Before the Razzies, before the Golden Turkey Awards, there was The Harvard Lampoon worst movies of the year. This page will look at all the movies they picked from 1939 to 1949. You will find many movies that starred Hollywood legends. Clark Gable has five movies on this table. Bette Davis has two movies. One of my all-time favorites, Cary Grant, has two movies and Flora and Steve’s Alfred Hitchcock has two movies. Are these movies really bad? That is for you to decide.
Some quick things to know before scanning through these movies. (1) They did not have a list for 1942, 1943 or 1947. (2) Sadly, we were not able to find box office grosses on all of their picks. (3) So you will not find the following movies: Five Little Peppers, Bad Little Angel, 20,000 Men A Year and Uncle Harry.
Harvard Lampoon’s Worst Movies 1939 to 1949 Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.
Harvard Lampoon’s Worst Movies 1939 to 1949 Can Be Ranked 6 Ways In This Table
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies any way you want.
- Sort Harvard Lampoon’s Worst movies by the stars of the movie
- Sort Harvard Lampoon’s Worst movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort Harvard Lampoon’s Worst movies by yearly domestic box office rank
- Sort Harvard Lampoon’s Worst movies by how they were received by critics and audiences. 60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie.
- Sort by how many Oscar® nominations and how many Oscar® wins each Harvard Lampoon’s Worst movie received.
- Sort Harvard Lampoon’s Worst movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score. UMR puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
Harvard Lampoon’s Worst Movies Adjusted World Wide Box Office Grosses
I have seen most of those films above and outside of Winter Meeting the rest at their worst are okay.
I used to and still love to read bad reviews of films. I bought the 50 Worst Films of All Time book when it came out. I bought their 2 follow-up books on the subject. I went to 7 films at the worst films off all time festival that Michael Medved and his brother hosted. I remember seeing Robot Monster, Plan 9 from Outer Space and White Pongo There. I don’t remember the other 4.
A few other selected winners from those Harvard Lampoon awards for those years you covered.
Worst Actor
1939 Tyrone Power The Rains Came
1945 Van Johnson The Thrill of Romance
1946 Orson Welles The Stranger
1948 Burt Lancaster I Walk Alone
1949 Gregory Peck The Great Sinner
Honorable mention was Gregory Peck in anything
Worst Actress
1939 Norma Shearer Idiot’s Delight
1941 Betty Grable Listed as worst performance overall. No film listed
1945 June Allyson Her Highness and the Bellboy
1946 Alexis Smith Night and Day
1948 Lana Turner The Three Musketeers
Shirley Temple (2 actresses listed) Fort Apache
1949 Shirley Temple Mr. Belvedere Goes to College
They actually gave out the worst supporting actors in 1946
Actor Andy Devine Canyon Passage
Actress Linda Darnell Anna and the King of Siam
Other interesting awards they gave in that time frame.
1939 Most Consistently Bad Performances Dorothy Lamour / Don Ameche
Most Colossal Flop The Wizard of Oz
1941 Worst Discovery Veronica Lake
Most Unattractive Actress Jeanette Macdonald
Fastest on the Downward Pass Alice Faye and Nelson Eddy
1944 Worst Discovery Maria Montez, also Frank Sinatra and/or Van Johnson.
Most in Need of Retirement Paul Muni
Fastest on the Downward Pass Don Ameche
Most Unattractive Andrews Sisters in anything but a total blackout.
1945 Oldest Actress of the Year Joan Crawford (honorable mention – Joan Bennett)
1946 Most Miscast – Female Ginny Simms as Ethel Merman in Night and Day
Worst Juvenile Performance Jane Powell in Holiday in Mexico
1948 Worst Duo Dennis Morgan and Jack Carson (alone, together, in any combination)
Worst Reincarnation Jeanette MacDonald in Three Daring Daughters
Due for a Pension Deanna Durbin
Career up in Smoke Robert Mitchum (Wasn’t he busted at this time for pot?)
1949 Special Award for Worst Film of the Century Joan of Arc
Most Sickening Combination Claude Jarman Jr. & Lassie
Least Deserving but Most Due for a Pension Barry Fitzgerald
Also Overdue for Retirement Margaret O’Brien
Did you know Roger Ebert gave over 60 films 0 stars?
Some of my worst films of the 30’s and 40’s era are;
AND BABY MAKES THREE 1949
BEDTIME STORY 1941
BEYOND THE FOREST 1949
BLACK DRAGONS 1942
CAPTURED IN CHINATOWN 1935
CHINATOWN AFTER DARK 1931
DAUGHTER OF THE TONG 1939 (there seems to be an unfortunate trend her)
ELIZABETH OF LADYMEAD (U.K.) 1948
FARMER IN THE DELL 1936
FATHER’S SON 1941
GEORGE WASHINGTON SLEPT HERE 1942
GREAT MOMENT 1944
GREEKS HAD A WORD FOR THEM 1932
MORE THAN A SECRETARY 1936
WRONG DIRECTION (SHORT) 1934
YOU BELONG TO ME 1941
I have seen 47 films on this list. The lowest on this list I have seen i number 60 – Of Human Bondage.
I think this list is ridiculous. Although not all of these movies are great, I would not say that ANY of the films I have seen are the worst movies.
Take for instance the two Hitchcock movies on the table, since you point out that Steve and I love his films. Spellbound is a classic. The Paradine Case is, I admit, okay. But the list misses Under Capricorn starring Bergman and Cotten. That was a belabored movie that is hard to sit through.
and of course, the fact that the top 57 movies of a list of 76 movies get a UMR rating of 80 or higher shows that the authors of the list are either biased, or that in these years the films are so excellent , good films are considered bad in a comparison
For me, what this list gives is some titles for me to seek out if possible.