In many ways, Hollywood had a good year in 2021, with many movies attaining box office and critical success. What’s more, it was also a year that saw a number of genres represented on the big screen, including some of the most powerful and influential franchises currently in Hollywood.
On the flip side of that dynamic, there were also quite a few movies that struggled to attain much appreciation from critics, and there are many that have earned the dubious distinction of being the lowest-rated movies of the year on Rotten Tomatoes.
Dear Evan Hansen (30%)
At first glance, it must have looked like Dear Evan Hansen might join the list of great movie musicals, given how well-received the stage play was. Unfortunately, a number of things worked in its favor, most notably the casting of Ben Platt, who had to be de-aged in order to look appropriate for the part that he was chosen to play. Just as importantly, the movie failed to improve any aspects of the play, and it fell flat and lifeless for many of its harshest critics.
Naked Singularity (26%)
Naked Singularity is another movie that, at first glance, not doubt seemed as if it was a sure bet. It has John Boyega, famous for his success in Star Wars, as well as a plot that seems timely, focusing as it does on a lawyer determined to defeat the system with which he has grown disenchanted. Unfortunately for many critics, it never really seems to engage with its own material, and even the fantastic element of an apocalypse doesn’t do enough to become worthy of what was regarded as a strong performance by Boyega.
The Woman In The Window (26%)
Amy Adams has been in many great movies, and it must have seemed that The Woman in the Window would be another of them. As with many of her more recent efforts, it focuses on a troubled woman who, though she is afraid of going outside, nevertheless spies on her neighbors and bears witness to a crime. Though it includes many strong performances, it never quite rises above the many homages that it makes to similar movies, and so it comes to seem, in many critics’ eyes, as a generic take on the thriller form.
Chaos Walking (21%)
There have been many great science fiction movies that do a great deal with an intriguing premise, and at first it seems like Chaos Walking, with its story about a woman who crash-lands on a planet inhabited only by males, would be one of those. Unfortunately, the movie spends too much time building up its premise and its world and less elaborating on character, the key ingredient in any successful science fiction story.
As a result, it struggled to find the warm critical reception that it might have had it done more to flesh out its central characters.
Die In A Gunfight (17%)
The romance and the crime thriller have, historically, been two of the most successful genres at the box office and, sometimes among critics, but Die in a Gunfight ultimately fails on both generic levels. While its two leads have some amount of chemistry, the critics disliked almost every other aspect of it, including its very obvious cynicism and its action sequences that felt surprisingly cheap for a movie of this caliber. Ultimately, it fails to live up to either the thriller or romantic aspects of its central plot.
Infinite (16%)
Antoine Fuqua is a director with many good movies in his filmography, but unfortunately, Infinite is not one of those. Critics didn’t like it for many reasons, not the least of which was that, despite being a science fiction thriller, it rarely manages to do anything new within the conventions of its own genre. More importantly, it’s a movie that is very full of plot-holes and, while this can work in certain kinds of movies, in this case it robs the movie of whatever bits of logic or internal coherence that it might have actually possessed.
Breaking News In Yuba County (11%)
Like so many of the other critically disliked movies of 2021, Breaking News of Yuba County seems at first blush to be the kind of movie that would earn critical love. Most notably, it features a powerful cast, including the likes of Allison Janney. Also similar to many of the movies of the year, it tries to blend two genres, in this case crime and comedy, with very mixed results.
Unfortunately, it never really finds the tone that it’s looking for, and so it ultimately becomes incoherent.
Habit (6%)
From the beginning, it’s clear that Habit is trying to be a rather updated version of Sister Act, focusing as it does on a group of young people who dress up as nuns to escape a drug lord. Unfortunately, it ultimately becomes a movie that is so obsessed with its own edginess and with its own supposed subversiveness that it feels very derivative. What’s more, it’s also a movie that becomes so obsessed with the fact that it’s making choices that appear in poor taste that it comes to undercut its own purposes.
Vanquish (5%)
There are many reasons why Vanquish would, at first glance, seem like a success, not the least of which is the presence of Morgan Freeman, one of the most respected actors in Hollywood. Unfortunately, even though it is a thriller, it rarely manages to do anything new or unique with the cliches that it uses so frequently. As a result, not even the presence of Freeman can elevate it, which helps to explain why it has such a dismal score from the critics.
Cosmic Sin (3%)
Like Freeman, Bruce Willis has been in many great movies in his time, including many that are science fiction, the genre of Cosmic Sin. This movie, which takes place in a distant time when Mars has been colonized, has all of the pieces that usually comprise a science-fiction epic, but unfortunately it doesn’t do much with them. Most distressingly, Willis seems, despite his usual powerful star presence, doesn’t seem especially interested in the movie, and so it lacks the basic elements that would allow it to be an interesting entry in the genre.