The 10 Worst Movies Of 2012 (So Far)

It's the film community's natural, set order: With the good (i.e., the 25 best movies of 2012 so far) always comes the bad. On the positive side, though, the first six months of the new year haven't been that weak at all, giving us plenty more quality flicks than dreadful ones. To put the point into a deeper context, it's worth noting that trimming our list of the best movies down to a manageable 25 was a difficult task, but the flipside countdown was much easier to compile, due to a smaller number of worthy options.

Still, the dreck that has infected multiplexes across the land equates to some of the most brutalizing cinema in recent years. Stricken with catatonic acting, idiotic scripts, and, in one particularly heinous case, a literally non-existent ending, our picks for The 10 Worst Movies Of 2012 (So Far) are bad enough to almost leave us feeling bad for being so harsh toward The Hangover: Part II, last year's crown jewel of foulness—the operative word being "almost."

Written by Matt Barone (@MBarone)

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Director: Jonathan Liebesman
Stars: Sam Worthington, Liam Neeson, Ralph Fienes, Edgar Ramirez, Toby Kebbell, Rosamund Pike, Danny Huston, John Bell

How bad is Wrath of the Titans, the sword-and-sorcery sequel to Clash of the Titans that nobody wanted, directed by the dude who bludgeoned us with last year's horrifically inept Battle: Los Angeles? Three months after seeing it, we can't recall anything about its plot, and that's because there really isn't one in the first place.

Sam Worthington, once again staking his claim as Hollywood's most robotic action movie star, reprises the character of Perseus in name and theory only; in reality, he's little more than an anonymous physical presence running away from CGI monsters that Peter Jackson must have rejected from his Lord of the Rings films. As for Worthington's co-stars, a venerable array of genuine talent that includes Liam Neeson, the underrated Rosamund Pike, and Edgar "Carlos" Ramirez, all of whom are underserved here...well, at least they're not Sam Worthington.

Director: Bobcat Goldthwait
Stars: Joel Murray, Tara Lynne Barr

Who doesn't want to pimp-slap some talentless, annoying reality TV stars or conservative blowhards every now and then? It's a chore to watch any show on VH1 or Fox News while fighting the urge to punch the nearest wall. But going on a killing spree, during which you kill every right-wing pundit and William Hung/Teen Mom type? Yeah, that's a bit excessive.

In a dark comedy like God Bless America, though, that level of pop-culture-fueled anger could provide a sharp, allegorical commentary, yet writer/director Bobcat Goldthwait drives his modern-day-society-sucks message home with the subtlety of a metal baseball bat to the cranium. It doesn't get much more on-the-nose than having your characters engage in shouting matches where they rattle off every kind of person they hate—in multiple scenes.

Director: Larry Charles
Stars: Sacha Baron Cohen, Anna Faris, Ben Kingsley, Jason Mantzoukas, John C. Reilly

Truthfully, the fact that Sacha Baron Cohen lazily rehashed his Borat/Bruno shtick to make the more traditional Hollywood comedy The Dictator isn't the worst thing about the film. What truly weighs The Dictator down so much that it sinks faster than a fat man floating without Swimmies is its total disregard for intelligent social satire.

Cohen's earlier flicks, the aforementioned Borat and Bruno, had plenty of memorable one-liners and R-rated hilarity, but their biggest shared strength was the skewering of America's darkest, most alarming impulses. The Dictator, about a controversial foreign leader living in the US with a fake identity, is more concerned with poop jokes, gags rooted in vaginas, and romantic comedy trappings.

It's as if Cohen and go-to director Larry Charles turned their brains off and unconsciously emulated everything that makes generic Hollywood comedies so infuriating. The chameleon-like actor should've just done another Ali G movie.

Director: Paul Berg
Stars: Taylor Kitsch, Brooklyn Decker, Rihanna, Liam Neeson, Jesse Plemons, Alexander Skarsgard, Hamish Linklater

Critics and cinema purists can hate on Michael Bay all they want, but one thing is certain: The man has a distinct style, and he does it better than anyone else can. Thus, it's both saddening and embarrassing to watch the otherwise competent director Peter Berg (Friday Night Lights, The Kingdom) knock around in Bay's sandbox for two long, hollow hours.

Presenting the classic strategy-first board game as a wannabe Transformers blowout, Battleship sacrifices character development, smart dialogue, and acting coaches' souls to make room for nothing but expensive (and, admittedly, strong-looking) CGI, loud noises, and pretty faces backed by amateur chops (Brooklyn Decker, Rihanna).

Director: James McTeigue
Stars: John Cusack, Luke Evans, Alice Eve, Brendan Gleeson, Kevin McNally

There has to be a filmmaker out there capable of turning the life of the enigmatic and haunted author Edgar Allan Poe into a solid movie. Anyone other than James McTeigue, the middling director who somewhat impressed with V for Vendetta (2006) and then totally screwed the pooch with the insipid action pic Ninja Assassin (2009); with The Raven, he and his cohorts ruined all Poe lovers' hopes and dreams.

Turning Poe into an 1800s spin on Alex Cross isn't a terrible idea, especially when you mix in the whole "killer uses Poe's stories as inspiration" angle. But the problem is that, instead of going for a David Fincher/Seven kind of creepy sheen, McTeigue opted for Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes aesthetic, but with more blood, added pendulums, and none of the fun. Not even a reasonably entertaining and swag-increasing performance from John Cusack, as Poe, can shake the dullness.

Director: Adam Shankman
Stars: Tom Cruise, Julianne Hough, Diego Boneta, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand, Paul Giamatti, Malin Akerman, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Mary J. Blige

Two hours' worth of big-name movie stars wearing laughable '80s garb while singing karoake? On paper, that pitch sounds utterly excruciating, and, we're not so happy to report, Rock of Ages is exactly that. Tenfold.

Based on the hit Broadway musical, director Adam Shankman's glitzy, ditzy musical feels like a shallow vanity project for every actor and actress involved. Even worse, it's devoid of any fervor for anyone other than the stars' agents, their financial advisers, and those obnoxious folks who frequent '80s bars and play air guitar whenever a Def Leppard song begins.

Director: Julie Anne Robinson
Stars:Katherine Heigl, Jason O’Mara, Daniel Sunjata, John Leguizamo, Sherri Shepherd, Debbie Reynolds

At this point in her brutal film career, aside from Knocked Up, Katherine Heigl is, for all intents and purposes, the kiss of death, a rom-com actress who makes Jennifer Aniston look like '90s-era Meg Ryan. Ask your girl to show you 27 Dresses, The Ugly Truth, or Killers if you need proof.

In theory, One for the Money, Heigl's worst movie yet, should have marked a "daring" moment of riskiness for the "A"-lister. For one, it's more of a goofy action romp than a lovey-dovey romantic affair, and it even required her to speak in a different accent; unfortunately, she went with a painfully bad New Jersey speech for the role of Stephanie Plum, a "gritty" Jersey girl character popularized by author Janet Evanovich (who also amateurishly directed the film).

If the movie's only offense was how it soils the Garden State's reputation worse than JWoww, it'd be reprehensible, but not worthy of severe public humiliation. But considering that One for the Money is also about as funny as a colonic, there's nothing left to do but rip it apart before banishing the flick from our memory banks.

Director: David Brooks
Stars: Alice Eve, Josh Peck, Brian Geraghty

The slasher movie subgenre of horror is certainly ripe for a creative resurgence—ATM, unfortunately, is in no way the needed kick-starter. Centered around a homicidal maniac who apparently raided the Urban Legend killer's closet and stole his snorkel coat, ATM deserves to be no more than a 25-minute segment in a bigger anthology film; screenwriter Chris Sparling, however, thought his concept warranted a full 90 minutes. "Overzealous" is an understatement.

The ridiculous premise, destined for unintended laughs from the moment Sparling dreamt it up, is as follows: Three unlikeable twentysomething folks leave their company's Christmas party, stop to take money out, and get trapped inside the cash dispensor's hub when a lame slasher shows up.

What follows is a series of tension-free scenes punctuated by the filmmakers' obviously strained attempts to stretch what could have been a Saturday Night Live Halloween show skit into a full-length feature—with, of course, disastrous results.

Director: Abel Ferrara
Stars: Willem Dafoe, Shanyn Leigh, Natasha Lyonne, Paul Hipp

The whole "end of the world" scenario has been beaten to death by Hollywood, so the proposition of a radically different version of that conceit is actually enticing. But when said tweak is to completely remove any and all excitement in favor of boring dialogue, constant whining, and unappealing dreariness, it's impossible not to miss the brainless and shallow world of Michael Bay.

Abel Ferrara, the veteran filmmaker behind classics like Bad Lieutenant and King of New York, decided to neuter his edginess and write about two insufferable lovers (Willem Dafoe and blank slate Shanyn Leigh) bickering with each other the day before all of humanity ceases to exist.

Since neither of its main characters is the least bit interesting or sympathetic, 4:44 Last Day on Earth meanders along for the longest 85 minutes imaginable. It'll make you wish the world really was about to end, if only to conclude the viewing agony.

Director: William Brent Bell
Stars: Fernanda Andrade, Simon Quarterman, Evan Helmuth, Suzan Crowley

Even without its huge, glaring, inexcusable flaw, The Devil Inside would still register as just plain awful. In the most egregious entry into the horror game's trendy, now overdone found-footage approach, director William Brent Bell and his co-writer, Matthew Peterman, deliver a paint-by-numbers bit, Exorcist-lite story about a hottie (Fernanda Andrade) who hires two demon-specialist priests to learn why her insane mother killed three people.

The typical exorcism movie beats are all hit upon, from levitation to blasphemic screaming and spiritual transference, and none of it is the least bit frightening. Which, honestly, would normally leave a film like The Devil Inside off a list like this; being simply generic and uninspired is bad, but not the "worst."

No, The Devil Inside, or, rather, Bell, Peterman, and the studio heads who guided them, are all guilty of a truly heinous offense that all but confirmed this one would top a "worst movies" list at some point or another. The crime: The Devil Inside is such a lazy, wallet-raping enterprise that it doesn't have an ending. Seriously, nothing. Just a Sopranos-finale-esque black screen that comes out of nowhere, during what seems like the climax, and provides space for a redirection to the movie's faux is-it-real-or-not website.

Yes, The Devil Inside is, essentially, an 80-minute advertisement for their crappy website, which we won't honor with potential pageviews by linking to here. May Bell, Peterman, and everyone else involved feel the wrath of Beelzebub.