The 50 Best Bad Movies

Last weekend, we were all reminded of what the month of January really means for ticket-buying movie fans. Amidst all of the awards season hoopla, with constant talk about good films like The Descendants and The Artist, audiences greeted an inferior new release in a way that rarely ever happens: the dreaded “F” rating via CinemaScore, a market research firm that pools together post-screening reactions for moviegoers. The recipient of this embarrassing grade was The Devil Inside, an all-too-familiar exorcism flick shot in the increasingly tired “found-footage” style and written with such laziness that it doesn’t even have a legitimate ending. Seriously, it’s the last episode of The Sopranos, minus the rocking Journey music and skill behind the camera.

The Devil Inside’s awfulness is a stark reminder of January’s M.O. for movie studios no longer interested in releasing films into theaters before the Academy Award voters’ cut-off date. Occasionally, a few very good films open, such as this week’s Haywire and next week’s The Grey, but those are the exceptions. The sad truth is that most new January debuts are either so piss-poor that they’re best wiped away from our memories, or they have much in common with the bad-meaning-good entries present on our countdown of The 50 Best Bad Movies, works of low art so endearingly inept that we can’t stop watching, and laughing at, them.

Written by Matt Barone (@MBarone)

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