I soon grew more and more used to this idea and went into the film with an open mind. All I wanted was a good standalone movie. I took a seat in my chair, removed my nostalgia-goggles and see what Warner Bros gave me.

They gave me a pile of brick-built shit.

I get that you changed characters from the show, but whatever changes you make... it has to be for the better of the film at handed. Every Ninja aside from Lloyd went to characters with complex backstories and layers of depth to their emotions and arcs to one-note archetypes that purely exist to... exist. To give this illusion of a team dynamic when in the end, it's Lloyd (who admittedly is much better than the show) who carries this movie with his dad, Lord Garmadon.

Not to mention that this film is just plain lazy. A big appeal of the LEGO Movie and the LEGO Batman Movie was how everything was made of brick. To rush this film out to theaters to coincide with the toys, Animal Logic cut corners big time by not only having the majority of the movie consist of natural environments, but they recycle animation on TOO many occasions that I'm baffled that I'm not watching some sort of anime.

Plus... it's just not funny. There are moments that make me chuckle, yeah but nothing that made me bellow out in laughter. Instead, it's replaced with empty morals, cliche overuse (with some being poorly timed and repeated no less) and characters you could give less of a shit about.

also, no spinjitzu. like, at all.

Halfway through the movie, you could say Ninjago made me want to Ninja GO.

ALSO...

STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI

Oooooooooooh boy, this movie.

First off, no, I'm not mad that this movie tried to do different things to subvert our expectations. What I am mad is that those subversions led to stupid or meaningless things. You can do different things all you want... that doesn't mean its good and the Last Jedi is a prime example of that.

There are a lot of scenes in this film that I loved. Rey, Luke, Kylo Ren... all great.

Spoiler

AND HOLY SHIT, THAT ONE SCENE WITH THE CARRIER BLASTING THROUGH A STAR DESTROYER AT LIGHTSPEED... OOOOH MY GOSH THAT WAS FUCKING AMAAAAAZING

Some of the morals this movie gives was also nice, so it's not like this film had bad intentions.

It's just that it got lost on its own way to surprise us that it doesn't know what it's doing most of the time. An entire sub-plot for example involving Finn I felt like it meant nothing in the long run and the movie could've gone on without it... and that's a BIG chunk of the film mind you.

Not to mention the under-use of certain characters. Characters we might not even see again. No, I don't care if I have to read or watch external media to understand them. I shouldn't have to go out of my way just to enjoy a fucking movie like this.

The Force wasn't strong in this one.

COOLEST LOOKING FILM:

CAPTAIN UNDERPANTS: THE FIRST EPIC MOVIE

...Wait, what? The last movie I put on this category was Doctor Strange? How does Captain freaking Underpants compete to that?

Well, I wouldn't say it competes with Doctor Strange, but I put this movie on here because of how the animation and designs transferred from the books of my childhood to a CGI animated film. The squash and stretch, exaggerated movements, it's all there and accounted for. Not to mention the additional use of other styles like 2D animation, the series' iconic Flip-o-Rama and I shit you not, a scene with hand puppets.

It's all very diverse and quite an accomplishment, all on a lower budget than most Dreamworks films.

This "First Epic Movie" was a true epic triumph in the looks department.

WORST FILM:

TRANSFORMERS: THE LAST KNIGHT

Transformers... we meet again.

Magnificent score aside, this movie is dogshit. This isn't just the worst movie I've seen this year... but the worst movie I've ever seen period.

This isn't a movie, thinking about it. This is a two hour display of loud noises and explosions woven together by a series of incomprehensible jargon on a script that apparently count as a "story".

There are so many plotholes this movie left behind that not only don't make sense in the grand scope of Bayformers as a whole... but doesn't make sense in the context of the film itself. Motivations flip for no reason, things are retconned for the sake of "twist", characters do and mean nothing to the story, underused or neglected concepts, boring scenes, boring climax, cringe-inducing humor, baffling "self-insert mary sue" plot twists, all the ingredients for a bad movie aside from bad visuals and a bad score is here.

Sad thing is, I actually was expecting good from this movie. Especially since I actually rather liked Age of Extinction, a movie that actually tried to do something different and even focuses on the robots for a good chunk of the story and gave them actual *gasp* DEPTH?!

What I was hoping for Nemesis Prime was a deconstruction of Bayformers Optimus as a character. With every passing movie, Optimus becomes more and more of a bloodthirsty psychopath than the Jesus Christ figure in other iterations of the character. Instead of believing in his troops, freedom, and nobility... Bayformers Optimus is more concerned about how to take someone's face in as cool of a way as possible. The idea of making Optimus evil and the tagline of "rethink your heroes" made me think this movie was finally gonna address this issue. It would make kids realize that Optimus here isn't a role model at all, and his destructive means of solving your problems would make you no better than the villains you're fighting.

Doesn't that sound smart? Doesn't that sound like a great surprise? A message of pacifism in a violent movie? Something to really make you think about what's right and what's wrong?

nah, let's just have optimus be brainwashed for 10 minutes before going back to the status quo.

Perhaps it's on me for expecting this much from this movie, but I really did think Bay learned.

He didn't, and we all suffered for it.

The Last Knight? Pffft. More like the Last Straw.

BEST FILM:

COCO

I really wanted to put Spider-Man Homecoming and Wonder Woman as ties for this spot. I really did.They were such fun movies and I can't get enough of them...

...But not putting this movie on number 1 would be a huge disservice to the masterpiece Lee Unkrich created.

This movie SOUNDS amazing, this movie LOOKS amazing, this movie IS amazing! I don't want to spoil a lot of it since the twists are fucking amazing, and I'm worried whatever spoiler-free things I give might take away from the experience, so I'll be vague for the sake of everyone who hasn't seen this yet.

This movie is so. fucking. SMART.

The incorporation of the Day of the Dead concepts, the family drama, the idea of remembrance... it's done so well and is so sophisticated. Not a single thing is patronized or dumbed down for the sake of a family audience. It's all so real from the joys and sadness of losing a loved one and what happens after they're gone. 

When you walk out of this movie, you think. You think about the people you have. The people you lost. Both friends and family. You wonder to yourself...

...What will you do to keep their spirit alive? What will you do to honor them? Whatever you do, do it with heart and soul... or they might be gone forever.

Coco makes you realize just how important those questions are. 

Do me a favor... no, do yourself a favor and go see this movie. Do your ancestors a favor and go see this movie. Fuck, do anyone a favor and go see this movie.

You will not be disappointed.

Coco is far from dead on arrival. No, it's very much alive and it will make sure you remember it no matter what.

 

 

 

Phew! So, that was my list. What about yours? Let's celebrate 2017's end by talking about movies, y'all! Time to hand out some awards!

[Solister]

2017 was a great year for me for seeing movies, generally I watch 1 movie per year, and in 2017 I watched 4, but I'm just going list 3 because I don't know where I could fit the 4th.

MOST SURPRISING FILM:

Kimi Na No Wa (Your Name)

This movie was released in 2016, but it only came to my country this year, does it count?

So, it was a Saturday afternoon, me and my mom were with nothing to do, so we decided to went watch some movie, nothing interesting was passing aside this minor irrelevant movie.

I'm not an anime fan, but always showed some interest on it, I wasn't expected so much of this movie, because I never heard about it and even saw some ad around the city or even on the web.

Spoiler

The movie is kinda confusing, you can notice this by the reaction of the people after the movie end.

It tells the story of a rural living teen girl, which always wanted to live on a big city (Tokyo), after some unknown happen she change her body with a teen boy of Tokyo. During the whole movie it shows their change of bodies as it tries to explain why all this is happening. You need to pay much attention in every detail of the movie to don't be lost in the story plot.

It's an unknown movie by the public in general, but very acclaimed in the anime world, you must have some interest on Japan and anime (Which I think 99% of people here has), so this can be a very interesting movie.

MOST DISAPPOINTING FILM

Star Wars the Last Jedi

No, you're not reading the OP again. Yeah, the movie have it lows and highs, but I assume I became very disappointed when I back from the theater, at the point I almost broke my Luke's lead statue on the floor.

Spoiler

So, what say about this movie that you probably don't know? Well, here are somethings that bring me attention:

The first and probably the majority plot of the movie are the Luke scenes. He didn't give any attention to the past of the Jedi, and ignoring everything of the original trilogy, that hurt me so deeply, and in fact, not just me, but Mark Hamill by himself. That was break with the unexpected Yoda's appearence as ghost, and I say that was one of the best moments of the movie. Some interesting thing to note are how the movie tries to tell many stories in only one movie: Rey trying to be a Jedi, Finn and Rose "dating" secret mission and the movement of Leia at the spaceship trying to command the resistance. Another strong point of the movie are the references, and probably the best for me, as I said earlier, the Yoda's appearance and the old "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope" video, for example.

WORST FILM

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

Remember of Kimi na no wa (Your Name)? Now think that first situation, but inverted. Again, it was a weekend afternoon, me and my mom without something to do, we checked some good movie to watch on the theaters, but nothing. It was a hard decision, but I choice this. Let's say that was the most "mature" movie I ever watched on my life on the theaters (I'm only 14!). So, the movie could be very well done, with a lot of effects but something on the development of the story didn't pleased me. Ok, may I didn't watched the first movie, so this could made me like a bit more the movie. But the movie use an unpleasant language as some totally unnecessary themes. By the way, I'm not going to say to much, because the movie was financial success, so I don't want to fight with no one here.

By the way, thank you Marvel, you probably made me never watch another Marvel's movie again.

---

I also watched Despicable Me 3, but I didn't found a good category for it.

Also, sorry, I'm pretty bad at reviews, but I think that the movie list is what matters.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

7 minutes ago, Solister said:

 

  Hide contents

So, what say about this movie that you probably don't know? Well, here are somethings that bring me attention:

The first and probably the majority plot of the movie are the Luke scenes. He didn't give any attention to the past of the Jedi, and ignoring everything of the original trilogy, that hurt me so deeply, and in fact, not just me, but Mark Hamill by himself. That was break with the unexpected Yoda's appearence as ghost, and I say that was one of the best moments of the movie. Some interesting thing to note are how the movie tries to tell many stories in only one movie: Rey trying to be a Jedi, Finn and Rose "dating" secret mission and the movement of Leia at the spaceship trying to command the resistance. Another strong point of the movie are the references, and probably the best for me, as I said earlier, the Yoda's appearance and the old "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope" video, for example.

 

Spoiler

To be fair, I don't really think they were trying to ignore any of the trilogies when it came to Last Jedi. If anything, I felt Luke's subplot was meant to be based more around addressing the main criticism of the prequels in which a lot of the time showed the Jedi being hypocritical, extremely controlling, and other such things. There's no denying that when they said "Bring Balance to the Force", they meant "Kill the sith and bathe it in light". 

Obviously, the Sith are evil, but Luke had a point that the Force wasn't something that belonged to exclusively the Jedi. Good and Bad, the force was shared by everyone across the universe and the same way Palpatine and Vader attempted to control the Force by killing all the Jedi, the Jedi attempted to do the same thing to the Sith. It's was never about balancing the Force, it was about controlling it, and both sides are really guilty for it.

Even the Yoda scenes show significant change for the character. This is someone who heightened Anakin's fears by telling him not to care about Padme potentially dying and just moving on with your life, as well as accepting a lot of the bad stuff the Jedi did. This film shows Yoda truly moving on and learning from his mistakes from the original order by explaining to Luke that while the original order had fundamental problems and got power-hungry, it was time to move on from the old ways and create a new order to help everyone. Keep in mind, this was the same purpose who was completely for the rules that eventually broke Anakin and aided in his turn to the dark side, so I actually found this twist of taking a critical eye to the Jedi and finally acknowledging that they weren't completely innocent as pretty refreshing honestly.

 

[Failinhearts]

Just now, Ryannumber1gamer said:

  Hide contents

To be fair, I don't really think they were trying to ignore any of the trilogies when it came to Last Jedi. If anything, I felt Luke's subplot was meant to be based more around addressing the main criticism of the prequels in which a lot of the time showed the Jedi being hypocritical, extremely controlling, and other such things. There's no denying that when they said "Bring Balance to the Force", they meant "Kill the sith and bathe it in light". 

Obviously, the Sith are evil, but Luke had a point that the Force wasn't something that belonged to exclusively the Jedi. Good and Bad, the force was shared by everyone across the universe and the same way Palpatine and Vader attempted to control the Force by killing all the Jedi, the Jedi attempted to do the same thing to the Sith. It's was never about balancing the Force, it was about controlling it, and both sides are really guilty for it.

Even the Yoda scenes show significant change for the character. This is someone who heightened Anakin's fears by telling him not to care about Padme potentially dying and just moving on with your life, as well as accepting a lot of the bad stuff the Jedi did. This film shows Yoda truly moving on and learning from his mistakes from the original order by explaining to Luke that while the original order had fundamental problems and got power-hungry, it was time to move on from the old ways and create a new order to help everyone. Keep in mind, this was the same purpose who was completely for the rules that eventually broke Anakin and aided in his turn to the dark side, so I actually found this twist of taking a critical eye to the Jedi and finally acknowledging that they weren't completely innocent as pretty refreshing honestly.

 

Yeah, this is actually something I really liked in the Last Jedi, I admit. It's something I predicted to be brought up once the first trailer dropped and I'm glad at the very least that was addressed.

[Solister]

2 minutes ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

  Hide contents

To be fair, I don't really think they were trying to ignore any of the trilogies when it came to Last Jedi. If anything, I felt Luke's subplot was meant to be based more around addressing the main criticism of the prequels in which a lot of the time showed the Jedi being hypocritical, extremely controlling, and other such things. There's no denying that when they said "Bring Balance to the Force", they meant "Kill the sith and bathe it in light". 

Obviously, the Sith are evil, but Luke had a point that the Force wasn't something that belonged to exclusively the Jedi. Good and Bad, the force was shared by everyone across the universe and the same way Palpatine and Vader attempted to control the Force by killing all the Jedi, the Jedi attempted to do the same thing to the Sith. It's was never about balancing the Force, it was about controlling it, and both sides are really guilty for it.

Even the Yoda scenes show significant change for the character. This is someone who heightened Anakin's fears by telling him not to care about Padme potentially dying and just moving on with your life, as well as accepting a lot of the bad stuff the Jedi did. This film shows Yoda truly moving on and learning from his mistakes from the original order by explaining to Luke that while the original order had fundamental problems and got power-hungry, it was time to move on from the old ways and create a new order to help everyone. Keep in mind, this was the same purpose who was completely for the rules that eventually broke Anakin and aided in his turn to the dark side, so I actually found this twist of taking a critical eye to the Jedi and finally acknowledging that they weren't completely innocent as pretty refreshing honestly.

 

Spoiler

What I wanted to mean are in some specific scenes:

For example, When he takes his Lightsaber from Rey and throw it on the sea. Or when He and Yoda watch the Jedi Tree being burn down. And in every try that Rey did to convince him to train her.

Something interesting to mention is that aside Rey, Leia also is training to be a Jedi, this wasn't showed in previous movies, but a lot of on expanded universe. Now on The Last Jedi, we could see she using the force (While lost in the space, backing for the ship), so I would bet that in Episode IX we may see Leia with a lightsaber (If they don't be forced to change the plot after Carrier's dead).

You talk about the prequel trilogy, but I assume I didn't remember well the movies so I can't say too much, and I didn't thought that still could influence on the newer movies.

 

[Failinhearts]

Just now, Solister said:

  Hide contents

What I wanted to mean are in some specific scenes:

For example, When he takes his Lightsaber from Rey and throw it on the sea. Or when He and Yoda watch the Jedi Tree being burn down. And in every try that Rey did to convince him to train her.

Something interesting to mention is that aside Rey, Leia also is training to be a Jedi, this wasn't showed in previous movies, but a lot of on expanded universe. Now on The Last Jedi, we could see she using the force (While lost in the space, backing for the ship), so I would bet that in Episode IX we may see Leia with a lightsaber (If they don't be forced to change the plot after Carrier's dead).

You talk about the prequel trilogy, but I assume I didn't remember well the movies so I can't say too much, and I didn't thought that still could influence on the newer movies.

 

Spoiler

 

Of course the prequels influence the newer movies. That's what a good saga does, tries to interconnect what happened before it whether good or bad. The only thing they threw away was the concept of the Midichlorians.

Rogue One had a character from the Clone Wars, the Republic is mentioned on multiple occasions, and now here in the Last Jedi is that Luke now understands just how corrupt the Jedi are. His actions you mentioned therefore reflect his new perspective now that this information was made available to him. When Yoda and Luke watch the tree burn down, it's to signify that they should no longer follow a group of people who were honestly corrupt from the start and build something new and better from it.

 

But I think we're getting off topic now. It's an awards topic, not a Star Wars discussion.

[Spidey3525]

BEST SCORE/BEST FILM:

Baby Driver

Simply put, I loved this movie. The best part about this film is easily how it handles the music; nearly every song is a winner in my book, but Baby Driver goes further by having choreography that has on-screen actions match up with the music in most scenes. It's like watching a perfect run of a rhythm game, making a complete joy to watch. Is it perfect? Not quite, the romantic subplot is pretty undeveloped but it's a minor flaw in my book. I want to give the best film award to Dunkirk (another stellar film), but Baby Driver is just plain fun to watch. If you haven't watched the film for yourself, I hope I've convinced you to check it out. 

MOST DISAPPOINTING/WORST FILM:

Kingsman: The Golden Circle

When I saw the trailer for The Golden Circle in theaters, I was sold on the film.  I went out and bought a copy of the first film, loved it, and waited in anticipation for The Golden Circle to hit theaters. Unfortunately, life got busy and I wasn't able to get a chance to see it; however, once the Blu-Ray came out, I grabbed it and watched it the next day. I heard that the reviews called it worse than the first, but I figured it'd still be enjoyable. 

I was very wrong. 

The Golden Circle does nearly everything in the worst way possible. 

Spoiler

• Boring, undeveloped villain
• Big-name side characters who don't get to do anything (I'm looking at you, Agent Tequila)
• Way too many homages to first film
• Eggsy's and Princess Tilde's relationship is as barebones as they come
• Killing off Roxy, one of the better characters from the first film
• Undoing Harry's death. I hate when characters are resurrected, but Harry's comes off as one the worst, given how he was killed with a point-blank gunshot to the head on-screen. I can't buy it that Valentine nor his assistant weren't able to hear the Statesman helicopter approach given how they barely walked off-screen or that a secret organization like Kingsman would let an agent's body go unrecovered. 

 I'm probably being more harsh on this film than most, but I hyped myself up too much for the movie. That, and the only other "bad" movie I saw this year was Justice League, but that movie provided far more enjoyment than The Golden Circle did. 

MOST SURPRISING FILM:

Star Wars: The Last Jedi

I'm mostly putting this film since I didn't expect to be as divisive as it currently is. I personally enjoyed it far more than The Force Awakens, but I didn't grow up with the franchise like most (I binged the entire series about a month before episode VII) so I don't mind when they take big risks like in this film. 

Spoiler

I know a lot of people hate Finn and Rose's side plot for ultimately being pointless since they can't find the hacker/get betrayed by DJ, but I personally like the whole sense of failure prevalent throughout the film, especially with Luke as well. That being said, the movie clocks in at two hours and a half, so having some scenes cut would've been appreciated. 

Don't get me wrong, the film has plenty of flaws but I feel that people will be less harsh on the film once the trilogy is complete. 

COOLEST LOOKING MOVIE:

The Lego Batman Movie

I just love how everything is made from Legos, brings back so many childhood memories for me.