Over the Thanksgiving holiday, Joe Carter put up a list of the 100 most over/underrated movies in his opinion, and asks others to do likewise. He divided the list into fifty seemingly arbitrary categories and lists what he considers to be the most overrated and underrated movies in each one.

Go read it. Done? Good.

Now I don’t have the time or inclination to make my own such list, but I do want to comment some on his list (he lists the overrated movie first, followed by the underrated one):

2. Movie about fraternities: Animal House | PCU (I hesitate to include these two together simply because the criminally overhyped John Belushi shouldn’t even be mentioned in the same breath as comic genius Jeremy Piven.)

He can’t be serious, can he? Belushi overrated, maybe, if you’re not into sophomoric physical comedy, but Jeremy Piven? Gimme a break! Besides, PCU prominently featured David Spade playing, of course, David Spade — an automatic strike against it in my book.

To be fair, I recently had questioned whether or not my fond memories of Animal House were overblown, based on my immaturity the last time I saw it. But a few months ago, AMC played it and I caught half an hour or so of it, and I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit that I was still giggling like a little girl at most of it. I don’t know why the sight of Belushi stuffing his face full of everything at the school lunch line is funny, it just is, okay?!?

4. John Wayne movie: The Searchers | Big Jake (Both are about the search for a kidnapped family member but Big Jake has two things missing from The Searchers: love and humor.)

Never saw Big Jake, but I would always ask my western-fan friends “If I only see one western, which should I see,” and the answer was almost always The Searchers. I finally saw it, and didn’t think it was anything special (if anything, it was a waste of Jeffrey Hunter). I’m not sure to what extent it ruined things that I knew what the “big surprise” was, but it didn’t help. So I’ve seen what most refer to as the best western, and I can pretty much state that I don’t like westerns.

To be fair, there’s another major camp of western fans: Most of those who didn’t answer The Searchers answered Once Upon A Time In The West, and I haven’t seen the latter.

11. Sam Raimi movie: Evil Dead | Army of Darkness: Evil Dead 3

Never saw the first Evil Dead, only Evil Dead 2: Dead By Dawn and Army of Darkness, and I have to say that Evil Dead 2 is the more underrated of the two. Don’t get me wrong, Army of Darkness is brilliant for what it is, but it’s almost entirely tongue-in-cheek. Evil Dead 2, however, works both at the campy humor level and at the horror level — its intended genre — which makes it the better film in my estimation.

Plus, ED2 has several classic moments that show off the physical comedy skills of Bruce Campbell better than the later film: the argument with his reflection in the mirror; the scene where the spirits take over his hand culminating in a fight with dishes in the kitchen; the shameful-yet-classic “Farewell to Arms” gag. Classic stuff.

31. Cult classic: The Rocky Horror Picture Show | Heathers

I’m not going to argue about Rocky Horror Picture Show being overrated — it’s hard not to be when you’re that popular, but I think that Heathers is incredibly overrated. What a stupid, stupid, stupid film, and what’s worse, it’s primarily because of that film that we had to put up with Christian Slater’s wanna-be-Nicholson act for so many years. If I’m going to pick an underrated cult classic, I’d have to go with 1994’s The Chase, which looks for all the world like a brilliant parody of the media circus surrounding the OJ Simpson low-speed Bronco chase but for one thing: The OJ Simpson chase happened on June 17, 1994, while The Chase was released on March 4, 1994, three months before the OJ incident. It wasn’t parody, it was downright prophetic.

By the way, if you see the movie, be sure to watch all the way through the end credits. There’s a great bonus snippet after the last credit rolls.

33. Musical: A Chorus Line | Moulin Rouge

I really, really, really detest musicals, but I’m forced to admit that I genuinely enjoyed Moulin Rouge. Then again, I also really liked 1996’s Romeo+Juliet, so maybe it’s a Baz Luhrmann thing. On that latter note, can we finally just admit to ourselves that Leonardo di Caprio isn’t just a “pretty boy” and can actually act? Claire Daines got all the attention here, but it was di Caprio that sold it. Ditto for Winslett and di Caprio in Titanic. Anyway, I digress.

38. Sequel: Star Wars: Episode IV | X2: X-Men United

Umm, how can Star Wars be an overrated “sequel” when it was the first one made? It also happens to be the second best of all the Star Wars movies, behind only The Empire Strikes Back.

39. John Hughes film: Planes, Trains & Automobiles | Some Kind of Wonderful

I have to strenuously disagree with the idea that Planes, Trains & Automobiles is the most overrated John Hughes film, for two reasons: First, the rental car counter scene is one of the most true-to-life hilarious moments captured on film. Second, and more importantly, Hughes is the man responsible for foisting The Breakfast Club upon us, and that’s one of the most self-important pieces of teen angst crap ever committed to celluloid. Actually, if you look at a list of Hughes’ films, you’ll see many more overrated than PT&A.

And while Some Kind of Wonderful actually was a sweet film, my most underrated vote goes to She’s Having A Baby; the narrative style involving a heavy dose of fantasy-acted-out double-takes was later (and far less skillfully) copied by the Ally McBeal TV show. If you watch this movie, you can see where the Ally producers came up with the idea, as the similarities are striking.

46. Kevin Costner sports movie: Field of Dreams | Tin Cup

Sorry, Joe, but all Kevin Costner sports movies are overrated. In fact, I’m pretty sure all Kevin Costner movies are overrated. Even Waterworld which, despite the universal panning it received, actually manages to be far, far worse.

47. Chick flick: Thelma & Louise | The Truth About Cats & Dogs

Not much to comment about here, other than to say it surprises me that Joe would have anything at all nice to say about anything involving Janeane Garofalo.

50 . Movie with a “Christian” theme: The Passion of the Christ | Ponette

While it surprises me to see Joe say it, I have to agree about The Passion of the Christ being overrated. Those who know me, however, will be surprised to hear why I thought it was overrated. I found very little of the anti-semitism about which many had complained (well, there was plenty of anti-semitism, actually, but it was virtually all black-letter, clearly-scripturally-justifiable anti-semitism, and the made-up stuff actually painted the Romans in a far worse light than it painted the Jews). No, the big problem with the movie was that the acting, direction, and cinematography were all extremely heavy-handed, as if Gibson didn’t trust the Biblical story to tell itself (or perhaps didn’t trust the audience to follow it without massive exposition). The violence was gratuitous in unnecessary ways, but that was actually the least of the movie’s problems. I couldn’t avoid the impression that Gibson was talking down to his intended audience.

I will also add my own over/underrated category, but not for movies:

Actor: Tom Hanks | William H. Macy: Hanks plays an “everyman” in pretty much everything he’s in save Forrest Gump and maybe Philadelphia. To be truly classified as a great actor, you have to have more range than I’ve seen Hanks display. Which brings us to Macy. He chews scenery in everything he’s in, and no matter how bad the movie may be, he’s always good. There are actually enough underrated actors in this category (Tony Shalhoub, for example, or John Lithgow or Alan Rickman) that I could (and probably should) dedicate an entire post to it.