7 movies these stars don't ever want you to see

Though, it might not be possible to hate your own film quite as much as Leonardo DiCaprio hates Don's Plum.

Leonardo DiCaprio really doesn't want you to see Don's Plum; so much so, in fact, that he's spent the last twenty years trying to stop you from seeing Don's Plum.

Following the news that its filmmaker's attempt to stream the work online in protest at its censorship has seen it pulled from the internet by DiCaprio (and co-star Tobey Maguire)'s lawyers, it's perhaps time to look back at some other creative choices Hollywood's stars would rather go forgotten.

Look at it this way; everyone's got a VHS lying in some cobwebbed cupboard at their parent's house they'd rather the world didn't see, some childish stunt or talent show that can only be reflected on with a entirely healthy dose of devestating shame and embarrassment.

Now imagine the whole world actually did see your living room rendition of Britney Spears' Oops!... I Did It Again. Can you empathise with the plight of these poor actors now?

Johnny Depp in Private Resort (1985)

This may be a hard pill to swallow, but it must be said: there's a film out there Johnny Depp might actually regret making more than Mortdecai. Back in the early '80s, a young Depp was advised by a mutual friend of his wife's to take up acting. That mutual friend was Nicolas Cage, and Depp soon landed his very first role in the classic 1984 horror A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Success wasn't to follow, however, until his breakout role in 1986's Platoon, meaning Depp had to pay his creative dues by agreeing to star in low-budgeted sex comedy Private Resort. The cheap, deeply unfunny farce thankfully bombed at the box office, allowing Depp's early role to largely disappear into the bargain buckets of VHS stores.

Unfortunately, you won't even be able to see much of Depp in action in the film's trailer, considering it's about 90% women's butts.

Mark Wahlberg in The Happening (2008)

Though everyone loves to slam into After Earth, it can surely be agreed upon that The Happening marks the point of peak ridiculousness in M. Night Shyamalan's wildly volatile career. How he went from The Sixth Sense and Signs to this, we may never know; though perhaps it's entirely excusable for Mark Wahlberg to have been duped into a starring role by his director's past outputs.

No one can quite summarise the absolute bizarreness of this film better than Wahlberg himself, put simply: "The Happening. F*ck it. It is what it is. F*cking trees, man. The plants. F*ck it." Words all uttered at a press conference for The Fighter, where he also elaborated; " You can’t blame me for not wanting to try to play a science teacher. At least I wasn’t playing a cop or a crook." Yeah, but a science teacher with a penchant for talking to plastic plants, Mark?

Oscar Isaac in Lenny the Wonder Dog (2004)

A strong contender for the most powerfully-named character of any future star's onscreen debut; here, Isaac plays a law enforcement officer known only as Detective Fartman. Yes, Fartman.

The role mainly involves Isaac holding coffee and laughing as this movie's baffling tale of a terrier set loose with an implanted microchip unfolds, with the pup slowly gaining increasing abilities in some freakish pre-emption of Scarlett Johannson's Lucy. Spoiler alert: it ends with a dog shooting lasers out of its eyes. 

Though Isaac would likely prefer to be best remembered for his later roles, perhaps as The Force Awakens' Poe Dameron or in the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis, he's at least kept his sense of humour about the part. Appearing on Late Night with Seth Meyers to promote X-Men: Apocalypse, the actor wisely pointed this out about his character: "he never farted once in the movie."

Mila Kunis in American Pyscho 2 (2002)



It's highly unlikely Kunis is the only one who'd rather American Psycho 2 politely disappeared from existence. Bret Easton Ellis never wrote a sequel to his hit novel American Psycho, so it may have come as somewhat of a surprise to the author when producers slapped the American Psycho 2 tag onto a screenplay for a film entitled The Girl Who Wouldn't Die and hastily inserted a quick Patrick Bateman subplot.

Kunis seems to have intended her role as a teenager-turned-serial-killer, triggered by a childhood encounter with Bateman himself, as a determined jump into feature film; considering she was at the time primarily known for her roles on That '70s Show and Family Guy. Unfortunately, a mauling from both critics and fans of the book alike saw American Psycho 2 damned to a direct-to-DVD release.

The actress has since expressed her own aggravation at the film's cash-in tactics; "I didn’t know it would be American Psycho II. It was supposed to be a different project, and it was re-edited, but, ooh … I don’t know. Bad.”

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John Cusack in Better Off Dead (1985)

A surprising entry for fans of Savage Steven Holland's brilliantly offbeat, darkly humoured comedy; it's usually regaled amongst the cult comedic classics of the '80s, yet the film's own star despises it. Yes, John Cusack thinks Better off Dead would be better off dead.

Though production apparently went swimmingly, and positive test screenings prepped Holland's film as a potential hit; the director was shocked when Cusack first sat down to watch the film, got up 20 minutes into the screening, and never returned.

The actor then apparently confronted Holland the next day, exclaiming, "You know, you tricked me. Better Off Dead was the worst thing I have ever seen. I will never trust you as a director ever again, so don't speak to me"; before claiming it had been the worst film he'd ever seen, and that Holland had made an absolute fool out of him.

That said, perhaps Cusack saw something no one else did; though it's now considered a cult gem, the film barely made a profit at the box office.

Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger in Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation (1994)

Now here's a case of atrocious timing: McConaughey and Zellweger cranked out this schlocker of a quasi-remake/loose sequel to Tobe Hooper's 1974 classic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre in 1994, with a release date set for 1995. Except that Zellwegger had a certain, little project known as Jerry Maguire on 1996's horizon, and producers secured a delay in the film's release to ride off the back of the actress' pitched rise to stardom. 

Only McConaughey happened to land his own break that same year, starring alongside Samuel L. Jackson and Sandra Bullock in the John Grisham adaptation, A Time to Kill. And with Robert Zemeckis' Contact and Steven Spielberg's Amistad landing on his slate, McConaughey became newly keen to suppress the low-budgeted horror.

The actor's agent purportedly put "pressure" on the studio to pull its theatrical release; the film eventually getting a 20-city release in 1997, before quietly making its way to DVD. ​

Sylvester Stallone in Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot (1992)