10 Exact Moments Actors Stopped Trying

When low-effort becomes no-effort.

By Jack Pooley /

Though it's fair to say that actors can only shoulder so much of the responsibility for a bad movie, when they rack up a streak of duds, it becomes increasingly easy to blame them for their own failures.

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While there are certainly actors who simply got unlucky or need a better agent, it's clear in many cases that they've simply lost their passion for their craft, and are now keen to phone things in for a fast paycheck wherever possible.

That's certainly the truth with these 10 actors, all of whom have many great successes to their names - even Academy Awards in a few cases - and yet, after a point they just stopped giving a damn about chasing projects worthy of their talents.

Furthermore, it's possible to comb through these actors' filmographies and pinpoint exactly where things went horribly wrong - the precise moment where they threw their hands up in the air and checked quality control at the door.

That's not to say most of these actors aren't beyond a comeback, but just don't get your hopes up...

10. The Mad Hatter Gets Madder (And More Annoying) - Johnny Depp

Johnny Depp's career has been an absolute rollercoaster ride of hits and flops, though in recent years it's certainly become more evident that the Oscar-nominated A-lister is chasing an easy paycheck above all else.

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Depp's last worthwhile performance was his chilling turn as Whitey Bulger in 2015's Black Mass, after which he's largely mailed in everything he's done from at least a couple of continents away.

The clear apex of Depp's downturn was in 2016's Alice Through the Looking Glass, where he reprised the role of the Mad Hatter but clearly lacked the energy or interest to do much entertaining with him.

Depp's performance was largely panned by critics, resulting in him eventually receiving Razzie nominations for Worst Supporting Actor and Worst Screen Combo (the latter for "Johnny Depp and His Vomitously Vibrant Costume").

If Depp's eccentric, hopped-up Hatter in the original film was already a divisive prospect, turning him into a deathly ill mope in the sequel simply amped up the irritation factor while stripping away most of the fun.

Since then, Depp's submitted himself to soulless blockbusters such as Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales and Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, as well as a glut of snoozily mediocre art-house offerings (Waiting for the Barbarians, The Professor).

As much as we'd all love to see Depp back on daring, go-for-broke form, he sadly seems content to phone his work in.

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