Before negativity is dived into wholeheartedly, it should be stressed that not all movies definable as Oscar bait are automatically bad. An Oscar bait movie is one that usually sticks to telling a true story about broadly emotional things, sometimes by way of sanitizing the truth, to some extent, but such a movie can be done well. Like, some might want to define Schindler’s List as Oscar bait, and if it were, it was successful Oscar bait, since it won Best Picture plus some other awards, but it also succeeded as a movie; not just a thing to win awards.
That’s probably the main distinction. It’s understandable why directors or producers (probably the latter more than the former) want to win Academy Awards, but if they want to make something great and compelling at the same time, then that’s potentially okay. But it’s not okay with these movies, since they kind of fail as movies, and exist solely as Oscar bait. Some successfully baited Oscar voters, while others fell flat, but all are united by the fact that you should avoid them, assuming you’ve not already forgotten that most of them ever existed entirely.
8
‘The 15:17 to Paris’ (2018)
The intentions behind The 15:17 to Paris were good, but the execution really let the whole thing down. It’s a movie about an act of terrorism that was heroically thwarted, and criticism of the movie is not intended to take away from the accomplishments of the people involved, but The 15:17 to Paris makes the bold decision to have the actual men play themselves in a re-enactment of the event in question, and some other parts of their lives, and… yeah, they’re just not very good actors.
The movie stands as a testament to the notion that the whole acting thing is hard, as even playing yourself is quite the endeavor. The 15:17 to Paris is easily one of the worst films Clint Eastwood has ever directed, and the kind that sticks out and makes him potentially disqualified from getting on a ranking of the best directors of all time. It’s a dreary, amateurish, and plodding film which, again, is a shame, considering the real-life story it tries to tell is interesting.
7
‘Darkest Hour’ (2017)
Ugh. Ugghhh. UGGGHHH. Darkest Hour is so boring. It is such a nothing film. The idea of typing 125 to 150 words about it is an insurmountable task, even for someone who summarizes about 25 to 30 movies every day in so many words. More than 99.9% of movies out there, it’s just so much nothing. This movie existed to get Gary Oldman an Oscar. That’s about it.
The existence of Darkest Hour is deeply annoying, as it has a façade of decency, at first glance, but then you try to unpack/remember it some days after you finished watching it, and you come up with absolutely nothing.
There’s no passion here, and no real attempt to make interesting the story of what Winston Churchill did as it became clear that Britain might have to enter the Second World War. In getting Oldman an Oscar, it succeeded, but at what cost? What else did Darkest Hour even do? Hell, the performance might be sort of good on the surface, but all the prosthetics do most of Oldman’s acting for him, and he’s been so much better in so many other movies. The existence of Darkest Hour is deeply annoying, as it has a façade of decency, like, at first glance, but then you try to unpack – or just remember – it some days after you finished watching it, and you come up with absolutely nothing. What a waste of celluloid, or whatever they filmed it with. WHO CARES?
6
‘The Theory of Everything’ (2014)
More like the theory of nothing. Ha-ha, got ‘em. But nah, The Theory of Everything is boring. Shock, horror. Another Oscar bait movie that doesn’t do much to actually feel engaging, since it doesn’t seem to care about that. It’s a movie about Stephen Hawking, specifically focusing on how he fell in love, and that’s familiar territory for an Oscar contender (historical setting, romance, hardships to overcome, blah, blah, blah), but it’s not executed well here.
The Theory of Everything is unbelievably tedious, almost as though those involved with its production wanted it to make as many potential viewers as possible drift off to sleep while it was all playing out. It’s the sort of movie that gives the whole biopic genre a bad name, and there’s good reason why you probably haven’t heard many people mention this one post-2014, or post-2015, if you want to be super generous.
5
‘Judy’ (2019)
You could pair Judy with Darkest Hour for a nightmarishly boring – but also quite consistent – double feature, if you were feeling particularly masochistic. Darkest Hour takes Winston Churchill and makes him boring, while Judy takes a chapter in the life of Judy Garland and makes her strangely boring, though, like Darkest Hour, the film did succeed in winning the top-billed cast member (here, Renée Zellweger) an Academy Award.
Like Oldman, Zellweger is technically not bad, but she’s also acting in a movie that’s a big old pile of nothing, existing for no reason other than to give a seasoned actor a chance to flex their acting muscles. Judy Garland wasn’t just one of the most iconic actresses associated with musicals, but also among one of the all-time greats of Hollywood’s Golden Age more broadly speaking, so she – and her legacy – deserved better than something this limp and tepid.
4
‘Stardust’ (2020)
There are so many things that can be said about David Bowie, to the point where maybe the best movie about him (the documentary Moonage Daydream) basically comes to the conclusion that it’s impossible to fully understand such an enigmatic figure. He made some of the best music of all time, had so many iconic songs that he’s also got plenty of underrated ones, and he was forward-thinking in a way that ensured even some of his songs from 50-ish years ago remain feeling futuristic, somehow.
None of that was properly explored or unpacked in Stardust (not to be mixed up with the rather charming 2007 movie of the same name), which was made without the approval of Bowie’s estate/family. So, Stardust tries to get around using Bowie’s actual music, failing miserably because the lack of said iconic music is very noticeable, and also, the movie is terrible for all the other reasons that a movie can be terrible. To make a long story short, it’s uh, like, not worth your time and stuff.
3
‘The Iron Lady’ (2011)
So, with the likes of Darkest Hour and Judy, you could argue that those were made because the main actors involved wanted to win Oscars, and that’s fine and all. But The Iron Lady can’t excuse itself in such a way, since Meryl Streep – who played Margaret Thatcher here – had already won two Oscars for two better movies (Kramer vs. Kramer and Sophie’s Choice), but maybe she wanted a third?
Well, she got one. Streep won a third Oscar for a movie that’s so far from what she usually stars in, quality-wise. This is an embarrassing film that does not handle the central figure it wants to depict well, or fairly, or even compellingly. Hell, you might well be someone who supported the controversial Thatcher and still find this film about her life utterly boring. It’s a misfire on all fronts, and undeniably one of the worst biopics in recent memory.
2
‘The Great Ziegfeld’ (1936)
So, The Great Ziegfeld did Oscar bait before it was cool, but at the end of the day, it’s still a very dull movie that feels dreary and a bit whatever. Its age is not being taken into account as a mitigating factor or anything, because ahead-of-its-time Oscar bait is still Oscar bait, and when an Oscar bait movie exceeds three hours in length – and is dull for that entire runtime – it’s more than worthy of a bit of a critical spanking, so to speak.
Some long movies don’t feel too long, but then there’s The Great Ziegfeld, where you don’t just feel every minute, but for every minute that’s actually there, you feel another one or two. Calling this biographical film about Florenz Ziegfeld tedious would be a ridiculous understatement, and even if you find yourself wanting to watch every Best Picture winner in Oscar history (yes, this did win Best Picture), you should still probably think about skipping this particular one.
1
‘Back to Black’ (2024)
As was the case with Moonage Daydream (the documentary) versus Stardust (the biopic), you should prioritize watching the excellent documentary Amy before you even think about trying to slog through Back to Black. Amy is exceptional, emotional, nuanced, and thought-provoking, as a portrait into the tragically short life of Amy Winehouse, while Back to Black misses from start to finish, failing to honor the artist and also falling short as an exploration of difficult – but important – stuff thematically.
And doing an Amy Winehouse biopic would be hard, for sure, but maybe some things just aren’t worth doing, even if filmmakers want to challenge themselves. This one could only go so far, in a best-case scenario, and Back to Black was far from the best-case scenario, instead feeling like one of the absolute worst movies of 2024, and a textbook example of how not to do a biopic about an influential yet troubled figure.