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'Cats' and 'Madea' lead Golden Raspberry Awards

February 8, 2020

The furry feline flop, as well as several Academy Award nominees, have been nominated for the movie industry's least coveted plaudits. The Oscars are to be announced in a Sunday evening awards ceremony.

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Ian McKellen in Cats
Image: picture-alliance/Universal Pictures/dpa

The nominations for the 40th annual Golden Raspberry Awards were announced on Saturday. Better known as the Razzies, the parody award celebrates the worst in cinema over the past year and coincide with their more illustrious cousin, the Academy Awards, which are scheduled for Sunday.

"Voting members of The Golden Raspberry Awards have sifted through a bumper crop of cinematic crud and made their selections for 2019's Worst Achievements in film," the organization said on its website.

Leading the nominations were the much-derided A Madea Family Funeral, major-studio flop Cats, and the horror film The Haunting of Sharon Tate, the latter of which review website Rotten Tomatoes describes as "dishonoring the events" it portrays and "offensively exploitative" towards the innocent victims of the notorious Manson family killings.

Much has been made of the disaster that was Cats, which was directed by Academy Award-winner Tom Hooper, had a massive budget, and for which the studio planned a massive Oscar campaign that it quietly withdrew from in December. Audiences were turned off by the strange and poorly-executed CGI, uneven tone, and the disappointing turns by many celebrated actors and singers.

In the acting categories, other Academy favorites like Jessica Chastain and Judi Dench were nominated. Chastain for the X-men film Dark Phoenix, of which one reviewer said that the only good part of the film was that the credits were correctly spelled, and Dench for Cats.

Perennial Razzie nominee John Travolta was also called out for acting twice, in the critically-panned The Fanatic and the racing drama Trading Paint, which has a 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and grossed $0 in the North American box office.

A Madea Family Funeral was nominated for seven awards, famously having been shot in only seven days as creator Tyler Perry becomes increasingly well-known for the swiftness with which he puts films together without regard to quality.

The Razzies also announced their nominees for the "Redeemer" award, honoring actors who have previously been in poor quality films but had redeemed themselves in 2019. This included Eddie Murphy, Keanu Reeves, and Jennifer Lopez. Many film critics had expected Lopez to receive a nomination for Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars for her acclaimed performance in the crime drama Hustlers.

Here is a list of the major categories:

Worst Picture

Cats

The Fanatic

The Haunting of Sharon Tate

A Madea Family Funeral

Rambo: Last Blood

Worst Actor

James Franco / Zeroville

David Harbour / Hellboy 

Matthew McConaughey / Serenity

Sylvester Stallone / Rambo: Last Blood

John Travolta / The Fanatic & Trading Paint

Worst Actress

Hilary Duff / The Haunting of Sharon Tate

Anne Hathaway / The Hustle & Serenity

Francesca Hayward / Cats

Tyler Perry (As Medea) A Madea Family Funeral

Rebel Wilson / The Hustle

Worst Supporting Actress

Jessica Chastain / Dark Phoenix

Cassi Davis / A Madea Family Funeral

Judi Dench / Cats

Fenessa Pineda / Rambo: First Blood

Rebel Wilson / Cats

Worst Supporting Actor

James Corden / Cats

Tyler Perry / A Madea Family Funeral (as "Joe”)

Tyler Perry / A Madea Family Funeral (as "Uncle Heathrow")

Seth Rogan / Zeroville

Bruce Willis / Glass 

Worst Director

Fred Durst / The Fanatic

James Franco / Zeroville

Adrian Grunberg / Rambo: Last Blood

Tom Hooper / Cats

Neil Marshall / Hellboy 

Razzie Redeemer Award

Eddie Murphy / Dolemite Is My Name

Keanu Reeves / John Wick 3 & Toy Story 4

Adam Sandler / Uncut Gems

Jennifer Lopez / Hustlers

Will Smith / Aladdin 

Elizabeth Schumacher Elizabeth Schumacher reports on gender equity, immigration, poverty and education in Germany.