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.

Peter Segal

The USC grad has worked exclusively in comedy throughout his 30-plus-year career, which spans both film and television (including recent work on well-reviewed shows like Angie Tribeca and Survivor's Remorse). But only his debut film—the last in the Naked Gun trilogy—scored above 60. (And that was despite the film winning two Razzie awards, though those went to co-stars Anna Nicole Smith and O.J. Simpson, with the latter leaving acting shortly after the film's release to dedicate his life to tracking down a killer.)

Segal's next project is the rom-com Second Act, which is due this fall.

The one good film:
63 Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult (1994)

Everything else:
46 Tommy Boy (1995)
49 My Fellow Americans (1996)
38 Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (2000)
52 Anger Management (2003)
48 50 First Dates (2004)
48 The Longest Yard (2005)
54 Get Smart (2008)
35 Grudge Match (2013)

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