5. Richard Kelly - Southland Tales (2006)
When
Donnie Darko suddenly hit the big time out of nowhere and became everyone's new favourite movie, the world looked to its young writer/director, Richard Kelly, to create his next work of genius, preferably in the science-fiction genre. Kelly, presumably blinded by the amount of recognition that he had received for his awesome debut feature, thought that he could create just about anything he wanted to for his follow-up, and his loyal fans would praise him in the same vein regardless. Unfortunately, he decided to create
Southland Tales.
Southland Tales feels like the movie that a director might make with just a few weeks to live - it's like a hodgepodge of absolutely every single idea that was working its way around Kelly's brain at the time, and it feels like the director wrote a script that he felt would encapsulate everything he had to say about the world, ever, as if he might never be given the chance to make another movie again. But cramming so much into one movie - especially since his debut flick was made on such a small-scale - defined "pushing your luck," - it felt like he was trying to be too smart for his own good. The movie flopped, raking in less than $1 million on a $17 million budget.