Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

Directed by Arthur Penn

The famous outlaws are given a revisionist treatment that attempts to give them some moral justification and emotional depth that seems to sit more comfortably in the 60s than the 30s.  Watching it today, when we are used to seeing multi-dimensional difficult characters, it's all a little too much to be very believable.  And god, Faye Dunaway is just awful.  She can never just play the part in a way that serves the overall film.  Every scene she's in she tries to steal it with a bunch of pretentious over-acting.

At the time it was seen as shockingly violent.  As much as I hate to build the impression that older things can't measure up to that of today, these days it would merely be par for the course.  No child of the 80s or later would even flinch at anything shown here.

Mommie Dearest (1981)

Directed by Frank Perry
 

Based on Christina Crawford's tell-all memoir of the same name dealing with her abusive relationship with her mother: Joan Crawford. Faye Dunaway as Joan, gives one of the most dreadfully over-acted performances in history. Instead of trying to give an accurate portrayal of child abuse, or making any attempt at giving a screen legend a fair and balanced portrait, showing her accomplishments along with her faults, what we get is this controversy baiting picture with very little resemblance to the actual subject. People familiar with Crawford's movies won't find much to recognize of the iconic actress here. Dunaway's Crawford is a grotesque cartoon more similar to Cruella de Vil than any real person. Her over-acting is so absurd it succeeds in making a joke of something that should be no laughing matter, the serious subject of child abuse. The validity of the claims of the memoir become irrelevant in the face of such an unbelievably over the top performance. I defy you not to bust out laughing at some of the scenes of this movie. Not surprisingly this has rendered the movie a significant cult hit because like a train-wreck it can be difficult to look away.

Network (1976)

Directed by Sidney Lumet

Absolutely unbelievably prescient in it's prediction for TV news. Amazing enough, this was satire at the time but today numerous parallels could be drawn between this movie and Fox News (or Glenn Beck). Roger Ailes must have used this as a blueprint.