It's that time of year again - the one in which I completely ignore the Oscars and the way they "honour" movies, and instead comment on the crappy films that gained notoriety instead. Due to 2021 being pretty similar to 2020 in terms of Covid-19 restrictions and the world being up the creak in general, I only really recognised a few of the films nominated this year, and thus was introduced to new ones that I'd rather not have known about.
Also, no political contenders this year! I do genuinely agree with the politics of the Razzies, but I feel that it sometimes awards politicians simply because they're right-wing politicians that they (and myself) despise, rather than because of their actual "acting" capabilities (which obviously they lack, but sometimes they're not even acting). I mean, Donald Trump once "won" Worst Supporting Actor for a Michael Moore documentary, but the film itself otherwise did well and all he did was appear in a few scenes rather than "act". That said, Hilary's America is a genuinely atrocious "documentary" with dreadful acting that rightfully won Worst Picture one year, and we had both the cringeworthy Absolute Proof (another "documentary" in the vein of Hilary's America) and that whole disgusting business with Rudy Giuliani and his pants zip last year. Oh, and we can't forget Donald Trump's "starring" role in Ghosts Can't Do It, which he rightfully won a Razzie award for - there was a memorable moment at the 2016 Razzies where a Trump impersonator discussed that role.
Anyway, back to the 2022 Razzies themselves. Like with previous Razzies, there were nominations and winners I expected, and then ones I didn't expect at all, as well as some choices that didn't make the cut but I would have singled out anyway. Anyway, here are all the categories that were present and my own opinions on them!
Worst Picture - Diana (Netflix).
I'm honestly surprised that Dear Evan Hansen didn't make this category, considering how much of a highly-publicised disaster it was and how people said that it makes the the infamous Cats movie look positively tame in comparison (and some of my past blog posts highlight my opinions on it perfectly). I was not surprised by Space Jam: A New Legacy making it however, given that it's a dire sequel to an already "meh" movie that basically exists to promote Warner Bros. and their back catalogue. I was not so familiar with the other movies though, which consisted of Mark Wahlberg vehicle Infinite (which is a disappointing adaptation of the otherwise decent novel The Reincarnationist Papers), Rear Window copycat The Woman in the Window (also an adaptation of a novel), the WAY too on the nose Karen and the Netflix disaster Diana, which is, you guessed it, a musical of Lady Diana Spencer's life and clearly trying to follow in the footsteps of Hamilton with its format. The last two movies in particular broke me with their sheer existence.
To the surprise of nearly nobody, Diana took home the dreaded "prize" for this category. It's actually a recorded stage production, but having it filmed makes it count as a "movie" too (I say "movie" because of its sheer quality). Apparently the reason it was in this format was due to COVID-19 restrictions at the time meaning that they couldn't show it onstage initially (the actual stage run only lasted for 33 performances), but I feel that they thought that it could be the next Hamilton via showing it in this manner. Since awards for crappy stage shows don't exist yet, I think this is a pretty good start.
Worst Director - Christopher Ashley for Diana.
I said I was kind of surprised and in fact kind of disappointed that Dear Evan Hansen wasn't nominated for Worst Picture, but fortunately, its director Stephen Chbosky has been nominated for this category. Sure, he was good with the adaptations of The Perks of Being A Wallflower and Wonder, but maybe this film would have benefited with going with a less "inspirational" and "sentimental" tone and instead focused more on being a satire in the same vein as World's Best Dad. Similarly, The Misfits wasn't nominated for Worst Picture, but its director Renny Harlin still appears in this category. Directors whose films already appeared in Worst Picture though include Christopher Ashley for Diana, Coke Daniels for Karen and Joe Wright for The Woman in the Window.
Chbotsky was one of the nominees I was really hoping would win this category, but I was also willing to see Ashley win it too. And of course, Ashley scored another "prize" for Diana in the end, given that the finished product is ridiculously camp and has some bizarre creative choices in it. The thing I remember him most for is the stage version of Xanadu, which did fine with the critics, but tries to be "self-aware" of the original film's cult status and comes off as forgettable as a result. Well, at least Diana isn't going to be forgettable any time soon (or at least I hope it isn't) with it making the original Xanadu look like quality material in comparison.
Worst Lead Actor - LeBron James from Space Jam as himself.
Ben Platt, once highly praised for originating the role of Evan Hansen on Broadway, is now being condemned for playing the same role in the Dear Evan Hansen movie despite being a grown-ass man - not helped by that dreadful wig they gave him for some unfathomable reason. And honestly, I was expecting this to happen given the major backlash. I was also expecting LeBron James to land on this list for playing himself in Space Jam: A New Legacy (especially given that fans of the original film were expecting Michael Jordan to return), and he did. The other nominees however are completely new to me, which include Scott Eastwood as Dylan "D" Forrester in Dangerous, Roe Hartrampf as Prince Charles (a fact that makes me shudder just thinking about) in Diana and Mark Wahlberg as both Evan McCauley and the 2020 version of Heinrich Treadway in Infinite.
Going into this, I genuinely hoped that James would not win. The way his character arc was handled was pretty dire and he could go a little hard on the dull surprise at times, but I think he's a better actor than Jordan as a whole and his voice acting for the animated segments is fine. Honestly, I blame the script for the result we received. Alas, he won the prize anyway, even though I would have given it to Platt or Hartrampf myself. The business with the whole "tragic backstory" and the father-son plotline in the movie probably didn't do his role any favours either, unlike Jordan's role in which he essentially riffed on the time he tried to become a baseball star. Oh well, at least James has Trainwreck to prove that he can act well when given the right script. Maybe next time just make him a supporting actor like in that movie or, better yet, don't just try and cash in on his career like Space Jam: A New Legacy was trying to do.
Worst Lead Actress - Jeanna de Waal from Diana as Princess Diana.
So thankfully Kristen Stewart has been critically praised for her role as Princess Diana in Spencer this year and in fact was nominated for the "good" awards rather than the Razzies. Which is a relief, because the mediocre Twilight franchise has otherwise put a damper on her career and made people forget that she is otherwise a pretty good actress who started off in hits such as Panic Room and The Runaways. The other Princess Diana, Jeanna de Waal, on the other hand was one of many people nominated for Worst Lead Actress. As was the normally solid actress Amy Adams for playing Dr. Anna Fox in The Woman in the Window, Razzie favourite Megan Fox for playing Rebecca Lombardi in Midnight in the Switchgrass and Taryn Manning for playing the titular Karen, full name Karen Drexler. And last but not least, Ruby Rose for her role as Victoria in Vanquish - oh god, the dreadful RWBY jokes I could make about this. I will say that Chloe Grace Moretz had better be relieved that her role as Kayla in the new Tom & Jerry movie didn't land her here, given that it just serves as yet another reminder of her fall from grace movie-wise (despite the fact that she was going to be more particular about her future roles before this came out) - but luckily for her, she just manages to escape her first potential Razzie nomination.
Notice how I said "the dreadful RWBY jokes I could make about this"? Well, I add emphasis on "could" because Ruby Rose ultimately "lost" the prize to de Waal and her dreadful Diana impression. It's one thing to butcher a role, but it's another thing to butcher it when it's a real life person, specifically one who had a tumultuous public life. Sure, the fact that the script itself glosses over Diana's psychological issues (something that Spencer makes sure to actually focus on) doesn't help, but it's still embarrassing watching her perform the role.
Also, what is it with British actors such as Naiomi Watts and Jeanna de Waal failing as Diana, but the American Kristen Stewart doing so well in the role? It makes little to no sense in my mind. That said, at least Naiomi Watts had the advantage of not starring in a musical when she received her nomination that one year (though ultimately losing to Tyler Perry as Madea).
Worst Supporting Actor - Jared Leto from House of Gucci as Paulo Gucci.
Well, the only role I recognise on this list is Jared Leto as Paulo Gucci in the otherwise decent House of Gucci, a role in which he tries to go for an Oscar-bait route but only rivals his infamous stint as the Joker in Suicide Squad with regard to how appalling it is. Razzie veterans Ben Affleck and Mel Gibson also make a return, this time for their respective roles in The Last Duel as Count Pierre d'Alençon and in Dangerous as Dr. Alderwood. Other nominees include Gareth Keegan as James Hewitt in Diana (ANOTHER Diana nominee) and Nick Cannon as Ringo in The Misfits - I feel with the latter that his film career already died sometime ago with Underclassman.
I was SO hoping that Leto would "win" this category, and thank god he did. Everyone else in that film was fine, especially Lady Gaga and Adam Driver, but Leto is cartoonishly over-the-top and hilariously bad. I watched one of his scenes and ended up chuckling, but for all the wrong reasons. Apparently, he's supposed to be some form of comic relief, but instead of making you laugh because he's "funny", he makes you awkwardly chuckle because it's so stupid. I also find it stupid that he was trying to make his role "Oscar-bait" with the prosthetics and voice. As a bonus, British film critic Mark Kermode went on a particularly hilarious and scathing tirade at the role, comparing Leto to a whale and doing his own impression of him. I'll post a link to the video here for those who are curious - I was cracking up the whole time I was watching it. XD
This isn't the first time Leto was nominated - there was his dreadful stint in Suicide Squad as the Joker after all. But the fact that this is his first actual Razzie Award, in my mind at least, more than makes up for the fact that he "lost" to Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor in Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice that year. Now the question is, is Leto worse as the Joker or Paulo Gucci?
Worst Supporting Actress - Judy Kaye from Diana as Barbara Cartland and Queen Elizabeth II.
Despite criticisms of Lola Bunny being based off of her original bland self from the original Space Jam, apparently Zendaya turned out to be alright in the role after all since she's not here. And to be fair, I didn't see much problem with her voice acting either, just the characterisation and the fact that the producers mainly chose her for her star power. Going back on topic though, we have TWO supporting actresses from the Diana musical - Erin Davie as Charles' new wife Camilla Parker Bowles and Judy Kaye as Barbara Cartland and (god forbid) Queen Elizabeth II herself. Seriously, why would you butcher the Queen like that?! Next is Sophie Cookson for her role in Infinite as Nora Brightman. And then, oh lord, Amy Adams and Taryn Manning return from the Worst Lead Actress category with a vengeance, this time for their roles as Cynthia Murphy in Dear Evan Hansen and Maggie in Every Last One of Them respectively. I would have probably also nominated the bystander in Dear Evan Hansen who excitedly goes "oh my god" over the video that Evan puts out after Connor's suicide, but that's an EXTREMELY minor role and a fault of the script and direction, so I'll let her off this once (maybe).
I don't know if anyone else expected it, but I myself highly expected Judy Kaye to win for both of her roles. Seriously, how do you screw up our queen like that?! And much to my relief, it seems that the Razzies had the same views as I did since she received the "award" after all. Yeah, watching Kaye portray both a writer of romantic novels who wore extravagant outfits and makeup AND the queen is a surreal experience indeed. Makes for double the atrocity if I do say so myself.
Worst Screen Combo - LeBron James and any Warner cartoon character (or Time-Warner product) he dribbles on from Space Jam: A New Legacy.
Best category yet! As always, the nominees never fail to disappoint, even moreso this year since there aren't any general actor and actor combos on the list this year. We've got, and I quote from the source, any klutzy cast member and any lamely lyricised or choreographed musical number in Diana, LeBron James and any Warner cartoon character (or Time-Warner product) he dribbles on in Space Jam: A New Legacy, Jared Leto and either his 17-pound latex face, his geeky clothes or his ridiculous accent in House of Gucci, Ben Platt and any other character who acts like Platt singing 24-7 is normal in Dear Evan Hansen and Tom and Jerry (a.k.a. Itchy and Scratchy) from, well, Tom & Jerry. And yes, as I said, I copied this stuff almost word for word. It's just the only way you can describe them and the main reason I love this category so much. X)
It was James and the Looney Tunes who won this category this time round. I feel all of the combinations this year were awful and had good reasons to be on this list, though I feel that this one took the award because how blatantly cash-grabbing it was. See LeBron James interact with the Looney Tunes! See Lola Bunny be accepted as one of Wonder Woman's Amazons! See Granny interact with Neo from The Matrix! See...a bunch of rapists and murderers cameo at a basketball game. Yeah, you read that right, the Droogs from the controversial A Clockwork Orange of all works make a cameo at a basketball game and it's exactly as ridiculous as it sounds. At this point, Warner Bros. was clearly just throwing whatever they had into the finished product without thinking about the implications of the characters involved (probably as a failed attempt to "appeal" to adults as well as children).
Worst Screenplay - Diana (script by Joe DiPietro, music and lyrics by David Bryan and DiPietro).
It's interesting how Infinite and Space Jam: A New Legacy were nominated for Worst Picture, but got replaced by The Misfits (written by Kurt Wimmer and Robert Henny - the latter of which also came up with the story) and Twist (mainly written by John Wrathall and Sally Collett, but with additional material from Matthew Parkhill, Michael Lindley, Tom Grass and Kevin Lehane, from an "original idea" by David and Keith Lynch and Simon Thomas - that's a goddamn mouthful) for this category. Every single other Worst Picture nominee however returns here - Diana (written by Joe DiPietro, who also provided music and lyrics along with David Bryan), Karen (written by director Coke Daniels) and The Woman in the Window (written by Tracy Letts and based on A.J. Finn's novel). Again, I'm surprised that Dear Evan Hansen didn't make it here considering the changes in the script that made the show's flaws more apparent, but I guess you can't "win" them all.
Diana is just one of those "magical" works with regard to how ridiculous the script is. There are some weird creative choices, it glosses over Diana's mental health issues whilst still apparently trying to make her "sympathetic" and the way that other characters are portrayed makes no sense. And as for the ending in how they portray Diana's ultimately death, it's just outright laughable. The songs themselves are also atrocious. I've read some of the lyrics and the rhymes are painful. The fact that one of the co-creators of the songs is the keyboard player from the legendary rock band Bon Jovi just makes it all the more baffling. No wonder it rightfully won this category just like with its other ones.
Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel - Space Jam: A New Legacy.
As it turns out, Diana wasn't able to get a clean sweep of nominations this year due to this category, with it simply being a "live" recording of an already dreadful musical (though you can see it as a dreadful remake of Diana's life as a whole). As a result, only three movies from Worst Picture returned for this category, along with one new film from Worst Screenplay and another from Worst Screen Combo. Obviously Space Jam: A New Legacy is a sequel to the film from the 90s and Tom & Jerry adapts from the famous animated shorts. Meanwhile, The Woman in the Window was classified as a rip-off of the superior Rear Window and Twist was classified as a "rap remake" of Oliver Twist. Karen on the other hand is an unintentional case, being classified as an "inadvertent remake of Cruella de Vil" (I assume they're talking about the general 101 Dalmations movies rather than the recent Cruella film, which is more of an origin story), kind of like when the appalling Adam Sandler vehicle Jack & Jill was depicted as a "rip-off" of B-movie Glen or Glenda? that one year.
Since Karen was described as being an inadvertent remake, I expected it to not win this category. And lo and behold, it didn't. Instead, it went to Space Jam: A New Legacy, which I said was a "sequel" but also crosses over into being a reboot for some reason. Whilst it does improve on a few flaws that the original Space Jam had, it ultimately brings in some new flaws and essentially comes off as just promoting Warner Bros.' back catalogue. At least previous Looney Tunes movies were a lot less on-the-nose about the whole "promoting other works" aspect. The only reason that this even exists is because of the original Space Jam being a box office success, given that critical reviews of it were mixed at best. Yeah, everything has to be about money these days, sadly enough.
Worst Bruce Willis Performance in a 2021 movie - James Ford in Cosmic Sin.
Oh dear lord, this is actually a thing. Apparently, Bruce Willis, once a major star in films like Die Hard, Death Becomes Her and The Sixth Sense was in so many dreadful movies last year that they gave him his own category rather than place him in Worst Lead Actor or Worst Supporting Actor. These roles include Ben Watts in American Siege, Thomas Malone, the Prey in Apex, James Ford in Cosmic Sin, Ron Whitlock in Deadlock, Robert Michaels in Fortress, Karl Helter in Midnight in the Switchgrass (already nominated for Worst Lead Actress), Jack Harris in Out of Death and David in Survive the Game. Seriously, how does someone star in eight movies in one year? And how come they were all DREADFUL?!
Well, the "winning" entry turned out to be Cosmic Sin. I looked it up just out of curiosity, and it's essentially a sci-fi movie with 3% on Rotten Tomatoes. That's all I can really say about that. What a mess Willis' career has become. It's always a great tragedy when a once-promising actor who starred in some of the great works of all time is relegated to starring in a mixture of turds and flops. Think Robin Williams, John Travolta, Chloe Grace Moretz and Kevin Spacey for instance (though Spacey being outed as a sex offender in the #MeToo movement was probably a bigger killing blow to him than Nine Lives and Billionaire Boys Club ever were).
The Razzie Redeemer Award - Will Smith from King Richard as Richard Williams.
Unlike the other awards, this one did not have its nominee list, consisting of Will Smith as Richard Williams, father of Serena and Venus, in King Richard, Jamie Dorman as "Pa" in Belfast and Nicholas Cage as Robin "Rob" Feld in Pig revealed until the day of the actual awards. They used to reveal the nominees beforehand, but I guess because it's a "smaller" prize (despite being most certainly more desirable for the recipients), the committee doesn't feel the need to anymore.
I was not surprised that Will Smith won this award. Critics practically adored this role of his and it was a movie award favourite this year. I've seen parts from it too and he really nails the role, especially when he's giving those inspirational talks to his daughters. It makes you remember that even though he has been in some awful turds such as Wild Wild West, After Earth and Collateral Beauty, he really aces it when he's placed in something of good quality like The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Men in Black or Pursuit of Happiness. Hopefully he carries on in this direction and doesn't dip back into another bad work like some of Razzie Redeemer recipients such as Sylvester Stallone and Mel Gibson.
So that's the Razzies for this year, and I enjoyed them as always. I know I explained a bit about my love for them on my first Razzies post, but can I just say that it just feels more correct in which the films are nominated. Films nominated for the Oscars or Golden Globes have to be registered by the film companies themselves, but here the "award show" selects them themselves. My only disappointment with this year's awards is that Dear Evan Hansen did not win any awards itself, but hey, I guess the fact that it's facing mockery online and that it failed at the box office also helps to give the filmmakers of that garbage the hint.
But overall, I enjoyed the awards ceremony as always, and getting to watch it online for the last three years serves as a major bonus. I'll probably write an article in the future discussing my thoughts on specific nominations from this year that may not have won, as well as the nominations from last year and the year before. It's always fun to discuss bad movies, if the internet is any indication. ;)
