11 Big Name Actors Who Ruined Good Horror Movies

Kenneth Branagh has been a success of the stage and screen for decades now, acting and directing popular features like Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) and Thor (2011), while putting his all into expansive adaptations of literary classics, such as Hamlet (1996).

Unfortunately, not all of his work shines with such glamour and artistry -- but it isn't always his fault.

His 1994 adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was no doubt intended to follow in the footsteps of the Francis Ford Coppola-directed Dracula from just two years prior, bringing a current, trendy cast to a deeply familiar gothic masterwork. What he didn't count on was old Bob De Niro doing, well, what he does best...

While in theory De Niro wasn't miscast as Frankenstein's monster, his approach to the part was all wrong. With a rigid, mob boss demeanour and a New York accent, he sticks out like a severed thumb amongst a cast whose dialogue and delivery is rooted in a romanticised high English. A stage actor to a fault, Branagh brought gusto and theatricality to every scene, both in his acting and direction, but this only served to amplify De Niro’s monstrous portrayal of the horror icon, damning the whole film to hell.