A Dark Truth | Through the Shattered Lens

A lot of people are saying that 2013 was a great year for movies. And I guess it was. An unusually large number of memorable films were released last year.

However, by that same token, a huge number of truly terrible films were released in 2013 as well. With that in mind, here are my personal picks for the 16 worst films of 2013. Why 16? Because Lisa doesn’t do odd numbers, that’s why.

16) Carrie

15) Getaway

14) After Earth

13) Broken City

12) The Company You Keep

11) See Girl Run

10) Would You Rather

9) Lee Daniels’ The Butler

8) Identity Thief

7) Movie 43

6) Disconnect

5) A Dark Truth

4) Freeloaders

3) Unhung Hero

2) Tyler Perry’s Temptation

And finally, my pick for the worst film of 2013…

1) Man of Steel

It’s only been recently that I’ve come to realize that Man Of Steel was the worst film of 2013. When I first saw it, I thought it was bombastic and rather silly but I also thought it was just another mediocre action film. However, the more that I’ve thought about the film, the more I’ve come to realize that Man of Steel truly represents everything that I dislike about mainstream film. Beyond the fact that it took itself way too seriously, Man of Steel spent millions of dollars to celebrate the destruction of a major city but couldn’t find five minutes to devote to character development or memorable dialogue. Two years ago, a lot of people disagreed with me when I announced that Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch was one of the best films of 2011. I wonder how those same people feel about Man of Steel.

Tomorrow, I’ll continue my look back at the year that was with my 10 favorite songs of 2013.

(You can see my picks for the worst films of 2010, 2011, and 2012 by clicking on the links in this sentence.)

For the latest entry in the 44 Days of Paranoia, we take a look at one of the more obscure films of 2013. A Dark Truth was briefly released last January and it didn’t get much attention. Having recently watched the film, I can understand why.

A Dark Truth (subtle name, no?) opens with a lengthy and disturbing scene of men, women, and children being chased through the jungle by machine gun-wielding soldiers. As we eventually learn, the people fleeing are the citizens of a village in Ecuador and the soldiers are there on a mission to kill every single one of them. It’s such a disturbing and well-shot sequence that I watched it with a sinking feeling because I knew that there was no way the rest of the film would be able to live up to it.

And it turns out I was right. Director Damian Lee seemed to realize this as well because he revisits the footage every time his film starts to drag. Unfortunately, the more we see these violent images, the less powerful they become. By the end of the film, that whole opening sequence has lost whatever power it had simply because we’ve seen it one too many times.

It turns out that the soldiers were working for a — wait for it! — Big Evil Corporation. It seems that this Canadian water purification company accidentally poisoned the village’s water and this led to several villagers getting sick. An executive, who is so villainous that he’s played by Kim Coates, ordered that all the villagers be executed. Among the few that escaped was a veteran political activist (Forest Whitaker) and his wife (Eva Longoria).

Meanwhile, in Canada, corporate executive Deborah Kara Unger finds out what the company did in Ecuador. Wracked with guilt, she hires former CIA Agent-turned-talk radio host Andy Garcia to go down to Ecuador and rescue Whitaker.

A Dark Truth, which obviously aspires to be something more than just a conventional action thriller, is a film that starts with an exciting bang but then ends with a whimper that, even if you have managed to stay awake while watching it, you’ll barely hear. This is one of the slowest films ever made (it certainly feels longer than 105 minutes) and the excessively stylized direction can’t make up for the fact that the film’s plot and dialogue are both painfully predictable. About the only thing that The Dark Truth has going for it is that, while Longoria is painfully miscast, the film does feature good performances from Garcia, Whitaker, and Coates. Best of all is Kevin Durand, who plays a hired assassin here. Durand doesn’t get to say much but he’s such an intimidating physical presence that he doesn’t need to say much.

Seriously, somebody needs to give Kevin Durand his own action franchise.

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