When was the last time you watched a favorite oldie after many years and the first thought in your mind was “Wow, that didn’t age well!”? We are often led to believe that so-called classic movies are flawless — that’s why they are called classics, after all! — but reality shows that some of them don’t really stand the test of time.
This in no way means that older movies are bad, just that decisions were made which back then might have made some sort of sense, but in the present age we know better than that. The good thing here is that at least we have evolved as a society to move past those decisions (we have, right?). Can we still enjoy our favorite movies? Of course. Should we repeat the poorly aged things that put them on the radar in the first place? I think the answer is obvious.
I guess the takeaway here is to think twice next time someone decides to make a movie, so that the audience a generation or two later can watch it and think “This aged well!” Meanwhile, scroll down to take a look at some of the movies that didn’t age well, based on the opinion of the viewers. Tell us what you think about them. Are there other poorly aged movies you would like to share with us? Head to the comments and let us know!
#1 Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
“The entire plot of the movie revolves around the villain being ‘secretly’ trans.”
Image source: weirdojac, amazon.com
#2 American Pie
“Using a secret camera to broadcast naked high school students on the internet.”
Image source: KerchBridgeSmoker, amazon.com
#3 The Notebook
“The Notebook (2004), back then people thought it was cute and romantic. But, the dude hangs off a Ferris wheel and threatens to jump unless the girl dates him. In all honesty, even then it was really creepy.”
Image source: DaveGrohl23, amazon.com
#4 I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry
sun-e-deez replied:
“Don’t forget they had one of the dudes (can’t remember which) be allowed in a fitting room with the woman he has feelings for and he gets to ogle her because she’s under the impression he’s gay and therefore trusted not to sexualize the experience. yikes!”
Image source: MissWitch86, amazon.com
#5 Revenge Of The Nerds
damnflanders replied:
“I mean, who hasn’t worn a mask to trick a girl into having s*x with you?”
Image source: GrilledStuffedDragon, amazon.com
#6 Overboard
“A man takes advantage of a woman that has amnesia and forces her to raise his kids.”
Image source: level 1 meathookromance, amazon.com
#7 The Nutty Professor
“The fat suits, fat jokes, use of the n-word that ends in a… it was all stuff I probably didn’t even notice 20 years ago that now made me feel extreeeeemely uncomfortable.”
Image source: TwentycharactersNott, amazon.com
#8 Pretty Baby
“Pretty Baby with a NAKED 11yr old Brooke Shields.”
Image source: littlelionheart77, amazon.com
#9 The Blue Lagoon
tangcameo replied:
“Wasn’t there a string of movies where Shields was underage and underdressed? I even remember a George Burns movie she was in that did that.”
Image source: SuvenPan, amazon.com
#10 Sixteen Candles
“I still enjoy it for what it is for the most part, but there are a few things that are pretty problematic, first and foremost being Jake Ryan telling Ted to take advantage of his girlfriend while she’s passed out. Long Duk Dong’s character is an insanely racist depiction of an Asian person. The whole underwear show is so wrong too.”
Image source: 114631, amazon.com
#11 Passengers
brinazee said:
“The entire sub-genre of romantic comedy can be described as “stalker gets the girl”.”
jts5039 replied:
“Passengers fits this description 100%.”
Image source: brinazee, amazon.com
#12 Manhattan
“Forty-four-year-old Woody Allen has affair with 17-year-old Mariel Hemingway. How art imitates life.”
Image source: AMerrickanGirl, amazon.com
#13 Blank Check
“Grown woman kisses a boy on the mouth.”
Image source: CompetitiveHost7929, amazon.com
#14 Animal House
“Pretty much every raunchy/irreverent high school/college-themed comedy from before about 1998. Animal House, Revenge of the Nerds, Porky’s, etc.”
Image source: DerikHallin, amazon.com
#15 Breakfast At Tiffany’s
“Casting Mickey Rooney as a stereotyped Japanese man?
Actually, I think “racist caricature” is a better way to describe his character.”
AlsoOneLastThing replied:
“Breakfast at Tiffany’s is a really bizarre adaptation. The whole Mickey Rooney thing is by a country mile the most egregious example of the strange decisions that the studio made but there’s also so much other stuff that is equally baffling. The story is almost exactly the same as the novella but the tone is completely different, the chronology of events is swapped around so it feels more like a series of vignettes rather than a coherent narrative, and some seemingly minor characterizations are changed which completely transforms the overall feel of the story. Breakfast at Tiffany’s the book is a tragic story about the platonic friendship and bond shared between a 19-year-old girl who is constantly exploited by men in her life and the one man who views her as a human being.
Breakfast at Tiffany’s the movie is a romantic comedy about a 30-year-old call girl who acts like she’s 19 and a male prostitute who do random things together and then fall in love for no reason. I’m begging Hollywood to do an accurate adaptation of this book someday.”
Image source: delosproyectos, amazon.com
#16 Arthur
“It’s about a “lovable drunk” and the first scene is him having a humorous crash while driving hammered. Oh, we all chuckled.”
Image source: algy888, amazon.com
#17 Porky’s
Image source: Ordinary-Stranger-69 , amazon.com
#18 American Beauty
“If Kevin Spacey perving on his high school daughter’s close friend was creepy back then, it’s only become worse now.”
Image source: Arkho__, amazon.com
#19 Head Of State
“The comedy about how crazy having a black President would be. Released in 2003.”
Image source: screenwriterjohn, amazon.com
#20 Never Been Kissed
“Drew Barrymore posing as a teenager and having a relationship w the teacher who gets MAD when he finds out shes not a teenager and is his age, then we’re just supposed to smooth it over at the end.”
Image source: sungirlie, amazon.com
#21 Bring It On
“The male cheerleader has a finger “slip” and assaults his teammate and it’s a quick laugh, slap, and I think a finger sniff.”
Image source: witchbb, amazon.com
#22 Soul Man
“You could never make Soul Man today.”
Image source: Huda_Thunkit, amazon.com
#23 Jurassic World
BeneficialName9863 replied:
“The new Jurassic world films already look more out of date than the original.”
hamakabi replied:
“The original has barely aged at all, I watch it pretty much every year.”
Image source: BeneficialName9863, amazon.com
#24 40 Days And 40 Nights
“No one lives like that in San Francisco or works at a tech firm designing websites to make money like that.
But most importantly, that ending would not fly. Victim blaming when he gets r***d by his ex-girlfriend??? It’s just so wrong.”
Image source: SuddenlyThirsty, amazon.com
#25 Song Of The South
3-DMan replied:
“But everybody still remembers Zippedy Do-Dah!”
Image source: Electricdragongaming, amazon.com
#26 Scream 3
“Scream 3 and its plotline of a movie producer who sexually assaulted young actresses. Miramax (i.e. Harvey Weinstein) made that movie.”
Image source: fibee123, amazon.com
#27 Blame It On Rio
lurgi replied:
“Michael Caine would appear in any piece of c**p if the location was sunny and the paycheck was good. I have to respect the guy for that.”
Image source: MorganOverlook, amazon.com
#28 Police Academy
“Police Academy had some dubious jokes.”
Image source: Ok_Comparison_8304, amazon.com
#29 The Hangover
“I rewatched The Hangover relatively recently and a character shouts ‘PAGING DOCTOR F****T!’ in the opening minutes and it is incredibly jarring for a movie that only came out about a decade ago.”
Image source: bobbybrown_, amazon.com
#30 Love Actually
“Seemed cute at the time, but now watching it I realize that there isn’t a single female character who isn’t a s*x kitten or a victim.”
Image source: sozinsky
#31 Grease
“I thought to watch it with my kids and was like WTF am I watching?”
Minion5051 replied:
“As a kid, I assumed it was a scream.”
Image source: sunny_dayz247, amazon.com
#32 Peter Pan
“There is a whole song and dance about making fun of “Red Men”. Also the “Following the Leader” song includes a line ‘Were off to fight the injuns the injuns, the injuns!'”
Image source: bell37 , amazon.com
#33 2012
“The movie about the world ending in 2012.”
Image source: Sensitivenotsoft, amazon.com
#34 Reefer Madness
thepiercedweirdo replied:
“I don’t know. That one kinda went dumpster fire phoenix and reemerged a comedy classic.”
Image source: CashgrassorNopass, amazon.com
#35 There’s Something About Mary
“There’s Something About Mary. Huge when it came out, almost forgotten today.”
Image source: Davel23, amazon.com
#36 Rambo III
“The heroic Afghan Muslim freedom fighters fighting the Soviets.”
Image source: Old_fart5070, amazon.com
#37 Charlie’s Angels
“It’s a fetish movie. Just designed to get butts into seats because hot girls dressed in outfits… the milkmaid(s), the dominatrix look (when they were penetrating the tech firm as ????), the stripper outfits (strip club, complete with Cameron in a martini glass with water), the pit crew scene, Cameron’s underwear dance… seriously, it was really pre-Internet because it was just for people with fetishes. I was 17 when it came out, and as a horny lesbian I think I watched a ton of the stripper scene(s) with the entire crew.”
Image source: astrangeone88, amazon.com
#38 Untitled
krljust said:
“Kevin Spacey is a rich closeted homosexual who murders his much younger lover.”
Burdiac replied:
“But it has that killer line when John Cusack refuses a drink and says he is not thirsty
‘If you’re thirsty, a drink will cure it, if you’re not, a drink will prevent it. Prevention is better than a cure.'”
Image source: krljust, amazon.com
#39 Heavyweights
Image source: amazon.com
#40 Sorority Boys
Image source: amazon.com
#41 Shag
Image source: amazon.com
#42 The Last Exorcism
“The Last Exorcism. Made obsolete by The Last Exorcism 2.”
Image source: tafkat, amazon.com
#43 The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button
wickedblight replied:
“Are you crazy? Dude looked 7 when he was 80!”
Image source: ComputerSong, amazon.com
#44 Rush Hour
“As someone in their mid-30s, the nostalgia I feel for early 2000s trash like this, fast and furious, rush hour, the hot chick, road trip, etc is so strong I know the early 2000s weren’t as golden as they seem compared to the 2020s so far, but damn if it isn’t fun to revisit and cringe.”
Image source: Slagsdale , amazon.com
#45 The King And I
Image source: amazon.com
#46 Modern Times
Gritty2020 said:
“90% of American silent films. They aged so poorly that they literally don’t exist anymore.”
Amish_Warl0rd replied:
“Can’t argue with that one. Also, people mainly watch silent films for history these days, but they were originally played in theaters with a live orchestra. So technically we’re also watching them wrong.”
Image source: Gritty2020, amazon.com
#47 Hitch
Image source: amazon.com
#48 Back To The Future II
“It’s been 7.5 years past their date and we still don’t have most of the things they predicted.”
tenehemia replied:
“Okay but bear with me –
2015 that Marty and Doc visit is 2015 that follows on the timeline from the altered 1985 that the second film begins in.
But that 2015 doesn’t exist, because of what happens at the end of Back to the Future 3 where Jennifer shows the blank fax to Doc and asks what it means, and he says “It means your future is whatever you make of it, so make it a good one.”
For some reason, Marty and Jennifer’s knowledge of the future and their different choices made because of that information caused the world to not develop the way it would have otherwise.
Maybe Marty decided to invest a bunch of money in something he saw as being popular in 2015 when he was there like IBM or something, and that investment led to others investing in IBM rather than investing in some startup company that had an idea for flying car technology. As a result, the flying car was never invented and 2015 turned out the way we know it. Basically, it’s Marty & Jennifer’s fault that we don’t have flying cars.
Image source: KennySharpest797, amazon.com
#49 Dirty Dancing
“A minor dating a guy clearly in his 30s at best.”
Image source: icrushallevil, amazon.com
#50 The Breakfast Club
allwillbewellbuthow replied:
“I’m with you, but I feel like The Breakfast Club is one of his less problematic teen movies.”
Image source: bent_eye, amazon.com
#51 Beauty And The Beast
Image source: amazon.com
#52 A Merry Muppet Christmas Movie
“The 1990s (I think) Muppets movie where someone shows Kermit what the world would be like if Kermit was never born. I think it fast forwards to NYC 2002 and in the movie, the Twin Towers were still standing, so canonically Kermit being born somehow caused 9/11.”
Image source: reddit.com , amazon.com
#53 Mary Poppins
Image source: amazon.com
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