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This whole post started a couple of weeks ago when I was researching terrible movie moms. I came across the #1 spot on our list and was stunned that Bette Davis had stooped to such a movie. I guess it just goes to show how fickle Hollywood can be. Watch out, Julia Roberts!
1. Bette Davis in Wicked Stepmother. Even Bette knew this 1989 movie was a total disaster – she dropped out halfway through filming with only part of her scenes filmed. The plot goes something like this: evil stepmother who is secretly a witch marries a nice man while his kids are away. She does terrible things like fill their refrigerator with meat (they are vegetarians). The shock! The horror!! Bette’s sudden departure was dealt with in a totally believable manner – the script was rewritten to make the evil stepmother a mother/daughter duo who had to share the same body; whoever isn’t in the body has to occupy the body of a cat. Duh. This thing practically writes itself. Bette said she dropped out of the film due to script problems, but writer/producer/director Larry Cohen said it was really due to her declining health. Although she did die just a few months after the movie came out, I’m inclined to believe Miss Davis on this one.
2. Joan Crawford in Trog. An ape-like creature is discovered in a cave and an anthropologist – Mommie Dearest, of course – wants to study him. She gets him back to her lab and starts her research, but some locals think Trog is a menace and break into the lab to kill the poor thing. Of course, Trog is the one who ends up killing the murderous mob and then goes on a misunderstood killing spree throughout town, but mostly it’s self defense. Trog ends up getting gunned down and Joan Crawford is supremely saddened. As am I. As was Joan, actually. According to IMDB, she once joked that if it hadn’t been against her religion, she would have committed suicide after seeing how awful the film was.
3. Myrna Loy in Ants, AKA It Happened at Lakewood Manor. Oddly, I think I’ve seen this film. Hopped up on insecticide, a bunch of rampaging ants attack. This 1977 made-for-TV movie is a long cry from The Thin Man series that made Loy a star.
4. Ann Margret in The Santa Clause 3. Maybe this one isn’t so bad, but I have a personal distaste for the second and third Santa Clause movies.
5. Gloria Swanson in Killer Bees. For someone whose most famous movie quote is (arguably) “I am big. It’s the pictures that got small,” this is a little painful. Gloria plays Madame Maria von Bohlen, the head of a family who can psychically command a swarm of killer bees to do her bidding. Yep. It was Swanson’s last film (also made for TV).
6. Olivia de Havilland in The Swarm. Apparently Hollywood couldn’t get enough of enraged insects in the ‘70s, because it was 1978 that saw Olivia de Havilland, Miss Melanie Wilkes herself, in one of the worst disaster movies of all time. But she was in good company – it also starred Michael Caine, Richard Chamberlain, Lee Grant, Patty Duke, Henry Fonda and Fred MacMurray. All of these big names were busy fighting off a swarm of African killer bees before they wipe out the U.S. completely. It was in theaters just two weeks before it was pulled and was so terrible that director Irwin Allen has forbidden anyone from mentioning it to him ever again. He even stopped an interview when the reported dared breathe the title.
7. Joan Blondell in The Glove. Almost 30 years after being nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role in The Blue Veil, Joan took a part in another apparel-based movie. This one, however, was about an ex-con who hunted down former prison guards and killed them with a big steel glove. But it was a Troma film, so it’s not like anyone should have expected cinematic genius (sorry, Troma fans).
8. Jennifer Jones in Angel, Angel, Down We Go. An Oscar, a Golden Globe and a bunch of nominations don’t necessarily mean that an actress won’t end up in a B-Movie later in life. Jennifer Jones, for instance, found herself in The Cult of the Damned, AKA Angel, Angel, in 1969. The plot, according to IMDB: “The overweight debutante daughter of the world’s wealthiest couple falls in with a gang of tripped out, skydiving pseudo-reactionary pop stars, who take their beliefs of the American ideal to profoundly impossible heights.”
9. Teresa Wright in Flood! You might not know the name, but Teresa Wright won an Oscar for Mrs. Miniver and was nominated for The Pride of the Yankees. But for 1976’s Flood!, another Irwin Allen movie, she wasn’t nominated for anything.
10. Tippi Hedren in Satan’s Harvest. As one of Hitchcock’s favorite blondes, Melanie Griffith’s mom could do no wrong for a few years – she won a Golden Globe for “best newcomer” for her role in The Birds and got rave reviews for Marnie. But starring in Satan’s Harvest in 1970 didn’t really continue her streak. One of the movie’s tagline was “She’s a good girl – until she smokes R-E-E-F-E-R!” if that tells you anything. It’s about a man who inherits his uncle’s ranch in South Africa and has to deal with attempts on his life all of the time; he can’t figure out why until he discovers that the ranch is actually a marijuana goldmine. And to be fair to Tippi, I think it’s not her fault that she had to stoop so low – when she declined to work with Alfred Hitchcock again after they had some personal problems, he told her that he would ruin her career. “And he did,” Tippi has said.
Also, pretty much every actress from the ‘30s and ‘40s who was still alive in the ‘80s appeared on either The Love Boat, Falcon Crest or both.
I’m positive you guys have more to add – and why limit it to older actresses? If you want to talk about the flops that present-day movie stars have been in, feel free to throw those in as well. I mean, seriously, Jamie Foxx went from Ray to Stealth? Meh.
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Perhaps then you should amend the part that says Tippi Hedren is “one of Hitchcocks favorite blondes”. She was probably one of his LEAST FAVORITE blondes, which is really saying something, given his affinity for blondes.
I nominate Helen Mirren in Teaching Ms Tingle. I actually saw this movie cuz I had met one of the stars before she was famous (she went to prom w/ a buddy of mine). Bad
Admittedly, not as horrible as Angel, Angel sounds. “skydiving psuedo-reactionary pop stars”?
Also, Kate Beckinsale in Van Helsing. Awful, awful movie. So much bad CG, it looked like a cartoon w/ live action spliced in here and there. And her Eastern Euro-accent was not her finest work.
posted by Jonny on 5-14-2009 at 5:33 pm
I remember being shocked to see Olivia De Havilland in another stinker called Lady In A Cage. I was ten-ish years old and it was very creepy. I think James Caan might have been in it too.
posted by Kathie on 5-14-2009 at 5:34 pm
Well, I guess she was one of his favorites until she decided she didn’t want to work with him anymore. I’ve read that there was some inappropriate conduct on his part (go figure, right?) and when she didn’t respond and then bought out her contract with him, he ruined her career. So… love/hate relationship, maybe!
posted by stacy on 5-14-2009 at 5:41 pm
Great list!
Here’s another one: Veronica Lake in Flesh Fest (1970), which she also produced. It was a horrid mess, about neo-Nazis somehow in possession of Hitler’s body in Florida. The final scene – not a spoiler here, seriously – is an extended closeup of Hitler’s face as maggots eat at it.
posted by Dan on 5-14-2009 at 5:58 pm
What? No mention of the greatest doozy in film history – Faye Dunaway in Mommie Dearest?
posted by Steve In San Diego on 5-14-2009 at 6:17 pm
I don’t believe she ever won an Oscar, but didn’t Mae West star in a stink-fest right before she passed, too? Considering contracts for movie stars back then, I have to wonder if some of these golden age actors and actresses were taking these roles to keep from eating cat food during their retirement. That’s just me supposing, though.
posted by Rusty S. on 5-14-2009 at 6:19 pm
Just to clarify, Joan Blondell was nominated, but did not win the Academy Award for The Blue Veil; she lost to Kim Hunter (Streetcar Named Desire).
posted by Ron in Nebraska on 5-14-2009 at 7:21 pm
Cate Blanchett in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Just kidding. …No, not really.
posted by KS on 5-14-2009 at 7:31 pm
That Mae West stinker was the notorious Myra Breckenridge. I’ve never seen it and probably never will. I hated the book and haven’t read anything by Gore Vidal since then.
Wait, I lied. I’ve read a couple of his magazine essays that dismayed me because, for whatever reason, included diatribes against his mother!
posted by Catseye on 5-14-2009 at 8:01 pm
That Mae West stinker was the notorious Myra Breckenridge. After reading the book, I’ve no desire to see the movie.
I’ve dislike Gore Vidal ever since I read a couple of his magazine articles where, for whatever reason, he wrote about how much he disliked his mother. Neither article was about mothers!
posted by Catseye on 5-14-2009 at 8:06 pm
Ann Margaret in Magic (1978) a movie which plagiarized both “Dead Of Night” and “Psycho” – incidentally, Anthony Hopkins is also in it as a deranged ventriloquist.
posted by John in San Fran on 5-14-2009 at 8:14 pm
Pretty much everything Halle Barry has been in since Monsters Ball?
posted by hilly on 5-14-2009 at 9:38 pm
For a whole list of “Why? Why? Why?”, check out 1968’s “Skidoo” with such notable names as:
Jackie Gleason
Carol Channing
Frankie Avalon
Peter Lawford
Burgess Meredith
George Raft
Cesar Romero
Mickey Rooney
And it was the last film of comedic icon, Groucho Marx
It’s a horrible mess of an attempt at a 60s counter-culture, hippy-centric ride where everyone is on drugs, including many of the actors at the time.
posted by SpaceMonkeyX on 5-14-2009 at 10:02 pm
I don’t know that I would say Kate Beckinsale is an “amazing actress”…
posted by Tina on 5-14-2009 at 10:02 pm
Definitely halle berry in catwoman.
Also Kate Winslet in Holy Smoke- this film was referred to me many times as a fantastic/ profound movie, but in reality it is neither of the two, and was popular amongst my college pals only because of a few steamy scenes. It is actually a really bad movie
posted by aditi on 5-15-2009 at 4:57 am
Judy Dench in the Chronicles of Riddick. Blarg.
posted by Zach on 5-15-2009 at 7:56 am
The Mae West stinker you-all are trying to remember/forget was called ‘Sextette’, with a young Timothy Dalton.
posted by ArtW on 5-15-2009 at 8:02 am
Audrey Hepburn in Robin and Marion (1976 – Sean Connery was Robin). I love the Robin Hood story and this nearly ruined it for me. It’s Robin and Marion 15-20ish years after the original story.
posted by Hastings on 5-15-2009 at 8:26 am
Meryl Streep in Death Becomes Her. (Though I secretly enjoyed the movie)
posted by K on 5-15-2009 at 9:52 am
How about Lauren Hutton in Once Bitten. It was the start of Jim Carrey’s career, but I’ve always felt sad for her to be in that role.
posted by Tex on 5-15-2009 at 10:12 am
Micky Rooney’s turn in Silent Night Deadly Night 5: The Toymaker pretty much represents the initial plummet in his rollercoaster ride of direct to video crap.
Elizabeth Taylor in the The Flinstones!
Robert DeNiro in Rocky and Bullwinkle . . . though let me pitch this article idea: good actors who make kid-friendly crap just to have something the kids/grandkids can watch?
posted by EMStoveken on 5-15-2009 at 10:12 am
Neither “Death Becomes Her” nor “Once Bitten” are bad movies. They are both well-written examples of their respective genres.
But how about Elizabeth Taylor in “Cleopatra”, Hilary Swank in “The Next Karate Kid”, Angelina Jolie in “Cyborg 2″, and Helen Mirren in “Caligula” (yes, THAT “Caligula”)?
posted by 8rustystaples on 5-15-2009 at 10:33 am
Ok, absolutely two of the biggest ’stinkers’ ever…..
‘Gangs of New York’ with Daniel Day Lewis, Cameron Diaz and Leonardo DiCaprio…. that was two hours of my life I will never get back.
And of course, ‘Secret Window’ with Johnny Depp. A reasonable enough story (I guess, throwing it a bone here) but absolutely the worst movie ever made (except for Gangs of New York, of course)
Ugh. They really should be ashamed of themselves for these two!
posted by Kristi on 5-15-2009 at 12:38 pm
Betty White in Lake Placid and Cloris Leachman in Lake Placid 2
posted by Erin on 5-15-2009 at 12:39 pm
Gangs of New York is an awesome movie! DDL is pimp in a top hat throughout, and the only bad part is Cameron Diaz
posted by Emma on 5-15-2009 at 12:47 pm
I guess I just have bad taste in movies. I liked Gangs of New York and Secret Window. I will say though that Johnny Depp should be ashamed of “The Ninth Gate.”
posted by Nicole on 5-15-2009 at 2:21 pm
I thought the movie Vanity Fair with Reese Witherspoon was awful. It made no sense and she was unfortunately bad in it.
Oh and how about The Rock in The Mummy 2? There was all of that hype about his break out role in this major movie and it was all CG…BAD CG!! Major disappointment.
:o(
posted by Lindsey on 5-15-2009 at 10:50 pm
@ stacy
I don’t know if you’ll see this post, but to follow up on the love/hate Hedren/Hitch relationship…
At one point on Marnie, they were arguing about something Hitch wanted her to do (I presume in a scene), and she called him FAT infront of the whole set crew. This is what prompted Hitch to want to ruin her career, for embarrassing him publicly like that.
posted by Jonny on 5-16-2009 at 7:47 pm