Life in a Day was made by asking YouTube filmmakers to submit footage about what their day was like on Jul 24, 2010. I would assume that such an endeavor would generate a lot of really pretentious footage. If you’re like me, you would be right.

It begins at midnight/early morning and goes through midnight, jumping around the world to show different experiences. When one guy films his walk through a parking garage and ride up an elevator, you’ve got to wonder, “How is this the most representative clip out of 80,000 submissions?” That’s not life. That’s a gimmick, like the guys going to the bathroom in Awesome! I F***in’ Shot That!

Most of the world wakes up in the morning. Of course footage of a homeless man sleeping is sad. An Asian father and son wake up to light a shrine to the departed wife/mother. A mom with cancer and catheter bags has to prepare her toddler son. Since that’s so emotional, they bring that family back later in the day.

When people start cooking breakfast, it gets really annoying. The eggs crack, vegetables chop and bacon sizzles in a rhythm. Thank you, Stomp, for making every filmmaker think natural noises are music. The rhythmic montage is such a crutch and there are several in Life. Find a flow that’s not a blatant assault on the ears. The music itself is horrible. It’s either an oppressive somber violin or overbearing flute music.

Some montages are just contrived, like one filmmaker asks “What is in your bag or pocket?” so everybody shares their valuables. Later that same filmmaker asks “What do you fear?” and people get to be racist and homophobic. Yes, I’m singling out the homophobe and the anti-Palestine Israeli. Yeah, we know those people exist.

A Korean bicyclist pops up three times, traveling the world. In a poverty stricken third world country, a family of 14 has to tie up their mentally challenged son/brother so he doesn’t wander off. They use the R word. A Middle Eastern father goes to Dubai for work to send money back home. I know that seems exotic to American audiences, but in the rest of the world that’s just as mediocre as our mundane lives.

If the cancer, poverty and hate aren’t blatant enough, there’s animal slaughter by cattle gun and throat slashing. Some people filmed the Love Parade mob in Duisburg.

A Parkour performance is cool, but he also shoplifts. If I was that market owner, I would totally prosecute that guy using this film as evidence!

One A-hole keeps filming when his wife repeatedly asks him to help her with the children.

Somehow no one sent in nudity. Or, if they did they obviously weren’t going to use it.

Even the end credits suck. The YouTube contributing artists’ names are not in alphabetical order, so if you know someone who sent in a clip, you can’t possibly find their name until you can pause it on DVD.

FAIL.

The feature length film — cut from over 4,500 hours of footage sent in by participants from 192 countries — will premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on January 27. It will be concurrently be live-streamed on youtube.com/lifeinaday at 6 p.m. MT.

Among the film’s numerous subjects are a Russian freerunner touring Moscow on foot and a Korean man who has been riding a bicycle around the world for nine years. Personally, I’d love to see a rundown of footage rejected by the filmmakers, which I’m assuming includes hours upon hours of such beloved YouTube fare as crippling nutshots, awe-inspiring face plants, and obese people running into things on Segways. (/Film)