50 Worst Movie Soundtracks
Our ears! Our ears!
Pretty Woman (1990)
The Soundtrack: A 45 minute medly that mostly relies on recognisable pop and the odd curveball – like David Bowie’s ‘Fame ‘90’.
Worst Song: The schmaltzy ‘It Must’ve Been Love’ by Roxette, which has pretty much been used as the blueprint for every romcom theme tune since.
Justin Bieber: Never Say Never (2011)
The Soundtrack: A compilation of hits from the mini popster, who croons them to a live and adoring audience.
Worst Song: We have to choose just one? Well, ‘Overboard’ is pretty soul-destroying, not least because it’s a team-up between Bieber and that other shiny bastion of homogenised pop, Miley Cyrus.
The Horror Of Party Beach (1964)
The Soundtrack: “The zombie stomp is fun to do, come along and do the zombie too!” The Del-Aires populate this cringe-y soundtrack with little nuggets like that. There’s a reason you’ve never heard of it.
Worst Song: ‘Zombie Stomp’, which contains the above lyrics. We rest our case.
Queen Of The Damned (2002)
The Soundtrack: Korn singer Jonathan Davis ropes in some rock buddies to help him fill out the moshpit soundtrack for this horror literary adap.
Worst Song: Marilyn Manson’s ‘Redeemer’ is one of the goth godfather’s worst tracks, and has no place on this album.
Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience (2009)
The Soundtrack: A tie-in for the documentary, which followed the chaste pop sibs during a 2008 tour. Naturally, the soundtrack’s all about them.
Worst Song: The cringeworthy ‘SOS’, a mainstream soft pop-rock ditty that sounds like every other soft pop-rock song released in the last decade.
Spies Like Us (1985)
The Soundtrack: Includes The Bar-Kays’ ‘Soul Finger’, Peter Aykroyd’s ‘Rock The House Down’ and ‘I’ll Be Loving You’, by Sammy Cahn and Vernon Duke.
Worst Song: Paul McCartney’s ill-advised ‘Spies Like Us’, which fell as flat as the film itself. And that’s really flat.
The Pod People (1983)
The Soundtrack: Pretty much impossible to find online or in stores anymore. Which is actually a good thing.
Worst Song: Ian Sera’s ‘Burning Rubber Tires’, with its mumbly, unintelligible lyrics and general pop blandness. What lyrics we could decipher don’t even make sense – “All I wanna feel / Is the wind in my eyes.” Steer clear.
Sign up for the Total Film Newsletter
Bringing all the latest movie news, features, and reviews to your inbox
Grown Ups (2010)
The Soundtrack: The usual blend of soft rock you’d expect from a movie starring Adam Sandler – it even features a tune by Journey (‘The Party’s Over’), which is par for the course when you’re struggling to keep up with the times.
Worst Song: When your soundtrack features Cliff Richards, you know you’re in trouble. The pearly-white-flashing one pitches up with ‘Devil Woman’, which is actually one of the classier numbers presented…
High School Musical (1985)
The Soundtrack: Zac Efron, Ashley Tisdale and Vanessa Hudgens provide the vocals on 10 safe and saccharine tracks aimed at the nippers.
Worst Song: ‘Get'cha Head In The Game’ (by Efron) comes with a particularly pungent whiff of cheese. Painfully earnest.
Rock 'n Roll Nightmare (1987)
The Soundtrack: You said it. This is pure cheese, not least from writer-actor Jon Mikl Thor, who also provides the film’s main track.
Worst Song: “What's the sound moving through the ages? / What's the sound turning over pages? / Rock! Talkin' 'bout rock!” Thor gets out the hair metal with ‘We Live To Rock’, which is just as good a song as you’d expect from a former bodybuilder.
Josh Winning has worn a lot of hats over the years. Contributing Editor at Total Film, writer for SFX, and senior film writer at the Radio Times. Josh has also penned a novel about mysteries and monsters, is the co-host of a movie podcast, and has a library of pretty phenomenal stories from visiting some of the biggest TV and film sets in the world. He would also like you to know that he "lives for cat videos..." Don't we all, Josh. Don't we all.