The seven best bad films ever made

The ultimate Bad Film, created by eccentric independent film-maker Tommy Wiseau.

Wiseau (left) embodies the qualities of the Bad Film auteur: an inexperienced but enigmatic outsider whose misguided confidence drove him to finance (he mysteriously conjured $6million for The Room), write, produce, direct and star in his passion project.

The movie seems to be about a love triangle between San Franciscan banker Johnny (Wiseau), his fiancé Lisa (Juliette Danielle) and best friend Mark (Greg Sestero). But any hope of following the story is lost in an abyss of fantastically awful acting, inane writing that starts and ends almost every scene with “hi” and “I gotta go”, subplots surfaced then immediately dropped, gratuitous sex scenes and tedious pacing.

Perversely, Wiseau’s strange brand of charisma and the fact he tried so very hard and failed so very badly has elevated him to cult status. Success comes in all sorts of ways.

B movie maestro Ed Wood’s most infamous work, Plan 9 from Outer Space must be admired for sheer audacity.

The rudimentary sci-fi-horror-melodrama is testimony to Wood’s feverish mind. No way was a dismal budget going to stop his idea about invading aliens who resurrect corpses to prevent the human race from blowing up the sun.

Wood cuts corners by using plastic children’s toys for space ships, shower curtains on set, and filming actors against roughly painted or blank backgrounds. Fast and loose continuity sees scenes frequently switching between night and day.

But most audacious of all is Wood’s use of two actors to play the role of the Old Man: his star actor and friend Bela Lugosi died before the film was finished, so Wood, determined to keep Lugosi’s scenes, simply got his chiropractor “disguised” by a cloak covering his face to stand in for the rest.

Tae Kwon-Do artist Y.K. Kim reportedly remortgaged his house to write, produce, co-direct and star in his film about a martial arts synth rock band, Dragon Sound, which takes on a gang of cocaine-dealing biker ninjas.

Kim’s film is an earnest attempt to teach the West about Tae Kwon-Do. But sadly in 1987 it made it into just a small handful of cinemas and was promptly forgotten. Jump to 2009 and this buried gem of a Bad Film was rediscovered by a programmer at Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, Austin, US who bought the 35mm print on eBay for $50 on a whim, and screened it.

This time round, 80s aficionados were unable to resist Miami Connection’s gloriously camp mishmash of cheesy dialogue, fighting, big hair, and synth tunes preaching martial arts and friendship. These days the movie enjoys a reputation as one of the most entertaining Bad Films around.

GUIDANCE: Violent scenes

The Exorcist producer Noel Marshall directed and starred in Roar with his real-life wife Tippi Hedren, two children John and Jerry and stepdaughter Melanie (Griffith). In it, an unconventional conservationist named Hank lives cheek-by-jowl with lions, tigers, cheetahs and elephants. But when his family moves in things go awry; his wild beautiful beasts cannot, of course, be domesticated and run amok.

The movie’s been dubbed as Hollywood’s most dangerous; while the number of injuries sustained by cast and crew over the film’s 11-year production is debated, the most cited figure is 70, including Griffith needing plastic surgery around her eye and cinematographer Jon de Bont (later Speed director) requiring over 200 stitches after being scalped by a curious lioness (he was back at work two weeks later). It’s genuinely quite astonishing that no one was killed.

Roar is special because there’s no way something so completely insane could ever get made today.

If you look carefully, at one point in a fight scene in Samurai Cop, lead actor Matt Hannon’s wig actually comes off. Filming was so dragged out Hannan thought it was finished and chopped his locks, only to be made to don a dodgy wig by director Amir Shervan.

Plot-wise, LA police call on the help of sword-wielding, Japanese-speaking, hirsute detective Joe Marshall, aka the Samurai, to tackle a ruthless Yakuza gang. The movie’s highlights include toe-curling sex scenes and stumbled-over lines that have been kept in.

Samurai Cop is prized because, like Miami Connection, it was nearly lost: it went straight to video when it was made but in 2012 film-maker Gregory Hatanaka found the negatives gathering dust in a run-down LA studio. Realising its potential, he restored it and introduced it to the midnight cinema circuit.

The cast had almost got away with it; but we’re glad they didn’t.

GUIDANCE: Strong language

Anti-marijuana propaganda film Reefer Madness, originally titled Tell Your Children, is the US’s classic moralising exploitation movie.

It warned parents of the dangers of pot with a cautionary tale about some nice high school kids who get enticed into a drug dealing couple’s apartment to smoke weed; an act which unleashes a spiral of murder, suicide, incarceration and manic piano playing.

The movie was financed by a church group, but sensationalist film-maker Dwain Esper brought the rights and distributed it as Reefer Madness. It resurfaced again in the 1970s when it became popular for all the wrong reasons.

No Bad Film list is complete without Troll 2. A family holiday to the town of Nilbog (read backwards to discover the film’s subject – clever eh?), takes a turn for the worst when the protagonists are pursued by evil vegetarian goblins bent on turning them into vegetables to feast upon.

Troll 2 is an overflowing cornucopia of laughable storylines, awful acting and ridiculous dialogue, but its bizarre backstory ensured its cult status: Troll 2 is in no way related to Troll; there aren’t even any trolls in it but a goblin; it was filmed in rural Utah with a cast of mainly local amateur actors; and the Italian crew spoke little English, causing all sorts of problems on set. How did it all go wrong?

In 2009 former Troll 2 child star Michael Stepheson’s documentary Best Worst Movie, about the fallout of making the film, received critical praise. Unlike Troll 2.

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