10) Planet Of The Apes
After a decade of great to at least interesting films, Burton had the first big stumble of his career in 2001 with this “re-imagining” of the classic 1968 Planet of the Apes movie.
Lacking the iconic imagery or the intelligence the franchise deserves, Burton’s version has a certain B-movie charm – and the ape prosthetics from Rick Baker are fantastic – but the director clearly did not really know what to do with the material. This is no more clear than with the infamously nonsensical ending that attempts to replicate the shock of the original but just leaves you scratching your head instead.
10 years later Rise of the Planet of the Apes swept this one under the rug and proved that there was a lot of life in the old franchise yet.
[zergpaid]9) Dark Shadows
By 2012, the heyday of the Tim Burton/Johnny Depp partnership was long gone and so the world gave a colossal shrug when the pair made Dark Shadows, a movie version of a cult supernatural soap opera from the 1970s.
Apart from only really appealing to a niche audience, it didn’t help that Dark Shadows had a wayward, uneasy tone. While it could have been a creepy horror throwback if handled correctly, the movie is a goofy ‘fish-out-of-water’ tale about an ancient vampire waking up in the 20th century. In an attempt to be faithful to a show that ran for over 1000 episodes, various subplots are squeezed into the two hour runtime, leaving it feeling bloated and unfocused.
On the plus side, Eva Green gives a great, OTT performance as an evil witch.
