A Brief Overview of Some of the Most Overrated Movies of All Time

How many times have you been told by critics or friends or dedicated review writers on Internet Movie Database that a certain movie is the greatest thing since the string bikini only to walk out of the theater or shut off the DVD player and wonder what all these people were smoking?  Every one of us has watched at least one movie that seems to be almost universally praised to the skies, but that leaves us scratching our head in befuddlement. The accolades awarded to Citizen Kane has pretty much doomed that film to being at the top of the list of movies to be termed overrated by anyone watching it for the first time today. In fact, Citizen Kane is a darn good movie by any standard, but I'm consistently stunned by what I consider to be the cinematic equivalent of a C-grade on a term paper that have been historically held up as examples of the finest that Hollywood has ever offered.

Ben-Hur.

I suppose long ago, when I was just a mere lad, I must have watched Ben-Hur all the way through. I can remember it airing on television as a special event and even at a young age had heard that chariot scene was exciting. That impressionable early viewing cemented only two memories of this Charlton Heston Oscar Black Hole in my young mind: the chariot race and the lepers. Other than, even today, I draw a blank. I just seriously don't understand the appeal of this long, boring movie. Charlton Heston is basically doing this standard Troy McClure stuff, showing none of the subtlety he displays in such films as Touch of Evil or Planet of the Apes. Everything builds up to that twenty minute chariot race sequence and it is admittedly worth slugging through to get to. But once it's over, Ben-Hur just completely loses my interest. And, to be perfectly honest, I find the podrace sequence in The Phantom Menace to be more rousing than the chariot race at this point.

The Sound of Music.