(Credits: Far Out)
Sat 10 January 2026 13:30, UK
The concept of guilty pleasure movies sounds antithetical to cinema, since you’re not supposed to be embarrassed for liking something. No director sets out to make a bad film on purpose, but many of them do, and sometimes, audiences are too embarrassed to admit that they don’t think it’s all that bad.
Everyone has at least one or two guilty pleasures that they know in their heart of hearts is a truly, utterly, and undeniably awful piece of work, but they can’t help themselves from giving it a regular rewatch. It’s OK to love them, even if more people should proudly wear the shit flicks they love as a badge of honour.
There are countless pictures that deserve the accolade, but how does one separate the wheat from the chaff and determine one of the most oxymoronic accolades of all: which bad movie that viewers are ashamed to admit their undying adulation for can be called the pinnacle of delightful trash?
Naturally, science has the answer, and it’s a simple one. All it needed to do was canvas as many people as possible, get them to anonymously submit their answers, and then have the boffins sort through the recommendations, crunch the numbers, and determine a top ten of endearingly irredeemable nonsense.
Remarkably, Ed Wood’s Plan 9 from Outer Space could only conjure the tenth and final spot. It’s one of the worst movies in the history of cinema, but that’s precisely why it’s become such a cult staple, with Ed Wood’s tangible lack of any noticeable talent or aptitude for filmmaking turning it into a riotous watch.
What the fuck is American Hot Babes, you may ask? Well, if you’re American, it’s Deep in the Valley, a risible 2009 rom-com that features Chris Pratt in the leading role. It’s a deep cut, but a lot of people must like it, if it was good, or bad, enough to be ranked as cinema’s ninth-best guilty pleasure.
Quentin Tarantino would no doubt be fuming to discover that Planet Terror was fifth, given how fragile he’s often revealed his ego to be, even if he’s acknowledged that it isn’t his finest work. Still, at least it managed to place ahead of Carry on Cleo, the Paris Hilton-starring House of Wax remake, and Aeon Flux, the picture that almost killed Charlize Theron.
Getting down to the nitty-gritty, it’s a most welcome sight to see that enthusiasts of actively bad cinema haven’t forgotten about Tango & Cash, even if it doesn’t deserve to be placed below Swordfish, which is memorable only for its opening scene, John Travolta’s ludicrous goatee, and Halle Berry demanding an extra $500,000 to film a topless scene, never mind the fact that Troy was named runner-up.
As Highlander would say, there can be only one, and according to science, the greatest guilty pleasure movie of all time is Andrew Bergman’s Striptease. You know what? That’s not a bad shout. Yes, it’s crap, won six Razzies, and derailed Demi Moore’s career, but the preposterous erotic caper is one of those onscreen trainwrecks that you simply can’t tear your eyes away from.
The 10 greatest guilty pleasures, according to science:Plan 9 from Outer Space (Ed Wood, 1958)American Hot Babes (Christian Forte, 2009)Aeon Flux (Karyn Kusama, 2005)House of Wax (Jaume Collet-Serra, 2005)Carry on Cleo (Gerald Thomas, 1964)Planet Terror (Quentin Tarantino, 2007)Tango & Cash (Andrei Konchalovsky, 1989)Swordfish (Dominic Senna, 2001)Troy (Wolfgang Petersen, 2004)Striptease (Andrew Bregman, 1996)
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