From boxing dramas to quirky comedies,
these movies breathed new life into the careers of some of our favorite actors.
There was a time when Eddie Murphy was the biggest movie star around, comedic or otherwise. The peak
of his powers was definitely in the 1980s, when he starred in some of the decade's biggest and
most beloved movies — "Beverly Hills Cop," "48 Hrs.," "Coming to America," and "Trading Places,"
to name a few. He still had a strong presence in the '90s with hits like "The Nutty Professor" and
underrated gems like "Bowfinger," not to mention his first forays into animated voicework. But
Murphy was nowhere near where he was in the '80s, and things got even worse in the 2000s and beyond.
While the 2000s saw him start to appear in middling family comedies, the decade also
introduced Murphy's memorable turn as Donkey in "Shrek," as well as a Best Supporting Actor
nomination for "Dreamgirls." The 2010s, however, is where Murphy's career truly took a nosedive,
as the "Shrek" sequels saw diminishing returns and his other movies were all entirely forgettable.
Murphy took a few years off after 2016's "Mr. Church," but came roaring back in top form with
the excellent biopic "Dolemite Is My Name," in which he portrayed the beloved Blaxploitation
icon Rudy Ray Moore. His performance not only earned him a Golden Globe nomination,
but it also won him the Razzie Redeemer Award, which is specifically designed to
honor actors who turned their careers around after a period of highly maligned work.
"It's comedy, and it's sexy, and it's action. It's a total entertainment experience!"
When you think of Bill Murray comedies, the mind goes directly to undeniable classics like
"Ghostbusters," "Groundhog Day," and "Caddyshack." Even his B- and C-tier work still includes movies
that most actors would be lucky to have part of their legacy, like "Stripes," "Scrooged," "What
About Bob?" and others. But it's easy to forget that Murray's career was in a bit of a slump
in the mid-'90s, which led to his renaissance as a more serious actor going into the 2000s.
After "Groundhog Day," Murray started to rack up a lot of mediocre to bad comedies. "Space
Jam" was a hit, but Murray was basically on improv cruise control during his brief
few scenes in it. Murray's 1997 dud spy comedy "The Man Who Knew Too Little" was a low point,
and indicative of where his career was during that era.
But things turned around for Murray when he got in touch with an up and coming director named
Wes Anderson. He landed a role in Anderson's movie "Rushmore," and he soon became an in-demand actor
for acclaimed indie directors like Anderson, Jim Jarmusch, and Sofia Coppola. Murray even earned
his first Oscar nomination for 2003's "Lost in Translation" as part of his new career trajectory.
Sir Ben Kingsley is in a lot of really great, highly acclaimed, all-time classic films — but
he's also just in a lot of films, period. That means that Kingsley sometimes has stretches where
he's in multiple forgettable movies in a row in between the noteworthy ones — something he
seems to have gotten a better handle on in recent years, at least. But there was a period in the
'90s when Kingsley was in the midst of a really bad stretch of films, and needed to prove that
he was still that same actor that wowed the world with his Oscar-winning performance in "Gandhi."
The year 1992 saw Kingsley earn his second Oscar nomination for "Bugsy," followed the next year by
his powerful performance in "Schindler's List." After that, Kingsley had a run of bad luck,
as none of his output for the entire rest of the decade was special or noteworthy. However,
in 2000, he reminded everyone just how menacing he could be when he participated
in Jonathan Glazer's subversive heist flick "Sexy Beast." Kingsley's chilling performance
as sociopathic criminal Don Logan not only showed a new side of his talents,
but it also earned him a Best Supporting Actor nomination.
"I'm not, I'm—" "Do the job."
"What?" "Do the job."
"No, Don." "Yes."
"No." "Yes."
"I can't!" "You can."
This time, Kingsley kept the momentum of his career going with yet another
Oscar-nominated performance just two years later in "House of Sand and Fog." Later
hits have included "Shutter Island," "Iron Man 3," and "The Jungle Book."
John Travolta was the king of cool in the late '70s, from his breakthrough role on the television
show "Welcome Back Kotter" to movies like "Grease" and "Saturday Night Fever." It's something he
struggled to maintain going into the '80s — and by the end of the decade, he was the male lead
in a movie about a baby whose inner thoughts could be heard by the audience. To be fair,
"Look Who's Talking" was a box office success that became an entire trilogy, but each of the sequels
did worse and was less beloved than the first movie. Besides, starring in a movie like that was
hardly what Danny Zuko or Vinnie Barbarino would have wanted for their alter ego's future career.
Then in 1994, along came a budding young filmmaker named Quentin Tarantino,
who decided that Travolta deserved to be the epitome of coolness once again. Travolta was
cast in "Pulp Fiction" — and after he took on the role of hitman Vincent Vega,
he was finally back on track. He earned his first Oscar nomination since "Saturday Night
Fever," which made way for appearances in other modern classics like "Face/Off."
"Pulp Fiction" also revitalized the lagging career of Bruce Willis — who,
in an interesting coincidence, voiced Mickey the baby in the first two "Look Who's Talking" movies.
Despite how much fame and fortune it brought him, Jim Carrey had grown tired of being known
as the guy with the silly faces as seen in "Ace Ventura," "Dumb and Dumber," and "The Mask." So,
in the late '90s, Carrey branched out a bit and showed off his formidable dramatic
chops in movies like "The Truman Show" and the Andy Kaufman biopic "Man on the Moon."
For much of the 2000s, Carrey did a pretty good job at both maintaining the newfound
serious side of his career with movies like "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," while
also still doing successful comedies like "Bruce Almighty." In the 2010s, however, his career began
to flounder with stinkers like "The Incredible Burt Wonderstone" and the extremely ill-advised
"Dumb and Dumber To," which tarnished the legacy of one of his most beloved movies.
Yet Carrey returned to the over-the-top comedic acting style of his '90s heyday in the best
possible way with his role as Dr. Ivo Robotnik in the surprisingly great 2020 megahit "Sonic
the Hedgehog" — as well as its also-solid 2022 sequel. If Carrey is truly serious
about retiring from acting as he's claimed, he at least went out on top and in classic form.
"So nice when diabolical evil lives up to the hype!"
When you're charming, funny, and indisputably handsome, Hollywood will often try and turn you
into a rom-com leading man — and they'll keep you there, if you let them. Some actors are
content with that, and building lucrative careers in that genre — but others grow
tired of the rom-com mill and make a concerted effort to get out before it swallows them whole.
That's what Matthew McConaughey did in 2011 when he starred in the well-received legal thriller
"The Lincoln Lawyer." Up to that point, the actor had become known for romantic
comedies and other fairly formulaic fare. He had previously been able to do standout
work in movies like "A Time to Kill" and "Frailty," but it eventually got to the
point where it had been a number of years since he did anything of real substance.
Apparently "Ghosts of Girlfriends Past" was the tipping point,
as it was right afterwards that McConaughey did "The Lincoln Lawyer." He immediately
followed it up with a number of noteworthy performances over just the next few years:
those include Christopher Nolan's "Interstellar," the first season of
"True Detective," and "Dallas Buyers Club," for which he won an Oscar.
A number of actors really went all-in on direct-to-video movies in the 2000s and 2010s,
and Nicolas Cage hit that market especially hard in 2018 and 2019. In those two years alone,
Cage was in nine direct-to-video movies — most with generic titles like "Primal," "Kill Chain,"
and "Looking Glass," which are as unremarkable as such names would suggest. He would later confess
that he took on so many films in such a short time to get himself out of a serious financial bind,
which is understandable — but that still doesn't change the fact that it put a stain on his career.
When he finally got his money woes behind him, Cage was able to get a little choosier with his
roles going into the 2020s. He used that freedom to star in and co-produce the 2021 drama "Pig,"
about a former chef who goes on a dark path of vengeance after someone kidnaps his pet hog. For
the first time in years, Cage actually turned in an introspective and subdued performance,
racking up review headlines like the one from Indian Express that proclaimed —
"Nicolas Cage pulls his career out of the gutter with one of
the most blistering performances of his life."
"The critics aren't real, the customers aren't real… because this isn't real."
Just a year later, Cage starred in the hilariously meta action
comedy "The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent," playing an exaggerated version
of himself during the perfect moment in his career to do so.
Clint Eastwood was one of Hollywood's best tough guys in the 1960s when he
starred in Sergio Leone's "Man With No Name" trilogy. He followed that up with
his tenure as another one of Hollywood's best tough guys in the 1970s and '80s:
Harry Callahan in "Dirty Harry" and its four sequels. But even though Eastwood started the
'90s off strong with his Oscar-winning Western epic "Unforgiven," the longtime
actor and filmmaker soon found himself on a cold streak for the first time in his career.
Although "The Bridges of Madison County" was acclaimed, Eastwood followed that up
with three fairly average thrillers and the fun but ultimately forgettable comedy "Space
Cowboys." None of his movies between 1995 and 2004 were necessarily bad,
but they just didn't come anywhere close to the high standards that audiences had come to expect.
Eastwood turned all that around and kicked off yet another career renaissance as an actor with
2004's boxing drama "Million Dollar Baby." His starring role not only earned him his
second Best Director win, but also his first Best Actor nomination since "Unforgiven."
Not only was Eastwood's directing career back on track, but the next movie he cast himself
in — 2008's "Gran Torino" — was another solid display of his skills in front of the camera.
If there's one thing nobody could accuse Burt Reynolds of, it's keeping his opinions to
himself. That includes movies he's been in and directors he's worked for — even ones that gave
him a late-career legitimacy boost. Reynolds never minced words regarding his feelings about making
the 1997 film "Boogie Nights" — he's more or less said he regrets making the movie altogether.
"It made me very uncomfortable." "Yeah."
"Cause I was afraid they might recognize me."
What's odd about Reynolds ragging on "Boogie Nights" is that the
movie not only earned Reynolds his first and only Oscar nomination,
but it brought renewed attention and praise to his career at a time when it was sorely needed.
In the years leading up to his role as adult filmmaker Jack Horner, Reynolds had appeared
in such movies as "Meet Wally Sparks," "Cop and a Half," and "Striptease," just to name
a few of the unfortunate projects he had been relegated to at that point in his life. He was
a far cry and many years removed from the likes of "Deliverance" and "Smokey and the Bandit."
"Boogie Nights" reminded the world that Reynolds truly was a talented actor when given the chance,
and it's a shame that he only ever looked back at it in a negative light.
There was a certain kind of big, bombastic action movie that was extremely popular in the 1980s,
but largely fell out of favor in the '90s. When it did, stars like Sylvester Stallone
were left trying to reinvent themselves to stay relevant. Stallone did okay
for himself at first with decent-sized hits like "Cliffhanger" and "Demolition
Man," but those still felt like projects that were the last gasps of a dying era.
With the possible exception of his role in the underrated animated film "Antz," Stallone did
almost nothing of any consequence for much of the '90s and the first half of the 2000s. Then
he decided to try and revive his career by bringing back two of his biggest franchises:
"Rocky" and "Rambo." With the former, he wrote, directed, and starred in 2006's "Rocky Balboa,"
which saw his breakout character make a late-life comeback. Art mirrored reality:
"Rocky Balboa" earned strong reviews and also went on to launch the well-received "Creed"
trilogy — the first two installments of which Stallone appeared in as well.
The 2008 "Rambo" revival didn't fare nearly as well, but Stallone followed
that up in 2010 with the first installment in his successful "Expendables" series. In a true
full-circle moment, Stallone was reunited with several of his fellow '80s and '90s
action stars who had dealt with similar struggles keeping their own careers afloat.