Nearly everyone can relate to having dealt with a horrible boss at work at one point or another. It’s why the “bad boss” trope is so popular in our entertainment media — especially movies. In a cathartic sense, we see ourselves represented in the frustrated, worn-down, stressed-out, and overworked on-screen victims of these overbearing overseers.
Whether they’re supervising an overworked office, presiding over a cutthroat company, or running a brutal brand, these bad bosses relish in getting under their employees’ skin and taking advantage of their underlings to get ahead. And we love to hate them for it.
Just look at David Harken, played with psychopathic glee by Kevin Spacey in the 2011 crime comedy Horrible Bosses. While the film is about a trio of the worst possible types of abusive employers, including the harassing sexual predator and the lazy, incompetent nepo hire, Harken is the worst of the worst, antagonistically terrorizing his employees with a variety of threats. (Oh, and there’s the whole murder thing, too.)
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Cruella de Vil, specifically Glenn Close’s wickedly memorable portrayal in the 1996 Disney live-action film 101 Dalmatians, is another one of cinema’s most unhinged boss types. The fur-wearing, fashion-obsessed head of the House of DeVil is an abhorrent abuser who frequently eviscerates her staff and henchmen. Not to mention she pressures her employee to hand over her pet dog’s newborn puppies so she can literally make a coat out of them. That’s just evil.
Not all of cinema’s worst bosses are overtly psychopathic or criminal, though. Some are more mundanely insufferable, such as Bill Lumbergh, the exhausting VP in the 1999 job-burnout comedy Office Space. You may not ever come in contact with a David Harken or Cruella de Vil in real life (hopefully), but it’s very likely you’ve encountered a Lumbergh or two.
With these bosses in charge, 5PM can’t come soon enough. Here are 10 of the worst on-screen employers cinema has to offer.
The Worst Bosses in Movies
From psychopathic supervisors to conniving CEOs, you wouldn’t wanna work a day for these terrible, horrible bosses from cinema.
Gallery Credit: Erica Russell
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