Gigli
Queen of rom-coms herself, everyone bows down for the “Maid in Manhattan,” Jennifer Lopez. It seems that often, love is blind. When reviews of her performance alongside her then-boyfriend make the comment that they “lack chemistry,” you know something’s up. Mixing a mob story and a romantic comedy is the unconventional love story that Hollywood really shouldn’t have dabbled in.
Our favorite review is the one by Newsweek, “after the schadenfreudian thrill of watching beautiful people humiliate themselves wears off, it has the same annihilating effect on your will to live.” Ladies and gentlemen, the 2003 Golden Raspberry hath been served. The critic’s consensus was that “Gigli” was bizarre and clumsily plotted.
Basic Instinct 2
Now, "Basic Instinct" is just one of those films you don’t mess with. It’s iconic, sexy, and thrilling for a reason, and this is most likely due to the decade it was released in. Sure, they might have brought Sharon Stone back for the sequel, but more than 20 years later, were producers truly that desperate to make some coin?
You know it’s Golden Raspberry-worthy when the director of the original film scoffed at the new script, and flat-out refused to direct a film that was going to be somewhat sacrilegious. With reviews like “ludicrous” and “predictable,” it should’ve been instinctual to know not to resurrect a film from another time.
Dirty Love
Written by Jenny McCarthy, this sadly won’t be the last time Hollywood produces a film about women and their quest to find Mr. Right. Beating films like "The Dukes of Hazzard" and "Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo" in the 2005 Razzies, this film really deserved the bottom spot that year along with the low ratings.
With a 7% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, lying somewhere between a rock and the comedy graveyard, this is a film you’ll want to miss. Stephen Holden from The New York Times gave a brutally honest review: “Even by the standards of its bottom-feeding genre, "Dirty Love" clings to the gutter like a rat in the garbage” Ouch!
Swept Away
2002’s Golden Raspberry goes to Guy Ritchie's film, "Swept Away." Starring musical legend Madonna, the film is a remake of the classic 1974 romantic Italian film. A fan of the original, critic Roger Ebert was unimpressed with Ritchie’s attempt, noting that Madonna didn’t do her role justice: “Striking a pose is not the same as embodying a person,” said Ebert.
He went on to say, “A role like this one requires the surrender of emotional control, something Madonna seems constitutionally unable to achieve.” Having the dishonor of being the Worst Picture of 2002, it really was swept away quickly from box office billboards, grossing under $600,000 in the U.S., despite a $10 million budget!
The Postman
“I’m no one’s messenger boy, I’m a delivery boy” – look, with a title like "The Postman," how could we not make that reference? This film was set in the future and was probably released a few years too soon. Now that we’re in 2020, you’d realize that the “near future” 2013 that "The Postman" was set in was certainly nothing like the reality of that year.
With a budget that reminded us it was a Hollywood production, its box office takings paled in comparison, drawing in less than a quarter of its budget, at $17 million US worldwide. Poor Kevin Costner didn't fare too well. Maybe they should’ve left "Waterworld" and the whole America-as-a-wasteland theme alone.