Razzies Create Special Category to Dunk on Bruce Willis

Forget the Oscars, the real fun is the day the Razzies get announced.

The Razzies, or the Golden Raspberry Awards, started 41 years ago as a way to “honor” the worst films and performances of the year. They tout themselves as a “counterbalance to the Oscars,” and overall they’re a fun, humbling way to troll Hollywood.

While there aren’t a lot of surprises on this year’s list, which was released on Sunday, purposely just two days before Oscars nominations are announced, it looks like 2021 wasn’t a great year if you liked Diana: The Musical, Karen, The Woman in the Window, Space Jam: A New Legacy or Infinite, which are all up for Worst Picture.

Although it wasn’t a great year for the likes of Amy Adams — who got dinged both for Woman and Dear Evan Hansen in the acting categories — it was a particularly rough time for Bruce Willis. The Razzies actually created a separate category (Worst Performance by Bruce Willis in a 2021 Movie) so they could nominate all eight of the action star’s straight-to-video (or straight-to-streaming) releases.

Willis has increasingly moved his talents to lackluster, boring and downright terrible films that never have a chance to reach theaters and that all seem to employ the same poster designer (the art usually featuring Willis plus one or two other forgotten stars of eras past over vague backdrops suggesting location and/or plot). He currently has 12 films completed, in post-production or announced for this year and next that seem to follow the same terrible pattern. Please, get this man a new Die Hard (maybe Christmas-themed?) or a Netflix show (maybe Christmas-themed?).

This really could be any Bruce Willis film from the past year (also, there are two sequels coming)

There’s been plenty of discussion as to why Willis subjects himself to awful film roles that even he doesn’t seem to enjoy. “These films, as disposable as they may be, have become a profitable safe harbor for actors of a certain age that exists on the quiet fringes of the 21^st-century Hollywood ecosystem,” as Esquire wrote back in 2020. “A place where the offers never dry up, the checks always clear, and the films’ obscurity doesn’t mortally damage the star’s career too badly before the next big studio offer or interesting indie can land on their agent’s desk.” But unless Willis has alienated everyone in Hollywood, it’s hard to understand why the actor can’t still appear in good movies now and again; in the past decade, he’s done solid to excellent work in everything from Looper to Motherless Brooklyn.

Voting Razzie Members (1,128 voters from 49 states and over two dozen foreign countries) cast their 2021 ballots online, selecting five top contenders in each of nine categories. This year’s “winners” will be unveiled on Oscar Eve, Saturday, March 26.