Film's One-Hit Wonders: 30 Directors With Only One Good Movie

by Jason Dietz, Metacritic Features Editor – April 15, 2018

Even the worst directors have one good film in them. Well, at least some of them do. In the gallery above, we've identified 30 filmmakers from the past four decades who have directed at least five features but have managed to receive positive reviews for just a single one of their films.

Catherine Hardwicke

The one-time production designer launched her directorial career in an impressive way with her 2003 indie coming-of-age tale Thirteen, which earned the director an award at Sundance. Hardwicke has yet to duplicate that critical success, though she does have a massive box office hit (2008's Twilight) to her name.

Note that we do not have a Metascore for Hardwicke's 2013 thriller Plush, which was barely released and has only a few reviews (mostly bad ones).

The one good film:
70 Thirteen (2003)

Everything else:
56 Lords of Dogtown (2005)
52 The Nativity Story (2006)
56 Twilight (2008)
29 Red Riding Hood (2011)
59 Miss You Already (2015)

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