100 Bad Movies - 99 - Marci X

The first of our FRIENDS stars rolls into the list, like a rusted out lo-rider, with broken hydraulics and an AM radio stuck on the religious station. Lisa Kudrow stars in Marci X playing the role of Marci, A socialite with a rich daddy alongside Damon Wayans who plays Dr S, a controversial “Gangsta” rapper. As far as the worst movies ever made goes Marci X deserves to be on the list, I'm just surprised its not closer to the top spot.

Wow where to start.

Well I actually watched Marci X with my girlfriend, and well, after this I think it’s safe to say the next 98 movies on the list, I’ll be watching by myself. The first movie I watched, yeah the Turkish one, left me feeling like this list might be doable, it wasn’t good, but it was bearable.

Enter Marci X! At this stage (A mighty 2 movies in) with this movie only being number 99, I have serious concerns over what I’m going to encounter further down the list.

Now to the movie. In a nutshell the movie attempts to tackle the social issue of the acceptability of profane and offensive lyrics in music and to a lesser extent its effect on youth. In Marci X it's Rap/Hip hop lyrics that are under attack, with the main target being Dr S. Now I'm quite partial to a bit of Hip Hop/Rap so I thought this movie might amuse me… How wrong I was.

So this movie takes a light hearted look at profane lyrics in hip hop, lets put it in context.

This movie was released in 2003, taking a quick peak at the Rap/Hip Hop landscape  around that time we see that:

Snoop Dogg had released 5 Platinum albums

Tupac had been Dead 7 years, releasing 6 albums before his death 1 platinum, 3 multi platinum, and another 6 had been released after his death, 2 Platinum, 4 going multi platinum.

Eminem had released 3 multi platinum selling albums all of which were shrouded in controversy due to the theme’s and obscene language present in the albums.

50 Cent released Get Rich or Die Tryin in Feb 2003, by the end of the year it had sold over 6 million copies.

So if we take these things into account, and the fact I’ve only mentioned a few of the more famous and recognisable artists in the Hip Hop/Rap world, we see that by 2003 the use of offensive lyrics and bad language is not something that is going to go away anytime soon. In fact it could be argued that the same contrversial themes, and obscene language are the cornerstones of the multi billion dollar worldwide Hip Hop/Rap industry. Therefore when Dr S is copping grief from politicians for lyrics like “I wanna love ya in the butt” I’m thinking, In what world did the makers of this movie ever think that would fly?? I mean seriously, I’ve heard worse language on American Idol.

And why oh why would you make a movie based on Rap music, without any good rapping. I mean I like Damon Wayans, I used to love ‘My wife and Kids’, and I recall having many a good chuckle at him in Major Payne, but really rapping is something he should cross off the list of things to do and stick to listening to it, don't even "sing" along, just listen.

While on the subject of rapping Marci does it. That’s right Lisa Kudrow raps. Phoebe…. Raps…

Its not good people, lets not mince words it’s bad. Seriously, her rap about her purse, or her purses or something, I couldn’t quite hear it all as I was busy ensuring my ears weren’t bleeding. It did give me a new appreciation of Phoebe’s musical talents, as by comparison Smelly Cat is simply a piece of musical genius. Lisa Kudrow please never EVER rap again, for the sake of all that is good in the world, ignore Nike -  JUST DON'T DO IT

Well that was quite the tangent now wasn’t it, probably because the movie was horrible! There I said it, it’s horrible. Here is the movie for you in 1 paragraph.

Marci’s dad who owns the record label Dr S is signed to, gets sick. Crazy Senator goes on crusade to protect the innocence of children by hating on Rap music targeting Dr S. Marci joins crusade to save Daddy’s Company, confronts Dr S. She raps *shudder* gets to know Dr S, lo and behold they fall for each other. Dr S does something bad loses Marci, Marci cries, Dr S does something good, they get back together and the Crazy senator is defeated, rap music is free to keep on swearing. Of course the credits roll while they are pashing or something similar, I was way, way to happy it was over to focus on the details.

IMDB Trivia sums this movie up beautifully:

“Chris Rock was offered the part of Dr. S but turned it down. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Rock said "It's the worst script I've ever gotten... I'd have been happier getting an envelope full of anthrax."”

Next up is number 98 on IMDB’s Bottom 100 Movies as voted by IMDB users: Police Academy: Mission to Moscow. I’m looking forward to it, I quite liked the Police Academy movies when I was younger, hopefully its place on the list is undeserved and I’ll have something nice to write.

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Like number ™ on the TOP 250 Movies as voted by IMDB users -

1992's - Unforgiven - 

Starring Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman and Morgan Freeman

Unforgiven [DVD]                     Unforgiven [Blu-ray]