Pidgeon is in Red, and she’s only mildly deplorable in it. Fortunately, her character arc comes to a satisfying conclusion, which helps make everything else easier to bear.
Juliette Lewis in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.
If I hadn’t already hated “Avatar”, Sigourney Weaver’s surprisingly wooden performance would have hurt it a lot.
I love the ending. It was a real mind-fuck.
Sondra Locke in pretty much any of her films with Clint Eastwood but I’ll nominate her performance in The Outlaw Josey Wales as the worst part of great western.
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines had the makings of a pretty good sequel, but then some idiot cast Nick Stahl as John Connor. Really? This sniveling lump is humanity’s last, best hope? Can anyone imagine following such a whiny, vacillating wimp into battle against the machines?
Honestly, I thought Terminator 2 had the same problem. Weaselly little Edward Furlong as John Connor? He at least seemed like he had more backbone than Nick Stahl, but not somebody you’d trust near your valuables, much less follow into battle.
What these sequels needed was somebody more like Lucas Black in Sling Blade. Someone who, even though he was small and threatened by larger forces, you could clearly see had the will and inner strength to fight back. Someone you could imagine one day becoming a leader.
This was the first example I thought of. It’s embarrassing to watch.
This. At first I was mildly surprised by Dumbledore’s angry expression, then my eyebrows rose when he slapped Harry in the face. But when he started choking Harry and had to be pulled away by Hagrid I knew something was wrong.
This/\ The second time I watched it, I just fastforwarded when her mouth was moving. However, the character was so dislikeable, I’m not sure if we can blame the actress.
I’m a nuclear scientist! 
someone who seems permastoned is perfect for the Neo.
Which would make a lot more sense if she wasn’t so HIDEOUS. The only thing uglier than her face is her delivery: “Is it still raining? I hadn’t noticed” gets quoted a lot among my group of friends to denote that someone is being so blindingly stupid that they deserve a smack.
I came in to mention Keanu Reeves in Much Ado, but I see I’m not alone.
I’m surprised Marlon Brando hasn’t popped up yet. But generally he was bad in bad films. His performance in Apocalypse Now is certainly distinctive, and I can imagine him as a kind of Charles Manson-esque cult leader, but (trails off)… what?
And - how can I forget? - Dennis Hopper’s performance in the very same stretch of film is also memorable but, watching it whilst sipping a cup of tea, without my brain filled with drugs, not in the middle of the jungle, he’s awful. With the stress on awe. Awefulsomely neither good nor bad. A harbinger of Nicolas Cage’s mega-acting. Pabst Blue Ribbon.
“Did you know that if is the middle word in life?”
The thing I remember most about Denise Richard’s performance is her introduction, which goes something like this, according to the IMDB:
(James Bond asks her name)
Dr. Christmas Jones: Doctor Jones. Christmas Jones, and don’t tell me any jokes, I’ve heard them all.
James Bond: I don’t know any doctor jokes.
At which point the film falls silent for several minutes, and all you can hear is the wind, and the faint dying cries of a distant animal. Some tumbleweed forlornly drifts past the camera. I can’t actually remember anything else about her performance; by which I mean that I’d forgotten she was in the film, I can’t recall what function she had in the film, or what she did… there was Robert Carlyle, Sophie Marceau, Robbie Coltrane, Judi Dench, Maria Conchita Grazia Alonso… thing, and Goldie.
Goldie. The drum’n’bass personality. I remember him. Can’t remember Denise Richards. She was dressed up like Lara Croft, and she was a nuclear scientist.
I’ll go all out for controversy. Taking the thread title literally (and ignoring the “otherwise” bit), Andre the Giant’s performance in The Princess Bride is objectively very bad, especially compared to the actors around him, but he steals the scenes he’s in and it works.
Sorry to nitpick but your grammar is terrible
I just saw the Ed Norton Incredible Hulk and thought it was actually a pretty good movie. Except for Liv Tyler. Who is wretched, and should never be cast in anything ever again. She was so unbelievably awful in that role.
Ah, the internet bandwagon of celebrity hatred. Keanu Reeves, Gwyneth Paltrow, Andie MacDowell, the gang’s all here. (Wait, has no one mentioned Ben Affleck, or Julia Roberts?)
But now it’s just getting silly. Andie MacDowell is “hideous” now? I mean, I know tastes are subjective and all, but Jesus, the woman had a career as a cover model.
Well, she’s a hideous actress. I think that counts.
Oh come on, just because someone’s a celeb doesn’t mean they can’t rightly be called on an occasional dog of a performance. (Previous posters have rightly pointed out that occasionally the director is getting exactly the performance they want - George Lucas, I’m looking at you - and so we can give some credit there when that’s known.) Frankly, I think Keanu Reeves’ best work (out of the films of his I’ve seen) has been in My Own Private Idaho and Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Maybe The Devil’s Advocate - I’d have to see that again. His more serious roles usually suffer from a woodenness that he seems to fall into. Again, this may be what the director wants, but eventually it all becomes so very much the same across roles.
Hey, nothing wrong with critiquing an acting performance.
It’s the internet groupthink I find tiresome.
They’re called boobs, Ed.
I’m surprised no one’s mentioned Malin Akerman in Watchmen yet. Great to look at, but ugh, that was one of the more vapid performances I’ve ever seen. And it’s not like I was expecting Antigone when I walked in the theater; I just wanted a neat graphic novel big-screen interpretation.
I thought she captured the rather thinly-drawn character from the comic quite accurately. Really, her only function in the thing is to evidence things about three other characters we’d have a hard time getting to otherwise.