There are films. There are guy films — and then there are great guy films and sometimes the term great gets placed on a film and we just end up accepting it. Then, twenty years later, these groups of movies are now considered classics and we’re not really sure how that happened.

This is the list of films of those films. Movies that we are supposed to like. Ones that every testosterone carrying male should be able to discuss and quote on demand and failure to do so could result in serious infractions applied to ones man card.

But in actuality, many of these films — these classic guy movies — aren’t very good. In fact some are actually quite bad.

Now the irony here is that being a bad film shouldn’t matter because we men love bad films — a great bad-film is sometimes better than a great good-film — see, Demolition Man, Time Cop or any of the Earnest movies as example .

But these, this list,  are movies that are not good or not bad in a good way. but we are told they are great.

… and they’re not.

1. Point Break.

Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze. Two guys who are very good at playing —. Well — Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze; that’s  pretty much it. In a film about an FBI agent who infiltrates a group of bank robbing surfers. It’s a movie that shows a great deal of  surfing scenes along with guys with long flowing locks of hair. And not much else.

9. Bullitt

Bullitt is the 1968 Steve McQueen film that every male car lover is supposed to love because of the Mustang chase scene — I actually had to study that exact scene several decades ago in a film class. But in actuality Bullitt is not a very good film. And it’s not even a fun film to watch and is really kind of boring. But it’s one we are supposed to like and now is old enough that we even seem cultured if we’ve seen it.

8. Slapshot

Slapshot is a 1977 Paul Newman film concerning a small mill town who is about to lay off workers where the town’s hockey team decides to save the day. If you love watching hockey players fight and a lot of toilet humor, Slapshot is for you — but you will loose about three IQ points when you are through — and then you’ll  need to watch Shindlers List about halfway through to even recover.

The  Grifters

I really wanted to like The Grifters — a film about traveling con-men, you’re off to a good start — and even saw it at the theatre when it first came out and for the first ten minutes I wasn’t disappointed. Then it just sort of — drifted off and tried to tie in this love story that didn’t work. But the  film now has a cult following and I’m not really sure why. If you feel pressured to watch it, see the first fifteen minutes of it then turn it off and then you can tell everyone what a great movie it is and not be lying.

6. Days of Thunder

I guess no one told the male population that Days of Thunder was a marketing stunt — a way to make a quick film on the racing industry to get all those NASCAR fans into movie seats. It’s badly written, quickly produced and has no real heart. But men love this film. And again, it’s now been around long enough that new generations are being spoon fed on what a great film it is.

5. Matchstick Men

Another con man movie I wanted to like because I loved the book. But of course, the only thing that was anything like the book was the title. A truly bad attempt and like everything Nicholas Cage has made since The Rock, it sucked.

4. Blade Runner

Every nerd born before 1980 is supposed to love Blade Runner — I actually saw it at the theatre the week it came out in 1982. In fact, I had a Blade Runner poster on my dorm room wall — because that’s what all Sci-fi fans at the time were expected to do. And then later, I realized that I didn’t really like it.

3. Dances with Wolves

I’m actually a big fan of all the Kevin Costner films that bombed — Waterworld, The Postman, those are great bad-movies. But the most successful one; Dances with Wolves, is not on that list. It’s a homogenized, preachy story that is a chick flick disguised as a western.

2. Top Gun

Want to piss a lot of guys off? Just say you don’t like Top Gun. Go ahead. I dare you.  Well, here goes. I don’t like Top Gun. It’s sterile. It’s forced. And the best acting in it is done by the airplanes. And worse yet, when Goose dies — I really don’t care.

1. 2001 a Space Odyssey

Yes, I understand that the monolith is supposed to be a religious symbol. And yes, the bone used by the monkey men to win over the waterhole represents technology. Yes,. But any time a writer or a director answer interviews with —it’s open to interpretation, that’s a cop out. I’ve seen the film several times and I now openly admit that I don’t get it. And I don’t really like it.