Creator Killer: Difference between revisions

 

== Film ==

** Before that, ''[[Rock-a-Doodle]]'' sank Bluth's ''original'' studio.

* ''[[Cutthroat Island]]'', one of the biggest box office flops of all time, bankrupted the studio Carolco, as well as destroying Geena Davis' career and her then-husband Renny Harlin's respectability as a director. The flop of this film (as well as that of ''[[The Long Kiss Goodnight]]'', also starring Davis and directed by Harlin) is widely credited with destroying their marriage, as Harlin had pushed for Davis, then known for comedic roles, to headline the two blockbusters. It also [[Genre Killer|killed off]] the pirate movie genre [[Back from the Dead|until]] ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]'' came along.

* ''[[Heaven's Gate (film)|Heavens Gate]]'' contributed to the collapse of its studio, [[United Artists]]. Even more infamously, it ended the "[[New Hollywood]]" [[Fall of the Studio System|post-studio-system]] era in which director/auteurs were [[Protection From Editors|given carte blanche]] to do pretty much whatever they wanted. Thus, not only did it kill a studio built by some of the first Hollywood stars, but ended an era that produced many of the best films in history.

** It particularly wrecked the career of its director, Michael Cimino. In the late '70s, Cimino had won the Academy Award for directing ''[[The Deer Hunter]]'', picking up his [[Auteur License]] in the process, and was then basically given a blank check to direct his [[Magnum Opus]]. ''Heaven's Gate'' was this opus, however, and Cimino is known to this day as "the guy who brought down Hollywood with his ego". He did manage to direct four more films after that, but they all bombed.

** ''Batman & Robin'' also arguably derailed the careers of [[Uma Thurman]] (''[[The Avengers (1998 film)|The Avengers 1998]]'' didn't help either), Chris O'Donnell, and Alicia Silverstone. Thurman finally made a comeback when she reteamed with [[Quentin Tarantino]] on the ''[[Kill Bill]]'' saga. Likewise, O'Donnell has recently kept himself afloat with his starring role on the TV series ''[[NCIS: Los Angeles]]''. In fact, one can argue that Schumacher, who went on to turn out hits like ''[[8mm]]'' and ''[[Phantom of the Opera]]'', is the only one who got out unscathed: even [[George Clooney]] had to completely reinvent himself to be taken seriously.

** An often overlooked fact is that [[Misblamed|Schumacher is not completely at fault]]. His original version of ''[[Batman Forever]]'' was much more in line with the tone of the [[Tim Burton]] films, but [[Executive Meddling|higher-ups at WB]] had it significantly edited to make it more family-friendly and marketable to children.

* ''[[Battlefield Earth (film)|Battlefield Earth]]'' was such a terrible film that Franchise Pictures lost huge amounts of money. However, the final nail in the coffin was when Franchise was hit by a lawsuit from investors who accused the company of [[Hollywood Accounting|deliberately inflating the film's budget to pad their coffers]]. Franchise Pictures lost the lawsuit and declared bankruptcy. [[John Travolta]]'s reputation got a bad rap due to this movie, but he later [[Career Resurrection|bounced back]]. ''[[Battlefield Earth]]'' also killed moviegoers' chances of taking any [[L. Ron Hubbard]] or Scientology film seriously.

* Fred Dekker (director of the cult classics ''[[Night of the Creeps]]'' and ''[[The Monster Squad]]'') was brought on by Orion Pictures to write the screenplay for and direct ''[[RoboCop]] 3''. Given the mixed [[Franchise Killer|reaction]] to the film, it's not exactly surprising that he hasn't directed anything since then. Aside from a gig as a consulting producer on ''[[Star Trek: Enterprise]]'' (itself nearly a [[Franchise Killer]], and that was way back in 2001), he hasn't helmed anything for the last twenty years. Better yet, it was delayed for two years as its production company, Orion Pictures, went bankrupt (although it wasn't the sole reason).

* Actor [[Charles Laughton]] was never given a chance to direct a second film after the failure of ''[[The Night of the Hunter]]''. A damn shame too, because the film [[Vindicated by History|has since been recognized as a classic]].

* [[Ben Affleck]] and [[Jennifer Lopez]]'s careers just ''barely'' survived ''[[Gigli]]'', but Martin Brest seems to have dropped off the face of the Earth. The [[Executive Meddling|studio interference]] and bad test screenings became too much for him.

* Music video director Joseph Kahn, once expected to emerge as the next [[Michael Bay]], wouldn't make another feature film for seven years after the flop of the 2004 action movie ''[[Torque]]''.<ref>And for good measure, his new film, the teen slasher parody ''[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6q9v_ak40w Detention]'', features a strong [[Take That]] to ''Torque''.</ref> Intended as a [[Spiritual Successor]] to ''[[The Fast and the Furious]]'' (only {{smallcaps|[[Recycled in Space|on motorcycles!]]}}) and produced by the same guy, Neal H. Moritz, the film was shelved for a year before release and was universally trashed by the time it was released. The careers of its stars (apart from [[Ice Cube]]) were also [[Star-Derailing Role|derailed]] by the film.

* Joe Eszterhas was, in the early '90s, '''the''' most powerful screenwriter in Hollywood - so much so that he received record amounts of money for his screenplays (including ''[[Flashdance]]'' and ''[[Basic Instinct]]'', which was the highest amount of money paid for a single script at the time). The 1995 release of ''[[Showgirls]]'' put studio executives at odds with him, but it went on to become a [[Cult Classic]] (much in line with Eszterhas' view that the film was [[Parody Retcon|intended to be satire]]). What followed were a string of underperforming and failed scripts for films such as the [[CSI: Miami|David Caruso]] vehicle ''Jade'' and the Sharon Stone flick ''Sliver''. Things briefly improved with the [[Write What You Know|semi-autobiographical]] ''Telling Lies in America'', which was well-reviewed and a modest hit on the indie circuit, but failed to get widely distributed. However, the 1998 film ''Burn Hollywood Burn: An Alan Smithee Film'' (which Eszterhas produced, wrote and starred in) was an unmitigated disaster and complete flop that all but ensured he would never sell a script to Hollywood ever again. Eszterhas ended up settling down to a quiet life as an author in Ohio - to date, his only screenwriting work of note has been on a 2006 Hungarian film called ''Children of Glory''. He tried to come back with a [[Mel Gibson]] film based on the life of Judas Maccabeus, but Warner Bros. shut that project down, allegedly because the script that Eszterhas came up with wasn't powerful enough, but Eszterhas is accusing Gibson of sabotaging the film to make sure his career stays dead.

** ''Burn, Hollywood, Burn'' also killed the career of respected director Arthur Hiller, who was known for making ''[[Love Story]]'' and being one of the hardest-working directors in the industry (to the point that he had at least one project being released every single year until 1997). Just before ''Burn'' was released, Hiller had his name removed from the credits - which resulted in the unintended [[Irony]] of "Alan Smithee" (the alias used for an anonymous director) directing a film that starred a character named Alan Smithee. The Writers Guild of America discontinued the use of the alias after the movie came out, and Hiller's career was in shambles. The only thing he's directed since then was the film ''Pucked'' (starring Jon Bon Jovi), which ended up being rebranded under the "[[National Lampoon]]" banner and released [[Direct to Video]].

* The British film company Goldcrest never really recovered from the one-two punch of 1985's ''Revolution'' (a massively expensive movie about the American Revolution with the [[Sarcasm Mode|ideal]] casting of [[Al Pacino]] and Nastassja Kinski)<ref>-which may explain why it was 15 years until [[The Patriot|we had another one]]-</ref> and 1986's ''Absolute Beginners'' (a hugely expensive musical set in the 1950s which [[Star-Derailing Role|derailed star Eddie O'Connell's career]] (his [[IMDb]] page is very skimpy after the film, and he has nothing after 2003), and served as a speed bump for Patsy Kensit's). See the book ''My Indecision Is Final'' for the whole sordid story.

* Jared Hess was expected to be one of the next great comedic directors after having box office hits in ''[[Napoleon Dynamite]]'' and ''[[Nacho Libre]]''. Then he released ''Gentlemen Broncos'', a movie that was such a disaster with critics (it was one of the ten worst reviewed films of 2009) and audiences (the film grossed just $110,000, a four-hundredth of ''[[Napoleon Dynamite]]'''s gross) that it irreparably destroyed Hess's career. He has not made a film since. He would later helm a loose [[Animated Adaptation]] of ''[[Napoleon Dynamite]]'', but it got cancelled after only one season.

** The problem was really one of scheduling: ''UHF'' had tested amazingly well and it has an enormous following. If it had come out any time other than summer 1989, which not only saw Indy, but also [[Licence to Kill|a Bond movie]], [[Star Trek V: The Final Frontier|a Star Trek movie]], the ''[[Ghostbusters]]'' sequel, ''[[Lethal Weapon]] 2'' and, oh, yeah, the first [[Tim Burton]] ''[[Batman (film)|Batman]]'', it might have done a lot better.

* The failure of ''[[Ishtar]]'' killed Elaine May's directing career, though she's still done well as a writer for such films as ''[[The Birdcage]]'' and ''[[Primary Colors]]''.

* Media Home Entertainment, one of the four "mini-majors" in the home video industry covering a large library of VHS releases in many diverse genres (alongside sublabel Hi-Tops Video releasing childrens' titles), collapsed in 1990 when Gerald Ronson, the leader of Media Home Entertainment parent company Heron Communications, was convicted of securities fraud due to his role in the Guinness share trading fraud in the UK, eventually closing shop in 1993.

* Vestron Pictures had had a huge success in 1987 courtesy of ''[[Dirty Dancing]]'', a film they had originally planned to release in theaters for only a weekend, and then send it straight to home video, since they had originally been in the video distribution business long before entering film production. Unfortunately, they followed it up with a series of flops, all of them B-Movies at a time when the public actually wanted more A Movies, and these flops, coupled with the fact that many of their former clients were now forming their own home video divisions and thus no longer needed their services, caused Vestron's parent company, Vestron, Inc., to go bankrupt in 1990.

* Surprisingly averted with Uwe Boll, despite the negative reception of any film he makes. He skirts this troupe only because [[Tyson Zone|no one expects anything from him]], and so [[Refuge in Audacity|no one will tie enough money to him to call it a big enough failure to get him to stop.]]

** In fact, for a while, some investors were tying money to him in anticipation of his films failing—so they could get generous tax writeoffs (for a time, German tax law allowed investors in German-owned films to write off their investments, including investing borrowed money and writing off loan-related fees, and only required them to pay taxes on any profits the film made; if the film lost money, they got a writeoff instead).

** The film's box office also led to head of marketing MT Carney (who had never worked in film before Disney hired her in 2010) to resign, since she was partially responsible for the film's infamously bad ad campaign.

* [[Diablo Cody]] broke into Hollywood with the highly-acclaimed film ''[[Juno]]''. Her follow-up, ''[[Jennifer's Body]]'', did ''not'' garner as much praise - critics picked apart the poor performance by [[Megan Fox]] and, more damningly for the creator, began to question Cody's overreliance on [[Totally Radical]] dialogue (a problem numerous critics had with ''Juno''). With the failure of ''[[Young Adult]]'', it seems Diablo Cody's star has risen and fallen.

 

== Live-Action TV ==