Warning: There are spoilers ahead for each movie mentioned!
Usually, when someone dies in a movie, it’s quite a serious event that can evoke genuine tears from the audience. Other times, when it’s a comedy, a death can be absolutely hilarious when executed (pun not intended) creatively. Other times, however, filmmakers get mixed up. Sometimes, when working on a dramatic film, they still deliver a death scene so goofy that it’s unintentionally hilarious.
Plenty of things can make a death scene in a dramatic film absurd or unintentionally humorous. It can be over-the-top, it can rely on lackluster CGI, or it can simply be executed with such poor pacing or editing that it causes the audience to laugh when they should be gasping. Whatever the case, these are the goofiest death scenes in the history of drama movies, ranked from least to most preposterously silly.
10
Lt. Colonel Austin Travis (Steven Seagal)
‘Executive Decision’ (1996)
Back during the late ’80s and early ’90s, Steven Seagal was a big action star at the top of his game. Soon enough, though, he started delivering the kinds of abysmal performances in abysmal movies that make him one of the most heavily disliked action movie actors working today. As far as his mid-’90s work goes, however, the political thriller Executive Decision is actually not bad at all.
One thing about the film that doesn’t quite work, however, is the death of Seagal’s character, Lt. Colonel Austin Travis. His death, which occurs after he closes a plane’s hatch before it decompresses with him outside, is a plot twist that happens surprisingly early in the runtime, and is supposed to be a heroic sacrifice. The only issue is how the scene is framed. Instead of getting a heroic close-up of Travis’ facial expression as he decides to sacrifice himself, or a slow-motion shot of him falling to his death, we get a long shot of his clearly CGI body ragdolling through the air in a way that can only be described as goofy.
9
Vic Deakins (John Travolta)
‘Broken Arrow’ (1996)
Yet another action film from 1996, except that this one’s not actually any good, Broken Arrow was the first collaboration between John Woo and John Travolta before they made Face/Off with Nicolas Cage one year later. It’s not quite bad enough to be considered one of the worst action films of the ’90s, but that also means that it’s not quite bad enough to call it “so bad it’s good.” There is, however, one crucial scene in the movie that meets that quality.
Travolta plays the film’s villain, Vic Deakins, a ruthless and sadistic terrorist who gradually loses more and more of his sanity as the story progresses. The final battle of the third act takes place on a train where Deakins is transporting a nuclear warhead that he stole. Ultimately, that warhead causes his demise, as it hurtles toward him and causes him to ragdoll out of the train in a way that’s absolutely hilarious—even if that wasn’t necessarily the intention.
Broken Arrow
- Release Date
-
February 9, 1996
- Runtime
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108 minutes
8
Inspector Javert (Russell Crowe)
‘Les Misérables’ (2012)
As much as his reputation suffered after making Cats, Tom Hooper was, once upon a time, one of Hollywood’s most awards-worthy names. He achieved this rep through films like Les Misérables, an adaptation of the legendary stage musical which is definitely not perfect, but nevertheless has a lot of strengths. Unfortunately, Russell Crowe‘s performance as the iconic villain Javert isn’t one of those strengths.
Javert is an antagonist whose entire characterization is built on the foundation of his voice, and sadly, Russell Crowe couldn’t sing to save his life. This makes his rendition of “Javert’s Suicide,” where the Inspector does precisely what the song’s title suggests, laughably lacking in depth and emotional resonance. It’s a lackluster performance in an otherwise great film, and it—along with the bafflingly goofy sound effect that goes off when Javert’s body hits the Seine after he throws himself off a bridge—makes a scene that should be devastating somewhat humorous instead.
7
Andrew Fassbach (Elyes Gabel)
‘World War Z’ (2013)
Thrilling and intense, even if not particularly faithful to its source material, World War Z surprised audiences back in 2013 as one of the most essential zombie films of the 21st century so far. It’s a mess, but one of the charming variety, full of grand-scale set pieces and a perfect balance between horror and unique action.
It’s also a mess with some worthwhile characters, including the virologist Dr. Andrew Fassbach (Elyes Gabel). The thing is that Fassbach is memorable for all the wrong reasons. After he’s given a gun to defend himself, he panics after the beginning of a zombie attack, runs away, slips on a plane ramp, and accidentally shoots himself in the head. It’s a moment that’s clearly meant to provide a bit of twisted irony and dark humor, and it works wonders, because it’s the goofiest kind of death one can suffer during a zombie apocalypse.
6
Russell Franklin (Samuel L. Jackson)
‘Deep Blue Sea’ (1999)
People looking for the next Jaws are better off looking elsewhere, but people who enjoy the occasional shark B-movie are guaranteed to love Deep Blue Sea, one of the most iconic sci-fi horror films of the late ’90s. As far as horror movies go, this one has pretty decent jump scares, including a particular one that’s generally counted among the most shocking yet hilarious deaths in film history.
Samuel L. Jackson plays Russell Franklin, an executive sent to investigate a facility where human-eating sharks are running (or swimming) rampant. While delivering a powerful monologue to the group, urging them to come together to get out of their current situation, he’s eaten by a shark. There’s something about the suddenness of the scene, the irony of its timing, and the godawful CGI that makes Franklin’s death laughably silly rather than scary.
5
Sir Edmund Burton (Anthony Hopkins)
‘Transformers: The Last Knight’ (2017)
When Michael Bay brought Transformers back to the silver screen in live action, the results were great. As soon as sequels started coming out, however, the franchise immediately crashed and burned. Somehow, Bay kept managing to find ways to make each new installment worse than the last, culminating in the abysmal Transformers: The Last Knight, one of the most boring blockbusters of the 21st century.
Hopkins, who clearly received no direction during this scene, distractedly looks around as though the massive robot weren’t standing twenty feet away.
Anthony Hopkins plays Sir Edmund Burton, last of the Order of the Witwiccans, a man who knows everything there is to know about the Transformers. His death takes place after he tries to stop Megatron during a climactic battle at Stonehenge, and it couldn’t possibly be goofier. Hopkins, who clearly received no direction during this scene, distractedly looks around as though the massive robot weren’t standing twenty feet away, and then distractedly keeps looking at everything except Megatron as he’s blasted into a crater in dramatic slow-mo.
4
Talia al Ghul (Marion Cotillard)
‘The Dark Knight Rises’ (2012)
There’s no denying that Christopher Nolan is one of the most talented and revolutionary filmmakers working today, and there’s also no denying that his Dark Knight trilogy is one of the most important and popular in the history of superhero films. Unfortunately, it’s also hard to deny that The Dark Knight Rises is the weakest of the bunch, and the silly death of its main antagonist is only one of the reasons why.
Going into Dark Knight Rises, Marion Cotillard was already a highly-acclaimed Oscar-winning actress who had proved her tremendous skills plenty of times before. Why, then, does she play the death of Talia al Ghul after her truck crashes like it’s Bugs Bunny pretending to fall asleep in a Looney Tunes cartoon? It’s impossible to tell, and it will forever be considered one of the dumbest things in the whole trilogy.
3
Propeller Guy
‘Titanic’ (1994)
Love it or hate it, there’s no getting around it: Titanic is one of the biggest films in the history of the art form, a technical and artistic achievement that deserved to make history at the box office, the Oscars, and the annals of disaster flicks. It’s an extremely well-directed and ultimately quite tragic film, and the harrowing sequence of the Titanic’s sinking is one of the most emotionally devastating third acts in the history of movies. However, it also has the propeller guy.
The propeller guy, a guy who jumps from the starboard, hits a propeller, and spins his way to the ocean, has become a bit of a meme, and for good reason. The way this digital creation ragdolls around as he falls is, quite frankly, really funny, tragic though the surrounding context may be. Whether it pulls one out of the experience or not is an entirely subjective deal, but one thing is certain, and that is that Propeller Guy will live in disaster film infamy forevermore.
2
Johnny (Tommy Wiseau)
‘The Room’ (2003)
Plenty of flops from the 2000s have come and gone, never gaining any kind of traction. Others, however, have become cult classics, and there’s no 21st-century cult classic bigger or more important than Tommy Wiseau‘s The Room, one of the most legendary awful movies ever made. It’s a complete disaster in absolutely every sense possible, but that’s exactly what makes it so fun.
Any cinephile who enjoys memorable theater experiences ought to watch The Room at a midnight screening at least once in their lives. There’s nothing quite like watching the film’s climactic ending, where protagonist Johnny commits suicide after his fiancée and best friend betrayed him, prompting fans to yell things like “do it!” or “oh hi, blood!” at the screen. It’s one of the worst-shot, worst-staged, worst-acted, worst-written death scenes in movie history, and that’s what makes it absolutely hilarious.
The Room
- Release Date
-
June 27, 2003
- Runtime
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91minutes
1
Jim (David Silva)
‘Fateful Findings’ (2012)
Move over, Tommy Wiseau: The modern king of atrocious filmmaking is the surprisingly prolific Neil Breen, and the sci-fi thriller Fateful Findings, where a computer scientist faces the fateful consequences of the mystical abilities he obtained as a child, may just be his most iconic work. It’s also the source of the goofiest, most hilarious death scene in movie history.The protagonist’s best friend, Jim, is first murdered by his wife, who stages the killing as a suicide. That scene alone would be enough to qualify this as the silliest death scene in all of cinema, but what comes after makes it even funnier. Breen’s character comes into the scene, struggles to pick up his friend’s body, and then acts mildly annoyed that he has committed suicide. “I can’t help you out of this one, Jim,” he tells him. This scene, by itself, is enough to qualify this film as one of the most essential so-bad-they’re-good movies ever, and this death scene as the goofiest ever filmed.
Fateful Findings
- Release Date
-
May 23, 2013
- Runtime
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100 minutes
- Director
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Neil Breen