The 20 Most Unintentionally Funniest Movies of All Time
Comedy is subjective, and it is almost impossible to categorically reject someone else’s taste. Unintentional comedy, though? It’s universal. Let’s face it: from the rudest of us to the most outwardly noble, we all love a fiasco as long as we’re on the right path.
Jokes that are meant to be jokes fail at least as often as they succeed, but nothing produces more consistent laughter than a failed attempt at being serious. This is because we are all terrible people who enjoy the misfortunes of people who are not us. You might as well accept it and enjoy a series of films that each tried their best, God bless them. Having failed, they have all succeeded in ways their creators could never have imagined. Here are 20 of the most unintentionally funny movies that you should definitely watch, but only with the right attitude.
Battlefield Earth (2000)
Director Roger Christian won an Oscar for his art direction on the original Star Wars, but he only won a Golden Raspberry for his work on John Travolta’s $50 million Church of Scientology fundraiser. In the year 3000, the Earth is ruled by the Psychlos, aliens who look like humans but have very tall heads . It’s poorly acted, cheap looking and ugly, with a color palette ranging from dirty brown to urine yellow. But hey, at least the plot is incoherent! With that said, if you can’t laugh at John Travolta and Forest Whittaker arguing about the fate of humanity while wearing giant drag queen wigs, you have no sense of fun.
Where to stream: Vicks
Wild Mountain Thyme (2020)
Christopher Walken’s terrible Irish accent alone would have earned this film a place, and Emily Blunt and Jamie Dornan also tried very hard and achieved little in the way of authenticity. The rom-com’s plot is, for the most part, no different: it’s about two people on neighboring farms who stay there for no particular good reason until they get together… also for no particular good reason. It’s all pretty corny, but you definitely have a reason to stay, and it’s a completely unexpected, completely ridiculous, magical ending.
Where to watch: Hulu
Fifty Shades of Gray (2015)
Speaking of Jamie Dornan! The weird, BDSM-lite (very lite) cultural phenomenon that was Fifty Shades hit the screen with Dornan and Dakota Johnson, exploring a couple designed to scandalize and excite, even though it never feels like they are in the same movie. He’s angry and cocky every minute, while she’s timid and quirky, all the time looking like she should be on the set of a rom-com next door. Except this movie won’t have her talking like, “What are butt plugs?” As if the definition isn’t in the title!
Where to stream: Max
Batman and Robin (1997)
Joel Schumacher was certainly aware of the campy, weird and idiosyncratic film he was making here, but his goal was to combine superhero thrills with comedy. On the contrary, almost everything is funny, except when it tries to be. There are no real “jokes” about chicks digging up a car and Batman’s credit card, but the Batsuits with visible nipples and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s moans generate plenty of derisive laughs.
Where to watch: Max, Prime Video
Incident (2008)
There’s a deliberate B-movie charm to this M. Night Shyamalan film, although the twist reveal is the worst of the writer/director’s career, but I also don’t believe it’s as intentional as some of its defenders claim. Of course, the film’s extreme seriousness about its subject (a mysterious suicide epidemic) makes it, at least at times, a real howler. For example, the scene where the terrorist lions slowly eat the zookeeper was meant to be shocking, but most of the time it just seems silly. And judging by his other films, Shyamalan doesn’t seem like a funny dude to me.
Where to watch: digital rental.
Troll 2 (1990)
For starters, this isn’t really a sequel and there are no real trolls in it, and we’ve already inadvertently found ourselves in funny territory. The film, directed and written by Claudio Fragasso, adapts the story of his wife Rosella Drudi, who wanted to make a serious artistic statement about how disgusting vegetarians are: the goblins here force their victims to eat food that turns them into a kind of vegetable paste, which is absolutely what it did would be a vegetarian. During filming, the actors spoke mostly English and the crew mostly spoke only Italian, making it difficult to make a serious horror film. One that includes a scene where a kid saves the day by peeing on the dinner table.
Where to stream: Tubi, Hoopla, Kanopy.
Roadhouse (1989)
Road House sits somewhere between Dirty Dancing and Spooks in Patrick Swayze’s career, making the excellent, inexpensive mix of action and romantic drama all the more enjoyable. When Bouncer Swayze isn’t involved in love scenes with Kelly Lynch, Bouncer Swayze battles Ben Gazzara for control of the titular dive bar… for some reason. With rambling macho dialogue (what does “dig a hole” even mean? How about “pain doesn’t hurt”?), but for kicks our hero rips the windpipe out of another dude’s throat. Funnier than it looks.
Where to stream: Max
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Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2010)
The first 40 minutes of director James Nguyen’s film are spent introducing a pair of characters who don’t have enough depth or backstory to justify the running time. Rod is a business type guy who is great at making PowerPoint presentations. Natalie is a successful fashion model who conducts high-end photo shoots in repurposed closets. When we finally get to the action with the birds, we see scenes of flying predators killing by hovering aimlessly before their victims while we are encouraged to imagine them tearing and cutting. This is all before we know that they are doing this because fossil fuels suck. Which is true. This may all sound like intentional comedy, but Nguyen had serious intentions, and was inspired by both Hitchcock’s The Birds and Al Gore’s documentary An Inconvenient Truth … a concoction you didn’t even know you needed. Its intentionally satirical sequel isn’t nearly as funny as this one.
Where to watch: Peacock, Tubi, Freevee, Redbox, Plex
Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002)
Hayden Christensen, a fairly talented actor in almost every other way, is humiliated by the second Star Wars prequel. We should have found a heartbreaking, tragic story for Anakin Skywalker, but instead we’re hoping for an appearance by James Earl Jones so we can move past the whiny, irritable phase of Darth Vader’s future. If there’s anything funnier in the saga than a young Jedi’s mindless and uninvited musings about sand, I didn’t find it.
Where to watch: Disney+.
Mommy Dearest (1981)
Look, I know this movie started a national conversation about child abuse… but there’s no universe in which a woman in a collagen mask freaking out over metal hangers isn’t something to scream about. Faye Dunaway achieves delightful effect.
Where to stream: Max
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)
The title is all over the place, with an acronym usually referring to court cases and a colon leading to a hint at the next film in the series. Highlights include a dramatic moment in which Lex Luthor’s peepee turns on, Batman suddenly develops dream powers that allow him to glimpse scenes from the upcoming sequels, and the film’s titular conflict resolves itself when the heroes remember that their moms wear the same thing same name.
Where to watch: Max, Prime Video
Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957)
As depicted in Tim Burton’s Oscar-winning biopic, B-movie director Ed Wood had enormous energy, confidence and very little self-awareness—a winning combination in this case. There’s just a hint of plot in this patently bad sci-fi story about aliens invading Earth and raising the dead, but we’re not here for the plot. Enter wrestler Thor Johnson, horror host Vampire, and the legendary Bela Lugosi… something like that. Lugosi died during filming, so we see Wood’s chiropractor stand in for him, waving his cape for no good reason and in scenes that could take place in broad daylight, the middle of the night, or both. Treasure, that’s all.
Where to watch: Tubi, Freevee, Plex, Pluto, Mubi, Hoopla, The Roku Channel.
Mac and Me (1988)
The plot here is pretty much just Alien (“MAC” in the film refers to “Mysterious Alien Creature”), but with a much smaller budget and more honed commercial instincts. Because Mac is also a reference to the Big Mac, just like the hamburger from main sponsor McDonald’s, a fact we should never forget. The film’s worst/best scene involves an elaborate impromptu dance number at McDonald’s, which includes a cameo from Ronald himself. As Paul Rudd taught us by showing this clip repeatedly on Conan O’Brien’s talk show, there’s even unexpected comedy in the form of an out-of-control wheelchair.
Where to watch: Prime Video, Tubi
The Wicker Man (2006)
The sheer outlandishness of much of what happens in this film has led to much discussion about how intentional its comedy is. Years later, Nicolas Cage, who plays Edward Malus, said yes , but I’m not entirely convinced. “No, not bees! Not bees! (in the scene where Cage’s character is tortured by bees, of course) – This is Nicolas Cage par excellence, and he still lives on as a meme, but my personal favorite moment is when Malus, disguised in a bear costume, punches a cultist performing a ritual . For some reason the film is also dedicated to Johnny Ramone. (I will say this: if the comedy was intentional, then director Neil LaBute wildly miscalculated the public’s interest in a satire about folk horror and human sacrifice.)
Where to watch: digital rental.
Pompeii (2014)
Paul W.S. Anderson (director of some 80 Resident Evil films) ventures into historical epic territory with mixed results (for mercy reasons). Kit Harrington does a fine job of leading, and Keifer Sutherland is much less convincing as the Roman senator; the combination of accents is, frankly, a little distracting. The film has Michael Bay style, with its uneasy combination of CGI set pieces and very serious historical romance, best expressed in the fiery finale (spoiler alert: the city doesn’t survive) when the two lovers are dramatically captured. in lava and immediately turn into statues as the music swells. It’s not, but ok. Certainly.
Where to watch: Netflix
Jaws: The Revenge (1987)
A triumph of Michael Caine’s glorious all-for-a-paycheck era, the actor joked about the film: “I’ve never seen it, but apparently it’s terrible. However, I’ve seen the house he built, and it’s amazing!” The long-venerable Jaws franchise certainly reached its zenith here, with the story of a shark coming to Amity to exact revenge on the widow and son of Roy Scheider’s character from the first two films (Martin Brody died off-screen). Ellen Brody decides to move to the Bahamas, because the ocean is clearly not enough for her at this point. It doesn’t matter: the shark follows her and for some reason even learned to roar like a lion. Don’t be too upset about what you eat characters because there’s a good chance they’ll show up again before the end.If you can forget that this is the sad end of the Jaws series, this is a delightful shark-themed comedy.
Where to watch: Netflix
Serenity (2019)
Matthew McConaughey plays Baker Dill, a fishing boat captain who is trying to find a giant yellowfin he has named “Justice.” Anne Hathaway plays the conniving femme fatale, an ex-wife who hires Dill to throw her current husband off the ship. It’s all very noir-lite and quite retrograde in regards to the female characters, especially Diane Lane’s Constance, who spends the entire film doing nothing but lying in her bungalow waiting for Dill to come so she can pay him for sex. But! And that’s all before we realize that we are not in a noir, but in a science fiction film! As if! Or maybe it’s just a murder thriller? I like a couple of good plot twists, but Serenity has so many of them that the boat quickly heads into shit-infested waters. This is highly entertaining garbage.
Where to watch: digital rental.
Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967)
John Huston directs Marlon Brando and Elizabeth Taylor in the adaptation of Carson McCullers’ book. A prestigious task, isn’t it? Instead, it’s an all-around high-quality melodrama, with a mix of good acting and over-the-top acting that makes the whole thing seem like some kind of fever dream. The above video of the film’s final scene is, of course, a spoiler, but watch it and try not to laugh; he captures the film’s tonal misfires flawlessly. Highlights for introducing queer themes into 1960s Hollywood film, but this was not the way to go.
Where to watch: digital rental.
Lost (1983)
Saturday Night Fever may be remembered for its memorable disco dance sequences, but beyond these moments the film had a gritty 1970s realism – while it came to symbolize the vibrant heyday of ’70s disco, it also tells a fairly down-to-earth story about a young man’s life. coming of age. Its sequel replaces all of this with a series of musical numbers with minimal connective tissue, none of which surpasses anything in the original, and all of which are quite funny. This ill-advised sequel is riddled with a lack of irony or even the slightest bit of ’80s self-awareness, and all the better for it. It’s like that friend you know who desperately wants to make it in theater, even if it’s terrible. It makes you feel a little bad, but sometimes you can’t stop laughing.
Where to watch: Paramount+
Room (2003)
All unintentionally funny roads lead here to Tommy Wiseau’s plotless masterpiece of incoherent dialogue, unintelligible accents, and love scenes that will make you reconsider every idea you ever had that sex was even remotely attractive. If you can figure out why the movie is called “Room”, other than the fact that some scenes actually take place in rooms, please tell me.
Where to stream: I couldn’t resist turning it on, but The Room is unfortunately not streaming anywhere. Grab a YouTube highlight reel and you’ll get the idea.