Actors Who Regret Their '90s Movies
The 1990s are littered with some of the most genre-shaking movies in the history of cinema. Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction" redefined crime capers. "Jurassic Park" pushed special effects to new heights. "The Matrix" changed the face of popular science fiction. Hollywood underwent an upheaval of classics that still resonates today — and all of these ground-breaking movies star some of the biggest names the industry has ever known.
While the decade offered these stars the chance to experiment and push the boundaries of cinema, there were also times when it pushed them into projects that they came to regret. Moments of misjudgment left a stain on their careers they look back on and wince. Whether it was because of problems during production, a crisis of faith, or because the movie just turned out to be awful, the reasons they rue these roles are diverse. From Kate Winslet to Hugh Grant, these are the stars who wish that some of their biggest blunders of the '90s never happened.
Sandra Bullock
Sandra Bullock became one of Hollywood's biggest rising starlets after appearing opposite Sylvester Stallone in the 1993 action movie "Demolition Man." A year later she starred with Keanu Reeves in the blockbuster classic "Speed." But when a sequel was greenlit, Reeves chose not to return. This gave Bullock the rare chance to take a leading role in her very own action movie, with Jason Patric as her co-star. Unfortunately, when all was said and done, the movie was a huge flop, barely making back its own budget. And in the years since, the actress has admitted just how much she wishes it had never happened.
In 2022 she was asked by TooFab if there was any movie in her career that she initially didn't like, but that perhaps she'd learned to appreciate because of its fan following. "I have one no one came around to and I'm still embarrassed I was in," she said. "It's called 'Speed 2.'" Admitting that the plot of a slow-moving boat never really made a lick of sense to begin with, Bullock revealed that the entire project was a shameful cinema sin from top to bottom. "That's one I wished I hadn't done and no fans came around, that I know of, except for you," she said, after the interviewer claimed they enjoyed the film.
Sylvester Stallone
He may be one of Hollywood's biggest action heroes, but Sylvester Stallone has had his failures too. From the much-maligned "Judge Dredd" to the awkward '80s Dolly Parton drama "Rhinestone," he probably regrets a great many films in his career. But there's one '90s flop that stands head and shoulder above the rest: The 1992 action-comedy "Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot."
"Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot" is best known for being the film Stallone was tricked into making by none other than action rival Arnold Schwarzenegger, who pretended to be after the role himself. "I had heard Schwarzenegger was going to do that movie and I said, 'I'm going to beat him to it," he told The Hollywood Reporter. "I think he set me up." Instantly regretting it, he was confused by the rest of the film's casting, particularly "Golden Girls" star Estelle Getty. "[It] was supposed to be like 'Throw Momma From the Train' with the mom as this really nasty piece of work. Instead, you hire the nicest woman in Hollywood, Estelle Getty, who you wish was your mother."
In the years since, Stallone has made his hatred of the film known, telling GQ in 2017, "If you ever want someone to confess to murder, just make him or her sit through that film. They will confess to anything after 15 minutes!"
George Clooney
The moment you hear the name "George Clooney" on a list of regrettable movies, you probably already know which movie is being lamented. It's one of the most infamous comic book adaptations ever, a film so bad it killed a franchise and nearly destroyed multiple careers. Released in 1997 and directed by Joel Schumacher, "Batman & Robin" was the fourth film in the series and Clooney's first big blockbuster project after starring in the hit medical drama "ER."It was also a notorious flop. Instead of making Clooney a sought-after action hero, he had to spend years apologizing for it.
"I always apologize for 'Batman & Robin," Clooney said in an appearance on the Graham Norton Show in 2015. "I thought at the time it was going to be a very good career move. It wasn't." And he hasn't stopped trashing the film. In 2020, in an interview with Howard Stern (via The Hollywood Reporter), he went further into just how awful the flick really is.
"Akiva Goldsman — who's won the Oscar for writing since then — he wrote the screenplay, and it's a terrible screenplay, he'll tell you ... Joel Schumacher, who just passed away, directed it, and he'd say, 'Yeah, it didn't work,'" the star remarked. But Clooney didn't just lay the blame at the feet of others; he readily admits to his own failure playing Bruce Wayne. "The truth of the matter is, I was bad in it ... We all whiffed on that one," he conceded.
Tom Hanks
Star of countless big screen classics, Tom Hanks counts six Academy Award nominations to his name, including two back-to-back wins in 1994 and 1995. He also has seven Primetime Emmy Awards as a producer, on such favorites as "Band of Brothers" and "Olive Kitteridge." Yet even with all his success, Hanks still has a movie that he finds hard to stomach years later. Directed by Brian De Palma and co-starring Bruce Willis, Melanie Griffith, and Morgan Freeman, "The Bonfire of the Vanities" makes Hanks cringe to this day.
A black comedy based on the celebrated 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe, the film sees Hanks play Sherman McCoy, a Wall Street power player, husband, and father whose wealth isn't quite what it seems. As his finances get stretched to their limits, he accidentally kills a bystander with his car while out with his mistress. When this is discovered by a local attorney, it leads to a firestorm. It's a story with a lot to say on racism, class inequality, and the excess of the '80s, but even with all of its high-minded themes, it just isn't very good.
"It's one of the crappiest movies ever made," he told Oprah Winfrey in a 2001 interview in her magazine, O. And Hanks wasn't alone in this opinion: The film was a box office bomb that was met with derision from critics, making many "worst of the '90s" lists.
Reese Witherspoon
When an actor has serious regrets about a movie, to the point of wishing to erase it from their filmography, it's usually about how bad the movie turned out. Maybe it harmed their career, is a stain on an otherwise strong work history, or is a persistent source of mockery. But in the case of Reese Witherspoon, she has an entirely different reason to wish she'd never made her most regrettable movies: her own happiness.
"I did a movie every time I was pregnant," Witherspoon said in a roundtable interview with The Hollywood Reporter that also included Jessica Lange (via The Statesman). "And I wish that I hadn't. I just wish I'd just let myself be pregnant." Lange concurred, having dealt with similar issues during her long career. "Yeah, just be pregnant, be home with the kids, don't have something that you have to get up at 5 a.m. for. Those are the regrets, not the ones that you said no to but the ones you said yes to."
As for which movies Witherspoon was referring to, it's known that she was pregnant by her then-husband Ryan Phillipe during the filming of 1999's "Cruel Intentions," which they both starred in. She was also pregnant while making the 2002 sequel "Legally Blonde 2: Red, White, and Blonde," and the 19th century drama "Vanity Fair."
Will Smith
Getting his start on TV in "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air," Will Smith shot to big screen stardom in the '90s with a string of blockbuster hits. He had a four-year run of success that's hard to top, with "Bad Boys" in 1995, "Independence Day" in 1996, "Men in Black" in 1997, and the criminally underrated political thriller "Enemy of the State" in 1998. Unfortunately, his luck just couldn't hold, and in 1999, he made perhaps the worst film of his career. He's said many times he wishes he'd never made it.
"'Wild Wild West' is a thorn in my side," he told People in 2021. "To see myself in chaps ... I don't like it." Why did he do the movie at all? Smith says it was his own fault for getting carried away by that incredible run of blockbusters. "I had so much success that I started to taste global blood, and my focus shifted from my artistry to winning," Smith said in an interview with GQ in 2016. "I found myself promoting something because I wanted to win, versus promoting something because I believed in it." To make matters worse, "Wild Wild West" is the movie Smith made after turning down the role of Neo in "The Matrix," a game-changingly bad decision he still laments to this day.
Whoopi Goldberg
By 1995, Whoopi Goldberg had already long established herself as one of the most talented actresses in Hollywood. She'd received an Academy Award nomination in 1986 for her leading role in "The Color Purple" and taken home the trophy for best supporting actress in 1991 for "Ghost." She'd featured in a recurring role on the acclaimed sci-fi series "Star Trek: The Next Generation," appeared in a pair of "Sister Act" movies, and was coming off her role as Shenzi in "The Lion King." That's when she made easily the worst movie in her career — and she knew she would regret it the moment she stepped before the camera.
That's because Goldberg's part in "Theodore Rex" wasn't actually one that she wanted to perform. She'd even gone so far as to try to back out of the project, but was forced to follow through. She's never been shy about expressing her disdain for the movie since, either. During her days as a co-host on the daytime talk show "The View," she once said, "[The film] makes no sense to anyone." Despite the fact that it has its fans — including "The View" producer Brian Teta — she wishes it could be erased from existence.
Val Kilmer
When it comes to superhero movies, there may be no role more coveted than Batman — but it wasn't always that way. Played by Adam West in the 1966 television series and an accompanying theatrical release, it wasn't until Michael Keaton put on the cape and cowl for Tim Burton's 1989 "Batman" that all of Hollywood took notice. So, when Keaton stepped away after a pair of films, the role became a sought-after one. Val Kilmer was as excited as you would imagine to get behind the wheel of the Batmobile for 1995's "Batman Forever." But years before Clooney regretted its sequel, Kilmer ended up having a miserable experience playing Batman.
Unfortunately, along with Keaton, director Tim Burton exited the threequel. Incoming helmer Joel Schumacher brought with him a very different take on the character. That's when Kilmer's enthusiasm faded. "Whatever boyhood excitement I had was crushed by the reality of the Batsuit," he in his 2021 documentary (via /Film). "Yes, every boy wants to be Batman. They actually want to be him ... not necessarily play him in a movie." But that's what Kilmer was doing, and the critical drubbing the movie received further killed his interest in continuing to play the character. Two years later, Kilmer quit the series, unwilling to debase himself further with another sequel.
Kate Winslet
It's hard to imagine an actor regretting not just the biggest role in their career, but a film that currently sits among the highest-grossing ever made. Now imagine that film is also one of the most beloved films in the history of cinema, with fans of all ages passionate about its action, adventure, and romance. What could there be to regret? Well, there's no need to imagine, because the movie is James Cameron's "Titanic," and it's star Kate Winslet who isn't so thrilled that people are still rewatching it year after year. Not because the movie is bad, but because she can't stand her own performance in it.
"It's awful," Winslet said during press interviews for the film's 3D re-release in 2012 (via The Telegraph). "It sounds terribly self-indulgent but actors do tend to be very self-critical. I have a hard time watching any of my performances, but watching 'Titanic' I was just like, 'Oh God, I want to do that again.'" It's a performance — and film — that she can barely sit through, despite its lofty reputation and millions of adoring fans. "Every single scene, I'm like 'Really, really? You did it like that? Oh my God.'" Still, she has some consolation: Winslet was nominated for an Academy Award for her role as Rose, though she might be glad she lost out to Helen Hunt to avoid further attention for it.
Bruce Willis
Bruce Willis made a name for himself on the small screen as Detective David Addison in "Moonlighting" before making the leap to the movies. When he did, he became an instant star thanks to 1988's "Die Hard," where he played grizzled cop John McClane. He struggled to recapture that film's success, though, in disappointments like "Hudson Hawk" and "Billy Bathgate." Perhaps trying to go back to the kind of role that made him a movie star, he became a cop in 1993's "Striking Distance."
Willis plays homicide detective Tom Hardy (no, not that Tom Hardy), but it isn't quite the same role as John McClane. For one thing, Hardy is relegated to the role of River Rescue Squad, far from the city-based excitement of "Die Hard." The movie wasn't a hit, and was mercilessly maligned by critics. When looking back on his career in a chat with Ain't it Cool News, Willis threw the film under the bus, calling it a "dog" for which he hangs his head in shame. Thankfully, it's a movie that most audiences have seemed to forget about, being happier to focus on his winning entries.
Julia Roberts
The 1994 romantic comedy "I Love Trouble" had everything going for it, starting with its star-studded cast. Led by Julia Roberts and Nick Nolte, it boasted a pair of big names who producers dreamed would become a classic Hollywood couple, ala Hepburn and Tracy. Unfortunately, the result was a total dud, with the two leads having fewer sparks than a dead Zippo lighter. It completely bombed at the box office. But that's not the only reason why Julia Roberts regrets the film.
Famously, Roberts and Nolte did not get along at all on the set of the film. According to contemporary accounts in The Los Angeles Times, the two feuded constantly, with Roberts more than a little annoyed by his male chauvinism. The fact that he reportedly openly insulted her around set didn't help. Rumors flew that things got so bad that they refused to even be near each other, often filming their scenes separately with stand-ins. Though these details were never commented on by either of them, Roberts did openly call her co-star "completely disgusting" in that Los Angeles Times interview, and Nolte has since responded with equal contempt for her. Suffice it to say, the production was an extremely unpleasant one that Roberts doesn't even like to talk about these days.
Bob Hoskins
In 1988, Bob Hoskins starred in one of the first — and still best — movies to combine live-action and animation when he played Eddie Valiant in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" But five years later, he tried to duplicate that success in another family film ... and wound up leading a movie so famously awful it single-handedly destroyed an entire genre. Later in life, Hoskins wasn't shy about discussing just how much he regretted ever starring in the 1993 video game adaptation of "Super Mario Bros."
"The worst thing I ever did? Super Mario Brothers. It was a f****** nightmare," he said in a wide-ranging interview with The Guardian in 2007. He continued his expletive-laden tirade against the film, going on to say, "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! F****** nightmare. F****** idiots."
Ultimately, the film wound up as poorly received by audiences and critics as it was by Hoskins. It gave the emerging genre of video game adaptations a bad name, and pretty much everyone involved probably wishes it never happened.
Jamie Lee Curtis
Since she rose to fame in the late '70s as Laurie Strode in John Carpenter's "Halloween," Jamie Lee Curtis has made scores of iconic films. But she's made almost as many bad ones, too. In fact, Curtis has more than one film that she's expressed regret over — and one of them was a sequel to that John Carpenter original. We're talking about "Halloween H20: 20 Years Later."
After sitting out four "Halloween" sequels, she agreed to return in 1998, but quickly realized she'd made a mistake. "To this day, I regret that I didn't say to everyone, 'If Debra Hill's not the one producing this movie, I'm not doing it,'" Curtis told EW. "But what ended up happening was, she wasn't part of it, John wasn't part of it, and I was still part of it, and it was a machine going down the road."
To add insult to injury, "Halloween H20" came just a year before another regrettable film: 1999's "Virus." Speaking with WENN in 2010 (relayed by Express), Curtis didn't hold back on her feelings for that one. "That's a piece of s*** movie. It's an unbelievably bad movie; just bad from the bottom. ... It was maybe the only time I've known something was just bad and there was nothing I could do about it."
Mark Wahlberg
So far, we've covered a variety of reasons actors regret even their biggest films. But superstar Mark Wahlberg has a unique one, and it involves his faith. A devout Catholic, there are movies from his early days in Hollywood that he looks back on with serious misgivings, and chief among them is the 1997 comedy-drama "Boogie Nights." It put the future A-lister into the role of an adult film star, and while it's always been met with stellar reviews and has a fervent fan following, it's not something that Wahlberg is proud of.
First came comments at a religious summit in 2017 where the actor called out his role as Diggler as something he regrets. "I just always hope that God is a movie fan and also forgiving because I've made some poor choices in my past," he told the audience (per IndieWire). "'Boogie Nights' is up there at the top of the list." Quickly, those comments swept the web, and Wahlberg had to explain further, telling People Magazine that the role was one that the Lord probably wasn't understanding of, given its extremely adult connotations.
Wahlberg wasn't the only one to regret the film, though. Co-star Burt Reynolds reportedly hated the film so much that he fired his agent over it.
Malcolm McDowell
"Star Trek" has a strong track record when it comes to guest stars, going all the way back to the original series, when Joan Collins made an appearance in "City on the Edge of Forever." The movies kept that tradition, with Ricardo Montalban and Christopher Lloyd in the second and third films. Cinematic takes on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" followed suit. It was "Clockwork Orange" star Malcolm McDowell who filled the role of celebrity guest in 1994's "Star Trek Generations," but from the sound of it, he wasn't a happy camper when he made the movie.
"I did them a favor," he said of his role in the film, referring to the fact that his character killed off the legendary James T. Kirk, played by William Shatner. According to McDowell, "Star Trek" was stale and boring when he appeared in it, and the cast was even worse. "Patrick Stewart spouting off for another forty minutes. Jesus! If you find that exciting, hey, go watch paint dry!" The film, which was met with tepid reviews, was a modest success, but clearly isn't one that McDowell looks back on with any amount of fondness.
Ahmed Best
We can all sympathize with an actor who regrets a bad movie, but when it comes to Ahmed Best, things get downright heartbreaking. A theater performer whose career already included the Broadway smash "Stomp," he was plucked from the stage to play the first fully digital main character in the "Star Wars" universe. But because he played Jar Jar Binks, Best became the target of fan outrage when the first prequel film irked longtime diehards. The harassment Best received turned his life upside down.
"I faced a media backlash that still affects my career today," Best said on Twitter (via ET). Most upsettingly, the actor admits that things got so bad he seriously considered suicide. Posting a photo of the New York harbor, Best shared his story to his followers. "This was the place I almost ended my life. It's still hard to talk about."
Thankfully, Best was able to recover emotionally, but not without years of turmoil. "There were a lot of tears, there was a lot of pain," he said, and it's fair to wonder if he wouldn't have been better off without the role entirely. Still, he made his return to the franchise in a 2023 episode of "The Mandalorian."
If you or anyone you know is having suicidal thoughts, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline by dialing 988 or by calling 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
Brad Pitt
Brad Pitt was just as huge in the '90s as he is today, starring in classics like "Fight Club," "Interview with the Vampire" and "Seven." He's not without his clunkers though, and the worst of them all might be an entry from 1997 that the star himself seems to regret. Not just because "The Devil's Own" was downright awful, but because its production was plagued with problems from start to finish — problems that famously included frequent clashes with co-star Harrison Ford.
All of those issues can probably be traced to the fact that the project got greenlit without any plan. "We had no script. Well, we had a great script but it got tossed for various reasons," Pitt told Newsweek (via /Film). "To have to make something up as you go along ... It was the most irresponsible bit of filmmaking — if you can even call it that — that I've ever seen. I couldn't believe it. I don't know why anyone would want to continue making that movie. We had nothing."
At one point, Pitt became so frustrated that he asked to get out of the movie. But the studio wasn't budging and demanded a massive multi-million dollar payout from their star if he walked. In the end, the movie got made, and while it paired two of Hollywood's biggest names, it flopped in theaters.
Michael Palin
Co-founder of the British comedy troupe Monty Python, Michael Palin starred in one of the freshest comedies of the '80s, "A Fish Called Wanda." An uproariously funny film co-starring Kevin Kline, Jamie Lee Curtis, and his Python cohort John Cleese — who also co-wrote and co-directed it — it won Kline an Academy Award for best actor and remains beloved decades later. Though they never made a sequel, the entire cast reunited for a spiritual successor, "Fierce Creatures," in 1997. But if you ask Palin, it was a huge mistake.
Interviewed by The Telegraph decades later, Palin lamented the entire process of making the film. He described his frustration at constant rewrites, with Cleese even reducing his part midway through filming. "That it took four months of my life [to film] is, on the other hand, barely believable from the amount of time on screen," he remarked. Even when filming first wrapped, the experience wasn't over. Not long before its planned release Palin was told that early test screenings went poorly and a wealth of reshoots were required. With a newly recruited screenwriter, Cleese overhauled the script yet again. Palin seemed proud of the final product ... until even more test screenings in New York forced the whole thing to be cut down. "After all these years of time, energy, money and hard graft, 'FC' looks likely to be a 90-minute quickie, its shape and content decided eventually by 20 people in Long Island," Palin added.
Ewan McGregor
No, Ewan McGregor doesn't regret "Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace" the way his co-star Ahmed Best does. After all, he was able to parlay the part into his own Obi Wan-centric series on Disney+ some 20 years later. Instead, the Scottish actor who came to fame thanks to indie hit "Trainspotting" looks back with a sense of disgust on the period drama "Emma," based on the classic novel by Jane Austen.
Asked which work in his career he'd consider his worst, McGregor was quick to answer. "Work wise? My character Frank Churchill on 'Emma.' I made the decision to do that film because I thought I should be seen to be doing something different from 'Trainspotting,'" he said in 2003 in a piece for The Guardian. "My decision-making was wrong ... It's a good film, 'Emma,' but I'm just ... not very good in it. I'm not helped because I'm also wearing the world's worst wig."
That said, while he may regret his performance and the film, McGregor said he used it as a valuable learning experience, and earned a newfound understanding of how best to pick his parts. Presumably, he now chooses projects that offer him a better head of hair.
Hugh Grant
British actor Hugh Grant has made plenty of mistakes in his career. When it comes to his movies, though, he definitely knows which one he regrets most: "Nine Months." But it's not for any of the usual reasons you'd expect. Despite it being one of the worst movies in his filmography, "Nine Months" isn't a movie he wishes he hadn't done because it was bad, but because of who financed it: controversial billionaire tycoon Rupert Murdoch.
"It would certainly stick in my craw to work for Fox," he told Entertainment Weekly (via The Independent). "I did make ["Nine Months"] for them 16 years ago, but I was naïve then. I didn't even know who owned [the studio]." The comments came in response to a phone hacking scandal that rocked Britain, where the paper News of the World was caught up in allegations that it had tapped the phones of a number of celebrities. Grant had helped catch them in the act by recording a conversation with one of their reporters, and went on record about how disgusted he was by the paper's owner, Murdoch, who also owned 20th Century Fox.
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Austrian bodybuilder-turned-actor-turned-politician Arnold Schwarzenegger has a number of films in his catalog he might wince at, including his very first comedy, "Hercules in New York." But that's not the one he regrets. As a matter of fact, the one he seems to have the most serious qualms about is one that remains a cult favorite: The 1993 fantasy action-comedy, "Last Action Hero."
A bomb in theaters, the film wasn't liked by critics, and was seen by audiences as a huge step down from his previous effort, "Terminator 2: Judgement Day." This reaction had the star rethinking his entire career. "When 'Last Action Hero' came out, I had reached my peak after 'Terminator 2', having the most successful movie of the year worldwide," he said in "Arnold," his Netflix docuseries (via Marca). "So, when the reviews for the film rolled out, I cannot tell you how upset that I was ... It hurts you. It hurts your feelings. It's embarrassing."
Glum over the negative response, Arnold withdrew. "I didn't want to see anyone for a week," he said. To cope, he relied on support from his family and friends, including frequent collaborator James Cameron. "He took it as a deep blow to his brand. I think it really shook him," Cameron said in the series. Thanks to that support, Arnold was able to overcome his regrets and team back up with Cameron for his comeback a year later in "True Lies."