The Worst Comedies Around

[Oscar]

I think comedy is just very tough to do well, requiring natural talent akin to being an NFL quarterback. Unless you're one of the rare geniuses, might as well forget it. The problem is, as usual, greed. Hollywood sees a fast buck to be made and makes it. They churn out more and more brainless offal which substitutes sex and potty jokes for real talent. It's pretty sad that this seems to still turn a profit. For those who are young enough to have missed them, go watch any of the Peter Sellers Pink Panther movies if you want some real belly laughs. He really was a genius.

[The Gravekeeper]

I'm gonna have to say that Sturgeon's Law is very much alive for comedies (90% of anything is crap, after all). I'll be the first to admit that I'm just not as easily amused by jokes as most people are (heck, my sister still believes that I don't have a sense of humour), but I'm still quite capable of recognizing what's supposed to be a joke in a movie and deciding whether or not it was actually a decent joke or just flat-out weak. Unfortunately, most movies rely on predictable, incredibly easy jokes. I'm sorry, but if I can see the punchline coming a mile off or I've heard the joke a million times before, I won't laugh.

Quite a few movies also seem to be completely unaware of one of something of a rule of comedy: the difference between comedy and tragedy is that the audience has little to no sympathy for the victim. If you're doing a slapstick where bad things keep happening to someone, you may come off as pointlessly cruel if your main character is a nice (or at least decent) person.

I also can't stand most comedies that try to have a moral. Case in point: Shallow Hal.

[AndyC]

The thing I've always hated is that belief that no matter what kind of comedy you're making, it needs a serious subplot. That has ruined more than a few movies for me. The perpetually immature hero is forced to grow up, some tragedy forces the wisecracker to be serious for once. You need some conflict and some character development, but if I just want to see some comedian doing his schtick in a movie made as a vehicle for him to do his schtick, I don't want the movie to deflate three quarters of the way through, so his character can do some soul-searching before resuming the comedy.

Not that a comedy can't have a little more weighty subject matter, but it should be appropriate to the style of comedy and the people doing it.

[ChaosTheory]

The serious subplot/moral dilemma gets used waaaayyyy too much in comedy.  The Jud Apatow flicks, while far from the worst, are especially guilty of this.  Sometimes it can enhance the humor just by presenting a contrast (i.e, Raising Arizona, Big Lebowski, In Bruges); or if it's really well done and actually relates to the main story (i.e. Galaxy Quest, When Harry Met Sallyl).  But it usually isn't. 
Most grating example I've ever seen?  A little nothing of a movie called LIFE OF THE PARTY.  The basic narrative: Alcoholism isn't a serious problem; oh, wait, yeah it is.
I really hated the SEX & THE CITY movie.  Took everything I enjoyed about the show and just hurled it out the window.  And the second one looks even worse.

[lester1/2jr]

not to be a pretentious bastard but it's liek ALL movies are bad comedies now! ever since Scream

[diamondwaspvenom]

The Scary Movie series deserves to be named among, not only as one of the worst comedies, but also as one of the worst franchises. Stupid, immature toilet humer with crude sex jokes and random violence DO NOT make a movie funny. The writers should be condemned for creating such stupidity.

[retrorussell]

I thought "Disorderlies" starring the Fat Boys was pretty dire.

[bionica]

I walked out of one of the scary movies and i have only walked out of a theater twice (the other was "little women")

the scary movie franchise is horrible and so are any of those spoof movies, like superhero movie also. i keep thinking based on the preview that it might be funny and each time i feel like i have wasted my time

the last seth rogan movie "observe and report" annoyed me. there were hardly any jokes and the movie was about mall cops! the mall is so much fodder for comedy. i came up with a bunch of jokes while watching it, and normally seth rogan is somewhat funny

"stepbrothers" wasn't funny either and normally will ferrel is

and i haven't seen it but i imagine "patch adams" or any other movie focusing on robin williams' antics leave an unfunny taste in the mouth

[Flu-Bird]

WALK LIKE A MAN a dreadful JUNGLE BOOK rip-off,TOYS a stupid antiwar toy peice of junk,HYSTERICAL, the HUDSON BROTHERS lame movie,THE FISH THAT SAVE PITTSBURG a waste of the talents of JONATHAN WINTERS,WON TON TON a dog of a movie,and ISHTAR consittred to be the all time worse movie ever made

[Ozzymandias]

Ozzymandias speaks: Has anyone mentioned Surgikill? Andy Milligan's attempt at a hospital comedy. There is a compilation of clips from it on You Tube. Ugh.

Ozzymandias has spoken!!!

[Pilgermann]

The worst ones are the horribly cliched wacky RomComs that Hollywood cranks out on a regular basis. My wife and mother-in-law forced me into watching The Ugly Truth the other night. Or how about What Happens in Vegas? Or 27 Dresses? Katherine Heigl, with the exception of Knocked Up, seems destined for a career of these awful abortions. Between these types of movies and CGI-driven hack remakes, I can't figure out which I hate more.

Oh crap, I'd like to add Failure to Launch.  An unbelievably terrible film that may cause brain damage.  I try to find some good in everything though, and that movie at least had the lovely Zooey Deschanel in an entertaining role:

[AndyC]

the scary movie franchise is horrible and so are any of those spoof movies, like superhero movie also. i keep thinking based on the preview that it might be funny and each time i feel like i have wasted my time

I actually didn't mind Scary Movie 4. I think that was because David Zucker, of Airplane!, Top Secret, and The Naked Gun movies, was at the helm. Really, the Zuckers and Jim Abrahams are pretty much the only people who have made good movies in that style of comedy, although they've each been responsible for their share of atrocities as well. The Wayans family had one good parody - I'm Gonna Git You Sucka. I can't say anything else they've done on the big screen has impressed me.