For every time the Oscars gets something so very right (i.e. Parasite winning best picture in 2019), the Academy Awards can also get other things so very wrong (remember when Crash triumphed over Brokeback Mountain or how they were so transparently skewed they generated the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite?).
The best original song category is no stranger to some regrettable follies. After all, this is a category that has nominated living legend Diane Warren 14 times and sent her home empty handed every single time. (“I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing,” “Because You Loved Me,” and “‘Til It Happens To You” sure seemed like locks at the time, and then, nadda.) It’s also the same category that controversially nominated a track from an obscure Christian flick back in 2014, only to have to revoke it later.
Of course, some of the most egregious Oscar moments have come from giving an Academy Award to confounding song selections. From forgettable Disney ditties to treacly disaster flick ballads (the only thing worse than perishing in The Towering Inferno or The Poseidon Adventure was the music accompanying them), there have been more than a few times when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) showed that they can be utterly tone deaf. (Apologies in advance to talented icons Phil Collins, Barbra Streisand, Elton John and repeat offender Randy Newman.)
In no particular order, these are one critic’s picks for the 15 worst Oscar-winning songs of all-time. Hey, you can’t get them all right.
Putting aside the fact that this is one of the more lackluster James Bond songs (we dare you to try and hum this one from memory), what was even more bleak was having it triumph over Lady Gaga’s “Til It Happens to You,” a harrowing ode to survivors of sexual assault, from The Hunting Ground.
A forgettable song from a forgettable movie, Phil Collins’ snoozer inexplicably beat out both Aimee Mann’s haunting “Save Me” and Trey Parker and Marc Shaiman’s hilarious “Blame Canada.” It’s the Crash of best original song winners: its victory remains baffling as ever. Listen here.
Talk about a disaster: this waterlogged ballad bested Michael Jackson’s far superior “Ben.” Listen here.
Must we? Because, honestly, Madonna has had infinitely better and more deserving songs from movies, including the Oscar-winning Stephen Sondheim composition “Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man)” from Dick Tracy. Worst of all, this drowsy ballad unreasonably won over the toe-tapping perfection that is “That Thing You Do!”
Kasha and Hirschhorn gave us yet another musical mishap from a ’70s disaster flick, toppling a better song; in this case, the self-titled, gut-busting theme to Blazing Saddles. Listen here.
Like Splash Mountain, it’s time to once and for all bid this song from this racist garbage adieu-dah. Listen here.
While other wistful ballads have managed to stand the test of time, this one is about as corny as it gets. It’s best known as something you dread hearing in the dentist chair. Plus, it somehow beat a killer Bond song! (In this case, Carly Simon’s “Nobody Does it Better.”) Listen here.
Disney had the best original song category in a chokehold for the ’90s (see: “Beauty and the Beast,” “A Whole New World,” “Colors of the Wind.”). But it was The Lion King that dominated in 1994, garnering three song nominations with “Circle of Life,” “Hakuna Matata” and the eventual winner, which was the weakest of the bunch, “Can You Feel the Love Tonight.” Not a bad song, but “Circle of Life” soars higher.
Awarding this cocktail lounge ditty over “What’s New, Pussycat”? Whoa-ah-ohhhh-ah-no. Listen here.
Like being stuck in the luau from hell, this sappy island tune somehow bested the Gershwins’ legendary “They Can’t Take That Away From Me.” Listen here.
This song means well, it really does. But for a song that’s supposed to capture the urgency of the global warming crisis, it barely scratches the emotional surface of the rapidly melting iceberg. Sorry to put you in second place again, Al Gore, but this one belonged to “Listen” from Dreamgirls.
As painful as it is to put the incomparable Doris Day on a worst-of anything list, this saccharine ballad doesn’t quite hold a candle to the song it beat out: Dean Martin’s absolutely essential “That’s Amore.” Listen here.
There was no way Randy Newman was ever going to be able to top “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” in the Toy Story universe, but maybe the Academy felt bad for snubbing that one all the way back in 1995 and awarded this subpar entry instead. Listen here.
Sorry to do this to you twice, Randy! But Enya’s “May It Be” from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings is the one song to rule them all. Listen here.
With all due respect to music/screen/stage legend Streisand, this song is no “Shallow,” and as far as 1976 is concerned, that year’s theme song was “Gonna Fly Now” from Rocky.