Not quickly after they had been first given out in 1929, the Academy Awards turned a very powerful and coveted award in Hollywood. These days, it is protected to say that an Oscar is the largest honor within the movie business. As such, studios and filmmakers suppose they’ve cracked the components: These films are referred to as Oscar bait. It is a obscure time period that totally different folks might outline otherwise, however in broad phrases, it is a movie that feels prefer it was devised particularly to win Academy gold.
Biopics of historic figures performed by beloved actors; large ensemble dramas with sociopolitical themes; comeback narratives for actors deemed long-overdue for an Oscar; there are all types of issues that may make a film Oscar bait, but it surely does not at all times work out. Certainly, there are some fairly terrible movies that nonetheless had ambitions to face on the Dolby Theater stage. They might have some redeeming qualities right here and there, but it surely’s not sufficient to actually make them not-terrible.
10
‘Amelia’ (2009)
Directed by Mira Nair
In 2000, Hilary Swank acquired an Oscar for Boys Do not Cry. 5 years later, she gained once more for the Greatest Image-winning Million Greenback Child. 4 years after that, she swung for the fences in an effort to get a 3rd — and failed spectacularly. The consequence? Amelia, the place she performs legendary American pilot Amelia Earhart in a narrative about her life and her eventual disappearance over the Pacific Ocean.
Not often all through the historical past of the twenty first century have there been Oscar-bait performances extra apparent than this one, however though Swank does certainly ship a stable efficiency, the film is not practically as much as her top. It is such a plainly formulaic film that it genuinely feels prefer it got here out of a bottle. It by no means fairly finds the suitable option to stability actuality with drama, and because of this, it is probably the most remarkably unexciting films about flying ever made.
Amelia
- Launch Date
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October 22, 2009
- Runtime
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111 minutes
9
‘Collateral Magnificence’ (2016)
Directed by David Frankel
Earlier than he lastly gained his long-awaited Academy Award in 2022 for King Richard (after which shortly stained that second with the notorious slap incident), Will Smith spent years desperately attempting to get an Oscar. A few of these makes an attempt had been actually nice films, others had been much less outstanding… after which there’s Collateral Magnificence. It is a few man retreating from life after a tragedy, questioning the universe by writing to Love, Time, and Loss of life. He receives sudden solutions and notice how loss can reveal moments of magnificence.
All of it sounds superb and dandy on paper, however viewers and critics alike had been in a position to see proper by the movie’s emotional manipulation. It has good intentions, but it surely’s so bonkers in how far it is prepared to go in begging the viewers to cry and begging the Academy to provide Will Smith an Oscar that it leaves a nasty style within the mouth. It is certainly one of the worst-written drama films of current years, and people who noticed and disliked it are grateful that the Academy did not fall for the lure.
Collateral Magnificence
- Launch Date
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December 6, 2016
- Runtime
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97minutes
8
‘Expensive Evan Hansen’ (2021)
Directed by Stephen Chbosky
Expensive Evan Hansen originated on Broadway with Ben Platt taking part in the titular position. It is a Tony and Grammy-award profitable musical a few socially-anxious high-school senior and his journey of self-discovery after a classmate’s suicide. When a film adaptation was made, as a substitute of casting an precise teenager within the lead, they solid a nearly-30 Platt within the position, put him in a wig and make-up that made him look nearly-40, and referred to as it a day.
There are all types of the reason why that is certainly one of the worst film musicals of the twenty first century, except for simply Platt being laborious to purchase as Evan. The musical numbers are lifeless, the visuals are drab and boring, and the story a few manipulative younger man mendacity his manner into changing into widespread and being along with his grieving crush comes throughout as creepy, to say the least. “Terrifying” could be a extra applicable time period. It is precisely the form of factor that one would have anticipated to get no less than a few Oscar nods initially, however even the Academy most well-liked to wave by a window as a substitute of touching this absolute mess.
Expensive Evan Hansen
- Launch Date
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September 24, 2021
- Runtime
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137minutes
- Director
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Stephen Chbosky
7
‘Amsterdam’ (2022)
Directed by David O. Russell
Although he is now notorious for the way abusive he allegedly is on set, David O. Russell and his films had been Academy darlings up till Jennifer Lawrence‘s Greatest Actress nomination for 2015’s Pleasure. Then got here Amsterdam, and issues shortly fell aside. It is a conspiracy thriller set within the Thirties, about three buddies who witness a homicide, are framed for it, and must uncover probably the most outrageous plots in American historical past.
Regardless of its extremely stacked solid that includes the likes of Margot Robbie, John David Washington, and Christian Bale, Amsterdam turned certainly one of the largest field workplace flops of the 2020s to date, and its luck at award reveals wasn’t significantly better. Individuals thought that each one the dazzling parts by no means added as much as a better complete, Amsterdam as a substitute dropping itself in its personal poorly-plotted narrative and noisy directing.
Amsterdam
- Launch Date
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October 7, 2022
- Runtime
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134 minutes
- Director
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David O. Russell
6
‘Grace of Monaco’ (2014)
Directed by Olivier Dahan
Grace Kelly was one of many biggest and most attention-grabbing actresses of Hollywood’s Golden Age. From being a Hitchcock Woman to profitable an Academy Award and three Golden Globes, she was a real icon. She was additionally Princess of Monaco because the spouse of Prince Rainier III till her demise, and it is a disaster of their marriage that the biopic Grace of Monaco explores, specializing in a interval throughout a political dispute between Rainier III and France’s Charles de Gaulle.
The visuals are lavish, the cinematography is gorgeous, and Nicole Kidman is dazzling as Kelly, however the movie is so offensively vapid that it is maybe one of many weakest biopics of the final quarter-century. It is the form of movie that is all type, zero substance; the writing is atrociously missing within the complexity of the real-life topic’s story, the directing is fully inert, and the casting outdoors of Kidman is fairly horrible.
5
‘Diana’ (2013)
Directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel
Nicole Kidman wasn’t the one one who tried to nab an Oscar nomination by taking part in a European royal within the 2010s. Naomi Watts did it too (and arguably to even worse outcomes) in 2013’s Diana. It is a romance drama exploring the final two years of Princess Diana’s life, as she embarks on a closing ceremony of passage: a secret love affair with a Pakistani coronary heart surgeon.
It feels extra like an affordable TV film than a manufacturing with even a fraction of the class of its topic, with performances which are lower than very best.
The movie, certainly one of essentially the most contrived Oscar-bait films ever, is a horrible disservice to each the Princess Diana mythos and Diana Spencer as an individual. It feels extra like an affordable TV film than a manufacturing with even a fraction of the class of its topic, with performances which are lower than very best — sadly, together with Watts’s. It is sappy, surface-level, utterly pointless, and a pathetic try at paying respect to Diana’s reminiscence.
Diana
- Launch Date
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September 19, 2013
- Runtime
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113 minutes
- Director
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Oliver Hirschbiegel
4
‘Blonde’ (2022)
Directed by Andrew Dominik
Girl Di and the legendary Hollywood star Marilyn Monroe had been remarkably comparable ladies. It is then much more tragic — and ironic, contemplating how a perversion of their public photographs was a typical downside for each — that Marilyn, too, is the star of an atrocious Oscar-bait movie. Blonde is much less a biopic and extra of a fictionalized retelling of the actress’s romantic {and professional} lives. Extra notably, it is concerning the mythologization of her picture and the way it’s consumed to today.
Blonde did get an Oscar nod, a Greatest Actress nomination for Ana de Armas (a not-entirely-undeserved honor), however that does not make it any much less unhealthy. It is in all probability certainly one of the worst Oscar-bait films ever, contributing to the exploitation of Marilyn’s picture and private life 100 instances greater than it feedback on it. It is all tragedy and trauma porn made by individuals who ought to have identified higher.
Blonde
- Launch Date
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September 28, 2022
- Runtime
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2h 46m
- Director
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Andrew Dominik
3
‘Emilia Pérez’ (2024)
Directed by Jacques Audiard
Made by a French director who does not communicate a lick of Spanish and who says he did not do any analysis on Mexico for the movie (you may inform), Emilia Pérez pretends to be an incisive satirical take a look at the nation’s delicate sociopolitical state of affairs, from narco tradition to pressured disappearances. As a substitute, it is essentially the most offensively tone-deaf and idiotically-written movie of 2024, with out even an oz of compassion or reality in the way it treats its material. The story follows a lawyer who’s employed by a trans narco chief with the intention to assist her transition, and later to get her nearer to her spouse and youngsters, who do not learn about her true gender identification and suppose she was killed.
Emilia Pérez proposes all types of untamed concepts which have proved offensive to each Latin People and the trans neighborhood. That being transgender instantly absolves you of all of your sins, that Mexico is a hellscape of delinquents residing in depressing situations, and that the individuals who have terrorized Mexico for many years are deserving of redemption are however a couple of of the movie’s baffling theses. As if that weren’t sufficient, the comedy is painfully unfunny, the musical numbers are astonishingly cringe-worthy, and save for a pair of stable performances by Zoe Saldaña and Karla Sofía Gascón, there aren’t any rescuable qualities on this absolute catastrophe. It has already gained 4 Golden Globes, and its Oscar prospects look simply as brilliant… for some motive.
2
‘Music’ (2021)
Directed by Sia
If the historical past of movie has confirmed something, it is that regardless of how gifted they’re, some musicians ought to simply keep away from films. This contains Sia, who acquired bold and directed within the atrocious Music certainly one of essentially the most boring Oscar-bait movies of all time. However being boring is not even the film’s worst crime — It is being horrible throughout. It is a few newly-sober girl who receives information that she’s to change into the only real guardian of her half-sister named Music, who’s on the autism spectrum.
In some unspecified time in the future, the film’s baffling misunderstanding of what autism is or the way it works stops being humorous and begins being wildly offensive. The characters are utterly empty vessels for Sia to manipulate the viewers on this awfully self-indulgent self-importance venture, with horrible music scenes and the clumsiest screenplay conceivable. Please keep on with singing, Sia.
Music
- Launch Date
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January 14, 2021
- Runtime
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107 minutes
- Director
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Sia
1
‘Cats’ (2019)
Directed by Tom Hooper
Even being just a bit over half a decade outdated, Cats already requires no introduction. Based mostly on the Broadway cult basic of the identical identify, it is a fantasy musical a few tribe of cats who should determine yearly which certainly one of them will ascend to the Heaviside Layer and are available again to a brand new life. The film looks like a waking nightmare of traumatizing CGI, musical numbers, and weird story beats and artistic choices.
There have been only a few films all through the twenty first century extra terrible than Cats, and the truth that Oscar gold was a real expectation that the workforce behind it had whereas making it makes it even funnier. It is certainly one of the worst movies of the previous couple of a long time, a really appalling insult to cinema that is not even humorous sufficient to be a so-bad-it’s-good cult basic: It is simply unhealthy.
