Show me a director who has worked for any significant length of time in Hollywood and I will show you a failure.
It is inevitable. No filmmaker survives in the movie world for long without the occasional flop, critically if not commercially. Even the best directors in history have made their fair share of missteps. (Or maybe you disagree! Perhaps you are a huge fan of Alfred Hitchcock’s Topaz or John Ford’s The Conqueror or Otto Preminger’s Skidoo. These things are subjective, of course.)
To get a sense of just how wildly a director’s career can fluctuate, check out the list below, which contains and compares the best and worst reviewed films by some of the biggest working filmmakers in Hollywood over the last several decades. Just about all of them boast multiple hits with a near 100 percent consensus among critics who contribute to Rotten Tomatoes. And just about all of them boast at least one “rotten” film on the site as well. (There are exceptions, of course, and those are interesting too.)
In the interest of fairness, we’re only considering movies these artists directed. It wouldn’t be right, for example to hold Transformers: The Last Knight against Steven Spielberg, even though he’s a credited producer on that film. (Holding it agains Michael Bay, however, is totally fair.) This list also excludes short films — but feature-length documentaries are totally fair game, and you will see a few of those mentioned throughout.
Here are the best and worst reviewed films on Rotten Tomatoes by 25 top filmmakers. Prepare to be surprised by some of the titles. I certainly was.
The Best and Worst Reviewed Movies By 25 Top Directors
Here are the highest and lowest rated films on Rotten Tomatoes by 25 of the biggest directors working today.
READ MORE: 10 Great Short Films By Famous Directors
Terrible First Movies from Beloved Directors
The good news is all of these directors have made much better films.
Gallery Credit: Emma Stefansky