"Fifty Worst Films Of All Time", Compiled by Harry Medved and Randy Dreyfuss, 1978
by hutches | created - 14 Jan 2015 | updated - 16 Jan 2015 | Public- Instant Watch Options
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1. New Moon (1940)
Passed | 105 min | Adventure, Musical, Romance
On a Louisiana-bound ship, a nobleman planning a campaign for liberty encounters an heiress.
Directors: Robert Z. Leonard, W.S. Van Dyke | Stars: Jeanette MacDonald, Nelson Eddy, Mary Boland, George Zucco
Votes: 641
"The script, provided by Jacques Deval and Robert Arthur, is meager in lively details, and what there is of it seems to flow rather sluggishly..." Bosley Crowther, New York Times
2. Abraham Lincoln (1930)
Passed | 96 min | Biography, Drama, War
An episodic biography of the 16th President of the United States.
Director: D.W. Griffith | Stars: Walter Huston, Una Merkel, William L. Thorne, Lucille La Verne
Votes: 1,711
"Totally dull...unbelievably slow dialogue...dull episodic overlong production...(Una Merkel's) portrayal of Ann Rutlegde must qualify as the worst example of miscasting in the history of cinema." - Anthony Slide, The Films of D.W. Griffith.
3. Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974)
R | 112 min | Action, Crime, Drama
An American barroom pianist and his prostitute girlfriend go on a trip through the Mexican underworld to collect the bounty on the head of a dead gigolo.
Director: Sam Peckinpah | Stars: Warren Oates, Isela Vega, Robert Webber, Gig Young
Votes: 21,530 | Gross: $0.58M
"all out preposterous horror" - John Simon, Esquire "so witless you can't believe it was made by the man who directed The Wild Bunch" - Vincent Canby, New York Times "the only kind of analysis it really invites is psychoanalysis" - Joy Gould Boyum, Wall Street Journal "Bring me the head of the of the studio who released this one." - Gene Shalit
4. Lost Horizon (1973)
G | 150 min | Adventure, Drama, Fantasy
While escaping war-torn China, a group of Europeans crash in the Himalayas, where they are rescued and taken to the mysterious Valley of the Blue Moon, Shangri-La.
Director: Charles Jarrott | Stars: Peter Finch, Liv Ullmann, Sally Kellerman, George Kennedy
Votes: 2,858 | Gross: $8.28M
"Worst Movie of the Year" - Esquire Magazine "Atrocious...lame-brained.." - William Wolf "As uplifting as a whalebone bra - and just as dated" Arthur Cooper, Newsweek.
5. The Omen (1976)
R | 111 min | Horror, Mystery
Mysterious deaths surround an American ambassador. Could the child that he is raising actually be the Antichrist? The Devil's own son?
Director: Richard Donner | Stars: Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, Harvey Stephens, David Warner
Votes: 132,598 | Gross: $4.27M
"A dreadfully silly film...Its horrors are not horrible, its terrors are not terrifying, its violence is ludicrous." - New York Times "I did it strictly for the money. I was flat broke...I do find it horrifying how many people actually believe all this silliness." David Seltzer. He wrote the screenplay.
6. Parnell (1937)
Passed | 118 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
The life of Irish politician Charles Stewart Parnell, following from 1880 onward his struggle to secure Home Rule, pursued in prison, Parliament, and elsewhere. Emphasis is on the ... See full summary »
Director: John M. Stahl | Stars: Clark Gable, Myrna Loy, Edna May Oliver, Edmund Gwenn
Votes: 568 | Gross: $1.58M
"A singularly pallid, tedious and unconvincing drama...Mr. Gable's speeches ring with insincerity." - Frank S. Nugent, New York Times "Disastrous...Probably the worst biopic ever made." - David Shipman "Parnell? No! Clark Gable, in his worst miscasting. He looks like a steel-union organizer gone Park Avenue and walks through his part with the heavy tread of the Golem." - Rob Wagner. "If Parnell was as woozy a goof as Gable portrayed him in the picture, Ireland still wouldn't be free." Carole Lombard, who was married to Gable at the time.
7. Return of Sabata (1971)
PG | 100 min | Drama, Western
The citizens of Hobsonville hire Sabata to rid them of the McIntock clan, who are forcibly and unlawfully taxing them under the pretext of town development.
Director: Gianfranco Parolini | Stars: Lee Van Cleef, Reiner Schöne, Giampiero Albertini, Ignazio Spalla
Votes: 2,201
"It makes little or no sense. Lee Van Cleef simply does his thing which consists of moving his right nostril (the rest of his face remains as immovable as stone). Kathleen Carroll, New York Daily News.
8. Robot Monster (1953)
Approved | 66 min | Comedy, Family, Horror
The monstrous Ro-Man attempts to annihilate the last family alive on Earth, but finds himself falling for their beautiful daughter.
Director: Phil Tucker | Stars: George Nader, Gregory Moffett, Claudia Barrett, Selena Royle
Votes: 5,453 | Gross: $1.00M
"A crazy mixed up movie...The seven man cast has to keep pretty busy, especially the not-too-threatening robot, who resembles a gorilla from the neck down." Los Angeles Times "Scripting and majority of performances rarely rise to a professional level...of the principlas, the less said the better." - Variety
9. Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964)
Not Rated | 81 min | Adventure, Comedy, Family
The Martians kidnap Santa Claus because there is nobody on Mars to give their children presents.
Director: Nicholas Webster | Stars: John Call, Leonard Hicks, Vincent Beck, Bill McCutcheon
Votes: 12,657
"Absolutely the worse science-fiction flick ever made, bar none" - Monster Times "Overly saccharine and nonsensical." - Boxoffice "Obvious and square cut as cheese." - Howard Thompson
10. Say One for Me (1959)
120 min | Comedy, Drama, Musical
Father Conroy (Crosby) has a parish which serves the acting and performance community. When one of his parishoners gets too sick to work, his daughter Holly (Reynolds) finds a job working ... See full summary »
Director: Frank Tashlin | Stars: Debbie Reynolds, Bing Crosby, Robert Wagner, Ray Walston
Votes: 351
"About as simple and uncerebral as it can get without coming to a dead stop." - New York Herald Tribune "trying to prove that God is on the size of the biggest production numbers." "By the time (Father Conroy) has straightened out their affairs, one feels him to be a sentimental, meddling cluck..." - Hollis Alpert "Tasteless and disturbing..." - Variety
11. Solomon and Sheba (1959)
Not Rated | 141 min | Drama, History, Romance
After becoming king of ancient Israel, Solomon faces threats coming from his jealous dispossessed brother Adonijah, the Egyptian Pharaoh and the scheming Queen of Sheba.
Director: King Vidor | Stars: Yul Brynner, Gina Lollobrigida, George Sanders, Marisa Pavan
Votes: 3,794 | Gross: $12.20M
"The film may well owe a debt to society for its cosmic breaches of taste, morality and intelligence. Penance is due." - Cue "Dialogue is often banal and bromides rub uneasy shoulders with Biblical quotations." - Variety
12. Spinout (1966)
Not Rated | 93 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
Band singer/race driver Mike McCoy must choose between marrying a beautiful rich girl and driving her father's car in a prestigious race.
Director: Norman Taurog | Stars: Elvis Presley, Shelley Fabares, Diane McBain, Deborah Walley
Votes: 2,358
"monotonously and unfailingly vacuous.." - Richard Davis, Films and Filming "foolish and altogether improbable..." - Hollywood Reporter
13. The Story of Mankind (1957)
Approved | 100 min | Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi
The Devil and the Spirit of Man argue as to whether or not humanity is ultimately good or evil.
Director: Irwin Allen | Stars: Ronald Colman, Hedy Lamarr, Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx
Votes: 1,522
"It is the kind of pontification that any kid who has ever dozed through a history class has learned to see through." - Richard W. Nason, New York Times
14. Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1971)
PG | 85 min | Animation, Action, Family
An ever-evolving alien life form from the Dark Gaseous Nebula arrives to consume rampant pollution. Spewing mists of sulfuric acid and corrosive sludge, neither humanity or Godzilla may be able to defeat this toxic menace.
Directors: Yoshimitsu Banno, Ishirô Honda | Stars: Akira Yamanouchi, Toshie Kimura, Hiroyuki Kawase, Toshio Shiba
Votes: 6,593
"One of the worst monster films ever...an idiotic kiddie show!...The theme song can drive you right up a ceiling." - The Monster Times
15. Myra Breckinridge (1970)
R | 94 min | Comedy
After undergoing gender reassignment surgery, an aspiring actress travels to Hollywood, where she also wants to make a claim on her wealthy uncle's estate.
Director: Michael Sarne | Stars: Mae West, John Huston, Raquel Welch, Rex Reed
Votes: 3,455 | Gross: $8.72M
"As bad as any movie ever made" - Leonard Maltin "So tasteless that it represents some sort of nadir in American cinema...Myra Brekinridge is about as funny as a child molester.." - Time Magazine "a self-consciously mod disjointed patchwork of leers vulgarity and general ineptness." - William Wolf "a single monument to sterile fantasies and pathetic impotence." - Wall Street Journal "Myra Breckinridge collapses like a tired smirking elephant with no place to go..." - Howard Thompson, New York Times
16. North West Mounted Police (1940)
Passed | 126 min | Drama, Romance, Western
In 1885, a Texas Ranger travels to Canada to arrest a trapper who's wanted for murder and who's stirring up the Natives in a rebellion against the Canadian government.
Director: Cecil B. DeMille | Stars: Gary Cooper, Madeleine Carroll, Paulette Goddard, Preston Foster
Votes: 1,830
"the story is a heavy accumulation of dramatic cliches...a big sprawling sometimes tedious picture in which the note of heroism if beaten like a drum to the accompanying clash of color symbols." - Bosley Crowther, New York Times "Frankly claptrap." - Newsweek
17. Last Year at Marienbad (1961)
Not Rated | 94 min | Drama, Mystery, Romance
In a strange and isolated chateau, a man becomes acquainted with a woman and insists that they have met before.
Director: Alain Resnais | Stars: Delphine Seyrig, Giorgio Albertazzi, Sacha Pitoëff, Françoise Bertin
Votes: 24,886 | Gross: $0.06M
"I got one clear impression from Last Year at Marienbad, and that was of Resnais and Robbe-Grillet grinning wickedly at each other above the heads of a trustful public that was flagging its poor little brain into some notion of what in hell the picture is all about." - Robert Hatch, The Nation "So repetitous, slow-moving and difficult to understand that it made me drowsy. This film is really the oddest thing ever shown on the screen...I think it's a lot of pseudo-artistic HOOEY." - Hazel Flynn, Hollywood Citizen-News
18. At Long Last Love (1975)
G | 118 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
Four socialite old friends unexpectedly clash, and switch partners during a party and attempt to make each other jealous.
Director: Peter Bogdanovich | Stars: Burt Reynolds, Cybill Shepherd, Madeline Kahn, Duilio Del Prete
Votes: 1,399 | Gross: $3.27M
"If this Peter Bogdanovich fiasco were any more of a dog, it would shed...The film cost $6 million - it looks like Fox spent $100 on Bogdanovich, $900 on Burt Reynolds and $5,999,000 on singing and dancing lessons for Cybill Shepherd." - John Barbour, Los Angeles "This is failure so dismal that it goes beyond failure. The musical is not trash, exactly. Its rottenness lies in the pretension and inflated ego behind its conception, in its pandering to film-buff nostalgia, and in some of the sorriest casting ever to sink a production..." Hollis Alpert, Saturday Review "I think we bombed!" Burt Reynolds, who starred in the movie.
19. Trouble Man (1972)
R | 99 min | Action, Crime, Drama
A neighborhood "problem solver" is framed for murder by a couple of local crime bosses trying to get him out of the way.
Director: Ivan Dixon | Stars: Robert Hooks, Paul Winfield, Ralph Waite, William Smithers
Votes: 1,605
"predictable, bland narrative...most of the violence is staged unimaginatively and quickly become frustratingly boring" - Hollywood Reporter "Trouble Man is a big rip-off, copy cat in form and inept in execution.' - Los Angeles Herald Examiner
20. Jet Attack (1958)
Approved | 69 min | Drama, War
Three American pilots are shot down behind enemy lines during the Korean war, where they encounter a mysterious Russian nurse. Their life is in her hands.
Director: Edward L. Cahn | Stars: John Agar, Audrey Totter, Gregory Walcott, James Dobson
Votes: 246
"Scriptwise, the film crawls with cliches...There is also an improbable east of movement behind enemy lines, but then, when Korea looks so much like Chatsworth, we suppose anything is possible." - Los Angeles Times
21. The Horror of Party Beach (1964)
Approved | 78 min | Horror, Musical
Sea creatures created from radioactive sludge terrorize a beach community.
Director: Del Tenney | Stars: John Lyon, Alice Lyon, Allan Laurel, Eulabelle Moore
Votes: 3,193
"(Monster's faces) are so phoney as to become almost fascinating, particularly a cluster of what looks like sausages in their mouths...The standard of acting is very weak, including the most expressionless and inanimate heroine of all time" Monthly Film Bulletin "The question in The Horror of Party Beach" is, which is more horrible, the monsters or the rock 'n' roll? The most curious aspect...is why, after the first couple of homicides, the rest of the victims linger around the disaster area, waiting for the worst. Audiences lured into the theater may ask themselves the same thing."
22. Hurry Sundown (1967)
Approved | 146 min | Drama
Drama of a ruthless Southern opportunist who tries to buy his cousin's land, and when thwarted, brings several tragedies to the lives of his loved ones.
Director: Otto Preminger | Stars: Michael Caine, Jane Fonda, John Phillip Law, Diahann Carroll
Votes: 1,386 | Gross: $9.00M
"...an execrable film. Indeed it is very possibly the worst major production to come out of Hollywood in the 1960's." - Life Magazine "A terrible movie...meretricious nonsense from start to finish." - New Yorker "hopelessly corny cliched soap opera." - William Wolf, Cue
23. Eegah (1962)
Unrated | 92 min | Adventure, Comedy, Fantasy
Teenagers stumble across a prehistoric caveman, who goes on a rampage.
Director: Arch Hall Sr. | Stars: Arch Hall Jr., Marilyn Manning, Richard Kiel, Arch Hall Sr.
Votes: 6,125
"Lowest Rating...Ridiculous Thriller." - Steven H. Scheuer
24. Dondi (1961)
Not Rated | 99 min | Comedy, Drama, Family
Six American GIs stationed in Italy befriend an orphaned boy, but the soldiers remain unaware that the lad has stowed away with them when they return to the U.S.
Director: Albert Zugsmith | Stars: David Janssen, Patti Page, Walter Winchell, Mickey Shaughnessy
Votes: 322
"Insipid...Dondi is played by one of the most untalented child performers ever to appear on the screen." - Steven H. Scheuer "Intolerably sweet...syrupy...the lovableness bit simply grows intolerable." - Variety "Watch this film and you'll know why David Janseen became a fugitve!" - Leonard Maltin
25. The Conqueror (1956)
Approved | 111 min | Adventure, Biography, History
Mongol chief Temujin battles against Tartar armies and for the love of the Tartar princess Bortai. Temujin becomes the emperor Genghis Khan.
Director: Dick Powell | Stars: John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Pedro Armendáriz, Agnes Moorehead
Votes: 3,868 | Gross: $4.50M
"A technicolored cloud of charming horsemen, childish dialogue and redimentary romance...An illusion persists that this Genghis Khan is merely Hopalong Cassidy in Cathay. Should get a few unintentional laughs..." - A.H. Weiler, New York Times "The terror of two continents takes almost two full hours to win one girl, so the script just skips the conquest of Asia. It apparently wasn't very important anyway." - Time "A well-nigh perfectly horrible example of Hollywood's prostitution of history..." - Moira Walsh, America Magazine "One of Wayne's worst. He simply shudders when anyone mentioned this film." Alan G. Barbour, The Films of John Wayne
26. Daughter of the Jungle (1949)
Approved | 69 min | Adventure
An airplane, carrying policeman and gangsters, crash-lands in a jungle, where they discover a white girl and her father, lost twelve years previously in another plane crash. The father and ... See full summary »
Director: George Blair | Stars: Lois Hall, James Cardwell, William Wright, Sheldon Leonard
Votes: 85
"leaps broadly outside the realm of logic." - Variety
27. Dick Tracy vs. Cueball (1946)
Approved | 62 min | Action, Crime, Family
Expensive diamonds are stolen but before the thief can fence them he is strangled by ex-con Cueball, who then takes the gems and continues murdering people he believes are trying to swindle him.
Director: Gordon Douglas | Stars: Morgan Conway, Anne Jeffreys, Lyle Latell, Paula Corday
Votes: 1,438
"Clues are handed to Dick Tracy on a plate and it would be difficult not to solve the crimes. The story is poorly constructed and full of flaws." - Monthly Film Bulletin
28. Ivan the Terrible, Part I (1944)
Not Rated | 95 min | Biography, Drama, History
During the early part of his reign, Ivan the Terrible faces betrayal from the aristocracy and even his closest friends as he seeks to unite the Russian people.
Director: Sergei Eisenstein | Stars: Nikolay Cherkasov, Lyudmila Tselikovskaya, Serafima Birman, Mikhail Nazvanov
Votes: 10,865
"a motionless motion picture. In some scenes only the slow movement of the eyeballs gives evidence of life." - Los Angeles Daily News "a series of dramatic tableaux with rather choppy continuity and minimum of subtlety in the characterization." - Newsweek "I've missed my chance. I didn't die at the right time. What monument you would have raised in my memory if I had died staight after The Battleship Potemkin! I've made a mess of my own biography!" - Sergei Eisenstein, who directed the film
29. Jamaica Inn (1939)
Passed | 98 min | Adventure, Crime
In Cornwall, 1819, a young woman discovers she's living near a gang of criminals who arrange shipwrecks for profit.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Stars: Maureen O'Hara, Robert Newton, Charles Laughton, Horace Hodges
Votes: 11,195
"Double disappointing...misfired period melodrama of smugglers and wreckers." - Take One "Undistinguished and creaky...there is a marked lack of enthusiasm in all this nineteenth century nonsense." George Perry, in his book "Hitchcock
30. Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1973)
G | 99 min | Drama, Family
A skilled flyer but very rebellious young seagull is kicked out of his clan. However, instead of being sad or lonely, he decides to enjoy and explore his newfound freedom.
Director: Hall Bartlett | Stars: James Franciscus, Juliet Mills, Philip Ahn, David Ladd
Votes: 2,326 | Gross: $1.60M
"cinematography look like a morgantic marriage between National Geographic and Vogue. dialogue...is supplied by uncredited voices that speak in tones usually reserved for biblical epics and heartwarming B movies about boys and their pet hamsters." - Esquire "If one must spend the better part of two hours following the adventures of a bird, far better that the hero be Daffy Duck than Jonathan Livingston Seagull...vomitous theosophy" - Time
31. King Richard and the Crusaders (1954)
Approved | 114 min | Adventure, Family, History
While leading the Third Crusade, King Richard the Lionheart (George Sanders) battles treachery in his own camp as well as the Saracens and their charismatic leader Emir Hderim Sultan Saladin (Sir Rex Harrison).
Director: David Butler | Stars: Rex Harrison, Virginia Mayo, George Sanders, Laurence Harvey
Votes: 915 | Gross: $2.10M
"Director David Butler shows us why the Crusades never amounted to much." - Time
32. The Last Movie (1971)
R | 108 min | Drama
After a film production wraps in Peru, an American wrangler decides to stay behind to witness the ways that filmmaking affects the locals.
Director: Dennis Hopper | Stars: Julie Adams, Daniel Ades, Richmond L. Aguilar, John Alderman
Votes: 2,651
"Gaseous and overblown mess." - New Republic "A hateful experience." - Village Voice. "Inchoate, amateurish, self-indulgent, tedious, superficial, unfocused...dismally disappointing and depressing." - Los Angeles Times
33. A Place for Lovers (1968)
R | 88 min | Drama, Romance
Julia, a fashion designer harboring a secret, spends ten days of passion in the Alps with Valerio, a race car driver, in what will be their last vacation together.
Director: Vittorio De Sica | Stars: Marcello Mastroianni, Faye Dunaway, Enrico Simonetti, Karin Eugh
Votes: 877
"The most godawful piece of pseudo-romantic slop I've ever seen!" - Roger Ebert "A pretentious and overwrought tale....unfailingly boring." - Cue "A Place for Lovers is the worst movie I have seen all year and possibly since 1926." - Los Angeles Times "Trashy soap opera. It's a disaster for all concerned." - Movies on TV
34. Swamp Women (1956)
Approved | 67 min | Adventure, Crime, Drama
An undercover policewoman helps three female convicts escape from prison so that they can lead her to a stash of stolen diamonds hidden in a swamp.
Director: Roger Corman | Stars: Marie Windsor, Carole Mathews, Beverly Garland, Mike Connors
Votes: 2,027
"Heavy-handed nonsense." - Leonard Maltin
35. Swing Your Lady (1938)
Passed | 77 min | Comedy, Music, Romance
Promoter Ed Hatch comes to the Ozarks with his slow-witted wrestler Joe Skopapoulos whom he pits against a hillbilly Amazon blacksmith, Sadie Horn. Joe falls in love with her and won't fight. At least not until Sadie's beau Noah shows up.
Director: Ray Enright | Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Frank McHugh, Louise Fazenda, Nat Pendleton
Votes: 587
"Vulgar, ludicrous, irresponsible" - New York Times "A sorry vehicle...As far as Bogart was concerned, the whole effort was tasteless and vulgar and he considered it his worst film performance." - Alan G. Barbour, in his biography of Humphrey Bogart
36. The Terror of Tiny Town (1938)
Approved | 62 min | Family, Western
An evil gunslinging midget comes to terrorize the good little people of Tiny Town. The townspeople organize to defeat him, and zany antics ensue.
Director: Sam Newfield | Stars: Billy Curtis, Yvonne Moray, 'Little Billy' Rhodes, Billy Platt
Votes: 1,945
"As all the cast are midgets, the element of surprise is lost and and the film tends to be just another Western." - Monthly Film Bulletin "Contrived..doll-like personalities." Variety
37. That Hagen Girl (1947)
Passed | 83 min | Drama
Mary Hagen lives in a small town in Ohio and goes to Jordon Junior College. For years, there have been whispers, rumors and gossip about who her real parents are. After Tom Bates returns to... See full summary »
Director: Peter Godfrey | Stars: Ronald Reagan, Shirley Temple, Rory Calhoun, Lois Maxwell
Votes: 723
"An atrocious comedy of Shirley Temple convinced she's Ronald Reagan's illegitimate daughter." - Leonard Maltin "An inept, all-thumbs scripting job that shows no comprehension of the problem." - Weekly Variety
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