Not every director is perfect. Even the best directors have directed some movies that audiences didn’t love so much. Francis Ford Coppola can’t make The Godfather every time, nor can Martin Scorsese direct movies as good as Goodfellas every time.
Making a movie is difficult and it is a testament to these directors that they have managed to make as many quality films as they have. While these directors have tremendous track records, some of their films are not considered to be as good as others. In some cases, great directors are even capable of films that are outright terrible.
Quentin Tarantino — Death Proof (7.0)
Tarantino has only directed ten movies so far, but each one has been so top-notch that a 7 is his lowest IMDb score. Death Proof has the gore that Tarantino is famous for, however, it doesn’t have the script. Pulp Fiction and Inglorious Basterds are both bloody movies that also have witty and sharp scripts to match with. Death Proof was a part of Grindhouse, so it was more focused on the violence than it was on the narrative.
Kurt Russell is a great villain as Stuntman Mike, but Death Proof still ends up being the most forgettable of Tarantino’s directing portfolio.
Robert Zemeckis — Welcome To Marwen (6.2)
Zemeckis has made many heartwarming, inspirational movies, including Forrest Gump, Cast Away, and Back to the Future. However, his latest attempt at reaching the hearts of viewers ended up being fairly flat. Audiences and critics found that Welcome to Marwen missed its mark when aiming for inspiration and ended up being rather boring.
Welcome to Marwen does have impressive stop-motion animation sequences when the dolls come to life, as well as a great performance from Steve Carell in the lead role, but it still doesn’t stop the movie from overstaying its welcome.
Martin Scorsese — Boxcar Bertha (6.0)
Scorsese’s second feature film wasn’t received as well as his first. Boxcar Bertha has been largely forgotten when discussing Scorsese films as it is his worst-reviewed movie. It is a violent movie, but the violence is more disturbing than it is exciting.
The story follows a couple who are on the run after Bertha is a suspect in a murder case. Scorsese is notorious for directing some fantastic gangster movies, but Boxcar Bertha is not considered to be one of his best efforts. Boxcar Bertha was produced by Roger Corman, so Scorsese may not have had as much freedom as he does now to execute his vision.
Steven Spielberg — 1941 (5.8)
1941 is Spielberg’s attempt at a war action-comedy, but it had mixed results. A war movie that re-teamed Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi after The Blues Brothers, it was a confusing choice for audiences and critics alike. Much of the humor of the film fell flat, which didn’t allow this hodge-podge of ideas to fully come together.
Belushi and Aykroyd are both hilarious actors, but their presence in a war film just seems out of place. Luckily, Spielberg would have much better results with war movies later in his career with Saving Private Ryan.
Stanley Kubrick — Fear And Desire (5.5)
Fear and Desire is Kubrick’s first attempt at a feature film, and it was a gutsy choice for a first-time director to start out with a war film. While Kubrick would go on to direct classic war films such as Paths of Glory and Full Metal Jacket, he didn’t quite nail it on his first try.
While it doesn’t have terrible reviews, it didn’t have much of a response with audiences as it was also a box office flop. Fear and Desire remains a forgotten movie in the highly-coveted catalog of movies directed by Kubrick.
Ron Howard — The Dilemma (5.3)
Similar to How the Grinch Stole Christmas, The Dilemma is an odd movie in Ron Howard’s portfolio. The film is a romantic comedy starring Vince Vaughn and Kevin James, where Vaughn catches James’ wife cheating on him and has to decide whether he should tell him or not. Reviews were poor for this movie and audiences didn’t respond well to it either.
The story is filled with clichés and the comedy mostly falls flat. Vaughn and James are funny actors, but this film just didn’t work for the most part. The Dilemma sounds more like an Adam Sandler movie than a film from the director of A Beautiful Mind.
Ridley Scott — The Counselor (5.3)
The Counselor has many ingredients that should have made something great. It is an intense crime thriller from Ridely Scott with an incredible cast including Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbender, Javier Bardem, Penélope Cruz, and Cameron Diaz. However, when The Counselor was released in 2013, it was largely rejected by both audiences and critics.
Many found the script to be very awkward, with an odd narrative and lots of awkward dialogue that was hard for any of the actors to make work. The script is one of the most important parts of any film, and even a skilled direct like Scott can only do so much with a flawed screenplay.
Clint Eastwood — The 15:17 To Paris (5.3)
Clint Eastwood has made plenty of movies that honor modern heroes including American Sniper and, most recently, Richard Jewell. The 15:17 to Paris portrayed three young Americans’ heroic act of thwarting a group of terrorists who hijacked a train. Eastwood made the unique decision to include the real-life heroes as the cast of the film, which didn’t work for many.
While it is a great way to honor these heroes, they are not professional actors and that was obvious to viewers as many of their line deliveries came off lifeless and awkward. The film also has a jumbled script that jumps around between time a lot. It’s a film that lacks focus, and while what it tried to do is commendable, most people jumped off this train before it got to its stop.
Alfred Hitchcock — Juno And The Paycock (4.8)
Hitchcock is the master of suspense, but not every one of his movies is a masterpiece. Juno and the Paycock is a comedy made by Hitchcock and there may be a reason why Hitchcock’s most remembered films are not his comedies.
The film was released in 1930 and is one of Hitchcock’s earliest features. His presence is not truly felt in this film, which may be because Hitchcock may not have mastered the classic Hitchcock vision which filmmakers consistently revere to this day. Audiences and critics have forgotten about this rather lackluster comedy from the legendary director.
Francis Ford Coppola — Tonight For Sure (3.1)
It’s hard to believe that the director of the Godfather trilogy would have a movie with this low of a score, but it is even harder to believe that Coppola directed a very raunchy, very adult comedy film in 1962. While Tonight For Sure has almost been neuralyzed from the minds of the general public, it still appears in Coppola’s filmography so it cannot be ignored. Based on the IMDb score for Tonight For Sure, this is an offer that almost everyone refused.
