Cinema is a cruel and ruthless world that can send you into retirement long before your age. If some actors and actresses have paid the price, it has also happened for some directors, one of whose films turned out to be such a failure that it burned their careers. If most of them are not necessarily known, there are still a few surprises in the pile, you will see.
1. “Waterworld” et “The postman” – Kevin Costner
While he was in the odor of sanctity at the end of the 80s and considered one of the most bankable actors and directors in Hollywood, Kevin Costner suffered two considerable failures. Despite his Dancing with the wolves crowned at the oscars, it is Waterworld which began to smash his career: a financial failure which for a long time remained one of the most important in cinema. And right behind he realized The Postman who clearly didn’t catch up and scratched him from the studios for a long time.
2. “Rollerball” – John McTiernan
Probably one of the most incredible points of this top: the film Rollerball not only ended John McTiernan’s career but also landed him in prison for over a year. The director of Die Hard 1 and 3of Last Action Hero or even of Hunting for Red October has delivered with this film a bastard product torn between its vision and that of its producer, who obviously has a different opinion.
The rivalry between the two men led McTiernan to hire a private detective to wiretap the producer, and a little later to lie to an FBI agent for ordering the illegal tapping, which earned him the famous passage in prison. . And if the film was such a big failure it’s because these two visions doomed the work which could have been a huge criticism against the pro-war American government (all that is explained much better in this great episode of Chroma ).
3. “Vercingetorix” – Jacques Dorfmann
You may not know it, but Jacques Dorfmann had a rich career before realizing this turd that is Vercingetorix. Among other things, he produced Army of Shadows et The red circle of Melville, which is either enough to say that he did great things. But of the three films he directed, Vercingetorix is the one who gave the fatal blow to his decades-long career. A sad critical and financial failure from which he did not recover even if for the occasion Christophe Lambert had put on his most beautiful mustache.
4. “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen” – Stephen Norrington
Here is a man who excelled in his field since he was originally responsible for special effects on films as major as Alien et Alien 2. But the desire to go further pushed him to move on to directing, first with the film Blade then after a few projects with the film The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
And as much to tell you that it was a complete oven, a dramatic failure which made Sean Connery stop the cinema, just that, we had already talked about it in the last bad films of good actors. It was also Stephen Norrington’s last film in case you were wondering.
5. “John Carter” – Andrew Stanton
When you realize Disney‘s biggest cinematic failure it’s hard to get up. And yet Andrew Stanton had proven himself by making 1001 legs, The world of Nemo et Wall-E which are clearly not small successes. But John Carter lost so much money that he seriously threatened Disney. Stanton co-directed Dory’s World after his failure, but mostly moved on to directing series episodes for a while, not necessarily up to the guy behind Wall-E.
6. “The Gate of Heaven” – Michael Cimino
Before directing this film, Cimino was one of the hottest directors in Hollywood as he had just won the Oscars with Journey to the End of Hell. But barely two years after the release of his masterpiece his career was buried. The filming of The Gate of Paradise was a real ordeal, Cimino showing too much perfectionism: he had a meadow repainted that he did not find green enough and increased the gap between buildings in an avenue because the space did not suit him.
Huge budget overruns, extended shooting and multiple tangles with the studio: Cimino ended up placing a guard with a weapon in front of his editing room to ward off the representatives of the studio which, moreover, sank because of the failure of the film . As a result, the film did not work at all, which happens when you want to present a 5:30 film that you reduce to 3:40 and the reviews are extremely negative.
7. “Batman et Robin” – Joel Schumacher
With a checkered career that had shown him successes and failures, Joel Schumacher made a rather questionable first Batman soberly titled Batman Forever. We already felt a difference in quality with Tim Burton’s film but it was really the third part that badly broke Schumacher’s career: Batman and Robin.
God that was bad, even George Clooney shit on the movie by entering the list of actors who hate their performances. Don’t worry, Schumacher did a lot of other stuff after the fact, but it would be a lie to say that it didn’t taint his career.
8. “Troubled Love” – Martin Brest
Very promising director of the 80s with films like Le flic de Beverly Hills et Meet Joe Black, Martin Brest experienced the end of his career because of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez. Or rather because of the film that brought them together because it also killed the professional future of Brest by being a horrible failure destroyed by criticism. troubled loves has also collected several Razzie Awards, the ceremony which rewards the most worthless films, just to break the morale of Brest.
9. “Pinocchio” – Roberto Benigni
Right after moving the world with Life is Beautifulactor/director Roberto Benigni attempted an adaptation of Pinocchio which completely screwed up. The film was intended to be dramatic and was so failed that it became funny, which shot him in the foot two years after winning three Oscars. He tried again the experiment of the realization three years later with The Tiger and the Snow but with no more success. He has worked as a director or actor on only five films since 2002, that’s not much.
10. “Ghost of Mars” – John Carpenter
Surprisingly enough, Ghost of Mars was originally supposed to be the sequel to New York 1997 et los angeles 2013 as we told you with the films that were originally the sequel to another film. Several factors ruined Carpenter’s plan to complete his Adventures of Snake Plissken trilogy, including the commercial failure of the second installment. So he reworked his script of Escape from Mars but this resulted in an incomplete, badly conducted work which really did not deserve to ruin the career of the genius behind The Thing et Invasion Los Angeles.