MovieChat Forums > Undisputed (2002) Discussion > WORST...MOVIE...EVE R

WORST...MOVIE...EVE R

posted 20 years ago by j4ny21
22 replies | jump to latest

There are some movies that have some sort of entertainment value, which makes them watchable once or maybe even twice, but all-in-all, are movies that make you question how in the hell they ever got greenlit in the first place. Undisputed embodies that, to me. Boxing is always fun to watch, so I'll admit that there was that catchy aspect to the film when I first saw it. Upon subsequent viewings (two of them, unfortunately) the idiocy of the film started to overshadow the entertainment value provided by the few fight scenes. Let's talk specifically about said idiocy:

1) In what I can only assume is a maximum security prison, considering all the muderers, rapists, etc., the warden rolls over and lets Michael Rooker (don't even get me started about that a-hole) run a fight, as long as they leave no evidence. Then the mobsters show up and are running bets on the fight...Evidence? Publicity? I'd say so.

2) Just by sheer coincidence, the heavyweight champ and the hottest prospect of his day, AND a boxing-obsessed mobster with the connections end up in the same prison. I guess God had a hand in this fight.

3) The dialog sucks sucks SUCKS!!!!!! My favorite example would be the scene when Ripstein is telling Monroe about the fight and Monroe asks for a percentage, and Monroe says "I know fighters usually get 50% ON THE OUTSIDE" which is followed up with the all too predictable, "But we're not on the outside." When dialog is that obviously used as a gimmick to allow for cool lines (it is my theory, bordering on fact, that the only reason Monroe says "on the outside" [which is implied, considering fighters don't get paid on the INSIDE] is to allow for this "cool" line to be said by the hispanic dude (dunno his name)).

4) The skinheads and the black prisoners unite behind Monroe. So emotional, I couldn't see the screen through my tears.

5) Michael Rooker---somebody kill him.

There are more, but I'd like other opinions, agree or disagree, but as you can see, I want this movie to die. Slowly.

[–] FooserX 20 years ago

I liked it.

I like prison movies, and I like boxing movies (rocky, girlfight, gladiator, etc)...so this was a nice combo.

It wasn't oscar caliber, hooah, but who cares it was still a great macho guy movie...like Roadhouse or something. I liked Wesley Snipes' character, as well as Ving Rhames...he played a great badass champ.

Good stuff! :-)

Scott

[–] thegladiator2550 20 years ago

while I'll agree with you on the points you made this movie is not the worst movie ever, there are far worse movies out there, I also believe you and most movie viewers look to deeply into the movies, the majority of movies are made with the intention of a. entertaining and b. making money(not neccessarily in that order) so why look so deeply into them?

Buy the book
http://www.lulu.com/content/128593

[–] Oliver-50 19 years ago

I have to agree with all the points j4ny21 made. No doubt about it this is simply put; an awful movie. Using the film gimmick of giving the bad-guy so much screen time that towards the end of the film we want him to get it is probably the films best idea - and casting Ving Rhames is smart. But it doens't work because we're supposed to have a hero that we like to win the match. That hero is legendary so-so actor Wesley Snipes who manages to use all 3 of his emotional acting expressions.

Walter Hill's directorial nadir. Shame on this movie!

[–] Nikopol29 19 years ago

I don't understand why you're losing so much energy and time talking about this movie if you did not like it. You hate Michael Rooker, too bad for you, he's a great actor, and if you saw his name on the cover why did you watch the movie????? Just take this movie as it is....a good entertainment movie, fun and worth warching it just for Peter Falk's character. Keep your hate for you. Otherwise you will have to write a looong-hate post for each bad movie on imdb....I hope you have much time to lose.

[–] seb_atkin 19 years ago

i thought it was a decent film, snipes was good and i thought the acting was good from everyone else too apart from his annoying little sidekick! who needs to go back to short circuit lol

[–] 19 years ago

[deleted]

[–] pmt008 15 years ago

With regards to Peter Falk, the only redeeming feature of this film is the scene where Falk starts effing and blinding about the warden calling off the fight. Seeing the guy, who I grew up with as Columbo, swearing like that was very amusing.

[–] sloppyjoewhisky 19 years ago

I kind of liked the movie. it's about prison and about boxing, so don't expect Shakespeare! btw, I enjoyed Rooker more than Falk. It was fun to hear columbo swear like that. It being a prison movie I constantly expected Danny Trejo to show up... what about you guys?

[–] leejones3-14159 19 years ago

One thing I can say about this movie was that it was fresh in a way. Most movies that are set in prisons portray the prison wardens as malicious, sadistic, violent brutes who love nothing more than making the prisoners' lives miserable. But in this movie the guards seemed to treat the prisoners with some respect for at least some of the time (obviously not during the riot scene). Thre was ver little of the usual cliched sadistic prssison officers you usually get in prison movies. Now I'm not saying that prison wardens are or are not sadists, I'm just saying that this movie goes against the general prison movie trend of stereotyping them as evil wardens abusing their power, and that is refreshing.

[–] dlbearcave-2 19 years ago

I found this one to be good (not great) afternoon entertainment. Like many of the respondents I'm a fan of boxing movies. Unlike many of the respondents I'm an ex-corrections officer, so you can understand my interest in that aspect of the plot as well. I like to look for prison movies that capture the genuine atmosphere and activities of the joint and this one comes closer than most, a lot of the everyday scenes within Sweetwater ring true. However...

Would they weld an inmate into his cell? I don't think so...
Would there ever be anything but an amateur bout in a prison? Not...
Civilians (even mobsters) sitting amongst large numbers of inmates? Some bug-out would take them hostage, I guarantee it...
Would something like this happen without some punk-ass inmate telling somebody on the outside and getting the warden fired? Nobody has a bigger mouth than an inmate who thinks he has something to gain...

Aside from that it was entertaining. In case you're wondering the most genuine prison movies I've ever seen were "Against the Wall", "An Innocent Man" and to a lesser extent "Shawshank Redemption" (I worked at the prison used to film Shawshank).

[–] blackflag-1 19 years ago

Why is Wesley Snipes always building *beep* in his movies nowadays? All of a sudden, he's a master of building bridges and pagodas in this movie, and in a movie such as "Murder At 1600", he's perfectly recreated a Civil War battle. But, we're not going to tell you anything about it, you're just supposed to understand it's his own personal way of brooding (they did slightly, but only slightly, touch on it in "MA1600").

If I want to watch a good, less-famous boxing movie, I'll re-watch "Diggstown" or, of course, the first or 2nd "Rocky" movie. Good acting, good story, actual emotion, and none of the *beep* crap, which is what Hollywood is now doing with 90% of their films.

If you liked this movie, I'm glad. I really am. But, it just had zero appeal for me. I'm glad it was on FX, and I didn't pay for it exclusively.

[–] j4ny21 19 years ago

Been a while since I originally started this thread, but seeing as how its still sort of active, I had to say one thing, which is an underlying problem on all imdb posts. To Nikopol29 (who may or may not ever check this thread again, so really to people like Nikopol): You ask why, if I hated this film, I spent so much talking about it.

This is a common response to many posts I've read where people don't actually like the movie they're posting on. My response is, why the *beep* not? Are we only to praise movies we love and hold our opinions inside when we dislike a movie? I'm sorry if I offend people who like movies that I don't, but I'm just as comfortable panning a bad movie as I am praising a good one.

If you disagree with my opinion, great, you're entitled, but I'm still going to post about movies I hate, and I'm going to be opinionated and biased and hateful and angry and disgusted with them, and I'll gladly let it show in those posts, so DEAL WITH IT.

In conclusion, Undisputed sucks, Michael Rooker sucks (though I'll make an exception for his performance in Henry, which I hadn't seen at the time I originally posted), Wesley Snipes sucks, and the guy that plays Charlie Utter in Deadwood sucks at everything except playing Charlie Utter in Deadwood.

Awww, did I offend you yet again? I'll shed a tear for you later, but for now I'm going to go on hating some movies, and sharing that hatred with the imdb-using world.

[–] jmac332083 19 years ago

worst movie ever my ass! you're an idiot!

Jimmy Mac

[–] j4ny21 19 years ago

With a handle like yours, and such an impressive list of favorite movies and actors on your profile, you are the authority, I must say. Therefore, I rescind my post: Undisputed, along with Bloodsport and Shotting Gallery, are now my top 3 all-time movies, thanks to Mr. VanDammeRules. I bow before your impeccable taste.

[–] TheTerminator2029 19 years ago

I thought this was a pretty solid movie. It had a great story to it, and I always thought Wesley Snipes and Ving Rhames were good actors. They always play bad-ass roles very well (See: Blade I-III, Dawn of the Dead [2004])

The only thing I particularly didn't care for, was the fact that Master P and his gang of thugs started rapping before the Monroe fight at the beginning of the movie. It was completely pointless and stupid. The song was retarded anyway.

It's no masterpiece, but I found it to be a good way to spend 2 hours.

[–] libormortis 19 years ago

Its funny nearly each movie ever made have a tread called worst movie ever, NOTE you can only come with that statement if you have seen ALL movies!!

[–] j4ny21 19 years ago

True, when I started this thread way back when I realized that A) it isn't really the worst movie ever (I can think of worse ones off the top of my head) and B) I haven't seen all movies, as you correctly point out. However, seeing as how there are thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of movies listed on imdb, as well as, I'm sure, millions of threads, the title of a thread has to be something eye-catching to get people's opinions, for or against, which was my real intention.

So no, this isn't the worst movie ever, just a bad movie that got me pissed off enough for its overwhelming "badness" to cause me to post about it, and what better way to get people to read a post than with an extravagant title like "Worst Movie Ever." I do, however, concede your point, libormortis.