Quarantine Movies Ranked: Part 1
It’s been over a year since we all went into quarantine. And since then, both of my parents have shown me a whole bunch of movies. In today’s blog post I’m going to be ranking all 40 quarantine movies---part 1. Part 2 will drop tomorrow. But when I say quarantine movies, I mean movies I watched for the FIRST TIME in 2020 and 2021.
40. Artemis Fowl: This was a movie from last year that everybody on the internet seemed to hate on. The critics gave it an 8% on Rotten Tomatoes, and honestly I didn’t hate it. But I did find it bland, boring, and forgettable. The movie had the pieces to be a pretty good movie that started a movie franchise, but you go on the journey and you just don’t care about anything that is going on. You have legendary actress dame Judi Dench give corny and funny lines that just don’t fit. The couple saving graces here are Josh Gad who is really funny, and steals every scene he is in. And the visuals are pretty good. Besides that, I wasn’t a big fan of this movie, and didn't hate it though.
39. Mortal Kombat (2021): This movie came out about two weeks ago, and honestly I don’t remember much about it. I haven’t seen any of the previous Mortal Kombat movies, or played the Mortal Kombat video games. And I think that is part of the reason why I didn’t like it, they assumed that people that watched this movie knew the characters and the world. But I didn’t so I was confused watching it, because I don’t know who the people were. The set design didn’t really work for me, and it looked goofy as all heck. It does have some bloody action that is fun to see, and Kano was the stand out character for me. Mehcad Brooks was also pretty good in this movie. But in general, this movie just wasn’t for me.
38. A Good Day to Die Hard: Another movie that it seemed like everybody on the internet hated, once again I don’t agree with that. I had fun with this movie, I got the one liners and the action that I want from this franchise. I like they went to Russia for this movie, and did something new and different with this franchise. But I don’t really like Jai Courtney as an actor, I’ve seen him in multiple things, and I just don’t care for him. This movie being one of them, he’s very unlikeable. He’s talking down to John McClane about him being a screw-up of a dad. And nobody wants that from a Die Hard movie. The villains I think are their weakest in this movie. It leaves the Die Hard franchise on a bit of a low point. Hopefully, we get a Die Hard 6 and it could end on a high.
37. Twilight: For me, this is such a bad movie---but such an enjoyable bad movie. Everything about this movie is bad. The acting, script, story, everything is bad. But that’s what makes it so much fun, watching everything about this movie fail terribly. But honestly, I was never bored while watching this movie. Scenes are overly long, you have 45 minute staring scenes between Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson (who I’m so excited to see as Batman in 2022). You have a young Anna Kendrick before she became mainstream, and it’s always fun to see here in things. So in general, this is maybe the best example of a bad movie. Maybe in 2021, I can have a ranking of the Twilight movies---if I can watch threw them all.
36. Bloodshot: This is one that I think with a few changes to the script, it could have been a much better movie. Right off that bat, it’s just a fun movie. A dumb fun comic book action movie, that I was never bored with. I’m a big Vin Diesel, and I always enjoy his movies. Some of the action is quite good, it’s shot very dynamically. And there is no shortage of cheesy jokes that worked for me. But this might have been the most predictable movie of 2020. You can write the rest of the movie with only seeing the first 30 minutes of the movie. The main example of this is with the Guy Pearce character. The tone of this movie is all over the place, you have a torture sequence while Pyscho Killer plays. So a very mediocre, but a very fun movie.
35. The Bourne Legacy: This might be the most frustrating movie on this list. Because I think the idea of having a new lead inside of the Jason Bourne world is interesting. And seeing a new point of view in this world with spies and assassins. A number of the action is pretty good in this movie, Oscar Isaac is a new edition (with the little screen time he has). But I think the movie is pretty boring, a good number of the dialogue is talking about pills. And when and where Jeremy Renner needs to take pills. I think Rachel Weisz is the worst leading lady in any of these movies, I just don’t buy as this character in this movie. And I think this movie had potential to be a great spin-off from the Matt Damon lead movies.
34. Sonic the Hedgehog: It seems like a bunch of people liked this movie a lot more than I did. I watched a drive-in back in April. Actually my first time ever going to a drive-in. And I thought it was fun, I enjoy James Marsden and Jim Carrey and they are both great in this movie. I’m a big fan of Jim Carrey, and it’s nice to see him doing this type of role. The visuals are great, and there is some cool action. Some moments did make me laugh a little bit. But, I didn’t like the Sonic character; he was too self-centered and mean, that I just found him very unlikeable. And I don’t like that fact that we are doing a Sonic movie as a road trip movie. So it’s fine, I had fun with it but didn’t make much of an impact on me.
33. Superman: Red Son: This was a straight to video DC animated movie from 2020. And I’ve always liked the idea of the Red Son comic book line. Where it tells a story of what if Superman landed in Russia instead of the USA, and became a soldier for the Soviet Union. The idea of that I think is very interesting, they got great actors to play Superman and Lex Luthir with Jason Isaacs and Diedich Baker (he voiced Batman in some animated movies and shows). But the movie is 1 hour and 24 minutes long, and they had twice as much plot. They could have made it into a 2 part movie, or make it a long 2 ½ hour long animated movie. So in general, I liked elements in it but thought the execution was disappointing.
32. The One and Only Ivan: This is a movie with a pretty great cast. You have Sam Rockwell, Bryan Cranston, Danny Devito, and Helen Mirren and they are fun actors and fun in this movie. Bryan Cranston was the best character in the movie for me, and he’s a great actor and I thought he fit this movie nicely. The visuals for the animals looked pretty good, and actually got nominated for an Oscar for them. There is a nice sense of humor, but this was a movie that I watched and went---ok. I had fun watching it, but after it was done kind of forgot about it. And haven’t wanted to go back and rewatch it, and I even forgot as I saw this movie until I looked at my 2020 movies ranked for this post.
31. LEGO Star Wars: Holiday Special: This was a 45 minute long short about a christmas party in the world of Star Wars. I had a lot of fun with this. What surprised me the most, was that it continued storylines from The Rise of Skywalker. For example, you have Rey training Finn with a lightsaber. It’s fun to see Rey going through the timeline of Star Wars and appearing in different events all through the universe. The Emperor and Darth Vader are a lot of fun to watch in this. But since it is only 45 minutes long, it has to rush through a lot of things in a short amount of time. So it’s fun, but I wish they added 10-15 minutes to make things flow a little bit better. So it has plot and humor which is what I wanted from this special.
30. Rounders: This is one of the more recent movies that my dad has shown me. Matt Damon and Edward Norton lead movies from the late 90s that are pretty good. It was one of Damon’s first movies after Good Will Hunting. And a film that Norton did before Fight Club. You also have Famke Janssen, John Malkovich, and John Turturro thrown into the mix. It’s one obviously has a great cast, some scenes work. But it was a movie that didn’t make much of an impact on me. I watched it, and thought it was good. But nothing more than that, if my dad wants to watch I’d probably watch it with him. But not one that I’d choose to watch on my own.
29. Notting Hill: I watched this movie and another movie that you will see in the next blog post. And I really like Hugh Grant in these types of movies, he has a nice charm and is great in these types of movies. He has great chemistry with Julia Roberts. And this is just a charming rom-com about a big named celebrity falling in love with a nobody from Notting Hill. This was another one that just came and went for me. I had fun with it, I chuckled at points in time, and the cast is great. But it didn’t leave much of a mark for me. So this section right here 33-28 aare pretty much tied for me. So they could move at any point in time.
28. My Cousin Vinny: Joe Pesci is one of these guys that can do so many different things, but is great at all of it. Goodfellas is the complete opposite of his role in this movie and Home Alone. This is a good little courtroom comedy that made me laugh. Marisa Tomei won an Oscar for this movie, and this was one of her first big movies that really made her a movie star. You have Ralph Macchio after he did The Karate Kid movies. Marisa Tomei is the funniest character in the movie, and she stole every scene that she is in. Like I said earlier, I had fun with it but forgot about it just a little bit. So this isn’t a top tier movie for me, it’s just right there in the middle.
27. Soul: Now, I know that a lot of people aren’t going to be happy with having this movie at number 27. But honestly, I thought this was a GOOD Pixar movie, and when a Pixar movie is just GOOD, it can be a bit of a disappointment. For me, this movie felt too much like a critics' movie. What I mean by that is it felt like Pixar was trying to make a movie that won a bunch of awards, they succeeded at the part. But they didn’t make a great family movie. Now, some of the animation is gorgeous, and some of the best from Pixar. Some of the ideas are strong, and I liked the Joe Gardner character. But at the end of the day, I wish they made it more entertaining. So this might be the Pixar movie that I’m most split on.
26. Greyhound: This is a movie that stars Tom Hanks and he also wrote it, and it dropped on Apple+ in 2020. What I thought this movie did the best, was making an efficient war movie. The runtime is only 91 minutes long, so you constantly feel the danger of everything. There is no breathing room to spend with the characters. And that’s kind of the problem here, we don’t really know much about the characters. They set a relationship with a woman with Hanks’ character but it doesn’t really go anywhere. So I wish they added 10-15 minutes to have more character development. But besides that, I thought this was a very good war movie.
25. Wonder Woman 1984: It seems like a bunch of people didn’t like this movie, and seemed to throw a bunch of hate towards it. Obviously, I really like this movie. I can get where people could call it a disappointment and not as good as it could have been. But I had it, it embarrassed the 80s cheesy, and has references to some older comic book movies. Pedro Pascal was great as Maxwell Lord, and he played all of the layers to the character really well. It has some great action, the car chase in the desert being the stand-out. There is a nice sense of humor. But in general, the plot line with the stone and granting wishes to people didn’t work for me. And there were too many laps in the logic of this movie. But in general, I think it’s good.
24. Reservoir Dogs: I’ve only seen two Quentin Tarantino movies, and this is easily my favorite. Like Greyhound, this movie has a short runtime but it’s very effective. It’s a heist movie, but we barely see any of the heist. All we see is the stuff before and after the heist. Tarantino created great characters, Michael Madsen’s Mr. Blonde being the stand-out here. And the torture sequence with him is fantastic. And it’s a movie that has a pretty great soundtrack. It’s also super interesting how Tarantino created this good of a movie with his directorial debut. This is a very good movie that does a lot of things really well.
23. Die Hard 2: Die Harder: I found this to be a solid follow-up to the original Die Hard movie. It has more of everything that you liked about the original movie. William Sadler is another great Die Hard villain, who is willing to kill a plane full of people just to prove his point. I was never bored while watching this movie, I found it to be very good. Now, I did say that it has more of everything that you liked about the original movie. And that is kind of the problem, it feels too much like a rehash of plot points and plot lines from the original movie. Also, it’s too big of a coincidence that McClane’s wife is there with the reporter from the first movie. So with very knick pics aside, I dug this movie and had a good time with it.
22. The Blind Side: A very good and sweet sports movie that really worked for me. Right off the bat, I thought Sandra Bullock was great in this movie. And she can be super tough at points in time but also can be kind and caring. Quinton Aaron was pretty great as the main character, Michael who just plays all of the layers to his character. It just has a great heartfelt message through-out it, and it has a nice sense of humor. But, I think the movie drags a bit toward the end. I think if they cut 10-15 minutes from the end, it could have moved up into the top 20. But in general, this is still a very good movie.
21. Justice League Dark: Apokolips War: In general, I find the straight to video DC animated movies pretty hit or miss for me. But I thought this was one of the better ones, maybe my favorite in this franchise. Basically, this is a rated-R version of Endgame with DC characters, and when I say rated-R, I mean rated-R. Because it is brutal, when people are ripped in half you see their guts. Batman says the f-bombs a whole lot. But it’s a movie where you feel the epic nature of this story, when characters die you feel the weight of that. I really dug this movie, I thought it delivered on the things it was trying to deliver. So it barely made the top 20.
Remember, tomorrow the second part of this ranking is dropping. What are some of new movies that you watched during quarantine? Thanks for reading!
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