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Matt Damon knew The Great Wall was a big ol' dud while he was filming it.
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00:00It's easy to forget that acting is a job first and foremost, and few actors are blessed
00:04with the luxury of only appearing in movies which speak to them on a personally and creatively
00:09fulfilling level.
00:10Given the many variables that go into a movie's creation, actors aren't always aware of quite
00:15the calibre project they're starring in, whether good or bad.
00:19But sometimes a script hits one of the two extremes so ferociously that they know precisely
00:24what they're in for from the jump.
00:26And while it's hardly news if an actor says they knew a great movie would be great from
00:30the moment they read the script, it's far more interesting to hear actors admit they knew
00:34movies would suck from day one.
00:36And so with that in mind then, I'm Ellie with WhatCulture here with 10 actors who knew the
00:41movie was doomed on day one.
00:43Number 10.
00:44Channing Tatum in Jupiter Ascending The Wachowskis' 2015 sci-fi blockbuster Jupiter Ascending was
00:51certainly an ambitious attempt at kickstarting a major new tentpole universe, albeit one that
00:57failed to strike much of a chord with critics or general audiences.
01:01Despite praise for the visual effects and the memorable Chicago chase sequence, the script
01:06and Eddie Redmayne's Razzie-winning performance were largely panned, and it failed to recoup
01:10its $210 million at the box office.
01:13Co-star Channing Tatum, who has never been one to mince words about his career disappointments,
01:19spoke out recently about the exhausting experience of shooting the film, which he knew wasn't
01:24coming together as soon as he started working on it.
01:27He said in an interview with Variety, Jupiter Ascending was a nightmare from the jump.
01:31It was a sideways movie.
01:33All of us were there for seven months, bursting our hump.
01:36It was just tough.
01:38Tatum also went on to criticise his own performance in the film, feeling that his work suffered
01:43from a lack of energy due to shooting four movies back-to-back without any time off.
01:48That said, Tatum's performance in Jupiter Ascending is far from the worst thing about
01:52it.
01:539.
01:54Emily Blunt in Gulliver's Travels
01:56It's not much of a secret that Emily Blunt was actually the first choice to play Black Widow
02:02in Iron Man 2, but she was forced to turn down the role due to a standing contractual
02:07agreement with Fox, who demanded that she appear in the Jack Black-led Gulliver's Travels
02:12instead.
02:13Gulliver's Travels went on to score largely negative reviews from critics and failed to
02:17turn a profit on its monstrously over-egged $112 million budget.
02:22During a recent interview with Howard Stern, Blunt called missing out on Black Widow a bit
02:26of a heartbreak, and went on to rather diplomatically explain that she knew Gulliver's Travels was a
02:31stud project from the get-go.
02:33Blunt added, however, that she has no ill will against anyone who worked on the film and had
02:37fun shooting it regardless of her own lack of desire to appear in it.
02:41She went on to say,
02:42There were a lot of really lovely people who were heaven to work with.
02:46I actually had a good time, a laugh with all of them, but it irked my heart for it
02:50to have happened in the first place.
02:518.
02:52Bob Hoskins, John Leguizamo, and Dennis Hopper in Super Mario Bros.
02:581993's Super Mario Bros. may endure almost 30 years later as a bewildering cult classic,
03:03but make no mistake, it was a major failure upon release. Demolished by critics and fans alike for
03:09its script and deviations from the video game source material, it was a critical flop and abysmal
03:15box office disaster. It won't surprise anyone who's seen the film to learn that the movie's production
03:19was abject chaos. In his 2007 autobiography, co-star John Leguizamo, who plays Luigi in the film,
03:27revealed that he and Bob Hoskins, who played Mario, were fully aware they were in a train wreck
03:32and would regularly get drunk on set just to make it through the day's shoot.
03:367.
03:37Sean William Scott in Mr. Woodcock
03:40Don't feel bad if you don't remember Mr. Woodcock, a comedy starring Sean William Scott, Billy Bob Thornton,
03:45and Susan Sarandon that came and went in a blip in the summer of 2007, amid negative reviews while
03:52doing little box office business. In a 2009 interview, the ever chill Scott talked openly
03:57about the movie's failure, straight up admitting that he and co-star Thornton knew it sucked while
04:02they were filming it. He said,
04:03We would rip on that movie, Woodcock. Like, this movie effin' sucks. It's so sad, man. There's
04:09nothing worse than going to a movie set knowing that this could end my career. Thankfully for Scott,
04:15Mr. Woodcock was enough of a non-entity that it was quickly forgotten and basically caused his
04:19career no harm at all.
04:216.
04:22Edward Norton in The Italian Job
04:24F. Gary Gray's 2003 remake of The Italian Job saw Edward Norton playing the role of villain Steve
04:31Frazelli, but Norton made no bones about the fact that he wanted nothing to do with the movie.
04:35In a similar situation to Emily Blunt, Norton only appeared in the film due to a contractual
04:40requirement from Paramount, who had signed him to a multi-picture deal. Norton had turned down numerous
04:46proposed projects from the studio and balked at the idea of starring in The Italian Job, until
04:51Paramount tied Norton up in litigation and forced him to appear in the film for one million dollars,
04:56a mere fraction of his usual 10 million dollar fee at the time. Watching the film,
05:01it's clear that Norton isn't thrilled about the experience, though ironically his performance
05:05ended up receiving the bulk of the film's critical praise. While The Italian Job wasn't an outright
05:10disaster like most of the films on this list, it settled for broadly positive reviews and turning
05:15a modest profit, albeit failing to launch the wider franchise, namely a planned sequel,
05:20the Brazilian Job, Paramount was clearly hoping for. 5. Jamie Lee Curtis in Virus
05:27Jamie Lee Curtis is one of the straightest shooters you'll ever find in Hollywood and has never been
05:32scared to speak her mind about her past projects, success or failure. But there's one movie in her
05:38filmography that she regards as a unique brand of misfire, and that's 1999's sci-fi horror film Virus.
05:45Beyond praise for its visual effects, the film was near universally panned by critics, and despite
05:51Universal splashing out on action figures and video game tie-ins, it failed to recoup even half of its
05:5775 million dollar price tag. In an interview with When back in 2010, Curtis singled out Virus as the
06:04only film in her career where she went into it knowing it was a dud and was unable to do
06:09anything to
06:09change that fact. She said, that's a piece of shh movie. It's an unbelievably bad movie, just bad from
06:15the bottom. It was maybe the only time I've known something was just bad and there was nothing I could
06:20do about it. Curtis seems to have a sense of humour about its failure though, telling IGN in 2003 that
06:26it's fun to compare terrible movies with her friends in the business. She said that's the only good reason
06:31to be in bad movies, then when your friends have bad movies you can say, ah I've got the best
06:36one,
06:36I'm bringing Virus. Never change Jamie Lee. Number 4. Bruce Willis in Cop Out.
06:43The production of Kevin Smith's 2010 buddy cop movie Cop Out sounds utterly miserable, with Smith going
06:50on the record to say that star Bruce Willis was a miserable, uncooperative presence throughout
06:54shooting and wouldn't even participate in promotional duties, ultimately calling the experience soul
07:00crushing. This was of course a long time before Willis' unfortunate recent medical diagnosis, which
07:06prompted Smith to call his prior comments petty. Yet it doesn't take much reading between the lines
07:11to see that Bruce knew he was in a dud and just couldn't muster the effort to turn it on,
07:15so to
07:15speak. Given that Willis turned in solid performances in Red, Lay the Favourite, Moonrise Kingdom and Looper
07:22in the two years that followed Cop Out, it clearly wasn't a case of him being generally disinterested in
07:27actually acting, but simply knowing the project was no good.
07:30Number 3. Whoopi Goldberg in Theodore Rex.
07:34Granted, a comatose person could probably have realised that Theodore Rex was going to be a
07:39terrible movie, let alone star Whoopi Goldberg, who verbally agreed to star in the buddy sci-fi
07:44comedy in 1992 and was then litigated into holding up her end of the bargain after attempting to back
07:50out. Goldberg evidently knew the project was a disaster then, which went on to receive universal
07:56critical scorn and also net Goldberg a Razzie nomination for worst actress.
08:01Worse still, New Line Cinema ultimately decided to release Theodore Rex straight to video,
08:07which with its $33.5 million budget made it the most expensive direct-to-video movie ever at the time.
08:14Goldberg was however paid $7 million for the role, and while she clearly knew it was a dreadful movie
08:19from the outset, there are certainly worse outcomes than being paid more money than most people will
08:24ever see in several lifetimes to make a terrible film.
08:27Number 2. Matt Damon in The Great Wall.
08:312016's The Great Wall was a sci-fi monster movie co-produced by American and Chinese movie studios,
08:37starring Matt Damon as a European mercenary who joins forces with Chinese warriors to help battle
08:43an alien threat emerging by the Great Wall of China. Despite being directed by the great Zhang Yimou and
08:49boasting a stellar supporting cast including Willem Dafoe and Pedro Pascal, The Great Wall received
08:55largely negative reviews for both its weirdly boring execution and accusations that it was perpetuating
09:00yet another white saviour narrative. Though the film went on to grow $334.9 million globally,
09:08its $150 million budget and large marketing spend meant it ultimately failed to turn a profit.
09:14While star Damon has largely kept quiet about the film in the years since, last summer he did break
09:20his silence and confirmed that he knew the project wasn't working when he saw how director Yimou was
09:24being pressured by financiers to change his vision for the film. He said in an interview with Marc Maron,
09:31I was like, this is exactly how disasters happen. It doesn't cohere. It doesn't work as a movie.
09:36I came to consider that the definition of a professional actor. Knowing you're in a turkey and going,
09:41okay, I've got four more months. It's the up at dawn siege on Hamburger Hill. I'm definitely going to die
09:47here,
09:47but I'm doing it.
09:48Number one, Matthew Broderick in Deck the Halls.
09:52Christmas comedy Deck the Halls was released in late 2006 to near universal critical disdain,
09:58while failing to lure in even the most undemanding of audiences, hopped up on eggnog and turkey.
10:04It was unable to recoup its oddly hefty $51 million budget.
10:08According to a 2013 episode of How Did This Get Made, which featured one of the film's cast members,
10:14Gillian Vickman, the three leads weren't thrilled about being on set.
10:18Christian Chenoweth was still reeling from breaking up with Aaron Sorkin and spent much of the shoot in tears.
10:23Danny DeVito flew in to do the bare minimum required of him, and then there's Matthew Broderick.
10:29Broderick, who reportedly spent months training with a real speed skater for the film's speed skating
10:34sequence, was spotted on set shaking his head and saying to himself, I've hit rock bottom.
10:40Evidently, Broderick knew he was starring in A Christmas Turkey, but unlike Chenoweth and
10:44DeVito, he managed to avoid scoring a Razzie nomination. Silver linings though, right?
10:49And that concludes our list. If you can think of any we missed, then do let us know in the
10:54comments below and while you're there don't forget to like and subscribe and tap that notification bell.
10:59Also head over to Twitter and follow us there and I can be found across various social medias
11:03just by searching Ellie Littlechild. I've been Ellie with WhatCulture,
11:06I hope you have a magical day and I'll see you real soon.
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