The Screengrab

TOM HANKS



I know, I know...this list is called “Stars We Hate,” and it’s hard to work up any real vitriol against Mr. Hanks: after all, he seems like a peach of a guy, he’s turned into a pretty good producer and he established an eternal place for himself in the cinematic canon as the voice of Woody in Toy Story 1 & 2. But let me ask you something: do you consider Tim “Buzz Lightyear” Allen a truly iconic movie star?  The Cary Grant of his generation?  No?  Why not? Like Hanks, Allen also rose to fame as a likeable lug in a dumb sitcom, then made the leap to movies with a series of mostly terrible high concept comedies, give or take one undeniable classic apiece (Galaxy Quest for Allen, Big or Splash for Hanks, depending who you ask). And, like Hanks, you totally wouldn’t believe Allen as a dangerous tough guy mobster in Road To Perdition...although, wait, actually, I take that back: considering Tim Allen was busted with a pound of cocaine back in 1978, ratted out 21 drug dealers to avoid a life sentence and spent more than two years in prison, I’m guessing he’s got more than a little bit of a dark side, which makes him an interesting performer even though, for some reason, he’s mostly chosen to squander his talent on crap over the years. Hanks, on the other hand, is more ambitious and, in the “serious” half of his career, has generally chosen better material (three movies with Meg Ryan notwithstanding)...but the problem is there’s no there there: he’s just not that great an actor, no matter how many Best Actor awards he wins. Sure, he pulled the “lose a lot of weight” gimmick for Castaway, which puts him on par (at best) with Ethan Hawke and Christian Bale, who pulled the same trick for Alive and The Machinist, respectively (though neither of them won an Oscar for their efforts). Playing gay was just another award-winning acting gimmick for Hanks in Philadelphia: I never believed his performance for a second, just as I failed to believe his grizzled tough guy act in Perdition or Saving Private Ryan. At his best, in light comedy or light drama like Apollo 13, Hanks is akin to the guy who got all the starring roles in your high school drama club...appealingly bland in productions the audience is predisposed to like. But a modern-day Jimmy Stewart (as people who should know better insist on calling him)?  Hardly. For one thing, Jimmy Stewart would never have subjected us to Bachelor Party or Forrest Gump.

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Our fearless – and quite possibly senseless – movie janitor is watching every movie on the IMDb Bottom 100 list. Join us now for another installment of Unwatchable.

We are now one-quarter of the way through our mind-and-butt-numbing journey up the IMDb’s Bottom 100 list, a quest every bit as fraught with peril as the one Martin Sheen endured in Apocalypse Now. (It remains to be seen whether Marlon Brando is waiting at the end.) According to my rough calculations, this means we still have three quarters of the list to get through – a prospect that would bring many a cinephile to his knees, sobbing and begging for mercy. As always, I must simply remind myself that this is a marathon, not a sprint, and I can only play the game on the schedule in front of me. In this case, that game is The Last Sign, a 2005 supernatural thriller starring Andie MacDowell.

I’m immediately suspicious of any movie that opens with a shitload of logos for companies I’ve never heard of.

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