10 Movies That Made New York City Look Like The Worst Place In The World

3. Coming To America (1988)

Unlike most of the movies on this list, Coming To America provides some welcome comic relief in its depiction of New York as a dilapidated hell-hole, with Eddie Murphy as an enormously wealthy African Prince who travels to America to find his bride. Arsenio Hall tags along as his assistant, and whilst Prince Akeem seems completely content to lounge about in squalor 'til the job is done, assistant Semmi remains evidently (and humorously) appalled during the whole visit. Prince Akeem is pampered back in his fictional African home nation Zamunda, and whilst his parents have found him a perfect bride for when he rises to the throne, he instead decides to secretly search for his own woman over in America. Akeem believes that the best place to find a bride for a future King in such a vast country is, of course, in Queens, and after arriving in an dreary, overrun neighborhood, the Prince goes out of his way to hide his Royal background - renting the cheapest possible room and taking a job as a cleaner. A lot of the comedy in Coming To America stems from the contradiction between Akeem's grand roots and the working-class culture of Queens. Much of the movie depicts this area of New York as dirty, intimidating, and littered with crime, with Samuel L Jackson even popping up for one of his first ever film appearances as a foul-mouthed armed robber. This is an America where people throw themselves down the stairs to avoid paying rent, and whilst the movie shoots NYC as positively depressing, the clash of class and cultures that's created by the inclusion of two wildly wealthy fish out of water ensures for some hilarious results.