100 Bad Movies You Should See Before You Die

[Ross Barlow]

You want a bad movie? *Sub Zero* (2005), directed by Jim Wynorski and starring complete unknowns, is probably the worst mountain climbing movie ever made. It actually made Sylvester Stallone (*Cliffhanger* 1993) and Chris O’Donnell (*Vertical Limit* 2000) look like authentic, competent and intelligent mountain climbers by comparison. It was that bad.

The only thing that made it worth seeing the film completely through was the very beautiful mountain footage (New Zealand Alps) – and some of the stunt-work, sets, and special effects – all of it stolen directly from Martin Campbell's okay film, *Vertical Limit* (2000). I mean they actually used outtakes from that film, dressing the actors in the same colors of clothing to blend the scenes together. I am thinking that the editors of *Vertical Limit* must have swept up the film cuttings from the floor and taped them into a re-edit with a lame new script and some bad actors.

None of the actors, writers or the director knew anything about climbing. It was beyond pathetic. It was horrifying.

Early in their climb of K2, they perform the worst rope-team safety "belay" I have ever seen in film. The leader is going to lead ahead and says to a teammate, "Belay me," while handing him an entire coil of rope that has simply been untied and that is still in loose coils. Then he immediately turns and sets off on his lead. The "belayer" stands there with a whole coil of rope held in his arms against his chest. No belay braking-device, no body-belay, no anchor, no clue.

When the leader promptly falls into the same crevasse that Robin Tunney fell into in *Vertical Limit*, the belayer of course has rope racing out of his grasp as the leader plummets down into the abyss. The guys standing around fumble to grab the rope and they all (improbably) stop the leader’s fall from bottoming out with gloved hands and the fact that one (unanchored) guy is tied into the other end of the rope. It was embarrassing to watch.

This team has a high-tech long-range “piton-shooting gun” that would have been okay in a mediocre Sci-Fi comedy flick. But I rarely saw ice-crampons on the actors’ feet in many of the critical scenes. This was probably a good thing, as the idiots would most likely have shredded themselves bloody if equipped with them.

Of course, ALL climbing films must have a horizontal Tyrolean Traverse for stunning visual effect (it does look dramatic), even if it makes absolutely no sense to the plot or the climb. On the other end of this Tyrolean Traverse line, a climber puts in the worst snow and ice anchor I have seen since the time I got blindsided by an avalanche on Cascade Mountain in the Adirondacks and my single ice screw popped (and I was swept down 140 feet).

I could go on and on. Don't bother seeing this film unless you are desperate for laughs. If you are a climber, you will be tempted to weep.

-Ross Barlow.

[Kat]

AI was an awful movie and I certainly felt like a sucker for not walking out on it because I was hoping it would come around. It didn't. For normal flicks I've seen, it up there on the shitlist.

Now, I generally like campy rock-n-roll flicks and I enjoy cult movies like Rocky Horror and Rock and Roll High School, but I have my limits. There is a movie by Ken Russell from around 1975 that is horrible beyond belief. It stars Roger Daltrey of The Who and Ringo plays the Pope. Ringo did some movies that were really out there and being the Beatle fan that I am, had to go see all of them at the midnight shows. Lisztomania is beyond bizarre and and man oh man is this one bad...

Kat

[John Dailey]

~ Hate to say it, Spielberg movie-fan I am, but, gotta agree with Kat. AI came nowhere living up to it's hyped-at-the-time 'promise.' It really seems like a quirky version of Bicentennial Man from the favored perspective of Spielberg re a young kid's 'wonder' at the strange-and-awesome universe around him/her. Both worthy of no more than an hr's time, if that. Both lacked sensibly handling all the 'questions' each implied; and, they both raised near identical implied questions.

~ We all will forever wonder just where Kubrick would have taken AI. I'm sure it wasn't where Spielberg fairy-tale-ishly decided to go. All that for a Blue Fairy dream/hope, indeed! What a waste of everybody's time.

LLAP

J:D

[Rich Engle]

A few of my faves, there's so many of course, but off the cuff...

Blade Runner

Apocalypse Now

Fellini's "City of Women" (or most any of his)

Goofy stuff: The Blues Brothers, Animal House...

Classic Hitchcocks like "Vertigo."

I usually can think of more but I'm not feeling it today.

[Reidy]

Don't even remember the name. Lauren Holly plays a flight attendant who lands an airliner safely after criminals hijack it.

Worst movie I'd go back to again and again is Garbo's Mata Hari, because the last few minutes are the most beautiful thing I've ever seen on the screen. Somehow I doubt the scene would have such an impact on a viewer who hadn't suffered through the previous hour plus.

[John Dailey]

~ Ya want a 'bad' movie? (both, within a-n-d without the O'ist framework-of-thinking/evaluating)

~ Check out Paul Newman's Hombre. Great acting, by all, no argument; suspenseful story (if not 'plot'); great scenery e-v-e-n. What's 'bad'? --- rent it. :devil: (Can one say blatantly, because near-obviously PURPOSEFULLY, confusing 'altruism' with 'love'?)

~ But, back to the 'origin' of this thread, Catwoman: With Halle Berry in (more or less) that outfit, who in the world needs a 'plot'?

LLAP

J:D

Edited January 19, 2007 by John Dailey

[Chris Grieb]

Reidy; The worst Garbo movie I have ever seen is Romance. I don't think her leading man ever did another movie he was so bad. There are some scenes which you watch and have the feeling Garbo and the rest of the cast went and laughed themselves silly after it was over.

[Judith]

"The Keep". Dreadful movie based on a wonderful book. I watched it only because it had Jurgen Prochnow in it (one of my favorite actors), and because of it I discovered one of my favorite authors, F. Paul Wilson, author of the book on which it was based.

Judith

[Rich Engle]

Back to fave movies, maybe on my top 3 ever list is "Chaplin."

Robert Downey Jr.=spectacular. It is very, very close to Chaplin's autobiography. If you're in entertainment, this movie really rings. Oh, it's so darned good...

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I made an opening post to a new thread (given below) without realizing that the present thread was supposed to be for this, so I renamed the present thread to "Bad Movies" to make it clearer and deleted my new thread. (I also decided to stop being a masochist and corrected the spelling of "masacist.")

I noticed on another thread that people were commenting on the worst movies they have seen. So I decided to start a thread specifically for this.

Some of the movies are so bad that they have become cult films, like Ed Wood's movies, the Killer Tomato series, etc.

And some are just awful by any standard.

Which movies should be avoided, or seen to enjoy the jaw drop of incredulity at observing sheer incompetence?

Michael

[John Dailey]

Mike:

~ Uh-h, re 'bad' movies, I don't think the term 'should' is really all that applicable (re seeing before one dies); well, except for film-students to learn what NOT to do in writing, directing, acting, financing, etc...hell, even being seen in as a potted plant!

LLAP

J:D

P.S. Hey, re Garbo: She always said "I vant to be alone." Let the poor woman be. What did they know about 'acting' and story writing back then, compared to the 'educated' buffs (and makers) nowadays? Hell, it was literature par excellence compared to the Flash Gordon serials.

Edited January 22, 2007 by John Dailey

[Rich Engle]

I don't know if it's "bad" but it's definitely not romantic realism!

Mike Judge's "Idiocracy." Just saw it last weekend. Oh my GAWD.

And I just thought of "Mars Attacks." Oh yeah.

Edited January 22, 2007 by Rich Engle

[CNA]

Striptease with Demi Moore

Hell Night with a very young Linda Blair (typical valley girl slasher type movie)

What the hell, might as well put up the movie Valley Girl as well. Yuck

The Fog remake

These last 3 are strange but quite funny to watch. Bad movies but remember watching them when I was younger and was just bustin' up at some of the scenes, especially in Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness. You think to yourself, WTF was that. Oh, man, even laughing now at it and what I remember watching. It's bad, definitely strange, and quite funny. If I am remembering correctly, the first one was a bit gory and I did not like it at all. I cringe at most slasher movies. But here are the last 3 with trailers.

Evil Dead Trailer

Evil Dead II Trailer

Army of Darkness Trailer

Edited January 23, 2007 by CNA

[Danneskjold]

Oh man! Army of Darkness was great!

THIS IS MY BOOM STICK.

[John Dailey]

~ HEY! Army of Darkness was G-O-O-D! It was hellaciously funny, in it's obviously intended quirky, 'off-beat' way. It outdid Sean of the Dead which tried to be a parody of Dawn of the Dead . 'Sean...' I thought was near-boring; talk about overdoing a Resident Evil plot, er, story. But 'Army...' ? F-u-n-n-y! Campbell was good.

~ Now, The Fog, and it's 're-make', well...some things just shouldn't be re-made. No one can outdo Carpenter anymore than Hitchcock, Ford, etc. The 're-make' shouldn't have been, any more than Psycho was.

LLAP

J:D

Edited January 27, 2007 by John Dailey

[John Dailey]

~ Eh-h, STRIPTEASE, ...

...well, call me biased. I have to say that it had a couple noteworthy things going for it for which I have to give it a, er, 'thumb' UP. --- Demi was definitely Mo(o)re there than in her other films, regardless that we're talking trick-....um-m-m...'makeup.'

LLAP

J:D

[CNA]

hehehehehe....John, you're a guy. Of course, you're biased. LOL Oh, I didn't like Striptease or Catwoman. Me, as for slasher movies, I've watched them, even the funnier ones but they were never really my cup of tea. I just have an issue with the glorification of death. Plus, I'm a girl and I spook easy. heheheh Hey, it's the perfect first date for a guy as the girl is burying her face into his chest or jumping into his arms. LOL I'm sure Victor will enjoy this quite a bit !!

But I'm curious now, do watch Valley Girl and Hell Night. Hmmm....but you may very well like Hell Night too. LOL When I saw it so long ago, I was like WTF was that, oh, my God, you can't be serious. BUT it's suspensful and a bit wicked as you'll find out that the ghoulish creature actually has a twin. OY. If I'm remembering correctly as it has been many many years, it's about sorority and fraternity kids that spend the night in a mansion where someone was supposedly murdered or something or other a long time ago and the mansion has been sitting empty since. As much as I can remember, it's their initiation into the club. Well, drugs, alcohol, and sex of course and as always here comes the slasher. OY

Angie

Edited February 1, 2007 by CNA

[Brant Gaede]

I don't watch bad movies. What's the matter with you people?

If you believe that watch "Hostel." Bring a barf bag.

--Brant

[CNA]

I don't watch bad movies. What's the matter with you people?

If you believe that watch "Hostel." Bring a barf bag.

--Brant

Well, Brant, a bit difficult to not watch a bad movie at some point or another or you can just stop watching movies altogether, you know, although you can avoid certain genres such as slasher movies which is what I do. But what is bad to one person for whatever reason may be very good to another. Kori didn't like Titanic and put it up as a bad movie in her opinion; whereas, I enjoyed it very much for a few reasons. For one, I'm very familiar with the circumstances of that sinking, the events before, during, and after it and have written papers on it when I was younger. Another one for me was the love story in the movie.

I've watched many many movies, some slasher movies as well, as I was a huge movie buff a long time ago. Not so much now for certain reasons but still watch on ocassion. Now I stay away from slasher flicks as I just have the whole issue with the glorification of death and so forth and that people actually pay a lot of money to sit and watch for however many hours to see blood and gore and people being tortured and/or killed and people getting off on it and so forth, etc. YUCK. Just doesn't sit well with me at all so I do not watch these types of movies; such as Hostel. There have been a few I've been asked to watch by others such as the remake of the Fog as I saw the original when I was very young and then asked what I thought of it, etc. But I do agree that you can stay away from the genres of movie that you think are bad because of what it depicts, etc. But difficult to not watch a bad movie at some point or another. What one person thinks is a good move you may very well think is horrible after seeing it.

What I've been told and I completely agree with you based on what I've been told is that Hostel is brutal and downright disgusting. To my understanding, it was based on real life events in a small town in another country. Oy, even more disgusting and evil, sick mother Fg people if this is true. This is one movie I would never watch, even if asked to.

Something that could be considered scary and suspenseful but not a slasher type movie, I would be willing to watch. If Victor ever gets the idea of taking me to a movie that is scary where he wants me jumping into his arms, he'll know the type of movie to take me to. (hint, hint, Honey)

Angie

[John Dailey]

~ I've found most 'slasher' movies, via their trailers, to be not my cup of tea. Not those that are such obviously for the pure purpose of being so, that is.

~ The 1st HALLOWEEN ('Michael') now has the dubious distinction of being the start of all of them, though there really was no bona-fide 'gore' scene in it anymore than actually in the original PSYCHO. The 1st NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET ('Freddy') was interesting, as was the 1st FRIDAY THE 13TH ('Jason'). The latter had an interesting end-twist. But, their sequels, and the later slasher-types? No-o-o...I watched SAW and decided "Nope; no more." No HOSTEL, 10,000 hillbilly maniacs, etc.

~ I don't mind believable gore or even sadism (HANNIBAL RISING is coming!) if there's more to the 'story/plot' than merely those. Elsewise, gimme ICE AGE 3 (or, CATWOMAN II.)

~ Brant: you actually watched HOSTEL?

LLAP

J:D

Edited February 2, 2007 by John Dailey

[Chris Grieb]

Last night I watched Detective Story on TCM. It got a lot of Oscar nominations but but has lots of chewing the scenery acting principally by Kirk Douglas. I don't know anyone could be understood with his teeth clenched together. The moral dilemma was Douglas plays a very dedicated detective who is discovers his wife has obtained an abortion. The detective is also investigating an embezzlement where the owner of the business is willing to drop the charges. The accused is a young man. The detective becomes aware about the wife's abortion and it makes him crazy. The wife leaves him. The detective ends up getting shot by a three time loser. The detective tells his partner to let the kid go. It was just awful. It is very naturalistic and this is one of the best movies of 1951.

[Brant Gaede]

~ I've found most 'slasher' movies, via their trailers, to be not my cup of tea. Not those that are such obviously for the pure purpose of being so, that is.

~ The 1st HALLOWEEN ('Michael') now has the dubious distinction of being the start of all of them, though there really was no bona-fide 'gore' scene in it anymore than actually in the original PSYCHO. The 1st NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET ('Freddy') was interesting, as was the 1st FRIDAY THE 13TH ('Jason'). The latter had an interesting end-twist. But, their sequels, and the later slasher-types? No-o-o...I watched SAW and decided "Nope; no more." No HOSTEL, 10,000 hillbilly maniacs, etc.

~ I don't mind believable gore or even sadism (HANNIBAL RISING is coming!) if there's more to the 'story/plot' than merely those. Elsewise, gimme ICE AGE 3 (or, CATWOMAN II.)

~ Brant: you actually watched HOSTEL?

LLAP

J:D

Yeah. I didn't know where it was going until it got there.

--Brant

[Danneskjold]

Ok, I've got one that DEFINITELY goes at number 1 on this list. It's worse than Catwoman by a HUUUUUUUUGE margin.

Ok, the movie is called Facing the Giants. It is so bad you'll want to cry. It's that football movie that was made completely by and using actors from that church down in Georgia. If I wasn't so used to Christianity I think I would have gouged out my eyes by now, instead it was just funny.

The movie's main protagonist is about an, I kid you not, infertile coach for a 2A Georgia Christian school chronic loser football team. The guy is such a bad coach that he's about to lose his job. Then a completely random, unnamed, guy shows up and gives him a bible and shows him how to integrate his faith into football.

That brought on the one good scene in the movie. By that I mean the one that didn't have me dry heaving and all it was was some kid carrying another on his back, while on all fours, across the football field. Which is hard, but I can see why they're a shitty football team because that is a POINTLESS drill, especially in the middle of the season. The guy kid was supposed to carry the guy to the fifty yard line, and since he was blindfolded, ended up carrying him all the way to the other end zone. It was an actually powerful scene. That might just because it was so much higher than the rest of the movie though.

This starts a series of bad coaching techniques, one of which is fixing a kicker's shitty kicking by giving him a speech on how the road to heaven is straight and narrow (ignoring the fact that the kicker was kicking the ball with his toe, which might have been the actual problem). He also taught his team defense by talking about how in the bible somebody built a wall in record time by having everybody build the section in front of their own house. Ironically, this is an excellent argument for capitalism.

Then midway through the movie somebody buys him a new car, fixing one of the things he prayed about. Amongst the other things he prayed for were for the team to do well and his balls to unshrivel. This prompted me to say "Now maybe someone will get his wife pregnant," for which I was promptly (jokingly) hit on the back by my mom.

In the end they win the state championship on a 51 yard field goal kicked by their backup kicker (the one that they made kick it straight by telling him to). Now, a 51 yard field goal is almost impossible for a high schooler. My football team's kicker is one of the top 3 in the state and he tops out before 40.

And then it turns out the coach's wife is pregnant. I said, "Won't he be surprised when it comes out half black" (The only black person with any sort of significant role in the movie was his assistant coach).

This movie was horrible. It made me really take some of Nero's ideas into consideration.

Edited February 18, 2007 by Jeff Kremer

[emb021]

Striptease with Demi Moore

I've only seen bits of it on tv. Its based on one of Carl Hiassen's books. While I haven't read any, he's also a columnist for the Miami Herald, a local paper. He's funny/sarcastic in his column, and I like his writting. Some good lines/scenes in the movie. Burt Reynolds as a weirdo politician. Ving Rhames as her bodyguard ("do I look like I follow politics?").

[Chris Grieb]

Could you give me some other titles Hiasson wrote. I remember a novel involving the Everglades.