Worst 80's Film That's Become a Cult Classic

Corwin

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There's been a lot of traffic suggesting the best 80's film, but how about the worst? To add a little spice to the question though, I want one which for some weird reason, or another, has become something of a cult classic!! Let me begin with my nomination and I defy you to not hear the title song echoing in your brain: Flash Gordon!! :p :D
 
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In my book: one of those Gremlins-wannabe s*ts, like:
Critters, Ghoulies, Troll
Excellent for drinking games: down the hatch when someone screams in terror!

On a more educated level:
Flashdance
An amazingly bad movie, with an amazingly good soundtrack, catching the amazingly crazy 80s zeitgeist.
 
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Flash Gordan was the greatest Sci-Fi movie ever made. Haven't you watched Ted? Man, you are old and senile ;) just kidding.

I never could get thru Footloose.
 
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There is only one Cult Classic for me, evvah.
It is from 1975, but I never saw it then. First time I saw it was twenty years later, I think. Never considered it to be an awful movie though, I thought it was marvellous from the very first time I watched it, and I have done so many times.

 
He's asking about worst cult classic, not about best ones. ;)
I mean guys, those movies mentioned (Rocky Horror excluded, it's not 80s) are not the worst ones at all, and those worst are not cult classics. Sure some of those bad ones were all superpopular at time of release, that doesn't make them cult classic - who would want to watch them today? :p

My pick would be Lady Terminator.
 
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Well, joxer, Corwin’s question is rather impossible. I mean, the worst 80’s movies, that were considered bad at the time of release... are still worth throwing in the trash can!
And your pick is even so bad I am sure it never got out of there, it was made in a trash can. ;)
A cult classic has to be at least a movie that I am willing to pick out of the bin without being scared of getting tainted with... eww, yuck. :)
 
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Too many to even mention. I've been really into youtube shows like Red Letter Media https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrTNhL_yO3tPTdQ5XgmmWjA and Good Bad or Bad Bad https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5n61wxikQ22tTpzyFT4ORg
highly entertaining if you're into bad movies (not all the movies they review are from the 80's though, but many).

I liked Flash Gordon and i even liked Howard the Duck :D There was just so little to choose from if you wanted e.g fantasy or sci-fi. These two movies might be bad but in comparison to what else there was - then they were actually quite decent!
 
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Its hard not to like all these campy movies. There are so many B movies produced in the 80's because VHS and rental stores demanded PRODUCT and as long as the cover looked good you could pretty much rent out anything :)

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I used to buy Variety back in the day because it was basically the equivalent of "comingsoon.net". Full of pre-production posters. The campiest producers back then included Empire International Pictures which had a great run in the 80's with Ghoulies and the Reanimator.

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Redneck Zombies -1989. TROMA DVD.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093833/
In the back-woods of America live a very special kind of people. Friendly, decent, hard-working dirt farmers. When they accidentally drink a barrel of nuclear waste they turn into tobacco chewing, flesh eating, cannibal kinfolk from hell. Meanwhile, seven sophisticated city slickers on vacation get lost in the woods and encounter a nightmare world of these illiterate, and extremely insensitive, undead. While the tourists hikers use all their wits and courage to stay alive, more and more "down-home" types imbibe the nasty brew until Redneck Zombies are everywhere. What started as a scenic nature-hike turns into a bloodbath of dismemberment and cannibalism.
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For all you DnD geeks (like me) Empire also made this gem (aka turd) in 1984. Its been years since I've seen it I'm going to have to find it now!

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The answer to this question is easy.

The Thing (1982) Dir. John Carpenter. Star. Kurt Russel.

You literally cannot move for people saying how much they love this movie today, there are die hards out there that will put out a contract on your favourite pet if you so much as indicate you were slightly bored by it. It has an 8.1 rating on IMDB, supposedly putting it up there with the gratest movies ever made.

When it was released?

It charted at just 8th upon it's opening weekend, stayed at no.8 the following weekend, dropped to 9th the next, then drifted out the charts.

It had to have last minute desperate reworks because everything was going wrong in the pre-screenings:

After one market research screening, Carpenter queried the audience on their thoughts, and one audience member asked, "Well what happened in the very end? Which one was the Thing…?" When Carpenter responded that it was up to their imagination, the audience member responded, "Oh, God. I hate that."

The critics pretty much hated it & it got a widespread panning for all the right reasons: it was boring, it was cold (emotionally), it was a bit late to the space monster party, etc etc.

It even got nominated for a razzie for it's musical score.

It temporarily ruined John Carpenter's career:

The impact on Carpenter was immediate—he lost the job of directing the 1984 science fiction horror film Firestarter because of The Thing's poor performance.[88] His previous success had gained him a multiple-film contract at Universal, but the studio opted to buy him out of it instead.[89] He continued making films afterward but lost confidence, and did not openly talk about The Thing's failure until a 1985 interview

I also remember it as being a nothing much of a film beyond some interesting special effects at the time & it was never something that flew off the shelves at video shops. And yet, at some point, who knows where and who knows why and who knows when it started, but an extremely aggressive cult now surrounds the movie with the kind of passion one would expect of a religious zealot.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 
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I see no one mentioned Little Shop of Horrors.



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My pick for cult classic would have to be Withnail & I (1987)
"In 1969, two substance-abusing, unemployed actors retreat to the countryside for a holiday that proves disastrous."

@ToddMcF2002; Reanimator is awesome! That's one of my favourite horrors along with Braindead (aka Dead Alive (1992)), Hellraiser 2 (1988) and From Beyond (1986), which features the same scream queen, Barbara Crampton. :D
 
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My pick for cult classic would have to be Withnail & I (1987)
"In 1969, two substance-abusing, unemployed actors retreat to the countryside for a holiday that proves disastrous."

Not sure what Withnail & I has to do with worst movies of the 80's though, it's quite far from being a B-movie, it's a critically acclaimed movie, it has a 5/5 rating from even the pickiest reviewers out there. Cult classic i might agree with but it's not "worst 80's movie that became a cult classic".

Samurai Cop would be my choice, that is a truly horrible movie which became a true cult classic because of how terrible it was, but terrible in a way that also makes it funny and therefore not unbearable to watch.
 
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The Thing is one of the greatest movies ever made. The audience didn't like it because it was light years ahead of it's time. What's the name of your pet? I will be over soon. ;)
 
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The Thing is an excellent movie and isn’t really cult at all. The recent prequel is based off the 1982 film not the 50’s one. Critics couldn’t handle the gore. Even Siskel and Ebert panned it for gore. Bunch of babies.
 
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My pick for cult classic would have to be Withnail & I (1987)
"In 1969, two substance-abusing, unemployed actors retreat to the countryside for a holiday that proves disastrous."

@ToddMcF2002; Reanimator is awesome! That's one of my favourite horrors along with Braindead (aka Dead Alive (1992)), Hellraiser 2 (1988) and From Beyond (1986), which features the same scream queen, Barbara Crampton. :D

Yup Reanimator! My brother uses the name H_west online. Even I didn't get it at first. We grew up watching this kind of stuff. It didn't make the cut because it was pre-1980 and missed it by a year but we can't forget Phantasm. An amazing movie with the ultimate cheesy scene fighting with the "monster" in his denim shirt :biggrin:

 
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