25 Dumbest Movies Of All Time

Posted by , Updated on March 23, 2024

Extraordinary films (regardless of how you interpret that) are a scarcity. Average, adequate, “well it kept me amused for some time” kind of movies are quite prevalent, as are those that we enjoy but acknowledge that they might not be cinematic masterpieces. Typically, mediocre or terrible films are also quite abundant, especially if you go through the $3 DVD bin at WalMart. Then, there are those films that are so abysmal that you find yourself dazed, unable to concentrate on anything else, or to utter a comprehensible sentence other than, “What? Why? Can I regain that wasted time?” There may be moments, even days later, when you recollect just how atrocious a movie was and feel a twinge of irritation or resentment towards yourself for watching the whole thing, or the exorbitant budget that was lavished on such a dreadful production, particularly in a world where so many are in financial need. This is a list of the 25 Dumbest Movies Of All Time, to guide you on what to steer clear of, or to subject yourself to as a form of self-punishment when necessary.

25

The Black Gestapo (1975)

black gestapo posterSource: https://www.rottentomatoes.com

The fact that a film named The Black Gestapo (1975) was made just makes us upset on several different levels. An ill advised entry into the blaxplotation genre (arguably an ill advised genre of film), it starts out with a group of black crime fighters ridding their neighborhood of white hoodlums, but then they start castrating and throwing them out of windows, and THEN they start goose stepping and wearing swastikas. Just skip this one.

24

Catwoman (2004)

catwoman-movieSource: http://www.denofgeek.com/

In 2004, Hallie Berry was one of the sexiest and most successful actresses alive. Then Catwoman was released, and we questioned everything. It should have been amazing; it had a budget of $100 million but only made $84 million total at the box office. All of it is unpleasant.

23

Jack and Jill (2011)

jackandjillSource: http://entertainment.time.com/

Jack and Jill is a movie where Adam Sandler plays both of the lead characters. One, a man and the other a woman. The entire basis of the film is Adam Sandler dressed in drag playing his own sister. After you watch it, you’re just kind of left wondering if maybe a giant meteor wiping out the species that created this would really be such a horrible thing.

22

Glitter (2001)

glitterSource: http://www.newsday.com/

Glitter (2001) was Mariah Carey’s entry into major motion pictures. It’s kind of hard to know where to start with the cringe – the cliche over-played plot about a girl who gets everything she ever wants because a hot guy really really believed in her, or said hot guy’s HORRIBLE fake New York accent, or his inability to cover his torso and upper arms at the same time. It was like watching a bad romance novel without an editor come to life.

21

The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)

swhsSource: http://www.starwarsholidayspecial.com/

The Star Wars Holiday Special isn’t technically a movie. It’s, well, a Holiday Special. But listening to Chewbacca’s family talk to each other in Wookie, without subtitles, for over ten minutes, might cause brain damage, but in case it didn’t, you get to watch Chewbacca’s wife, Mala, watch a cooking show and make Life Day Dinner. It aired exactly once, in 1978, and then never again. Lucas actually declared it non-canonical and tried to have every tape destroyed, but, well, The Internet means nothing recorded is ever truly gone. It does contain a clearly not sober Carrie Fisher clinging to Chewbacca singing about life day, which is the only vaguely holiday thing about the movie.

20

White Chicks (2004)

White chicks movie posterSource: http://www.metacritic.com/

White Chicks (2004) is a movie about two FBI agents, played by the Wayans Brothers – who are, it should be noted, black – going undercover as white chicks. It just kind of hurts and feels forced on every level. There really isn’t a redeeming quality about this movie, and you walk away wondering why you gave it nearly two hours of your life.

19

Son Of The Mask (2005)

son_of_the_mask_2005Source: http://www.metacritic.com/

Son Of The Mask (2005) is the sequel to The Mask (1994). Where the mask starred Jim Carey and was definitely not a family movie with a PG13 rating, the sequel scales it back to make a “family” film. Except it’s not a really a family film, when the entire premise is based on the fact that a child is conceived while the main character, played by Jamie Kennedy, is wearing the mask. It’s basically Kennedy’s character showing us how inept he would be with a regular child, much less a mask enhanced child, while Loki tries to hunt them down to find the mask. And no, Loki isn’t sexy or particularly clever.

18

Green Lantern (2011)

green-lantern-movieSource: http://worstmoviesevermade.com/

Green Lantern (2011) was supposed to be DC’s big break into Super Hero movies in the 2010’s. It wasn’t. Despite starring the amazing Ryan Reynolds, it’s kind of like someone else was piloting Reynolds’ body for most of the film. (No, wait, that was just the awful CGI. They basically just filmed heads, and put them on CGI bodies, it seems.) Not entirely sure how the writing team managed it, but they made Ryan Reynolds unfunny. This movie was insulting to comic book fans and movie goers, in that it assumed you could just take a big budget, big names, and put out a terrible product and people would still like it.

17

The Master of Disguise (2002)

masterdisguiseSource: http://www.rogerebert.com/

The Master of Disguise (2002) is a 65 minute movie with 15 minutes of credits.  If you didn’t know, the Screen Actor’s Guilt requires a minimum run time of 80 minutes for a feature length film, so Master Of Disguise fills in the 15 minutes with credits, outtakes, and bloopers. That should probably give us a heads up that something is amiss, but in case it doesn’t, another strong clue is that the lead character’s name is “Pistachio Disguisey.” While Dana Carvey is a very talented and funny actor, even putting him in the starring role here can’t save this movie.

16

Fred: The Movie (2016)

lucas_cruikshank_by_gage_skidmoreSource: http://www.thetoptens.com/

Fred: The movie (2016) – because someone thought a horribly annoying youtube channel needed to be a show and then a movie. Fred: The movie is about a teenage boy playing a six year old boy, whose voice is digitally altered to be high pitched and grating. The jokes are so bad they’re borderline inappropriate for children, which is important because this is a made for TV movie that premiered on Nickelodeon. Still, movies this bad are an insult to the intelligence of children.

15

It's Pat! (1995)

its-patSource: http://www.avclub.com/

It’s Pat! (1995) is a movie based on the SNL character Pat, who is overweight, annoying, and completely ambiguous in gender. Aside from being unable to be made in 2016 because it’s not remotely PC and would surely trigger nearly everyone, it’s also just a terrible, horrible, stupid movie. The basic the plot of the movie: is Pat a boy or a girl?

14

The Touch of Satan (1971)

touch2Source: http://www.imdb.com/

The Touch of Satan (1971) is as horrible as the title would imply. Just a touch of Satan is enough to ruin a movie, apparently. Or to add long awkward gaps between dialogue where the characters just kind of sit around and stare at each other. You would think a story about a witch selling her soul to Satan to save her sister from being burned at the stake could be interesting, but no.

13

Leonard Part 6 (1987)

leonardpt6Source:http://www.nytimes.com/

Leonard Part 6 (1987) was written by and stars Bill Cosby, who then went on to say before the film’s release that no one should go see it. Also, it should be noted that there are no Leonard parts 1-5. Cosby plays a retired CIA agent who leaves retirement to solve the mystery of small animals, like a piranha (which reads a playboy at one point), bunnies, and frogs attacking active CIA agents. Before Leonard comes out of retirement though, there’s about half an hour of Cosby just hanging out in his fancy house, being fancy, before the action starts.

12

Troll 2 (1990)

troll2Source: http://screenrant.com/

Spoiler Alert: Troll 2 (1990) doesn’t actually have any trolls in it. It’s your cliche story of a guy who wants to give up big city life and move his entire family out into the country, only this time he does so ignoring the warnings that goblins will turn his family into plants and eat them. “Why do they need to be plants first?” a reasonable person may ask. Because the film was originally conceived as anti-vegetarian propaganda. It actually has nothing at all to do with the 1986 movie Troll which it’s a sequel to, and between the cruddy special affects, gay jokes, the fact that someone dies in popcorn, and the weird forced plot, Troll 2 is memorable for how utterly bad it is.

11

Howard the Duck (1986)

howard-the-duckSource: http://www.dorkly.com/

Howard the Duck (1986) is a movie about a walking talking cussing duck alien who crash lands in Ohio and must save Earth. While the movie is very loosely based on the Marvel comic of the same name, sometimes what translates wonderfully via comic does not translate to live action. The dialog includes such gems as, “Is that a talking duck? I’m doin’ too much toot!” Don’t…don’t subject yourself to this. Not even drinking games can make it enjoyable.

10

Freddy Got Fingered (2001)

freddy-got-fingeredSource: http://boards.straightdope.com/

Freddy Got Fingered (2001) is a movie starring Tom Green and is somehow worse than the name would lead you to believe. The movie is basically just Tom Green being Tom Green. He moves out of his parents house and ends up working in a cheese sandwich factory, which he can’t handle, so he moves home and then…I’m not really sure there’s a plot. There are some vaguely related scenes involving Green’s character’s father so that we can all enjoy weird scenes of Green beating a cripple and making awkward gross “humor.” It’s kind of like the whole film is Tom Green screaming, “look at me, look at me, look at me,” which he actually does in one scene.

9

Napoleon Dynamite (2004)

votepedroSource:http://www.rogerebert.com/

While sometimes stupid things are funny, for sure, some things try too hard to be stupid/pathetic funny and just end up being weird and off putting. Our main character, Napoleon, is so purposefully awkward and nerdy that it just becomes hard to watch. You’re left with a movie that seems like it was made simply to sell t-shirts at hot topic so the teenagers can tell you, “You don’t get it!” when you point out it’s a horrible movie.

8

After Earth (2016)

after_earth_logoSource: http://variety.com/ Image Source: wikimedia commons (public domain)

When an actor admits a movie is the “most painful failure” of the their career, your expectations should be somewhat lowered. Will Smith said exactly this about After Earth (2016), which Smith co-wrote, his wife produced, and he and his son, Jaden Smith, starred in.  The pacing was weird and dull, the acting was terrible, and the plot…The plot is that earth was evacuated 1,000 years ago, and the Smiths get stranded there. Everything on earth has evolved to kill humans, of which there have been none on the planet for 1,000 years. There are enough flash forwards and flash backs that you need a flowchart to keep track of where you are, and a thousand other little things a reasonably intelligent person would take issue with. Like the miles and miles of lush green vegetation, yet being told the planet freezes over at night.

7

King Kong Lives (1986)

king-kong-livesSource: http://www.denofgeek.com/

In 1976, King Kong was remade, and it was pretty decent. In 1986, a sequel was made, called King Kong Lives, and it wasn’t good at all. It had a very small budget for a movie that had poor special effects, and it’s obvious in the finished product. The pacing – in a movie about a giant ape being kept alive in a coma and given an artificial heart –  allows it to be boring. Obviously, a blood transfusion and a new heart cure comas, so that happens. Also there’s a Lady Kong? When the apes are people in ape suits it’s just weird and stupid. Adding baby Kong helps exactly none.

6

Battleship (2012)

battleship_posterSource: http://theultamate.blogspot.com/

Sometimes Hollywood has the ability to take things that aren’t movies or even stories and make them into amazing film franchises. For example, Pirates of the Caribbean was a Disney ride. Sometimes Hollywood tries too hard and you get things like 2012’s Battleship. We assume they spent the money on the actress and CGI instead of hiring someone to write a plot. The movie is basically the Navy vs. Aliens, blowing crap up at sea. It is arguable that the movie is enjoyable, but still stupid.

5

Theodore Rex (1995)

theodore-rex-dvdSource: http://www.mtv.com/

If you ever wanted to see Whoopi Goldberg in 1995 in a spandex suit fighting crime with a dinosaur, watch this movie. If that is not a very specific desire you’ve had for more than a decade, skip it. It’s pretty obvious watching it that even Whoopi thought it was horrible. Please remember this is the same talented woman who acted in The Color Purple, and don’t hold this movie against her.

4

Seed (2007)

seedposterSource: http://whatculture.com/

It’s arguable that any Uwe Boll film could have been put on this list. Hailed by some as the worst filmmaker ever, Boll’s best films are a B-, and his worst well…take for example Seed. A young man who’s disfigured goes on a killing spree, and his final body count is 666. The point of the film is that cops are inept and this kid is somehow worse than the devil. Did we mention that the “film” starts with PETA stock footage of animal torture to show how bad the kid is?

3

Gigli (2003)

gigliSource: https://en.wikipedia.org

One would assume that two people who are very publicly dating and in love would have some chemistry on screen; that is if one hadn’t seen 2003’s Gigli. Jennifer Lopez, who plays a lesbian LA gangster-y girl of some sort, happens to meet Ben Affleck, who is a low-level LA hit man gangster-y tough guy who’s just kidnapped a mentally handicapped man. One could argue there are holes in the plot, but there’s honestly more holes than plot.

2

Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo (2005)

deuce-bigalowSource: http://www.newsday.com/

Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo (2005) is probably low hanging fruit, but it feels like this movie was out to insult everyone: blacks, European whites, Americans, children, sex workers, and people with developed senses of humor. Because one awkward movie about a male prostitute with a mouthy sidekick wasn’t enough, this is basically the same thing, but in Amsterdam.

1

Battlefield Earth (2000)

john-travolta-battlefield-earthSource: https://editorial.rottentomatoes.com/

Battlefield Earth (2000) is a movie about Aliens invading earth and the worst performance by John Travolta in the history of ever. L Ron Hubbard, the creator of Scientology, wrote the sci-fi book this film is based on to make the religion seem “cool” to younger people. Travolta, a Scientology devotee, worked for years to have the film made, which kind of just makes it hurt all the more.

 

If you enjoyed this list, check out 25 Best Movies Ever Made.



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