Ten Wonderfully Bad Car Movies
There are some car movies out there that are so bad, they circle around the globe like Superman and somehow become good. Or at least become so bad they're fun to watch. Here are the movies our readers thought were awful but we secretly enjoy.
Welcome back to Answers of the Day — our Jalopnik summer feature where we take the best ten responses from the previous day's Question of the Day and shine it up to show off. It's by you and for you, the Jalopnik readers. Enjoy!
10.) Taxi
Suggested By: SennaMP4
Why It's So Bad: Incompetent New York City cop Jimmy Fallon has crashed too many cop cars while on patrol! His boss took his license, but left him his badge, so now he's a police officer without a ride. When he gets the call for a big bank robbery downtown, he's forced to hop in the nearest cab. Luckily, that taxi is driven by the exuberant and sassy Queen Latifah. Hijinks ensue. Her cab transforms into some sort of street racer. She has the driving skills of a professional Hollywood stunt driver!
Photo credit: YouTube
9.) Rubber
Suggested By: Jackie's honeymoon headcold
Why It's So Bad: Rubber tells the story of a telekinetic, sentient tire that has the power to kill people and animals with its "mind." It goes on a killing spree, terrorizing a small town in the middle of nowhere. The creature feels no remorse (don't forget, it's just a tire) and kills indiscriminately. I don't know what happens, but I assume Tire Rack doesn't offer refunds for this kind of thing.
Photo credit: YouTube
8.) Asphalt Wars
Suggested By: Edvinas Baltruaitis
Why It's So Bad: The first 30 seconds of Asphalt Wars's trailer looks promising. You can feel the artistic tension. "Take me seriously!" It seems to cry out: " I am a modern tale of class struggle about a guy just trying to get by and do the right thing! I'm ultimately uplifting!" But it's just an illusion. Sped-up footage of factory-stock Civic sedans and super-dangerous hay bales falling off of the back of trucks dash all hopes for an enjoyable, inspiring cinematic parable.
Photo credit: YouTube
7.) 2 Fast 2 Furious
Suggested By: frogberg
Why It's So Bad: I'm gonna come clean right now: I kind of enjoyed the first The Fast and the Furious. I thought it was exciting and fun, brightly colored, flashy — it had the proper ratio of bad dialogue to car chases. That all got thrown out the window in its sequel, the appropriately named, 2 Fast 2 Furious. Paul Walker returns as a cop on the run, this time in Miami. Vin Diesel, smart man that he is, got out before this movie was made. The same shenanigans follow: street races, drug money, gangsters, brightly-colored imported cars, and people who take themselves far too seriously for a movie with two too many twos in the title.
Photo credit: YouTube
6.) Corvette Summer
Suggested By: Irishman
Why It's So Bad: When one of the first lines in the trailer is "...Who's back from Star Wars" things are not looking good. I guess Mark Hamill needed something mindless to do in-between stints as Luke Skywalker, but he should have done anything but this. If everyone knew as much about anything the voiceover guy won't shut up about, they never would have agreed to get involved in this travesty. And plus, custom jobs like this looked cool for about six minutes in the mid-1970s. Corvette Summer arrived during minute eight.
Photo credit: YouTube
5.) Drive Angry
Suggested By: Captain Morgan
Why It's So Bad: Someone has made Nick Cage's zombie self very, very angry. So angry, he's driving. But don't worry about the plot — so simple a monkey could have written it — look at this explosion! And this car crash! And check it out, Nick's got a weird gun! And there's a guy in a suit who's creepy! Now the movie's over, and it doesn't matter if you knew what was happening, because all the cool stuff happened in the meantime.
Photo credit: YouTube
4.) Six Pack
Suggested By: Tonyola
Why It's So Bad: Six Pack, the story of a Nascar driver (Kenny Rogers) whose parts get stolen by a mischievous pack of six orphans (including a possibly age-of-consent Diane Lane) who he then rescues and in turn bail him out of jail, holds the distinction of being the only movie on today's list that is so bad, no one put its trailer up on YouTube. So now, try to enjoy the first six minutes of Six Pack.
Photo credit: YouTube
3.) 200 MPH
Suggested By: BANned72
Why It's So Bad: Everyone loves watching street racing, right? As if the majority of the Fast and Furious franchise wasn't bad enough, now we get to suffer lower-budget knockoffs. At least these guys sprang for a helicopter and cars with rims, though. If you like soulless acting, not-particularly-special cars, strippers, and explosions, then 200 MPH might be for you. Otherwise, go outside and read a book.
Photo credit: YouTube
2.) Redline
Suggested By: E34IsAnUnderratedE30..ExceptBetter
Why It's So Bad: This is the movie that helped catapult Eddie Griffin into Jalopnik stardom. His escapades behind the wheel of a Ferrari Enzo during the production of this travesty meant that his was a name no one here would ever forget. But what about the movie? Well, it's about a number of high-stakes street races in cars that are cooler than tarted-up Hondas and Toyotas. There's a boatload of money, four platinum bars, and a human life at stake in various parts of the movie. Just remember: when the stakes are this high, it's not whether you win or lose. It's how long you can survive. Watching this movie.
Photo credit: YouTube
1.) Driven
Suggested By: JVal14
Why It's So Bad: When there's no dialogue at all in a trailer, it can't be a good sign. When there's footage of Sylvester Stallone driving a Champ car on the street, in traffic, with no helmet on, it's definitely not a good sign. Sly initially wanted to base this joke of a movie on Formula 1, but allegedly couldn't get enough information out of the teams to make it happen. I'm really okay with that. What resulted was a convoluted, contrived shambles of a movie that made only $32 million against its $72 million budget.
Photo credit: YouTube