Directors chair

Well now, today I will do another Directors chair. As I ask the question; Is Joel Schumacher that bad? Now I know you are thinking about my Kubrick, review. But I will tell you now, my opinion of Kubrick is praise and admiration for his work and art and not his methods or techniques.

As for the man in question. I started realizing that people hated, I mean really hated Schumacher for his role as a director. His work on certain films (you know what, but I'll get to it later.) has sealed his faith as one of the worst directors of all time. But really is he? He has been known for placing homosexual undertones or even overtones in some of his films. But in some films he just does well. Examples include “A time to kill, Phone Booth, The Lost Boys, 8 mm and falling down”; all of these were well received or box-office hits. Lost boys is considered to be a landmark vampire film, while Phone booth is a tense psychological thriller (seriously that name sounds so lame, but the film is suspenseful at the same time)

A time to kill is actually one of my favorite films. It’s like all the other courtroom dramas set in a prejudice/racist state of the south, but power house actors bring it so vividly to life. Actors like Sam L Jackson, Kevin Spacey and Matthew McConaughey.

But now the question must be asked, what about the bad movies? My goodness there is a lot. Films like St Elmo’s fire, Batman forever and of course Batman and Robin. I’ll tell the truth, I don’t mind ‘batman forever’ that much. It had some (SOME!) good actors, an interesting introduction to the Riddler, who is one of my favorite Batman villains, and Jim Carry is hilariously over the top. I don’t mean it will be on one of my top ten’s, but still a guilty pleasure. In fact note to self review lost boys and Batman Forever.

But as for his bad films, when they bomb, they really bomb, or rather bat-bomb. Batman and Robin became the official worst batman movie of all time. Poor acting, bad sets, bad props, awful script and dialog. Some say it was a giant step back and it was. It was campy, hoakey and in a way it was a tribute to the 1960’s tv series of old. Maybe it was bad, but does that make him the worst director ever.

Even Phantom of the Opera was poorly received, mainly due to poor script and bad direction.

He is certainly a visual director in tackling elements of fantasy or fiction.  But his tackling as a director can be sometimes flawed.

Be that as it may, it should not be said that Joel Schumacher is one of the worst directors of all time. He has good films and has bad films, maybe he is just a normal director.

Just to avoid any disappointments, I will give you my top five favorite Schumacher films:
5.     Batman Forever, Funny, action and some good acting. OK in my opinion.

4.  The Wiz, he wrote the screenplay and it is personally one of my favorite musicals.

3.  The Lost boys: some cool acting, cool effects and proper vampire lore

 2.  Phone Booth: Tense, well shot (no pun intended) and it has an Irish man in it.

1.  A time to kill: Good drama, good acting and a good ending.

      

So what are is your least favorite director that everybody likes, or your favorite director that everybody hates? Please comment below. Adieu.