Over the past few years, the Golden Raspberry Awards – or the Razzies – have gone from being a good-natured event that poked fun at the pompous and self-serious into a sneering, nasty little cabal of the self-satisfied deciding which unfortunate actor or filmmaker should be their next victim. 

Although the award, which ‘rewards’ the worst Hollywood films and actors of the previous year, has often got it wrong in the past – the nomination of Stanley Kubrick as Worst Director for The Shining has aged especially badly – it used to be seen as fun, which is why the good-natured, such as Halle Berry, Paul Verhoeven and Sandra Bullock, would appear to collect their accolades in person. And they were, admittedly, bang on about Cats. But when it came to Bruce Willis, the Razzies went far too far. 

I have written before about the cruel and sneering attitude that the “awards” adopted towards Willis by creating a new category in this year’s ceremony entitled ‘Worst Performance by Bruce Willis in a 2021 Movie’, which nominated the actor for his eight performances in various undistinguished pictures over the year. Yet, when the actor’s daughter Rumer made public her 67-year old father’s diagnosis of the brain disorder aphasia and his subsequent “stepping away” from acting, it became embarrassingly clear that the Razzies, never a tactful or sophisticated organisation, had made a catastrophic error. 

Their initial reaction was to tweet “the Razzies are truly sorry for Bruce Willis’ diagnosed condition. Perhaps this explains why he wanted to go out with a bang in 2021. Our best wishes to Bruce and family.” The insincere tone of this met with disapproval, and so, inevitably, the Razzie cofounders John Wilson and Mo Murphy put out a solemn statement that “After much thought and consideration, the Razzies have made the decision to rescind the Razzie Award given to Bruce Willis, due to his recently disclosed diagnosis. If someone’s medical condition is a factor in their decision making and/or their performance, we acknowledge that it is not appropriate to give them a Razzie.” 

For good measure, they also rescinded Shelley Duvall’s Worst Actress nomination for The Shining, on the grounds that her performance had been elicited by psychological mistreatment by Kubrick; a transparent attempt to demonstrate their socially aware credentials in unflattering circumstances.