25 Movies That Killed Careers

Heading into the film community's hectic and prestigious awards season, it's that time of year when careers are made, reputations are enhanced, and producers search far and wide for the latest crop of breakout actors and filmmakers. Just last year, relative unknowns like Jean Dujardin (The Artist) and Rooney Mara (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) watched their industry stocks rise significantly, so much that the former is currently shooting a movie with Martin Scorsese (The Wolf of Wall Street) and the latter has spent 2012 working with highly admired directors Steven Soderbergh and Terrence Malick.

Who will emerge from this year's awards race to become the next big things? It's too early to tell, so, naturally, it's as good a time as any to reflect upon the polar opposite of breaking through: totally sinking into the depths of Hollywood's unforgiving purgatory. With as much as luck and chance as it takes to select great, high watermark projects, folks working in the always fickle movie game can lose it all with by merely joining a production that's, unbeknownst to them, predestined to crash and burn.

For several uncomfortable reminders about the darkest side of being a professional actor or moviemaker, have a look at 25 Movies That Killed Careers.

RELATED: The 25 Most Anticipated Movies Of Fall 2012
RELATED: The 10 Worst Movies Of Summer 2012
RELATED: The 25 Worst Movies By Good Directors
RELATED: The 10 Worst Movie Franchises That Should Have Ended Earlier

Written by Matt Barone (@MBarone)

Follow @ComplexPopCult

The casualty: John Gilbert

The ever-eloquent Guru of Gang Starr said it best: "It's mostly the voice." However, the actors and actresses who achieved fame during the silent film era were lucky enough to avoid being judged by the vocal talents, namely John Gilbert, a box office champion nicknamed "the great lover."

When technological advances progressed cinema into the "talkies" phase, stars of Gilbert's caliber weren't able to avoid having to speak on camera for the first time, and when audiences heard the actor's voice in his first-ever talkie, 1929's His Glorious Night, the response was less than ecstatic.

More so than Gilbert's vocals, His Glorious Night's silly dialogue and overall shoddiness left the star reeling from the most poorly received film of his career. Today, he's regarded as one of the prime examples of a silent film heavyweight whose career was irrevocably damaged by the talkies.

The casualty: director Tod Browning

Tod Browning stands as one of the horror genre's most important directors, simply for making the 1931 classic Dracula, which stars the iconic Bela Lugosi and ranks as one of the greatest monster movies of all time. But what's less celebrated about Browning is the fact that, prior to Dracula, he was impressively prolific, shooting nearly 50 films categorized in all genres.

Browning bravely went for pure realism when casting his next horror film, Freaks, sidestepping costumes and makeup and hiring real-life physically deformed people to play a bunch of circus oddities. For audiences of the time, who'd never seen anything like that before in a movie, Freaks was far too shocking to stomach. The film was banned in the United Kingdom and Browning saw his stock in the moviemaking world plummet to the point of no return.

Those who've yet to see Freaks should seek it out immediately, for both its stunning audacity and one-of-a-kind creepiness. Browning's daringness warrants endless acknowledgement.

The casualty: director Charles Laughton

As an actor, England native Charles Laughton was a talented, class act. Horror heads will always remember him as the wonderfully deranged Dr. Moreau in the underrated gem Island of Lost Souls (1932), and followers of awards season history fondly recall his work through his Best Actor win for The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933) and nominations for Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) and Witness for the Prosecution (1957). As a director, though, Laughton wasn't quite as triumphant. At least not in life.

Laughton's directorial debut, the dark 1955 thriller The Night of the Hunter, premiered with a hulking, excellently frightening Robert Mitchum in the lead role, and foolish critics weren't all that kind. Nor were audiences, who, for the most part, ignored the film during its theatrical run.

Due to The Night of the Hunter's being such a letdown, Laughton never directed another movie. Which, in hindsight, is a damn shame, since his film, along with Mitchum's masterful performance, has stood the test of time to hold up as one of the better psychological horror films ever. One of its biggest fans, in fact, is Spike Lee, who took inspiration from Mitchum's "LOVE" tattoo (seen above) when giving his Do the Right Thing character Radio Raheem's his "love and hate" brass knuckles.

The casualty: director Michael Powell

As they say, time heals all wounds; it's just too bad that the late filmmaker Michael Powell wasn't alive long enough to fully feel the love. In 1960, the accomplished British director, known for adored pictures like 49th Parallel (1941) and The Red Shoes (1948), took a serious creative risk by directing the disturbing horror film Peeping Tom, a daring look at a voyeuristic serial killer that was phenomenally ahead of its time. Film critics contemporaries working in the United Kingdom didn't think so, viciously attacking not only the film but Powell himself for making what they considered to be a vile piece of misogynistic and degraded work.

Following the Peeping Tom backlash, Powell's career in the UK was ruined. If only people back in '60 realized what horror fans know today—that it's an exceptional exercise in suspenseful shock cinema—the genre could've had more Powell-directed, exemplary entries.

The casualty: director Michael Cimino

Behold what's arguably the biggest career-killer of them all.

Prior to the film's legendarily problematic production, director Michael Cimino was one of several filmmakers coasting through the 1970s on waves of critical praise and Academy Award recognition, thanks to the 1978 classic-in-the-making The Deer Hunter. In Heaven's Gate, about the animosity shared between European immigrants and land barons in Wyoming in the 1890s, Cimino saw the chance to create something truly epic, so much so that, through bullying, a shitty attitude, and other poor filmmaking tactics, he pushed the film way over budget, into the $44 million range (a huge sum back in 1980).

When the film premiered in November 1980, audiences hated it, as did several prominent critics who reviewed Heaven's Gate in time for its one-week theatrical run at one New York City theater. In April 1981, the film reopened with nearly an hour's worth of scenes cut; in the end, though, Heaven's Gate only grossed a paltry $3 million.

The casualty: actor Klinton Spilsbury

Never heard of Klinton Spilsbury? Then you're clearly not one of the five or six people who'd ever admit to having seen 1981's forgotten clunker The Legend of the Lone Ranger. An attempt to expand upon the legacy of the popular 1950s TV series, director William A. Fraker's inept flick introduced, and immediately dismissed from the public eye, newcomer Klinton Spilsbury as the titular hero.

The fresh-faced actor was reportedly a nightmare to work with on the film's set. His fighting with crew members and uncontrollable disobedience left Hollywood power-players unwilling to ever cast him in anything after The Legend of the Lone Ranger.

His two Golden Raspberry Awards (for Worst Actor and Worst New Star) might've had something to do with that, too, not to mention the producers' decision to dub in another actor's voice over Spilsbury's dialogue.

The casualty: director Willard Huyck

George Lucas, who's no stranger to poor choices (ask any Star Wars fan to assess his constant tinkering with their beloved trilogy), really dodged a bullet in the mid '80s when he opted not to direct the adaptation of Marvel Comics character Howard the Duck himself.

Remembered, with good reason, as one of the worst movies ever made, the 1986 assaults viewers with bad acting, cheesy special effects (opting for live-action over animation was idiotic), and screwball humor that even a little kid can recognize as wit-deficient. And don't even get us started on that duck-and-human sex scene.

The unfortunate job of directing Howard the Duck went to frequent Lucas collaborator Willard Huyck, an old film school friend of the Star Wars mastermind's who co-wrote the scripts for American Graffiti and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Lucas must have thought he was blessing his pal with the chance to direct a pricey big-studio affair; in reality, Huyck was given control of a movie that never stood a chance of being any good. He hasn't directed a single thing since.

The casualty: actor Geena Davis

Those who tuned into A&E's recent mini-series Coma were greeted by a familiar face: that of Geena Davis, a gifted actress who'll forever be associated with genre classics like David Cronenberg's The Fly (1986), Tim Burton's Beetlejuice (1988), and Ridley Scott's Thelma & Louise (1991). So why has Davis been off the grid for so many years, save for three Stuart Little films spanning from 1999 through 2006? Two words: Cutthroat Island.

Considered one of the biggest flops in cinematic history, the $98 million action-adventure misfire is also remembered as the last movie produced by Carolco Pictures before the company flat-lined in bankruptcy. It's also credited as one of the factors responsible for Davis' divorce from husband/Cutthroat Island director Renny Harlin, as well as the red mark on her permanent record that scared directors and casting agents off from casting the Academy Award winner in leading roles.

Proven by her Golden Globe-winning work in the short-lived ABC series Commander in Chief, Davis should be able to find steady work on the small screen. As for her return to feature film prominence, we wouldn't bet on it.

The casualty: actor Elizabeth Berkley

It seemed impossible that any Saved by the Bell veteran could ever unseat Dustin "Screech Powers" Diamond as the show's biggest pop culture punch line. Then again, no one was prepared for the creative catastrophe that was, and, frankly, still is, director Paul Verhoeven's NC-17 exotic dancer drama Showgirls.

Though she gave it her all in the film, engaging in a ridiculous pool sex scene and repeatedly rocking her birthday suit, Elizabeth "Jessica Spano" Berkley gave the kind of godawful performance in an all-around dire film that makes casting agents looking for bankable stars avoid an actor like he or she recently bathed in a bathtub full of salmonella water. At least she didn't have to bump uglies in a pool full of that.

The casualty: actor Lori Petty

In the early part of her career, Lori Petty had a nice streak going, starting with the badass action flick Point Break (1991), continuing with the women's baseball charmer A League of Their Own (1992), and completing a trifecta in the family-friendly hit Free Willy (1993).

While working on 1994's dumb-as-hell In the Army Now, though, Petty should have been wise enough to take cues from co-star Pauly Shore and do the exact opposite of everything he'd done. Unfortunately, she tried her first-billed luck in Tank Girl, a loud, annoying, and altogether silly sci-fi dud that represents the kind of film Shore would make if he were a chick and could get any studio executives to return his phone calls. Twenty-one million dollars' worth of lost studio money later, Petty has never been given even a reasonably sized role in a movie.

The casualty: director Roland Joffé

It's amazing what a single box office turkey can do to a great filmmaker's career. Before he tragically directed Demi Moore and Gary Oldman in the critically savaged 1995 mess The Scarlet Letter, Roland Joffé was a very respected shotcaller with a pair of Oscar-nominated movies to his name: The Killing Fields (1984) and The Mission (1986).

With The Scarlet Letter, a universally panned Nathaniel Hawthorne adaptation that barely broke double-digit box office grosses but cost $46 million, Joffé squandered all of his hard-earned good will, and it's been uninspired torture porn (Captivity, 2007) and poorly reviewed, minimally released historical pics (There Be Dragons, 2011) ever since.

The casualty: actor Carrot Top

The fact that a prop comedian shtick can only last so long in a feature film was the least of Carrot Top's problems when his big-screen starring debut, Chairman of the Board, premiered in 1998—the gaping lack of anything resembling an effectively funny joke should have been a much bigger concern.

Less Louis C.K. and more Yahoo Serious, Mr. Top's acting chops weren't exactly up to snuff, though hardly anyone actually paid to witness the one-note comic's inefficiencies for themselves. Chairman of the Board cost an estimated $10 million to produce andearned back a minuscule $181,000 in theaters.

Unsurprisingly, no studio executives have been foolhardy enough to give Carrot Top another prime movie opportunity. Chairman of the Board isn't a total washout, though; during an appearance on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, co-star Courtney Thorne-Smith was amazingly skewered by fellow guest Norm MacDonald, resulting in one of the greatest things you'll ever find on YouTube.

The casualty: actor Jake Lloyd

George Lucas' much-maligned Phantom Menace is an anomaly on this list. Going up against widespread fanboy disapproval, the first entry of the writer-director's second Star Wars trilogy was a huge financial success, and it gave young star Jake Lloyd, cast to play the crucial role of little Anakin Skywalker, a certified blockbuster to brag about amongst his grade-school buddies.

But the pressures of constant interviews, media attention, and every other demand cast upon Hollywood actors was too much for Lloyd, who retired from acting in 2001 after, per his past interviews, destroying all of his Star Wars swag. He also cited bullying from classmates as a factor in his decision to stop acting. After all, there's only so many Jar Jar Binks jokes a kid can take.

The casualty: actor Chris Kattan

It's an unwritten rule that anyone who rises to top-billed notoriety on NBC's Saturday Night Live must be given a shot at becoming a Hollywood actor. So, naturally, Chris Kattan earned himself the chance to evolve into the next Adam Sandler when Touchstone Pictures strangely saw potential in a lunkheaded mobster spoof called Corky Romano. Instead of being Kattan's Billy Madison, though, the insufferably grating "comedy" repelled audiences and found a spot alongside Julia Sweeney's It's Pat in the SNL cast member film canon.

The casualty: actor Tom Green

From the moment discerning folks first saw Tom Green's moronic shtick on MTV's The Tom Green Show in 1999, the smartest of viewers knew that the Canadian performer's routine wasn't long for this world. All it took to bring Green's career crashing down was an astoundingly bad film called Freddy Got Fingered, a braindead monstrosity in which the star/co-writer, amongst other inexcusable "gags," licks a bone sticking out of an injured's man leg and jerks off an elephant.

Audiences ignored the film, disgusted critics brutalized it, and only reality "stars" Ray J and Donald Trump (via The Celebrity Apprentice) has given Green any noteworthy on-screen shine in the years following Freddy Got Fingered's reign of comedic terror.

The casualty: director Ron Underwood

Ron Underwood, as far as we're concerned, will forever earn a pass for directing one of our favorite monster movies (1990's Tremors) and the hilarious 1991 comedy City Slickers. Unfortunately, we don't run Hollywood; thus, the permeating stench emitted by his 2002 disaster The Adventures of Pluto Nash will continue to leave Underwood off the wish-lists of studio executives looking to bankroll films that people might actually see.

That's what happens when a director is given $100 million to make a sci-fi blockbuster with the once-bankable Eddie Murphy and barely cracks $7 million in ticket sales. Yup, with the monumentally underperforming Pluto Nash, the poor big-wigs who ponied up cash to finance the film lost upwards of $93 mil. And the closest Underwood has made it to multiplexes since was 2005's embarrassing Usher Raymond vehicle In the Mix.

The casualty: actor/writer/director Robert Benigni

Straight out of Italy, lively filmmaker-actor Roberto Benigni blindsided Hollywood and American audiences in 1997 with Life is Beautiful, the funny and heart-wrenching Nazi concentration camp tearjerker that dominated the Oscars by winning three awards, including Best Actor (for Benigni) and Best Foreign Language Film. Afterwards, insiders waited patiently for five years to see if Benigni could repeat the international acclaim, and when he finally released his live-action Pinocchio adaptation in 2002, they received their answer. And it wasn't a good one.

Withheld from any press screenings by Miramax before its uneventful Christmas '02 release, Pinocchio reeked of catastrophe before confirming its direness to those unfortunate enough to endure Benigni's ill-advised efforts. Basically, Pinocchio is about a middle-aged guy prancing around in children's pajamas for nearly two hours, pretending to be a puppet while everyone else around him fumbles poorly written jokes and unsuccessfully tries to save what little face they can. Check out the film's Rotten Tomatoes page at some point—Pinocchio stands at a 0% approval rating, the same percentage as Bucky Larson: Born to be a Star.

Aside from a minor role in Woody Allen's recent disappointment To Rome with Love, Benigni's career has yet to fully revive post-Pinocchio. Some stories should never be anything but animated.

The casualty: actor Cuba Gooding Jr.

Cuba Gooding Jr.'s resume is rather deceiving. Following his Academy Award-winning performance in the 1996 smash Jerry Maguire, the actor has appeared in over 30 movies, which would lead one to believe that his career is alive and well. And it is, if by "alive and well" you mean "relegated to either small, co-starring parts, dismissible family films, of straight-to-DVD junk."

The credit for Gooding's downward spiral, post-Maguire, goes to Boat Trip, an excruciating embarrassment of a film that makes Snow Dogs look like Old Yeller. It's the kind of movie an actor should make years before starring in an Oscar-baiting movie, when upstart thespians are desperate enough to establish themselves that they'll willingly participate in the Z-grade comedies rejected by Saturday Night Live cast members. For a once-in-demand Academy Award recipient, though, Boat Trip is the kiss of leading-man death. Unless you consider Daddy Day Camp to be a good look.

The casualty: director Martin Brest

For all the insults and laughter the movie title Gigli instantly elicits, its two stars, Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez, are doing just fine these days. At best, the widely publicized flop is a stain on their otherwise positive track records. For director Martin Brest, however, Gigli is the last title on his directorial filmography.

That's right, the guy who once called the shots on Beverly Hills Cops, Midnight Run, and Scent of a Woman hasn't made a single thing since the wrath of Gigli brought with it scathing reviews, a $7 million box office tally (on a whopping $76 million budget), and six awards at the 2003 Golden Raspberry ceremonies. Affleck, meanwhile, has directed two excellent and lucrative films and has a third, and supposedly career-best, picture on the way (Argo). Sometimes, it's a really cold game for non-actors.

The casualty: director Stephen Norrington

Stephen Norrington's brief stint in Hollywood certainly began with success: His first shot at big-time filmmaking, 1998's Marvel Comics adaptation Blade, cashed out with over $130 million worldwide on a $45 mil budget and granted star Wesley Snipes a profitable and mostly well-received franchise. Five years later, it was time for Norrington to strike comic book adaptation gold once again with The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, based on notoriously anti-movie writer Alan Moore's beloved graphic novel and given a prime, blockbuster-specific July release date.

Despite the fact that the film raked in over $170 million worldwide, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen remains an abysmal mishmash of moronic dialogue, incoherent action sequences, and low-grade acting in the eyes of sensical movie lovers. One so bad that it inspired co-star Sean Connery to retire from acting. And Norrington has yet to make another movie, having helplessly watched studios rid him of assignments like Ghost Rider and Clash of the Titans. Clearly, the producers revisited The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen before upgrading Norrington's pre-production attachments to actual on-set directing.

The casualty: director Pitof

In the wake of Catwoman's box office no-show and four Golden Raspberry Awards victories, it's been star Halle Berry who's received the bulk of the ridicule, and rightfully so. After winning an Academy Award two years prior, the actress should've known better than to sign onto such an inept production. Yet, due to Berry's involuntary hoarding of the film's bad vibes, director Pitof's name is rarely ever associated with Catwoman. There's a good reason why, though: No one's heard a peep from the guy ever since its doomed release.

In his home country of France, Pitof spent the better part of a decade working as a visual effects supervisor, a native hustle that led him to perform the VFX task on the set of 1997's Alien: Resurrection. Since the dismal Catwoman's colossal failure, though, he's only directed a TV movie (Fire & Ice, 2008) and edited two as-yet-unseen short films. As far as Hollywood is concerned, Pitof's feature film-directing career is purr-fectly non-existent.

The casualty: actor Jamie Kennedy

We should all send blank checks to director Lawrence Guterman's house, because, if not for his decision to cast Jamie Kennedy and direct the awful and unnecessary sequel to Jim Carrey's The Mask, titled Son of the Mask, audiences could still occasionally fall victim to Kennedy's one-note comedic sensibilities. In bit parts, like the one he played in Scream and Scream 2, the goofy funnyman isn't half-bad, but, like Russell Brand after him (see: last year's Arthur), Kennedy isn't well-rounded enough to carry a film on his skinny back.

Not that Son of the Mask's laugh-free script did him any favors. A sophomoric attempt to sell tickets off Carrey's film's name, Guterman's bomb tasked Kennedy with reacting wide-eyed to a baby's horribly rendered CGI fuckery. Guterman exerted more energy on the film's obnoxious visual effects than he did on the actual screenplay. Kennedy, meanwhile, could only watch as his potential leading man career in big-screen comedies turned into what you'd find in his infant co-star's dirty diaper.

The casualty: writer-director Richard Kelly

Even though it sunk at the box office, the independently made and brain-scrambling coming-of-age oddity Donnie Darko (2001) has amassed a loyal, ever-growing cult following on home video, and it's easy to see why. Combining authentic and sympathetic high school characters with time travel, psychological horror, Tears for Fears, and end-of-the-world paranoia, Donnie Darko is one of the new millennium's most impressive directorial debuts. It's made all the more remarkable when you realize that writer-director Richard Kelly was only 26 in 2001.

After the film's warm critical reception and late-blooming popularity, Kelly had a decent amount of clout, and, to his credit, he avoided signing onto a pointless remake or bland sequel to oversee another original script, Southland Tales. That (for the many who have never seen the bomb) was an incredibly ambitious dystopian musical that clocked in at nearly three hours and satirized both America's celebrity culture and government-provoked corruption of the military. Complete with a proposed comic book to further illustrate the multilayered world he'd envisioned for the project, Kelly's sophomore effort was one brimming with shoot-for-the-stars fearlessness.

And, for the most part, critics loathed it. A disastrous premiere at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival planted the first seeds of bad buzz, which later sprouted into full-blown disappointment when a limited release merely triggered a dismal $375,000 worldwide intake on a budget estimated somewhere between $15-17 million. Just like that, the once-promising Kelly's reputation was permanently sullied with a now-infamous cinematic catastrophe, and all he's been able to direct since was the fascinatingly bizarre but financially pedestrian sci-fi/horror flick The Box (2009).

The casualty: actor Brandon Routh

In 2006, Brandon Routh was on top of the world. Only 27 years old at the time, the young actor had appeared on various television programs, including Will & Grace, Gilmore Girls, and One Life to Live. But when he won the coveted role of Clark Kent in director Bryan Singer's massive Man of Steel reboot, Superman Returns, Routh was poised to become one of Hollywood's hottest new faces. Until comic book die-hards saw the film.

To be fair, Superman Returns wasn't a failure; Singer's superhero blockbuster earned $391 million worldwide on a $209 million budget, and Routh even snagged a Best Actor prize at the Saturn Awards. Yet, in the eyes of DC Comics fanatics, his wooden, charisma-free turn as Superman was a non-factor in a largely miscast and ultimately unsatisfying production.

The stigma of being unable to capitalize on such a golden opportunity has since prevented Routh from landing any notable, bigger-sized roles in any major releases. Consider this: His only other leading roles were in last year's horrendous horror-comedy Dylan Dog: Dead of Night and the forgettably generic, and little seen, sports drama Crooked Arrows. Somewhere, Routh is probably praying that Henry Cavill, the star of next year's second Superman reboot, Man of Steel, feels his pain.

The casualty: actor Mike Myers

As long as they keep making Shrek movies, Mike Myers won't truly ever be "dead," career-wise. Just don't expect any live-action comedies written by and starring the Saturday Night Live alum anytime soon. Sorry, Austin Powers fans, but 2008's The Love Guru basically obliterated any hopes of having a major studio fork over the big bucks to Mr. Myers.

The bad will technically started in 2003, when The Cat in the Hat was nominated for three Razzie awards, including a Worst Actor nod for Myers. Instead of returning to the Austin Powers franchise, which would have at least provided a safety net stitched with familiarity, Myers tried introducing a new zany character to the masses: Guru Maurice Pitka, a painfully unfunny (dare we say racist) creation surrounded by a plethora of potty humor and a startling lack of originality.

Budgeted at $62 million, The Love Guru barely inched its way to $41 million at the box office. And Myers avoided a losing streak at the Razzies when he scored the Worst Actor trophy for this Worst Picture winner. We doubt even Wayne Campbell could resurrect Myers' leading man status at this point.