10 Terrible Movies That Made Great Actors Look Like Failed Amateurs

9. George Clooney - Batman & Robin

Joel Schumacher's second stab at the Batman series was an almighty cheese platter; a film so trashy that the whole franchise was ultimately scrapped after its release, only given the darker, high-quality reboot that the character deserved in Batman Begins eight years later. Batman & Robin is a wildly overproduced schlock-fest that has more in common with the corny Adam West TV series than the Dark Knight's comic book roots. It was chisel-jawed George Clooney who won the race for the dark, brooding lead role of the masked vigilante, but instead of portraying a complex, intriguing character, the former ER doctor instead found himself hopelessly lost within a loud, special-effects extravaganza. Batman & Robin is far more preoccupied with blowing things up to a big brass instrumental than giving its eponymous leads any sort of character development, and Clooney looks completely trapped throughout. When buried within the curvy batsuit complete with nipples and codpieces, he is almost entirely reduced to quipping cheesy one-liners, whereas in the Bruce Wayne role he is decidedly dull, dreary and off-game. It all turned out alright of course. Clooney went on to make some fantastic pictures, and the Christopher Nolan reboot means that the Dark Knight finally has a franchise to be proud of. The further away Batman and Clooney got from this disaster in 1997, the better.