#72 Gigli (Wes)

Gigli

Kevin Smith has made some of my all time favorite movies. I even enjoyed Jersey Girl after spending years avoiding it due to the amount of Smith fans that I know who slated it. But it wasn’t just the opinions of other people that made me reticent to watch it, it was the fact that it starred Ben Affleck. I know that sounds silly, especially after Affleck had been in all of Smiths movies since Mallrats, leading in Chasing Amy, and having a major role in Dogma, but perhaps that’s the magic of Smith. He can take an actor I really don’t like very much and with a great script actually get me to like his performance. So when Gigli became the next movie to watch on our list I briefly wondered whether Martin Brest could repeat this feat. But of course this is a list of the worst movies ever, so I didn’t wonder for long at all…

Ben Affleck plays Larry Gigli, a mobster who kidnaps Brian (Jusin Bartha), the mentally challenged brother of a federal prosecutor who is attempting to send a mob boss to prison. Not trusting Gigli, his boss sends Ricki (Jennifer Lopez) to ensure the job gets done properly. Gigli gets annoyed that he has to follow the orders of a woman (who is also a lesbian, which annoys him further), whilst putting up with Brian and his obsessive wish to “go to the Baywatch”. Of course things go wrong, but Gigli being the charmer that he is still manages to sleep with Ricki (so that’s two lesbians that Affleck has turned straight due to his charm – see also Chasing Amy), and eventually get Brian to a beach where Baywatch is being filmed, so everyone is happy. Except me, and the thousands of other people who’ve seen this movie. Probably pissed the lesbian community off a bit as well.

  

So why do I have such a dislike of Affleck? Is it because he’s been in one of the worst movies I ever decided to sit through (and by some miracle didn’t make this list) – Pearl Harbour? A movie that I’m not ashamed to admit made me cry. Not because it was sad, but because I needed to pee so badly, but didn’t want to pause and therefore stretch out my torture by another minute or two. Is it because of his dreadful portrayal of Matt Murdock/Daredevil, which has made me dread ever seeing him play a super-hero ever again (thankfully his portrayal of Batman will be alongside Superman, so I can happily avoid that movie – and if you want to understand my hatred of Superman then check out my review of Superman IV here http://100reasonstogooutside.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/91-superman-iv-quest-for-peace-wes.html). I can’t pin down the exact reason why I dislike him so much, but having to watch him in a movie just fills me with anger.

So just how bad is Ben Affleck in this movie? I think I should probably let some of my tweets from the night we watched this do the talking really:

(After Affleck pretends a torch is a walkie talkie to fool Brian into thinking the Baywatch was shut for the day) “The torch was about as convincing as a walkie-talkie as Ben Affleck is as convincing as a hitman”.

“Ben Affleck is the least convincing gangster since Bugsy Malone”.

“He's more Ronnie Corbett than Ronnie Kray”.

“Ben Affleck is the least convincing person at being seductive since Slimer flew through Bill Murray in Ghostbusters”.

“More al fresco than Al Capone”.

“Fun fact: there was so little electricity between Affleck and Lopez that Gigli was the worlds first solar powered movie”.

Yes, the movie was so bad that I spent much of it trying to think of the names of real-life gangsters just so I could make bad puns (Colin was much better than me at this game, hence the random gags too) . Unfortunately I couldn’t think of a Dillinger pun, so if anyone out there can come up with one, then please comment and make me laugh.

The other actors in this are barely powerhouses either. Jennifer Lopez, who was once out-acted by a terrible looking CGI snake in Anaconda, really should have stuck to a career in music. Not that I think she had any talent in that either, but it would mean that I wouldn’t have to sit through another one of her insipid performances ever again. The only other movies I’ve ever seen Justin Bartha in are the National Treasure movies where he spent two movies having to fight Nicholas Cage for screen time. In Gigli it’s like he’s in an amateur dramatics version of Rain Man.

This movie actually does star two of Hollywood’s greatest actors in minor roles, but unfortunately even they put in forgettable performances. When your film can’t be saved by Al Pacino or Christopher Walken, then you know that something major has gone wrong. I think much of this can be blamed on what is the Vogon poetry of scripts. When Ricki finally relents to the charm bombardment that Gigli is hitting her with (I can only guess this happened off-screen), she lies on the bed seductively and utters the immortal lines “It’s turkey time. Gobble gobble”. I’m not entirely sure where this sort of thing is ever considered sexy, but it’s certainly not on any planet I’ve ever walked on. I don’t think I need to expand on anything more to do with that script, that really does just sum everything up (I really wish that I made that up, but that atrocious scene can be seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vw9sQ98s9AE).

I honestly can’t think of a single bit of this movie where I wasn’t thoroughly bored or just confused as to what the actual point of the movie was. That actually makes it worse the An Underground Comedy Movie, which at least made me laugh a little at the beginning. Those are words that I honestly didn’t expect to be typing at any point soon. This is definitely one movie to avoid, I would say it was a complete turkey, but that just brings back terrible memories of watching it. Gobble gobble *shudders*.