This Sunday marks the 89th Academy Awards in Hollywood, California. More importantly, though, this Saturday marks the the 37th Golden Raspberry Awards.
The 'Razzies' are, in simple terms, the antithesis to the Oscars: sarcastic, puerile and totally non-congratulatory. Condemning the absolute worst in that given year's film.
"It's all about taking Hollywood's favourite pastime - congratulating itself - and turning it on its head," says John Wilson, the founder and president of the Razzies. "It's our reminder that yes, you made movies like Doubt, Benjamin Button and Slumdog Millionaire, but you also made things like Love Guru and Meet Dave and Indiana Jones 4."
Actor Tom Green picking up his Razzies in 2002 for Freddie Got Fingered. He was the first actor to ever come and collect it. Image: PA
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The first Razzies ceremony took place in 1980, spawned from the fact Wilson had left film school at UCLA and gotten a job at a movie trailer company, where he was forced to sit through around 250 films at a film festival the company sponsored.
"When you see that many movies, the odds do not favour the stuff that the Oscars or Globes are talking about," Wilson told TIME back in 2009. "The odds favour the opposite: it's far easier to make and finance, and therefore far easier to see, a bad movie."
The impromptu occasions took place at Wilson's own home. "The Oscars come on at five and are over some time around nine, and when you have that many people over, you have to have something to do, so I set up a cardboard podium and invited people to offer up nominees for the worst film of the year."
Halle Berry being a good sport. Image: Razzies Channel
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The following year, Wilson distributed press releases to newspapers across Southern California and by the mid 1980s, people went out of their way to cover the DIY award show. In 1984, Wilson bumped the Razzies to the day before the Oscars, to great success.
"When we moved it to the night before the Oscars it suddenly became this big deal. Part of it is that you have all this press in town for the Oscars from all around the world, and the night before the show, they really have nothing else to do."
Today, the annual ceremony is just as much an event as its inspiration, thanks to the notoriety surrounding it and its famous celebrity hate.
The most nominated actor remains Sylvester Stallone, who has notched a record 31 Razzie noms. He allegedly left a voicemail for Wilson in 2000 after finding out he was nominated for worst actor of the century.
Image: PA
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"When he heard he was up for Worst Actor of the Century, we did get a voice mail that sounded like him - for legal reasons we can't say it was him," Wilson told The Hollywood Reporter. "But his point was, my movies make money, stop picking on me.'"
"You're not exempt from the Razzies if your movie made money."
There are also good sports, A-list good sports in fact, who have embraced the humour of the event. Showgirls director Paul Verhoeven turned up the Razzies to accept the award for Worst Picture in 1996, while in 2005, Halle Berry performed a parody of her OTT Oscars speech while accepting the Worst Actress award for Catwoman.
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Sandra Bullock echoed Berry's banter in 2010 when she picked up a Razzie for The Blind Side the same year she won an Oscar, delivering a hilarious speech as she did so.
Video: Razzies Channel
When it comes to fellow Razzie favourites, a close second to Stallone is Adam Sandler, whose infamously bad Jack and Jill flick tore through 32nd Golden Raspberry Awards in 2012.
Similar, in essence, to how the Academy works, Wilson employs near to 700 punters - journalists, industry insiders and general film buffs - to cast their vote on the movies of the year and how crap they are.
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While they have never been televised, the idea that it one day could remains a dead horse for Wilson, who claims that failing to get usage rights on the films they're slagging off will always stop them from getting the Razzies on primetime TV. Not only that, but Hollywood suits despise them.
"There are some people in Hollywood who get the joke, but most just seem to hate it, and wish we would go away - which of course makes all this that much funnier."
We can only hope that this tradition is continued long into the future, in an ever-increasing, self-absorbed, political-snowflake, celebritydom.
Featured Image Credit: PA