In 1981, the world was first introduced to the Golden Raspberry Awards, better known as the Razzies. Awards to recognize the best that the film industry had to offer on any given year had existed for decades by that point, but an award ceremony to recognize the worst of cinema? The idea, at least at this large of a scale, was practically unprecedented.
In the end of the day, however, the Razzies are just another film industry award, and that means that they’re also susceptible to the many pitfalls of their peers. Case in point: Snubs, cases where an awful film that deserved to be nominated for a Razzie did not. There have been several of these over the decades, from actors who delivered shameful performances that didn’t get their due shade, to even legendarily atrocious movies that altogether failed to get even a single nod.
9
Gal Gadot — ‘Snow White’ (2025)
Category: Worst Supporting Actress
There’s no getting around the fact that Disney’s obsession with remaking their old animated classics in modern live-action formats got stale years ago—if it was ever even fresh to begin with. It has come to a point where the House of Mouse’s newest “efforts” seem increasingly devoid of any heart or soul, and that has come to a breaking point with Snow White.
Even setting the movie’s atrocious marketing campaign aside, and ignoring the obvious review bombing that affected it online as soon as it came out, it’s hard to deny that Gal Gadot‘s performance as the iconic Evil Queen is laughable at best. There are several reasons why this remake failed the original, not least of which is the fact that Disney’s first-ever villain had to be played by an actress whose line delivery and demeanor feel as wooden as the spinning wheel that sent Aurora to sleep.
8
‘Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker’ (2019)
Category: Worst Picture and Worst Screenplay
Hollywood has been showing an obsession with making über-expensive flops as of late, and of every soulless movie that cost over $200 million, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker—the most expensive film ever made, with a budget of around half a billion dollars—is one of the most egregious. Every Star Wars fan, even those who had grown disillusioned with Disney’s sequel trilogy, hoped that the Skywalker Saga would come to a satisfying close. That hope was for naught.
Not only was Rise of Skywalker not nominated for any Razzies, it was nominated for Oscars. No reasonable person would pretend that any of its performances are truly Razzie-worthy, but Worst Picture and Screenplay nods were definitely in order. From the nonsensical plot to the many obnoxious ways in which the movie messes up the franchise’s lore, the 2010s saw very few cinematic disasters this gargantuan.
7
‘Alone in the Dark’ (2005)
Category: Worst Picture and Worst Screenplay
No conversation about the worst anything when it comes to cinema is ever complete without talking about Uwe Boll, and that’s why the infamous filmmaker has five Worst Director Razzie nominations. One of those came for his horrible adaptation of the Alone in the Dark video game series, and the movie’s so bad that it’s a travesty it didn’t also receive Worst Picture and Screenplay nods.
It’s one of the worst action movies ever made, incompetent in virtually every sense imaginable. The story makes next to no sense yet is also terribly boring, the action is about as thrilling as watching paint dry, and the lighting is so bad that you can barely see anything—not that you’d want to, anyway. It’s the kind of bottom-of-the-barrel stuff that gave video game movie adaptations a bad rap for so long.
6
‘Artemis Fowl’ (2020)
Category: All
It’s easy to see that Disney hasn’t really been having a good run at all throughout the 2020s, and that started right as the decade kicked off. Right in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the House of Mouse released Kenneth Branagh‘s Artemis Fowl, based on the 2001 novel by Irish author Eoin Colfer. It’s an affront both to its source material and the world in general.
It’s far and away one of the worst movies of the 2020s in every way imaginable, in spite of its respectable director and star-studded cast. It didn’t receive any Razzie nominations, but it deserved practically all of them. The performances are awful, the visuals feel like they’re assaulting the audience’s eyes non-stop, the story is dull and sluggishly paced, and the whole thing is too chaotic to care about it at all.
5
‘Dragonball Evolution’ (2009)
Category: All
Fans of Akira Toriyama‘s manga series and the legendary anime based on it hate to be reminded of its existence, but alas, every time one talks about the worst movies of the last 40 years, one must bring up Dragonball Evolution. With abysmal ratings of 2.5 out of 10 on IMDb and 0.9 out of 5 on Letterboxd, it’s one of the most universally despised movies ever across both platforms.
Any [nomination] would have been appreciated, really; whether for the shoddy writing, the subpar acting, the terrible direction, or preferably the film as a whole.
Though the movie was an unsurprising commercial failure, it’s not like it was an under-the-radar release at all, so it’s almost unbelievable that it didn’t receive any Razzie nominations whatsoever. Any would have been appreciated, really; whether for the shoddy writing, the subpar acting, the terrible direction, or preferably the film as a whole.
4
‘Birdemic: Shock and Terror’ (2010)
Category: All
Seeing as it’s one of the worst horror movies of the last 100 years, Birdemic: Shock and Terror‘s reputation precedes it. It’s one of the most infamously terrible movies of all time, as well as one of the funniest and most iconic so-bad-they’re-good movies ever made. There’s virtually nothing about it that works, and that’s precisely the source of its irresistibly terrible charm.
Birdemic didn’t exactly receive a huge worldwide release, but it wasn’t small, either; so it’s anyone’s guess how it managed to go home without any Razzies to its name. It’s hard to think about a category the film was eligible for that it didn’t deserve, from Worst Picture to Worst Anything for its cast. It’s a hilarious movie, that’s for sure, but there’s no denying that the only reason that’s the case is because it’s terrible.
3
‘Troll 2’ (1990)
Category: All
The Italian-American indie horror film Troll 2 isn’t actually a sequel to Troll, nor does it even feature any trolls to begin with. That ridiculous title is entirely to blame on American distributors, but it’s a perfect sign of the surreal experience that awaits all those bold enough to want to check out one of the worst films of the last 100 years.
The 1991 Golden Raspberry Awards only had four Worst Picture nominees, as opposed to the usual five, so there was definitely room for this legendarily so-bad-it’s-good cult classic. There was plenty of room in all the other categories, too, which makes it quite a surprise that a film so iconic for being horrible didn’t receive any nods.
2
‘The Room’ (2003)
Category: All
For anyone even slightly familiar with the world of cult cinema and of so-bad-they’re-good gems, The Room needs no introduction. Tommy Wiseau‘s iconic vanity project is recognized by many as the single worst movie ever made, full of some of the worst dialogue, the worst pacing, the worst scenes, and the worst characters of any movie of the last 25 years.
As far as individual movies go, The Room‘s snub in every Razzie category is perhaps the biggest snub in the satirical awards’ history. The movie’s release was small, and the Razzies typically like to shoot at far bigger targets, so it’s hardly a surprise that Wiseau’s disasterpiece didn’t receive any nominations; but it doesn’t make it any less of a decision that has aged horribly.
1
Neil Breen
Category: Any
The history of movie awards is filled to the brim with travesties. The fact that Glenn Close has never won an Oscar, the fact that Park Chan-wook and Wong Kar-wai have never even been nominated for one, the fact that Stanley Kubrick‘s only Oscar victory was a Best Visual Effects award—and of course, the fact that Neil Breen, the modern master of terrible cinema, has never received a Razzie nomination.
The awards’ preference for bigger names to receive nods is understandable, but at this point, it feels like Breen is mainstream enough among the Razzies’ target audience that a nomination for any award is long overdue. From Fateful Findings to the director’s latest work, Cade: The Tortured Crossing, this man has been so dedicated to torturing audiences for so long that a Raspberry Award is the least the world can do to recognize his legacy.
