10 Most Disappointing Movies That Wrecked a Director/Actor's Career (2025)

Actors and directors have to weigh up all their options before they sign on to something new. In the worst-case scenario, they know that if a movie is bad enough, their career will suffer for it. And unfortunately, that exact worst case scenario has happened to many people.

A lot of the time, it's not their fault that the movie was so bad. The creative team didn't gel together, or the studio interfered and made bad decisions. Nonetheless, the actor or director whose name was on the movie poster had to deal with the consequences.

10 Alicia Silverstone Was the Female Lead of Batman and Robin

Alicia Silverstone was riding high from Clueless when Batman and Robin came along. On the surface, it looked like an excellent career choice. Superhero movies were big business even back then and none other than George Clooney was going to play Batman. But it all went horribly wrong.

The movie was a disaster, hated by fans and critics alike. Clooney was able to survive it thanks to his strong body of work, but Silverstone had no chance. It was she who received a Razzie Award for her performance, and even more cruelly, she was body-shamed by those who hated the film. Even though, of course, her weight had nothing to do with anything.

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10

Batman and Robin

superheroes

Director

Joel Schumacher

Release Date

June 20, 1997

Cast

George Clooney , Arnold Schwarzenegger , Chris O'Donnell , Uma Thurman , Alicia Silverstone

Runtime

125 minutes

Characters By

Bill Finger, Bob Kane

Production Company

Warner Bros.

9 Jaden Smith Was Roasted for After Earth

After successful turns in The Day the Earth Stood Still and the Karate Kid remake, Jaden Smith was ready for a new challenge. He decided to star with his incredibly famous dad, Will Smith, in a science fiction film called After Earth. It was about a father and son who land on an abandoned Earth filled with dangers.

To say the movie wasn't successful would be an understatement. The film was absolutely loathed by critics, and it was heavily suggested that Jaden's career was the result of nepotism. He never acted in a big blockbuster movie again, and these days he's more of a musician than an actor.

After Earth

PG-13 (for intense violence and scary sequences)

Action

Adventure

Drama

Where to Watch

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See Also

Everest climber Irvine's foot believed found after 100 yearsWhat Happened in Middle-earth after the Lord of the Rings Movies?

*Availability in US

Director

M. Night Shyamalan

Release Date

May 31, 2013

Studio

Columbia Pictures

Cast

Will Smith , Jaden Smith , Sophie Okonedo , Isabelle Fuhrman , Zoe Kravitz

Writers

Gary Whitta , M. Night Shyamalan

Runtime

100 minutes

Main Genre

Science Fiction

8 Elizabeth Berkley Never Recovered From Showgirls

Elizabeth Berkley was primarily known for playing Jessie in Saved By the Bell when she decided to do Showgirls. Showgirls was an NC-17-rated film that controversy could not save, with Berkley getting the brunt of the bad reviews. After that, Berkley quit her talent agency and her movie career basically came to a dead end.

Berkley told People in 2020, "Of course it was disappointing that it didn't do well, but there was so much cruelty around it. I was bullied. And I didn't understand why I was being blamed. The job as an actor is to fulfill the vision of the director. And I did everything I was supposed to do." She went on, "No one associated with the film spoke up on my behalf to protect me. I was left out in the cold and I was a pariah in the industry I had worked so hard for."

Showgirls

7 Shannen Doherty Was Made the Scapegoat For Mallrats

When Kevin Smith made Mallrats in 1995, it was poorly reviewed and a box office failure. But it wasn't Smith who took the fall - it was the most recognizable person among the cast, Shannen Doherty. She was already famous for Beverly Hills, 90210, but had yet to break all the way into movies.

The failure of Mallrats ensured she never got that far. "People literally thought that I was carrying the movie so therefore... it was a box office failure it was completely on me. So there was no film career after that, which was a little brutal," she told Smith on her Let's Be Clear podcast. Smith apologized to her for that.

Mallrats

R

Romance

Where to Watch

• stream
• rent
• buy

*Availability in US

Director

Kevin Smith

Release Date

October 20, 1995

Cast

Shannen Doherty , Jeremy London , Jason Lee , Claire Forlani

Writers

Kevin Smith

Runtime

1 Hour 34 Minutes

Main Genre

Comedy

Producer

Sean Daniel, James Jacks, Scott Mosier

Production Company

Gramercy Pictures (I), Alphaville Films, View Askew Productions

6 Brandon Routh Lost Out After the Failure of Superman Returns

In 2006, Brandon Routh got what had to be the greatest gig in Hollywood: playing Superman. Unfortunately, the Superman film he was attached to was Superman Returns. Despite Routh putting in a perfectly solid performance as the Man of Steel, the film flopped, and with it went Routh's career.

Routh hasn't been in a big blockbuster since. He did, however, return to the world of superheroes with a role in The CW's Arrowverse, and eventually, he got to reprise his role of the Superman Returns Superman in the Arrowverse crossover Crisis on Infinite Earths. Superman Returns had more appreciation by that point, and those fans loved it.

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Superman Returns

PG-13

Superhero

Action

Adventure

Sci-Fi

Where to Watch

• stream
• rent
• buy

*Availability in US

Director

Bryn Singer

Release Date

June 30, 2006

Cast

Brandon Routh , Kevin Spacey , Kate Bosworth , James Marsden , Parker Posey , Frank Langella , Sam Huntington , Eva Marie Saint

Writers

Michael Dougherty , Dan Harris , Bryan Singer

Runtime

154 Minutes

Main Genre

Superhero

Production Company

Warner Bros., Legendary Entertainment, Peters Entertainment

5 Matthew Modine Had a Bomb With Cutthroat Island

The 1995 pirate flick Cutthroat Island cost $115 million to make and made a mere $10 million at the box office. Hollywood looked around for someone to blame and pointed the finger at star Matthew Modine. His career took a huge hit, as did pirate movies. It wasn't until 2003's Pirates of the Caribbean that the genre had a comeback.

Modine told Entertainment Weekly in 2016 that he never disliked the movie himself. "There are things that don’t work in the film that I feel critical about — which I don’t need to discuss now —but overall, it’s a fantastic film. And I think it’s as good as the Johnny Depp Pirates of the Caribbean movie. And you just wonder why one worked and another one didn’t. Was it just the wrong moment? Were we just too early?” he mused.

Cutthroat Island

PG-13

Action

Adventure

Director

Renny Harlin

Release Date

December 22, 1995

Cast

Geena Davis , Matthew Modine , Frank Langella , Maury Chaykin , Patrick Malahide , Stan Shaw

Writers

Robert King , Marc Norman

Runtime

124 Minutes

Main Genre

Adventure

Budget

$92-98 Million

Studio(s)

Carolco Pictures , Cutthroat Productions

Distributor(s)

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

4 Faye Dunaway Behaved Badly on the Set of Mommie Dearest

Faye Dunaway portrayed Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest. The film was awful, and reportedly Dunaway's behavior on set wasn't up to standard either. She was allegedly rude to the cast and crew and held up production constantly. Her career never recovered from the upset.

"I think it turned my career in a direction where people would irretrievably have the wrong impression of me – and that's an awful hard thing to beat," she told People in 2016. "I should have known better, but sometimes you're vulnerable and you don't realize what you're getting into. It's unfortunate they felt they had to make that kind of movie. But you can't be ashamed of the work you've done. You make a decision, and then you have to live with the consequence."

3 Stephen Norrington Fought With Sean Connery on The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

Stephen Norrington had previously directed Blade and seemed all set for major success, but then The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen came along. What followed was a legendary fight between Norrington and movie star Sean Connery, and that killed all chance of the movie being good.

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was actually successful at the box office, but not successful enough to guarantee a sequel, and Connery didn't want to do one anyway. He had such a bad time that he retired from acting, and the finished film was absolutely savaged by critics. Norrington never worked on a blockbuster again, with all his future projects ending up in development hell.

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

PG-13

Fantasy

Action

Thriller

Sci-Fi

Director

Stephen Norrington

Release Date

July 11, 2003

Cast

Sean Connery , Naseeruddin Shah , Shane West , Peta Wilson , Stuart Townsend , Jason Flemyng , Tony Curran , Richard Roxburgh

Writers

james robinson

Runtime

110 Minutes

Main Genre

Action

2 Lea Thompson Suffered Over Howard the Duck

When Howard the Duck came out, nobody had the slightest idea what to make of it. It was a box office disaster, received extremely negative reviews from critics, and was nominated for multiple Razzie awards. It did, however, become a cult classic in later years... but that reappraisal came too late for star Lea Thompson.

"There is no way to be an artist and put your heart into something and not be hurt when people say terrible things," Thompson told The Hollywood Reporter in 2021. I got whiplash from being in the most beloved movie of the year and then the most hated movie of the year. It gave me a unique perspective on Hollyweird."

Howard the Duck

PG

Action

Adventure

Comedy

A sarcastic humanoid duck is pulled from his homeworld to Earth where he must stop an alien invasion with the help of a nerdy scientist and a struggling female rock singer.

Director

Willard Huyck

Release Date

August 1, 1986

Cast

Lea Thompson , Jeffrey Jones , Tim Robbins , Ed Gale

Writers

Steve Gerber , Willard Huyck , Gloria Katz

Runtime

110 minutes

Main Genre

Adventure

1 Tom Hooper Hasn't Directed Another Movie Since Cats

Tom Hooper directed two hugely successful movies, The King's Speech and Les Miserables, before Cats landed in his lap. On paper, Cats might have seemed like an easy success, since it was based on a very popular Andrew Lloyd Webber musical... but Hooper and the producers made every wrong decision possible.

The cats were a combination of CGI and human actors, and they were pure nightmare fuel. The actors were all top caliber (Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Idris Elba) and they all could sing, but they couldn't possibly save the movie. Cats scored a spectacularly bad 19% on RottenTomatoes, and currently holds a 2.8 on IMDb. Hooper hasn't worked on a movie since, with his only post-Cats credits being two episodes of the BBC/HBO show His Dark Materials.

Cats

PG

Comedy

Drama

Family

Musical

Fantasy

Director

Tom Hooper

Release Date

December 20, 2019

Cast

James Corden , judi dench , Jason DeRulo , Idris Elba , Robbie Fairchild , Mette Towley

Writers

Lee Hall , Tom Hooper , Andrew Lloyd Webber

Runtime

110 minutes

Main Genre

Musical