It’s complicated by the fact that even a bad actor can be really good in certain roles. In the extreme case, the role could be “just be yourself.” On the other end is the “Much ado…” fiasco. At the very least Keanu does not have a wide range of acting ability, at least of not coodled by a director with a very specific vision in mind.
I was going to post this exact thing. Sandra Bollock won a Razzie and Oscar for acting the same year. Ben Affleck did *Hollywoodland *and Lindsay Lohan did A Prairie Home Companion and both are considered good performances. Even Tom Arnold has a line in True Lies where he tells Ahhhhhnold that of course hes losing his wife because of the line of business theyre in and you get a glimpse of some powerful acting.
Well, I tend to judge professional actors by comparing them to other professional actors. When I say “Dr. Jones is a bad doctor,” that doesn’t mean he’s not better at doctoring than the average American, (personally, I’m a horrible doctor). I mean he’s not a good doctor when compared to other doctors.
Right. And The Gift was post post-Much Ado acting lessons, which is why I think they were at least someone effective.
I actually, sincerely forgot during The Gift that the guy was Keanu Reeves.
but i love the movie Much Ado About Nothing, and think that he makes a fine John. He is just like a specific person I know in real life that is John to the perfect ‘t’ 
I’m sorry, I just don’t agree. The fact that there are worse actors does not absolve Keanu Reeves of being a bad actor.
I call him a bad actor because he can only play himself. He was wonderful in ‘Bill and Ted’, he was passable in ‘Speed’, he was an appalling black hole of awfulness in ‘Much Ado About Nothing’, and he sucked the wrong orifice in a sloppy manner when he was onstage in ‘Hamlet’ for Manitoba Theatre Centre in 1995.
Great, you didn’t like his performances in those movies. Have you seen any of the other films mentioned here? He’s been consistently making movies for the past twenty years, and has far more under his belt than the four everybody always mentions when they talk about him. What do you think of his performance in The Gift? Do you think the character he plays in Devil’s Advocate is the same guy as Johnny Utah, and do you think either of them are identical to his performance in A Walk in the Clouds? Would you say Neo and Ted “Theodore” Logan are essentially the same person?
Keanu wasn’t blessed with boatloads of talent, and he’s not capable of a huge range, but as an actor, he’s got plenty of things going for him. Only “everybody knows” he sucks, and so it’s pretty easy to disparage him without actually discussing the work he’s done…
That’s true. So-called “bad” mainstream movie and TV actors are like “bad” professional athletes in MLB, the NFL, the NBA, and the NHL. They represent the end product of a long and intense winnowing out process. A “bad” football player or baseball player is only bad in comparison with his peers.
I don’t know if the analogy holds since there aren’t entire organizations and events revolving around bands of amateur doctors who are convinced they’d be called to work at Johns Hopkins if only somebody would notice their amazing, natural surgical talent.
Writers are in the same boat. Stephanie Meyers, for example, is a terrible writer. But, when you compare her awful, published dreck to the shit you find in slush piles, then suddenly she’s akin to Hemingway. Just like acting, there’s a lot of people who think they can do it, and only a rare few who ever actually publish anything (and an even slimmer percentage of published authors enjoy some modicum of success).
Oh, I love it too, don’t get me wrong. He’s just…bad. Lovingly, appallingly, scenery chewingly bad. Luckily for Branagh and all the rest, he’s cast in the role in which you can get away with it. (See also: Michael Keaton in the same film. WTF *was *that?! Keaton is not actually a bad actor, either, it was just a bizarre set of choices that must have made sense whilst he and Branagh were passing the spliff before rolling the camera.)
And if I had a friend who actually talked like Keanu’s John, I’d poke him in the belly and giggle at him. 
Ha, I knew when I saw the thread title that this would turn into a debate over Keanu Reeves. And FWIW, I’ve liked him very much in many of his roles.
I was genuinely surprised by how good he was in A Walk in the Clouds, which is the only reason I wasn’t surprised by how good he was in The Gift. He’s not a great actor, but he’s not as bad as all that.
It’s my opinion that, given the right role, ANYONE can give a great performance. (It’s ‘the right role’ part that’s hard.) Years ago, the red-head announcer, Alan somebody, on David Letterman, did a bit where he played a film noir detective of some sort - played it straight, and it may have been his sonorous voice, but for those two minutes he was just great!..I love Keanu, whether he’s good or not good, but wasn’t he just perfect for The Matrix? They wanted to make it with Will Smith, and that would have made it a whole different movie far as I’m concerned.
But that’s not true, unless you think he’s a creepy wife-beater who explodes into violence without warning in real life. He’s a very intelligent man, nothing at all like the moronic slacker he played in Bill and Ted.
I’m not comparing him to Sean Penn, he’s no Sean Penn (one of our finest actors ever), but what if people still judged Penn by the moronic slacker he played in Fast Times at Ridgemont High or his slow-witted Sam without having seen his truly great work? That would be highly unfair.
For genuinely bad acting, what about Megan Fox? Not sure if she qualifies as really huge star yet, but I was wowed at how bad she was in Jennifer’s Body.
I hate him enough that I avoid his movies. I’ve seen all the films to which I referred, plus the Francis Ford Coppola ‘Dracula’. (“How’s it going, evil vampire dude?”) How often should I taste a rotten egg? Other people may disagree; the opinion I am expressing is mine, though it may or may not be shared by others.
I don’t mean to pick on poor Keanu - there are lots of other bad actors in Hollywood films. Julia Roberts, Sandra Bullock, Jim Carrey… My point remains - I don’t care that there are worse actors who are not in Hollywood; when I see bad acting, I call the person a bad actor.
I take it you haven’t seen The Truman Show, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Man On The Moon or The Majestic. I didn’t think so. Whatever you do, don’t go see I Love You Phillip Morris either. Your whole acting worldview could crumble.
Hell, compare Stephanie Meyers to the vast majority of published Young Adult fiction out there. Twilight is light years better than a lot of the stuff that gets published under the YA publishing label.
That’s not really evidence of anything except that Alan Kalter is a good actor.
tricky thread since there are a lot of ambiguities starting with “good” with “actor” being a close second. as others have pointed out, good ranges across a broad spectrum, and can be defined very differently. convincing? diverse/flexible? accomplished? as for actor, are we saying leading men? character actors?
some guys are great in their roles because they ARE their roles. R. Lee Ermy? is Ermy a great/convincing actor?
i really have nothing to add to this convo except a bunch of ambiguous rhetorical questions.