Many actors have publicly expressed regret over films they've starred in, often citing poor scripts, difficult productions, or disappointing results. Here are 35 notable examples of stars who have openly criticized their own movies.
Josh Brolin on 'Jonah Hex'
Josh Brolin has been quite clear about his thoughts on his film 'Jonah Hex' over the years, telling Variety, 'It was not successful creatively or monetarily. I mean, everybody knows how I feel about 'Jonah Hex.'' He said in 2024, 'I won't ever stop shitting on 'Jonah Hex' because it was a shitty fucking movie!' Brolin had previously blamed much of the problem on his hiring of an inexperienced director, Jimmy Hayward; he'd done so after being rushed by the studio to pick someone within two weeks. 'I just think we made a big mistake with the director — not to blame it all at him, because that was my choice, that was my bad choice.'
'And then the studio took it over, and every time that's happened, in my experience, it has only gotten worse. That's what happens when you start cutting to this idea of pandering for an audience, and how testing can bite you in the ass,' he continued. 'You don't know what the audience is going to want. 'Jonah Hex' was them taking the movie back and saying, how can we make this the most accessible movie? And they ended up making the least accessible movie.' On another occasion, he said he 'hated' making the film. 'The experience of making it – that would have been a better movie based on what we did. As opposed to what ended up happening to it, which is going back and reshooting 66 pages in 12 days.'
He said he'd wanted it to be like 'High Plains Drifter,' and that if he'd had $5 million, he would do the movie he'd originally envisioned, because 'that's the version of that movie that would have been successful.'
Channing Tatum on 'G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra'
Channing Tatum really, reallyyyyy didn't want to do 'G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.' He reportedly turned it down seven times, but was eventually contractually obligated to star in it. He told Howard Stern, 'I fucking hate that movie. I hate that movie. I was pushed into doing that movie.'
For the second film, 'G.I. Joe: Retaliation,' he asked that his character be killed in the first 10 minutes. From 'Coach Carter,' they signed me to a three-picture deal … As a young [actor], you're like, 'Oh my god, that sounds amazing, I'm doing that!' He continued. 'Time goes by, and you get other jobs, and you're building your quote, and you have a dream job you want to do. And … the studio calls up, and they're like, 'Hey, we got a movie for you, we're going to send it to you.' And they send it to you, and it's 'GI Joe.'' Tatum said the script was bad, but he was told he'd be sued if he refused to do it. He complied and even returned for the sequel, though he asked that his character be killed in the first 10 minutes.
Matthew Goode on 'Leap Year'
Matthew Goode knew that 'Leap Year' would be a mess from the start. 'I just know that there are a lot of people who will say it is the worst film of 2010,' he said, revealing he mainly took it so he 'could come home at the weekends.' (The shoot was in Dublin, and Goode was then living in England with his girlfriend and newborn.) 'It wasn't because of the script, trust me. I was told it was going to be like 'The Quiet Man' with a Vaughan Williams soundtrack, but in the end, it turned out to have pop music all over it. A bit like 'Chasing Liberty' again. Do I feel I let myself down? No. Was it a bad job? Yes, it was. But, you know, I had a nice time, and I got paid.'
Hugh Grant on 'Did You Hear About the Morgans?'
Hugh Grant called 'Did You Hear About the Morgans?' a 'massive turkey' and a 'total failure,' and blamed it for his career cooling afterward. He called his offers drying up 'slightly embarrassing' and said he was sensitive at the time about people not liking the film. He also regretted how many rom-coms he made at the time; though some have stood the test of time (particularly 'Music and Lyrics'), he felt, 'I should've made interesting decisions and done different stuff. Instead, I repeated myself almost identically about 17 times in a row.' However, he said, 'It was very charming to me' of the storyline, so it's not all bad.
Ben Affleck on 'Armageddon' and 'Daredevil'
Ben Affleck openly mocked 'Armageddon' throughout the DVD's commentary, dissecting the main plotline of the film. 'I asked Michael why it was easier to train oil drillers [to become astronauts] than astronauts to become oil drillers, and he told me to shut the fuck up, so that was the end of that talk,' he says at one point. He also questions, 'In a week, we're going to learn how to be astronauts?', calling it a 'logic stretch' that astronauts couldn't learn to drill. 'They don't know jack about drilling? How hard can it be? Aim the drill at the ground and turn it on.'
'Have you ever noticed that everybody in all these movies always has to be 'the best?'' he also points out. 'Bruce Willis is 'the best' deep-core driller? I didn't know they rated deep-core drillers. Like, if you went around and asked somebody, 'Who's the best deep-core driller?' You know what I mean? Like, 'I'm the best espresso maker in Manhattan.' How do you know? Who's keeping track of these things?' He stood by his comments years later. 'Everything I said was a hundred percent true.' He's even called the commentary the 'best work' of his career. He's also called the film 'the weirdest, kind of wonderful, strange, otherworldly movie experience,' so it certainly doesn't seem he had a bad time filming it.
'Armageddon' isn't the only film of Ben Affleck's career that he has panned. He later said his movie 'Daredevil' 'didn't work at all.' He continued, 'If I wanted to go viral, I would be less polite. That was before people realized you could make these movies and make them well. There was a cynical sense of 'Put a red leather outfit on a guy, have him run around, hunt some bad guys, and cash the check.'' He later called the film the only one he regrets, saying it 'killed' him that 'it got f―ked up the way it did.'
Robert Downey Jr. on 'Dolittle'
Robert Downey Jr. called 'Dolittle' a 'two-and-a-half-year wound of squandered opportunity.' Finally done with the MCU (well, at the time), Downey Jr. thought the film could be 'another big, fun, well-executed potential franchise,' though he 'had some reservations.' Still, he and his team got overexcited as he was 'bulletproof' and a genre movie 'guru,' losing sight of the importance of execution. Ultimately, he said, his wife, Susan Downey, who produced the film, had to roll 'her sleeves up to her armpits to make it even serviceable enough to bring to market' — and the two had to change their business advisors.
Rooney Mara on 'A Nightmare on Elm Street'
Rooney Mara almost quit acting after starring in the 'Nightmare on Elm Street' reboot. She called it 'not a good experience' — though she declined to go much farther. 'I have to be careful with what I say and how I talk about it. It wasn't the best experience making it, and I kind of got to this place, that I still live in, that I don't want to act unless I'm doing stuff that I feel like I have to do. So after making that film, I kind of decided, 'Ok, I'm just not going to act anymore unless it's something that I feel that way about.''
In another interview, she gave a few more details. 'I didn't want to act anymore. I was like, this isn't what I signed up for. If this is what my opportunities are going to be like, then I'm not that interested in acting. So I was very discouraged and disheartened,' she said. She actually said she hadn't wanted the role in the first place. 'You kind of learn to self-sabotage with things you don't want to get. Sometimes you don't want to get something, but you do a really good job, and you get it anyway. That was kind of [what happened with] 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' — I didn't really even want it. And then I went in [to audition], and I was like, [whispering] 'F—. I definitely got that.''
Mark Wahlberg on 'The Happening'
At a press conference for 'The Fighter,' Mark Wahlberg acknowledged a 'bad movie that [he] did,' saying that Amy Adams dodged a bullet by not costarring in the film. While he initially did not want to reveal the film, he quickly changed his mind. 'Alright. 'The Happening.' Fuck it,' Wahlberg said, naming the sci-fi flop in which his performance was widely panned. 'It is what it is. Fucking trees, man. The plants. Fuck it. You can't blame me for not wanting to try to play a science teacher. At least I wasn't playing a cop or a crook.'
Paul Newman on 'The Silver Chalice'
Nobody seemed to hate 'The Silver Chalice' more than its star, Paul Newman, who actually took out a newspaper ad to apologize for the film when it was set to air on TV, trying to get people not to tune in (this backfired). He called his debut film 'the worst movie produced in the fifties.' In his autobiography, he recalled being aghast at seeing the 'god-awful' finished product, certain it would destroy his career. 'That I survived that picture is a testament to something,' he said in a 1994 interview. 'I was horrified and traumatized when I saw the film. I was sure my acting career had begun and ended with the same picture. It was god-awful. It's kind of a distinction to say I was in the worst film to be made in the entirety of the 1950s,' he wrote.
Sean Connery on James Bond
In another older example, Sean Connery famously hated playing James Bond, the role he is best known for, especially as the films went on. He said the movies 'don't tax one as an actor. All one really needs is the constitution of a rugby player to get through 18 weeks of swimming, slugging, and necking.' He also stated post-'Thunderball,' his fourth Bond film, 'What is needed now is a change of course, more attention to character and better dialogue.' The part itself, he described as 'a cross, a privilege, a joke, a challenge. And as bloody intrusive as a nightmare.' He at one point stated he hated James Bond and would 'like to kill him.'
Ralph Fiennes on 'The Avengers'
Ralph Fiennes called 'The Avengers' 'the turkey of all turkeys,' telling Vanity Fair, 'They didn't even have a premiere. They didn't even have screenings. They just said, 'Put it out and then shut your eyes.'' It was so bad he actually thought it would end his career, though he hadn't realized it was bad while making it. 'I loved going to work on 'The Avengers,'' he said. 'You don't go to work thinking you're going to make a bad film. I went to work thinking, 'Great, let's reinvent 'The Avengers,'' which I loved as a kid. It's only now, because of the way it was received, that we look back and groan.' However, ultimately, 'I think it's a badge of honor to have a real flop on your resume,' he said.
Will Smith on 'Wild Wild West' and 'After Earth'
Will Smith essentially revealed he only did 'Wild Wild West' to make money at the box office, and kind of 'tricked' people into seeing it. 'I had so much success that I started to taste global blood, and my focus shifted from my artistry to winning,' Smith said. 'I wanted to win and be the biggest movie star, and what happened was there was a lag — around 'Wild Wild West' time — I found myself promoting something because I wanted to win versus promoting something because I believed in it.' Back then, he said, it was easy to market a 'crap movie' to fans through 'a trailer with a lot of explosions.' But modern audiences are different. 'I have to be in tune with [the fans'] needs and not trick them into going to see 'Wild Wild West.''
Reflecting on his career in another interview, he said, 'There's been disappointments, but every time I came back with a newer, fresher attitude. But the first time where it didn't work the way that I wanted was 'Wild Wild West.' I was coming off of 'Men in Black,' and everything was like, 'Oh, we can't lose,' you know?' Of course, the film was a major loss. 'I was like, 'Oh! Tragedy!'' He actually turned down 'The Matrix' to do the film in what has to be one of the biggest film fumbles of all time.
He also called 'After Earth' 'the most painful failure of my career' — especially because he dragged his son Jaden into it. ''Wild Wild West' was less painful than 'After Earth' because my son was involved in 'After Earth,' and I led him into it. That was excruciating,' Smith told Variety, stating that it led to him realizing that his MO in life — to be number one — was 'not a good source of creation.' He recalled being 'devastated' about the reviews, though learning his father had cancer shortly after quickly eclipsed his feelings on the film. 'That Monday started the new phase of my life, a new concept: Only love is going to fill that hole,' he said of processing the news. 'You can't win enough, you can't have enough money, you can't succeed enough. There is not enough. The only thing that will ever satiate that existential thirst is love. And I just remember that day I made the shift from wanting to be a winner to wanting to have the most powerful, deep, and beautiful relationships I could possibly have.'
Faye Dunaway on 'Mommie Dearest'
Faye Dunaway wishes she had never made 'Mommie Dearest,' in which she played Joan Crawford. 'It was meant to be a window into a tortured soul. But it was made into camp,' she said of the film, stating also that it 'was never modulated director-ally' and became 'kind of a Kabuki performance.' Dunaway also came to view the film, which was based on Crawford's daughter's memoir, as exploitative, saying, 'It's unfortunate they feel they had [to] make this kind of movie.' She suggested it lacked nuance. 'It wasn't brought into a vision that said, 'Look, let's really talk about who these two people were.' Only God may ever know what passed between [Crawford and her daughter].'
'In many ways, I think [the relationship] was the inevitable tragedy that comes from a child of want, which is what Crawford was, and a child of plenty, which is what the little blonde girl was,' Dunaway continued. 'I think it turned my career in a direction where people would irretrievably have the wrong impression of me,' she told People years later. 'And that's an awful hard thing to beat. I should have known better, but sometimes you're vulnerable, and you don't realize what you're getting into.' However, she concluded, 'You can't be ashamed of the work you've done. You make a decision, and then you have to live with the consequences.'
Charlton Heston on 'Beneath the Planet of the Apes'
Charles Heston found sequels 'tacky' and did NOT want to appear in 'Beneath the Planet of the Apes.' However, he was ultimately convinced by producer Richard Zanuck, who got him to take a gamble. Still, Heston said he'd only do it if his character — along with everyone else on the planet — were killed in an atomic bomb blast. He only appeared briefly at the start and end of the film, but he quickly became unhappy even with this, calling it 'my promised chore' that he was 'beginning to regret.' He also called it the first film 'I've ever done in my life for which I have no enthusiasm.'
Charlize Theron on 'Reindeer Games'
Charlize Theron called 'Reindeer Games' 'a bad, bad, bad movie.' However, she said, 'Even though the movie might suck, I got to work with John Frankenheimer. I wasn't lying to myself — that's why I did it. I mean, he directed 'The Manchurian Candidate,' which is like the movie of all movies. Fuck regret. Just fuck it.'
Jacob Elordi on 'The Kissing Booth'
Jacob Elordi said of 'The Kissing Booth' films, 'I didn't want to make those movies before I made those movies.' He also called them 'ridiculous' and 'not universal. They're an escape.' When asked if he had a 'one for them, one for me' mentality, Elordi said, 'My 'one for them,' I've done it. That one's a trap as well. Because it can become 15 for them, none for you. You have no original ideas, and you're dead inside. So it's a fine dance.'
Richard Gere on 'Pretty Woman'
Richard Gere similarly found one of his major roles frivolous. He called 'Pretty Woman' 'a silly romantic comedy' and his 'least favorite thing.' He also criticized the film's glorification of Wall Street types and corporate raiders. 'It made those guys seem dashing, which was wrong,' he said. 'Thankfully, today, we are all more skeptical of those guys.'
Shia LaBeouf on 'Transformers'
Shia LaBeouf heavily criticized 'Transformers,' which turned him from a child actor to an action star, calling the series 'irrelevant' and 'dated as f**k.' He continued, 'You come up on these stories about 'Easy Rider' and 'Raging Bull' and De Niro and Scorsese and Hopper, and you find value in what they do. Meanwhile, you're chasing energon crystals. It's very hard to keep doing what you're doing when you feel like it's the antithesis of your purpose on this planet.'
He criticized the second film in particular, saying he 'wasn't impressed with what we did.' Promoting another film at Cannes, he stated, 'There were some really wild stunts in it, but the heart was gone…we got lost. We tried to get bigger. Mike,' he continued, referencing the film's director, Michael Bay, 'went so big that it became too big, and I think you lost the anchor of the movie. You lost a bit of the relationships. Unless you have those relationships, then the movie doesn't matter. Then it's just a bunch of robots fighting each other.' In another interview, he called the second film overly complicated and confusing, saying they were making a movie with no script, making it up as they went, just to hit a deadline.
Alec Guinness on 'Star Wars'
Alec Guinness famously hated 'Star Wars.' He even reportedly begged George Lucas to kill his character, Obi-Wan Kenobi, off. 'I just couldn't go on speaking those bloody awful lines. I'd had enough of the mumbo jumbo,' he said. He also once recounted a story where a young boy who had seen 'Star Wars' dozens of times asked for his autograph. Guinness said he'd give it on the condition that the boy never watched 'Star Wars' again.
Jamie Lee Curtis on 'Virus'
Jamie Lee Curtis has openly admitted to hating her 1999 movie 'Virus,' calling it 'unbelievably shit' and 'unbelievably bad...from the bottom.' She said she knew it was bad during filming, but was left with little choice in continuing with the train wreck. 'It was maybe the only time I've known something was just bad, and there was nothing I could do about it.'
Sally Field on 'The Amazing Spider-Man'
Sally Field, who played Aunt May in the 'Amazing Spider-Man' films, was pretty scathing in her critique of them. 'It's not my kind of movie,' she told Howard Stern. 'It's really hard to find a three-dimensional character in it. You work it as much as you can, but you can't put 10 pounds of shit in a five-pound bag.'
George Clooney on 'Batman & Robin'
George Clooney panned 'Batman & Robin,' though he did take a lot of the blame, saying it 'physically hurts' to watch his performance. He also called the screenplay 'terrible.' He even revealed he won't let his wife or kids watch the film because 'There are certain films I just go, 'I want my wife to have some respect for me,'' and 'It's bad when your 4-year-old kid goes, 'This sucks.' That could be painful.'
Val Kilmer on 'Batman Forever'
Val Kilmer had a similar experience, where he tried to show his children 'Batman Forever,' only for them to fully walk out after less than 20 minutes into the film. He continued to watch it 'like a chump,' and later concluded, 'it's so bad, it's almost good.' Turns out he hadn't even read the script before he took the role...which he only did to make money so that he could have time to write and become 'the wild auteur I saw as my destiny.' He quickly became disillusioned with the project, namely due to the heavy (almost 100-pound), uncomfortable suit, which made it difficult to act as he could barely hear his costars. He also felt it didn't even matter who was in the suit and that playing the role was a 'cipher'; essentially just following instructions. 'It's not about Batman,' he said. 'There is no Batman.'
Tim Roth on 'United Passions'
Tim Roth also did a film for money. He said he 'hated' filming 'United Passions' and called it 'the wrong film but for the right reasons.' He continued, 'I had two kids in college, so I had to make a decision, and it was probably poorly judged, but once you make that decision, you have to follow through. It's a hard road, being in something you don't want to do, but I'm glad I did it for my family.'
Viola Davis on 'The Help'
Viola Davis heavily criticized 'The Help' for its white savior narrative and not putting the maids at the forefront of the film. She said, 'There's a part of me that feels like I betrayed myself, and my people, because I was in a movie that wasn't ready to [tell the whole truth].' She also said the movie was made 'in the filter and the cesspool of systemic racism' and that she regrets taking the role.
Bryce Dallas Howard, who played Hilly (the villain) in the film, ended up agreeing with Davis's criticism: ''The Help' is a fictional story told through the perspective of a white character and was created by predominantly white storytellers. We can all go further. Stories are a gateway to radical empathy, and the greatest ones are catalysts for action,' she said.
Gwyneth Paltrow on 'Shallow Hal'
In another problematic film, the actors wish they'd never appeared in, Gwyneth Paltrow really regretted starring in 'Shallow Hal,' calling the fatphobic movie a 'disaster' and her least favorite role.
And Jack Black also reportedly said he felt like he sold out with the film: 'I had an opportunity to work with some dudes I thought were really funny, but it didn't turn out as I'd hoped. I wasn't proud of it, and I got paid a lot of money, so in retrospect, it feels like a sell-out.'
Halle Berry on 'The Rich Man's Wife'
Halle Berry did NOT like her film 'The Rich Man's Wife,' and she knew it would be bad from the start. 'I'm sorry, everybody who worked on this movie, but I kind of knew it wasn't going to be the greatest cinematic experience for the people,' Berry revealed on 'The Late Late Show with James Corden.' 'You go into these movies always with the best intention,' she continued, 'But then sometimes you get on the set, and then you realize, 'What, was I high when I agreed to do this? Was I smoking crack?'' The film received 14% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Sandra Bullock on 'Speed 2: Cruise Control'
Sandra Bullock regretted starring in the 'Speed' sequel, 'Speed 2: Cruise Control,' which has a 4% on Rotten Tomatoes. 'I have one [that] no one came around to, and I'm still embarrassed I was in. It's called 'Speed 2.' I've been very vocal about it. Makes no sense. Slow boat. Slowly going towards an island.' Bullock said she wished she hadn't done it, which was the choice that her 'Speed' costar Keanu Reeves made, saying he 'didn't respond to the script.'
David Cross on 'Alvin and the Chipmunks'
David Cross wasn't fond of any of the 'Alvin and the Chipmunks' films, saying, 'All I wanted was to get the f**k out of there as soon as possible…and buy a summer home with the check.' Still, it was the third one that really killed him; he called it 'literally, without question, the most unpleasant experience I've ever had in my professional life,' saying that for the film, he was 'forced at legal gunpoint' to spend an entire week on a Carnival Cruise.
On the 'Jim Norton and Sam Roberts' podcast, Cross spoke about getting the call that he was going to have to appear in the film. He said of the pelican scenes that he figured a stand-in could be used since his face originally wasn't going to be shown, but that he was told he had to be there because of his 'distinctive walk,' even after begging. Cross actually lost out on $150,000 due to his brutal honesty about the film. He was supposed to receive the amount as a bonus for promoting the film, but lost out on it after publicly trashing the movie and his experience on set.
Sylvester Stallone on 'Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot'
Sylvester Stallone said the critically panned 'Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot' was 'the worst film I've ever made by far.' He also called it 'maybe one of the worst films in the entire solar system, including alien productions we've never seen,' and said, 'a flatworm could write a better script than 'Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot.'' He only took the role in the critically panned movie because he thought he was taking the part from longtime rival Arnold Schwarzenegger — he was essentially tricked into it by Schwarzenegger faking interest.
'I read the script. It was so bad,' Schwarzenegger said. 'So I went in – this was during our war [between Schwarzenegger and Stallone] – I said to myself, I'm going to leak out that I have tremendous interest. I know the way it works in Hollywood. I would then ask for a lot of money. So then they'd say, 'Let's go give it to Sly. Maybe we can get him for cheaper.' So they told Sly, 'Schwarzenegger's interested. Here's the press clippings. He's talked about that. If you want to grab that one away from him, that is available.' And he went for it! He totally went for it. A week later, I heard about it, 'Sly is signing now to do this movie.' And I said, [pumps fist] 'Yes!''
Bob Hoskins on 'Super Mario Bros.'
Bob Hoskins REALLY hated 'Super Mario Bros.' In an interview, he called it his worst job, biggest disappointment, and the one thing in his life he would go back and change. He'd previously said, 'It was a fuckin' nightmare. The whole experience was a nightmare. It had a husband-and-wife team directing, whose arrogance had been mistaken for talent. After so many weeks, their own agent told them to get off the set! Fuckin' nightmare. Fuckin' idiots.'
His costar Dennis Hopper felt similarly, saying, 'It was a nightmare, very honestly, that movie. It was a husband-and-wife directing team who were both control freaks and wouldn't talk before they made decisions. Anyway, I was supposed to go down there for five weeks, and I was there for 17. It was so over budget.' He recalled seeing the film with his then six or seven-year-old son, who afterward asked why he'd done the film. Hopper said he told his son, 'so you could have shoes.' His son apparently replied, 'Dad, I don't need shoes that badly.'
Christopher Plummer on 'The Sound of Music'
Christopher Plummer never liked 'The Sound of Music.' 'It was so awful and sentimental and gooey,' he told the Hollywood Reporter. Plummer also called it his most challenging role, as 'You had to work terribly hard to try and infuse some minuscule bit of humor into it.' He also said he was bored with the character: 'Although we worked hard enough to make him interesting, it was a bit like flogging a dead horse. And the subject matter is not mine. I mean, it can't appeal to every person in the world. It's not my cup of tea.' However, he ultimately came around to the film later in life, calling it 'terrific' and 'timeless.'
Michelle Pfeiffer on 'Grease 2'
And finally, Michelle Pfeiffer reportedly hated her film 'Grease 2' 'with a vengeance' and 'could not believe how bad it was,' saying she was 'young and didn't know any better' when she took the role. The sequel was massively panned, but it did jumpstart Pfeiffer's career, so it can't be a total loss!
