10 ‘very bad’ movies that are actually worth watching
Movies are, always have been, and always will be a subjective experience. One person may look at the Quentin Tarantino classic Pulp Fiction and see a perfectly passable crime flick, whilst the next person may cherish the movie as a masterpiece and frame its poster for their lounge wall. The same can be said for pretty much every single movie in cinema history, apart from Mad Max: Fury Road, that’s indisputable territory.
Of course, it is such subjective disagreements that drive friendly film debate across the world. ‘What’s the better Martin Scorsese movie, Goodfellas or Taxi Driver?’, ‘Does The Godfather Part II trump the original?’, ‘Is The Emoji Movie the worst movie of all time?’ etc. Yet, the definitive nature of internet culture has led to similar debates feeling a little toxic. Indeed, in the opinion of the majority, some movies are definitively bad.
So, in efforts to stir discussion ourselves, we’ve created a list of supposedly ‘very bad’ movies that we thought were actually worth watching, with our list including a range of movies from across the spectrum of cinema. Whilst some of the forthcoming films were hated by audiences, others were loathed by critics, with each of them sharing pretty common ground in that they were deemed to be terrible.
Check out our list below, which includes underrated movies from the likes of Neill Blomkamp, Harmony Korine, Tim Heidecker, Eric Wareheim and Chloé Zhao.
10 ‘very bad’ movies that are actually worth watching
The Beach Bum (Harmony Korine, 2019)
It used to be that when a movie by Harmony Korine rolled around the world of cinema held its collective breath, then ran to the cinema on the opening night to watch the inevitable masterpiece. Such was not the case for his 2019 movie The Beach Bum, however, with the film not even being able to make back its $5million budget, suffering from middling reviews and a green splat of a Rotten Tomatoes score too.
Nowhere near as cynical and icky as his past movies, The Beach Bum is an utter treat of a movie that illustrates the talents of an idiosyncratic artist who has come to the end of his career and fancies making a film about everything and nothing at the very same time. It’s bliss.
The Cat in the Hat (Bo Welch, 2003)
Before you stick our head on a spike and wave it around the internet for all to see, just hear us out on this one. Sure, Bo Welch’s utterly bizarre adaptation of the Dr. Seuss book The Cat in the Hat wasn’t all that truthful to the magic of the source material, but let’s be honest, the 1957 children’s book isn’t exactly known for its intriguing narrative. In many ways, screenwriters Alec Berg and David Mandel captured the spirit of Suess with a surreal reimagining of their own.
With subversive humour that likely works a lot better today than in 2003, Welch’s movie starred Mike Myers as the titular cat, bringing his all to a role that demanded a lot. We’re not saying it’s a masterpiece, but its sheer creativity and weird humour are worthy of some praise.
Elysium (Neill Blomkamp, 2013)
The name ‘Neill Blomkamp’ was pretty much plastered on every online message board and Hollywood office after the release of District 9 in 2009, with the ‘Best Picture’ nominee baffling critics and audiences alike thanks to its ingenious imagination. So, when the director followed up his success with Elysium in 2013, everyone expected the same level of quality, a hope that was squashed upon the film’s release.
Sure, Elysium isn’t as good as District 9, but people were far too quick to dismiss the Matt Damon movie that brought a lot of good ideas to the table and finished them off with some nifty effects too. With elements of melodrama and camp filmmaking, we think time will be kind to Elysium…eventually.
Eternals (Chloé Zhao, 2021)
We’re not going to sit here and write that Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe was a success, because it wasn’t. But, we’d also like to highlight that it was films like Thor: Love and Thunder and Black Widow that dragged things down, leaving Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Eternals to pick up the pieces. Marvel fans always complain about repetition, with each film playing out in the same old way, but when Chloé Zhao’s Eternals offered something new, everyone shamed it for ‘not being like the others’.
Boasting some of the best visuals the MCU has ever produced and memorable sequences that genuinely make us want to come back for repeated viewing, Eternals is one of the most interesting movies Marvel has ever made.
Little Nicky (Steven Brill, 2000)
Adam Sandler has been the butt of endless online jokes for some time now, and with a filmography that includes such duds as Grown Ups 2, Jack & Jill and The Ridiculous 6, who can really be surprised. Still, many forget that he is an incredibly talented comedian, lending his skills to such favourites as Billy Madison, Happy Gilmore, Punch-Drunk Love and, in our humble opinion, 2000’s Little Nicky.
It isn’t the easiest of Sandler’s movies to market, but that’s why we love it. There’s a peculiar originality to Little Nicky that’s hard not to fall in love with. ‘What is that accent he’s doing?’, ‘Who came up with this idea?’, ‘Was that Quentin Tarantino?’.
The Meg (Jon Turteltaub, 2018)
Everyone loves a shark movie, this has been evident ever since Steven Spielberg released Jaws in 1975 and coined the term ‘blockbuster’ in the process, with the film sparking queues of keen audience members to form out into the street. The same thing didn’t quite happen upon the release of The Meg in 2018, but it did make a decent amount of money, earning over $500million.
Despite this, critics and audiences apparently didn’t love the movie, even though, upon reflection, it’s a complete joy from start to finish. Utterly stupid and entirely bombastic, The Meg is a B-movie-esque thrill ride that puts cinematic enjoyment front and centre.
The Room (Tommy Wiseau, 2003)
Tommy Wiseau’s infamous 2003 movie The Room is popularly known as the worst movie of all time. But after countless video essays, interviews, and even a tribute film made by Seth Rogen and James Franco named The Disaster Artist, it’s difficult to see the movie as being bad. Certainly ‘so bad it’s good’, we’d argue that the legacy and impact of The Room has made the film just straight up ‘good’, being seen as a subversive comedy and weird, borderline experimental drama.
The perfect melodrama for people who don’t like romantic movies, The Room is the kind of movie a character from within the world of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks would have made; we’re looking at you, Pete Martell.
Speed Racer (Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski, 2008)
The Wachowski sisters blew the figurative doors of Hollywood to smithereens back in 1999, releasing one of the most influential movies of all time in the form of the sci-fi action flick The Matrix, starring Keanu Reeves. The sisters were destined for greatness, or were they? Indeed, the filmmakers have never truly been able to replicate their success with The Matrix trilogy, even if we believe that 2008’s Speed Racer was a thing of cinematic astonishment.
Created using an abundance of special effects techniques, Speed Racer takes the audience into a vortex of flashing lights and colour and refuses to let go. Who cares how generic the story is, it simply serves to elevate the visuals. Godspeed.
Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie (Tim Heidecker, Eric Wareheim, 2012)
It’s fair to say that in contemporary society comedy has become an enigma. Thanks to internet culture where all types of content and humour seem to clash with one another all the time, memes have become the prime source of entertainment, and they’re all as weird and irreverent as the next. In fact, we’re sure that if Time Heidecker and Eric Wareheim’s 2012 movie Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie had been released a decade later, it would have been a hit.
Instead, the movie was hated by pretty much everyone, despite having some of the funniest and most memorable sequences in all of modern cinematic history. It might play out more like an elongated sketch show, but it remains undoubtedly hilarious.
Under the Silver Lake (David Robert Mitchell, 2018)
Much like the South African-Canadian filmmaker Neill Blomkamp mentioned earlier on this list, people went mad for the American director David Robert Mitchell upon the release of It Follows in 2014. Sure, any keen movie fan would have known about his understated 2010 film The Myth of the American Sleepover before, but regardless, he became a hot property, only for his 2018 release Under the Silver Lake to flop critically and commercially.
Mitchell’s passion project has so much more going for it than it appears, however, with the film being an intriguing, densely layered mystery that boasts some slick performances from the likes of Andrew Garfield, Riley Keough and Callie Hernandez.
